Page 50 of Tainted Blood

“Find it as quickly as possible. It’s cambion blood,” she explained as a very tall man walked into the room. He took one look at the screen where Isaiah was still holding the images and locked the office door. “It’s happened. Some vampire got his hands on cambion blood. Not a cambion proper but a decanter of someone’s blood.”

“I see that,” he snarled. He went to stand beside her, his expression hard. Warlord Raphael Alvarez. He looked like a man I could see going to war.

“You knew this could happen,” Isaiah said, and I wondered if he was trying to hide his anger and failing or just wasn’t giving it any effort.

“We’ve seen it once before,” Kaliya answered. “When Raphael and I met, he was being hunted by Mygi. They were getting tired of chasing him around after five years and hired the vampire Sinclair. You know this story, Isaiah.”

“I do.”

“Well, the night we killed him, he had fed off Raphael. He’d been told it makes vampires more powerful than any other supernatural blood. He became…” She lifted her hand, a clear indication of the pictures. “It was hell to kill him. He killed Carter while like that, actually. Carter didn’t stand a chance.”

“This was a roughly three-to-four-thousand-year-old vampire who killed four vampires who were close to the same power as him,” Alexius said softly. “It took several of us to kill him.”

Kaliya paled. “That’s problematic,” she said softly.

“Why did you never tell me that his blood could do this?” Isaiah finally snapped, glaring at them. “You worked for the Tribunal. Your report should have explained this, and even if you thought it didn’t belong in the report, you should have toldme.” He ended on a snarl.

“I couldn’t let you decide to exterminate my mate and his kind,” she answered, equally fierce. “Are you mad? I couldn’t trust you with that information. You would have taken your petty protest vote and made an entire campaign against allowing the cambions to join the Tribunal, if you even wanted them to live at all.”

“Look at what they can do to my people,” Isaiah snarled, lifting one of the final images up. “Look, Kaliya. I think I have the right to defend my kind from this sort of problem.”

“We’ve been trying to do that for your kind and mine,” Raphael growled, his eyes changing. I had never seen anything like it, except earlier tonight. The whites of his eyes turned black as his irises turned brilliant blood-red, practically glowing. Black veins spread from his eyes, and his skin was losing color, turning grey as those veins spread. He changed, growing taller, and horns grew out of his forehead without tearing his skin in the process. He made Kaliya seem small beside him.

“Do you think I want my cambions’ blood floating around? Do you think I like knowing that someone out there probably has blood the lab took from us? We don’t go anywhere near the vampires in Phoenix, and this is one of the reasons for that.”

“It’s not just about making sure you don’t lose vampires to this, Isaiah. It’s about protecting the cambions from becoming blood bags to make monsters,” Kaliya continued.

“Now isn’t the time to discuss the politics of this,” Alexius said softly, the image of calm.

I wasn’t. My mind was racing as I tried to reckon with the argument. I agreed with both sides, and there was an edge of panic I was fighting at the same time because Raphael was terrifying.

Isaiah had been right. Samas hadn’t turned into an unidentifiable monster. The stamp of demons was clear. Raphael embodied it.

“Forever the practical one, Alexius.” Kaliya snorted. “You’re right, though. We don’t have time for it. You need to secure the cambion blood before anyone else drinks it.”

“What smell should we be trying to find? We haven’t caught anything unique.” Alexius stepped closer, closer than Isaiah. “You can taste these sorts of things on the air as well. Vampires have a sense of smell very honed on blood, but even the best here haven’t identified anything.”

“That’s the problem you’re facing, and I should have said it sooner, but…” She cursed. “Unless a cambion is actively using their power…” She gestured to Raphael. “They smell human. Entirely and completely. If the blood is black, that means the cambion bled it out while he or she was actively using their powers, but if it’s your typical red, it’s going to seem perfectly human. There are only two supernatural species I’ve seen that identify them as anything other than human, and those are the werewolves and werecats. The moon cursed believe the cambions stink. Unless you have one with you right now, you might not have time to get one before something happens. It wouldn’t be hard to take that blood and poison whatever supply you have. We also don’t know what would happen if a normal human was forced to ingest it or worse, what would happen is a vampire fed off that human. You are all in real danger if you can’t lock down that blood. Let’s pray there aren’t more samples of it.”

I stepped back again as her words rang true. Horrifyingly true. If the blood smelled perfectly human, any of us could unknowingly ingest it.

“Is there anything that might cure or even stop the transformation?” Alexius asked as Isaiah threw the images down.

“Not that she would know if she killed the one person she saw this happen to,” Isaiah snapped. His eyes were red with rage, but I had a feeling that they were both feeling the same fear I was.

“Isaiah is right. Raphael and I have no idea. It’s not something we ever wanted to experiment with, for obvious reasons. Clearly, the older or more powerful the vampire, the worse this transformation is.”

“If we find the fucking blood, do you want me to destroy it or give it back to you?” Isaiah asked, rubbing his face.

“If there’s a chance, I would like it back. I might be able to identify the cambion it came from,” Raphael said, his form still making it hard for me to look at him. It was mostly human except for the skin and the horns and theeyes. “But if you can’t safely hold on to it, destroy it.”

“If I believed we could be of any help, I would offer to arrive, but time…” Kaliya made a face.

“We’ll handle this.” Isaiah finally composed himself. “Thank you for your time and knowledge. If there is anything, I will reach out.”

“Of course. Good luck.” Kaliya walked back to her desk to do something, but Isaiah disconnected the call with his phone.

“Why didn’t we try to see how they could help?” I asked.

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