Of course, reaching the garage was easier said than done. With the safe house's defenses already compromised, they couldn't rely on the automated systems to either give them warning of a further attack, or help them fend them off. They would have to rely on their native abilities and senses alone to make the traverse across the building to the underground structure holding a handful of vehicles.
So it wasn't surprising that, as they eased out of the alcove where the familiars had huddled, Lash's senses immediately pinged. A quick hand out to tap his sister on the left shoulder three times to let her know he had sensed three heat signatures approaching from the left. An equally quick nod confirmed her acknowledgment of the info then she was angling to their right, her weapons swinging to the left to target the oncoming soldiers.
For his part, Lash brought the shiva up to bear along the same sight path as he slid sideways to match his sister's movements. He could activate the futuristic weapon's smart capabilities but, while it would take out one squad, it would alert the other three to their position.
So he kept a finger off his trigger even though every instinct screamed at him to fire. It was further proof that Ingrid was right: his anger and blood hunger had compromised his judgment, making him vulnerable. He'd have to control both much better if he had even a hope of surviving this vendetta. Especially since he might not have his sister to bail him out next time!
Thankfully the Dark Father was with them and they remained undiscovered during their traverse of the main floor. It wasn't without several close calls, however, as two squads began a room-by-room clear of the house, forcing the two siblings to detour more than once. A clear that became more aggressive when the remains of the first squad, along with the dead familiars were discovered.
Finally, they were letting the armored door leading to the stairs down to the underground garage slide closed behind them. A quick glance at each other then again Ingrid led the way, her weapons ready, as they carefully and silently began their descent.
By this point, Lash could feel that the greater part of his strength had returned. Along with it the confidence that he could hold his own in a fight. Yet, as his body ached from the abuse he had so recently heaped upon it, he knew that recovery was fragile. They still needed to avoid getting into a firefight of any kind.
Which, of course, brought up the question:
"The street's going to be covered," he said in a soft voice only after they finished their descent and were satisfied they were the only two in the fairly large chamber. "I didn't have time to confirm if the underground safety track was still unimpeded."
Each Ventru safe house was equipped with a way to get clear of the building, night or day. For older holdings like those in Frankfurt that meant underground passages which often ran for several kilometers before coming out near a river, or protected ravine. They could only hope that the safety track for this particular safe house hadn't yet been compromised. Normally its status wouldn't have even been questioned, but with turned familiars upstairs all bets were off.
Ingrid grimaced as they heard a bang coming down the stairwell. It wouldn't be long before the nestari found the garage entrance.
"Then we best find out," she growled with a quick look over at her brother. Then she was quickly stepping to an access panel beside the door leading to the stairs.
A biometric scan later the panel was sliding aside, the house's systems recognizing her bloodline as Ventru. A quick dance of her fingers over the control surface and Ingrid was bringing up a schematic of the safety track, a twisting tunnel leading out to the Main River.
"I've served the Liliths for so long in other parts of the world, I wasn't sure I'd remember the access protocols," she admitted in a low voice as she brought up real-time video from security cams in the tunnel. "Almost as long as you've served the Council of the Night as Qos Viran."
"I remember the protocols," Lash replied with a wry twist of his mouth. "But I'd forgotten just how dangerous and chaotic our homeland is."
Satisfied that the tunnel was both intact and undiscovered, Ingrid turned back towards him, her expression grim.
"And it's just become more dangerous for our enemies, my brother," she tautly declared. "Death awaits those that oppose us."
"As they so justly deserve," Lash added, his own expression tightening with resolution. Then they were both looking at the stairwell door as a rough explosion announced the upper door being breached.
Grimacing, Ingrid palmed the biometric reader on the panel once more.
"Time to leave the trap," she hissed as a door on the garage's back wall slid open.
The pair was nearly a hundred meters down the passage, a broad tunnel big enough to allow two vehicles to drive side by side, when another loud, echoing roar told them the lower door to the stairs had now been penetrated as well. Since safety passages were fairly common for vampiric safe houses, the nestari would immediately begin to search for the entrance now that they were in the garage.
"Can you run, Ing?" Ingrid asked as they turned away from the passage's near end and refocused on getting out.
"I believe my recovery is sufficient to allow that," the big vampire replied. "Even if it wasn't..."
"Right," Ingrid replied before breaking into a ground-eating run. Gritting his teeth against the pain that would cascade through his body the moment he doubled his pace, Lash followed suit. Together they pounded down the tunnel, moving with a speed only possible to Children of the Night.
Thankfully that speed, several times that of a normal human and roughly three times that of the fastest Olympic sprinter, allowed the two Lashes to cover the five-kilometer stretch to the river in a matter of a few minutes. Still, they had to pull up at the tunnel's far end for a breather.
"You don't have another werewolf vial in that pack of yours, do you?" Lash hoarsely gasped as Ingrid, only slightly less winded, searched for an access panel.
"They're for emergencies only," she grimly replied. "Channel your strength, brother. You're not done yet."
Grimacing as he straightened up to try and stretch the pain out of his aching body, Lash threw a look in his sister's direction.
"Only if you can get this door open, Ingrid," he retorted. "If we get pinned down here, those nestari will turn us both into sieves."
Hearing that, his sister grimaced even as she continued looking for the access panel.
"Sometimes your soldier's pragmatism is literally a pain in the ass," she growled, earning her a wry smile from Lash.
"It's a hard habit to break," he retorted. "Burned into me by too many failures to count."
"No failure here!" Ingrid replied with a triumphant grin as she found the sought-for access panel and flipped open its door. Just in time: even as she began to trigger the unlocking code for the door, they could hear distant movement from the tunnel's heart.
"Trigger the tunnel's boobytraps while you're at it, Ingrid," Lash grimly directed as he brought his Shiva up to bear down the tunnel. "A few parting gifts for our friends."
"Now there is the Ingamon that I grew up with!" Ingrid replied, her grin broadening even as she activated the tunnel's trap system. "Bloodthirsty to the end!" Then she was closing the panel and turning towards him.
"Time to go!"
The two Lashes were nearly two hundred meters down the winding road beside the Main River when they felt the first explosion shiver the ground beneath their feet.
"Surprise," Ingrid said with a grim smile as they shared a quick look of satisfaction. Then they were resolutely returning to putting as much distance between themselves and their pursuers.
By this point, it was nearly 8 pm, well after sunset in January. That meant prime vampire time. Depending on just how many clans were in on the plot to purge the Ventru, they could be facing hundreds of enemies at any time.
Thankfully the road along the river was old and not especially popular in the winter, with the snow and ice making the cobblestones dangerously slick. So it was deserted as the two vampires hurried down its length. That allowed them to reach the shrouded vehicle parked in a private stall nearly five kilometers from the tunnel entrance unscathed.
Marked with a Ventru glyph invisible to non-vampire eyes, it appeared to be untouched by the forces swirling through the city. Still, the two gave it a careful examination, top to bottom before Ingrid jerked the shroud aside.
What was revealed was a late model silver Toyota Landcruiser, complete with UV-blocking shading and armor plating. A biometric panel on the driver's door provided access.
"Excellent," Ingrid said with a satisfied nod. "This will do nicely."
"For what, precisely?" Lash wanted to know as he walked around the front of the vehicle, finally satisfied that it wasn't boobytrapped. "You sound like you have a plan."
"You mean, something better than the 'kill anything that shoots at me' plan that you were working on, dear brother? Then yes, I have a plan."
Smiling thinly at the barely veiled jab, the big vampire folded his muscular arms across his broad chest.
"Our enemies deserve to die," he retorted. "If I have to kill every member of the council to find out who's targeting us ..."
Ingrid held up a quick forestalling hand.
"The Qos Viran may solve things with brute force, but that won't work here," she pointed out. "While you initially succeeded in your frontal assault, you left yourself vulnerable to less honorable means of attack, like the trap at the safe house."
She paused to look out over the partially iced over river. When she began speaking again, the vampiress' voice was thoughtful.
"If a member of the Council of the Night has indeed declared a vendetta against the Ventru as both you, and the Lilith I serve, suspect, then this is a knot of snakes that won't be loosened by hacking at it. We need to be subtle and careful, looking for the opportunity to cut here and there until we've worked something loose."
Ingrid looked over her shoulder at the suddenly thoughtful Ingamon.
"Starting with getting out of Frankfurt," she said. "Out of Germany altogether, preferably."
"No Lash has fled in cowardice from battle," Ingamon growled, preparing to argue.
"Even soldiers need to regroup, Ing," Ingrid quickly jumped in before her brother could storm on. "Think of it as a strategic repositioning while we gather intel."
Lash slowly closed his mouth against the hot retort he nearly flung into his sister's determined face. If one of their safe houses were compromised, then all of them in the city could be. And if he wanted to find the vampire that initiated the vendetta, he couldn't afford to be constantly running and fighting from safe house to safe house while trying to gather resources. He needed intel and quickly.
"Very well," he conceded, "we do it your way. Strategic retreat. Where did you have in mind?"
Motioning him to get in, Ingrid pulled open the driver side door and climbed behind the wheel.
"Antwerp," she answered once he was inside. Confirming the key was in a safety box, she hit the key-less ignition.
"My mistress has a stronghold there."
"Belgium?" Lash asked as the Land Cruiser moved into motion. "She's Degoor?"
Ingrid quickly shook her head in the negative.
"Nestricht, before she discovered she was a Lilith," the younger Lash revealed while she steered their vehicle onto the relatively narrow road. "A small clan, but with ties to the diamond industry. They've been accumulating wealth and holdings for over a thousand years." She glanced over at her thoughtful brother. "My mistress will have the connections and resources we need to properly begin our hunt for those that have begun this vendetta against the Ventru." Then she was focusing back on the road.
"I just hope we get there before most of our clan is wiped out!"
Thankfully the run to Antwerp was fairly straightforward, a 400-kilometer trip that took them on the Number 3 Autobahn to the Belgian border, then the E313, the Koning Boudewijnsnelweg, or King Baudouin Motorway, into the city itself. So it was still nightfall by the time they slid through the city's old center and onto a street overlooking the old Diamant-Stadspark.
Lash frowned as Ingrid pulled down into an alleyway and almost immediately took a hard left into a gated driveway. Pulling out a small remote, she pressed a button and the two vampires watched as the gate, now revealed as a true barricade of nearly half a foot worth of high-strength steel, slowly slid out of the way to reveal nearly twenty heavily-armed guards in black clothing and body armor, automatic weapons directly pointed at them.
It was Ingrid's turn to frown.
"What is this?" she growled, undoing her seatbelt with more force than necessary. Then she was punching the door open.
"Lieutenant Urlev, what is the meaning of this?" she demanded to know. "You raise weapons against your captain!"
"No disrespect meant, Captain Lash," one of the armored m'tada soldiers hastily replied without dropping their weapons' aim, "but a messenger from the Council of the Night arrived yesterday arrest warrant in hand with your name on it." He paused slightly. "And one for your brother."
"Since when did the sworn protectors of a Queen of the Night bend the knee to the trained dogs heeling the Council?" she immediately fired back and, despite the tension in the situation, Lash found himself smiling at the fire in his sister's words. "You all know the servants of a Lilith are above the Council's dictums. And you all know me! I have broken no law, whether it be Council legislation or the wishes of our queen."
"But your brother ..." the lieutenant began.
"Has served the Council as Qos Viran, and our people with honor and distinction his entire life!" Ingrid interrupted to finish for her underling, her voice hard and insistent. "The Council is wrong to accuse him of anything other than honorable service to the People of the Night!"
"She's right," a smooth voice interjected from behind the gathered m'tada. "Commander Ingamon Lash had done nothing but serve, and serve our people well."
At the sound of the voice, the entire guard detail went down on one knee as a short, slender form in dark leather stepped out of the shadows and into their midst. Even as his eyes fell onto the newcomer, Lash felt an overwhelming urge to do the same as potent pheromones hammered into his senses with the force of a battering ram, subsuming his will and demanding absolute obedience.
Instead of kneeling, however, he carefully stepped out of the vehicle and formally saluted hand over heart.
"Night Mistress," he began, bowing his head even as Ingrid took a knee on the other side of the Landcruiser. "You honor us by greeting us yourself at your door."
"Honor, commander?" the Lilith quickly replied, stepping further into the light to fully reveal herself. Short of stature, as were most Nestricht, yet possessing the flawless beauty and pale skin that European Liliths seemed to favor, her presence was a palpable force that pressed against Lash's sensibilities. So much so they almost brought him to his knees for a second time.
"I merely wanted to save my guard captain from an untimely death at the hands of her own soldiers," she went on to say, stepping towards the still running Landcruiser. "She has served me well for over a decade and has saved my life countless times herself. It would be a shame to lose her." She fixed Lash with a glowing-eyed gaze. "You, on the other hand, mean nothing to me."
"My queen ..." Ingrid began to quietly protest without lifting her head. She was quickly silenced when the Lilith made a gesture with her hand.
"You mean nothing to me, commander, but I see no justice or honor in the pogrom currently begin carried out against the Ventru," she went on to say. "Especially when your actions in North America were carried out on the express command of one of my elder sisters."
"You ... know of the events in North America?" Lash asked, a brow raised in surprise.
"Of course," the Lilith replied. "None of my sisters act without accord. Your healer, Lieutenant Olira, upon her return to Brazil, advised Aizea of your actions. That report was quickly forwarded to the handful of my sisters here, in Germany and Belgium that would have contact with members of your clan." She paused to clasp her hands behind her. "None of us found fault with her decisions or actions. Aizea, as was right for a queen of her status and power, was fully justified in commanding your Qos Viran unit to North America to assist the psylord Mordecai in defeating the Brotherhood of Advanced Intellects, which have been ruthlessly hunting us for centuries."
Again the Lilith paused.
"Most of my own clan, the Nestricht, have been destroyed by Brotherhood war parties," she revealed, her voice significantly quieter and more thoughtful. "By bidding you act, Aizea has saved the People of the Night from extinction at the hands of the Brotherhood."
"And yet my clan, the Ventru, oldest of the vampire Houses, is now under an order of extermination," Lash pointed out, fighting to keep the bitterness and anger out of his voice. "An order leveraged supposedly in retaliation for me rendering assistance to Mordecai."
The Lilith slowly nodded without taking her eyes off a grim Lash.
"Officially, yes." Lash felt something change in her presence and at some silent signal her guards, including his sister, climbed back to their feet. "But unofficially so many of the accords governing interactions between the Council of the Night and the Liliths have been broken, we suspect a conspiracy to destroy the Ventru has finally come to the surface after hiding for nearly five hundred years!"
"I thought as much!" Lash growled, throwing a look over at his sister. "They were just looking for an excuse."
"The Liliths agree," Ingrid's mistress said. "But the M'tada is a specialized force and in insufficient numbers to go directly against either the Hands of the Council or the nestari being fielded by the other Houses. So we cannot support the Ventru or you against them."
"So you will arrest me in the name of the Council and hand me over," Lash grimly noted.
To his surprise, the Lilith quickly shook her head.
"We will shelter you," she indicated, "but only long enough to get you some answers about this conspiracy and who supports it on the council." She looked over at a thoughtful Ingrid. "Then, I'm afraid, you are on your own."
Lash pondered that for a moment. Then, slowly, he nodded.
"Whatever help you can render to me and my clan, I am grateful for, night mistress," he said, again bowing his head. "It is more than even I had hoped we'd get."
The Lilith smiled thinly.
"Save your thanks, commander," she urged, "in the event what information we gather proves useful. In the meantime, we need to get you out of sight from prying eyes. Come! My stronghold awaits!"