Carpathian 22 - Dark Predator

throw up to stop it.
    He blinked rapidly, feeling her holding him close, filling more and more spaces with herself until for the first time he was complete. He wasn’t alone. Stars burst in his head, opened like a primordial mix, rushing at him so fast at first he couldn’t grasp what he was seeing.

8
    Z acarias’s brothers crouched among the rocks, shock on their faces. Riordan was little more than a newborn babe, but there was nothing young about his awareness or intellect. He stared with the same shock and horror at the approaching vampire as his older brothers. Above them, dark storm clouds churned in the sky, nearly obliterating all the stars, but the full moon shone bloodred, right through the towering, turbulent clouds.
    Spread out, behind him. When I tell you to run, get out of here and do not look back, Zacarias commanded. You are responsible for Riordan, Manolito. Fall back with him. Nicolas and Rafael, protect them. All of you, get out of here.
    We will help you, Rafael said, his voice shaking.
    You cannot do this alone, Nicolas stated, sorrow dripping from each word.
    Run, Zacarias. Run with us, Manolito pleaded.
    Zacarias heard their protests, but when he gave an order, they knew to obey. Their mother lay dead, her body torn and bloody, crushed against the rocks. There was no time to mourn her or think of her as she was in life. His father had arrived too late to save her, but the vampire who had made the kill lay in strips beside her, the body literally torn apart. The sheer savagery shown in the killing should have warned Zacarias before his father turned around to face them, but still, those jagged teeth and red-crazed eyes were a shock.
    His father’s hands were raised toward the mountains where the boulders were set so precariously. The ground shook. Zacarias hadn’t expected the attack on his brothers and he was that second too late in countering. He threw a shelter around the boys to protect them from the avalanche even as he raced into the attack. He knew his father hadn’t expected aggression and it was the only thing left to him. His father was far older, stronger, more experienced, but he was a newly made vampire and wouldn’t be used to the high the kill had given him.
    His father was skilled in battle, a legendary hunter whose name was whispered in awe, but he’d taught those same skills to his oldest child. Zacarias was still considered young as a Carpathian, but he’d fought vampires and battles often. He’d already begun to lose his emotions, colors had long since faded from his vision and he wasn’t even close to the age when that should have happened.
    He struck through his father’s insubstantial form, stumbling forward. The blow took him hard in the back and sent him flying forward into the pools of blood from his mother’s body. He skidded across the gore facedown, landing nearly on his mother’s head. Her lifeless eyes stared accusingly at him. He planted his hands to lever himself up only to find they were buried wrist-deep in her blood. His stomach lurched. His heart nearly stopped.
    Zacarias!
    With Nicolas’s warning filling his mind, he rolled, dissolving at the last moment, remembering that he could. His father’s fist slammed deep into the ground, right through his mother’s lifeless body.
    Zacarias was shaken to the very core of his being, and he had to pull himself together if he was going to survive. And if he didn’t survive, neither would his brothers. He breathed away his mother’s blood covering his body and the sight of her eyes staring at him, accusing him of trying to kill his own father. Not his father. Vampire. The undead. An evil, foul creature who would destroy everything and everyone in its path. Even now, the very grass withered beneath its feet. It. Vampire. Not father. Not the man he loved and respected above all others.
    Zacarias felt the familiar coldness sweep through him, the chill he’d noticed early, even as a young boy, but now it was a glacier consuming him, pouring into his body, icing his veins. When other boys were carefree, running and playing, he had been quietly observing ways to kill, to battle, to outwit. His senses were acute, his reflexes faster. He had soaked up information, worked on concealing himself even from his parents. He had practiced over and over his ability to sneak up on others and observe them for hours without being seen. He had known even then that he was different, that the cold seeping into his veins