Neona leaped to her feet and rushed down the hillside. “Only one?”
“It appears that way.” Lydia accompanied her to the small village of a half dozen stone buildings with thatched roofs.
The other women were there, lighting a few torches before the main campfire was extinguished to leave the valley in darkness. Then the five women hurried to the cave where Neona’s mother, Queen Nima, was waiting.
The torches were slid into brackets on the stone walls, and the large room brightened. Pink- and cream-colored stalactites glistened with moisture high overhead, and sparkling water fell from a fissure in the stone wall, splashing into the pool below. Behind the pool, a narrow corridor wound deep into the inner recesses of the sacred mountain. In front of the pool, there was a wide stone floor, worn smooth over the centuries.
Queen Nima paced across the floor and motioned to the owl perched on the back of her throne. “He has spotted one male intruder, invading our territory from the north.”
Lydia’s niece, Winifred, muttered a curse. “Do you think it could be Lord Liao?”
“Possibly,” Nima replied. “Or one of Master Han’s soldiers.”
“They’ve never gotten this close before,” Neona said. The battle two weeks ago had occurred forty miles from their border. The women warriors of Beyul-La had borrowed horses from the nearby village to travel that far to fight the enemy, for it was imperative to keep the sacred valley a secret.
“No man can be allowed to see Beyul-La,” Nima warned them once again. “Freya, take the eastern territory. Winifred, the west. Neona, the north. And Tashi, the south. Find him. If he’s a lost villager, show him the direction home. Threaten him with death if he returns. If he’s one of Master Han’s men, kill him without hesitation.”
The four women bowed their heads to acknowledge the acceptance of their orders.
Neona rushed to the area where they kept their armor and weapons. She always wore the breastplate and helmet left by her father, a warrior from Greece.
“There are only six of us now,” Winifred said as she slipped on a metal-studded leather breastplate.
“We know that,” Lydia muttered, watching her one remaining daughter, Tashi, put on armor.
“I think we should each consider having a daughter,” Winifred continued.
“Perhaps,” Queen Nima replied. “We will discuss it later. First we must deal with this invasion.”
“Oh, I see what Freddie means,” Freya said, coming to her sister’s defense. “The intruder might have potential.”
“Exactly!” Winifred nodded. “He could be fair of face, strong, and fleet of foot.”
Lydia snorted. “More likely, he’s a stumbling fool who has lost his way and doesn’t have the sense to get home.”
“But if he’s a good specimen,” Winifred argued, “we should consider taking his seed.”
Freya sheathed her sword. “I hope I find him.”
Winifred scoffed. “It was my idea. I should be the one to find him.”
With a laugh, Tashi handed them each a coil of rope. “Here. In case you need to tie him up.”
Neona frowned. Freddie and Freya seemed awfully eager to have a child. Didn’t they care that they would have to give the baby away if it was male? Neona had tried only once to get pregnant, but when the seed had failed to take root, she’d secretly rejoiced. After seeing the pain her sister had gone through, she was afraid of falling into that same trap of despair.
“Very well,” Queen Nima conceded. “You will take the man’s seed, but only if he is exceptional. Our daughters must be warriors, superior in mind and body. And don’t forget the main purpose of this mission.”
Neona nodded, while the other women murmured, “Yes, your majesty.”
With a growing sense of unease, Neona slid on her father’s helmet. It was brass with a black plume and decorated cheek guards. She’d always wondered what had happened to the brave Greek soldier who had journeyed so far from home and become the father to her and Minerva.
When she was young, she’d asked her mother, and Nima had said he’d gone back to Greece. Then she’d warned Neona never to speak of him again. Over the years, Neona had come to suspect that her mother had not told the truth.
“Stay true to our noble cause,” Queen Nima reminded them. “Once you are done with the man, kill him.”
Chapter Two
From his perch high on top of a craggy peak, Zoltan surveyed the countryside around him. The landscape had become increasingly mountainous as he’d traveled south. Up here, he could see farther, but the cold wind was slicing through his suit. As a Vamp, he could endure it better than most humans, and since he’d always prided himself on never quitting till a task was done, he decided to press on.
A large bird flew by, a hawk, Zoltan thought. It was a shame he’d never been able to communicate with birds like his mother could. If so, he could have asked the hawk the location of the fierce warriors that the dog had warned him about. Or perhaps the bird would know something about the feathers on the end of the new arrow he still held in his hand.
A few years ago, he’d taken the old arrow from his castle to some scientists in Budapest so they could examine it using modern technology. The results had surprised everyone. The arrowhead was ancient, similar to those used by the army of Alexander the Great. The carvings were unknown. The feathers were from a golden eagle, and the wood had come from a king cypress tree, which grew in parts of China and Tibet. The scientists had concluded that the arrow had been crafted in ancient Greece, using wood that had been imported from the east. They’d urged him to donate it to a museum, but he’d declined.
Now he had to wonder if the scientists had gotten it backward. What if the arrow had been crafted here in Tibet, using an ancient Greek arrowhead? Did that mean the so-called fierce warriors had traveled all the way from Tibet to Transylvania to kill his father?
Zoltan had always wondered if his father’s murder had been an act of revenge after the death of his mother, but it didn’t seem likely. It would have taken months to travel such a long distance in 1241. And his father had been murdered only a few hours after his mother.
Unless . . . could the murderer have been a vampire? A Vamp could have teleported to Transylvania. Or maybe the fanciful tale told by a few surviving villagers had been true. They’d given him a horrifying account of monsters and warriors so fierce that no living person could have ever defeated them. Zoltan had always suspected their elaborate story was nothing more than a pitiful piece of fiction to justify their failure to save their village and loved ones. If only he could remember more of that fateful day . . . but he’d spent most of it unconscious. He’d awakened the next day, miles from the village with no idea how he’d arrived there.
He took a deep breath. That was 1241. Those warriors, even if they had been fierce and monstrous, were now dead. Unless they were vampires . . . But if they were bad vampires, why did they fight Lord Liao two weeks ago? Why did they save Russell?
Zoltan levitated higher in the air, gritting his teeth against the cold wind. Higher and higher so he could see over the mountaintops. There, to the south, were those lights?
He focused on them so he could teleport there, but then with a flash, they disappeared. Damn.
How could he give up now? He teleported across the valley to the top of the next mountain, then continued to teleport, zeroing in, as best as he could surmise, on the area that had been lit. After ten minutes of traveling, he landed on a sloping hillside, surrounded by forest. He had to be close now.
Dead leaves and needles cushioned the ground, softening his steps as he moved downhill. Every now and then, the forest cleared for an outcropping of large boulders that gleamed silver in the moonlight.
With his superior hearing, he caught the sound of a trickling stream far to his right. It was running down the hill to the valley below. And behind him, the tiny snap of a twig.
Animal or warrior? He paused to listen more closely. A whooshing sound. He dove behind some bushes just as an arrow missed him and thudded into a tree.
He glanced up at the arrow. The same carved design on the staff. The feathers of a golden eagle. He’d found them!
Or rather, they’d found him. He teleported to a nearby outcropping and crouched on the rocks, scanning the forest.