The Vampire’s Servant
Chapter 142

I woke up warm. I hadn't thought Echo would actually come turn on the heated blanket without Victor being here. She was a very thoughtful and kind girl.

My pride in her escalated when she took over Victor's position so gracefully and adeptly. She knew she couldn't handle the vampire business, and turned it over to the lieutenants instead of asking Finn or me to help. She had us work on things that fit us far better than the political and legal sides of vampirism.

"Mmm. Talia. So soft and tiny." He murmured.

"I'm going to beat your a*s if you don't let me go, Finnick. We can play before your bedtime. I want to go find out what Echo has managed. And Sean should be fully fae now. I wonder if he's something tasty." I replied, pulling out of his grasp. Finn sighed. "You're no fun."

"I'll be plenty of fun once Victor is no longer in danger." I told him.

"Are you really sure it was okay to let Echo be named Master of the territory, Talia? I know it was her idea, but I wonder if she understands exactly what it means." He said, getting out of Victor's bed.

"I don't believe Echo cares what it means. She's very focused on saving Victor. She thought this might make the curse leave him alone. That it might confuse the curse, because she's a dhampyr and not as vulnerable as a vampire would be. They are much harder to kill." I climbed down from the bed and made my way to Victor's closet.

As travelers, Finn and I didn't tend to carry a lot with us. I had accumulated a few more things from staying with Bellamy, but I would have them sent to Zendaya when I moved on. For now, I was enjoying watching Bellamy's family grow.

We dressed quickly and went to the kitchen. Finn was feeding nightly so he would always be at his maximum, power-wise. He was drinking his blood, when an odd look came across his face.

"I don't feel like we need to find that person anymore. I feel like we have everything Victor asked for. Do you think Echo actually managed to find that person while we were sleeping?" Finn asked.

"I wouldn't put it past her. Echo will be an amazing vampire when she turns. She brought together so much and it seems like she's been the one to find everything. All she had to do was see how her life with Victor would be affected. And have no one there to reign her in. If Victor had let her be part of everything sooner, I'm sure we would have already had this curse resolved." I chuckled. "He coddles her too much. She's a very capable young woman."

"And a little frightening. I didn't realize there was another small female in the world who was as scary as you. I'm betting you'll be best friends."

"That is something I am hopeful about. I want Echo to be comfortable with me and include me in her life. I'm not like those other mothers in law. My childe's spouse will actually like me and not just pretend." I winked.

"Shall we go see what the kids have come up with?" He asked, offering his arm.

"You better rinse that mug or Echo's going to tear your head off." I laughed.

He took the mug to the sink and rinsed it well before we headed to the office. I opened the door and it was like all hell was breaking loose. The scene itself was strange.

Sean was green and being held back by Rosario and Valor. Harmony was standing behind the desk yelling at the corner where Gray was camped by a large cage that hadn't been there before. Echo was holding on to her sister and glaring in the same direction. The cage held a large black cat who was sitting on a cat bed and making a clicking chirruping sound. Gray looked completely bewildered. Preston was standing behind everyone with an appalled expression on his face.

"I'll fucking skin you if you say something like that again!" Sean shouted.

The cat chirruped again and Sean started fighting even harder to get free.

"Shut up, or I'm going to find out about muzzles for cats." Harmony growled.

"You know, male cats calm down once you get them snipped. We can make an appointment with the vet this week and have his balls taken off." Valor suggested. The cat hissed and Valor laughed. "You'd try."

I looked to Finn, who seemed equally confused. They were all acting like they could understand the cat and were threatening it. The cat seemed to be responding. "What is going on here?" I demanded.

The cat looked at me and chattered. Everyone froze and stared at him.

"You're so lucky she couldn't understand you." Echo muttered and shook her head. "No more giving him attention. He's trying to distract us from our work. If you think you can't ignore the cat, then I want you to leave. I don't have the time or energy to deal with this. Harmony, look into that cat muzzle idea."

Finn and I crossed the room to her. She finally seemed to get Harmony calm and sent her off to find Cam. Echo straightened the map on her desk.

"Thank you for coming down as soon as you woke. Today, Fenton III died. We found that the being Finn was talking about was his cat. They called him The Old Man, but he's actually Fenton Sr. and we brought him home." Echo explained.

I looked at the cat again. That was the man who'd caused so much suffering? The one who made my childe have to be caged like an animal. I growled.

"None of that, please. He knows he's valuable and enjoys taunting people. All afternoon Fenton has been whittling away at Sean's composure. It didn't really help that Sean's been angry since he found out who the cat was." Echo said. "He gave us a pretty good idea, though."

"Who, Sean or the cat?" Finn asked.

"Both, in a way. Sean commented on the Hearts' Forgetting spell and how it afflicted all supernaturals born, or living, inside the barrier for the Intruder spell. What if, instead of casting that spell on each group individually, he cast it as an area spell and used the same wards as the intruder? I'm guessing that was pretty accurate, because Fenton started insulting Sean and Rosario." She replied.

"This is great. Is he telling anything else?" Finn grinned.

The cat made a trilling sound.

"Obviously, he's not paying attention. Finn, if he were cooperating, do you honestly think I would have him in a cage?" Echo asked with an incredulous look.

"Oh, you have a point. Should've thought of that." He chuckled.

"Why are you keeping him, then? Why not just kill him? He's obviously not making himself useful." I scoffed.

"He's over one hundred and forty years old. We don't know if we can kill him. If we did, I don't know what it would do to the curse. It's not like he'd tell me if killing him would relieve any part of it. But we do know it will attack if we go after the wards." Echo said. "The wards need to be our next focus." Preston added. "I'm pretty sure Sean was right. I looked over the list of possible spells, and it looks like a large chunk of what he did was that reversed Intruder spell and the Hearts' Forgetting spell. They line up with the bulk of the curse that we can map. If we take those two spells and the one we already dispelled out of everything, the only one left is the curse on Victor."

The cat started chattering again. Echo blushed a little and balled her hands into fists. She was glaring at the map.

"What's he saying?" I asked.

"He wants to know why I'm not affected as the Master of the territory. He says that I must not be the Master if another vampire is affected. Simply, Fenton, I am the new Master. The old Master is no longer able to be with us. It's not safe for him. Your curse may know how to kill him, but it doesn't know how to kill me." She replied.

He tilted his head and chirruped.

"Because I'm a dhampyr. We're harder to kill than a human or a vampire. Now, either help, or be quiet. I need to focus on this. I was completely serious about getting ahold of a cat muzzle." Echo said and focused on the map.

I shook my head. "That map isn't going to get you the answers you need, Echo."

My heart hurt for her. If I were in the same situation, I don't know that I would be thinking as clearly as she was. The idea of Zendaya being locked in a dark cell, while I was struggling to overcome something I couldn't physically attack, made me feel a little lost. Victor's turning had always been one of my greatest regrets. He was so broken and beaten when I found him in those woods, that I thought I was giving him a gift. I thought he would want to live.

I had no idea about what he had gone through. What he had lost. Not until I completed our bond and I got to see his life as it left him.

He became my most precious childe. I tried to give him as much reason to live as I could. When he came back to himself, he tried to die over and over again. He would hide outside where the sun could take him. He ended up spending a few years in a cell to keep him from staking himself.

Victor begged me for death. He pled for death like one of Marius' prisoners did. I was torturing him by keeping him alive.

When the integration process was complete, I saw him calm. He knew there was more out there for him. He craved the power to keep others from suffering.

In Victor's old territory, he was known as a benefactor of the sciences. He made certain children were able to be vaccinated as soon as vaccines came available. He ran a program to make medical treatment for children free and his territory would lead the world in adopting new practices in medicine.

More than that, he tried to make our people more compassionate. The rules he created would kill a lot of the more sadistic vampires, the ones who loved tormenting the weak. In a lot of ways, Victor had made vampires ready for human consumption. They were more than willing to work with us because we were focused on abiding these rules. Victor took little pride in that. Instead, he worked to keep improving lives for the humans who depended on him in his territory.

He was a model man and vampire. Only young vampires ever forgot about him. The older ones, the ones who knew him and knew of him, remembered. Now he had the title of 'The Hunter'.

It took a lot for vampires to give titles. It had to be memorable. Even the young ones knew of The Hunter. Even if they didn't know the name Victor Nightshade, they knew the title he'd been given. Victor never even knew he'd gotten the title.

I was proud of him, always. Where I would indulge with a few of my children like I did with Finn, I never did that with Victor. He was different, special. Like a true child, one I'd birthed and raised. I felt like a mother when it came to him.

That was why this curse had me so frustrated. There was nothing I could do to save him. It had to be how he felt watching over his human children as they died. I wouldn't stand by and watch him die like that. I couldn't. Marius appeared next to me. He wrinkled his nose. My broodmate was always amusing to me. He thought very seriously of himself. I loved watching him loosen up the longer he knew Echo.

"What on earth is that odor?" He sneered.

"Cat litter." Gray answered. "It's gross."

"Why do you have a creature like that in here?" Marius asked.

Fenton hissed at Marius. I couldn't help but laugh when Marius hissed back. He really didn't like animals. Not natural ones, not supernatural ones. That's why his love for Harmony was so strange. He truly loved her, though.

After he'd seen her shift, he went on and on about how beautiful and stately her wolf was. He told me how much he was looking forward to her having pups. He said he would make sure all of them were protected from the first beating of their hearts until their last. Echo finished explaining everything to Marius. He looked thoughtful.

"Is this why you wanted me to come when I woke?" He asked.

"I figure, you've tortured a lot of creatures. Some of them had to have been cat shifters. You would know more about that than I would." Echo replied with the same dark look I'd seen Marius get when he talked about his... hobby.

Marius chuckled. "I learned a lot about torturing them while in their cat forms. Domestic cats may be different. I will have to search for more information. Are you certain? I would hate to have you stop me before I get started." "Echo. Don't do this. It isn't you. You wouldn't allow someone to be tortured. Come on, angel." Gray pled.

The cat made some sad mewling sounds. Gray looked at him with sympathy. If I hadn't been looking at Echo's face, I would have thought he was pleading as well.

"He just called you a weak little bitch. He isn't a cat, he's just living in the body of an animal who should have died decades ago. This is an angry, angry man." She explained.

"He really did just call you a weak little bitch." Preston added. "He's been making fun of you a lot. Calling you an obedient puppy. Asking her how she trained you. Asking if you're house broken. It's most of what makes Harmony angry, since she's a wolf too." "Did he mock my daughter?" Marius growled.

"No. He's just been sticking to the people who can't understand him." Sean replied in an angry tone.

"Babe, I don't care what a cat, or a human, thinks of me. You need to calm down. He's probably grumpy because he wants belly rubs or something." Rosario snickered.

Fenton chittered something at him. Rosario laughed.

"You understood that?" Echo asked.

"No. I just figured he would threaten something. I'm not scared of a kitty cat. I'm certainly not bothered by what he says, because it all sounds like cat sounds. I can see why Gray has a problem. It just sounds like you're goofing off and treating the cat like it's saying stuff when it isn't. If not for the fact that Preston has been doing it too, I would have thought you four were messing with me." Rosario answered.

"You mean you only believed us because Preston is answering back too?" Sean asked in a hurt tone.

"No, babe. I know you wouldn't lie. It's just a little ridiculous. He obviously didn't have a choice of what animal to become, who would become a little kitty?"

The cat hissed and Rosario laughed again. It growled and hissed like it was threatening a fight. Echo started laughing, too.

"Rosario, would you stop riling him up? His threats are too funny. I need to be serious. Gray, you don't understand me still. You have no idea what I'd do to save Victor. Torturing one cat seems like a relatively small thing in the long run." Echo said. Gray stood up. He had a scowl on his face as he stalked over to the desk and glared down at Echo. She met his eyes with a very serious a cool expression.

"The curse is making you like this. You aren't like this. You're my gentle angel. Don't let the curse make you do something you'll regret." He hissed.

"It takes several weeks for the curse to manifest. I would do this for Victor. I would do this for you. I would do this for my family. You've never seen me when people I love are threatened. If you can't handle this, you're free to go elsewhere. Eventually, you'll have to deal with the kind of person I really am, Gray." She replied, coolly.

He turned and stormed out of the office. I turned back to Echo. She was watching him leave. Her head shook briefly. Like she was trying to shake a thought from it.

I could see Marius' chest swell with pride. She was exactly the sort of vampire he liked. She was focused, driven, and unemotional. Where had this Echo been hiding?