A Dome of Blood Read online

  A Shade of Vampire 67: A Dome of Blood

  Bella Forrest

  Contents

  Also by Bella Forrest

  Problems reading?

  New Generation List

  Family tree

  1. Derek

  2. Harper

  3. Rose

  4. Elonora

  5. Ben

  6. Rose

  7. Sofia

  8. Kailani

  9. Hunter

  10. Amane

  11. Nathaniel

  12. Rose

  13. Elonora

  14. Ridan

  15. Amane

  16. Herakles

  17. Elonora

  18. Kailani

  19. Douma

  20. Amane

  21. Herakles

  22. Elonora

  23. Derek

  24. Elonora

  25. Elonora

  26. Hunter

  27. Kailani

  28. Nathaniel

  29. Harper

  30. Kailani

  31. Elonora

  32. Kailani

  33. Elonora

  34. Nathaniel

  35. Herakles

  36. Douma

  37. Elonora

  38. Dmitri

  39. Derek

  40. Amane

  Read more by Bella Forrest

  Also by Bella Forrest

  HARLEY MERLIN

  (New fantasy/romance/supernatural series!)

  Harley Merlin and the Secret Coven (Book 1)

  Harley Merlin and the Mystery Twins (Book 2)

  Harley Merlin and the Stolen Magicals (Book 3)

  Harley Merlin and the First Ritual (Book 4) (Releasing November 30th, 2018)

  HOTBLOODS

  (Supernatural romance. Completed series.)

  Hotbloods (Book 1)

  Coldbloods (Book 2)

  Renegades (Book 3)

  Venturers (Book 4)

  Traitors (Book 5)

  Allies (Book 6)

  Invaders (Book 7)

  Stargazers (Book 8)

  THE CHILD THIEF

  (Action-adventure/romance.)

  The Child Thief (Book 1)

  Deep Shadows (Book 2)

  Thin Lines (Book 3)

  Little Lies (Book 4)

  Ghost Towns (Book 5)

  THE GENDER GAME

  (Action-adventure/romance. Completed series.)

  The Gender Game (Book 1)

  The Gender Secret (Book 2)

  The Gender Lie (Book 3)

  The Gender War (Book 4)

  The Gender Fall (Book 5)

  The Gender Plan (Book 6)

  The Gender End (Book 7)

  THE GIRL WHO DARED TO THINK

  (Action-adventure/romance. Completed series.)

  The Girl Who Dared to Think (Book 1)

  The Girl Who Dared to Stand (Book 2)

  The Girl Who Dared to Descend (Book 3)

  The Girl Who Dared to Rise (Book 4)

  The Girl Who Dared to Lead (Book 5)

  The Girl Who Dared to Endure (Book 6)

  The Girl Who Dared to Fight (Book 7)

  A SHADE OF VAMPIRE SERIES

  (Supernatural romance)

  Series 1: Derek & Sofia’s story

  A Shade of Vampire (Book 1)

  A Shade of Blood (Book 2)

  A Castle of Sand (Book 3)

  A Shadow of Light (Book 4)

  A Blaze of Sun (Book 5)

  A Gate of Night (Book 6)

  A Break of Day (Book 7)

  Series 2: Rose & Caleb’s story

  A Shade of Novak (Book 8)

  A Bond of Blood (Book 9)

  A Spell of Time (Book 10)

  A Chase of Prey (Book 11)

  A Shade of Doubt (Book 12)

  A Turn of Tides (Book 13)

  A Dawn of Strength (Book 14)

  A Fall of Secrets (Book 15)

  An End of Night (Book 16)

  Series 3: The Shade continues with a new hero…

  A Wind of Change (Book 17)

  A Trail of Echoes (Book 18)

  A Soldier of Shadows (Book 19)

  A Hero of Realms (Book 20)

  A Vial of Life (Book 21)

  A Fork of Paths (Book 22)

  A Flight of Souls (Book 23)

  A Bridge of Stars (Book 24)

  Series 4: A Clan of Novaks

  A Clan of Novaks (Book 25)

  A World of New (Book 26)

  A Web of Lies (Book 27)

  A Touch of Truth (Book 28)

  An Hour of Need (Book 29)

  A Game of Risk (Book 30)

  A Twist of Fates (Book 31)

  A Day of Glory (Book 32)

  Series 5: A Dawn of Guardians

  A Dawn of Guardians (Book 33)

  A Sword of Chance (Book 34)

  A Race of Trials (Book 35)

  A King of Shadow (Book 36)

  An Empire of Stones (Book 37)

  A Power of Old (Book 38)

  A Rip of Realms (Book 39)

  A Throne of Fire (Book 40)

  A Tide of War (Book 41)

  Series 6: A Gift of Three

  A Gift of Three (Book 42)

  A House of Mysteries (Book 43)

  A Tangle of Hearts (Book 44)

  A Meet of Tribes (Book 45)

  A Ride of Peril (Book 46)

  A Passage of Threats (Book 47)

  A Tip of Balance (Book 48)

  A Shield of Glass (Book 49)

  A Clash of Storms (Book 50)

  Series 7: A Call of Vampires

  A Call of Vampires (Book 51)

  A Valley of Darkness (Book 52)

  A Hunt of Fiends (Book 53)

  A Den of Tricks (Book 54)

  A City of Lies (Book 55)

  A League of Exiles (Book 56)

  A Charge of Allies (Book 57)

  A Snare of Vengeance (Book 58)

  A Battle of Souls (Book 59)

  Series 8: A Voyage of Founders

  A Voyage of Founders (Book 60)

  A Land of Perfects (Book 61)

  A Citadel of Captives (Book 62)

  A Jungle of Rogues (Book 63)

  A Camp of Savages (Book 64)

  A Plague of Deceit (Book 65)

  An Edge of Malice (Book 66)

  A Dome of Blood (Book 67)

  A Purge of Nature (Book 68)

  A SHADE OF DRAGON TRILOGY

  A Shade of Dragon 1

  A Shade of Dragon 2

  A Shade of Dragon 3

  A SHADE OF KIEV TRILOGY

  A Shade of Kiev 1

  A Shade of Kiev 2

  A Shade of Kiev 3

  THE SECRET OF SPELLSHADOW MANOR

  (Supernatural/Magic YA. Completed series)

  The Secret of Spellshadow Manor (Book 1)

  The Breaker (Book 2)

  The Chain (Book 3)

  The Keep (Book 4)

  The Test (Book 5)

  The Spell (Book 6)

  BEAUTIFUL MONSTER DUOLOGY

  (Supernatural romance)

  Beautiful Monster 1

  Beautiful Monster 2

  DETECTIVE ERIN BOND

  (Adult thriller/mystery)

  Lights, Camera, GONE

  Write, Edit, KILL

  For an updated list of Bella’s books, please visit her website: www.bellaforrest.net

  Join Bella’s VIP email list and she’ll send you an email reminder as soon as her next book is out. Tap here to sign up: www.forrestbooks.com

  Copyright © 2018 by Bella Forrest

  Cover design inspired by Sarah Hansen, Okay Creations LLC

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, includ
ing information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  Problems reading?

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  New Generation List

  Dmitri (son of Victoria and Bastien – half human and half werewolf)

  Elonora “Lenny” (daughter of Ash and Ruby – vampire-sentry)

  Varga (son of Ash and Ruby – vampire-sentry)

  Kailani “Kale” (daughter of Brock and Arwen / granddaughter of Corrine and Ibrahim – witch)

  Hunter (Sofia’s adoptive brother / adopted son of Aiden and Kailyn – werewolf)

  Vesta (daughter of Idris and Rayna – water fae)

  Family tree

  If you’d like to check out the Novaks’ family tree, visit: www.forrestbooks.com/tree

  Derek

  Everything was going from bad to maybe better, then horribly worse.

  Ta’Zan had Sofia in a glass box, in his private quarters, while the rest of us were stuck in the diamond dome. He was going ahead with the creation of his new line of Arch-Perfects, with rebuilding the starships and comms blocker towers that our outside crew had destroyed, and with his plan to raise his armies and turn them against the universe.

  Yes, he was delusional in his genetics obsession, but he had the power and the resources to force it down our throats. He would be able to take his Perfects out into the vast cosmos and conquer the In-Between, one planet at a time. We were the only ones who could stop him before he took flight—not because we were superior to his winged warriors. We weren’t. But because we were here, and we could do something about it, or die trying.

  But the stakes had reached a new high. Our outside crew, led by my children, Ben and Rose, had succeeded in stealing devil-vipers from the colosseum’s animal sanctuary, as well as kidnapping Amal. Without his prime scientist, Ta’Zan was seething and bordering on brutally vicious.

  He had Cassiel drag Floren Pyris, a fire fae lieutenant, out of our group, and executed him right in front of us. It was his ultimatum: either the outside crew surrendered, or he’d continue to kill one of us every twelve hours. That wasn’t even the worst part. The next prisoner on his kill list was my wife.

  Pain spread through my stomach, like red-hot knives cutting through my entrails, as I tried to think clearly and come up with some kind of strategy to stop Ta’Zan from killing Sofia and more of our people. Rose and Ben’s crew couldn’t surrender—it would mean the end of our effort to stop him. Abandoning the In-Between and letting it fall under Ta’Zan’s bloody rule was not an option. Billions of lives were at stake.

  Rose assured me that they had this under control, but she didn’t immediately give me details. She’d said she needed to confer with the rest of her crew. They weren’t going to let twelve hours pass without something to at least stall Ta’Zan from going ahead with his next execution. My heart was twisted and tiny and in permanent agony, separated from Sofia and worried sick about her, about the outcome of all this. I couldn’t even imagine a world without her. None of us could.

  The founders and I sat in a circle, unable to formulate a coherent thought for the better part of an hour. Nothing we said had any value in the absence of details regarding Ben and Rose’s plan to stop Ta’Zan from killing Sofia. The angst was almost palpable.

  “Have you heard from Rose yet?” Lucas asked, pointing at my earpiece.

  I shook my head. “I’m sure I will, the moment they have a clear and detailed plan,” I answered. “I’m on the edge of my seat, though.”

  “Tell me about it,” Aiden said, a muscle twitching nervously in his jaw. “If anything happens to Sofia, I swear I’ll—”

  “We won’t let anything happen,” I said, cutting him off.

  His collar was probably hot already. We couldn’t talk much about fighting the Perfects and Ta’Zan, since the shock collars were wired to react to our brainwaves. They were able to interpret what we said and what we intended to do—which was why they released an electric shock whenever we tried to attack Ta’Zan or one of his underlings. We’d been testing their limits, but this wasn’t the time to get ourselves zapped.

  “I’m not liking this silence. It reeks of doom,” Corrine said, her concern for Kailani more than obvious.

  “Let’s wait for the kids to get back to us, Corrine,” I replied. “We may be helpless in here, but I know they won’t let anything happen to Sofia.”

  “So, then, what? They surrender?” Claudia shot back, equally shaken. She had a lot to lose here, since Elonora and Varga were both in that group, and we’d already gone to great lengths to get Varga out of the prisoner dome, in the first place.

  I shrugged. “I’m not sure. All I can say is that I trust Ben and Rose to come up with something smart. We’ve come too far to let Ta’Zan win this.”

  “I get that, but what about our kids?” Aiden sighed. “Hunter is out there… If he and the others end up in here, it’s all over. If they don’t surrender, Sofia dies. If this isn’t that space between a rock and a hard place, I don’t know what is.”

  We had everything to lose if Rose and Ben’s crew surrendered. If they didn’t, my wife, their mother, was going to die. How the hell are we getting ourselves out of this one?

  “If Kailani gets captured, Ta’Zan will want access to all that raw, untapped power of hers,” Ibrahim muttered, his brow furrowed. “And I’m talking about the Word here. About her swamp witch skills. They may be learned and not genetic, but he won’t care. Ta’Zan will dissect her like a frog and turn her inside out if he has to. He’ll do whatever it takes until he somehow gets what he wants out of her or he kills her.”

  “Don’t even say it out loud!” Corrine snapped, running her hands through her messy curls. “I can’t… No, I can’t even imagine what that’ll be like. She can’t come here.”

  “If I know Ta’Zan well enough, I’d bank on him threatening Kailani to kill Corrine or Ibrahim, or anyone else he knows she’s close to,” I said. “He’ll try every other avenue before proceeding to… you know.”

  Corrine exhaled sharply, her eyes tightly shut for a moment.

  “Think about Lumi, too,” Vivienne said. “Thanks to Cassiel, Ta’Zan surely knows about her, about Taeral—”

  “Oh, crap, Bogdana as well,” Xavier murmured, his eyes wide. He understood the damage that a surrender could do. “Jeez.”

  “Well, at least he doesn’t know that Bogdana is his surrogate mother,” Cameron answered, raising an eyebrow. “I doubt the crew will come out all at once, anyway.”

  It was my turn to frown. “What do you mean?”

  Cameron and Liana exchanged glances, then smiled at me. “You know Ben and Rose are way too sharp to simply succumb to Ta’Zan’s request. I mean, come on… Rose didn’t tell you she’s got this covered simply to console you, Derek. She’s a lot like you, remember?”

  I couldn’t help but chuckle lightly. “You have a point there.”

  “If they do opt for a surrender, it’ll be controlled, and with an endgame,” Cameron added. “They won’t all come out at once. We’ll probably see Rose and Ben’s crew first. They’ll maybe claim the others are gone. They won’t drag their allies into it, and Ta’Zan won’t be able to go back on his word. He said he wants the outsiders, not all the rebels. They’ll hold him to it, and, if he cheats, it won’t look good for him in front of his Perfects.”

  Xavier gasped. “And if they do go down this route, it’ll be up to the rogue Faulties, the Draenir, and the handful of Perfects they’ve got on their side to save the day.”

  “Dammit. We should’ve just gone to Hawaii for a holiday,” Kailyn mumbled, rolling her eyes. “This isn’t the way I wanted to spend my ‘founders’ break,’ you know.
”

  The shadow of a smile flickered across Yuri’s face.

  “What’s up, Yuri?” I asked.

  “I’m thinking about Lenny and Varga. They’ve got a serious bone to pick with Ta’Zan. They’d rather die than let him win. I know I shouldn’t be smiling about it, but I’ve got to give Ruby and Ash credit where it’s due. They’ve raised two phenomenal warriors.”

  Aiden groaned, pressing his index fingers against his throbbing temples. “You know what the worst part is? I know Sofia. She wouldn’t want them to surrender. She’d also rather die than let Ta’Zan beat us.”

  My breath was cut short for a moment. Aiden was right. Sofia would gladly die, if it meant that the rest of us got to live and fight another day.

  “One thing is for sure right now, and I think Sofia would agree, too, if she were here with us,” I said, exhaling deeply. “We cannot lose hope. We can’t let this bastard dictate any more terms. We’ve crippled his space fleet. We’ve taken down his comms blockers. We’ve turned some of his own people against him. We can do more, even if we’re stuck in here.”

  “Derek is right,” Marion replied, gently squeezing Lucas’s hand. “Even with these stupid collars on, we can do something. After all, we started a Faulty riot not that long ago, right?”

  “As long as we’re breathing, Ta’Zan won’t win,” Jax interjected, joining our group. “Let’s not forget that we’ve got GASP on the line, with Calliope, Nevertide, Neraka, and the entire Supernatural Dimension ready to back us up. We’re not alone in this. We will prevail, somehow.”