House of Pawns Read online

  Copyright © 2015 Keary Taylor

  All rights reserved. Except as permitted under the U.S. Copyright act of 1976, no part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system,

  without the prior written permission of the author.

  First Edition: December 2015

  The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.

  Taylor, Keary, 1987-

  House of Pawns (House of Royals) :

  a novel / by Keary Taylor. – 1st ed.

  Formatting by Inkstain Interior Book Designing

  www.inkstainformatting.com

  House of Royals

  House of Pawns

  Branded

  Forsaken

  Vindicated

  Afterlife: the Novelette Companion to Vindicated

  The Bane

  The Human

  The Eve

  The Raid: an Eden Short Story

  The Ashes: an Eden Prequel

  Ever After Drake

  Moments of Julian

  Depths of Lake

  Playing it Kale

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  About Keary

  “LIV,” IAN GROWLS IN SOMETHING low and feral and afraid. He either falls forward or lunges at me, I’m not sure which, but suddenly his hands are gripping my shoulders with an entirely new strength.

  I’ll be bruised later.

  Ian’s nose traces my shoulder, up toward my neck. Maybe he’s just catching his balance, all of him suddenly too close, but an instinctual part of me says those fangs of his are searching for their first meal.

  I’m too stunned to react.

  The warmth of his body is instantly ripped away and there’s a great clattering sound as Ian and Rath collide into one of the ancient entry tables.

  A feral hiss rips from Ian’s throat and his hands gather the front of Rath’s shirt, pulling their faces a breath apart. But one of Rath’s hands has wrapped around Ian’s throat, his fingers deep in his flesh; the other hand holds a stake pressed hard up against Ian’s ribcage.

  “Rath, no!” I scream, darting across the entryway. I claw at both their arms, attempting to force myself between the two of them. “Ian, stop!”

  “Are you in control?” Rath demands. I see his fingers constrict around Ian’s throat. I pull at his arm with as much strength as I have, but it doesn’t budge a millimeter.

  “No,” Ian hisses. And with his reply, his glowing red eyes meet mine. They’re terrifying. A vampire’s eyes only ignite when they’re angry or hungry, and Ian’s are the brightest I’ve yet seen. Black veins sprout from them over his face. “I swear I won’t hurt you, Liv.”

  “Let him go, Rath!” My voice is frantic. There are tears threatening to spill. They’re happy, relieved, confused, even angry. “Let him go!”

  Rath shakes his head because Ian swipes at him like he’s a rabid jaguar. Rath takes five aggressive steps forward, backing Ian into a wall. Ian’s head smacks into the plaster with a crack. “He’ll be out of control until he feeds. I’m sorry, Alivia, I don’t have any other choice right now.”

  Rath reaches into his pocket, jabs something into the side of Ian’s neck, and not a second later, Ian collapses to the ground, with a howl of pain as his body contorts in spasms.

  Elle’s toxin.

  I swear under my breath and collapse to the marble floor next to Ian. A demented wail escapes his throat. His fangs are fully extended and his eyes open again to stare uncomprehending at the chandelier above us.

  “Ian,” I choke out. “How… You can’t be…”

  “What is happening?” Rath growls as he straightens himself back out. He knows Ian is no longer a threat, so he takes a moment to compose himself. “This… Him as a vampire is an abomination! He… This is only possible if his father is a Born!”

  I look back down at Ian, dressed in the paramedic uniform we buried him in, covered in dirt, and shake my head in confusion. Ian clenches his teeth together tightly, taking breaths in harsh, shallow, quick pulls. His eyes are screwed shut. Black veins still cover his face.

  “Ian, can you hear me?” I ask as I place a hand on his shoulder.

  His hand snaps around my wrist, nearly crushing my bones with its strength. A scream leaps into my throat as Rath swings an arm between us, driving a stake deep into the flesh of Ian’s wrist.

  Another howl of pain from Ian leaves my eardrums feeling as if they’ve exploded. He cradles his bleeding and obviously broken wrist to his chest.

  “I won’t…” he tries to speak. “I don’t want…to hurt her.”

  “You may not want to,” Rath says through clenched teeth. “But every instinct in you is telling you to kill her right now. You’ll drain her dry the second you get the opportunity and it’ll happen before you even realize your teeth have sunk into her artery.”

  Ian sucks in another painful hiss and his eyes shift to mine. Everything in them tells me as much as he will try to fight against it, he’ll do what Rath said.

  “Ian,” I breathe as a single tear breaks out onto my cheek. “You’re alive.”

  But instead of softening, instead of nodding and placing his hand gently on my cheek like I want him to, his eyes just harden. He looks away from me. “No, I’m not.” The words are gravel in the middle of the roughest road on the darkest night.

  “You resurrected.” I have no comforting words right now. My brain has not caught up to speed with this impossible twist yet.

  “We have a situation to deal with right now,” Rath says, interrupting my thoughts that are nothing close to coherent. “He’ll need to feed. Soon. And, he’ll need a lot of blood.”

  “Jasmine said the first feeding is a draining one,” I say as I feel all of my own blood seep toward my feet. “She brought me him to feed on.”

  Rath nods. He crosses to Ian and grabs him by an ankle. At just the touch, Ian screams in pain. But he can’t move more than to curl into the fetal position. Violent shakes rip through his body.

  “What are you doing?” I demand as I follow Rath.

  He drags Ian down the hall of the south wing. “We need to control him until we can figure things out.” He stops at a huge portrait of three women in beautiful, ancient dresses. Rath swings it out away from the wall, revealing what is almost an imperceptible door. He presses it in and it pops back out.

  He swings it open, and before I can rush forward to see what is hidden there, he flings Ian inside, and Ian disappears.

  There’s a scream, and then a thud with a crunch and a splash.

  “Ian!” I scream as I rush forward. And stop just at the precipice.

  The door opens up into a small space. There is no floor. What looks like a stone well drops straight down, probably twenty feet. I can barely see Ian at the bottom, lying in the fetal position in a puddle at least eight inches deep.

  “He might drown down there, Rath!” I scream. “He can barely move!”

  “A vampire cannot drown,”
Rath says as he breathes hard. He doesn’t meet my eyes, but pulls his cell phone from his pocket and starts scrolling through contacts. “This will keep him contained until I get back.”

  “Release him,” I demand. Rath closes the door, nearly slicing my arm off as it slides closed, and I realize it’s made of solid metal. I hear a heavy sounding click, like a lock sliding into place. It’s clear: the door only opens from the outside. “Where are you going?”

  “To get dinner for your resurrected, Born vampire boyfriend.” His voice drips with malice. I dart down the hall, jogging to keep up with Rath.

  “We’re just going to grab someone off the streets for him to drain?” I ask in horror. Rath turns for the garage and grabs the keys to the Ferrari.

  All signs of his limp from a few days ago are gone.

  “Your father had connections.” And, without another word of explanation, he shuts the door out to the garage in my face.

  I place both my hands on the door. I’m breathing hard, quick, sharp pulls, in and out. In. And out.

  The engine on the other side of the door roars to life and the garage door opens. The car hums as it back out and then the door closes once again.

  It’s a difficult thing, more difficult than it should be, to turn away from the door. To remove my hands. And walk back down the hall.

  The painting is still hanging away from the wall. I easily find the door once again now that I know it’s there.

  I press in the spot I thought Rath had. Nothing happens. I push on every surface of the door, slam my weight into it.

  “Ian!” I yell. I shove my shoulder into the door, but all it does is hurt me. “Ian, can you hear me?”

  But if he can, he doesn’t respond. Or his response can’t be heard through the door.

  He’s down there, in the water, in the pitch black.

  He’s confused.

  Thirsty.

  Alone.

  “Ian,” I whisper against the door. My hands settle on its surface, my forehead resting, as well.

  And I just can’t handle anything else.

  I break down in sobs.

  I LOOK UP WHEN I hear the garage door open again, five hours later. I stand up, wipe my face clean, and watch Rath with conflicted feelings as he walks down the hall toward me.

  In his right hand is a bag, a big, insulated one.

  “What is that?” I ask with trepidation.

  “Blood,” he responds as he sets it on the floor right next to the door. “Your father stopped feeding on anyone who was unwilling in 1875, and modern medicine accommodated that more easily in the past seventy years.”

  Rath presses his hand on the door, seemingly in the same way that I did, and it opens without any fuss or bruised shoulders.

  I shove him aside, knowing I am only able to do so because he let me. “Ian?” I call down into the darkness. My eyes take a moment to adjust.

  He’s there, sitting with his back propped against the well wall. His head rests against it, his face tilted up at me. His hands clutch and hug around his arms, and his entire body shakes with violent tremors. The stake no longer pokes through his wrist, though it remains a bloody slick.

  “Li…Liv,” he manages.

  He’s a mess. Black, angry veins cover his face. They stretch down his neck. His eyes are brilliant. But his skin is ashen, his lips cracked and dry.

  “Give me one of those,” I demand of Rath. If I’m feeling conflicted about this impossible situation, it’s nothing compared to the look on Rath’s face.

  He slaps a blood bag down in my opened hand.

  I look down at it for a moment. This came from someone. Some mother, or brother, or daughter who volunteered to give of their self with the intent to save lives. The cool liquid slides over my hand inside the plastic bag.

  Someday, I’m going to crave this. I’ll rip open a bag like this and I’ll down it without a second’s hesitation. It will be all I can think about some days.

  This is my future.

  “Try not to think about it,” Rath says softly. My eyes rise to meet his. His expression has softened. There’s that protective loyalty I’ve grown used to in the past few months. “Circumstances have changed. You have a choice. For the time being.”

  I take a deep breath, roll my shoulder back, and lift my chin.

  I do have control.

  I grip the blood bag tight and turn back to the opening.

  “I have blood for you, Ian,” I call down to him. He slowly opens his eyes to look at me again. “I think it will help if you drink. Are you ready?”

  He gives a tormented grunt or growl—I’m not sure which it is. “No, I’m nowhere near damn ready.” He smacks his head back against the stone wall and I hear a crack. I hope it wasn’t his skull. The speed of his breathing increases, though, and a feral sound builds inside of his chest. I’m waiting for a ferocious howl to escape from him.

  “Ian,” I say, my voice hardening. “I know how much you must hate what is happening right now. But you’re only making things worse for yourself. Drink it.”

  I toss the blood bag down and it lands in the water right next to him.

  I expected him to get pissy about it—for him to fight me and say he’ll never drink it. He’d rather die again than be like them.

  I didn’t expect him grab the bag with a speed so inhuman. I didn’t expect him to rip into the bag with his instantly extended fangs. I didn’t expect the blood that dripped down his face or the satisfied moan that echoed throughout the well.

  “More,” he growls without looking up at me.

  Rath hands me another blood bag and I toss it down to him.

  One after the other, Ian asks for another. Ten. Twelve. Fourteen bags.

  I toss him the fifteenth. We’re all quiet now.

  It’s nearly morning.

  When he finishes the bag, Ian tosses it aside with the others. But this time, instead of begging for more, he hangs his head. He rests his forearms over his knees and lets his head hang between his arms.

  “Ian?” I ask tentatively.

  He doesn’t respond.

  “Ian?” I ask, using every ounce of strength I have to keep calm. “Are you alright?”

  Again, he answers me only with silence.

  I’m about to call to him again when Rath grabs my arm. I look over at him and he just shakes his head. He gently guides me away from the door, this time leaving it open.

  “Give him a few moments,” Rath says. He doesn’t let me go as he walks me down the hall. “It will take some time. He’s just become everything he hates. And you’ve just been witness to him having no choice but to succumb to it. Having the person you love most witness your undoing isn’t an easy thing.”

  There’s that word again. Love.

  I made Ian make a promise to me, a few months back—to not fall in love with me.

  I think you knew damn well I was breaking that promise from the day you made me make it.

  We’d screamed the words at each other just days ago.

  The fissure in my heart cracks just a little wider.

  “I will stay close to him,” Rath says. “Take some time.”

  “Promise me you won’t hurt him,” I say. It’s a ridiculous request. Ian is a vampire now, Rath should not be able to hurt him. But Rath is Rath, and nothing about him is what meets the eye.

  I can tell it’s a pained promise to make, but he nods in consent nonetheless.

  Take some time. It’s as logical an idea as any at this point, I suppose. I dismiss myself and walk back up the stairs. I change into fresh clothes in my room. Jeans that hug my legs from hip to ankle. A heavy sweater. Boots and a coat. My father’s key necklace.

  I ignore the multitude of bruises I’ve gained because of Ian.

  I pass my father’s office on my way back to the stairs. I pause in the doorway.

  There’s the Conrath family crown, sitting on the desk. Behind it is the chalkboard with my schemes of revenge upon it.

  Jasmine’s na
me is written at the top with a big X through it. There’s Micah, as well. Lillian, Anna, Christian, Samuel, Cameron, Trinity, Markov. My enemies. My possible allies.

  Just hours ago, I was prepared to turn against everything I was when I arrived in Silent Bend. I was prepared to become a human vampire monarch. I wanted revenge and blood.

  In just a few short hours, everything has changed.

  But sitting there in the corner, wrinkled and destroyed, lays the dress I wore at the House just days ago. The dress I was to wear as I died—to save Ian. The dress I was to resurrect in.

  The dress that is covered in Ian’s blood.

  Jasmine murdered him.

  She drove a sword through his stomach, right in front of me.

  Hatred builds inside of me. I didn’t know I was capable of the true meaning of the word until she took from me the one thing I was willing to literally die to protect.

  Ian may be here now. He may have resurrected.

  But my desire to end her hasn’t changed.

  I TAKE THE PORSCHE.

  There isn’t a particular reason. It’s the first time I’ve driven it. But for the past four days, I’ve felt like there was a rabid animal trying to claw its way from my belly up my throat to suffocate me. It’s just millimeters from doing so.

  And at the moment, speed and adrenaline seem like the cure to kill it.

  I drive ninety on these forty mile an hour highways. My windows are rolled down, letting in the frigid winter air.

  I park on the narrow road in the graveyard. The frozen ground crunches beneath my feet. The clouds in the distance threaten snow.

  I pass grave markers. Old. New. In-between. Countless mothers and fathers. Children. Enemies. Lovers.

  All these lives. And I’ll only ever get to experience this one.

  It’s something that’s always baffled me.

  We are bound to only one life.

  The day has not yet broken, so I have to take care not to trip over myself and those that rest in the ground.

  The breath in my chest stills as the place comes into view.

  I was here only days ago. I watched them lower Ian into the ground. Returned to find him covered in six feet of earth.