Blood Shaman_Sara Nightwing Book 1 Read online

  Blood

  Shaman

  By

  Art DeForest

  This is a work of fiction. All characters, organizations and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Sometimes both.

  Copyright © 2017 Arthur D. DeForest

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted, in any form or by other means, electronic, mechanical, recording or otherwise, without prior written permission of the author.

  Acknowledgements

  To my editors and good friends,

  Dorene Johnson and Diane Velasquez.

  They make my work a joy and my books better.

  Books by Art DeForest

  Kaitlyn Strong

  I Love the Shadows

  Stalking the Shadows

  Savage Shadows

  Kaitlyn Strong, Books 1-3

  Light and shadows

  Shadowlands

  Hunter’s Saga

  Hunter’s Game

  Hunter’s Chase

  Hunter’s Vengeance

  Hunter’s Home, Books 1-3

  The Nightstalkers

  Nightstalker Incorporated

  The shadowed form slipped through the night with such quiet ease that the chirping of the crickets never stopped. She was dressed in black from head to toe. Almond-shaped eyes missed nothing as they peered out from between hood and balaclava. As she approached the hidden ventilation shaft, any onlooker who’d seen her would have been amazed at how such a trim figure could move with such liquid grace under the weight of the backpack she carried. They would have understood immediately that the figure the were observing was more than human.

  The ventilation shaft was well hidden. A casual passerby would never have noticed it. The ebon-clad figure, had memorized maps of the facility, however, and it was simple, using her night vision, to detect the warmer air blowing out of the shaft.

  She made little noise as she removed the camouflaged cover from the shaft and unstrapped the large pack from her back and let it lie on the ground next to the round hole in the ground. Unencumbered, she slipped headfirst into the narrow shaft, propelling herself in spider-like fashion down into the absolute black below.

  The shaft had been drilled through over a hundred feet of dirt and sandstone before interfacing with the metal ductwork of the facility itself. Consulting her mental map, she continued for a short distance through the maze of ducts before coming to a halt in front of a screen-covered opening in the side of the duct.

  Using her supernatural hearing she listened intently for a moment, to assure herself no one was nearby. Focusing, she sent a short, sharp strike with an open palm into the lower right corner of the screen. The strike sounded like a cannon shot to her sensitive hearing. In actuality, the noise wasn’t loud enough to have been heard by a human standing in the hall, just outside of the room.

  This facility wasn’t populated by humans, however. It was guarded by lycanthropes, werewolves to the humans, and it was occupied by genetically modified animals which closely resembled their lycan guards in general shape and ability. Those hybrid creations were why she was here.

  Her name was Jade. At least, that’s what she went by now. Her startling green eyes being the source of the name. Her exotic Asian features had attracted the attention of Antonella Abandonado back in the 1800s when the flood of Chinese and other Asian workers were being brought in to build the country's fledgling railway system. Antonella had come across her in a grimy New York City alley as she desperately fought a man who thought all Asian women were good for was raping and then killing afterward.

  Antonella saved her from that fate. Not out of any sense of altruism, but simply because she was a predator who liked to feed on lesser predators. Jade knew this about Antonella, but her gratitude and awe of the beautiful vampire’s power ensured her unwavering loyalty over the next one hundred sixty plus years.

  For Antonella’s part, she had seen a gorgeous young woman who refused to give into fear, and in an impulsive decision decided to give her the gift of unlife. A relationship of mentor to protégé was born.

  The matriarch of House Abandonado sent Jade out to the badlands of Colorado to take the facility back from the filthy lycans who controlled it at present. Her secondary purpose was to wreak vengeance on Sara Nightwing. It was time to rid the world of that particular thorn in Antonella’s side.

  Another strike and the bottom of the screen was free, allowing Jade to bend it quietly upward enough to gain entrance into the room below. Once inside the room, it was a simple matter to stand on a handy chair and, using a screwdriver from her pocket, take the screen the rest of the way off.

  She used the same chair as a wedge to ensure the door leading out was secure before heading back up the shaft for her gear. Vampire musculature made short work of the upward climb. Soon she was lowering her pack down the shaft on a thin but strong coil of rope she’d brought along for the purpose. Pushing it ahead of her, she was soon back in the room she’d earlier secured and had her ear pressed to the door, listening for movement.

  Satisfied that she was clear for the moment, she removed the chair from underneath the knob and cracked the door open far enough to look up and down the corridor outside. Ducking back in, she retrieved her pack then slipped silently into the corridor. Turning right, she headed deeper into the facility, heading toward the utility room where air was drawn in from the outside world and circulated throughout the underground compound.

  Jade was approaching an intersection with another corridor when she began picking up the sound of claws clicking on the hard linoleum floor of the corridor. She glanced around quickly, confirming that there was no place close enough to hide before whatever was in the hall reached the intersection.

  A slow smile, hidden behind the balaclava, formed on her lips as she slid the pack to the floor. Reaching over her shoulder, she pulled a sword from the sheath hanging vertically between her shoulder blades. The double-edged, willow leaf blade slid silently free of its encumbrance. The razor edges reflected the light from the fluorescent tubes overhead. The rest of the twenty-eight-inch blade was tinted black.

  She moved on silent feet closer to the intersection, preparing to ambush her adversary. Jade enjoyed killing. The sense of power when her blade took a head was intoxicating. Decades of training transformed her into an efficient and brutal killing machine. It was the most important lesson Antonella had taught her, to be ruthless in dispatching anyone who stood in her way. She learned to revel in the power that ruthlessness gave her as she pursued House Abandonados ambitious plans to control all the supernaturals and dominate the human race.

  Jade firmly believed that vampires were the apex predators on the planet and she never tired of putting the lesser races in their place. It was a lesson she was about to teach again.

  She crouched into a fighting stance, her blade held low with the tip angled up slightly. A thrust to the vitals and a quick spinning slash would end this battle before it even started. It seemed, however, her prey had different ideas.

  The clicking sound of the claws slowed as they approached the intersection. Jade heard a snuffling sound as they came to a complete stop. “Damned lycans and their fucking noses,” she thought as she took advantage of her opponent’s momentary pause to throw herself around the corner, trying to regain the element of surprise.

  Her blade was already stabbing forward as she came around the corner when she realized she’d misjudged the height of her opponent. A thrust that was designed to impale the vitals, instead cut a deep furrow along the upper thigh, parting the fur, skin, and muscle of the
huge leg. The lycan was in his half wolf, half human battle form and his head was a full foot and a half higher than her own five-foot-four inches of height.

  A growl of pain issued from the lycan as he tried to dodge the strike. He didn’t let the wound deter him as he sent a big hand with one-inch claws at the fingertips arching toward her head. Jade withdrew her blade and ducked the blow using the defensive motion to spin in a quick three-hundred-sixty-degree turn, bringing the sword in from the side to slash across abdominal muscles that were visible, even under the fur.

  The lycans big legs buckled, and he crashed to his knees as entrails spilled from the large gash. The cut wasn’t enough to kill him, but the pain was enough to bring his head down to a level that was more easily attacked. Jade’s return, backhand slice sent her opponent’s head rolling from his shoulders and across the corridor. It finally came to rest against one wall with a meaty thud.

  A look of satisfaction encompassed Jade’s features as she recovered her stance. Leaning down, she wiped her blade on the beast’s fur before re-sheathing her blade and returning it to her pack. She dismissed the lycan in the adjoining hallway completely from her mind.

  The corridor she was in, dead-ended at the utility room she was looking for. She could hear the whir of fans as they pushed air from the surface out to the rest of the facility. Closing the door behind her after entering the room, Jade dropped her pack once more and rummaged through it, briefly. A moment later she pulled out a coil of silicon tubing that had a sharply pointed attachment on one end. Approaching the fan housing, Jade pushed the sharp point through the thin metal wall of the large metal conduit that leads from the fan assembly up into the ceiling and out to the rest of the facility. Once it was inserted, she quickly secured it in place with a piece of tape.

  Going back to her pack, she withdrew a good-sized gas cylinder from its depths and affixed it to the other end of the tubing. The gas was a unique mix of ingredients developed by the Abandonados pet scientists. It was designed to incapacitate their mutant creations should the need arise. It had also proven useful in knocking out lycans. It could kill humans.

  Smiling contentedly at a job well done, Jade opened the valve and released the knockout gas into the ventilation system. In a matter of minutes, every living creature in the facility would be unconscious or dead. Jade had no worries in that regard. She was already dead, and she didn’t need to breathe.

  Digging back into her pack, she started to withdraw an assortment of, what looked like, dog collars in varying sizes and made from some flexible metal. Each collar had a steel box attached to it. On the top of the box, three small LED lights could be seen, yellow, green and red. Examining one of the collars closely, Jade withdrew a small remote control from the thigh pocket of her pants and quickly entered the three-digit code she saw, engraved on the collar, into the remote’s keypad. She then pushed a small button up near its top.

  The yellow light came on immediately. Three seconds later, two small but wickedly sharp wire probes snaked out of the box. If the collar had been on and positioned correctly, those probes would have pierced flesh and sunk deeply into the wearer’s spine. Satisfied the collar and remote were functioning properly, she picked up the collars and started moving through the facility. She attached a collar to every being there and activated each one.

  The collars were another control invention created by House Abandonado. It didn’t impart the absolute devotion that the shaman, Hatali had over his creations, but it did give the vampires control over them. It also gave the holder of the remote some protection from the sometimes wild and dangerous creatures. All it took was the press of a large red button on the remote, and either the designated collar or every collar would simultaneously detonate the small charge of C4 enclosed within, would render the wearer of the collar immediately headless.

  Jade moved cautiously through the facility keeping a vigilant eye out for Sara Nightwing. It was believed that she was still at the facility and Antonella very much wanted to have a heart to heart chat with her.

  Jade just wanted a chance to face her in combat. The Abandonados didn’t know for sure what Sara was, but her fighting skills were legendary. It was the kind of challenge Jade loved most.

  Once all the collars were attached to the eighty creations and their three living lycan guards, Jade returned to the room where she’d initially made her entrance into the facility. It was there that she pulled out another item from her pack. The small component looked similar to a wi-fi router, a small box with two tiny antennas attached to the back and a line of small LEDs along the front. It was larger than a router, however, having an eight-hour uninterruptible power supply built into it. No one wanted to lose control of the creations in the event of a power outage.

  She plugged the box into a convenient wall socket and then started to unspool a thin coil of wire attached to the back. Delving one last time into the pack, she withdrew a small aerial antenna and once more entered the ventilation system and making her way quickly back to the surface. The thin line from the back of the box trailing out behind her as she crawled. Once the antenna was installed on the surface, it wouldn’t matter if the collared individual were outside the facility or in. Jade would control their lives with the simple push of a button. [1]

  2

  Sara Nightwing tilted her head back and let the smoky heat and complex notes of the single malt fill her mouth and excite her taste buds. Her shoulder came in contact with that of the gorgeous brunette sitting close to her at the bar. Kaitlyn Strong bumped her shoulder back, with a gentle smile. She still seemed to have a slight expression of surprise on her face as she stared into Sara’s deep chocolate eyes.

  Sara had been around for a long time. Centuries. In that time, she’d discovered a person’s looks, or even their gender wasn’t a bar to feeling love. Certain bright personalities attracted her over the years. Souls that compelled her to draw closer. There had been many men, and a few women in that time, but being long lived in a violent world had seen those sweet relationships fade...or die.

  She had new hope with this budding new relationship though. Kaitlyn was also long-lived, and she was a fierce warrior with budding magical abilities that, with Sara’s help, could turn her into a valiant champion. She also might stay alive long enough for this new and shiny connection to deepen into something more. The thought made Sara’s normally composed features soften a little as she shared the look with her protégé.

  Jake, the Alpha for the Denver lycan pack and owner of the bar the girls were at, watched the two with a smile of his own. He and Sara had intimate moments in the past, but both knew it was never going to be more than that. Their intimacies lay rooted in a shared sense of responsibility for the pack and the other beings close to them. “From the look those two are sharing,” he thought to himself. “They’re feeling something entirely different.”

  Clearing his throat, he got the ladies attention. “So, no luck finding that new lab in New York, yet?” He asked as Kaitlyn transferred her gaze from Sara to him.

  “Not yet,” she sighed. “We have a general area that we’ve been focusing on ever since Fangs found the nest of rat creations in the old tunnels, but we still haven’t got it pinpointed yet.” As she spoke his name, Fangs looked up from his spot next to Kaitlyn’s stool with a questioning “Mrow?”.

  “It’s not your fault.” Said Kaitlyn, looking down at her burly savannah cat companion and stroking his head. “We’ll find it.”

  “Honestly, I wonder if we’re looking in the wrong spot.” She said dolefully, bringing her eyes back up to Jake’s. “Those rats must have been down there for quite a while to have reached that size. I swear,” She continued on, heatedly. “Those damn things were the size of a medium dog!”

  “It’s a good thing then that Fangs is the size of a large dog now.” Said Sara with a smile, casually placing an arm around Kaitlyn’s waist. Kangee, Sara’s animal companion, looked over at the current focus of the conversation with the gloss black eyes
of his kind. “Stupid cat.” He cawed from his specially made perch at the end of the bar. Sara glanced over at him, fondly before turning back to the conversation.

  “Damn straight,” replied Kaitlyn. “They still did a fair amount of damage to the big guy.” Turning to look back down at Fangs her hand came up to rest casually upon the hand Sara had placed on the top of her hip. Their fingers interlaced and Kaitlyn leaned slightly into Sara’s loose embrace.

  “Well,” said Jake, clearing his throat, and making as if to look down the bar at his other customers. “Rats grow fast. Who knows how long they were down there.” Taking a towel from his shoulder, he started wiping down the shiny wood of the bar’s surface.

  “Thomas called in today.” He continued, referring to the Alpha of the Grand Junction pack. Thomas’ elevation to Alpha was very recent, coming as a result of adding almost eighty creations to the group he was now overseeing. As a result, he still kept in close contact with his former Alpha, often seeking his advice. “He’s heading out to the facility in a couple days to check on things.” Jake finished.

  “Is there a problem?” Asked Sara, temporarily taking her eyes of her paramour.