Fatal Sight (Harbingers Of Death Book 2) by LeAnn Mason (universal ebook reader txt) 📗

parrot, but I needed the answer. Why was he hunting me? Why had he killed my parents? Why me?

“You really know nothing.” His sigh was long-suffering, annoyance beginning to seep through his jovial facade. “I detest lectures, so pay attention. This will be short. I am sure you have learned by now how we vampires are formed.” When the vampire flicked a glance my way to confirm I was following so far, I schooled my expression into neutrality, still angling for a way to take him out if an opening presented itself.

“And of course, the only way we can retain our soul and our immortal life is if we continue to avoid being discovered by harbingers. It is fortuitous that generally, we remain under the radar, so to speak, since we are already dead. But there is one harbinger that can find us should our existence be threatened again.” Anthony raised a finger in my direction.

“Me?”

“It is unfair, really. We were humans, given the gift, the opportunity of becoming supernatural. We are strong enough to escape death the first time. We earned the right to a second chance at life — a supernatural life. And yet, you other supernaturals think you are above us, that you have the right to steal our very existence from us. We are hunted just for what we are. It is genocide.” The last was spoken with an angry roar, and I took a step back, nearly tripping on the druid. Suddenly, he grinned, and I repressed a shudder. “I suppose you know something about that.” His chuckle sent a tingle of discomfort down my spine, and my expression soured.

“Anyway, if we remove that which threatens us, we can retain our lives. Another thing that I think you know about now, don’t you, little banshee?”

I hardly thought they were ‘lives’, considering he was actually dead. Either this vamp was special, or dying and coming back fucked up your head because his logic was faulty. He didn’t earn his life. He stole it. He slipped out of death’s grasp like a prisoner escaping the cell he belonged in. It was unnatural. Especially when his continued existence was dependent upon him taking life from others.

“So, what, you kill all banshees so you can make more vamps?”

Anthony tossed his head back and laughed so hard that I hoped that he might pass out from the exertion. Then he sobered and turned to me with condescension. “Goodness me, no. If the Harbingers relied on banshees, they’d long be defunct now, would they not?”

He had a point. Somehow, the director foretold the deaths before I did. I wondered fleetingly again who the director was. A god? The God? The Fates with their strings to cut? Did they decide the deaths or simply observe them? No distractions, Aria!

My chin jutted up. “So, why do you need banshees dead if we’re not to stop souls from being reaped?”

He reminded me of the creepy dolls in every horror movie ever made that I’d seen late at night on bad cable channels in various motels. “Because we need to continue to avoid death.”

Feeling stupid, I blinked. “You want to make it so I can’t tell the harbingers about your next death? Jokes on you. I can just kill you now and ta-da.” I spread my hands wide, wiggling my fingers. “One soul, ready for the reaping.”

He rolled his eyes. “As if you could.” He hadn’t told me his weaknesses with all this information — or his strengths, besides evading death. Did they get abilities with their supernatural upgrade?

“Why not just silence us?” I asked. I didn’t let my hand drift down to my hip again, but if my mother thought of turning off my abilities, why hadn’t the vampires?

He snarled. “Because there are others who would use you. We need a permanent fix.”

“Use me?” I chilled a little. “What others?”

“Such a young thing. You think there is only one vampire horde in this world?” He snorted delicately. “The others… they are older. They didn’t see the danger of banshees, only the potential. Stupidly, they brought them into their homes.”

“Why?” I shifted the dagger. Standing here talking so long was making my palm sweat, but it was useful information… assuming he wasn’t lying to me. But why lie when he planned on killing me?

“Why? Because, you simple girl, we drink blood. From humans.”

“Isn’t that like cannibalism?” I blurted out. “You were human before you died.”

He ignored me, but his nostrils flared. I was getting to him. I had talent like that. “Some of us...” He twisted his wrist. “Some of us get carried away. Bloodlust is a hard thing to fight.” His eyes drifted past me to the druid, and I realized I’d interrupted his feeding. He might have kept going if I hadn’t walked in. “If we go too far—” his eyes drifted back to me, accusingly, “— the harbingers show up.”

“Which you don’t want,” I finished, understanding. “Because then you get found out and reaped.”

His knuckles cracked as he turned to face me. “Exactly, little banshee. So, you, like your parents, need to die. Now, do you have any other questions or can we—”

I pounced.

It was to his detriment that he reminded me of his former crimes. I screamed with rage, those devastating moments blooming anew in my mind, that heart-crushing moment when I realized my dad wasn’t coming back, that I was an orphan, that he’d met the same fate as my mom. I’d sobbed into the musty motel room in which I’d been waiting alone for over a week before packing myself up — and leaving most of their effects behind as I’d been instructed — and moving on without them.

As anticipated, the cockiness was the vampire’s weakness. He’d assumed I’d listen politely to his full monologue. But screw that. In my version of the story, the villain died. Immediately. He got his just penance for all that he’d done to fuck with my life, not to mention who knew how