Blood Wars: Book 4 (The Talisman Series) Read online

  OTHER BOOKS BY BRENDA

  * coming soon

  Paranormal Romance

  The Emerald Talisman (Book 1)

  The Sapphire Talisman (Book 2)

  The Onyx Talisman (Book 3)

  Out for Blood – Phil’s Story

  Blood Wars (Book 4)

  Urban Fantasy

  Everblue

  Evergreen

  Everlost

  Dystopian

  Glitch

  Switch*

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  Blood Wars

  Book 4 – Talisman Series

  Volumes 1 – 4

  A novel/by Brenda Pandos

  Text Copyright © 2014 by Brenda Pandos.

  All rights reserved.

  This novel is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either a product of the author’s imagination, or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locals, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental and beyond intent of the author. No part of the book may be used or reproduced without written permission of the author.

  Cover design and layout by the author herself.

  www.designbybrenda.com

  Cover image © Valuavitaly - depositphoto.com

  TABLE OF CONTENTS

  OTHER BOOKS BY BRENDA

  DEDICATION

  Blood Wars - Volume One

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  Blood Wars - Volume Two

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  Blood Wars - Volume Three

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  Blood Wars - Volume Four

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  AFTERMATH

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  CONNECT WITH BRENDA

  OTHER BOOKS BY BRENDA

  EXCERPT OF GLITCH

  CHAPTER ONE

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  DEDICATION

  To Julie Bromley,

  for always being there.

  Blood Wars - Volume One

  CHAPTER ONE

  Nicholas gripped my hand as we walked through the crowded hall. I knew if I could feel his emotions, he’d be calm as a cucumber where as my heart flipped summersaults the entire time. Though I couldn’t wait to show him off, after arriving I wasn’t sure if I liked the attention anymore. Watching the girls stop and flap open their jaws when I’d just risked my life and annihilated vampires everywhere, made this seem so small in comparison.

  My whole other life before, due to my freaky empathic abnormality, had forced me to stay in the shadows and blend into the wallpaper as if I didn’t exist. But not anymore. Today I could finally let the world see the real me. The one I’d always wanted to be. Confident and smart. The one who didn’t react to everyone’s stupid emotions. The one whose mother didn’t die from a vicious vampire attack. The one who could easily nab a hot guy if she wanted. Of course having Nicholas’ love ahead of time helped, but I didn’t need him to feel good in my skin. Saving the world spun everything in a different light, and I didn’t need to prove myself valuable. I deserved love. In fact, everyone deserved to love and it shouldn’t be granted because of ones looks, or pecking order, or boyfriend, or anything superficial like that. I wanted to scream that truth from the top of my lungs. To set others free. They had no clue what life could have been like and it didn’t need to revolve around the car you drove or the fancy bag you carried.

  I turned to Nicholas and sighed. His beautiful, now blue-eyes, twinkled down at me.

  “Your high school is smaller than mine,” he said under his breath.

  “Correction, your high school.” I raised my right eyebrow.

  He grinned at me with that lopsided smile and my knees weakened. I could look at that smile forever.

  “I bet that’s her cousin,” a girl whispered after we walked past.

  “Ewww. That explains a lot,” her friend replied with a cruel giggle.

  I blinked slowly, and surprisingly, didn’t care. Before, I would have walked through her plume of jealousy and gagged, but I didn’t need to defend us. By third period, Nicholas’ history would splash the conversation of the school and those two would know the truth along with everyone else. Well, not the real truth.

  I smiled again, feeling the warmth of his hand encasing mine as it traveled up my arm. I was safe within his peaceful aura, or at least what I remembered of it.

  We made our way toward the registrar’s office as the dumbfounded sea of kids parted. I almost laughed when Mrs. Hinney did a double take before pulling up Nicholas’ new schedule.

  “Texas, huh?” she said. “I thought I detected a slight drawl. It’s so much nicer here with the sea breeze. I’m from San Antonio myself.” She stopped and hummed for a second, her fingers pulling out what looked like two schedules. “Interesting. It isn’t every day we get two new transfers.”

  The musky scent of Phil’s cologne filled the small space. Nicholas and I turned at the same time. I hadn’t so much as thought of him since seeing him at the cave yesterday.

  “We meet again.” Phil flashed his usual surly smile.

  My heart thudded a hard beat.

  “Oh, good,” Mrs. Hinney said. “Ya’all know each other.” She purposefully enunciated her drawl as she handed Phil and Nicholas sheets of paper. “I’m assuming you’re Phillip D’Elia.”

  “The one and only.” Phil smiled broadly and winked at her.

  Mrs. Hinney blushed. “Well, looks like you’ll be in the same classes with Nicholas Kendrick, here, which’ll make it easier for Julia to show ya’all around. You will, won’t ya, sweetie?”

  “Yeah, of course.” I looked over at Nicholas’ schedule. P.E., U.S. History, Physics, English, Precalculus, and Spanish II.

  I grumbled to myself. We only shared two classes together: P.E., and History with Mr. Marshall. Scratch that. I traced my finger over the paper and read a new teacher’s name.

  “Who’s Mr. Cruor?”

  Mrs. Hinney screwed up her face. “You didn’t hear?” She shook her head and tsked. “Mr. Marshall had a heart attack yesterday and is in the hospital. Mr. Cruor will be filling in until he’s better.”


  I exhaled sharply. “That’s awful.”

  “Yes, it’s quite shocking.” She rested her fist over her heart. “I would have never guessed him to be of poor health with how much he enjoyed running. One can never be sure.”

  “True.” In our prior life, vampires were most likely the culprit, preying on the healthy and the young. Nature had taken up the vacancy.

  I clasped Nicholas’ free hand, relieved we were in a different time now and could live without fear of the dark. The awkward pause lingered until another student tried the door handle behind us.

  Phil moved to catch the frame, holding the door open while smiling at the petite blonde who gaped up at him. I stepped around them and exited into the hall first. Phil insisted Nicholas go next. The two argued for a brief moment while the freshman’s eyes flickered between them. Oh, brother.

  Nicholas finally conceded and joined me by my side, clasping my hand again. I welcomed it like a bee to honey.

  “Ready?”

  I melted inside. Though I was still adjusting to his outer packaging, his voice and sweetness was the same.

  Phil walked behind us as we traversed down the hall silently, heading for the gym. With the delay, the clock hanging in the hall read we only had fifteen minutes left of class. Would now be the opportune time to interrogate Phil? It still needled me how he remembered my last name.

  “I never would have guessed,” Phil said under his breath.

  “Guessed what?” I turned to him.

  “Nothing.” Phil pressed me with his usual smirk before he turned down a different hall than the one leading to the gym. He did a quick look over his shoulder. “I know where to go.”

  “But that’s not…” the way.

  Nicholas gripped my hand harder and mumbled, “Don’t worry about him.”

  “See you around, Parker,” Phil finished flippantly.

  “Wait,” I called out.

  Phil’s steps slowed a beat. He didn’t turn around right away.

  “You never told me how you knew my last name.”

  He pivoted and shot his mischievous blue-eyes at me, and I remembered how dark they were when he was a vampire—dark like coal. “Because we’ve met before. Remember?”

  His admission rocked through me, and I bit my lip as he gauged us. I knew that look. I’d seen it countless times. He was challenging me to deny our relationship, what we’d been through. A desire to run to him and hug his neck choked through me. I’d lost him, my best friend, and now that we’d had a second chance in this parallel universe, I wanted to tell him I was so glad we were together again and alive.

  Nicholas’ simple tug brought me back to reality. Nicholas and Phil were rivals, and I had to think of him now. Though he didn’t ask me, I knew he’d love nothing more than for me to bury my past and pretend we didn’t remember. And it would be so easy to play dumb. Then there’d be no reason for Phil and I to be friends in this lifetime. My heart ached.

  This was the moment of truth, and I had to pick Nicholas.

  “Have we?” I asked, tipping my head.

  Shock hit his eyes for just a moment, then he wiped it away with a laugh. He shook his head. “Lucky guess then.”

  Nicholas’ locked wrist held me in place until Phil disappeared.

  “Why didn’t you tell him?” he asked, eyes questioning.

  I furrowed my brow, swallowing down the lump growing in my throat.

  “Because it will just complicate everything. There’s nothing we can do about it, and besides, the three of us are the only ones who remember,” I hope.

  Nicholas shrugged and remained quiet, and I hated that I didn’t know what he was feeling. I’d thought he’d be happy that I didn’t go there with Phil, but without my empathic abilities I’d never truly know.

  I wrapped my arms around his waist and hugged him tight, vowing to count my blessings every moment we were together. This was the right decision, confusing as it was. The past needed to stay in the past. In order for us to move on, we had to leave the unanswered questions along with it. Today would be the hardest day.

  We never ended up in PE. Instead, I lured Nicholas into the stairwell. We were nothing but lips and hands and heat—oh, the heat. Only once the bell rang, did we break apart. He moaned into my hair, and pressed his body into me, his want swallowing me whole. I licked my swollen lips, wishing we could just run away. Our near death experience made me want to grasp every moment with him as if it was our last.

  How was I going to keep my hands to myself long enough to attend class regularly, not to mention homework and graduation the year after next. My hormones screamed his name, and I wanted to give into them like a drug addict.

  “Now that’s my idea of physical education.” He ran his fingertips under the hem of my shirt, grazing my stomach.

  I giggled. You and me both, I thought.

  My cheeks heated when the sound of feet on the stairwell interrupted us, and I made sure my clothes were in the proper place. Not only had we completely missed PE, Phil knew we ditched. Did he mention something to Coach Hoffman?

  With a one last mind tingling kiss, I unwillingly extracted myself from Nicholas’ arms and tugged on his hand, leading us to the doorway. We needed to concentrate in the new history teacher’s class. Hopefully he wasn’t a tool like Mr. Marshall was.

  Once inside the classroom, we broke apart to a less obvious level. I motioned for him to sit in front while I took my seat in back, trying to keep our relationship on the down low. Brushing my fingers absently over the tender skin of my lips from Nicholas’ stubble, I wondered how red they were. There was an empty seat behind me, but if Nicholas sat that close, I’d be a goner the rest of the year.

  The substitute paid no mind to any of the students milling about noisily into the classroom. He couldn’t be bothered as he wrote a long list of dates and events on the white board. I cringed. New teacher meant new teaching style, new info, new everything.

  Sam and Katie came into the room, each giving me their version of a faltering smile. Then like magnets, both their gazes brushed toward Nicholas before they took their seats.

  Sam leaned toward me. “Hey, where were you? I heard something in P.E. about you and some new guy?”

  I bit my lip. Nicholas’ sudden arrival yesterday had left no time for me to tell Sam, let alone explain how I knew him. Our familiarity with one another was going to send her reeling and put me in the bad-best-friend-doghouse. “Mrs. Hinney asked me to give the new guy a tour of the school.”

  “Really?” Sam blinked at me with that look of happy shock.

  Katie slid into her seat in front of Sam, and ticked her head toward Nicholas’ direction. “For the love of hotness,” she mouthed.

  I hid my grin under my fingertips as Nicholas’ turned around and swung his baby-blues to meet mine. A sliver of warmth flooded me, settling deep in my belly. How were we going to fake this budding relationship when we knew each other so well?

  Then, like clockwork, just as the warning bell sounded, Phil sauntered in and panned the classroom. Sam bit her lip as the two exchanged odd, almost knowing glances.

  As Phil walked toward me, the sub turned and flashed a bright smile to the class. His incisors, shone for the briefest of moments, but my breath froze in my windpipe as his icy blue-eyes bore into mine—cold and power-hungry. Locked powerlessly within his gaze, the students faded around me. A shudder convulsed through me. I knew this man. I feared this man.

  Cain. The Prince of Vampires.

  “Mr. D’Elia, I presume.”

  Phil froze midstride.

  Only after the teacher turned his attention to Phil did I feel myself be released. Sweet air trickled once again into my lungs.

  “Nice to not be the only newbie around here. I’ve been expecting you and Mr. Kendrick. You’re fine where you are in front, Mr. Kendrick.” He gestured to me. “Mr. D’Elia, please take the seat behind Ms. Parker.”

  My throat hitched once again. He knew my name.

  CHAPTER TW
O

  Besides being Cain’s doppelgänger and confusing his intense gaze as a knowing stare, Mr. Cruor’s first name wasn’t Cain like I’d suspected. Horace, as the class discovered, was single, grew up in Boston, had a degree in archaeology, loved to travel, and owned a German shepherd named Felix. With his shock of black hair and piercing blue-eyes, all the girls were mesmerized by him—all but me.

  The evil memories of what his lookalike had done in the evil Dr. V’s lair scattered across my parallel universe like shattered glass. I knew firsthand the insane bliss of being bitten, the spiritual oneness of having someone drink your life force into their body. Only my blood was poison and his death started a chain reaction that killed every other vampire alive, including Nicholas, right before my eyes. Somehow we’d awoken alive without vampires, and only the three of us remembered. The coincidence Horace looked like Cain sat my teeth on edge, not to mention the feel of Phil’s breath heating the back of my neck the entire class period.

  After the ending bell rang, I darted out of the classroom first. The throng of people and nosey listeners anxious for gossip from the new guy made talking to Nicholas in private difficult.

  “Did you see—?” I started only to be thwarted by Phil.

  He joined our circle. “I can show Nick where the physics building is,” he said as if nothing had happened.

  “It’s okay. I’ve got it.” I looked into Nicholas’ eyes, remembering the horror when he’d changed into ash before me. A shudder convulsed down my arm to the hand he held.

  “You don’t want to be late to English. I’ve got it.” Nicholas gave an apologetic smile. He motioned his head back toward the history room. “Later.”

  So I hadn’t imagined the similarities. “Are you sure?” I forced out a weak grin.

  Nicholas nodded.

  I swallowed hard. “Okay, I’ll meet you back here.”

  As the two of them strutted away, the brown and blond heads of the guys I loved in differing ways, I couldn’t stop the terror welling inside me. The stomach-jolting fear I’d wake up from my dream where those I cared about were truly dead, rocketed through me.

  “You’ve been holding out on us,” Katie said as she joined my side.

  Sam took up the other, sandwiching me. “I’d say,” she said, angered.