by Rye Brewer
Oh. Yes. I had a birthday, didn’t I? A month ago. I used to look forward to my birthday, even when I didn’t do anything particularly special.
And then, it hit me: I was going to have a lot of birthdays. More than anyone I had grown up with, more than my parents ever would. The day would eventually go by unnoticed because there would be no one to notice it. They would all die and there would be no one left who remembered me the way that I was, back in my human days. Like I had never existed.
I shivered and wrapped my arms around myself, as though that would help warm a chill deep inside me.
Cari, you know I have the ability to find people when they’ve disappeared. I’ve had men looking for you.
Oh, no.
I know you’ve left the country.
Oh, no, no.
I cannot presume to know why you would take such drastic steps, why you might run away from your life and disappear overseas. And I don’t yet know where you are, what you’re doing. But I will not rest until I find you.
I closed the email and pushed away from the desk as the room spun around me. He was looking for me? Who would’ve thought? I certainly wouldn’t have, not ever. Who even told him I was missing? I smacked the heel of my hand against my forehead again and again.
“What’s wrong?”
I hadn’t even heard Gage enter the room, still wet from his shower. He knelt beside the chair.
“Cari, what happened?”
I pointed to the screen, now only displaying Raze’s desktop. “My father’s been looking for me. I shouldn’t have checked my email, maybe, but I’m glad I did, or I wouldn’t have known.”
He didn’t seem to think this was as big a deal as I thought it was. “All right. Didn’t you expect something like this might happen? Or did you assume everyone in your life would write you off as a lost cause?”
“My father isn’t just anybody. He has connections. Powerful ones. And he lives somewhere here, in Europe. Italy, the last I heard.”
“A whole other country.” He stroked my hair before patting my back. “The odds of him ever being able to find you are slim to none.”
He was right. I was overreacting. A few deep breaths later, I was able to think more clearly. “You’re right. It’s just a surprise, is all. You asked if I thought everybody would write me off—well, my father basically did, a long time ago. We have no relationship whatsoever.”
“But he still loves you,” Gage whispered. “Not that I blame him. I guess it goes to show that no matter how terrible we think things are with our parents, they’re still our parents.”
“You’re making me feel awful right now,” I whispered, but with a tiny smile. “I’ve thought some pretty terrible things about him in the not-so-distant past.”
“Knowing you, he deserved every last bit of it.” Gage stood, bringing me with him, then wrapping me in a hug. “At least you know he still cared, through everything.”
It still didn’t make me feel better. No, I would never write him back or call him, in spite of his phone number being at the bottom of the message. That would be the worst idea ever.
But still…
“I couldn’t let him see me like this,” I whispered, burying my face in his chest.
“Like what? Like the way we are?”
I winced. “I didn’t mean it as an insult, I swear.”
“I know you didn’t; and I can’t blame you for hesitating. He wouldn’t take it well if he knew what you’ve become. Humans never do.”
“It would be too risky for us, anyway,” I added, and I wondered why I even felt the need to say it. Of course, it would be way too risky. It was out of the question!
Why did I keep coming back to the idea, even so?
Gage sighed as he pulled back just enough to look at me. His arms were still around my waist, still reminding me how I wasn’t alone. He didn’t need to say it for me to feel it. “You know. Under the right circumstances… at night, of course, in a private place… we might be able to arrange for you to see him. If that was what you really wanted.”
I shook my head as tears choked me. “No. I would rather him think I’m dead. It would be better for everyone involved—including you.”
He stroked my back as his mouth curved into a sad smile. “Do you really mean that? Don’t think about me right now. Just about you. Is it true that you’d rather he think you’re dead?”
I drew a breath and intended to say I did. I wanted my father to forget I had ever existed.
Instead, I shook my head again. “No. I don’t want that. And he won’t be around forever, either. Maybe it would be good for him to have closure and at least know I’m okay. And I guess seeing him one more time would give me a little closure, too.”
I leaned against him with my eyes closed, tears rolling down my cheeks.
8
Jonah
“A vacation?” I muttered, reading the note again.
Just like my sister Philippa. Choosing that very moment to take a vacation. Sometimes I wondered if she existed in her own little universe.
No, that wasn’t fair. She had been through more than enough with Vance. If she needed a little time to herself, that was the least I could allow her.
I folded her note and place it on my bedside table with a heavy sigh as a knock sounded at the closed door.
“Come in.”
It could only be Fane. Anissa wouldn’t knock, Scott was… wherever Scott had run off to, and Gage hadn’t been around in ages. I wished I had more time to devote to thinking about him, worrying about him.
Sure enough, my father stepped into the room. Or the man who used to be my father.
And he was on a mission. I could see it in his eyes. Not everything about him had changed.
“I hope I’m not interrupting anything,” he said, hands folded behind his back.
I only held up the note from Philippa. “Vacation.”
He glanced at it. “I see. Well, she needs it. It isn’t as if any of us would be able to stop her if we tried. I wanted to let you know that I received a message. Someone wishes to speak to me. I won’t be gone long.”
I frowned. “All right. Just… remember what we talked about.”
It was his turn to frown. “You do realize I’ve been traveling under the cover of darkness for longer than you’ve been a vampire?” He shook his head, but there was grudging humor in his eyes as he created a portal right there in my suite.
“I don’t want to run the risk of it being discovered, after all,” he replied in answer to a question I hadn’t had the chance to ask.
I watched as he stepped through and disappeared.
He was never one to waste time when he had a plan in mind.
Not knowing who he was meeting with bothered me to no end, though I hadn’t dared speak a word of it to him. He would only have berated me for treating him like a child, which, I could admit to myself, I would have been doing.
The portal still swirled long after Fane had gone through. I would’ve expected it to close immediately on his using it. Instead, it glowed as brightly as ever, as large as ever.
My curiosity grew with every passing second the portal remained up. What was he doing? Who was he meeting? How had they even gotten in touch with him?
I should’ve known better than to ask myself such a question. There was never any telling how he managed to do anything. He had contacts everywhere.
I needed to know where he was and who needed him. As simple as that.
I went through the portal, hoping I would end up someplace safe, at least. Out of sight.
I recognized where I ended up—I was only a block or so from the high-rise. I could see it from where I stood, stretching up toward the clouds. It was easier for him to emerge from an alley without notice than it was to pass through the building, I supposed.
There he was, walking with his shoulders hunched against the chill night air, hands thrust into his pockets. I followed at a distance, walking close to the buildings so I might
duck into a doorway or alley if he happened to look behind him.
After a mile or so, he slipped into another alley, this one between two storefront take-out restaurants. I didn’t have to follow him inside to hear what was happening, thanks to my heightened vampire senses.
Lights from inside the restaurants illuminated the narrow passage between the buildings. Fane stopped in front of a dumpster, and a man stepped out from beside it.
Their auras were similar, telling me the stranger was also of a magical type. A warlock, something of that nature. He was tall, dark-haired, appeared to be young, but there was no telling with such matters—I appeared to be young, too.
“I know what it means, you coming out here,” the stranger said. “I wouldn’t have asked you do so if it wasn’t important.”
“I know that. Which is why I’m here,” Fane replied. “What is it?”
“I had word from the Starkers.”
The Starkers? That name again? What were the odds?
The man continued, “They’re hunting a newly-turned vampire. A female. Rumored that she’s traveling in France with a companion.”
Fane’s hands tightened into fists at his sides. “Who is this companion?”
“Gage. Word has it, he is the one who turned her. I’m sorry.”
I leaned against the brick wall, suddenly short of breath. I should’ve known he wouldn’t be able to get away with it. Though I wouldn’t have imagined a group such as the Starkers being involved; they had gone so deep undercover as to seem gone, erased from history.
I’d assumed it would be the League’s doing if Gage were to be brought to justice for his crime.
Fane took a moment to digest this. Nothing about his posture revealed what he was thinking. “Thank you for bringing this to me,” he finally said. “It means very much to me, Stark.”
Stark. I didn’t have a moment to process the identity of the man. To discern what this meant.
Stark nodded before creating a portal and disappearing through it. Unlike the one in my bedroom, it closed immediately.
Fane didn’t move. He stood exactly as he’d been during Stark’s news, to the point of staring at the empty space which had seconds ago held his informant.
There was no sense in waiting. “Fane?” I walked to him. “Who was that?”
He showed no surprise at my being there. “Stark,” he said. As though that explained anything. “Of course, you already heard me use his name. You heard everything he said to me, too.”
I winced. “You knew I was listening? How? Did you hear me?”
That would mean his hearing was the same as it had been in his vampire days.
He shook his head—the first time he had moved since I approached. “No. I didn’t have to. You came through the portal I created, one which I had a connection with. I felt you come through the moment you did.”
He’d been on to me all along. Once again, I should have known better.
“What are you going to do?” I asked.
He looked at me as though he doubted my sanity. “Go after him, of course. Warn him. Find out what he thought he was doing when he created a vampire.”
My conscience panged more than just a bit as I remembered Gage’s frantic assertions that he’d done the right thing. That he’d had no other choice but to create a vampire. Knowing how he clearly loved the girl. How close she’d been to dying a horrible death.
Knowing all along that he’d made a terrible mistake.
“I’ll go with you.” It was a snap decision, just as the decision to follow him through the portal had been, but it was the only way I could imagine making things right for my brother. I hadn’t offered him assistance when he needed me most. And he’d attracted attention as a result.
“There’s no chance.” Fane folded his arms, planting his feet. Immovable. “I would never allow that to happen.”
“I don’t recall asking whether or not you allowed anything.”
“I can travel during the day,” he pointed out. “You cannot. You would only slow me down. And in case you hadn’t already thought of this—which I doubt, because it seems as though you’re reacting based purely on emotion rather than on reason—the Starkers would want you, too, if they found out you were traveling with me. Who would that help?”
When he spoke like that, when a wall of words poured from his mouth in that strident, no-nonsense tone of his, he reminded me of the Dommik Bourke who had once presided over clan meetings. A man no one dared cross, one who was in control of himself and his clan and his reasons for taking the actions he did.
Even so, I had little time or patience for him right now.
“You think you’ll be able to face the Starkers alone?” I countered, mimicking his pose. “The last I heard of them—granted, this was a long time ago—their headquarters are in Europe. That’s where they’re strongest, the most dangerous. The offshoot branches which cropped up here in the States are nothing compared to that core group overseas. How do you expect to manage this alone? When they’re allowed to go from country to country, crossing the border with no questions? They’re given carte blanche thanks to their connections to some higher group, some higher… authority. And you expect to circumvent them on your own?”
“You seem to know a lot about them, even though you claim you last heard of them a long time ago,” he pointed out.
“Yes, so I think we can both imagine how much more powerful they’ve become with time.”
“Stop this, now. You’re wasting both of our time by presenting this argument. You forget, I can walk among the Starkers. You can’t. You’re still a vampire.”
He made too good a point. I detested the fact the lack of solid argument to counter with.
Instead of admitting defeat, I shifted subjects. “This Stark. Is he the Stark? The one who created the group? Or is he just a descendant of the founder?”
“He’s the Stark. The very one. He’s the one Sara went to for training when she first developed her elemental powers.”
“Anissa told me about that—I only wondered if there was more than one of them.” Whether he’d proven helpful to Anissa and her sister or not, I couldn’t pretend to admire him. Not when he had led to the death of countless others like us.
When he might inadvertently lead to Gage’s death.
Fane frowned. “Have you cleared up the contaminated blood situation?” he asked. “The batch Sara drank from, which gave her the powers?”
“We emptied out and started fresh,” I assured him. “I couldn’t risk anyone else in the clan drinking from that tainted batch.” Then, I thought again. Damn. “I didn’t clear out my personal supply, however. It got away from me. But now that you’ve reminded me, I’ll take care of it as soon as I can.”
“Good. The fewer accidental elementals, the better.” He reached out, clapping me on the shoulder. “I had better go as soon as possible. There’s no telling how long it might take for me to track Gage—or, at least, the Starkers.”
“I would feel better if you would have me go with you,” I insisted.
Something about allowing him to attempt such a mission on his own bothered me more than I could say. It felt wrong, somehow. As though I was allowing him to do something foolish without at least doing my best to convince him otherwise.
He only shook his head. “Jonah, I know you want to help. But you’re needed here. Sirene and baby Elena need you. Anissa needs you. The League—without your presence, who’s to say what Marcus might manage to do? I shudder to think.”
“Marcus is locked up. Anissa can take care of herself for a little while. And Sirene and the baby are fine, better every day!”
“Enough.” Hands which had gripped my shoulders lightly suddenly clamped down in earnest. “You will stay here with Sirene and Elena. They need you.”
I bristled at his insistence. Gage was my family, my true family. My twin. Why should I not want more to protect him than my half-sister? “What can I do for them? They don’t need me anymore.”
“I thought you loved your new sister,” he whispered, and a pang of regret struck my heart.
“I do,” I insisted. “Really, I do. This isn’t a matter of not loving her.”
“Then stay here and protect her, and her mother. I’ll be able to go about my business without fear for them, which will be an immense help to me and Gage, both.” He leaned in, eyes locked on mine. “Please. Do this for me.”
It was no use. He had me.
“Can you at least do one thing for me, then?” I asked with a resigned sigh.
“What’s that?”
“Get a damned cell phone, at least. Stay in touch for once.”
9
Anissa
The wind whipped around me, as it always did when I stood on the roof of the high-rise. How many times had I stood up there, waiting for someone or something? Meeting in secret?
It seemed like there had never been a time when the high-rise and the family who owned it weren’t part of my life.
“Allonic?” I called out, waiting in the darkness. Hoping he would hear me in that way he had, like he’d heard me when I needed help with Sara. He had come then. I needed him again.
Within minutes, he was there, stepping out of a portal which closed behind him. “What do you need?”
I could only shake my head in wonder. “How do you hear me when I call? I’ve always wondered.”
“It’s a shade thing.” His smile was cryptic. “Is that why you called me here? To ask why I come when you call?”
I snickered. “Hardly. First, are you still set on what we discussed outside League headquarters?”
“Undoubtedly.” His voice was flat, determined.
“I thought you would be.” I reached into my boot to remove the bone dagger, which I had wrapped in a hand towel from to ensure it didn’t cut me again.
