[S.C. Bloodline, CH 17]

[Amelya’s point of view]

“I can see her” Nixole’s voice echoed through her mind as she collapsed onto the floor.

Pain fluctuating across here entire form. A ringing echoing through her ears. Nela was quickly at her side, Monticello at her heels.

“What happened?” Monticello questioned his golden arm glistening in the setting sunlight.

“Give me the girl!” Nixole’s voice was harsh and screeching.

Before she’d even realized her body was crawling toward the young witch. Who still laid on the floor knocked out from her Aunts spell to transport her.

As her hand touched the girls back a blackness enveloped them.

“I knew you couldn’t resist” The old witches voice chuckled a bit out of the darkness. “She’s got powerful blood”

“My blood!” Nixole gasped, a white gowned woman layed just beyond Amelya’s reach. “Your of my line? How is that?”

The old woman appeared sitting cross legged in the middle of the black abyss. A smile on her face, yet her golden teeth were gone.

“We come from a long line of witches. One in particular who has been gone along time. She warned of your and Onyx return.” The woman shook her head from side to side. “Onyx was your doing. You created him. We have long since been waiting. Your daughter sends her regards”

As the woman spoke a figure started to form out of the blackness at their feet. A small cat formed, black as the night sky, eyes a twinkling green.

“This will be your vessel! I refuse to let my niece become the plaything that you will use to destroy the immortal” The woman’s voice was powerful but Nixole just laughed a bit.

“Do you understand who I am?” She stood up and in seconds whipped her left hand at the woman and she was floating. Yet she hadn’t broken out of her pose. “I refuse to let you not see my wrath”.

Another swipe of her hand and the old woman’s eyes opened. The white blindness washed away leaving soft light brown eyes. Startled by her recovered sight she looked at Amelya still pinned to the ground.

“I can’t move!” Fear was ripping at her voice, and her eyes darted from Amelya to Nixole.

“You bring me to this prison world. Encore a beast to trap me in. Using spells I made centuries ago.” Nixole shrugged a bit looking down at Amelya. “She was going to give up a secret that you haven’t been told of an old prophecy my daughter saw.”

Amelya tried to stand up but was met by some unseen force. Nixole just stared at the old woman, waiting for her to speak again.

“If you knew all this then why not warn your newest child?” The woman smiled.

“Newest child?” Amelya found her voice and questioned the old witch.

“Children!” The old witch laughed.

“I created the spell that saved my family when the old village burned our home due to my own ignorance. I had cursed the woods, helped the few humans who made it through. Gave them food and jobs. Protected them!” Her voice grew. “Then they repay me by burning my home to the ground. I reanimated everyone by sacrificing my youngest two girls to revive the rest….”

“Those two girls have been reborn” The woman laughed. “The witches of the great covens have the other girl. She’s already been a huge help to us.”

“Thanks for letting me know where my other daughter is” Nixole said while looking down at Amelya. “I’m sorry daughter. If not for your sacrifice none of your brothers and sisters would have survived.”

“She sacrificed her young twins to revive all her other children!” The old witch laughed. “You both ment less to her.”

“That’s why Onyx needed my blood and Cleo!” Amelya was struggling to her feet now.

“Your father took your mate to have something over you. His witch could have easily took the blood she needed.” Nixole huffed looking back at the old woman. “What do the witches want?”

“Of course they want to see the end of your precious immortal children.” The old woman struggled but didn’t have the strength to break away.

“Why? Most of them have been sleeping since long before this generation of witches was born.” Nixole had lost her nerve, the power was gone.

“Do you think it’s been all sunshine and rainbows since the last war? Witches have been hunted by humans. Hunted by the immortals your children created for their power or just to get them away from the immortals.” The old woman shouted, her temper getting the best of her. “You brought about the abominations, and only you are to blame.”

“Let them be in peace. We all take down Onyx and destroy him for good. Then you let the rest of my children go about their lives.”

“Will you willingly let his sireline die with him?” The old witch questioned. “Even those of your children who will take his side again?”

“There can be peace.” Amelya stumbled towards Nixole. “Onyx has to be delt with. But killing this witch won’t do anything but further us from being able to live together.”

A wave of her hand and the woman fell to her feet. Nixole looked in awe for only a minute before turning to Amelya. A sadness deep within her caused a few tears to fall from her eyes.

“You both saved them all.”

“You need to accept the vessel” Amelya said moving between Nixole and the old woman. “We need them on our side.”

“Your giving them the power to keep me in a cat?” Nixole asked looking down at the unmoving black feline.

“It’s a show of good faith. Onyx is going to be on a rampage. Showing the witches that we aren’t going to be like him will give them a reason to side with us”

“Your daughter is correct.”

“What if they don’t side with us? What if they side with themselves? Try to destroy all of you?” Nixole was pleading.

“What if they are tired of fighting…. And just want to live?” Amelya looked back at the old woman and gave her a quick nod.

“That vessel can only hold me if I allow it. So you better be right about this.” Nixole dropped to her knees next to the cat. “I’m sorry your sister and you have been cast into this shitty situation.”

“Your daughters are smart.” The old woman slowly stepped over to Amelya’s side. “The other girl was quick to help your kind once her powers manifested. Thankfully she was near a coven.”

“Protect them please.” Nixole started to weep.

“I’m not long for this world. It took all my power to bring my niece here to you. And create that vessel. You will be needed close to them.” The old witch’s movement started to fade a bit.

“I accept the vessel!”

Night had fallen once Amelya opened her eyes. Nela was standing over her shouting something she couldn’t make out at Sapphire who was at the gardens gate with a handful of vamps. Ready to breach to spell protection for the garden.

The cat appeared next to Amelya as she struggled to stand. Nela growled as the cat, rubbed against her leg.

“Take me to Sapphire…. I need to speak to her” Then she was out again.

[Cleo’s point of view]

Pain was all she could feel, once the deed had been done. Being whisked away from her pair felt like hell. Yet she could still feel all of the sadness that had consumed Amelya.

Light had started to shine down on them once they stepped foot in the sands. The witch hadn’t said a word to her, not that she could speak with Amelya’s blood in her mouth.

The black haired man stood off in the distance. Coming toward them at a slow pace. A smile on his face once he seen Cleo.

“How wonderful of you to join us” He said reaching toward the witch with his hand.

There fingers intertwined and a kiss was shared. Cleo just gagged to herself trying hard not to devour her lovers blood. Watching the two exchange a lust fueled kiss or two. Before breaking apart and gazing her way.

“With your silence I assume you got what we need from my daughter?” Cleo’s eyebrows raised in confusion. “Oh I forgot. You don’t know the price my wife paid to turn us all immortal and raise us from ash.”

“Don’t you think you should keep it to yourself?” The witch hissed through her teeth.

Onyx was quick to pull away from her grasp. A questioning look on his young face. Like the audacity of this witch to dare question his actions.

“This is my youngest daughters mate. Don’t you think she’s got the right to know the history of my family?” It was a question the witch didn’t answer, just nodded.

“Your old family my love” It came out of her mouth as a question but Onyx didn’t answer or acknowledge it at all.

“How could she be your daughter? She’s got parents?” Cleo hissed, not believing a word of his lies.

“Souls move through the either being chosen or not chosen. I do not know why? Or how? But from the moment I seen her I knew who she was.” Onyx turned his back on both women and started away in the sand. “We had ten children. Can you believe that? Only two of them inherited her power over the mystical arts.”

“That’s a lot of kids” The witch groaned, rolling her eyes thinking about how they came to be.

“Do you like humans?” Onyx question came as a shock to her.

It was out of place, it made no sense. They were off in god knows where. Watching the sun rise in a barren desert. And the most powerful and most dangerous vampire in the world was asking about humans.

“I don’t hate them…. Amelya was a human when I found her…” She answered back quickly and honestly.

“You don’t have to be afraid. Your to precious to Amelya for me to do you any harm.” Onyx didn’t look back but kept his eyes on the rising sun. “I wouldn’t cause her any more pain then necessary”

“So why take me in the first place?” Cleo countered.

“She doesn’t know me. Unlike the others who grew up and worked beside me. Your going to be the bridge between us.” Onyx turned his smile gone. “Do you think me evil young vampire?”

“You started a war against the humans…. Massacres in the name of your own power…. One of the reasons all your children were put to be dried….” Cleo wasn’t sure how to answer, so the truth would have to do.

“They burned my house while we slept…. All of us were human then….. Made my wife sacrifice our young twins to bring about our rebirth….” Onyx hung his head a bit. “What kind of monsters do such a thing. We treated them like friends and neighbors. Protected them from harm…… Yet I had to listen as seven of my children burned to death….”

“I thought you had eight more besides the twins….” Cleo said, questioning the math.

“A butchers son was sweet on Aquamarine….. She was young but had already received her mothers gift. He’d gotten her away…. Run into the forest my wife cursed to keep us all safe….” Onyx grumbled a bit thinking about the boy. “Foolish human ran them into a pack of wolves… She was much like her mother… As they attacked her and him. She cast a spell creating what you know now to be werewolves….. at the same time her mother was bringing the rest of us back from the either”

“What happened to her?” Cleo questioned as he looked up at her rage making his eyes red.

“She died changing the wolves to humans and the boy to a wolf. Creating the first pack….. I wanted to end his life once I found out what had happened….. Nixole refused me. Said his life was already saved by our daughter. So they were set up to keep us from humans.” Onyx looked at his new witch lover and his eyes softened a bit. “I couldn’t save my family from those humans…. But I refuse to allow them to destroy any more of our kind….”

“I’m sorry for your loss…” Cleo spoke the words and Onyx looked at her in utter disbelief.

“Why do you grant me those kind words child?” The witch took a step back as he rounded on Cleo. “I do not deserve them. I a man listen as my whole family burned to death. To weak to do anything….”

“You were unaware of a threat… That doesn’t make you responsible….” Cleo argued, the memory of her own father’s smiling face as hunters took his life flashed through her mind.

Tears started to fall and Onyx dropped his head to the sand. Letting a long sigh escape. Her own tears and pain starting to rush back in as a wave of sadness washed over her.

“I’m sorry to have scared you” Onyx stood and walked back toward his witch lover. “I don’t know what the stories and tales they tell you all now.”

“It wasn’t you…. You don’t scare me. My father was killed by hunters right in front of Jayden and I when we were younger” She chocked on the words. “They scare me….”

“Aquamarine didn’t die bringing back her wolf….. she merely ascended for a time. Much later she came back…. A lone group of men found her washed up by the sea…” A chuckle erupted from his body, shaking a bit his back still turned. “They became her lovers, protectors, and the first hunters of our kind…. Blessed by intricate tattoo’s that could only be passed by blood….”

“After that…. She disappeared….. nobody recorded anything more about her…. To our knowledge” The witch started. “I believe she’s still out there somewhere…. Knowing that he was coming back again”