My Love Forever (The Night Movers Vampire Series Book 1) Read online

  “Freya, think what you are doing. Do you want to live with the death of your father on your conscience? Once done you cannot take this back.”

  “How well I know this brother, for I live it every day. Even though it was not what I wanted. But I will never be able to carry on knowing that my father murdered my family. If I do not do this to him tonight then you must promise that you will end me.”

  “No, Freya I could never do that. I only chose this life because father made you take the blood, I cannot live it without you.”

  “He took the choice away from both of us that night; he knew what you would do when I had taken the blood. I would bet you tried to stop him.”

  “Yes I did try. I knew you would hate him for it.” “Well now you know everything I hate him for, so you must understand why I have to do this. Please Aðalbrandr, help me finish him.”

  “I looked down at my father who had blood pouring from his mouth, and then I looked back to Freya and nodded my head.”

  “She removed his head with one swing of the axe and then quickly moved it from his body. She took the same blanket she had covered the woodpile with and asked me to help her wrap his body in it. She told me we needed to burn him until there was nothing left but ash, so I picked up his body and carried it to the cart.”

  “I tethered the pony to the cart as quickly as I could and Freya placed father’s head in a basket and covered it up.

  She went back into the house to bring a burning torch of wood. She placed it into a metal cone that was attached to our cart as we would need it to start a fire.”

  “Then we went far enough from our village so that they wouldn’t see the fire burning. We were lucky that the weather had been warm and sunny recently, so the ground was dry. After fashioning a small pyre we placed father’s head and body on it although we kept the two parts separate.”

  “Freya lit the blanket and basket surrounding his body and head and we watched as the fire raged on into the night and all that was left of my father were ashes.”

  I had stopped talking at that moment.

  That same sickening feeling washed over me every time I relived this night. I still cannot believe I played a part in my father’s death, and I wondered if Julia would be appalled with my story.

  She touched my face and kissed my lips. “You are still traumatised about that night aren’t you Alex. How did you face each other after all your fathers remains had gone?”

  “It was hard for me to look at Freya. She took my hand and started shaking and saying, “Please don’t hate me brother. I could not live knowing what he had done and not seek revenge for my family. But now it is done I cannot find the peace I thought would come to me.”

  “I took her in my arms and held her tightly. She was sobbing and shaking but I could find no words to comfort her. So I just continued to hold her until she stopped crying. Then I lifted her into my arms, put her in the cart beside me and set off for home.”

  “Before we got there she asked me to take her to where her family were buried, so I steered the pony in that direction and took us where she had asked.”

  “When we got to their grave Freya jumped down from the cart and walked over to the mound. It had flattened out over the year and the wild flowers Freya and Gamall had planted were growing in abundance.”

  “Freya Dropped to her knees and touched the ground before she began to wail so loud I thought she would wake the village. She clawed at the earth screaming, “I need you to come back to me my loves; I need to feel you in my arms.”

  “I ran up behind her and pulled her away from the earth before she could dig any deeper, and I held her arms to her side stopping her from moving.”

  “Please Freya, you cannot do this,” I shouted. “They are gone and you have to leave them in peace. You must let them go. Not in your heart and your mind though. You can keep your memories of them and I can keep mine, but you must let their bodies rest undisturbed.”

  “I cannot,” she cried.” I need to be with them. They were my life and without them I have nothing.”

  “You have me dear sister, and I have you. You are my only family now. Please do not leave me. I need you to survive this life. I chose it because of you, so that you would not be alone.

  Do not tell me what I did was in vain, and that you will try to leave me now.”

  “Freya turned and grabbed my shoulders before saying. “I don’t know how to do it Aðalbrandr. I don’t know how to live without reason.”

  “I will be your reason Freya. Let us try to live this life that we were thrown into and be good and honourable people.” She sagged in my arms and I lifted her on to the cart and took her home.”

  “We talked on the way and she told me how her need for her and Gamall to find out what exactly started the fire that night enabled her to find out about our father although she said she had her suspicions about him anyway.

  She told me how Gamall informed her of everything he had learned from Colton our fathers cousin, but how he was worried that she would not be strong enough to finish our father if she wanted to. So they organised for a good strong hunter/warrior to spar with her in fights. The hunter taught her how to fight with fists and weapons, and she gained more strength every day.”

  “Gamall had been reluctant to see his friend die even though he hated him for causing the death of Freya’s family, so he made her promise not to do anything until he had passed away.”

  “I said she could have come to me with what she knew, but she said she didn’t want to taint me with her deception and actions. Also she thought I may have tried to talk her out of it, which was definitely right.”

  “I realised that night that Freya had not been given time to really grieve over the loss of her family, so she sought revenge for them instead. I knew if Freya was ever going to be happy again she would have to grieve fully. I would help her, because no matter what she had done that night she was my sister and I loved her.”

  Julia was silent but her gaze never left mine.

  “I think if I were Freya I would have done the same. She had everything taken away from her, and then and your father took her choice away too by making her immortal.

  “If the driver who had crashed into me had lived I would have sought him out and shot him. Years in and out of prison hadn’t reformed him. He didn’t deserve to live after he caused Megan to die. I’m glad he’s dead but I would have liked him to suffer.”

  “It’s not so easy to kill Julia. It changes you and the memories haunt you, whether you are happy to kill or not.”

  “Have you killed many people Alex? I mean, you have lived a long life so you are a very powerful vampire. There must have been people who crossed your path who you fought with.”

  “In 1743 I was at the docks in Liverpool waiting for the fabrics to come in from the Far East. At that time slave trading was big business, and I happened upon an area in which slaves brought in on a ship from Africa were being paraded on a platform.”

  “A man was wielding a long whip which he cracked against the wood often, making the slaves and everyone around flinch with the sound.”

  “There were black men and women of various ages being sold to the highest bidder. Some of the women were topless and looked as if they had been beaten. Two of the men were also beaten and bloody and full of infected sores.”

  “One of the men collapsed and was dead before he hit the platform.” “A man who looked as if he worked for the one in charge of the auction just threw the dead man into a large crate. The other slave was swaying, as if he too was going to fall and the man who was asking for bids went to kick the sick slave into the same crate, saying that he was ready to die anyway so no one would bid for him.” “Before his kick made contact I leapt up onto the platform and said I would buy the slave. The auctioneer was shocked and asked if I was ill in the head for wanting a slave that wouldn’t last the day out, and the crowd that had gathered laughed at me. But I threw him some coins and they gave me leave to take the poo
r slave.”

  “I took him back to the rooms I rented whilst in Liverpool, but the landlady protested vehemently to his presence. I compelled her with mind control to stop her dispute and send for a doctor.

  I then brought him water to sip and I set about trying to clean his wounds. I thought he was too far gone for my blood alone to heal him but I needed to know if there was any chance of saving him so he could live a mortal life.”

  “He looked to be in his mid twenty’s and should have had a full life ahead of him. The doctor said that the infections that were in his festering wounds would finish him and soon, and there was nothing he could do.

  He had gone past the stage of fever and had turned cold and shivery. So I sent the doctor on his way after compelling him with mind control into thinking he had saved the man.”

  “I patted my chest and said Alex repeatedly, trying to get him to understand my name. Then I pointed to him and he weakly touched his own chest before saying something like, ‘Jesuwa.”

  “To me it sounded like Joshua, so I patted his chest and said ‘Joshua”

  “Then I looked into the man’s eyes and asked him if he would like to live forever. Of course he couldn’t tell what I was saying but he nodded his head anyway. I bit into his wrist and drank his blood, his gaze never leaving mine as I did so.

  I didn’t need to drink for too long as he was near death anyway so when I heard his heartbeat falter and get to the last few intermittent beats I bit into my wrist and gave him my blood.”

  “The next evening he roused a made immortal or vampire as common folklore likes to call us. Joshua was thirsty for blood constantly and with the language barrier it was hard to get him to understand that I had to bring it to him.

  During that time I used mind control to get the local prostitutes to come to my rooms and feed Joshua their blood, although I did pay them well for this service.”

  “It took nearly a week for the bloodlust to calm enough to transport Joshua with me safely back to Yorkshire.”

  Julia put her hand on my arm and asked “Is this Joshua York you are talking about? Josh your friend and colleague?”

  “Yes it is. We each of us have a story Julia, human or not.”

  “Carry on Alex,” she encouraged.

  “We stopped regularly on the way back and made sure that he was well fed on both blood and healthy foods. When Freya saw what I had brought with me she looked at me astounded. We had never before discussed turning a human and she was shocked that I had done so. I explained what had happened and she immediately took him into her arms and held him, whispering soothing words which visibly calmed him.”

  “Over the next few months Freya taught him how to speak English. She also taught him to read, write and basically everything else he would need to know to help him get by in life.”

  “Joshua told us about his life in Africa. His family were poor, as were most of his village. They had a small parcel of land and a shared Ox to help them plough.

  He worried that without his help his family would struggle to work the land.

  Unfortunately as Joshua was a made vampire he would not be able to survive in a sunny climate anymore so he would be unable to return to his family.

  So at twenty five years old he became part of a new family, a brother for me and Freya.”

  “Often Joshua would wake up in a panic, screaming in his natural language.

  He said the horrors that he and the others had experienced on the ship would come back to him in his dreams.”

  “He was beaten badly for trying to stop the rape of one of the women that had been captured. She had been from his village, and was a sweet, kind young woman, who was going to be married to his friend.”

  “A few of the captives had been brought on deck to work, and it was during that time that two of the guards had grabbed the woman and forced her down to the floor before they started to rape her.

  She screamed and tried to stop them but her movement was restricted as she was still in chains.”

  “Both Joshua and another captive leapt on the guards and tried to stop them but they couldn’t do too much as they were in shackles.

  They were pounced on by a number of guards before being tied to a pole then whipped and beaten. It was the lacerations from the whip which became infected on Joshua, and would have been his death if I hadn’t saved him.”

  “The woman was brought back below deck later and was unrecognisable. They had beaten her so badly that they had broken her jaw, cheekbone and all her fingers. Her eyes were swollen shut and she was bleeding from her mouth and ears, and as she was naked they were also able to see that she was bleeding from her female parts and backside. Because all the captives were on shorter chains, no one could go to help her so they all they could do was listen to her whimpers and tears until later that night the whimpers stopped. Her body was discovered the next morning by the guards bringing water. The captain came down and became angry and beat the guards, I suppose to him he had lost the money she would have brought when sold. They went away and left her body below deck for hours before they came back and wrapped her in cloth and took her above deck to dispose of.”

  “After he had done speaking I knew that I couldn’t rest until these men were punished, but it was Freya who suggested finding out when the ship was next due into Liverpool so that we could bring the men to Justice.

  The whole issue of slavery was bad enough to contend with but to treat another human that way was deplorable and while these men were alive their brutal actions would continue.”

  “At that time it was seven nights travel to Liverpool as Joshua could only travel at night. So we planned our Journey well in advance and when we finally reached Liverpool I went about my business as usual.”

  “During the daytime I purchased fabrics and other items from the trade ships so no one would become suspicious as to why Freya and I were hanging around.“

  “When the ship came in we stayed until some of the crew and guards came on to the docks. I recognised one of the guards, who was present at the auction, but obviously I could not identify anyone else, although seeing him was enough to assure me that it was likely to be the same crew as it was nearly a year before when I rescued Joshua.”

  “Joshua was always treated equally by Freya and I. He was our family as far as we were concerned but for this to work he had to act like our slave. It didn’t matter that he was finely dressed as many people considered it a sign of wealth to be able to dress slaves in fine attire.

  We perused the local Taverns and whorehouses until we found the same men who had raped the woman Joshua had told us about.”

  “We lured them to the back of a slaughterhouse which was a fitting place to end them.”

  “It would have been easy to just break their necks or slit their throat but Freya suggested a punishment befitting their crime. So Joshua handed them a knife each and then Freya used mind control on them, telling them to cut off their cock and balls.”

  “The men screamed as they were doing it, but Joshua kept up the mind control that Freya had started and encouraged the men to carry on.

  He used mind control again to help them remember the woman that they had raped and left to die onboard the ship that had brought Joshua to England.”

  “Eventually I decided that I had seen enough and sharpened my claws to slit their throats. When death finally claimed them both, Joshua collapsed on the floor and wept. He carried on crying during our walk back to the rooms and Freya immediately started to mother him, drying his tears and putting him to bed. Then she let her own tears flow but I couldn’t comfort her.”

  “I felt sickened and could not seem to stop pacing, so I went out to a tavern and drank until I felt warmth seep into my cold mind, letting the whore I purchased change the thoughts in my head to pleasure not death.”

  “We left Liverpool the next morning and none of us have spoken of that night since. Joshua and I dealt with enough scum over the years that needed a swift exit from this
earth, but we usually just used mind control to screw them over and take their money and property instead.”

  “We gained property and businesses all over England but we always preferred Yorkshire. We have homes in North, East and West Yorkshire as well as here in South Yorkshire where our main business is run.”

  “Freya came to live with us for a time near to this area where we are now.

  She was always trying to do her best by the families surrounding where we were living in Barnsley in South Yorkshire.”

  “There were many women and children working in the mines as well as the men of the family, and many of them did not make it too far into adulthood.

  They were either dying in accidents, from poor nutrition and lack of sunlight, or back breaking work. All common occurrences for the poor mining families in our beloved Yorkshire, and throughout Britain and Wales.”

  “Freya used to go to the poorest areas with baskets of fruit, meat and bread to help feed the families living there. They used to call her ‘The Angel’ because of she was so kind and generous and would always make time for the children, telling them stories like she used to in our own village when she was still human. And of course when you see Freya you will also see why the children thought her an angel.”

  “I can’t wait to meet her.”

  “She will love you Julia, and you will love her.” “What about Gregor? What’s he like?”

  “Gregor is a very serious man who doesn’t trust easy. He has a good business mind and he, Sergei and Viktor, head a similar business to ours in Russia. We have been friends for centuries and opted to merge part of our business some time ago. As well as doing our supermarket jobs we are both the go to transportation service for vampires, either born immortals or made.”