CHAPTER 6 Orleans

Modern Times...

Anjael sent a message requesting a meeting with the Delphi of the Moon and then packed for the flight to Patmos. She wanted to go with the vampires, but she didn't fully trust the Master Vampire who was head of the Lake Mead Coven because of his ancestry. She had been to Lord Evan's parties in Blue Diamond. She knew who much of both covens' income came from a shared brothel and call girl service; many of the girls were from sex trafficking. She objected to the later, but the vampires did take good care of the workers releasing them after a decade, after they were enthralled to believe they had spent the last decade working in a sweatshop. The released workers were also given a green card. Their broad blackmail ring kept the non-humans in and around the state safe.

For now, her demoness added. She had lived long enough to know humans would only obey or pay for so long to keep their secrets then they would lash out.

It was almost sunset when she arrived at the terminal. She was surprised that Lord Vincent, his beloved, son, and three more of his coven weren't with the others.

"Where is your master?" Anjael demanded of a female vampire.

"The coven leaders decided to stay to manage the coven assets."

Anjael stepped off the plane and dialed his number.

"Lady Wasi, how are you?"

"Wondering why you aren't on my plane?" Anjael tried to keep the snarl out of her voice. "The Augur Vampyr ask the Werewolf Delphi to help the covens to leave this continent."

"Only six of us are remaining. We will be perfectly safe. I have hired additional security. Have a good flight." Vincent hung up before she could protest.

She texted, You owe me.

The response was immediate, Only if the threat proves true. I still do not believe there is an Augur Vampyr. This may just be a way for the wolves to get the Vampires to leave this country. My coven will enjoy their vacation on your dime.

Rolling her eyes, she texted Ouro, Dart, and Lazarus about the situation. Why are Lord and Lady Alexandroff and a third of their coven staying in Las Vegas?

Dart texted the group. I am sorry, my queen. He suddenly changed his mind after making a phone call.

Lazarus added, Leave them.

Considering the past motivations of the Alexandroff vampires, she texted back, Dart, come to the airport.

She went to the door, stripped, and spread her wings. Ten minutes later, she circled above the Las Vegas Coven Manor. She landed and walked in. The office door had been opened and she could hear Vincent's son Donnie upstairs. He and his uncle were looking for the safe that held the wealth and paperwork of the destroyed coven and complaining loudly about only finding the empty one in the office. Remembering how little loyalty vampires who didn't follow their deva had, Anjael shook her head in disgust and stepped back outside. She flapped her wings and headed back to the airport. Dressing she then boarded the plane. She smiled at all of the vampire passengers as she slipped into the cockpit.

"Ready to go Rick?" She smiled at the pilot who had been with her since the first Gulf War.

"Aren't we waiting on Dart?"

"I am here." Dartanian closed the door. "My queen. My apologies for..."

"Don't apologize for the treachery and lack of loyalty of the vampires, Dartanian. The leaders of Lake Mead Coven stayed behind to loot the corpse of the Las Vegas Coven," Anjael announced bitterly.

"Vampires have no loyalty beyond the blood and bite," Dart muttered.

"That isn't true... Those who follow their deva care about their species," Anjael corrected him, but she knew Dart would never trust any vampire after what happened to his stepfather.

"Deva?" Rick asked. "What's a deva?"

"Devas are what humans call gods and goddesses. The vampires worship the three-faced goddess of death, sex, and time. She is their mother after a deva of the sun rejected and cursed them when they refused to kill and conquer the other species or so their mythology claims," Anjael explained.

"Well, if I wasn't an atheist, she sounds like the kind of goddess for me and my best buddy."

Dart laughed at Rick's tone, but Anjael shook her head as she went past her fellow Bibre Cruor and his human friend.

As the plane sped eastward, she wondered if she should send a warning to the Coven Orleans and Coven Le Moyne. Closing her eyes, she let herself remember.

/\^^^^/\

1812, Louisiana...

Mardi Gras was particularly decadent this year and Anjael loved it until the murders started. The entire city went from festive to terrified after the third body had been found clawed like a werewolf attack, drained of blood like a vampire attack, and with blue lips and a grimace like the soul had been sucked from the victim.

The two Lord Me Moynes argued with a warlock from the local Wicce coven about who was doing it. The three couldn't decide if it was a true deamonus or a wendigo. The human chief constable talked about summoning soldiers from the United States Fort upriver. The territory would be a state in a few months. However, the governor of the territory argued against it, afraid the United States would retract their agreement to make Louisiana a state or send soldiers to declare marshal law. Lady Wasi watched from above.

As the only Cruor believed to be on this continent, Anjael leaned over as the son of the Coven Orleans master murmured to her, "What do you think?"

"The victims did not smell of deamonus. Someone is trying to make it look like the vampires and werewolves are both killing them."

"Do you really thing so? This wendigo thing sounds terrifying." Claude shook his head.

Anjael let her tail rub his leg and he smirked at her as she finished, "I have never smelled a wendigo, so I do not know if it is true. It would have to travel a great distance from its territory to come here... I do not think it is such a creature... The bodies smelled of... of nothing... like something was poured on them to hide every scent."

Claude kissed her shoulder. "Perhaps. Let us go. I'm bored. There is a party at the Pearl River Plantation tonight."

Shaking her head, Anjael turned back to the discussion. The argument went on until an hour before dawn. The vampires went to their manors. After enjoying a passionate morning with Claude before he slept, Anjael went out into the sunshine. Looking at the haunting, moss draped trees, she wondered what was hunting the boroughs of the bayous around New Orleans. She dropped her slip and spread her wings. Flying east to the secret Coushata camp. The elder bowed to her as she landed and greeted him.

"Why have you come to seek us, wind walker?"

Folding her wings around her, Anjael asked in his language, "Elder Wolf, have the creatures called wendigos ever come to the bayou lands?"

"Never, they do not like the combination of heat and humidity. Occasionally, in winter, they will travel down the spine of the sky-reaching mountains which divide east from west, from the land of the bears to the land of the Dinné but they do not come here." The elder alpha tipped his head at her. "The heat melts their frozen hearts...Why do you ask about such a creature, Pale as Clouds?" He used the name his tribe called her.

"Someone is murdering humans in the areas around the city of New Orleans. The bodies are clawed like a Lycani attack, drained of blood like a Vampyri attack, and appear to have had their soul sucked out as though a Deamones attacked them," she revealed.

"Where their hearts or eyes eaten?" the elder asked, looking perplexed.

"No, and the bodies smell of nothing."

"Then it is not a wendigo killing the humans." Elder Wolf frowned. "Do you think we will be blamed?"

"I think that is the intent. You are the only Lycani group in the area and the humans want to summon soldiers to seek the killer. The Vampyri have enough wealth and influence to be spared," Anjael spoke her worry without directly saying it.

"And you fear they will come here to kill us even though we have harmed none." He scowled then announced, "I think we shall move west to join our kin soon."

Nodding, Anjael looked around at the tribe living in high houses attached to giant trees above the dark water. "That may be wise, Elder Wolf."

"Thank you for the warning, Pale as Clouds. Whatever you are hunting, it is not one of the starving ones with frozen hearts. It is someone who seeks to stir the waters until they are muddy. Be careful." Elder Wolf took a pouch from around his neck and placed it over her head. "You may need this. It sounds like one of the mad ones of mixed blood."

"Mixed blood? But I have smelled no Lycani-Vampyri mix-blooded offspring in the city." Anjael scowled, remembering through her mother's memories how those who had both a wolf and a shadow went mad sometimes. Most were fine and learned to cope but a few lost themselves to whichever was stronger and had to be hunted and culled. The resulting rampages meant that all hybrids had been killed and all future intermarriages between Vampyri and Lycani were forbidden because of the abilities of the offspring.

"What of the ones called witches? Many of their kind live in the city of the French settlers and intermarry with both man and Vampyri," Elder wolf announced.

She hadn't considered it was the Wicce because those who she knew were just as horrified as everyone else. "Perhaps... I will find it and stop it before I return home. I will try to find you when I travel toward Santa Fe."

"Goodbye for a season then, my friend."

She spread her wings and leapt skyward, vanishing in the bright blue haze. Instead of returning to Coven Orleans, she flew to the St. Louis Cathedral. Landing at the barely century-old building, she slipped inside and then into the confessional.

"What confession do you have today?" the priest asked through the curtain.

"I am not here for confession, Brother Justus, I need to speak to you about the murders," Anjael murmured.

The curtain was lifted and a Wicce priest of the order of protection stared at her. Justus sighed then declared grumpily, "So the faux demoness returns... What did you discover, Lady Wasi?"

His tone made her inner self grumpy to be called a species that was extinct but that was who the Bibre Cruor had to pretend to be now so they wouldn't be hunted and killed by those who wished to rule unchecked and enslave those weaker than they. They were too few to risk themselves and her uncle would be grumpy when she returned to Santa Fe with this tale.

/\^^^^/\

She flew unseen above the city as revelers cautiously began their festivities. The sun had not set when a scream of panic reached her sensitive ears then cut off suddenly. She dove for the place. Flying back and forth across the area until she spotted a woman laying in an alley. Landing, she examined the still warm corpse. It was damp with a liquid she had never smelled before, it confounded her ability to scent what had killed her. The woman's blood had been taken and possibly her soul energy, but the wounds looked contrived. No Lycani attacked like the wounds showed yet the vampiric neck punctures appeared real. She picked up the woman and flew quickly away from the alley, taking the body to the cathedral.

"Justus," she screeched as she landed, carrying the woman's quickly cooling body down the stairs of the tower. The priest met her halfway

"Bring her in here."

Anjael laid the corpse on a table in a room filled with ancient symbols. "Some liquid was poured on her when I found her, it was still damp and it confounded my ability to scent her attacker."

He sniffed then sucked on a bit of still damp cloth. "Scent blocking tincture. Once it dries completely even a griffon or dragon could not find a scent."

Justus rushed around lighting colored candles. He began drawing symbols on the woman as the archbishop came in.

"What is this?"

"Your eminence," Anjael bowed to him. "I found this woman just after she was murdered." She quickly fetched him a chair.

The elderly priest nodded, sitting, then watched the younger-appearing one working. "Brother Justus said you came to confession this morning. Lord Pierré Le Moyne also sent his servant with news. He says it is not the Vampyri and that they and the Wicce suspect something called a Wendigo."

"I flew to see the Coushata Lycani to the west," Anjael responded quietly shaking her head. "The elder says the Lycani are not doing this but also that it is not the work of a Wendigo. Those cannot survive in this climate."

Glancing at the chanting priest, he nodded, we will learn soon."

"Pull the curtains," Justus ordered so Anjael quickly obeyed as the archbishop straightened.

The image of the woman appeared, she turned her head as if called and walked toward her murderer as though she knew him. The killer's face was covered by not one but two deep hoods as though he had two faces. The killer embraced the woman who did not seem to realize the danger, then she struggled as her blood was drained. A mouth was pressed over hers as she died, and her life essence was inhaled before everything faded. The dead body convulsed like it was having a seizure then lay still as Justus collapsed, shaking with fatigue.

He panted out, "It is a Wicce-Vampyri hybrid hunting the people of New Orleans."

"How can a Vampyr be out in the day without burning and blistering or have a child with a witch?" The archbishop demanded but Anjael remembered something from centuries before she was born.

"Because his mother was a witch, and Vampyr hybrids born to human or Wicce mothers can be changed once they reach adulthood and remain daywalkers like me," Anjael revealed.

"How do you kill a Vampyr who does not die in the sun?" The Archbishop demanded.

"You cut off their head and tear out their heart," Justus answered then he picked up something that fell from the dead woman's hand. "It looks like she pulled a button off her killer's waistcoat." He held it out to Anjael, who looked at it then handed it to the archbishop.

After examining it, he gave it back to Justus. "It is a carved bone button. Show it to all the priests who give communion at all masses. If a similar button comes in, we shall know who is doing this thing."

"We need to be careful," Justus warned, "This hybrid is gathering souls for some profane but powerful act. The victim submitted to him willingly until she realized he meant to kill her. If we do not stop him, many will die."