House of Shifters: (A Paranormal Urban Fantasy) (The Vampire Project Book 4) Read online

  House of Shifters

  The Vampire Project Book 4

  Jonathan Yanez

  “Your past doesn’t dictate who you choose to be today.”

  -Aareth Emerson

  House of Spells

  Copyright © 2017 by Jonathan Yanez. All rights

  reserved.

  Archimedes Books

  Orange, CA 92868

  www.archimedesbooks.com

  Formatting: Archimedes Books

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  No part of this book may be reproduced,

  scanned, or distributed in any printed or

  electronic form without permission. Please do

  not participate in or encourage piracy of

  copyrighted materials in violation of the

  author’s rights. Thank you for respecting the

  hard work of this author.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters,

  places and incidents either are the product of

  the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously

  and any resemblance to locals, events, business

  establishments or actual persons—living or

  dead—is entirely coincidental.

  Created with Vellum

  To all the members in my pack. I’m here because of you.

  Contents

  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

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Author’s Note

  Also by Jonathan Yanez

  Also by Jonathan Yanez

  Epilogue

  About the Author

  Chapter One

  Leah

  “Make sure you’re turning more than you are killing. After the events in Term, it’s clear that my dear sister’s pet will not be going quietly.”

  The body Commander Steel held in his hands was more of a husk than a human form. The man’s skin had gone from a healthy pink to a sickly grey in a matter of minutes. He stopped struggling as soon as Commander Steel sank his razor sharp teeth into him.

  “Where’re you getting all of these people anyway?” Commander Steel, the man who had once been known as the mercenary “The Scar,” threw the body he had been feeding on off to the side. Red lines flowed down his lips like tiny rivers. Small crimson drops fell from his chin to the stone floor beneath. “I can’t imagine people are lining up to become my next snack.”

  “Haven’t you heard?” Leah drummed her fingers together in front of her with a devious grin. “My sister has completed her mage-powered locomotive to every city in the Outland now besides Azra. I have vampire soldiers scouring the outlying villages and smaller towns now for our victims. But remember, we need our vampire army to—”

  “Yes, you’ve reminded me a dozen times now.” Commander Steel rolled his eyes and took a long breath. “I was experimented on to do your bidding. I’m to bite once, and only once, those soldiers we deem strong enough to join The Legion. Don’t worry, I’m turning most of them. I’m only indulging in a snack or two, or three, each day.”

  Leah Nobel nodded slowly. Things were going according to plan, despite the events in Term where most of their standing vampire soldiers had been slaughtered by former Captain Sloan and her band of misfits. When one was given unlimited funding, it made any setback no more than a bump in the road. The experiments to Commander Steel had gone better than planned. He was not only stronger and faster, but he was also now able to turn other ordinary humans into vampires with a single bite.

  Moreover, those he had turned were also able to do the same to other victims. Even now the standing army inside New Hope was more vampire than human. Soon, they would have thousands of the creatures at their disposal, willing to conquer the Outland and its many smaller cities.

  And these new vampires were different. They were as fast and as strong as Sloan. Even physically, they had changed. When they fought, their entire mouths now became lined with sharp teeth, not just with their canines like before. Their hands also became their weapons; talon-like nails sprouted out of the ends of their fingers on command.

  “What about those inside the city who are starting to ask questions?” Commander Steel asked as he sat down on one of the many cushioned seats in the room. Although Leah Noble worked in the underbelly of the palace, it didn’t mean she couldn’t make it comfortable. The room they stood in was one of her own design—hard stone floor and walls with rich tapestries on the walls, and comfortable furniture.

  “Our soldiers will obey or find themselves forced to obey.” Leah’s eyes gravitated to one of her favorite paintings: the picture of three young girls on a red hilltop. The artist had captured her and her sister perfectly—strong, determined, destined for greatness … or at least two of them were. “The populace is also beginning to ask questions about our vampire soldiers. A ragtag group of vigilantes calling themselves The New Order has begun to stir the pot. But they’re human; they’re nothing.”

  “I can take a look into it for you if you’d like.” Commander Steel slouched in his chair. His grey-and-black uniform emblazoned with the queen’s symbol of two swords crossed behind a black bat sat wrinkled on the cloth. “It’s been getting kind of boring around here, what with all of your experiments on me finished. Now I’m just biting people left and right.”

  “That is unnecessary. You’re needed here to grow our ranks. I have another asset looking into this New Order business. I trust she’ll be fine.”

  “She?”

  “That’s what I said.” Leah turned her gaze from the picture to the Commander. She found him handsome despite the scar that ran down the right side of his face. “And soon, you two will be joined by another.”

  “By ‘she,’ are you talking about that redheaded child?” Commander Steel couldn’t help a smile cross his lips. “This isn’t a game for kids to be playing at.”

  Leah felt a surge of anger push to the surface. It was a feeling she was surprised to experience when someone talked about Elizabeth Ahab. She had grown protective of the girl in the near month she had been training her.

  “Don’t concern yourself with the goings-on of witches.” Leah squinted at the Commander with a furrowed brow. “She is capable of more than you know.”

  Commander Steel shrugged. “You’re the boss. So what about this other asset you’re talking about? Another dive into the lab to experiment on the vampire elixir?”

  Leah shook her head. She hadn’t planned on inviting the commander to witness her latest experiment. Now, she thought it might be a good opportunity for him to see her actual power. It would make him think twice if he ever decided to go rogue and disobey her.

  “Actually, why don’t you come with me.” Leah motioned to the vampire to follow. “Our next experiment should be about ready to begin.”

  Commander St
eel looked at her with a raised eyebrow. Leah could read his thoughts as clearly as she could read her own. He was debating on the odds of whether or not he had already outgrown his usefulness.

  “I’m not going to kill you.” Leah rolled her eyes and made for the door. “You’re much to valuable for that.”

  Leah reached the thick, wooden door and let herself out into the hall. Her facility was located underneath the palace. To anyone unfamiliar with the grounds, it was a labyrinth of twisting halls and large rooms. For Leah, it was home. She began traveling to where the latest experiment waited for her.

  A few steps from the room, she could hear Commander Steel’s boots on the stone floor behind her. They softly echoed off the walls with each one of his strides.

  Leah didn’t feel a need to turn and validate his decision. He was a dog simply following his master.

  With Leah in the lead, the two maneuvered through the turns and twists of the many halls and passages. The halls were wide, no rugs underfoot. Mage-powered lights hung from the walls or off the vaulted ceilings, providing enough light to make one think they were outside during a sunny day.

  Leah made a note to herself as they traveled down the barren halls. She would have to do something about the décor soon. More paintings would be a welcome addition to help liven up the dull scene.

  While she was debating on how many painting to purchase, she arrived at a set of double doors at the end of one of the halls. She straightened her black robe and walked inside.

  The smell was the first thing that hit her. The stench of a decomposing body was nothing new to her. With her extensive work in the area of resurrecting the dead, she had gotten used to everything besides the initial shock of the putrid odor.

  The room they walked into now was at the very rear of the dungeon’s lower level. Stairs met her feet as she walked down into the mouth of a cave. Instead of a room greeting the witch and the vampire, a massive cavern with hundreds of stalactites and stalagmites jutted up from the ground and hung from the ceiling. The room welcomed them like some giant mythical creature’s open maw.

  Leah moved down the steps to the dirt floor below. Just past the smell of the rotting body was the deep earthy scent of the rich soil.

  “My God,” Commander Steel said, following Leah. “What are you doing down here?”

  Leah smiled at her work. It was something she had only tried successfully once before with Brenda Emerson. It was her resurrection room. It hadn’t been used in years, mostly due to the strain it put on her body and the failed outcome with Brenda’s experiment.

  A table sat in front of her with a lifeless form underneath a white sheet. Wires ran from the body to a podium with matching golden handles pointing up from the desk.

  More wires ran over to ten glass cylinders, each showing the silhouette of a sleeping person inside.

  Commander Steel moved slowly toward the cylinders. With the sleeve of his uniform, he rubbed away the condensation that had gathered on the outside of the glass holding cells. “You have people—children in these? Are they dead?”

  “Not dead. I’ve induced them into a sleep state. I’ll need each and every one of them very much alive if I’m going to bring our subject back from the dead.” Leah moved to the podium. She rolled up the long, black sleeves on each of her arms before placing her hands on the two golden grips on top of the podium. “You may want to stand back for this.”

  “Your vicious drive to harness the unknown never ceases to amaze me.” Commander Steel took a step back from the wires and cylinders. “And who are we bringing back from the dead, exactly?”

  Leah ignored the question. Already she began bending the magic inside of her to do her bidding, both hands gripping the handles on the podium. Leah let out a long, slow breath, allowing the raging magic inside of her to gather.

  Dark purple swirls of magic began oozing from her hands like a dozen tentacles, while warmth prickled over her body, the sensation promising the coming wave of sweat that would follow her struggle to channel life from one point to another.

  The wires connecting her podium to the table and the cylinders began to glow with a bright purple light. Leah’s hands shook with the amount of effort she poured into the experiment as she first pulled life itself from her victims and then pushed it into the body on the table.

  The only other time Leah had tried the experiment successfully, she had left the ten children inside the test tubes, awake. Their screams as their life was sucked out of them were too distracting. Leah preferred her new method now. Despite her own beating heart she could hear in her head and the hum of the magic as it raced across the wires, it was silent.

  Pulling the life from so many at once was more difficult than Leah remembered as she wrestled the life force away from her victims one at a time, the children desperate to hold on.

  The second part, giving the life force to her experiment, would be easy. After all, everyone wanted life, even a cold corpse that didn’t know it.

  The first step complete, Leah now channeled the power of existence into her experiment. She bore down on the podium—hard. Sweat gathered behind her neck and at her forehead as she willed life into the dead.

  As suddenly as the experiment had begun, it ended, and Leah released her hold on the podium, breathing hard. Her knees gave out, and she sunk to the floor.

  “Are you all right?” Commander Steel ran to her. “Did it work?”

  “I’ll be fine.” Leah waved the commander away. She stood on her own power and pointed an outstretched finger to the table. “Look for yourself.”

  The figure under the white sheet was stirring. Muscles that had not been used for a while began to twitch with life. At once, the figure sat bolt upright. The sheet stayed intact, still harboring the person’s identity.

  “He shouldn’t remember who he is. Brenda Emerson had no idea,” Leah whispered to Commander Steel. “If somehow he did retain his memory, be ready.”

  Commander Steel swallowed hard. His face free of any fear but awed in wonder.

  Leah walked slowly to the sitting form. With one slow motion, she pulled the sheet from her latest experiment. “Do you know who you are?”

  Underneath the sheet sat Marcus Walker still in the clothes he had been buried in. His suit was dark brown with a white shirt underneath. His wild, dark brownish-grey hair and beard were combed perfectly. His eyes roamed around the room, confused.

  “I know this is going to be a lot to take in.” Leah placed a comforting hand on his shoulder. “But you should know that you’re very special. You are among friends. Do you remember anything?”

  “No … I—” Marcus looked down at the palms of his hands, turning them over as if they had the answers to so many of the questions he searched for. “Did I die? No, I know I died. How … how am I here now? Where am I?”

  “You’re safe inside the queen’s palace in New Hope.” Leah took a step back and motioned Marcus from the table. “You did die, but I was able to bring you back. I’ll explain everything to you, but we should hurry. There is work to be done.”

  Chapter Two

  Sloan

  “I can’t help but feel like we’re prisoners.” Kade chomped down on a sandwich as he walked alongside Sloan, Kimberly, and Aareth. “I mean, have you seen the way the Azra guards have been looking at us? It’s like I ate their last sandwich.”

  “You did eat our last sandwich,” corrected one of the guards escorting them to the Azra capital building. “Along with half the cookies and fruit.”

  “You’re not going to fat shame me, if that’s what you’re trying to do.” Kade shrugged, stuffing the rest of the sandwich into his mouth. “I’m immune to bullies. It’s my secret power. Outside of shifting, that is.”

  The guard rolled his eyes at Kade.

  Usually Kade’s good nature was enough to make Sloan at least crack a smile, but she had too much on her mind at the moment to be amused by his shenanigans. Since the refugees of Term had arrived at the city of Azra a few w
eeks before, the city leaders had met them with anything but a warm embrace. In fact, they hadn’t met the city leaders at all. They had been placed in a large, empty apartment building at the outskirts of the city while they waited to meet with the governor of Azra.

  Their lodging was decent enough. It was an apartment structure with adequate rooms and facilities, but these were families. Families who needed to begin their lives from square one. They would need to find jobs and move out on their own to find knew homes as soon as possible, though they were being told they needed to wait to have their meeting with the governor before they were able to do so.

  On top of this, Sloan was having the urge again—that thirst that tickled the back of her throat. It reminded her of the monster she really was, told her she would need to drink again, and soon.

  “Despite our situation, the view could be worse.” Kimberly walked beside Sloan, opposite Kade. She wore a giant cloak that shielded her from the sun’s rays. “Azra is a beautiful city. Not as welcoming as Term, but nice in its own way.”

  Sloan still stayed quiet. She had taken time to notice the sea breeze as it drifted into the city. Azra was located on the water’s edge. The city sat on a hill and had an amazing view of the sea as it stretched out as far as the eye could see. But Sloan wasn’t interested in the view today. Her mind was reeling with ways to get the citizens of Term integrated into the society as soon as possible, figure out a way to curb her thirst, and above all, get back to New Hope.