Blood Moon by Dawn Thompson

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Start of a stunning new series!
THEIR DARK CURSE Jon Hyde-White was changed. Neither his horse nor his dog trusted him any longer, and with good cause; the transformation was almost complete. Soon he would cease to be an earl's second son and become a ravening monster. Already lust grew, begging him to drink, to devour, to swallow in great gulps hot blood from every opalescent neck--and the blood of his fiancé, Cassandra Thorpe, would be sweetest of all. Was that not why they were chosen? Was that not why the blasphemous creature Sebastian burst upon them from the London shadows? But Sebastian's evil task remained incomplete, and neither Jon not Cassandra was beyond hope. Still she smelled of meadowsweet and lilies, and he still believed in Heaven. One chance remained--in faraway Moldovia, in a secret brotherhood, in an ancient ritual and the power of love and the...BLOOD MOON

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Blood Moon

Dorchester Publishing

Chapter One

Jon stripped naked in the woad field. There wasn't a minute to spare; Cassandra would be waiting at the crypt in the kirkyard. He would have been there an hour ago if he hadn't stopped to feed ... so he wouldn't be tempted to feed upon her. He glanced about. There wasn't a soul to be seen, just the tall swaying woad, its strong-smelling yellow blossoms tinted green by the velvet blue of pending darkness. The tall stalks swayed, dancing in the breeze, whispering their secrets, keeping his, just as they always did. They would be gone soon. Midsummer's Eve; the harvesting would begin. Then he would have to take shelter in the forest when he roamed his land in the north.

In a blink and a blur, he sailed through the air and hit the ground running on four sturdy, corded legs, his thick footpads trampling the woad, bending the stalks, his tall, muscular, barrel-chested body grown taller, thicker, covered with a shaggy coat of silver-tipped black fur. He could make better time as canis dirus, the dire wolf, beating a path through the woad on all fours, than he could standing upright, though that was always an option-better time than he could in his normal incarnation, come to that.Normal. The word didn't even signify. He would never be normal again.

His vision had narrowed now, just as it always did when he shifted into the shape of the great wolf, and his facial features transformed into an elongated snout. It wasn't because of the darkness. He was possessed of keen night vision in both incarnations. Small consolation, that, he thought bitterly, swallowing hard in a vain attempt to break up the lump in his throat. His bared canines were dripping blood carried over from his other self and the feeding that had just taken place. It slid down his long pink tongue, splattering his forefeet with foam and spittle as he ran. But still, the thick, metallic taste laced with salt clotted at the back of his palate. Its rich, toothsome flavor-piquant and mysterious-would stay with him until it was time to feed again.

Maybe she wouldn't come tonight. Maybe all this haste was for naught. It was a pleasant fiction. He loosed a bestial canine whine. If she wasn't there, he would agonize over her whereabouts until he set eyes upon her again, just as he was doing now, running his heart out, burning his lungs dry gulping the cool night air. If only he hadn't needed to feed. If only he trusted himself in her presence when the hunger-the feeding frenzy-was upon him once the sun sank below the horizon each night. Streaking through the woad, he cursed Sebastian, the vampire who had infected him and nearly made her. Sebastian would stalk her until he finished what he'd started, until he'd made her his slave like the others. Over Jon's dead body.

Would she have sense enough to climb the tor to Whitebriar Abbey, his inherited manor, when she didn't find him at the crypt? Would Bates, his faithful servant, admit her? Why hadn't he told her to meet him at the Abbey in the first place? He was counting upon the sacred ground in the kirkyard keeping Sebastian at bay. According to legend, full-fledged vampires could not bear crosses or consecrated places-or anything sacred, come to that. How Jon himself still could was a mystery, though holy water boiled when he touched it. But this wasn't legend; this was real. Perhaps these things came about gradually in the newly made. Whatever the cause, he was glad of the effect.

He was out in the open now. He had left the woad behind, though its pungent scent still filled his nostrils. Was it something remembered from his childhood, when he'd played in these fields and knew every inch of them, or something related to the here and now? More likely the latter. His sense of smell was always heightened in wolf form. It was almost painful when he needed to feed, stabbing pains shooting through his sinuses until he'd tracked down his prey. At least he didn't have to suffer that now; he wouldn't need to feed again tonight. It was safe to be with Cassandra, to hold her in his arms, to comfort her. He dared not take it beyond that, though he longed to live in that exquisite body, to succumb to the lure of an innocence that had bewitched him from the moment they'd met at Almack's in London that Season. Sebastian might have taken her first blood, but he-Jon Hyde-White, third son of the Earl of Breckenridge, who'd had noble aspirations of becoming a vicar and had answered the call to Holy Orders before it all began-was to blame, as surely as if he'd been the one who'd plunged his fangs into that sweet flesh that smelled hauntingly of meadowsweet and lilies of the valley.

Wolf though he was, tears misted Jon's eyes. Padding to a halt in the clearing, he threw back his head and howled into the darkness. The sound trailed off to a mournful wail, lonely and sad. No creature answered it; no woodland voice replied, though birds fled the trees into the clouds at the edge of the copse that bearded the thicket. Across the moor, a light in the kirk at the foot of the tor beckoned, and he bolted toward it, praying he wasn't too late.

Nothing stirred in the kirkyard when he arrived. Surging into human form-if he could still be considered human; he wouldn't dwell upon that now-Jon stood naked, clothed only in the mist that drifted among the crooked headstones like wraiths risen from the dead. The Hyde-White crypt loomed before him, deserted, an upright vault covered in woodbine creepers, fitted with an iron-barred door. It would be open. Since the nightmare began, the vicar, Clive Snow, his mentor and confidant, had unlocked it every night at dusk, and locked it again once the first gray streamers of dawn chased the mist each morning. Just to be certain. In case Jon needed sanctuary from Sebastian, who only roamed the moor at night.

Jon tore open the wrought ironwork, then the door, and stepped inside. His heart sank. The crypt was empty. Cassandra wasn't there waiting as he'd hoped she would be-as he'd prayed she'd be. He wasn't surprised. God heard him no longer. Why would God help one undead, and another destined to be? Had Clive Snow damned himself as well by giving them aid-by keeping Jon safe and giving her sanctuary? Was Jon's friend and mentor another casualty of the nightmare? He shuddered to wonder.

Shaking those thoughts free like a dog sheds water, Jon strode inside, the stone floor cold and hard beneath his bare feet. A change of clothes was set out neatly on a stone bench in the corner. He dressed himself hurriedly, tugging on his drawers and buckskin breeches, then the shirt, waistcoat, and chocolate brown superfine frock coat. He would go back for the clothes he'd left in the woad field, but not yet. Not until he'd found Cassandra. Not until he knew she was safe.

He tugged on his turned-down top boots and stamped his feet to settle them inside the stiff though malleable leather. They still felt like the large, padded feet of the dire wolf, and would for awhile. The wolf was his favorite part of the condition, as he referred to it. He did love roaming fleet-footed over the moors, with the Cumberland north wind whipping tears into his eyes, combing his silver-tipped fur.

His makeshift toilette complete, he stepped out into the misty darkness and closed the door of the vault. The light in the nearby vicarage beckoned, and he parted the mist with long-legged strides, hoping Cassandra had taken refuge there, and banged the knocker impatiently-once, twice. He raised his hand to grip the knocker again when the door came open in the vicar's hand.

The elder clergyman pulled Jon inside. "Are you trying to rouse the dead?" he asked, leading the way toward the study.

Clive Snow seemed borne down as he trudged the narrow hallway lit by candles in wall sconces. The flickering candlelight picked out the silver in his hair and shone in his articulate eyes, the color of amber, which had always seemed to see into Jon's soul. Jon couldn't bear those penetrating amber eyes boring into him now. There was no time for a lecture; even less for explanations.

He dug in his heels. "Is Cassandra here?" he asked.

"No. Is she supposed to be?"

"We were to meet at the crypt. She was supposed to arrive before sunset, and she isn't there. She doesn't realize the danger she is in, Clive. Sebastian will try again. It's only a matter of time."

"Jon, we must talk," said the vicar, gripping his arm.

"Yes, but not now. I must find her before Sebastian does. He's out there somewhere. I know it-I feel it! If he finishes what he's begun, she will be his for all eternity. She will be lost to me forever." He broke free. "I must go," he said, sprinting down the narrow corridor.

"Jon!" the vicar called after him. "We must talk, I say! If we do not speak before the sun rises on another day, you will find the crypt locked when you reach it. I mean it!"

Jon didn't answer. It was an empty threat. If Clive were to lock him out of the crypt while in wolf form he would have no togs to change into when he transformed back. Clive Snow knew that. He would hardly let Jon be caught in the altogether by some member of the parish visiting a loved one in the kirkyard. Only one thought moved Jon then. Where was Cassandra? He had to find her.

"Jon!" the vicar called after him. "Come back here!"

"I shall-later," Jon said, slamming the rectory door a little too loudly as he fled, the vicar's protests ringing in his ears. No. He most definitely wasn't himself. How could so much have happened to change his otherwise ordered life in the mere space of a sennight?

Seven days ago, he'd known who he was and where he was going. His future was charted, impeccably planned. He was to be vicar of All Saints Parish. The previous vicar and his friend, Clive Snow, was retiring by dispensation from the bishop. It was all arranged. What's more, Jon had met the girl of his dreams, and had been about to press his suit when Clive Snow's missive arrived, asking him to try to locate a parishioner gone astray, to convince the man to return to his increasing wife post-haste. Jon now bitterly wished he'd never received that missive.

Half sprinting, half stumbling, he scaled the tor to the flattened summit where Whitebriar Abbey stood buffeted by the cruel north wind, no less scathing in spring and summer for all these seasons' mildness. Bursting into the abbey, he bellowed for Bates at the top of his lungs.

The white-faced valet-cum butler cum footman, since Jon's condition reduced the staff-loped to the gallery balustrade above on his lame leg, his graying hair fanned out behind him in dishabille, his stone-colored eyes wide.

"Oh, sir!" he cried. "Thank heavens! I am at the end of my tether. Please come!"

"What is that racket?" Jon asked, scaling the broad, carpeted stairs two at a stride. Only then was he aware of the din echoing through the mansion above.

"'Tis Gideon," said the servant. "I cannot do a thing with him. He's run mad, I think!"

"What's happened?"

"The young lady's come-"

"Thank God!" Jon cried, his posture collapsing in relief.

"I put her in the blue suite off the west gallery," Bates went on, pointing down the upstairs hall, "and no sooner had I done when Gideon come a-chargin' up here goin' at that door all-out straight. See for yourself, it's nearly in splinters."

"Fetch his chain."

The servant shot out his hand, the dog's chain dangling from his fingers. Jon hadn't even realized that Bates was holding it all the while. He snatched it from him.

"Gideon, stay!" he commanded.

The mastiff's head flashed toward him. Its jaws were dripping foam, flinging spittle, its dilated eyes glazed with the iridescent luster of mindless irritation.

"Gideon, heel!" Jon charged.

The mastiff pranced in place-tail wagging, lips snarling-his head bobbing back and forth between the wounded door and his master, a troop of desperate whines leaking from his throat between growls. Jon rattled the chain, and the dog padded toward him warily, tail between his legs. Reluctance ruled the animal's step, and still there was a silent showing of fangs, culminating in another guttural growl and a rousing bark that more closely resembled a snarl. What was wrong with the animal? Gideon had never snarled at him before.

Jon snapped the chain fast to the collar and jerked the dog to a standstill, handing the chain to Bates. "Take him below," he said. "And keep him there."

"Y-yes, sir. I'm sorry, sir. I cannot control him when he's thus. You are the only one he heels to."

No longer, Jon thought. He gripped the door handle and waited, his fingers working the gilded scrollwork impatiently while the servant led Gideon down the stairs, before he lifted the latch. Once the pair was out of sight, he burst into the room, calling Cassandra at the top of his lungs. She didn't answer, and he streaked through the sitting room, charged through the door to the bedchamber adjoining, and pulled up short. Cassandra was nowhere in sight, but her sprigged muslin frock lay in a heap on the floor under the antique Glastonbury chair in the corner.

Calling her name again, Jon spanned the distance to the dressing room in two strides, but she wasn't there either, and he crossed back into the bedchamber, his eyes upon the daintily patterned frock underneath the chair in the corner. It was moving.

Approaching with caution, Jon squatted down and seized the frock, suspecting rats. The shape of something small wriggling inside confirmed his suspicions, and he surged upright and raised his foot, set to crush the rodent beneath the heel of his top boot, when he was stopped by a mewing sound leaking forth. Jon lowered his foot to the floor, then reached down toward the moving frock. Once, twice he drew his hand back before he finally seized it, exposing the head of a little black kitten, whose big green eyes stared up at him like two sparkling emeralds in the candlelight. In fact, the creature seemed all eyes, the way they dominated that tiny face.

All at once, the mewing became sobs, the head expanded, and the soft ebony fur became a streak of molten silver surging toward him in a blurred rush of motion. Then she was in his arms. The scent of meadowsweet and lilies of the valley threaded through his nostrils from her sun-painted hair, from her naked skin bared by the tangled frock twisted around her that showed him more of her exquisite body than he was prepared to view. His sex grew hard against her. The tightness began at his very core-the hunger-as he could smell her blood. He could taste the salty sweetness of its thick nectar at the base of his tongue. He fought back the inevitable drool, the lubricant saliva that made the piercing easier. Anticipation quickened his heartbeat. He felt the painful pressure as fangs emerged from his canine teeth-long, sharp, hollow fangs-their manifestation an arousal. The feeding frenzy! How could it be? He had just fed.

As if it had a will of its own, his hand slid the length of her soft white throat, feeling for the pulse beneath that smooth, opalescent skin. Blood was racing through her veins, through the artery leaping there. Her very life was palpitating beneath his trembling fingers, inches from the deadly fangs hovering above; it was there for the taking. He groaned and put her from him, tugging the twisted frock back up over the milk-white breasts trembling in rhythm with her sobs.

"What ... do you think you're ... about, Cassandra?" he panted. Reeling away from her, he raked his hair with a trembling hand, taking deep, shuddering breaths, and did not face her again until his needle-sharp fangs had receded. After a moment, all evidence of the condition faded-all, that is, except the thick, hard arousal challenging the seam of his buckskins.

He spun to face her. "What did I just see here, Cass?" he asked through clenched teeth, as if clenching them would keep the fangs from emerging again.

Cassandra reached toward him, but he backed away. "Stay where you are!" he said. "Good God, come no nearer!" The throbbing in his sex dominated his body, echoing in his ears like the thunder of timpani. He had to keep her at arm's length.

Cassandra burst into fresh tears. "I ... there was a rat," she wailed. "I smelled its blood. It gave me such a hunger. I hate rats, Jon. What is happening to me?"

How he wanted to take her in his arms and comfort her-only that. How he longed to embrace that sweet flesh on any pretext. He dared not. He had to keep his distance. He would not finish what Sebastian had started. There was hope for her if he did not yield to temptation. But it was more than mere temptation, this; it was something dark and sinister and all-consuming that he could barely control. How long before he could no longer keep that control? How long before ... No! He dared not give those thoughts substance with words-not even in his mind.

"Did you feed?" he murmured, his voice trembling and strained.

(Continues...)

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Excerpted from Blood Moon by Dawn Thompson Copyright © 2007 by Dawn Thompson. Excerpted by permission.
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