Called to Order Read Online Free Page A

Order could impose thoughts on humans who were less aware of their conscious abilities and therefore of a weaker cognition. This was an ability mainly used for survival, a means for compelling a human donor in order to feed.
    There were also advanced levels of telepathy their kind referred to as gifts or disciplines. Adam’s gift was sensing emotion. Adam’s sister Gracie’s gift was overhearing thoughts. She could pick up threads of mental dialogue here and there, but she was still young and still trying to hone her gift. Adam would often help her practice by playing I Spy. He would select a random item in the room and Gracie would try to pluck clues from his mind. Presently, he regretted helping Gracie hone her skill to such perfection. His mother, whose primary gift was loving her family, now seemed needlessly concerned.
    Abilene’s eyes wavered from him to his father, to Grace, and back to him. Only Cain seemed unconcerned by their sister’s outburst.
    “Adam, dear, is everything all right?” his mother asked.
    “It is fine, Mother. Everything’s fine.”
    Cain let out a quiet huff of laughter, but continued stuffing his face. Abilene did not miss his brother’s amusement. Her frown deepened. “What’s going on? Gracie?” Grace froze, clearly reluctant to betray her brother.
    “Someone better tell me what’s going on right now,” their father announced as he caught Cain’s hand reaching for a second helping of potatoes.
    “Hey,” Cain protested.
    “Nothing. Nothing is going on,” Grace amended.
    “Cain?”
    “Hey, I just want to eat.”
    “You can eat when I know what has Gracie upset. Adam?”
    Adam gave one last resigned look around the table then braced himself for the inevitable. “I’ve got the calling . I can sense her. She’s near.”

Chapter 2

    Once Jonas had settled Abilene down, he went directly to his father’s home. Ezekiel Hartzler, at almost three hundred years, was a member of the Elder’s Council. He had been the patriarch of the Hartzler family since the late nineteen twenties when the eldest Hartzler, Ezekiel’s brother Isaiah, left The Order never to return. Isaiah was now considered rogue, a label he’d earned after not returning after receiving the calling .
    Other than the required jaunts into town to conduct business, their kind didn’t much leave their land. Unlike other Amish societies, their order did not promote Rumspringa , a running-around time adolescents experienced just prior to adulthood where they would temporarily live amongst the English. If they chose to return it was just that, a choice to be baptized as a permanent part of their Amish order. Jonas’s kind experienced no such choice.
    The Order was something one was born into and could only be executed out of. There were no excommunications as in other human sects. Members only left for extended periods to follow the calling of their human mate, a calling not every immortal experienced. Being one of the called was the one and only case exposure was pardoned to an extent. Because the calling was a sort of cosmic pull between an immortal and their sometimes-human counterpart, it was necessary to enlighten those predisposed mortals of their species.
    However, if a mortal mate chose not to join The Order, their memories would be erased by the elders, removing any proof of their specie’s existence before they were deposited back into the modern world. The last time this had occurred was in the seventeen hundreds. The vampyre whose mate chose not to stay had to eventually be executed. The rejection of his mate was something his baser needs could not accept, thus causing him to eventually go mad, an outcome The Order preferred to avoid. Such was why, when a member of The Order was called , it was their duty to answer the calling . Otherwise they could easily become a danger to the rest of their species, losing control of their actions, and eventually risking exposure through the carnage left in their