Tortured Hearts and Broken Lands

  Vampires of Blood and Bone Vol. 16

  B.A. Stretke

  Superiorland Publishing

  Copyright © 2023 B.A. Stretke

  All rights reserved

  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.

  No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.

  ISBN-13: 9781234567890

  ISBN-10: 1477123456

  Cover design by: Art Painter

  Library of Congress Control Number: 2018675309

  Printed in the United States of America

  Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright

  PROLOGUE

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  About The Author

  PROLOGUE

  The scene was chaotic, with Dallas and his men descending upon them and Emily screaming and running for the woods. It turned out Kevin's brother, Ted, and sister-in-law, Emily, were the ones who were trying to kill him. If it hadn't been for his beloved Archer and Archer's friend Dallas, Ted would have succeeded in killing Kevin. As it turned out, Ted was the one to leave this world.

  "What's wrong?" Archer asked as he pulled back to look down at his beloved Kevin, who he was holding tightly to his chest, protecting him from everything around them. He then saw that Kevin was covered in blood, Archer's blood.

  "Oh, my God, that bastard Ted shot you!" Kevin screamed as he saw the blood that was covering them both.

  "I'm fine. Bullets don't affect me. It's a perk of being a vampire." Archer showed Kevin that his wounds were rapidly healing. The relief was overwhelming, and Kevin threw himself back into Archer's arms. Dallas walked up and cleared his throat to get their attention.

  "Why don't you two head back to the cottage, and we will take care of things here." Dallas would see to the disposal of Ted's body and clean the scene.

  “Where’s Emily?” Kevin asked, not really caring since she was as guilty as Ted.

  "She grabbed Ted's gun and ran off into the woods. She's being followed by my men, but I doubt she will last long in these woods." Dallas informed flatly.

  "Why?" Kevin asked.

  "She has a gun and is covered in blood and just ran into cougar country," Archer stated.

  “They’re real cougars?” Kevin was beginning to understand.

  "They can be, and they're very paranoid when it comes to trespassers." Archer and Kevin headed back to their garden cottage in DuCane territory, while Dallas went into the woods after Emily.

  CHAPTER ONE

  Dallas followed the woman's tracks into the woods. She was disoriented and irrational and in cougar territory. She had taken the gun from her husband's corpse and was covered in his blood. She would be an easy target for the Cougars. The shifters that resided within the forest were a different breed than those who lived in town.

  They were harsh and unforgiving, especially the cougar packs. Following the difficulty and upheaval of the last few years with rural shifters being captured and victimized, they tended to kill first and ask questions later. But who could blame them when often it was their own survival that hung in the balance.

  Dallas could hear the cougars just ahead. They were tracking something or someone. He moved quietly but swiftly. Vampires have a speed and agility unmatched by any shifter species. He came up on a group of three who then dispersed. They were looking for someone, and Dallas assumed it was Emily.

  “She’s in the area, I can smell her.” One of them muttered. “She’s armed and bloody and a danger to us all.” The same one continued with his rant. The other two remained silent and moved off in opposite directions.

  Dallas followed one of them, a smaller version of the others and smaller than any cougar shifter he'd ever met. The small cougar dropped down into a gully, and Dallas remained on the edge, hidden by the dense forest but where he could see him clearly. He watched him move toward the river, and then he saw her.

  Emily was waving the gun wildly around and raging nonsense. She was incoherent. Dallas was about to intervene when the cougar put his finger to his lips, indicating for her to be quiet. He then stepped forward, took the gun from her, and tossed it in the river. The others were yelling for him to report, but he was not responding.

  This small shifter was ignoring his brothers cougars, which was not typical of the young members of cougar packs. Young cougars were strictly trained from birth to submit and follow their elders and leaders, or at least that is what he'd heard.

  Dallas watched as the young cougar led the woman to the crossing of the river, which would allow her access to a road that was well-traveled. It was a place where she could receive assistance and escape cougar territory and the cougars. The young cougar waited until she was safely away before turning back the way he'd come and proceeded to cover her scent trail as he went. Dallas watched until the young cougar was out of sight, and he could hear the elder shifters chastising him.

  "Stop wondering off, Andy." He snapped. "The woman needs to be found and dealt with before she comes after us and kills us in our beds."

  "How do you know she's planning to attack? She looked delirious, not dangerous." The young one responded with an equal bite.

  "She rushed onto our lands carrying a gun after there was trouble just outside our borders. Would you have us do nothing and let our numbers be decimated as before?" The elder shifter made an emphatic retort. It was a bit of a leap, but Dallas could understand the concern. The young one did not answer but rather walked away. He was not going to share that he'd helped the woman escape.

  Dallas wasn't sure what to make of it all. He'd never witnessed the backwoods cougars doing anything for anyone but themselves, and they certainly did not stick their necks out for strangers. This shifter had him perplexed enough that he continued to follow and watch him for another hour before returning to the Palace and making his report.

  Andy couldn't get Elroy or Ford off his back. The two of them kept after him to find that woman and deal with her before she killed them all. They were acting ridiculously, but then so was his brother Billy. The woman was delusional; out of her head, she was not a danger to them.

  Billy was the leader of their pack, and he ran a very tight ship. He and his second in command, Ford Monroe, ran the pack like a dictatorship and guarded their land to the point they killed anyone who presented the slightest threat. Cougars were known for being reactionary and insensitive, and Billy ran his pack under the mantra, kill first and ask questions later. Many thought that was a joke, but it was not.

  Shifters in the area had been victimized in the past, and many were tortured and killed in the name of magic and power. It was a terrible time, but Master DuCane found and destroyed those who sought to enslave the shifters. The Master received no appreciation for his effort since the lingering animosity that existed between the two species continued to make gratitude impossible. Cougars and Vampires were like oil and water and were meant to never mix according to Billy and the elders.

  “Andy!” Damn, it was Billy.

  "What?" He kept walking, and then his brother shouted again in that way that said pay attention or pay dearly, so Andy stopped and turned to look at him.

  "I got a report that she's made her way to the main road." He looked accusingly at Andy. "You should have caught her. You're too busy daydreaming to keep your mind on the job at hand. If she returns with others and attacks us, it is your fault, and any death or loss of property will be on you." He was going full-on dramatic, yelling and pointing his finger in Andy's direction.

  Andy didn't doubt he believed what he was saying. He was so immersed in the paranoia that Ford had been peddling around the pack these last few years that Billy saw enemies everywhere. He didn't bother to respond because anything he said to the contrary would be dismissed as always.

  "Go back to the encampment. Maybe you can be of some use there." He snipped at him angrily and turned away, heading back to where Ford and the others were standing. Billy loved to embarrass him in front of the others; it made him feel superior and in control, but everyone knew that it was Ford who made the decisions.

  Ford was a master manipulator, but Billy would never see or accept that as truth. The one time he tried to warn Billy that Ford was taking over, Billy slapped him hard, called him jealous, and said that Ford was more of a brother to him than Andy would ever be. It was ugly, and Andy has never ventured an opinion on the subject since.

  He wasn't sorry he helped that lady; she was not going to hurt them, and he wasn't going to stand by and let them hurt her. He didn't know her story, and he didn't care. She was gone, and someone else's problem now. Andy headed back to the encampment, a fortified compound consisting of a main lodge surrounded by several smaller log homes and wooden structures. It wasn't attractive by any means, but it was functional.

  “What was the fuss all about?” One of the younger members ran up to w
alk with Andy.

  "The vampires were warring with some outsiders, and Billy wanted to make sure nothing spilled over onto our lands," Andy explained it as best he could while keeping his brother in a good light.

  “Are the vampires going to war with us?” The boy asked, clearly concerned.

  “The vampires have no cause to war with us.” He stated.

  "They hate us." He said with a conviction that was troubling, but that was the lesson that Billy and Ford were teaching the young ones.

  "We aren't exactly friendly either, so what do we expect." Andy countered.

  “You like the coven?”

  “I neither like nor dislike them; I don’t know them.”

  "I don't like them." He finished and walked away. Andy did himself no favor by sparring with the boy, for he was certain to tell his father, who would tell Billy.

  Andy went straight to the medical center, which was just a small, makeshift hut, to see if he could be of assistance. They were always in need of help. Billy did not see the value in providing medical aid to the sick or injured, so they were the last to receive any support. They made do with volunteers and handouts.

  There were no doctors or nurses, just people trying to help in the best way they knew how, and that included Andy. He volunteered at the medical center often. Billy viewed it as a drain on time and resources and believed the sick or injured either healed on their own or they died, and it was nature who made that decision. Andy wondered if that would be the prevailing opinion if it were Billy or Ford who needed the care.

  Andy stopped at his small one-room cabin to grab a bite to eat before heading over to the medical center. He used to live in the main house, which was large and grand. It had all the comforts and conveniences, unlike the rest of the encampment. Andy was moved out of the main house two years ago when Ford became second in command and took over Andy's rooms and insisted that it would be better if only the leadership of the pack resided in the main house.

  Ford has slowly, through pressure and manipulation, changed a lot of things about the pack, and not for the good. The money that comes in is used almost exclusively for defense, and anything that's left is placed in the leadership account, which is then used at the discretion of Billy and Ford with no accountability required.

  It was never an ideal living situation, but Ford's interference has made things a little worse. The cougar shifters were always looked down upon as reactionary, primitive, and belligerent, with little empathy or intelligence, and Ford's leadership is making that assumption a reality.

  Schooling, apart from half-assed homeschooling, is dissuaded or rejected out and out. Any form of emotional training or interpersonal skills are also rejected and considered weaknesses. The young are being done a massive disservice, but Andy is one man with no power, and the pack is tired, having not yet recovered from the exploitation of the magics.

  CHAPTER TWO

  Dallas continued with surveillance of the cougar encampment for several days following the incident with the woman, Emily. He found himself intrigued by the actions of the young cougar. He'd studied cougar activity in the area for years and never witnessed one do what that young man had done. The shifter put himself in danger to save a stranger; perhaps he had underestimated their capacity for compassion.

  He didn't see the man again but witnessed others behaving in a manner expected of a cougar shifter. They were short-tempered, angry, abrupt, and aggressive, and that included some of the young people. Dallas was wondering where the kind fellow came from and who he was. The desire to know more about him struck Dallas as odd, but the urge would not go away.

  Dallas had spent the morning surveilling the cougar encampment, at least that's what he put in his report, but actually, he was looking for the cougar shifter who had saved Emily. Unfortunately, he never spotted him; the guy must not leave the encampment very often.

  Archer and Kevin were spending a few days at Kevin's cabin, which was en route back to the Palace, so Dallas decided to stop and see if Archer knew anything about the young cougar he was interested in.

  "I never directly dealt with any of the cougars apart from Billy Burns, and I have never observed a cougar being decent. They're always arrogant and uncouth.” Kevin said as they all sat outside on the porch that he and Archer had built onto the back of the cabin.

  "I think I know who you're talking about," Archer spoke up. "He's Billy's younger brother, his name is Andy. He left the encampment a few years ago and went to university in Ann Arbor. I think he's the first of the forest cougars to get an education beyond high school."

  “What did he study?” Dallas asked.

  "Not sure, but I think it was agriculture or farming or something to do with food production."

  “That would be valuable for a pack that subsists in the wilderness.” Dallas was impressed with the young man’s vision and desire to help his people.

  Archer shook his head. "Actually, they saw it as weak and meaningless, and from what I heard, Billy demoted him in the pack hierarchy to goat herder or something. He's treated poorly, but that hasn't stopped him from building greenhouses and running a successful, functional farm. Andy is responsible for the majority of the pack's food but gets no acknowledgment. He's seen as weak and not a suitable brother for the leader of the cougars." Archer finished, and Dallas was at a loss for what to say. He feeds them, and they think he's a loser; it did not make sense, but then the cougars rarely made sense.

  "I'll never understand the brain function of cougars," Kevin interjected.

  "All aggression and zero logic," Archer added his opinion, and the others agreed.

  "That doesn't seem to be the case with Andy," Dallas told them and then described what he had seen. "He helped her get away. He hid her and brought her to the roadway."

  “Emily is still out there causing trouble.” Kevin lamented.

  "She's been dealt with," Dallas assured. "Her mind has been wiped clean."

  "She's lucky to be alive," Archer added.

  "She's alive because Andy saved her," Dallas spoke up.

  "Can't imagine his brother was too pleased that she got away," Archer said and then added. "Considering the fact that she had a gun and was wandering around his territory, his paranoia would have been on high alert."

  "And the fact she escaped sent that paranoia even higher," Dallas interjected. "The man is on edge from what I hear."

  "That's just the natural state of this cougar pack," Archer said with a hint of disdain. "Andy would do well to get away from his brother and that pack, but he stays, and I'm not sure why."

  "Because he cares." Dallas had recognized Andy's caring nature from the moment he saw him. He had a different air than the others, a different way of talking and walking and presenting himself. He was a different man, a better man than those he lived among.

  Andy was in the greenhouse tending the tomato plants when Ford walked in and began reprimanding him about the human female who had gotten away. "She's probably planning an attack thinking we're weak, and it's all your fault." He started the same ramble that Billy had been on, but he added his own flair. "You should be horse-whipped for your incompetence. If you weren't Billy's brother, he would have delivered a fitting punishment.

  Andy continued to work on his plants and did not respond to Ford's goading. He wanted a reaction, a fight so he could look tough, but he wouldn't just start hitting him without provocation. He was Billy's brother, so Ford had to be somewhat careful, not that Billy cared, but Billy preferred to do the hitting himself.

  "You hid her from Billy. I saw you help her get to the road. You're a disgrace to the pack and a disgrace to your brother." Ford was upping his pressure, but Andy remained calm, knowing that Ford saw nothing, for if he had, Billy would already know. Ford was a kiss-ass of the first order, and he would run to Billy with the slightest negative information about Andy. He wouldn't keep such a secret, and he certainly wouldn't help Andy.

  "I did nothing of the kind, and it is not my fault if you and all your men were unable to track and find one delirious human." Andy took a step closer and held Ford's angry stare. "Perhaps being pack second is becoming too much for you, Ford. Billy wouldn't be pleased if he found out you were trying to blame me for your failures." He went to grab Andy by the throat, but Andy blocked his hand and effectively knocked it away.