Scarlet Queen Ch. 10-11

"It's perfect," Dante murmured as he took the keys from Ellie and opened the driver door for her to climb in.

Ellie had to jump into it as both Dante and Rain chuckled a bit.

"Shut up, it's not my fault for being short, blame my genetics," she retorted.

"Oh no, we'd never blame them. You are adorable as you are, ma belle," Rain murmured as he settled in on the other side.

Dante started up the engine and drove off, feeling more carefree than he thought possible.

Chapter Eleven

They drove for about a hour before they found a restaurant that was still open. Ellie sat in between the two of them munching contently on a hamburger in the parking lot. Finishing it, she reach in the bag and found that there were no more. Picking up the bag, she peered into it just to make sure.

"Where did they all go?" She asked with a frown, sure that there had been at least one more.

"That's what I was wondering, you are super tiny," Rain murmured, handing her one of his.

"Hey now, I haven't eaten in... hold on, I forgot. Oh yeah, the day I got hurt, I ate a scone I think. Anyway, are you sure you don't want it?" Ellie said eyeing the hamburger.

"No, I'm full," Rain said.

Ellie continued to munch on the hamburger Rain had given her, then sat back in the seat and sighed in satisfaction.

"So good," Ellie murmured.

"You full now?" Dante asked her.

"You are kidding me, right? Rafe's grandfather once told me that I should enter one of those giant 96oz steak competitions, I gave it some serious thought but it's in a public place and people make an awful fuss over eating. The crowd would probably have a collective heart attack if I asked for seconds. How gauche."

Rain and Dante laughed at the thought of Ellie daintily eating the giant steak, and then placing her fork and knife down, and primly giving her compliments to the cook, before asking for another one.

"Well, apparently they don't make steaks for dhampirs. Besides, I don't eat often, but when I do I enjoy it," Ellie said primly.

"Why don't you eat often?" Rain asked.

Rain thought back and realized he didn't eat often too, but he tried to eat a meal at least once a day, for appearances if nothing else.

"I forget mostly, I don't get hungry like a human does. Well, except for those times on the new moon, when I go human. That's a moot point now. Anyway, I generally let my body decide when I'm actually hungry, whether it's for blood or food."

Rain understood what she meant, but he knew the dangers of that. If one didn't drink enough blood or get enough food, they could be hurt when they were at their most vulnerable.,which tended to be when one was famished or hurt - like what had happened with the stage collapse.

They sat in silence for a moment, until a phone started to ring. Rain didn't recognize the ring tone, it wasn't something that either of Dante or he used, they looked down at Ellie who frowned before pulling out her phone from her pocket.

"Hello?" Ellie asked answering it.

Rain used his preternatural hearing to listen to the person on the other end.

"Detective please help me," a scared female voice pleaded.

"Oh my, Linzi is that you? Where are you?" Ellie demanded softly trying not to panic Linzi.

"I don't know but he's after me, I think he's found my location. I don't know what to do, I'm so scared," Linzi whispered before bursting into fresh tears.

"Hold on, I can figure out where you are. Stay on the line though, I'm going to put you on speaker while I work," Ellie replied, taking the phone from her ear and pressing the speaker button.

Then she did something that Rain hadn't expected. Ellie hit a button that looked appeared like a normal button but it pulled up a GPS menu, Ellie typed in the number that came up when the call came in.

Rain watched as the screen changed to a virtual picture of the world before it narrowed down and triangulated Linzi's phone to a specific location. Rain was suitably impressed; he didn't realize that such technology existed. He had a feeling that it was something that was probably developed by Ellie or for her. Rain wanted that feature for himself.

She then punched another button on her phone to view her own GPS location. It came up and then calculated the distance and shortest route between the two locations.

"Linzi, honey, don't worry, we're not far from you; we're just about fifteen minutes out," Ellie said.

"Oh thank God, wait who's with you?" Linzi asked suspiciously.

"People that I trust with my life, we're on our way," Ellie stated, motioning to Dante, who took it as a signal to start the car, and peeled out.

Ellie relayed the first direction to him and then spoke to Linzi, "Linzi, can you put your phone on speaker for me? I want you to drive around, but I want you to stay near where you are maybe keep to a circuit, stay on bright lit streets. Can you do that for me?"

"Yeah," Linzi muttered as she changed over to speaker and started the engine.

"Stay calm, please trust in me, I'll keep you safe," Ellie said soothingly.

They could hear Linzi take a few calming breaths before she answered, "I know."

Ellie telepathically reached out to Rain, Can you do me a favour?

Rain replied quickly, Absolutely.

Can you relay the directions to Dante mentally, I going to try to keep Linzi calm until we can reach her and hopefully get some more information about this mysterious villain.

Rain nodded and quietly started to relay the directions mentally.

"Linzi honey, I need you to tell me about what's going on. Do you know this man's name?"

"Not his real name, he likes to called himself 'The Keeper'."

"Was he part of the cult?" Ellie asked.

"Yeah, he was the ring leader, I never saw his face though," Linzi shuddered and they could hear her start to panic.

"It's okay, Linzi honey, I won't allow him to hurt you," Ellie soothed.

Linzi started to take in deep breaths again trying to quell the hopeless panic she obviously felt.

Desperately she changed the subject and asked, "Can you tell me your real name, please?"

"It's Ellie. Eleanor Reina Aquitaine Prescott at your service," Ellie murmured.

Rain was surprised that Ellie gave her full name, but given the circumstances it seemed reasonable. Just hearing Ellie's name seemed to have an effect on Linzi.

"It's an interesting name, who gave it to you?"

"My mother, she wanted me to create my own path in life, so she named me after a woman who did just that, so I was named after Queen Eleanor of Aquitaine."

"Wow, my mother gave me mine because she thought it was cute. You're English right, where are you from though, the northern part, or the southern?" Linzi asked.

"I'm originally from the northwest coast, but I spent most of my time in London. Now, can I ask you a few more questions, Linzi? I promise only three more, we can sort the rest out later."

"Okay, but how far are you away now?" Linzi asked.

"About seven minutes out, one of my partners here drives like a bat out of hell," Ellie responded with a half laugh.

Linzi chuckled too, Rain thought she probably felt safer knowing that Ellie was so close.

"Okay, Linzi, when did he start stalking you again?" Ellie asked gently.

"Um... when I was in the hospital. I read some of the cards on the flowers, and he had sent seven bouquets in all, they all said that he was watching over me, it sickened me."

"Did you notice anything about his appearance, like how tall or big he is?"

"His face was always covered; he wore one of those ski mask things, with a hockey mask over it. It reminded me of Jason from Friday the Thirteenth. He's big, too, and I mean really big. I'd say over six and a half feet and over three hundred pounds; it's not fat though it looks like muscle," Linzi replied with another shudder.

"It's okay, you're going to be okay. We're only five minutes out. One last question, when did you notice that he had found you?"

"I saw him drive by me when I pulled out of the grocery store tonight. Oh God, Oh God, I didn't notice, he's still following me, he's right behind me, right now!" Linzi screamed as the sound of a large vehicle ramming Linzi's car became evident.

"Dante floor it! Linzi hang on, we're really close!" Ellie shouted.

Up ahead of them, Ellie saw a small car being chased by an SUV.

"Dante flick the lights! Linzi do you see the truck ahead?" Ellie said.

"Yes I see it, please save me," Linzi sobbed.

"Linzi, I'm going to get rid of him for you but we're going to play chicken. At the last moment I want you to veer right, alright?" Dante commanded.

"Okay."

The car came racing toward them, Rain drew Ellie into the shelter of his body to protect her from what was coming.

"Right, three, two, one, Linzi veer!" Dante commanded.

Linzi veered, and the SUV behind her did the same thing, as Dante turned the front of the truck into it and caught the back side. The SUV screeched to a halt as it was pushed into a wall on the other side.

They all looked at each and realized that no one was hurt. Getting out quickly, they noticed that the truck surprisingly had very minimal damage, just a dented bumper. Dante noticed that the grill appeared to be reinforced.

"Damn, Craven knows everything," Dante said under his breath.

Ellie ran over to Linzi who had jumped out of the car, and hugged Ellie sobbing. Ellie held her and murmured soothing remarks.

Rain and Dante started to walk to them, but a loud screech of metal alerted them. Looking back they watched the SUV pull out from against the wall and barrel towards them, trying to get away. Both men dived out of the way in the nick of time.

The SUV screeched to a halt again and they looked up. They saw Ellie was on the hood, right up against the glass. At first they thought she had been hit but, as they ran up on the car, they realized that she had actually punched a hole in the glass, and grabbed hold of the man. Rain and Dante were shocked to see Ellie try to drag him out of the car by his shirt. If not for the seriousness of the situation, they would have both laughed at the sight of a tiny woman, who looked like a wind could knock her over, trying to drag a huge man out of a car.

Ellie changed tactics and moved using supernatural speed and wrenching the door off the car. She tore him out of the car that way, tossing him to the ground before she started wailing on him.

"You stupid son of a bitch! This is for trying to kill the men I love," WHACK!

"This is for all the people you killed," WHACK! WHACK!

"And this is for Linzi!" WHACK!WHACK!WHACK!

Hearing the far off sirens, Dante grabbed Ellie by the waist and dragged her bodily off the prone man.

"Damn it, Dante, let me at him!" Ellie howled in anger.

"Calm down, love, he's not worth murdering. Come on, the cops are a few blocks away, let's leave him for the police," Dante said.

Ellie huffed, as Dante carried her to the truck where Linzi and Rain waited. Rain opened his side and Dante passed her to him before quickly moving to the driver's side, getting in and taking off.

No one spoke, everyone expected to be pulled over at any moment. About thirty minutes later, once they were on the highway, everyone all breathed an audible sigh of relief.

Dante took a quick peek at Ellie and noticed that she had her hood up and her face hidden in Rain's shoulder.

Ellie what are you doing? Dante asked telepathically.

I'm trying to calm down from a rage; I'm pretty sure my eyes are glowing, and I don't need to explain that to a traumatized Linzi, Ellie muttered.

Oh, I don't think that's a problem, Rain muttered.

Ellie looked up at Rain just as Dante gave him a half frown. Rain gave them both bored stares, as if to say, you don't see the obvious.

Linzi broke their mental bickering, when she did something completely bizarre. She laughed.

"Um, Linzi, are you ok?" Rain asked.

"I'm sorry you must think I'm nuts, but did you see what Ellie did to him. I mean he's terrorized me for so long like this giant boogie man, always waiting there ready to drag me into his nightmare. Then just when I thought I was done for, a tiny avenging angel flew at the car and tried to drag him bodily out of the SUV. It was the most ridiculous thing that I ever saw. What exactly were you thinking?" Linzi guffawed.

"That I would have succeeded if not for the damn steering wheel. By the way missy, pot calling the kettle black, you're not much taller or heavier than I am."

Everyone but Ellie laughed at her retort.

"That's what made it so awesome. I mean to me in my mind, he was huge, standing six and a half feet as well as a solid three hundred pounds. I always thought, ' I can never win against him, he's going to kill me', but you're a little smaller than me Ellie You're what, 5 foot 4 and a hundred pounds soaking wet?"

"Hey, I am a solid one-twenty," Ellie defended herself.

Rain snorted.

"Alright, alright, one-ten, ass," Ellie muttered directing it at Rain.

"All lovingly distributed," Rain said soothingly as he hugged her.

"Anyway, he's almost triple your weight and a foot taller, but somehow you managed to beat the snot out of him. Hellfire, I'm sure you could have killed him, though I'm glad you didn't. His miserable end shouldn't be on your conscience, but thanks, Ellie, I really mean it. After seeing what you did, I'm less of afraid of him. He's not a mythical monster anymore, just a human one," Linzi whispered.

Ellie let go of Rain and leaned forward to hug Linzi.

"No worries, pet, you've always got my number, I'll always save you from sickos. Though, hopefully this is the only one because you deserve to be safe and happy. I'll even save you two," Ellie said encompassing Rain and Dante in the comment.

"Doubtful, you and Rain are the ones who get into trouble. I foresee myself rescuing the two of you all the time."

Rain snorted again, "Not a chance, I'm better at swords than you are."

"Only because you've been challenged more times than I have, you cad," Dante retorted.

"By the way, how did you end up with both Rain and Dante? Damn, that did not come out the way I meant it. I'm so sorry, I keep accidentally offending you," Linzi said looking visibly upset at the faux pas.

Ellie brushed her hair out of her face smiling and replied, "No worries, no offence taken. As to how I ended with them... well... I'm still trying to figure that one out, since they sort of hoodwinked me. Though I'm over it and quite happy with the arrangement."

Rain and Dante chuckled at the apt remark.

"Wait, so are you childhood friends or something?" Linzi asked.

"Destined lovers," Rain said nonplussed as if it were an everyday fact.

"All three of you are lovers?" Linzi gasped out, initially shocked but she seemed to accept it quite quickly.

"I told you I was hoodwinked," Ellie muttered as Rain kissed her cheek.

"How did that happen? I'm sorry if I'm being nosey, I'm really happy for you though."

"You're not being nosey and thank you for that. As to all the sordid details, that's sort of complicated. Here, I'll give you the Cliff Notes: I met them at a party, Rain wooed me and proposed marriage. Then an incident happened which I was involved in and Rain nearly died. I thought they wanted to kill me because of it, though that was a complete misunderstanding..."

"... Or a paranoid delusion..." Rain muttered with a sigh.

"...Alright, I'll admit that it was probably paranoia on my part, thought that is neither here nor there. Anyway, Rain's recent accident happened and I was blackmailed to work on his case. Somehow they both figured out I was on the case. I'm kind of still pissed about that breach of security; I'll fix it later, though. Moving on, I got hurt, they saved my life and we ended up bonded together, and the rest is history."

"Wow, just wow, those really are some Cliff Notes," Linzi murmured as she stared at Ellie.

"Life happens, it's better just to go with the flow," Ellie said nonchalantly.

"So um... you're like them then? You're a vampire?" Linzi asked.

"Wait, you know about vampires? Damn, I didn't recognize before because it's faint, but you're a dhampir just like Ellie," Dante said out loud.

"Wait, what am I missing, how do you know Linzi's dhampir?" Ellie asked bewildered.

"Yeah, and what do you mean Ellie is too?" Linzi asked wide eyed.

"Well, it's just became apparent that born dhampirs can't recognize other born dhampirs. We'll have to ask Craven about that one later. To answer your question, you both are born dhampirs, though Ellie's older than you are Linzi. Before you ask, Ellie's almost two hundred years older. Her Cliff Notes did leave much to be desired, but she made me into a dhampir too, and I made Dante. When we saved Ellie's life we changed her so that she is now similar to us, though she still has a lot of her born dhampir quirks."

"That's odd, my step-dad told me that a dhampir will go full vampire if bitten on the day they go completely human."

"From what we've been told by Craven, that's more of a yes and no situation. If a dhampir is bitten by a full vampire, than they can go full vampire, however they still retain most of the dhampir gifts, like a great ability to withstand full afternoon sunlight, and other things vampires are vulnerable to. If a dhampir is bit by a 'made dhampir', then they essentially retain everything that they had before minus the ability to go fully human or fully vampire once a month."

"There's so much to learn," Linzi sighed.

"It'll come, I'm over two hundred years old and I'm still learning, just as are these reprobates I'm sure," Ellie said.

Rain poked Ellie in the side at the remark but Ellie leaned back and kissed him soundly before resting her head back on his shoulder.

"Do you think... Craven will teach me about dhampirs?" Linzi asked after a moment.

"Absolutely, he's a crotchety old goat though, but I'm sure he'll grow on you," Ellie remarked.

Linzi laughed and everyone continued to chat about random topics. Finally, they pulled up on the driveway at Craven's manor.

Craven, Rhyder, and Gabe stood outside.

"Who are they?" Linzi asked nervously.

"Oh, there's Craven, he's in the middle. Rhyder, is Craven's right hand man and head of security and is, coincidentally, on the right, and Gabriel is a doctor, he specializes in dhampirs. He's on the left. Gabe's also here because he's working temporarily as my right hand man so to speak, while his brother is protecting Jinx."

"Jinx is okay?" Linzi asked looking happier.

"Yes he is, Rain and Dante's friend Silver, is also watching over him, so he is safe as houses." At Linzi's blank look Ellie amended, "I meant to say well protected."

"Oh, thank you so much Ellie, I can never repay you for all you've done," Linzi said.

"I'm okay with that, Craven taught me that you should never help someone if you're only expecting something in return. I would like to stay friends with you if that's okay. I never made friends before,only enemies, which I can live with, but you'll have to excuse me if I do something stupid," Ellie stated.

"I'd be honoured to be your friend, Ellie," Linzi said

"Thank you, Linzi, oh I should mention I'm also a tad paranoid, it's best to be honest up front," Ellie replied with a smile.

Rain and Dante both chuckled at the 'tad' remark. Linzi didn't seem to mind though, especially when she responded with, "Well I often speak before I filter my thoughts, so you'll have to forgive me for that too."

With that the two women shared a laugh and another hug.

Rain and Dante shared a smile over the their heads. They were happy that Ellie was taking steps out of her comfort zone. They also had a feeling that Linzi and Ellie would become great lifelong friends.