Torina (Tales from the Island) Read online



  Tales from the Island:

  TORINA

  A short story

  By Joleene Naylor

  https://www.joleenenaylor.com

  [email protected]

  Copyright 2014 by Joleene Naylor

  Cover art copyright Joleene Naylor 2014. All rights reserved.

  Ramblings from the Darkness at https://www.joleenenaylor.com

  You never know what you’ll find in the shadows…..

  **********

  Children of Shadows:

  The sixth installment of the Amaranthine series pulsates with the dark blood of vampire lore.

  The Children of Shadows, a vampire cult not seen for hundreds of years, resurfaces to wage war on the vampire guilds. Led by a familiar face, the cult wreaks havoc while Katelina and Jorick are trapped in Munich’s stronghold. Ume, a mysterious vampiress, who claims to know Verchiel, offers the help of her secret organization. But how are she and Verchiel connected, and can they trust her?

  As mysteries are solved, new ones appear. Why have the Children of Shadows returned, and is it really a former ally that leads them, or a look-alike? Jorick and Katelina will have to team up with past companions and new allies if they want to find out the truth.

  Legends rise and secrets are revealed in a world where vampires walk, drenched in blood and shadows.

  **********

  Other books by Joleene Naylor:

  Amaranthine:

  0: Brothers of Darkness

  1: Shades of Gray

  2: Legacy of Ghosts

  3: Ties of Blood

  4: Ashes of Deceit

  5: Heart of the Raven

  6: Children of Shadows

  7. Clash of Legends

  8. Masque of the Vampire

  9: Goddess of Night

  Also:

  Vampire Morsels Collection: 17 Short Stories

  101 Tips for Traveling with a Vampire by Joleene Naylor

  Heart of the Raven Mini Prologue Collection

  Tales from the Island: Six Short Stories

  Thirteen Guests: A Masque of the Vampire companion

  Road to Darkness: A short story companion to Brothers of Darkness

  COMING SOON:

  Tales of the Executioners

  * * * * * * * * * *

  Thanks to Bonnie Mutchler and Chris Harris for their ninja-like proofreading skills.

  * * * * * * * * * *

  This is the second of six short stories, Tales from the Island, that fit between the novels Heart of the Raven and Children of Shadows.

  They may or may not make sense if you have not read the accompanying novels.

  After five novels of bloodshed and terror, Katelina finally gets her island vacation, but it’s not all she expected. How can it be when her companions are vampires? Get ready for book 6 of the Amaranthine series, Children of Shadows, with these tasty bites. What happens on a vampire vacation, stays on a vampire vacation.

  * * * * * * * * * *

  DAY 2:

  Torina slipped into the emerald green bikini and studied the effect in the full length mirror. She frowned and pulled at the top, as if she could physically force her ample breasts to sit higher. She’d spent more than two hundred years trying to get them to cooperate and they still refused.

  She turned this way and that, nodding in approval at some things and frowning at others. A voice from long ago came back to her, “If men find you pleasing you will never need to worry. Happy is the woman who looks to these things.”

  The words sounded wise, but her mother had been wrong. No matter how pleasing you were there was always something to worry about. Hunger, thirst, loneliness.

  “My stupid brother.”

  As if conjured from her thoughts she saw him through the window. He took a seat on the brightly lit patio and gazed towards the ocean. A short woman wrapped in a kimono hurried after him and took a chair. She held yards of blue fabric in her lap and, as Torina watched, she turned to her embroidery.

  Things stirred in the back of Torina’s memory. Quilting parties. Embroidering a handkerchief for her father. The sounds of giggling women and tiny stitches in neat rows. The memories were disjointed and hazy, too old to be important, and she brushed them aside.

  She headed downstairs and outside. The tropical night was warm. A sea breeze caressed her skin and rustled the palm trees. A pair of grass roofed mansions sat in the center of the island, home to the group of vacationers, and she left her own for the one with a kitchen. Why they’d only put amenities in one house had not been explained, but it was an inconvenience.

  She paused suddenly at the sliding glass doors and scented something in the wind that would taste better than canned blood. Even if they put an umbrella in it.

  Torina turned towards the trees and plunged into the foliage. She wound her way up the dark hillside until she came to a clearing at the top. The mortal stood, hands clasped behind his back and eyes on the sky above, unaware of her presence. He wasn’t particularly attractive, though he wasn’t ugly. He had dark hair, cropped close, and ginger skin. His shoulders were broad and spoke of manual labor, and she imagined his chest would be muscled, but it wasn’t his body she was interested in, only his blood. She could smell it coursing through his veins, singing for her taste.

  And why shouldn’t she sample him? He was one of the humans that peppered the island with the sole purpose of making the vampires’ stay comfortable.

  She took a purposefully noisy step. He spun around, eyes wide. Fright rose and fell in them, masked quickly under servitude.

  He bowed. “Madam, how may I be of service?”

  She walked towards him slowly, swaying her hips in a calculated rhythm. “There’s no need to be so formal. It’s just you and me here.”

  He looked up. His face flushed and he dropped his eyes again. “What can I do for you?”

  She stopped before him and lifted his chin with her finger. “I can think of lots of things, can’t you?”

  He gulped, his eyes locked in her deep emerald gaze. Her smile was slow, seductive, satisfied, like a spider with a particularly tasty bug.

  That’s what he is.

  Torina wiped her mouth and left him lying dazed in the grass, staring at the stars. She picked her way down the hill and swerved towards the beach, pausing at the edge of the trees. Several of her vacation companions were already there, including Micah, a bald specimen with a goatee and tribal tattoo down one side of his face. He lounged on a beach chair, dressed in a pair of patterned swim trunks and a white tank top that hugged his well-muscled chest. A cigarette hung from his lips, and he motioned to someone she couldn’t see.

  She gave her breasts a final, fruitless lift and plunged out into the open, making a point to draw Micah’s attention. The bald vampire gave a low, crude whistle and she struck a pose for him. He swung up from his beach chair and headed towards her, hands extended. Torina lithely danced away a step. “Did I give you permission to touch?”

  “Why the fuck else would you run around in that?” he asked.

  “Because it’s a bathing suit.” She rolled her eyes. “Unless you think it’s better to swim without it?”

  Micah leaned back on his heels and gave her a long once over, then he jerked his thumb towards the others. “If it was one of those jack asses I’d say no, but you’re the exception to the rule, baby cakes.”

  “Baby cakes?” The name was so ridiculous even she couldn’t keep a straight face and she broke into laughter. “You need to put more thought into your terms of endearment.”

  Before he could defend himself, she patted him on the back and strode towards the water. Though it was night, the ocean was warm, and she slid in
to it until the water was over her breasts. She lunged forward and swam with long, smooth strokes.

  Swimming was something she’d learned in her new life; her immortal life. Her mother would never have allowed her daughter to do something as undignified as that. Ladies were ladies, and swimming was a sport for boys and badly raised girls. Torina imagined her mother watching television; young women wearing little more than underwear, sweating, swimming, running, doing the same things that men did. It was just as well that they’d received immortality after her mother’s death. The woman would never have been able to handle the modern world.

  When she got tired of swimming she made her way back to the shore. Loren, a teen vampire with dark curly hair and large brown eyes had joined his bald friend. The boy was dressed in a pair of loud Hawaiian style swim trunks and nothing else. His pale, naked torso only reminded everyone how young he’d been when he was turned; doubtless no more than