Page 31 of Bite of the Vampire

“Unless they’re counting on us calling you and you all will join us.”

“We are at Levka and Caitlin’s place now. No one suspicious seems to be there. I’m pounding on the door. Uh, we better talk later. I just woke Levka up and he’s really not happy about it. You’d better hope this isn’t a false alarm.”

8

Levka couldn’t believe Arman and Ruric had woken him at this ungodly hour. “Somebody better be in danger of losing his or her life if you’re here disturbing us,” Levka said, letting Arman in.

“Stasio contacted me, well, tried to get ahold of you first, concerned that six men are at his bed and breakfast who might be assassins. He’s having breakfast with Jasmine.”

“When assassins could be ready to take their heads?” Levka shook his head.

“I’m sure he didn’t want to lead them to the rest of us. Though calling us to come as backup will have the same result,” Arman said, “because we’ve always been there for each other.”

“Caitlin should stay behind,” Ruric said.

“How often do I have to say this?” Caitlin sounded annoyed. “You might be bad vampire princes, but I’m the queen of witchiness. I won’t be left behind.”

“All right.” Levka couldn’t believe they’d brought a vampire assassin into the fold and were already in more trouble because of it. “I think Jasmine’s going to be a problem.” Levka and Caitlin packed their bags and loaded up the van. Then he drove across the street to Stasio’s place.

“You said the same about me,” Caitlin reminded Levka.

“You were different.”

“It’s just that you’re so used to your friends as many years as you’ve been together, before the Black Death even. I’m still an unknown quantity in many ways. Jasmine will be too. In a hundred years, you’ll probably be more used to us.”

Levka parked the van and leaned over and kissed her cheek. She was right, but he wouldn’t admit it.

Several vehicles were parked at the bed and breakfast, but Levka couldn’t believe the Welsh League had gotten hold of the Scottish League to tell them rogue vampires were in the area. How would any of them have known where they had ended up?

As soon as they walked inside the bed and breakfast, ready to fight if they had to in order to protect their friends, Stasio and Jasmine quickly joined them from the dining room. Levka saw the men, all appearing to be in their twenties. One of them stood up from a sofa in the sitting area, his curly blond hair reaching his shoulders, his blue eyes steady on Levka as he inclined his head in greeting as if he knew he was the one in charge.

“You’re the vampires that led the revolt against the Welsh League of Vampires, aren’t you?” he asked. “We need your help to overthrow the Scottish League.”

“You know how well that went, don’t you?” Obviously not well because Levka and the rest of the Welsh rebels had failed to change the regime and the princes ended up losing their castles and estates and had to leave their homeland behind. But many others involved in the battle had lost their lives on both sides.

“Aye, but we can’t do it on our own. I’m Scotty, by the way. We heard you had returned to your castle in Wales.”

“It was Stasio’s.” In a way, Levka would have liked to have been in his own castle, except he wouldn’t have been happy with the changes made there, nor would he want to see that someone else was in charge of it.

“Right. Well, we heard you had a bit of trouble with the League there and that an assassin was after you—”

“After Stasio’s cousin,” Levka corrected.

“Uh, aye. And you had to flee.”

“So how do you think we can help you?” Levka was surprised Scotty and his followers knew so much about them.

“Over a thousand of us are willing to go against the League.” Scotty glanced at the other men with him, and they nodded in agreement.

“We lost in our fight against the Welsh League. I don’t understand how you think we can assist you withyourrevolt,” Levka said.

“You didn’t have the numbers of rebel vampires fighting your cause the last time thatwehave now. You were much more newly turned back then. So we could really use your assistance. I’ll lead them, but you’ve been through this before.”

Levka folded his arms. “And lost.” He didn’t want them to have any delusions about how sideways this could go.

Scotty smiled. “We know you can do it, or we wouldn’t be asking you. We’ve seen the reports on what you’ve done in the States. We know you are constantly in trouble with the Dallas League and not because you’re doing anything wrong. We do the same for humans who need our help, think of it like a vampire vigilante service. And we know about you and the lady.” Scotty glanced at Caitlin. “Things happen that are out of our control. But we do what is right for all the right reasons. The Leagues would label us as renegades for breaking their rules, rules that have outlived their purpose. For instance, take your saving the girls from those thugs in the warehouse district in Dallas. You nearly lost your life. For what? To save humans, something the League strictly frowns on. But given the same circumstances, we would do the same. Why is it condemned instead of looked upon as a heroic deed, as it should be? The bottom line is that we need your help to pull it off.”

Levka agreed, of course. “If we succeed in helping you to overthrow the ones in power?” He and his friends weren’t mercenaries by any means. But if he were to put his life, and his friends’ lives on the line, he had to know what would be in it for them. Otherwise, why should they risk dying over what he truly felt was a lost cause? He didn’t know these vampires. He had no idea if they had done anything like he and his friends had done that had put them in a horrible light. They might have just wanted to overthrow their League to take the power to rule and not plan to help others—humans or otherwise.

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