Brother Remembered - Black Dagger Brotherhood FanFic - Sumter Colony 2

Chapter 3

1680

"It has yet been a third fortnight, Brother. We will find him." Tohrture, the impromptu leader of the Black Dagger Brotherhood, leaned his creaking chair back, balancing it on its two rear legs as he clasped his hands behind his head. His muscular shoulders strained against the silk of his tunic, and his thighs stretched the seams of his leathers. He drew a great breath and sighed, dark blue eyes staring at the rafters of the small travel cottage as if beseeching some unknown entity for reassurance that his words were true.

Night sprawled in his chair. He'd been a member of the band of males created by the Scribe Virgin to be warriors for as long as Tohr. Together with a dozen other males, they were dedicated to protecting the vampire race from the biggest threat they'd faced in centuries. The lessers, humans altered into vampire killing machines through a ritual that removed their hearts and slowly faded their coloring to albino white, hunted them mercilessly with genocide in mind. The Brothers fought to do equal damage to them. No other human knew of either side's existence, a fact both were happy to have remain true.

Night ran a hand over his face, weary to his bones from the nights of fighting and searching. "I tell thee, Tohrture, our future King, still yet transitioned, is well and truly gone. We have lost him to his chosen fate as surely as I lost his sire and mahmen to the lessers."

Tohrture scowled and shifted his weight, slamming the front legs of the massive chair on the floor, and flung himself from it to pace yet again. "Wrath does yet live! I know this as surely as the sun comes for us in the morn."

Night sighed and leaned forward, hanging his head as he rested his elbows on his knees. "It is e'er hard, bother mine, but we must needs consider that, even if what thou say is of the truth, Wrath the Younger desires to not be found."

Tohrture whirled on his battle-worn companion, eyes narrowed, and fists white-knuckled. "Dost thou imply we should yet abandon our search?" His glare bore into the dark-skinned male before him, and he watched his closest comrade raise his head as if it outweighed him by half to look him in the eye. Tohrture could see the tightness in Night's face, creases placed there by long days of worry and even longer nights of fruitless pursuit. In their tracking, they had come far from the Great Hall only to find the trail gone cold. Again.

"Thou didst speak it thyself. It has been six long weeks since Wrath slipped away. We must needs look and see the truth for what it is: Wrath the Younger is as a ghost, and we wouldst be yet unavailed if our efforts continued." Night stood and clasped his friend's upper arm, offering comfort as much as a warrior might. "We should hasten home on the morrow. Thou knowest this to be right."

Tohrture gave in to the reality of Night's words, his spirit deflating as his body sagged, landing roughly in the heavy chair. He covered his face with his hands to hide the tears that sprang unbidden from his eyes.

Night squeezed his shoulder in support, making no comment or jest about the depth of emotion he witnessed. He, too, would shed tears had he the energy, but the events of the last years, beginning with the slaughter of Wrath the Fair and his Queen, Anha, and ending now with Wrath the Younger's disappearance, had emptied him as a steady flow of wine would unburden its cup.

"He has yet transitioned, Night," Tohrture spoke roughly. "How might he be expected to survive alone?"

Night sank into his chair once more. "Have we not trained him as we could? Does he not know how to fight?"

"Aye. And a good warrior he will yet be, as was his Sire before him."

"And does he yet know what to do when the transition comes upon him?"