But he’d sure as hell try.
Epilogue
Hunter stood outside the ceremonial teepee he’d erected near clan headquarters decades ago, his heart racing. Every year on his birthday he came to this rocky cove to seek guidance from the demon that had started all this. And every year he came out of the buffalo hide tent with no answers. He’d never once seen the legendary demon, and bit by bit, doubt chipped away at his beliefs.
This time had to be different. It wasn’t his birthday. And this wasn’t about answers or proving the demon’s existence. It was about a curse that was going to activate the moment he took a mate. A curse he knew he wasn’t strong enough to survive.
Baddon and Myne flanked him, daggers drawn, waiting for his signal. Myne was the most bullheaded, disobedient son of a bitch on the planet, but even he didn’t shirk ceremonial duty. He was a born vampire through and through, and Nez Perce honor flowed thick through his veins. He respected tradition and ritual.
He also liked making Hunter bleed. So yeah, this was always great fun for him and the only time Hunter could count on him to show up when ordered to.
Fresh from Riker and Nicole’s mating ceremony, Hunter squared his shoulders and let the ceremonial robe pool at his feet, leaving him naked in the biting cold night. Signal given, Baddon swung around in front of him. His silver blade flashed in the moonlight as he slashed a shallow cut across Hunter’s chest. The sting from Baddon’s knife was fleeting, but Myne’s wouldn’t be.
Baddon stepped aside, and Myne took his place, an eager smirk curving his lips as he jabbed the tip of his dagger into Hunter’s sternum. Pain made Hunter clench his teeth as Myne took his time carving a deep gash all the way to Hunter’s navel.
Myne was such an asshole.
Satisfied that Hunter was bleeding enough, Myne stepped back. “May your spirit quest bring you good fortune,” he murmured, the genuine sentiment behind the words leaving Hunter slightly astonished.
Baddon bowed his head. “Spirits be with you.”
Hunter acknowledged them both with nods. But he wasn’t here to talk to his totem animal or to contact any spirits. As third-generation born vampires, they wouldn’t know about the demon, and Hunter couldn’t tell them. They probably wouldn’t believe it anyway.
Sometimes even Hunter wasn’t sure what to believe.
He strode inside the teepee, his bare feet coming down on the soft animal pelts that lined the floor. In the center of the tent, the small fire Baddon had prepared crackled, its flames beckoning him closer.
Nervous energy made Hunter’s hand shake as he dragged his palm across his bloody chest and then gathered a handful of herbs and grasses from the plain wooden box placed near the fire. kneeling, he tossed the herbs, coated in his blood, into the flames. Almost instantly, the tent filled with a fragrant fog that teased his nostrils. Hunter closed his eyes and breathed deep, taking the smoke into his lungs.
“Come to me,” he whispered.
A grayish mist clouded his mind, and the ground fell away beneath him. Pressure built in his chest, a crushing, squeezing sensation that turned every breath into a searing whip of agony. At the same time, an intense buzz vibrated every cell in his body. He felt as if he could come apart at any moment. He hated this part of the ritual, when he was torn between wanting to throw up and wanting to scream with the ecstasy of it. This was the point where his totem animal, a grizzly bear, would often appear to him, but that wasn’t what he’d come for, and through a thickening haze of swirling colors in his head, he called out again.
“Samnult. Show yourself.”
Damn you, demon, if you exist, now’s the time to prove it.
In the dim recesses of his mind, he heard a voice.
He called to it, and then he cried out as a tidal surge of euphoria washed over him. It was as if he was floating, cradled by warmth while a million hands caressed him both inside and out. He was sex. The air touching him was sex. The smoke he breathed was sex.
“Hunter.” The impossibly deep voice rolled through him like an orgasm, and he moaned with the pleasure of it. “Open your eyes.” Hunter obeyed, found himself standing across the tent from a man draped in plush furs. Iron rings circled the rich reddish-brown skin of his arms. Crimson paint streaked his face from the corners of his mouth to where it disappeared into hair so black it absorbed the light from the fire, leaving the man surrounded in a swirling, pulsing shadow.
The world around Hunter lurched.
Demon. And not just any demon. This was the demon.
As if a secret door inside Hunter’s head had been unlocked, hundreds of years of history flipped through his brain like a movie on fast-forward. The very origins of the vampire race came to vibrant life in his mind.