Tina watches from the roof top waiting for the most opportune time to act. She catches her breath at the amount of vampires before her. She assumes since she doesn't see any wolves that they are coming in from the woods.
There won't be any need to worry about them, then. Tina has complete faith in the defenses of the forest and with Faline and Lucius there, no wolves will make it out alive.
She turns her entire attention to the hundred or more vampires before her. She doesn't think she's ever seen so many vampires at once. But one thing she is very happy about, they are all lower level vampires. They will be far less of a problem then those of the ruling class, like Lucius.
She shudders to think of an army of this size all made up of Lucius's class of vampires.
'There are no vampire's in his class. He surpasses them all Tina. How many vampires do you estimate?' Faline's voice asks her. Tina still gets shivers when that happens. She had no idea that non wolves could be inducted to a pact. It's still unsettling.
'At least a hundred, perhaps as many as two. It's hard to get a definitive count they keep moving.' She sends back.
'Do your best, the wolves will be dealt with shortly then we'll be out to help.' This is from Lucius.
'I have a few tricks up my sleeve to help even the odds a bit.' Tina replies back and can't help the smile that slides into place.
'That's a girl.' Lucius can hear her smugness and leaves off, presumably to deal with the wolves.
Tina doesn't worry about him anymore since the vampires are making their move.
A good twenty or so are killed by the magic holding the gate, before they manage to break through. Tina shudders at the smoking, burning bodies before she prepares to send off her own spell.
She sends out, 'Down!' All the defenders immediately drop to the ground and do their best to not touch the invaders. Tina sends out her lightning spell and thirty or so invaders are now crispy critters.
Immediately the defenders rise up and tackle the now more hesitant invaders.
The guards are able to keep the invaders back before they once more hear, "Down!"
This time when the defenders go down, some of the invaders are smart enough to do so as well, fortunately they weren't fast enough.
More than half the invaders are now dead or dying.
The remaining are more hesitant than ever before but they make their way in.
The defenders fall back to secondary positions and take a breather.
Some of the vampires stop and look around. They start sniffing and leave off the main group.
Tina smiles. She has no idea where Lucius put the poisoned meat, but there is no doubt that it has caught the attention of some of the invaders.
She remembers back on the conversation:
"Why is there bloody meat out on the counter?" Lucius asks Tina.
"A special treat prepared for the invaders. The meat is laced with wolfbane and silver nitrate. It is also spelled so that both wolves and vampire invaders will be irresistibly drawn to it. I have already set some out in the forest and this will be for the gate."
"Tina, dear, you do realize that the defenders are also wolves and vampires?" Lucius asks with a smirk.
Tina looks at Lucius, "Are you feeling an incredible urge to eat this?" Tina rolls her eyes at Lucius.
"Nope," Lucius replies not even a little perturbed by her disrespect. Tina marvels at the mellowing influence Faline has had on Lucius.
"That's because you're not an invader. If the meat isn't consumed by an enemy within eight hours then it will combust so the wolves won't be tempted." Tina replies.
Lucius smiles and his eyes glitter dangerously, "Really? Well now, I know just the place to put this." Lucius takes the meat and leaves. Before she has time to even really process the conversation Lucius is back.
Tina shakes her head. She doesn't have time now to reminisce about things.
She smiles wickedly, perfect. This time instead of sending out lightning she sends out a fireball.
She tells her people to run. They do, without hesitation. She smirks. Wolves don't run from fights. They must understand the danger to themselves pretty good.
By the time Lucius and Star make it to the front there are only small pockets of invaders left.
They find Quinlin and Sharee fighting and Quinlin is holding his own, but Sharee has been injured.
This makes Star very angry. She jumps in and takes care of those attacking the female vampire.
Lucius watches Quinlin deal with the others.
He turns away once the threat has been dealt with.
Finding another threat he takes off, for once leaving Faline/Star behind.
Lucius takes himself to wherever he can find a fight. Many times taking on multiple fighters at once.
His guards, the loyal ones, are fighting well, but they have been severely outnumbered even with Tina's help.
Most are still fighting but some, even with Tina's protections are down.
Slowly the fighting ends.
Lucius looks around. His yard has become a field of carnage. But he finds no moving enemies and that pleases him.
He looks but is unable to find Faline/Star.
He does find a female. A beautiful stranger walking towards him.
He feels drawn to her.
"Hello, you must be Lord Lucius." The female purrs as she comes up to him.
Lucius narrows his eyes at her, "Yes. Who are you?"
The female smiles enigmatically, "My name isn't important." She goes to him and touches him. Lucius doesn't take her hand off him, nor does he reprimand her.
Faline, turning back to her human form walks up to the strange female and puts her arm around her neck, fingers ready to rip the females throat out.
"Who the hell are you?" Faline demands. Lucius stays strangely silent.
The female doesn't answer straight away so Faline allows her nails to become the nails of her wolf and dig into the tender flesh of the neck. "Who are you!"
"My name is Namaste." Faline snorts.
"Some greeting. You see those markings on his neck?" Faline demands.
"Yes," Namaste manages to choke out.
"Do you know what they mean?"
"Yes, he is true bonded." The female says choking even further.
"What are you?" Faline demands.
"I'm a witch." The female reluctantly replies.
"Then if you know that he is marked why the fuck were you touching my mate?" Faline is more than a little pissed at this moment. Not just at the witch either. Lucius allowed another female to touch him.
"I was hired by Lord Darin to seduce then kill Lord Lucius," Namaste tells her.
"Why?" But Faline heard all she needed to hear.
"He killed my coven."
"Oh, you mean Tina's coven that her sister took over and made black?" Faline says hiding her anger and pain.
"Tina? He killed her years ago." Namaste replies crying.
Faline spits to the side, "Tina is the one helping us, you dumb ass bitch. She came to Lucius for protection against her sister." With that Faline rips out the throat of the witch.
"Faline!" Lucius says angrily. "Why'd you do that?"
Faline looks at Lucius incredulously. "She just admitted to enspelling you with the intent of sleeping with you and killing you because she works for Lord Darin and you're upset because I killed her?"
"Yes, you didn't need to kill her." Lucius growls out.
Faline looks at him in disbelief. "You wanted her. You wanted to sleep with her, it wasn't just a spell."
Tina had managed to hear that last part and look with horror at Lucius as Faline takes off.
"Quinlin go after her." Lucius demands with anger evident.
"Lucius, come here," Tina says and although normally Lucius would balk at her command he follows it without thought.
"Shit." Tina says softly.
"Lucius, tell me, do you love Faline? Are you that angry that she protected her mate from a killer?"
Lucius looks at Tina blankly for a bit, "She didn't need to kill her."
"She was sent here to kill you, Lucius, seduce you and kill you. Faline had every right to kill her and protect her mate. You just rejected her. Then you sent another wolf out after her, showing her again that you reject her.
"You may very well have just killed your mate, Lucius. Congratulations." Tina says softly with tears in her eyes.
Just then they both hear the howl of pain coming from Star.
"What the fuck happened?" Lucius demands. The sound of Star's pain finally breaking through the spell Namaste had laid on him.
"You allowed Namaste to enspell you and you rejected Faline/Star."
"How?" Lucius says in great pain.
"The spell worked in deep and attached to your doubts of her and your fears."
Lucius looks at Tina in shock. "I don't doubt her."
"You doubt your worthiness, you doubt at times that you are good enough to be with her. You fear that she will leave you or that you won't be able to save her one day. Well you just pushed her away."
Faline had told him not long ago that she didn't think she'd be able to survive if he ever rejected her. What had he done?
"If you don't want her to die, I suggest you go find her before it's too late. I will do my best to help her, but Lucius, she's already cut all pack bonds. She's not planning on living."
With those word ringing in his ears Lucius takes off to where he heard her howling her pain. He just prays that he won't be too late. He can't believe he did this to her again.
As he runs he instructs those that can to dismember the dead invaders and place the body parts in the special boxes he has prepared. He'll be paying a visit to the council as soon as he can, with Faline at his side.
If he's not too late.
He feels the small box in his pocket as he runs. He just hopes that he'll be able to give it to her now. That she'll accept it.