Niccolo (Blood Brothers) by Eve Vaughn

course, this is obviously your first taste of the stuff. After all, I understand you were thoroughly twisted in your mama’s apron strings.”
    Jagger’s eyes narrowed at the taunt. He tilted his head back and gulped the rest of the drink down in one swallow, then slammed the glass defiantly on the end table.
    “So you have some spirit, after all. I’m pleased to see that. You might do. Tell me, why did tonight’s events bother you so much?”
    “Because those people did nothing to deserve what happened to them. You and your men killed them as though you were animals.”
    “It is what we are. We are the ones who will inherit the Earth. You, more than anyone, should know this. It is a shame your mother hasn’t told you.”
    “Told me what?”
    “Well, as you are half warlock and half vampire, you will be very powerful, indeed. One side does not cancel the other out, you know.”
    “I don’t understand what you’re getting at.” Jagger clutched his head. His thoughts seemed jumbled and cloudy.
    “It’s very simple. Even though you’re not a full blood, you’ll still have the same abilities of both sides as you age. You are the future. Imagine what would happen were you to mate with ... a shifter, perhaps. Do you realize how powerful your offspring would be? There would be no stopping our cause then.”
    “Your cause?” Jagger was confused.
    “I see you’re still not getting it. No matter. In time you will. Tonight was only the beginning.”
    “You plan on killing more innocent people?” Jagger asked incredulously. This couldn’t be real. He shook his head to alleviate the fuzziness surrounding his thoughts, but he couldn’t seem to focus.
    “Innocents? You think humans are innocent? For centuries they used up what is rightfully ours. We deserve the right to walk around without suppressing our nature. You especially should feel outraged. How many of your ancestors were burned at the stake in the name of their God, who has long since turned his back on us? Look at you now. You’re in pain. I can feel it. Your body temperature is rising and you hunger for something, but you don’t know what. You lie awake at night, breaking out in a sweat. You seek out women, but you force yourself to not take what you really want.”
    “How do you know?”
    “How could I not know? It’s obvious to me that you are in the beginning stages of la morte dolci. I bet your mother and precious uncles never mentioned anything about it, did they? You’ve been so busy trying to stifle your vampire side that you’ve been making yourself sick.”
    Jagger opened his mouth to speak, then immediately closed it. He had held a part of himself back but it was mostly to please his mother. Was it possible that her motives in telling him to do so were not as altruistic as he had thought? No. He refused to believe it. “My mother did what she could to protect me.”
    “No, what she did was handicap you. She knew exactly what she was doing. The tears whenever you asked about your father. The sad little faces. The truth is your mother and uncles manipulated you. You should have been raised among your vampire kin; maybe then you would have realized your full potential.”
    Jagger’s heart clenched in his chest. Everything that the ancient said made an odd kind of sense. A war of emotions flowed through him. He felt angry and defensive at the same time. He was almost positive his mother had never intentionally led him astray, but now he had doubts. “Why would my mother do this? I thought —”
    “You think she loves you? I’m sure she does, in her way, but is it really love to keep a father from his son? Your mother used you as a pawn. Can you imagine the pain of someone separated from his child? Oh yes, she knew exactly what she was doing, but enough about her. I’m going to see that you are made well.”
    The more Jagger wanted to argue the more his head pounded and the fog clouding his thoughts thickened. “What do I need to