by L. M. Pruitt
“Whenever he’s not higher than a kite,” one of the twins muttered. I resisted the urge to slap them both across their angelic faces, just to make sure I got the right one.
Rian didn’t need any help defending himself. His eyes flashed with something akin to hate, and his hands balled at his sides. “Some of us were given more difficult tasks than being bearers of ill-will, Guile. If I only had to stand in a room and breathe to accomplish my goal, I daresay my life would be much easier.”
“What task do you have, Rian?” I interrupted the flow of words before they grew any more virulent. I could feel Gillian stiffening with indignation behind me; anything to keep her from going on a tirade was a small price to pay.
His eyes fell, almost as if he was ashamed. “Visions of the future. Which wouldn’t be so difficult, except for the… side effects.”
Now my curiosity was peaked. “Side effects?”
Rian nodded, turning and lifting the back of his shirt. I gasped, because his back was covered with scars uncannily similar to my relatively fresh marks. Dropping his shirt, he said, “I trust no more explanation is needed.”
“You saw what they were going to do to my father.” Picking my way through the maze of furniture, I stopped in front of him. Like Theo, he was about my height but sickeningly thin, his hair limp and dull. Rian lowered his eyes to the floor, nodding his head.
“Since that time, I’ve done my best to repress the visions.”
“Against the advice of the Council,” one of the twins interrupted nastily. I ignored her, although I could tell by the soft thump and the squeal following it that someone, probably Gillian, had smacked whichever twin had talked. I rolled up his left sleeve, studying the track marks.
“With heroin. Not the best choice, given the possible side effects of the trips.”
“Members of the Council are generally as tough to kill as the leader.” Rian smiled grimly. “I can handle a lot of heroin.”
I thought for a moment, mulling the situation over. He was as valuable a weapon as any, and considering the current climate I couldn’t afford to have him stoned out of his mind. “So you block the visions with heroin, because they’re not just painful mentally, but physically.”
When he made a defensive noise, I pursed my lips and shook my head. “I’m just making sure I have it right. No judgment, I’m not a fan of S&M myself. If you could have the visions without the pain, would you come off the heroin?”
Rian’s eyes met mine, and through the haze of withdrawal I could see the hope and longing in them. “How?”
I tilted my head to the side, eyes closed. At some point during one of Gillian’s lectures – there were far too many of them to keep track of – she’d brushed over something about being able to take in other people’s pain. Part of the healer deal, although she still hadn’t explained it to me.
“Jude, there is a fine line between making sacrifices and throwing yourself into the fire.”
I ignored Gillian, trying to remember how she said it could be done. Both parties had to be willing to transfer the pain. The healer had to be strong enough, mentally and psychically, to do the transfer. I slid my hand down to grasp Rian’s, my free hand going to his other hand. I eased up the grip, until my hands were hovering right over his.
There was something I was forgetting – or didn’t know. There was a lot I didn’t know, and it was becoming frustrating. How was I supposed to lead hundreds of people without any idea what any of us were capable of?
Hands grasped my elbows, and by the scent enveloping me, I knew it was Gillian. Her low voice, murmured in my ear as when she’d explained how to call air. It blew lightly over my skin, drying the sweat dripping down the side of my face.
If calling air had been difficult, this was impossible. It was like doing brain surgery in the dark with no experience. Which, I guess, is what I was doing. Setting up levees, keeping some things out, letting others in. I wasn’t foolish enough to take all the pain - if Rian stubbed his toe, I wouldn’t know about it unless he told me.
I’d seen a few TV medical shows, so I knew a little about synapses and nerve ending and whatever else is up there. Rian’s were whacked as hell, and I had to do some major rearranging. Somehow, line A had been connected to part C instead of part B, and so nerve-ending D was in hyper drive.
If I ever had to have any electrical work done at the Crossroads, I was so tipping the guy. This was damn hard.
When I finally opened my eyes, my breath came as fast as if I’d run a five-minute mile, and my hair was sticking to my neck. But Rian was smiling, and his eyes didn’t look quite so hazed over. I made to drop my hands, and jumped when someone grabbed my left to place what felt like a heavy glass in it. I glanced at it long enough to see it was some sort of dark liquor, and tossed it back.
It burned going down, but helped hold back the shakes I could feel coming. The hand turned me and helped me to a chair, and I finally saw it was Theo. Gillian was attending to Rian, and the room was silent. For a moment.
“Well, it looks as if the Prophecy can do any little thing she sets her mind to. How lucky we all are.”
I held up the hand unoccupied with the glass and crooked my fingers. Guile, I think, hesitated for a moment before stepping forward with a mutinous expression on her face. She knelt until our eyes were level, hers full on insolence. I had a moment’s hesitation on what to do. Then she smirked.
Curling my free hand into a fist and making sure not to tuck my thumb, I managed enough energy to throw all my weight into the punch. It hurt slightly, but had the desired effect of knocking her on her ass. Fully exhausted, I slumped back in the chair, closing my eyes. The priest spoke up across the stunned room.
“I would have used an uppercut, but the girl has an excellent right hook.”
Chapter Eleven
I hadn’t jammed any knuckles, which was good. But my hand was singing – definitely not good, and this meeting wasn’t even fully under way.
The bad omens kept piling up.
Rian had been kind enough to get me a bag of frozen peas, although Gillian had said a salve would work just as well. At this point, I was tired of the out of the ordinary and ready for the mundane. Unfortunately, that was going to happen about the time ice skating was possible in Satan’s living room.
After hurried introductions by Gillian, the priest turned out to be Father O’Brien, which made me hungry by thinking of breakfast potatoes. Being hungry and with nothing else to do, I suggested we shift this disaster to the kitchen. If they weren’t hungry, well, they could watch me eat.
Most of us assembled around the table. The twin I’d knocked out was in the informal parlor, although Theo and Rian had moved her from the floor to a sofa. I think they’d jostled her more than needed, but she had it coming in one way or another. Gillian hadn’t made any comment, which made me wonder exactly how bad things were among the Council as a whole.
Great-grandmother Lisette thumped her fist on the kitchen table, silencing the whispering more effectively than a shotgun blast. I’d have to remember her technique for future meetings. Something told me it wasn’t the thumping alone that had people ceasing their conversations and turning their heads in her direction. When you’d lived as long as she had, people tended to pay attention to you no matter what you did.
“While I’ve always enjoyed dinner and a show, I’d have to say now isn’t the best time for it. We need to figure out what we’re going to do with this war going on, and whether or not we’re going to go through with this proposed alliance.” Something about her tone of voice let me know where she stood - firmly on the not side.
“Proposed alliance?” I set my fork down on the plate. “The way it’s been talked about, I assumed it was a done deal. And even if it’s not, what’s there to discuss?”
Lies spoke up from her place halfway down the table. “What’s there to discuss? It’s a war between vampires. The Covenant has no place in it.”
The tiny murmur of agreement had
me shaking my head. “It’s a war between those who kill innocent people and those who don’t. What does it matter if they’re vampires?”
Gillian looked up from the pot she was stirring. When I’d asked her why she wasn’t sitting, she’d smiled mirthlessly. “Thirteen’s a tricky number. Best not to chance anything right now.” I’d raised an eyebrow, especially since with Guile on the sofa there were only eleven at the table, not twelve, but accepted her statement. There was enough going on without pondering superstitions.
“Many people are of the opinion that there’s no such thing as a good vampire. Or if there is, it’s because they’re no longer a body but a pile of ash.”
The water soothed my dry throat. The streets teach you how to survive. Learning how to survive beats some down until there’s nothing left. I’d seen it happen more than once, the kids who never found a way out of the alleys and out from under the overpasses.
Sometimes, learning how to survive made you see there’s more than black and white in the world. There’s a whole spectrum between the two, millions of shades of gray, where something can be right and wrong at the same time, or it can be neither. Survival isn’t a pretty thing. It plays hell with moral systems if you’re not willing to bend.
At that moment, I wondered how many sitting at the table with me would survive whatever was going to be thrown at us.
“Jude.” Gillian’s voice jolted me out of my thoughts, and water sloshed over the rim of the glass onto my hand. Theo, sitting on my right, silently handed me a napkin. One of the other council members, a plump, middle-aged woman whose name might have been Sarah, wrung her hands where they sat on the table. Everyone was watching me, waiting. For something.
“If Hart wins this war, there won’t be any peace. Not even a trace of it. I think we all know that. He’ll use any means necessary to win, which means we’re already screwed.”
“How can you say that? We’ve some of the most powerful voudouns, witches, seers. All he has is brute force.” At the opposite end of the table, seated next to Great-grandmother Lisette, a man a little younger than me spoke up. Christophe, if I remembered correctly. “How could he possibly hope to launch an attack against the Covenant with so little?”
“Hart kills because he likes to. Even if he didn’t need to, he would.” I thought of Izzy, and sighed. “I don’t think any of us here can say the same. I don’t think most of you could kill even if your life depended on it, literally.”
“You could.” My eyes met Theo’s. There was no reproach in them, just a simple acknowledgement of the truth.
“I did. And I know asking others to do the same, even if it’s the only option, is asking too much.” I set the glass down, a dull thud on the heavy, glossy wood. I looked around the table again. “But I can ask Williams. I can ask those in the Covenant who want to learn how to fight be trained by people who’ve had decades of fighting experience.”
“You’d turn us into warriors. We’ve never been warriors.” Father O’Brien tapped his fingers on the table, a frown marring his features. “Surely there’s another way.”
“There isn’t. Either we fight, or we die.” I rubbed my eyes with the heels of my hands, suddenly more tired than I’d been all night. “Whether you kill someone with a sword or a spell, they’re still dead. I’m just giving us another weapon to fight with.”
“And afterward?” Lies asked. If I wasn’t firmly convinced she had a heart of ice, I’d have said she sounded worried. “When you’ve conquered the evil, and good has won the day, what happens to your alliance, to the Covenant then?”
“Does anything have to happen? It’s not like you haven’t been coexisting with vamps for a while. You just wouldn’t have to worry about getting picked off if you ran into the wrong one.”
“Enough with the debating. Jude, is there an alliance?” Gillian’s voice cut across the rising whispers as effectively as Great-grandmother Lisette’s. Once again, all heads turned toward me. Good thing I didn’t really have a fear of public speaking or I’d have been royally screwed.
I thought of Izzy and of Baptiste, whom I’d never met, but had died because of me. Two dead before the war had even begun. Whether I agreed to an alliance or not, Hart wasn’t going to leave me alone until I was dead. If nothing else was certain, that was. I could sit back, wait and watch while people around me died, or I could do something about it.
“I’ve said it already. We either fight, or we die.” My eyes met Gillian’s, and I could see she had known all along what I’d do. “I don’t want to die. And as long as I lead, all of you are my responsibility. Your lives are worth as much as mine. That means I’ll do whatever it takes to keep more people from dying, even if you don’t like it.”
“The Council has the final word.” Christophe spoke again, and part of me knew the kid was trouble. Whether it was normal teenage trouble or the kind to get somebody killed was something I couldn’t tell, yet.
“The Council had the final word.” Rian spoke, and we all jumped. He’d been quiet since entering the kitchen, blending in from habit or not having anything to say. “With her ascension to leadership and – even more so, her place as the Prophecy – Jude is the final word in all things pertaining to the Covenant.”
“So we fight.” Theo’s hand grasped mine under the table, and I held on, needing something solid at the moment. Gillian nodded, and I let out a breath I hadn’t been aware of holding. Great-grandmother Lisette spoke from the other end of the table, and I noticed for the first time there was a subtle division in the table – those siding with myself, and those siding with Lisette, even though she hadn’t expressed a concrete opinion. Subtle, but enough the hairs on the back of my neck stood up.
“We’ll see how the Covenant fares with such leadership.”
The vagueness of her statement had me clutching at Theo’s hand. Sometimes damning by faint praise could sound an awful lot like a threat.
Dawn was a few hours away when I opened the door to the Ritual Room. Theo, Rian and Father O’Brien trailed behind me. I didn’t open the door so much as walk toward it. Like every other time I’d approached, it swung open on its hinges, and the room beyond seemed to let out a deep breath, like it had been scared I wouldn’t be back. Since reassuring a room would have put me closer to the crazy category then I was willing to be, I compromised by running my fingers down the length of the door before stepping inside.
I was halfway across the massive room before I realized two of the three were still on the threshold. I turned around, crossed my arms, and waited for them to get their butts in gear. I was still waiting five minutes later. Finally, I asked, “Okay, what’s the deal? It’s a door, you walk through it. I know you can, because I’ve seen you do it all night.”
“Never have I seen the door open without being touched.” Father O’Brien took a tentative step forward, almost as if he was afraid the room was going to boot him out. I wasn’t the only one who gave inanimate objects and open spaces a personality.
“Great-grandmother Lisette said the same when Gillian told us how the door unsealed itself at the mere touch of your fingers.” Theo waited by the door, studying it. When he narrowed his eyes, I had to bite my tongue to keep from giggling. First, considering the level of intensity in this conversation, it would have been inappropriate,. And second, if you laugh because a man makes a cute face, it starts the potentially fatal shift out of the friend zone.
Rian didn’t seem to have either of the hang-ups of the other two. It might have been sheer bravado, but I was betting after a lifetime of drug use and violent visions, something like a door opening was small stuff. He walked the path of the outermost circle, whistling some song that tugged at my memory but couldn’t place. After completing one circuit, he turned to me, his face breaking into a grin.
“You’ll develop a real love for this room in a couple of weeks. Just be sure to lock the door behind you.”
Before I could ask him what the hell he meant, Theo stepped into the room. There was a
brief pulse in the air, then it settled again. I wondered if I was the only one who noticed it, but a quick look at everyone’s face told me they’d felt it too. Father O’Brien tapped his chin with one finger, muttering to himself. Rian’s grin spread wider, if possible.
My face probably looked like Theo’s. Confused.
“Well, well. Interesting, but something to be dealt with later.” Father O’Brien clapped his hands together, and I jumped, one of those involuntary reactions around priests. It made going to Mass something of an adventure. “I think we would all benefit with a little talk, without the usual disturbances.”
“Ooh, a secret meeting. Are we going to use code names?” I was being flippant, but not really. Even an idiot could tell there were factions within the Council, some overlapping with others, but none really working together. Part of me knew I shouldn’t take sides. But another part felt it was too late for unifying these people. The Council wasn’t going to survive this war, and I already knew there were some people I didn’t want on the chopping block, figuratively or literally.
“Not necessary. Everyone plots against everyone, so it’s assumed no one’s to be trusted.” Rian lounged on the fainting couch in the study area of the room, stretching until his joints popped. My mental levees seemed to be holding up just fine. He was practically wallowing in sensation. He hadn’t even flinched when he’d gotten whatever vision showed him the activities in the room in a few weeks.
Score one for the good guys.
“What Rian’s trying to say is that….” Theo trailed off, drumming his fingers on the chair closest to the fireplace. We’d all gravitated toward the only soft furniture in the room. “Well, just what he said. There are as many alliances as there are members, a few times over.”
“Do I need to worry about any of you running off and playing Telephone?”
Father O’Brien rested his elbows on his chair arms, folding his hands together over his middle. “No, Jude. Some may doubt, and some may believe but be resentful. Others may simply have no opinion. But I speak for all of us here now when I say that we follow you and your decisions.”
