Ramona didn’t know if any other Gangrel had escaped. She thought that all those she’d met were dead. But there might be a few others who’d managed to get away. She guessed that they might return here if they could. There had been no instruction to that effect, but there had been no instructions about much of anything that she could remember. The Gangrel seemed to function through instinct more than order, and it seemed a natural thing to come back to Table Rock. Is that why I’m here? she wondered. Instinct? She hadn’t meant to come there; she hadn’t meant to go anywhere.
Fighting the pounding at her temples, Ramona walked over to the heaped dirt just beyond Table Rock. She stood above Zhavon’s final resting place and reached within for the pain of that loss. But she couldn’t feel it. All she saw was a heap of dirt. Ramona tried to picture Zhavon’s face as she’d seen it in her vision before, to remember the sensation of holding the girl to her chest, but the Gangrel could see only a throbbing, malevolent eye. She could feel only the hollow spot on her cheek where the acid had burned deeply.
Ramona had seen her dead. The ghost sight had accomplished that, if nothing else. But did that mean that she was free of the pain of their loss, or robbed of it? The feelings that should have been there were fading and growing foreign to her. Zhavon. She could say the name, but she could not climb from the pit of numbing indifference. Ramona pawed at the dirt with a monstrous clawed foot. What was the death of one mortal girl compared to the horrors she’d seen tonight, to the horror her existence had become?
The pounding at her temples grew stronger. It took on the aspect of rhythmic drumming, not too unlike what would once have been the beating of her heart. Ramona clamped her palms to her head, but the pounding continued, grew louder. Hammers striking her skull, until she could stand it no longer. Then quickly order emerged from the din. And Ramona recognized the litany demanding release.
“I am Eddie,” she said weakly. “I die for my clan this night.
“I am Jen. I die for my clan this night.”
From somewhere miles behind her, Xaviar moaned, but her voice grew stronger.
“I am Darnell. I die for my clan this night!
“I am Stalker-in-the-Woods. I die for my clan this night!”
Xaviar moaned again. He growled. Ramona turned and saw the anger in his face, but she was not silenced.
“I am Ronja… I am Peera Giftgiver… I am Louisa. I die for my clan this night!”
“Silence!” Xaviar commanded her through teeth clenched in pain. With his one good arm, he dragged himself across the rock. “Stop, damn you.”
“I am Bernard Fleetfoot… I am Crenshaw. I die for my clan this night!” Ramona saw Xaviar’s pain and fury. Each name struck him as an accusation of his failure. Weak and pathetic Toreador, my ass! he was hearing. He could not face the destruction of his people, not yet. Ramona paused, but the litany still clamored for release. Couldn’t Xaviar, so much older and more powerful than her, feel this? Surely Blackfeather would have understood.
Xaviar clawed his way closer, snarling with each inch. “I’ll teach you to disobey me, you damn whelp.”
Ramona stiffened. She took a step back from her elder, and her voice rang out stronger than ever. “I am Mutabo… I am Lisa Strongback…” Name after name she recited. One after another, she released their spirits to the night.
“I am Brant Edmonson. I die for my clan this night!”
Xaviar pursued her. His intent was clear. But he could not catch her.
“I am Ratface. I die for my clan this night!”
Finally, Xaviar collapsed. His fury faded, and his strength was long since spent.
Ramona raised her voice to the heavens. She defied her elder’s pride. She defied the terrible eye, wherever it was at this moment. “I am Joshua Bloodhound. I die for my clan this night!
“I am Maria Evernorth. I die for my clan this night!” With this final declaration, Ramona fell to her knees, not three feet from Xaviar. He lay motionless, as if staked, but his gaze burned into her.
“Go away from here,” Xaviar said. He raised his face; it looked much older and more haggard than before. Ramona watched him lying there, broken. She pitied him—and she hated him. He possessed the same arrogance that Tanner had—that self-assurance that they thought gave them the right to push around everyone else, to make decisions for everyone else. Tanner had brought Ramona into this gruesome world of darkness, but it might as well have been Xaviar that had done it. And what of Tanner? she found herself wondering. His name had not come to her as part of the litany; she had not seen him with her dead.
“Get out of here!” Xaviar bellowed, and interrupted her thoughts. “I will bring the seven clans to deal with this beast. You are no longer needed. Begone!” Ramona could feel the vitriol in his words. She was a reminder of his failure, of his most terrible defeat, and he wanted no part of her. She doubted he could catch her, not in his current condition. But he wouldn’t always be in this condition.
Ramona found herself running again, her fatigue overcome by hatred, her body fueled by fear. She ran not from Xaviar, though leaving him was not, she guessed, unwise. It wasn’t even the throbbing eye she ran from anymore. She ran from the emptiness that had taken root within her, that threatened to annihilate all that she’d ever been, and she feared that she’d never escape it.
About the Author
Gherbod Fleming was born behind the Iron Curtain to a Dutch expatriate and a Russian stenographer. The stenographer’s husband took exception to the situation and promptly shot and killed Fleming’s father. More recently, Fleming authored the Vampire: The Masquerade Trilogy of the Blood Curse: The Devil’s Advocate, The Winnowing, and Dark Prophecy.
Clan Novel Gangrel: Book 3 of The Clan Novel Saga Page 21
