Equites : Book 4 of the Heku Series (22 page)

Mark slowly moved to the closet and
stepped inside. He saw fear in her eyes as she shut the door, and
he heard it lock from the outside. As soon as Emily ran from the
room, he opened the door and followed after her.

Emily hit the stairs running and
descended, two at a time, unsure why her leg was hurting. She
ignored the pain and kept going.

“
Keith!?” she
screamed.

“
Emily?” Kyle asked,
appearing before her on the stairs. He stopped and put his hands up
when she leveled the 9mm at him, “Whoah, what’s up?”

“
Stay away from me,” she
said angrily.

Kyle looked up at Mark as he quickly
filled him in, in a voice too silent for Emily to hear.

“
Emily, listen to me,” Kyle
said with his hands up. “I can explain, ok? We aren’t going to hurt
you.”

“
Sure you aren’t, just one
little bite, eh? A little blood to quench the thirst?” she asked
suspiciously.

“
Just put the gun down
before you hurt yourself,” Kyle said softly.

“
I’m not the one that’s
going to get hurt. You better stay back,” she warned.

Kyle took one step toward her, and the
sound of a gunshot rang through the palace. The entire Council
appeared on the landing below Emily. One of them moved quickly to
Kyle, who was shot in the chest but quickly healing.

“
Em?” Chevalier asked,
frowning.

“
Keith!?” Emily screamed,
and pointed the gun at the Council.

Chevalier took a step back, his eyes
wide. Mark’s lips moved quickly as he whispered what he’d
seen.

“
Put the gun down,” Damon
said sternly.

Emily glared at him, “You would like
that, wouldn’t you, vampire? You are not drinking from
me.”

“
Keith? Sam?” she
yelled.

“
Yes, Emily?” Sam asked,
appearing beside her. He gasped and watched Emily hold the gun on
the Equites Council.

“
Where’s Keith?” she asked,
not taking her eyes off of the Council.

Sam frowned and looked at
Chevalier.

“
Get back in that room,”
Emily yelled at the Council. Chevalier nodded, and they all stepped
back into the council chambers.

“
Follow me,” Emily said to
Sam, and ran down the stairs to the ground floor. She turned on one
of the guards and held the gun up to him.

“
Where’s the door out?” she
asked him, glaring.

The guard frowned, confused, and
pointed at the front doors.

“
Is this Montana?” she
asked the guard, and he shook his head.

“
Sam, where is Keith?” she
asked again when she stepped out into the daylight.

“
He’s… I don’t know where
he is,” Sam said.

Emily turned on him, “Are you with the
vampires now?”

He shook his head, “No, I’m
not.”

“
You are acting weird… you
are, aren’t you?” she accused.

One of the Cavalry members walked up
and patted Sam on the back, “Emily, Sam, how’s it
going?”

Emily stepped back from them and
pointed her gun at Sam, “How could you, Sam? You were my Dad’s
friend. How could you join the vampires?”

The Cavalry guard looked at her with
wide eyes. Emily heard the whinny of a horse from behind her, and
took a few steps back, the 9mm still directed at Sam and the guard.
She couldn’t figure out how she’d gotten here. She just hoped Keith
was back at the ranch and would protect her from them. The vampires
had never gone so far as to kidnap her before. She knew how mad
Keith would be when he found out. Her head was pounding, making it
hard to think clearly.

Emily looked around and spoke to
herself, “Car… I need a car.”

She spotted the stables and backed
toward it, “One move, vampire, and I’ll shoot. You can just stay
here, Sam, I… I can’t believe you joined them.”

The guard nodded and watched her
closely.

Emily pressed her hand to the side of
her head, and fought to clear her mind. The only thing she was sure
of was that the vampires kidnapped her, and she had to get back to
Montana, to the safety of the ranch and Keith. She tried to
remember how long she’d been gone. Long enough to be very pregnant
was all she knew.

When she was a safe distance from the
vampires, she spun and ran for the stables. The guards watched as
she ran past them in her nightgown and robe. Her bare feet made
very little noise against the ground. Their orders were to stay
away from her, so they moved into the shadows as she
passed.

Emily stopped when she got into the
stables and turned to make sure no one was following her. She
looked around the stables and gasped when she saw Patra watching
her from her stall.

Emily grabbed an unfamiliar bridle off
of a hook and disappeared into Patra’s stall. She put the bridle on
quickly, but couldn’t pull herself up onto the mare. Cursing under
her breath, she led the mare into the stables and used a bale of
hay to climb onto her back. When she turned the mare toward the
exit of the stables, she saw the exit blocked by heku.

She raised her gun toward them, “I
have enough ammunition to kill all of you, so back off.”

Chevalier put his hands up in front of
him, “Emily, you need to listen to me.”

“
Listen to a vampire?” she
snapped. She didn’t notice how they winced at the name.

Kyle moved quickly off to the side and
Emily spun toward him. She felt arms wrap around her from behind
and pull her off of the mare, while another set quickly took the
gun.

Emily screamed and fell to the ground
as the arms around her turned to ash. The sudden impact made her
head hurt worse, and knocked the wind out of her. She looked up as
the vampires descended on her.

Chevalier knelt down beside Emily and
put her face between his hands, he stared down into her eyes. He
hated the way she looked at him with terror filled eyes, but they
soon calmed as her breathing slowed to match his. He knew he
shouldn’t have been able to control her. This only worked on Emily
when she was sick or tired.

“
Can you hear me?” he
asked, his voice smooth and calm.

“
Yes,” Emily
whispered.

“
Where are you?”

“
I don’t know.”

“
Where do you live?” he
asked, not breaking her gaze.

“
Cascade,
Montana.”

“
Where is
Keith?”

“
At the ranch,” she said
softly.

“
Who are the Equites?”
Chevalier asked, concentrating on her eyes.

“
I don’t know,” Emily said,
and then blinked a few times. She screamed and fought against the
vampires holding her.

“
Do it,” Chevalier ordered,
as he re-caught one of her hands and pinned it to the ground. Damon
quickly gave her an injection, and then grasped his chest when he
felt the burn starting. He fell backwards just as the pain stopped.
Emily stopped fighting and fell silent against the
ground.

“
What the hell was that?”
Chevalier asked, letting go of Emily and looking around.

“
She’s lost seven years of
memory,” Sam said, looking down at her.

“
Damon, get Mark revived.
He’s the only one that was by her when it happened,” Chevalier
said. He picked Emily up, not sure exactly what to do with
her.

“
She’ll turn us all to ash
if we aren’t careful,” Quinn said, looking down at her.

“
Move Allen into Kyle’s
room, and we’ll have to restrain her to the bed. Sam is the only
one she can’t ash, so he’s the only one to have any contact with
her until I figure this out,” Chevalier told them.

Chevalier looked over as Mark stood
up, still grimacing from the pain of being burned.

“
What happened, Mark?”
Chevalier asked.

“
The first I knew something
was wrong was when she started yelling for Keith. I went into her
room… and she pulled a gun on me and ordered me into the closet.
She even locked the door,” Mark explained.

“
Quinn, please talk to
Exavior. Mark, get some four-point restraints,” Chevalier said
coldly, and headed up to Emily’s room.

Chevalier and Damon hooked the soft
leather restraints to her wrists and ankles. They stood back and
watched her slow breathing as she slept.

“
This was one of her
fears,” Chevalier said as he sat down on the bed.

“
Losing her memory?” Damon
asked.

“
No, being restrained,”
Chevalier sighed.

“
I don’t think we have a
choice.”

“
I know we don’t. I also
know that no heku can be in here until she’s calmed down. Seven
years ago, she had no control over the ability, didn’t even know
she could do it,” Chevalier said. He remembered the long hours in
Colorado it took to get her where she had some shred of
control.

“
What if she never
remembers?” Damon asked, lowering his eyes.

“
I don’t know.” Chevalier
looked up when Sam entered.

“
Allen’s moved over, but
he’s pretty upset about being away from his Mom,” Sam said as he
approached the bed.

“
I’ll talk to him,”
Chevalier said.

“
If she orders me to let
her go, I have to,” Sam reminded him.

“
Damnit, I forgot about
that,” Chevalier growled.

“
Can’t we claim something…
like insanity, to nullify that?” Damon asked the
familiar.

“
I don’t make the rules. I
just follow what my master says,” Sam told him.

“
Didn’t Emily tell you that
you had to obey me?” Chevalier asked him.

“
Yes, then she canceled it,
and re-issued that order,” Sam said.

“
Is there anything I can
say to make my word stronger than hers?” Chevalier
asked.

“
No,” Sam said
bluntly.

“
What about Allen? Can you
move to him as your master as long as Emily is incapacitated?”
Damon asked.

Sam thought for a moment, “If I truly
believe that Emily is not in her right mind, I would naturally fall
to Allen.”

Chevalier growled, irritated, “Well do
you?”

Sam nodded, “Yes, I do believe she’s
no longer capable of handling the situation. Therefore, Allen would
be my new master until that changes.”

“
Fine, so I tell you not to
let her go, and the only person that can tell you any different
would be Allen?” Chevalier asked.

“
Yes”

“
Then that’s what I’m
saying. Give her food, water, whatever she asks for, as long as you
don’t undo the restraints,” Chevalier ordered.

Sam sighed, “I agree, though I don’t
like it.”

“
Doesn’t she have a way of
slipping out of restraints?” Damon asked.

“
No, these are the kind the
Valle used. She couldn’t get out of those,” Chevalier said. He
hated himself for putting her in them.

Damon left quietly and Sam sat down on
a chair to wait. Chevalier stayed with Emily until she started to
wake up, and then left hesitantly. He waited outside of her door,
hoping her memory would come back.

“
Sam?” she asked
softly.

“
I’m here.” Chevalier heard
him sit on the edge of her bed.

“
Let me out of these. Why
am I in them?” she mumbled, the drugs were still affecting
her.

“
Do you know where you
are?” Sam asked, and Chevalier cocked his head to the side to
listen closer.

“
Keith?” Emily screamed,
and Chevalier could hear her straining against the
binds.

Quinn appeared at Chevalier’s side,
“Did Emily ingest more blood from the Encala yesterday, than she
did from you when you bonded?”

“
Probably, I only gave her
a few drops in some wine,” Chevalier said.

“
Exavior said that if she
ingested more of Vaughn’s blood, it’s allowing them some control
over her. They apparently used the control to make her forget the
last seven years,” Quinn explained.

“
So, what now? She needs to
drink my blood to remember it again?” Chevalier asked
angrily.

“
I asked him and he didn’t
know if that would work.”

“
But he hasn’t had any of
her blood, and I have.”

Quinn nodded, “That’s our only hope,
that one connection. He has the runes though, and you don’t, that
could very well put you on an even playing field.”

“
Does he think the memories
are gone?” Chevalier asked as he watched the door. Emily was
screaming at Sam to let her go.

“
He thinks they are just
masked,” Quinn said hopefully.

Chevalier and Quinn turned to the door
when they heard Emily scream out in pain. Chevalier stepped in
cautiously, and watched her from the door. Emily was screaming and
her back was arched. Sam stood helplessly to the side.