Daughter of the Tides, Servants of the Moon Book 2
emptiness of the far north

Charlemagne had just stepped out of his mother’s scrying room after her acolyte had come and gotten him. He was surprised when his uncle stalked toward him.

“Has she seen anything yet?” Lothaire demanded.

“Yes, Uncle. She wants to see you.” Charlemagne couldn’t hide his surprise. His mother and uncle hated each other openly and viciously.

Lothaire nodded and went in. Valeria was laying on a chaise lounge. She waved her hand to him. Her tanned complexion was unusually pale in the candlelight.

“Lothaire, you have to go… Go to the north, there’s a lost city, a buried city… there are no roads except in the dead of winter… Roads of ice or roads in the sky… Where the wolf and the bear share the land and the stars… You will have to travel by wolf to reach a ghost city under the grass… Don’t let Soleil’s son find it… He’ll bleed them… he’ll burn them… He’ll bleed us and burn us all.” She started sobbing inconsolably for several minutes as she seized his wrist with her claws and pressed a piece of paper into his hand. “Please, take Charlemagne with you when you go… Save him, Lothaire… When you escape, save my son.” She passed out still clutching his wrist and he pried himself from her grasp.

Lothaire looked at the piece of paper and there were three places marked on a rough map in symbols. The first mark was the ancient symbol of the vampires in a circle and had been darkly leaded as if it had been traced many times beside a mark meaning blood moon. The second faintly pencil-drawn symbol was of three moons near the eastern shore of Hudson Bay near a strange double lake with the ring lake of the Moon’s Gate to the southeast. It almost looked like the moons weren’t meant to be there, they were so faint. The third symbol was at the Moon’s Gate temple, the old runes for ashes. He puzzled over it. He held the paper up to a candle and watched it burn to make sure Helios and Soleil did not find it. The location would be difficult to reach. It was Inuit wolf and bear territory. As a Des Rues, he knew they would not be welcomed. His mind worked out the logistics of doing a recon mission first.

“Lothaire?” Valeria sat up and looked at him with wide glassy eyes. “Did… Did I see it?”

He looked at her in surprise, “You told me where to go and told me not to take Helios. You said to take your son.” He paused as she blinked in confusion. “You were quite distressed and insistent. You don’t remember?”

Valeria shook her head, “I only remember seeing you needed to fly far north and run to the valley hidden. An old wolf and a young bear are waiting for you. If they see Helios, they will flee and not speak to you.”

Lothaire nodded. Contemplatively, he stood for a moment more, then said, “Tell no one, not even Charles what you saw. Soleil has him bewitched for the benefit of her son. You are an Oracle, even as an Alpha, he cannot compel you to tell him of your vision. If he asks me, I will mislead him. I will take your son with me and go immediately.” In his mind, he added. ‘And perhaps I can break him from his brother’s thrall.’

Lothaire almost growled when he stepped out and saw Helios standing with Charlemagne, Charles, and Soleil. To Valeria’s red gowned acolyte, he said, “Tend your mistress.”

“Did she see anything?” Charles almost sneered in contempt and Lothaire noticed that Charlemagne flinched, looking away.

“Charlemagne and I are to go to the place of the ice roads, in the land under the star bear, that means Alaska.” Lothaire half-lied convincingly. “We will leave tomorrow.”

“I’ll go with you, Uncle,” Helios immediately offered but Lothaire shook his head.

“You are training to be First Beta, nephew. You need to stay here and train with our warriors as is your duty. It is probably a wild goose chase. We’ll be gone no more than three or four days.”

Soleil eyed him suspiciously. “Perhaps I should consult with Oracle Valeria before you go.”

“The Moon’s oracles don’t concern you, witch,” Lothaire snapped at Soleil before he could stop himself.

“Mother is probably asleep, she will rest for several days after such a difficult vision,” Charlemagne said quickly, trying to pacify Soleil’s enraged look and his father’s angry growl.

Calming himself, Lothaire hoped he could bait Helios into staying behind. “If they are there, and refuse to come south by choice, then Helios will can bring the warriors for a quick strike. I doubt the Yukon Pack will let us just take them if they believe they are following what the Temples want.”

“Taking Des Rues warriors into Yukon Territory could mean war.” Charles growled. “If they want war, we will stain our teeth with their blood.”

“There will be no need, if your heir and I prove the treachery you suspect the temples of, brother.” Lothaire interrupted firmly. “Let me do my job. I’ll take a small group with Charlemagne, as Alpha Heir of the Des Rues, no one would dare oppose him.”

“Find them quickly, Lothaire. We will bring the warriors if we do not hear from you in four days,” Charles declared.

“I’ll have the warriors prepared,” Helios added but the whole time he had looked at Lothaire as if he suspected the lie. Lothaire could almost see his scheming thoughts behind his golden eyes.

“Very good, Helios. Alpha, we will leave in the morning. Come, Charlemagne, we need to pack.” Lothaire and his younger nephew walked away. He could feel a creeping sensation on his neck as they left Valeria’s hall. He knew Soleil was wishing she could kill him, and he worried again that his enthralled brother might let her.

“Charlemagne, do you trust your father’s witch? Do you trust her not to kill us, so her son can be your father’s heir?” Lothaire asked once they were alone.

“Helios would never betray me.” Charlemagne responded with confidence. “Don’t let his mother bother you, Uncle Lothaire. Witches are not like wolves.”

“No, they are not, nephew, and they are never to be trusted.” Lothaire insisted.

“Times are changing, we need to be more accepting of people who believe differently than we do. It is called tolerance.” It almost sounded like Charlemagne was chastising him.

“Tolerance doesn’t mean we have to forget who we are or where we came from. You should not have to give up your beliefs and traditions because someone else believes differently,” Lothaire retorted. “Honestly, you sound like those humans, who demand equality for all in inspiring words while oppressing everyone around them with unfair laws and regulations. Be careful, nephew, you are to be the next Alpha of Des Rues, your words, your leadership, and your judgement must be firm and unwavering.”

Charlemagne was surprised when Lothaire dragged him out of bed hours before dawn and put him in a car then on a plane. Lothaire was trying to make sure they left Helios without a clue to where they were really going. As soon as they landed in Washington, Lothaire dragged him out onto the tarmac and into a smaller private plane, while the rest of their party loaded into off-road equipped trucks for a many-hour drive north to the place Valeria had marked with a blood moon.

“Where are we going?” Charlemagne demanded as it took off and headed east.

“To the real location of your mother’s vision. Not that we will find anything, but we might as well make it harder for your brother to kill both of us in no wolf’s territory.” Lothaire snarled.

Charlemagne refuted him, “Helios would never hurt me. He’s my brother.”

Lothaire leaned back in the small seat in the compact plane. “I once believed that of my brother too. You’re young, Charlie. You’ll learn… the only one you can truly trust is your wolf. I suggest you get some sleep, we have a long run after we land.”

“And why should I trust you, Uncle Lothaire?”

Lothaire leaned back and pulled the edge of his stocking cap over his eyes. “Because I am trying to save Des Rues, so you can inherit it instead of that witch’s spawn.”

Charlemagne made an angry sound and Lothaire pushed up the edge of his cap to reveal one steely silver-blue eye. “If any of those other warriors return from our planned destination, then you can doubt me and your mother. If they don’t, doubt your brother and his, they are the only ones who would have ordered them killed.”

A few minutes after pulling the knit back over his eye, Lothaire sounded like he was almost snoring then he muttered, “Stop trying to link your brother. We are out of range of even his witchcraft. Go to sleep.”

Grumpily, Charlemagne tried to make himself as comfortable as possible in the cramped, uncomfortable space.

The sun sunk low in the west when the plane came in on approach of a large body of water. “Beta, we are at the coordinates you requested.” A heavily accented Russian voice said from the front.

“Thank you for the ride. Safe flight home.” Lothaire said through the speaker, to Charlemagne he announced. “Shift to your wolf, so you don’t freeze to death when we get out. Here is where we must reach before midnight or we will both die from inhaling the frigid air.”

“You are mad.”

“And you are ill-prepared to be Alpha if you cannot perform this simple recon mission. Now shift, so I can put your pack on your wolf or do you wish to walk around naked after we arrive?” Lothaire asked calmly.

Charlemagne stripped and stuffed his winter wear into the pack Lothaire held out then shifted into his large rusty brown colored wolf. The wolf stood patiently while Lothaire knelt respectively and attached the pack. “My Alpha. Once we are on the shore, follow me quickly. This is great ursine territory.”

He shrugged his pack onto his naked back and shifted into his wolf. He gave a powerful howl over the sound of the engines and the plane circled one last time before dropping low over the frozen water. Roughly bouncing on the ice, the plane landed then the door slid open. Lothaire’s wolf bolted out onto the ice with Charlemagne’s close behind. They sprinted for the frozen foliage and snow drifts as the plane roared back into the sky. Following the terrain map, he had memorized, Lothaire led his nephew straight to the location he was certain the Delphi had hidden the vampires. A place from a map he had burned but somehow, Lothaire suspected Delilah Ayala was one step ahead of him again.

The tunnel was filled with debris and dust from a partial collapse. Old Cold War era desks sat in rooms filled with file cabinets and rotted paper. There were no secrets to be discovered here. No one had even been in this place in a handful of decades.

“What is this place?” Charlemagne demanded.

“The place your mother sent us. I don’t understand. She said they were here. She said to not let the witch burn them or they would burn us all.” Lothaire’s fist slammed once on the top of a desk and it collapsed into a heap of rotted wood.

“Maybe, my mother finally has lost her gift and her mind.” Charlemagne sounded truly regretful. “I’m… I’m sorry, Uncle. When can we leave?”

“Tomorrow. We need to go east and check another location.” Lothaire puzzled over the vision Valeria had given him. She had been so believable, so certain. His eyes followed a tendril of dust floating in the air like the curl of incense smoke in moonlight. For a moment, he could scent Tamaza. He realized Charlemagne was still staring at him. “Go back to the old lake cabin. Keep the fire going. We’ll leave at first light in the morning. I’m going to look around more and maybe hunt us some game. No reason for both of us to freeze.”

Lothaire waited for Charlemagne to leave, then followed the scent of moonlight mixed with the smell of snow and flowers carried by the air. He stood contemplatively in front of a bookcase filled with old manuals. This place was set up like it was a cold war listening and early warning station. It was small, offering shelter to fewer than ten, but Valeria had called it a lost city, a buried city. His keen wolf ears heard something, the sound of waves in the distance. It was coming from behind the wall.

‘Lothaire…’ The whisper reminded him of the one-time Tamaza had let him kiss her to prove they were not true mates.

“Tamaza? I’m here… Show me.”

He turned full circle. He was alone. The sound seemed to come from far away. He felt the air move slightly and pulled a dusty book from the shelf, shaking it to make a cloud of dust. A stream of dust curled around the lower corner of the bookcase then went under it. Bending, Lothaire felt along the underside. There was a small metal loop. He hooked it with his finger and pulled. There was a click and the bookcase swung in.

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