Highland Son (Highland Sorcery: A New Dawn) by Clover Autrey Page A

Roque’s draconic genetics overshadowed the rest. And he’d never known any members of Roque’s clan, nor would his uncle ever speak of them.
    A multitude of questions sprang to his mind. Were there other surviving vampires? Where were they? How did they survive? Yet the minute Lance brought him downstairs into what was an old horse barn, the taller creature had been on him, leaning close, taking in his scent.
    “Magic trills through his essence. Strong, this one.”
    Alexander held his ground, allowing the perusal of his essence, fascinated at the vampire’s sensory ability to do so. How did it work? Pheromones? A higher sensitivity to magic? Could he detect a magic wielder’s essence with the same intensity he could hear his heart beat from a great distance?
    Oh just give him one sample and his equipment back at the lab…
    “What makes you believe you can succeed where my race has failed?” the vampire asked.
    “I don’t know that we can,” Alexander answered truthfully.
    The others in the barn watched him, eight or nine in all, intent on his every word. They were all men, hard-edged and watching him with a wariness born of putting their faith in the wrong hands. If Jewel and Lance had saved them from Sheppard, each one of them had magic or were not wholly human, or had been suspected of such.
    Then again, they may have met up after Lance left Sheppard. He doubted very much that the vampire was ever part of Sheppard’s group.
    “But we’re going to give it our best shot,” Alexander finished.
    They all had a stake in this. The vampire’s long hair fell lower on one side as he cocked his head, waiting patiently. Preternatural brown eyes bore into him, disconcerting in the way he seemed to take in everything. Alexander suspected the man heard his blood pumping through his veins, felt every pitch of his breathing.
    “Are there more of you?” Alexander asked before the vamp could throw another question his way.
    The vampire blinked slowly. “There are hundreds left, yes, holed up in colonies like rodents throughout the continents.”
    Anger flared through Alexander. His hands curled into fists. “Why haven’t you aided mankind? You could have stifled the tide of near extinction.”
    “Do not judge, little sorcerer. We, too, are at the brink of extinction. You delude yourselves in believing those monsters have a taste that only runs to humankind.” He pushed into Alexander’s space. “We fought at first, and in a fair fight, vampire-kind would have prevailed.”
    “Easy, Deverell.” Lance laid a hand on the vampire’s shoulder. “It’s a fair question.”
    “But with the Sifts’ ability to create holes and reappear at will…” Alexander conceded.
    The vampire nodded. “It’s true you have the means to even the battle field?”
    Alexander held Deverell’s penetrating stare. “Oh, yeah.” A grin tugged at his lips at the unforeseen range of new possibilities a colony of vampires provided. “Will your kind fight again? Fight with us?”
    The vampire growled deep in his throat, predatory and anxious, a lion who caught scent of a jackal. “We savor such a battle.”
    “Good.” Alexander hoped his expression was just as lethal. “Good.” But first he needed a plan to get Dez and Ethan out of Sheppard’s hands. His friends first, vampires later.
    He looked around the faces for Jewel, frowning when he didn’t see her. Where could she have gotten off to?
     
     
    ~~~
     
     
    Alexander choked on the first spoonful of soup. Had he heard her right? “You aren’t going back there. No.”
    Lance and the others quieted at his outburst.
    “I’m the only one of us who can.” Jewel kicked at the empty tin can near her foot that he’d just emptied of water. They sat in the barn on the bench seat of an old pickup, which no longer had a truck housing it.
    “It’s too dangerous. I won’t let you.”
    “Won’t let me? You’re the boss of me now?” Jewel shot off the seat, eyes flashing and