Two months ago, a slayer killed Nikolaus Drake.
Not any slayer, but a vigilante witch with death in her eyes.
As if acid, her blood ate into his flesh. Felled in an instant,
Nikolaus had gasped for breath, and could not find it. His heart
had stopped beating.
A vampire isn’t supposed to survive the death cocktail—
that’s what vampires call witch’s blood—but, after being hit,
Nikolaus had collapsed onto the body of one of his dying
cohorts. Crazed by the active decimation of his body, he’d
drunk from his friend, racing to take the blood before death’s
release of the mortal soul made it useless.
The blood had served to restart Nikolaus’s heart. He wasn’t
sure how he’d made it home, or how he’d been able to stop
the caustic effects of the death cocktail.
And it didn’t matter anymore. Nikolaus had survived. He
was now a vampire phoenix, risen from ash and blood. But his injuries had forced him into seclusion, for a witch wound
proved a stubborn heal. He still bore scars and could yet feel
his left lung wheeze when he exerted himself.
Before being transformed into a vampire, Nikolaus had
been a surgeon, a man who had witnessed many people
survive incredible odds to recuperate and heal. But yes, sometimes
they also died.
Experiencing recovery for himself had changed him. It
had fixed a lust for vengeance into the scarred sinews of
Nikolaus Drake’s soul. He, a man who had always strived for
peace, now desired a bloody revenge.
Foremost, Nikolaus could not stand back and do nothing
when he knew the witch yet stalked the shadows in search of
one more vampire to make ash.
Summer solstice arrived in two weeks. That night,
Nikolaus planned to return to tribe Kila.
Yet he could not do that until the anger that had brewed
within him for two months was settled. Before the attack,
Nikolaus had led tribe Kila and served them well for twenty
years. The tribe was wary, but none were safe from the death
cocktail—save Nikolaus. He possessed immunity now—the
witch could not again harm him—so hewould fight for his tribe
and destroy the enemy.
One thing could tip the scales and return his mind to the
peaceful resolve needed to lead properly.
Tonight, he would kill the witch.
The witch’s name was Ravin Crosse, and she rode a big
black street chopper with the word venom curved across the
