Watch of the Wicked (Devil's Witch Book 3)

Nick didn’t argue against it when I asked to sleep downstairs. I think he figured after I spotted all the other tenants of the huge house I would eventually make my way back to him. I don’t know how old any of them are, but Will told me newly turned vamps are usually the most vicious. The moment Nick left my side my skin returned to its normal hue and he headed upstairs. I didn’t want to follow him, but I wasn’t going to risk sticking around for all the vampires to taste.

I found an empty room upstairs and locked the door after seeing Nick go back into his own room. Then I woke this morning to the sound of knocking on the door. Heinrich told me it was time to leave and that Nick was already outside waiting.

Now, we sit in the car together driving through town. It’s hard not to show my fear seeing most of the shops charred up from being set on fire. Most of the business buildings have red and black flags hanging outside. I don’t see any witches on the streets, just auras of mostly yellow and red.

We’re not in his normal police car now. Instead, we are in one of the bigger SUVs and another officer is driving the car and Heinrich is sitting up from in the co-pilot seat. They are all still dressed in uniform and so is Nick. His skin still makes him look like a ghoul and I think it may have to do with our conjoinment. Either that or his use of black magic.

The vamp baby sits between us strapped into a baby seat. He’s been crying the whole car ride and I wish I could cry too, but I cried enough last night. I have to be strong to get through this and rescue my friends...and the town too. I’m starting to think it may be too late though.

The car comes to a stop outside Nick’s church and Heinrich opens the door for me. I can hear the organ playing from outside. Once I get the vamp baby out of his seat, I carry him around the car where Nick stands talking with Heinrich in german. I don’t why, but my mind automatically picks apart their words and I’m able to understand them without som much as a second thought.

Nick looks up at me and waves for Heinrich to go in the church. His smile makes me even more nervous as he leads me into the church. Immediately, the first thing I smell when we walk inside the big church is blood. The coppery scent is overwhelming and I feel hundreds of eyes on me as I follow Nick up the aisle to the altar. I try not to look at the huge stained glass mural or the giant red and black flags lining the walls of the church’s interior. The only people in here are vampires and it’s unnerving having them all quietly stare at me like I’m some ethereal being.

I look down at the floor. No longer is it a shiny marble, but stained over in scattered smears of dark color. Could it be blood? But there’s so much of it...

I walk up behind the stage and the vamp baby finally stops crying in my arms as I sit down on a cushioned hand-carved chair. It has their symbol of supremacy engraved on the backrest and Nick’s chair is identical to mine. He sits down on it and is seated to my right -- closer to the edge of the stage than I am. A very old looking vampire policeman sits to my left and I spot Yansmen and Heinrich near a row of flags behind us.

Across the stage, a couple of other very old vampire men are sitting down with heavy looking black books sitting on their laps.

No one is talking and I squirm in my seat wondering what is going on. The only thing I can hear is the organ being played somewhere high above us. There’s something about it that just makes everything more sinister about this house of “worship”. Nick looks pleased when he catches me looking at him and I avert my stare sensing his arm resting just behind me on the top of my chair.

One of the vampires across from us stands up with his book in arm and strides over toward us to stand in the center of the altar. I catch sight of its title Neo-Vampire Doctrine.

There’s a lot of youthful vampires looking up at us and it makes me wonder just where all these vampires crawled out from. The coven wasn’t even aware there were so many of them, but maybe that is why they were so easily taken over.

The vampire slams the book down on what appears to be an offering table and then turns to the crowd below. He proceeds to scream things in german with a murderous glare and knotted fist as he looks up at the ceiling. I tense up, thinking him possessed just like both vampires on either side of me as they watch the screaming vampire like he’s a saint or something. He is lecturing everyone about their supremacy and the necessary actions the vamps are to take now that they’ve decimated the witch population.

They want to create a generation of vampires where there will be only a pure form of vampire hybrids, but I don’t know how they expect to do that when they’ve killed all the witches. Then I remember what Nick said yesterday about the vamp baby...and me giving birth to it.

I shudder and swallow bile seeing the vampire speaking suddenly turn around and look at me. A big bowl is being passed around the pews and each vampire takes their turn slicing their hand open and pouring some of their blood in it. It’s revolting and makes me nauseous. They are all insane. Eventually, the blood offering bowl makes its way back to the altar. Nick leaves his seat and I tremble in disgust seeing him dunk a glass inside the bowl and drink some.

The vampire who was giving his sermon retreats to his seat as Nick steps to the center of the altar facing the church-goers. The glass drops out of his hand when he downs it all and shatters onto the ground making me jump a little in my seat. My breath catches in my throat when I see the blood moving on the ground around him in a slow circle before rising off the ground and seeping into his clothes turning his uniform red.

His voice lowers as he tilts his head downward. Something seems to take over his body, “Someone has skipped out on their offering.” He looks up and jerks his head in my direction with a wide toothy grin that sends spiders up arms. His eyes are completely black blending in with his ghoulish skin.

“Let’s close in prayer,” he speaks in a deep, cunning voice while turning to look back at the crowd below. I watch as everyone below bows their head as Nick steps down from the altar walking row by row through the pews. No one looks up at him and everyone appears to be closing their eyes, but me.

I scream seeing him take his rifle out of his waistband. I don’t know why he has it, but it looks like something out of the military. He shoots a vampire sitting all the way in the back sending blood over all the vamps sitting nearby. No one even looks up from their prayer and I grab the vampire baby having enough of their sick ways and make a run for it.

I don’t want to be here!

No one stops me when I run off the stage with the vamp baby and into a back hallway. The floor is carpeted in red, probably to hide the evidence of all their other countless murders. I stop short in the hallway though when I hear a strange moan. Is that Stella?

I push the door open with a sick feeling in my gut and find the giant german officer has her tied up to a chair with rope. Stella’s arms hang limply at her sides with blood dripping down them from her neck. Heinrich stands behind her with his jaw clamped down on her neck and Stella’s face is full of some kind of twisted bliss.

“Stop it!” I scream.

Heinrich snaps his head up looking at me as if just now realizing he has an audience. I gag at the sight of my best friend covered in blood with a giant bleeding bite mark on her neck. I start to walk inside betting on Heinrich listening to me since I’m their supposed goddess. I can save Stella if I get him out of here and far away from us.

Once I step fully into the room, I start getting a strange sensation though. The air feels warmer in here than it did out in the hallway and my face takes on a blush from the peculiar heat. My legs feel like jello and I stumble with the vamp baby in arm.

Clumsily, I bump into a filing cabinet feeling the child’s weight disappear as strong arms take him from me. I blink hard as the room spins and rest a heavy hand on the cold surface of the metal cabinet I lean against.

My neck throbs where Nick bit me so long ago and I don’t know why. I place a hand on it with a whimper feeling my stomach start to burn too.

“G-goddess, I ssssorry...y-you not suppossssed to be in here...too late...” I hear Heinrich say somewhere in the room.

His voice sounds slurred, and despite his words, he doesn’t sound sorry at all. I look up under my lashes to see him standing right in front of me.

“I can’t...h-help it.”

“What?” I whisper while trying to look around him for Stella.

I scrunch my eyebrows in confusion when Heinrich grabs my waist with his large hand.

He smells like blood and spice, but my body feels sluggish. I can’t move much at all to pull away from him. My breathing becomes shallow as my mind fogs over feeling the healed bite mark on my neck pulsate again.

What he’s doing should send me running for the hills, but forbidden pleasure floods through my veins making every sensation hypersensitive. His hand trails down and over my hip to my bottom leaving a path of heat in its wake.

I close my eyes with a drunken smile and when I open them I no longer have the capacity to control my sight. All I can see are colors. That mainly being the bright red one in front of me.

Then another set of hands suddenly grabs my hips. Flustered, the side of my face flares feeling someone else behind me nuzzle their face into the crook of my neck. Their hands glow a darker red from the vampire in front of me with traces of black swirling around. One leaves my hip and starts rubbing my neck brushing over the throbbing area. A wave of pleasure washes over me when they start rubbing agonizingly slow circles over it with their thumb.

My throat feels dry and my heart pounds heavily in my chest. Their touching stops suddenly, leaving me a moaning mess as they haul me backward against them.

“Uh!” I gasp feeling them stumble back with me. The back of my head gets thrown back sharply into someone’s chin like they fell back against a wall. Faintly, I hear things fall around us in the background.

One of them steps out in front of me and moves along with me. They slam up against me and burrow their head into my neck like the one behind me is already doing.

“Ich bin auch hier.” a low voice chuckles behind me. Their voices tickle my skin and I squirm feeling uncomfortable smashed between the two of them.

The vampire in front of me answers in what sounds like an impatient growl, “Ich habe darauf gewartet.”

The voices sound familiar, but their names become forgotten. I can barely focus on them enough to hear them continuing to talk roughly in their foreign language to one another. All I can think about is the sauna the room has turned into and the blissful sensation their caresses and persistent touch bring. I don’t think I’ve ever felt so relaxed and safe.

I can’t even discern their auras now that I am sandwiched between them. My hand is grabbed from the one behind me just as I’m kissed fully on the lips by the other. My mouth opens in bliss feeling their heavy warm touch roam over me synchronously.

Liquid heat pools down my wrist. My legs go weak and there’s nothing holding me up anymore, but their chests pressed into my back and front. I grit my teeth to keep from making an embarrassing sound. I can feel how red my face is already and covered in sweat from their relentless groping.

The person behind me drops my arm and starts kissing my neck, but the person in front of me still hasn’t pulled away. Their nearness and touch is too much and my head swims in confusion at why I’m being held by both.

Suddenly, the person behind me grips my waist and turns me around. Their lips smash into mine and I rock backward falling into the waiting arms of the other. I hear more things crash as the force of their impact has the vampire growling behind me.

Then something sharp pinches the side of my neck just as the person kissing me deepens the kiss. I tremble feeling the pulsing area on my neck get massaged by a strange sensation. Soon after, I feel a gush of liquid heat spill down my neck.

The person behind me pulls away, and at the same time, their hands leave my hips as they take up holding my wrist again. Something latches on to it and joins the sensation that’s pulsing steadily from my neck.

I’m left gulping for air with both my neck and wrist vibrating with a wonderful new heat. After a long minute, the person behind me releases my wrist. My upper body sways forward, and to keep myself from falling, I grab onto the strong shoulders of the one in front of me. I’m bent about two feet forward at an awkward angle with my butt pointed in the air. My nails dig into their shoulders because I know if I let go I’ll fall.

All the while, they’ve been talking to eachother over my head. I don’t know why it annoys me though.

They both stop talking and then return to weirdly nuzzling each side of my neck as if reading my thoughts. Another shudder rakes through my body. The one in front of me remains rubbing my back with their head still lowered into the crook of my neck despite my uncomfortable predicament.

My back arches when hands start lightly kneading my hips and working their way up my waist tempting me to let go of the other person’s shoulders.

The pleasant pulsing coming from my neck ignites another violent shiver down my spine and my knees buckle.

“Oh...” I sigh heavily in ecstasy feeling delirious.

My hands slip from the person in front of me, but my hips are gripped and kept firmly in place by the person behind me. Another shallow breath escapes me when hands make their way back down and start massaging my lower back as forbidden heat swells in my tummy.

“Ah!” I gasp feeling their grip on my hips tighten.

I’m pulled back so hard my body snaps completely upright with whiplash. Then I feel something hot wash over my skin seeping deep into my bones as hands stroke my hair.

“I’m tired.” I mumble feeling sore all over, particularly on my neck and wrist.

The touching ends and the room becomes less claustrophobic. My breathing steadies and my vision starts to come into focus. The first thing I see is all the sticky blood dripping down from my wrist. It looks like an animal bit into it, but I can feel Nick already using our magic to heal it, or more accurately, cover it up.

I look in front of me seeing Heinrich’s mouth covered in blood after he pulls away from my neck. Stella still is tied up in her chair bleeding. She’s slumped over having passed out because when I check her aura it’s still glowing telling me she’s alive. The vamp baby lays in a cardboard box in the corner of the room.

The room is Nick’s father’s office, but now it is destroyed. Papers are everywhere and cabinets are crashed over. The picture frames on the walls are either hanging lopsided or have fallen and smashed onto the ground. When I first came in here, it wasn’t so disorderly. No...we made this mess.

My heart clenches wondering just what exactly happened to me. Heinrich looks buzzed and not sorry at all. I look over my shoulder catching Nick smirking near the side of my head as he looms behind me.

Anger consumes me and I thrash in his arms. Heinrich looks shocked and when Nick lets go of me I turn around seeing him for what he really is.

If they worship me like they claim, then they should have no argument. Nick said he would change things if I didn’t approve, but he was talking about the church then. He never intends to change himself.

“How can you call me your goddess then treat me so cruelly? I will not be used!” I shriek.

His smile falls and he cocks his head to the side.

“You are the bearer of our children. Only you can give birth to our neo-vampire hybrids. We are not being cruel by showing you how much we cherish you for that. I have not turned you. Instead, I am sheltering you from such a fate and giving you the benefits.” Nick explains in a soothing voice.

I narrow my eyes and try not to sound hysterical, but it’s hard not to when I’m starting to connect the dots, “I don’t understand...what have you done to me?”

“What I have done once, I will do again. Over and over again, until our town has a sufficient enough population to survive and reproduce.”

Then I remember something strange. Something slimy and small, it had entered my mouth from one of them when they kissed me. I try to remember who, but everything is a blur. I know I felt this sensation before, it was before the vamp baby arrived.

Hesitantly, I touch my stomach. Something tiny moves around in the pit of it and my eyes roll into the back of my head.