Dance of the Gods

by Nora Roberts

  “And she’d be right.”

  “I know. I know. But oh God, I wish I didn’t see the ones we left behind. I wish their faces, their screams weren’t in my head. We can’t save them all, and I said as much to Hoyt when we were in New York. It was easy to say it then.”

  She shook her head. “And you’re right, I need some rest. I have to take this tray up, see that the others get some of it inside them. You could do me a favor.”

  “I probably could.”

  “You could take this one into the library. Moira’s in there.”

  “She’ll likely think it’s poisoned if I take it into her.”

  “Oh stop.”

  “All right, all right. But don’t blame me if she pours it down some drain.” He hefted the tray, muttering to himself as he left the kitchen. “I’m a vampire, for God’s sake. Creature of the damn night, drinker of blood. And here I am playing butler to some erstwhile Geallian queen. Mortifying is what it is.”

  And he’d wanted to pass some time in the library, with a book and the fire.

  He stepped in, leading with his irritation, and a scathing comment rolling up to the tip of his tongue.

  Which would have been wasted, he decided, as she was curled up on one of the sofas, sleeping.

  Now what the hell was he supposed to do? Leave her be, wake her and pour the damn tea into her?

  Undecided, he stood where he was, studying her.

  Pretty enough, he thought, with a potential for true beauty if she put any effort into it. At least when she slept it didn’t seem as though her eyes would swallow her face, and whoever she aimed those long, large gray beacons toward with it.

  There was a time he’d have found it entertaining to corrupt and defile her kind of innocence. To peel it away slowly, layer by layer, until there was nothing left of it.

  These days he preferred the simplicity of the more experienced, women who were in it for no more than he was. A few hours of heat in the dark.

  Creatures like this took a great deal of effort. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d been stirred enough to play with one.

  In the end he decided to leave the tray on the table. If she woke, she’d drink it. If she didn’t, well, sleep itself would go a long way to restoring her.

  Either way, he’d have done the chore.

  He moved to the table, laid the tray down with barely a click of china on wood. But she stirred, nonetheless. A low moan, a little tremor. He backed away, his eyes on her face—and was careless enough to step into a thin slant of sunlight.

  The quick, searing pain in his shoulder had him cursing under his breath even as he moved quickly out of the beam. Annoyed with Glenna, with himself, with the sleeping queen, he turned to go.

  She began to twitch in her sleep, small sounds of fear gurgling in her throat. Her body rolled up into a tight ball as she shuddered. And in sleep, she began to speak breathlessly.

  “No, no, no.” Again and again, until she fell into unintelligible Gaelic.

  She thrashed, rolling to her back, going stiff as she bowed up, exposing the line of her throat.

  He moved quickly, stepping between the couch and the table, and leaning down, gave her a hard shake.

  “Wake up,” he ordered. “Snap out of it now, I haven’t the patience for this.”

  She moved fast—and he faster—slapping the stake she stabbed out with from her hand. It clattered on the floor ten feet away.

  “Don’t do that.” He gripped her wrist, felt her pulse striking like an anvil against his fingers. “Next time you do, I’ll snap this like a twig, I promise you.”

  “I—I—I—”

  “Very succinct. Are you understanding me?”

  Her eyes, huge and glassy with fear darted around the room. “She was here, she was here. No, no, not here.” Moira came up to her knees, gripping his arm with her free hand. “Where is she? Where? I can still smell her. Too sweet, too heavy.”

  “Stop.” He released her wrist to take hold of her shoulders. Another shake had her teeth chattering. “You were asleep, you were dreaming.”

  “No. I was…Was I? I don’t know. It’s not dark. It’s not dark yet, but it was…” She put her hands on his chest, but instead of pushing him away as he expected, she simply dropped her head there. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I need a moment.”

  He caught himself reaching back to stroke her hair—that long thick braid the color of dark oak. He dropped his hand to the side.

  “You fell asleep here on the couch,” he said in a flat, almost businesslike voice. “You had a dream. Now you’re awake.”

  “I thought Lilith…” She reared back. “I nearly staked you.”

  “No. Not even close.”

  “I didn’t mean—I wouldn’t have meant.” She closed her eyes in an obvious effort to find some composure. When she opened them, her eyes were clearer, and very direct. “I’m very sorry, but why are you here?”

  He stepped to the side, gestured. Now it was simple shock that moved over her face. “You…You made me tea and biscuits?”

  “Glenna,” he corrected, surprisingly embarrassed at the very thought. “I’m just the delivery boy.”

  “Um. It’s very kind of you all the same. I didn’t mean to sleep. I thought I would read after Larkin went upstairs. But I…”

  “Have your tea then. You’ll likely be the better for it.” When she only nodded, made no move, he cast his eyes to the ceiling. Then he poured out a cup of tea. “Lemon or cream, Your Highness?”

  She tipped her head to look at him. “You’re annoyed with me, and who could blame you for it? You brought me tea, and I tried to kill you.”

  “Then don’t waste my time or the bloody tea. Here.” He pushed the cup into her hands. “Drink it down. Glenna’s orders.”

  Still watching him, she took a sip. “It’s very nice.” Then her lips trembled, her eyes filled.

  His belly tightened. “I’ll leave you with it then, and with your tears.”

  “I wasn’t strong enough.” The tears didn’t fall, just glimmered in her eyes like rain over fog. “I couldn’t help them hold the spell, I couldn’t do it. So it broke away, it shattered, and it was like shards of glass ripping through us. We couldn’t get any of the others, any of the others from the cages.”

  He wondered if he should tell her that Lilith would only replace the ones they took. Likely twice the number in her fury.

  “Now you waste your own time, blaming yourself, and feeling sorry for yourself with it. If you could’ve done more, you would have.”

  “In the dream, she said she wouldn’t bother to drink me. Being the smallest, the weakest, I wouldn’t be worth the trouble.”

  He sat on the table facing her, helped himself to one of her biscuits. “She’s lying.”

  “How do you know?”

  “Creature of the night, remember? The smallest is very often the sweetest. A kind of appetizer, if you will. If I were still in the habit of it, I’d bite you in a heartbeat.”

  She lowered the tea cup to frown at him. “Is that, in some strange way, a kind of flattery?”

  “Take it as you like.”

  “Well. Thank you…I suppose.”

  “Finish off your tea.” He got to his feet. “Ask Glenna for something to block the dreams. She’s bound to have it.”

  “Cian,” she said as he started toward the doorway. “I am grateful. For everything.”

  He only nodded and continued out. A thousand years, he thought, and he still didn’t really understand humans—and women in particular.

  Blair drank Glenna’s tea, and decided she’d stretch out for an hour with her headphones. Ideally, the music would rest her mind, give it time to clear and recharge. But it all circled around with Patty Griffin’s soulful voice.

  The sea, the cliffs, the battle. That moment, when the sky darkened, of absolute certainty that she’d come to the end. And that tiny cold seed of relief inside her that it would, finally, be over.

  She didn’t
have a death wish, she thought. She didn’t. But there was that small, secret place in her that was tired, so horribly tired of being alone, of having what she was and what she had to do dictate she would stay alone.

  Alone with blood and death and endless violence.

  It had cost her the love of a man she’d wanted so much, and the future she’d believed they would have together. Was that when it had started? she wondered. Was that when that little seed had planted itself inside her? The night Jeremy had walked away from her?

  Pitiful, she thought and pulled off the headphones. Pathetic. Was she going to let her psyche be twisted up by a man—and one who hadn’t been man enough to deal with her? Would she come to accept death just because he hadn’t accepted her for who and what she was?

  That was just bullshit. She turned to her side, hugging her pillow as she studied the fading light through the window.

  She only thought of Jeremy because Larkin had gotten her juices going again. She didn’t want to go soft again for a man, to feel herself being taken over and swept off by all that emotion.

  Sex was okay, sex was fine, as long as it didn’t mean anything more than relief and release. She couldn’t go through the pain again, and that awful feeling of abandonment that left the heart a quivering, bleeding mass inside the chest.

  No one stayed, she thought as she closed her eyes. Nothing was forever.

  She drifted off, the music from the headphones she’d neglected to turn off tinny and distant.

  It filled her head, the music that was her own excited blood pumping. It was nearly dawn, the night’s work over. But she was so full of energy, so fired up, she knew she could go for hours yet.

  She looked down at herself as she walked the last block toward home. She’d ruined another shirt. The job, she thought, was hell on the wardrobe. It was torn and bloody, and her left shoulder was a mass of bruises and throbbing pain.

  But she was so juiced!

  The suburban street was quiet and pretty—everyone tucked up in bed and safe. And as the sun came up, the dogwoods and tulip trees were so showy and pink. She could smell hyacinths and took a deep breath of soft, sweet spring.

  It was the morning of her eighteenth birthday.

  So she was going to clean up, rest up, then spend a lot of time making herself irresistible for a very hot birthday date.

  As she unlocked the front door of the house where she lived with her father, she slung her bag off her good shoulder, dumped it. She needed to clean her weapons, but first she wanted about a gallon of water.

  Then she spotted the suitcases sitting near the door, and the leading edge of thrill dropped away.

  He came down the steps, already wearing his coat. He was so handsome, she thought. Tall and dark, that chiseled face and bold eyes. Just the slightest glint of silver in his hair. A world of love and misery opened inside her.

  “So you’re back.” He glanced at her shirt. “If you’re going to let them bloody you, take a change of clothes. You’ll draw attention to yourself walking around like that.”

  “No one saw me. Where are you going?”

  “Romania. To research, primarily.”

  “Romania? Couldn’t I go? I’d really like to see—”

  “No. I’ve left a checkbook. There should be enough to run the house for several months.”

  “Months? But…when are you coming back?”

  “I’m not.” He picked up a small carry-on bag, slung it over his shoulder. “I’ve done all I can for you. You’re eighteen, you’re of age.”

  “But—you can’t—Please, don’t just go. What did I do?”

  “Nothing. I’ve put the house in your name. Stay, or sell it. Go where you like. It’s your life.”

  “Why? How can you just walk out on me this way? You’re my father.”

  “I’ve trained you to the best of my ability, and yours. There’s nothing else I can do for you.”

  “You could stay with me. You could love me, just a little.”

  He opened the door, picked up the suitcases. It wasn’t regret she saw on his face, but an absence. He was, she understood, already gone.

  “I have an early flight. If I need anything else, I’ll send for it.”

  “Do I mean anything to you?”

  He looked at her then, full in the face. “You’re my legacy,” he said, and walked out the door.

  She wept, of course, stood there alone with spring wafting in on the pretty breeze.

  She cancelled her date, spent her birthday alone in the house. A few days later, she sat, alone again, in the cemetery, preparing to destroy what the boy she’d cared for had become.

  For the rest of her life she would wonder if she’d kept that date, would he have lived?

  Now she stood in the bedroom of her Boston apartment, facing the man in whom she’d poured all her love, and her hopes. “Jeremy, please, let’s sit down. We need to talk about this.”

  “Talk?” There was still dull shock in his eyes as he shoved clothing into a duffle. “I can’t talk about this. I don’t want to know about this. Nobody should know about this.”

  “I did it wrong.” She reached out, had him shrug her away in a gesture so sharp and dismissive she felt it cut her to the bone. “I shouldn’t have taken you out, shown you. But you wouldn’t believe me when I tried to tell you.”

  “That you kill vampires? What was I thinking, not believing you?”

  “I had to show you. We couldn’t get married if you didn’t know everything. It wasn’t fair to you.”

  “Fair?” He whirled toward her, and she saw it clearly on his face. Not just the fear, not just the rage. Disgust. “This is fair? You lying and deceiving me all this time?”

  “I didn’t lie. I omitted, and I’m sorry. God, I’m so sorry, but it wasn’t something I could tell you when we first…and then I didn’t know how to tell you what I was, what I do.”

  “What you are is a freak.”

  She jerked her head back as if he’d slapped her. “I’m not a freak. I know you’re upset, but—”

  “Upset? I don’t know who you are, what you are. Christ, what I’ve been sleeping with all these months. But I know this. I want you to stay away from me, away from my family, my friends.”

  “You need time. I get that, but—”

  “I’ve given you all the time you’re going to get. It makes me sick to look at you.”

  “That’s enough.”

  “It’s past enough. Do you think I could be with you, that I could touch you again after this?”

  “What’s wrong with you?” she demanded. “What I did saved lives. It would have killed people, Jeremy. It would have hunted and killed innocent people. I stopped it.”

  “It doesn’t exist.” He dragged the duffle off the bed they’d shared for nearly six months. “When I walk out of here, it doesn’t exist, and neither do you.”

  “I thought you loved me.”

  “Looks like we were both wrong.”

  “So you walk out,” she said quietly, “and I cease to be.”

  “That’s right.”

  Not the first time, she thought, no, not the first. The only other man she’d loved had done the same. Slowly, she drew the diamond from her finger. “You’d better have this back.”

  “I don’t want it. I don’t want anything that’s touched you.” He strode to the door, glanced back once. “How do you live with yourself?”

  “I’m all I’ve got,” she said to the empty room. Then she set the ring on the dresser, lowered to the floor and wept.

  Men are vile creatures, really. Using women up, casting them aside. Leaving them alone and broken. Better to leave them first, isn’t it? Better yet to pay them back, and leave them bleeding.

  Sick and tired of being the one left behind, aren’t you? And all the fighting, all the death. I can help you with that. I’d so like to help you.

  Why don’t we talk about it, you and me? Just us girls. Let’s have a few drinks and trash men, why don’t we?
<
br />   Aren’t you going to ask me in?

  Blair stood at the window, and the face behind the dark glass smiled at her. Her hands went to the window, started to lift it.

  Hurry now. Open up. Ask me in, Blair. That’s all you have to do.

  She opened her mouth, the words already in her mind.

  Then something flew at her from behind, sent her sprawling across the room.

  Chapter 5

  There was a scream of rage from what floated outside the window. The glass seemed to vibrate from it, almost to bow in from the pressure.

  Then it was gone, a blur of motion. Blair felt the room spin.

  “Oh no, you don’t. There’ll be none of that.” Larkin took a firm grip on Blair’s shoulders, pulled her up to her knees. “What the bloody hell were you doing?”

  His face shimmied in and out of focus. “I’m going out. Sorry.”

  The next thing she knew she was coming to on her own bed, with Larkin tapping her cheeks. “Ah, there you are. Stay with us this time, will you, muirnin? I’m going to fetch Glenna.”

  “No, wait. Give me a minute. I just feel a little sick.” She swallowed hard, pressed a hand to her shaky stomach. “Like I’ve had entirely too many margaritas. I must’ve been dreaming. I thought I…Was I dreaming?”

  “You were standing at the window, about to open it. She was outside, somehow standing out there. The French one.”

  “Lora. I was going to ask her in.” She turned horrified eyes to Larkin. “Oh my God, I was going to ask her in. How can that be?”

  “You looked…wrong. I’d have said you were asleep, but your eyes were open.”

  “Sleepwalking. A trance. They got into my head, and they did something. The others!”

  He pressed her back down when she started to jump off the bed. “Downstairs, the lot of them. In the kitchen where Glenna’s put a meal together, God bless her. She asked if I’d fetch you. I knocked, but you didn’t answer.” He looked toward the window now, and his face went grim. “I nearly went away again, thinking you were sleeping and could probably use that as much as food. But I thought I heard…I heard her talking to you.”

  “If I’d let her in…I’ve never heard of them being able to do mind control if you haven’t been bitten. Something new. We’d better get down, tell the others.”

  He brushed lightly at her hair. “You’re shaky yet. I could carry you.”

  “Bet you could.” It made her smile. “Maybe next time.” She sat up, leaned toward him, touched her lips to his. “Thanks for the save.”

  “You’re very welcome.” He took her hand to help her off the bed, then wrapped his arms around her when she swayed.

  “Whoa. Head rush. They worked something on me, Larkin. They used memories and emotions. Private stuff. That seriously pisses me off.”