Chapter One
The miniature cherry blossom fell onto the soft moss. Rin picked it up, held it gently between his thumb and forefinger marvelling in the perfect beauty of the bonsai’s flower. He closed his eyes and inhaled the sweet scent. The perfume drifted through him weaving into old scars, stirring old memories he spent centuries attempting to bury in the deepest recesses of his mind. And heart.
Spring always pried open doors he tried to seal shut. The scent didn’t just remind him. It takes him by the throat. Ash behind the sweetness. Blood dripping from petals. An innocent flower enough to rip those doors open and let the darkness slither in.
He clenched his jaw as memories assailed him. He crushed the blossom in his fist before he threw it to the floor.
Every year, the warmer weather brought the same tightness, like the world was bracing for impact again. Even after all these years, the darkness still lingered too close. He glanced at the cherry blossom bonsai and tried not to remember the time, many lifetimes ago, when the white and pink flowers dripped red with blood.
Rin turned his back on the balcony garden, wishing he could turn his back so easily on his memories, and opened the rickety wooden door to his apartment. He stepped through the doorway and removed his shoes, some habits too ingrained to ever dismiss. He flicked a switch and a dim single light threw the room into a hazy light, it’s glow barely touching the far corners of the room. Shadows lingered in the dark recesses, unmoving and constant.
He should be out hunting the shape shifters tonight, but physical exhaustion stole through him after four days straight of being on duty. This time of year, he preferred to keep busy, trying desperately to keep the memories at bay. But now he had little choice but to rest as his muscles screamed in fatigue and his mind clouded. If you expected to survive against the shifters, you needed more than instinct and training. You needed discipline.
Rin crossed the lounge room and stood by the bedroom door. A futon bed sat made up and immaculate in the corner of the sparse room. He couldn’t bring himself to lie down and sleep. What would he see in his sleep? His throat tightened at the thought of closing his eyes. There was no rest in sleep. Would the familiar red eyes gleam and narrow on him as they always did in his dreams in spring as the cherry blossoms bloomed, no matter how much time passed. Awake he could erect those walls he spent many life times perfecting, barriers that kept him calm, disciplined, lucid. But as sleep slipped him into darkness it stripped him bare, left him vulnerable. Left him with memories.
He cursed, turned his back on the bed and returned to the lounge room. A leather couch ran along one side of the wall, a single backless chair, bookshelf and a desk all lined the other side of the room. Rin sat in the chair, his back against the cold wall, determined to stay awake regardless of the fatigue clawing at him. He stared at the wooden mantle above the small fireplace where his sword sat. Its blade encased in a black sheath and cradled by two intricately carved hands now slightly worn by time.
With gradual, painstaking pace the night ebbed away as the sky through the window began to lighten to hazy grey with the beginning of the day, Rin fought the sleep that yearned to take him.
Against his will his eyes began to slide shut and he jerked his head up trying to keep sleep at bay. He sat rigid in his seat. His eyes drifted shut again, as this time exhaustion took him into sleep.
Darkness consumed him, rage and hatred blinding him to all. Blood drenched his clothes, the blood of others mingling with his own as his wounds opened up. He ignored them and gripped his sword tight, the handle now soaking with blood. The screams of terror cut short during the night and silence wafted across what was left of the village. Along with the sweet scent of cherry blossoms in full bloom.
The metallic tang of blood coated his tongue driving him deeper into blood lust. His heightened hearing cut through the screams of the battlefield as the night wind carried the last echoes of the dying. The earth beneath him, scorched and blackened, turned to bloody mud under the weight of bodies.
Here he wasn’t the Samurai he was born to be. There was no honour. No discipline within him. Here he allowed heated blood lust to consume him completely. He was a blade, a storm of utter destruction. A weapon forged in a new found power that gripped at his soul and fed his grief. Fed his rage.
Red gleaming eyes came out of the night and Rin’s dread and rage heightened. He smelt death and knew it was coming for him. Anger and pain were all he remembered in the darkness, the sound of metal on metal, of metal slicing through flesh.
And then bright, glowering green eyes arrived in the darkness and pure terror threatened to consume him.
Rin jerked awake with a start, rolled across the floor and reached for his Samurai sword, sliding it soundlessly from the sheath. Breath coming fast, he scanned the dimly lit room. Nothing lurked in the shadows. No gleaming eyes narrowed their gaze on him. The past clung to him, slick and hot, desperately attempting to crawl into his mind. Into his heart. Would time never allow him a small semblance of peace?
He cursed, wiping the sweat from his face. His nightmares burned at the back of his skull, always so realistic. If only they were just nightmares. But he’d lived too many years to mistake memory for dreams. Rin closed his eyes briefly, raised his sword and sliced its tip across his forearm. Dark crimson blood trickled down his arm. Pain was simple. Pain obeyed. Not like memories.
He returned his sword to its sheath and placed it in the hands that were made for him so long ago.
The hands were small, delicate, and strong. Just like the person they were modelled from. And just like Avery, they held something deadly, something that had seen too much blood. His hand hesitated above the carved knuckles, then stopped. The caress of those hands had lived longer in his memory than peace ever had.
Rin stood up, ignoring the blood dripping from his arm, walked to the door and looked out onto the small, shabby balcony. The narrow strip of violet dawn had spread across the sky. The cry of an early morning bird rent the air. Rin tensed, his tired muscles clenching.
This time of year was always difficult for him. It held too many memories.
But this year with Avery being so close it tore at his soul. He could feel her always lurking at the edges and in the shadows pressing against her heart. He longed to touch her, hold her against him, and take comfort from her warmth. His palms flexed, empty. His body remembered where she fit against the length of his body. Her presence clung to him in the quiet moments. He could almost feel her soft breath against his ear, her fingers slipping down his spine as she curled around him, just as it used to be. She was forever with him, a wound that refused to heal.
But many years had passed since either of them sought comfort in the arms of each other. Perhaps too much had passed between them to ever allow such vulnerability ever again.
The last time he’d seen her she’d tried to take off his head. She loathed him and he couldn’t blame her. For what he’d done to her he hated himself more than she ever could. But she had also given him what little information she knew about the Venator infecting shifters. The contradiction gave him hope where no hope should be had.
Hatred had still darkened her brilliant green eyes as he’d approached her that day. His hand had itched to grasp the sword by his side.
“What is it you want, Sensei?” Avery hissed at him as he approached, the old honorific caught at her throat. His spine locked, unlike his heart, and he flinched as she called him her teacher. She said it not with the respect and reverence she once did, but with venom and spite. He knew she wanted to cause him the sharp jab of pain that sliced through his heart.
“There is a Venator giving powers to the Versipellis,” Rin said, getting straight to the point. Tithe had asked him to find out what the shifters knew about the rogue Venator. And that’s what he would do. No matter how hard it was for him to look into her deep emerald eyes. “Do you know anything of this?”
“Perhaps.” She cocked her head to one side and glared at him, goading him. He knew that tone, one she’d used when he was the teacher and her the student. Long before their lives had shattered. Avery alone knew when to bait him, challenge him, always reading him with frightening precision. He struggled to hide the stiffening of his spine.
“Do the shifters know who the Venator is?” he asked, trying for patience.
“Why would I tell you?” Avery inched her way backward, slow, one hand sliding behind her back. Rin curled his fingers around the handle of the sword at his side. “If a Venator is foolish enough to give your powers to us, why should we not take them?”
“Because the hunter’s powers are merging with the shifters,” Rin bit out. “Corrupting them, infecting their mind and judgement.”
“What do you know of judgement?” Avery snarled, both her hands splayed on her hips, a gesture of anger she always had her knuckles rapped for whilst in training.
“I know enough,” said Rin, the whisper catching at his throat.
“All you know is the judgement of my kind.” She stepped forward and Rin stood his ground. He clenched his teeth and tried not to inhale the musky scent of her so close. “You judge us, hunt us, and then slaughter us. All at the will of your Venator leader,” she added with pure venom. Rin knew why she despised the leader of the Venators, the bitter loss of a brother at another’s hand never diminished.
“It is my duty.”
“Where was your duty to me? To us? Your duty be damned to hell.”
Rin bit down his reply as bile rose in his throat. His duty had been condemned to hell on one particular night many years ago. He’d been paying penance for his duty for what felt like forever.
He stiffened his spine and forced himself to focus on the job at hand. “This Venator does not give our powers to your kind without purpose to himself. It is power they seek, over the shifters and hunters alike. Those he has corrupted have killed the shifters as both a hunter and one of your own. Does that not disgust you?”
“Perhaps once it would have.”
“Tell me what you know.”
Avery glared at him, sparks of hatred and defiance burning in her stunning green eyes. He recalled the very first time he’d seen her jade eyes gaze on him, their unexpected colour in a Japanese woman, along with her long white blonde hair, had shocked him. Thoughts of magic and sorcery filled his mind. But once he’d seen her eyes, he had been lost to her forever.
Even as a Samurai she had been forbidden to him. A rule neither of them heeded. And even as a Venator she had been his still. Until she became his ghost, haunting him, her presence never to leave him complete.
“I do not know the identity of the Venator giving my kind hunter powers,” Avery sighed, looking away. “I know Darius hunts his brother for the death of their father because of those combined powers.”
“Would you tell me if you did know the identity?”
“Yes.”
He baulked.
“Why?”
“Because I know what it is to be turned into a shifter.” She raised her head and glared at him again. This time she couldn’t shield the pain in her eyes fast enough. “And I have seen what the transformation into a Venator has done to you. The combining of both is something I would not wish upon another.”
“If you weren’t changed into a shifter you would be dead now. As would I if I wasn’t initiated as a Venator first,” Rin whispered, the words cost him.
“And if I’d reached you first, before the Venator who changed you?”
“Then I would fly by your side in the sky.” The words left him before discipline could stop them. Her gaze sliced through his heart deeper than a blade.
The admission had been too much for her. Avery’s hand whipped behind her as she drew the sword from behind her back. She swung and arched the weapon. Rin bent backward, the blade missing his throat by millimetres.
Rin stared, unseeing out into the lightening sky. It would do him no good to dwell on such memories. He turned and headed for the bathroom. He stripped off, pulled the band from his long ponytail and stepped into the warm shower. He closed his eyes for a moment and tried to wash away the pain of the memories as they threatened to consume him. He always held a tight rein over his emotions. He had been trained to ignore them. To use them only to heighten his skills and since becoming a hunter of the shape shifters he had used those skills to his full advantage. But since the arrival of Avery those hard fought for skills were slowly failing him and his emotions were bubbling to the surface. He didn’t relish the thought of what would happen if he lost control. He’d seen the consequences of that dark side of himself once before.
It needed to stay buried.
It had been his admission that he loved Avery enough for her to be able to turn him into a shifter that still turned his stomach. How different life would have been if she had reached him first and not the Venator. But a Venator was what he was. It was his duty. His calling and now he would have it no other way.
Rin turned the shower to cold and shivered as the icy water cascaded across his well honed body. He pressed his palms to the cracked tiles, bowing his head as the water soaked him. Every droplet hit his oversensitive skin, sharp and relentless. His body shivering, he pushed down the heat of his emotions and stepped out of the shower. He dressed quickly and silently and went to stand in front of the fireplace.
Bowing, he reached out with both hands, and with reverence took the Samurai sword from its cradle. He strapped it to his side, just as he had done every day long since before he had been initiated into this life. Rin grabbed his long black coat from the hanger by the door. The weather was warmer now, but the coat hid the sword from passers by and avoided questions.
His movements habitual, disciplined, he turned and walked out of his apartment. The headquarters to the Venatoris Versipellis was a five minute walk. As always, his stride appeared casual, but he took in everything around him. His was a profession where it paid to be vigilant. The morning streets were quiet as the early light flickered into life. Not a soul to be seen. Rin’s lips twitched, his skin prickled like static as his senses kicked in. A shifter lurked in the shadows. Today another hunter would take care of it. First he needed to check in.
The huge wooden front doors to the old Masonic Hall opened in silence and he stepped inside the darkened hall. The two sentinels on either side of the doors stood motionless as Rin acknowledged them with a curt nod. He strode across the hall to a door off to the right, knocked once and waited.
“Enter.”
He opened the door and stepped into Tithe’s office. The leader of the Venators sat behind his messy desk. He looked up from the screen of his laptop as Rin entered.
“Rin.”
Rin said nothing.
“How do you fare?” Tithe’s voice stayed even, emotionless as always, though Rin felt the carefulness underneath.
“I am well,” he replied. Tithe’s eyes narrowed a fraction, too much knowing sat behind those green eyes. “I need you out on the streets for the next few days.”
Rin had the impression he was trying to keep him busy. And he was grateful for it.
“Darius, the husky shifter, and his human mate are expecting their child soon,” said Tithe, his deep voice holding the slightest trace of some unknown emotion. “The child’s impending arrival is causing havoc amongst the shifters.”
“Will the child be shifter, human, or hunter?” The fact a human woman carried a shifter’s child still shocked him. He had never known of such a thing.
“Perhaps a part of all three. It is unprecedented and unknown. The polar bear, Dane and his mate came into town this morning in preparation.”
Rin clenched his jaw as a shot of sharp, hot guilt tore through him. It had been his interference that caused the human woman, Lea to become a shifter. He had been the one to tell her where to find the polar bear, Dane. If he had not done so would the woman still be human? He knew only too well the consequences of turning a human into a shape shifter. He only hoped that she had found happiness and love with the bear. Would it count towards his atonement if she did?
He pushed down his guilt and raised his head, though he didn’t quite meet Tithe’s gaze. “With so many alpha shifters in town, are we expecting trouble?”
“I would be surprised if we get through this without a fight breaking out somewhere.” Tithe paused, stood up and came around the front of his desk. He shoved some papers out of the way and sat on the corner of the desk as a few sheets of paper fluttered to the floor. Rin locked his muscles in place, fighting the urge to retreat. “I know this time of year is always difficult for you. This year even more so with the hawk in town.”
Rin stiffened. “I can deal with it.”
Tithe gazed at him and Rin looked back, unblinking but couldn’t help the shot of force that hit him. Anticipation slid down his spine.
Tithe looked down for a moment. “Avery’s brothers have arrived in town this morning.”
Rin’s hand automatically went to his sword as a snarl escaped his lips. His breath hitched, he fought for control and barely won. He didn’t remove his hand from the hilt of his blade.
“To what end?”
“I don’t know.” Tithe paused. “Rin….”
“If they breach the peace they will be dealt with in the same fashion as any other shifter. I will report to you as necessary.” His pulse thundered. Old instinct whispered to draw his blade. Old grief whispered to turn and walk out before Tithe spoke another word. He clenched his jaw tight enough to ache and held his ground, not moving a muscle.
He waited as Tithe looked at him silently, sadness darkening his eyes. At last Tithe nodded and Rin turned on his heel and left the office. He remained stoic, his exterior belying the turmoil churning within him. It was difficult enough with Avery in town, but now her brothers had returned.
He meant what he said, if they breached the peace, this time they would die at his hand. There would be no mercy. For any of them.
