by Meg Cabot
In a flash, he was up the steps, seizing her arm with fingers that sank deeply into her skin. He didn’t care anymore that a crossbow was trained on her skull. Why should he care that he was causing her pain?
“Meena,” he said, in a voice that was as brutal as his grip on her, “we’re going. It’s over.”
She knew precisely what he meant by those words. Not only was the conversation over, but so were her struggles to bring him back to her side . . . the side of humanity. The demon inside of him had won, and finally taken over. Lucien had allowed it to take over, had fed and nurtured it beside the waters of the Mannette. There was nothing she could do now to get through to him, because concepts like good and evil—and life and death—meant nothing to him anymore. It was all the same, as long as he had what he wanted.
More frightened than she had ever felt in her life, she looked down at Alaric, so beaten and exhausted that he seemed to have given up . . .
. . . except that in that moment, as Lucien pulled her away from Father Henrique, Alaric lifted his head. As their gazes met, an image burst into her mind with such startling clarity, it was as if Alaric had physically shoved it there.
“What about the book?” Meena heard herself blurting.
Father Henrique’s hands, which had lowered the crossbow, suddenly swung it back up. Lucien’s fingers tightened on Meena’s arm.
“What book?” the priest asked, with unmistakable nervousness.
“The book,” Meena said. “Lucien’s book, the one his mother left him.” She looked up at Lucien. “Didn’t you want it back?”
Lucien’s expression changed. Before, he’d looked furiously angry, and seemingly intent on a single purpose: getting Meena back.
Now his focus shifted slightly.
Overhead, thunder rumbled. Some of the non-Palatine humans who’d been standing in the courtyard turned around and tried to leave, but the Lamir swiftly blocked their paths.
“Of course.” Father Henrique smiled weakly at Lucien. “I’m so sorry about that, my lord. That was another of the schemes they came up with to capture you. But I—”
“Didn’t you tell me that we needed to keep the book from falling into Lucien’s possession at all costs?” Meena asked innocently. “Because it would make him all-powerful?”
Father Henrique’s eyes widened. “I did,” he said. “But I said those things only to be convincing in the role I was playing as one of—”
“Where is the book?” Lucien snapped. The tension in his voice wasn’t the only signal that he was getting impatient. The lightning and sudden increase in wind velocity said their piece, as well.
“Only Alaric Wulf knows,” Father Henrique said quickly. “And he won’t say. I believe he probably destroyed it.”
Meena felt the ground tremble and looked around in confusion because she’d heard no explosion. It took her a moment to realize that it hadn’t been the boiler again. It was the Mannette. Lucien was angry and getting more so, and his wrath could be felt beneath their feet. It had probably been detected for miles around, and misread by geologists as a minor earthquake instead of what it was . . . the rumbling of a hellmouth.
“Oh, good heavens,” Sister Gertrude exclaimed, after she’d recovered from the shock of the trembler. “Alaric didn’t destroy it. He gave it to me, last night at the museum. He ran into me while he was looking for Meena. He said to keep it with me at all times, and not to give it to anyone.”
The vampires that were gathered around her stepped back after she drew from beneath her habit the small manuscript, in its hard, jeweled-encrusted cover.
Out of the display lights, and in the dark of the storm, it looked considerably less like a mystical religious object and more like a very old, very fragile book.
Nevertheless, when Lucien’s gaze fell upon it, his entire face changed. The tension seemed to leave it, and the red glow Meena had gotten used to seeing in his eyes dimmed.
“Give it to me,” he said, in a voice that was devoid of any thunder.
Sister Gertrude moved nervously through the crowd of vampires and up the steps, where she cast a long glance at Alaric, who’d apparently spent the last reserves of his energy throwing Meena the mental image of the book, since his head had dropped down to his chest. He appeared to be unconscious.
“I want you to know I’ve read it,” Sister Gertrude said as she handed the book to Lucien. She could not seem to help the air of strong disapproval she radiated . . . disapproval not of the book, Meena knew, but of Lucien and Father Henrique. “I minored in Latin.”
Lucien, after hesitating for a fraction of a second, reached out and took the book from her.
The moment his fingers touched the jeweled case, the rain stopped.
“It’s a lovely book,” Sister Gertrude said.
Lucien had already opened it, and had begun to turn the pages, gazing down at it with fascination.
Meena looked up. The clouds overhead were breaking apart.
“Oh,” Sister Gertrude said, turning around on her way down the steps, “and you might want to pay particular attention to page seventy-four—”
That’s when Father Henrique thrust Meena aside, aimed his crossbow directly at Sister Gertrude, and fired.
Chapter Forty
The shot would have been instantly fatal if it hadn’t been for two things.
First, Carolina saw what Father Henrique was about to do and leaped at Sister Gertrude, knocking her out of the direct path of the four arrows that were set loose, one after the other, from the repeater. Instead of embedding themselves in Sister Gertrude’s wide, generous heart, they hit her in the shoulder as Carolina tackled her.
And second, Meena rammed Father Henrique as hard as she could in the solar plexus with her elbow. The priest lost his balance, but didn’t release his hold on Meena. Both of them went staggering down the steps, and the shot veered slightly wide.
“Sister!” Father Bernard bent beside the stricken nun’s side. “Are you all right?”
“Don’t touch them,” Abraham warned as the son of the deli owner was about to do what anyone, instinctively, would. “She’ll bleed out. We need an ambulance.”
“No emergency vehicles can get through,” Morioka reminded them.
“Do you see?” Meena spun around to demand hotly of Lucien. “There’s something in that book he doesn’t want you to see. She was trying to help you, and he shot her. This is why we can’t simply walk away.”
Emil, who’d raced over to pick up the crossbow Father Henrique had dropped when Meena struck him, seemed to agree.
“My lord,” he said as he looked up at the priest, who was nearly a head taller than he was, “I beg your pardon, but I do feel as if there is something familiar about this . . . creature.”
“No, no, you are mistaken,” Father Henrique said quickly. “I thought the nun was going for her gun. I was only trying to defend his lordship.”
“No,” Lucien said. He was still flipping slowly—almost reverently—through the manuscript’s pages. “Emil is right. Up close, you do look slightly familiar. How do I know you? Other than from last night at the Met.”
“You don’t,” Father Henrique said, quickly. “I’m from South America. I’ve never even been in this part of the world before.”
“I know it sounds unlikely,” Emil said. “But something about him is reminding me of your father, my lord.”
“Never,” Father Henrique said, with a nervous laugh. “Though, of course, I thank you for the compliment—”
Lucien had stopped turning pages. He stared down at something. From where Meena was standing, she could see a brilliantly illuminated illustration of a familiar-looking man holding what appeared to be the earth in his arms. Above it was a depiction of heaven, complete with an angel. Below it, hell, and Lucifer.
There was some writing alongside the picture. The writ
ing was in flowing script in a language Meena couldn’t decipher, especially upside down.
But she already knew what it said, because she’d heard the writing read aloud so many times. It was the illustration from her dream . . . the one at which Lucien and his mother had been gazing on the seat by the window.
Lucien evidently recognized it as well . . . only his association with it was far different from Meena’s. He lifted his head with a snap to stare at Father Henrique.
“It was you,” Lucien said. His gaze was back to burning red-hot.
“What?” Father Henrique’s eyes went wide with denial . . . and fear. “No, no, my lord. I don’t know what you—”
“This is you.” Lucien held up the book. With a clear view of the illustration for the first time—in her dream, she had only ever been able to get a glimpse of it—Meena could see that he was right. The figure in the illustration was Father Henrique. The resemblance was unmistakable: the dark curly hair, dark eyes, and strong, handsome chin. Even the flowing priest’s robes were the same.
The only difference was that back then, Father Henrique had worn a tonsure, a sheared circle of hair in the center of his head.
“I remember,” Lucien said, sounding much more like the man she’d fallen in love with than he had in the past few days. “I remember you now. You were the priest at Poenari Castle. Father Henric. You performed all the masses. You gave me my first Communion. You baptized me. You taught me catechism lessons from this book.”
Father Henric seemed to realize he’d been caught . . . and to decide it was wise to try a different tack.
“Why, yes,” he said obsequiously. “Yes, my lord, I did. I’m so honored that you’d remember. I didn’t think it was worth mentioning because it was so long ago, and you’ve risen to such great heights in the world since then, whereas I—”
“South America?” Lucien looked back down at the book. “What have you been doing all this time in South America?”
“Oh,” Father Henric said, “same thing as always. Giving masses. First Communions. Teaching catechism. Baptisms . . .”
“How can you?” Emil asked, in wonder. “The holy water alone . . .”
Father Henric smiled. “When a priest invokes the dark side at the behest of a parishioner,” he said, “as I did for your father, my lord, upon the death of your mother, he is taking an enormous risk. And things were very different in those days than they are now. I could have been excommunicated, or worse. It was only right that I be rewarded. Immortality was the least I deserved, but the dark prince himself chose to repay me with far more than that. After he bit me and made me one of his kind, I found that not only did I have the gift of everlasting life, but I seemed also to have a built-in immunity to all the things that kill most demons—light, stakes, crosses—”
To illustrate his point, the priest reached out and laid a hand over Meena’s necklace. Then, a few seconds later, he lifted his hand and held it out.
His palm was unmarked.
“See?” He shrugged. “That was your father’s gift to me, sire, for the favor I did him. And I wouldn’t have taken that risk for any other parishioner. Your father was a very, very remarkable man—he loved your mother so much. She was such a special woman. And after she was gone, well, you know he changed. He became quite—”
“Mad,” Lucien said curtly.
“Concerned,” Henric corrected him. “For you and your brother, may he rest in peace. Your father wished that there was a way he could make sure all of you could live forever. The death of your mother was so painful to him that he didn’t think he could bear the idea of having to cope with the loss of either of you. So he asked me to see if I could come up with a way to make all of you immortal. And so . . . ” The priest shrugged. “I did. And you’re welcome for it.”
This time, there was no tremor from the Mannette. No thunder. No lightning. Lucien didn’t respond to Father Henric’s statement at all.
He merely opened his hands, allowing his mother’s book—which he’d been holding so closely—to fall to the courtyard floor.
It landed in a puddle. Meena watched as the sooty water lapped at the golden pages.
And from that small gesture, she knew. It burst upon her with as much startling clarity as if Lucien’s mother herself had come back to life and whispered it into her ear. She not only knew, but she understood—not only why Lucien had sought out the Mannette, but all the horror and pain Lucien must have gone through for the five centuries during which he’d watched his father torture and kill hundreds of thousands of people, unable to do a thing to stop him . . .
. . . because Lucien himself had been inflicted with the same unquenchable thirst for blood, and had killed—or been responsible for the killing of—just as many people.
Only unlike his father or half brother, he had never given up his soul. Not entirely. He couldn’t.
Because it was a physical impossibility.
“Your father was most pleased by my gift, my lord,” Father Henric was going on boastfully. “And I want you to know, I stood by him until the very end. When I fled from those Palatine fiends in London, right after they murdered him,” he said, “I never stopped thinking of you, my lord. I traveled as far as I could to get away from them—the jungles of South America—where I discovered the Lamir. Right then, I began building an army with which to return to you and help avenge his death. I couldn’t stand by, knowing you’d lost your beloved mother, and then your father, and then your half brother. You shouldn’t have to be preyed upon like this, hunted like an animal. Something has to be done. That’s why I’m here.”
“He’s lying.”
A new voice rang out in the courtyard. Meena turned her head and was astonished to see Alaric not only standing but holding the crossbow that had been strapped around his back. He’d reloaded it, and now he had it trained on Henric, even though he knew perfectly well that the priest wasn’t vulnerable to arrows. It must have been force of habit.
“He’s not indestructible,” Alaric said to Lucien. “He told me inside that there’s one way to kill him.”
“He’s lying to you, my lord,” Henric said quickly. “Don’t you see? They all lie, because they don’t understand the beauty of what we are.”
“There’s nothing beautiful about what you are,” Meena said angrily. “What’s so beautiful about that?” She pointed at Sister Gertrude, who lay on the ground surrounded by a ring of Lamir, hungrily sniffing the scent of her blood in the air. Only Abraham, clutching the SuperStaker, and Carolina, Morioka, Santiago, and Father Bernard were keeping them away, using the stakes and holy water they’d found in Meena’s purse.
“This situation,” Emil said nervously, “has become untenable, my lord.”
“I’m going to have to agree,” Mary Lou murmured.
Lucien looked from them to Henric. But he didn’t seem to see any of them.
“Stay out of this,” he said. “It doesn’t concern you.”
“Yes, it does,” Meena said. “It concerns all of us.” She stooped to lift the book of hours from the puddle.
It actually didn’t appear to have been damaged that badly. She’d forgotten that the pages were made of vellum, which was chemically treated leather, and essentially waterproof. It was possible that, once it dried out, it might be all right. As all of them might be . . .
. . . if they lived.
“There’s only one good thing Father Henric has ever done,” Meena said. “And at the time, he had no idea what it could lead to. And as soon as he figured it out, he tried everything in his power to keep it hidden from you, Lucien, because it’s the one thing that can destroy him. That’s why he’s here. Right, Father Henric?”
“Please tell me you’re not going to listen to her, my lord, ” Father Henric protested. “A human? They’re the ones who’ve been trying to destroy us, and why? We can’t help what we are. Why mus
t we be hounded and persecuted and even starved, when we are only doing what nature intended?”
“Nature?” Meena asked, with a humorless laugh. “What was natural about what you did to Lucien—the spirits you invoked the night that you made his father into what he was? Didn’t that go against the laws of nature?”
“His father was my prince,” Father Henric shot back. “I did as he asked.”
“Didn’t you also serve a higher prince?” Meena demanded. “Shouldn’t you have consulted him in the matter first?”
“I did,” Henric said, with a triumphant look.
“Oh,” Meena said, opening the book to the page 74, the one from her dream. “You mean this prince?” She pointed at the illustration of Lucifer.
Henric’s grin faltered slightly. “Precisely.”
“He’s not a prince,” Meena said. “As you know perfectly well, he’s a fallen angel. And what was Lucien’s mother?”
“A p-princess,” Henric stammered. But there was terror in his eyes.
“No,” Lucien said, shaking his head. “She was an angel.”
Meena swung around to look at him. Tears glittered in her eyes as she gazed up into his, which had gone back to their normal deep brown.
“Yes, Lucien,” she said, holding the book open in front of him. “That’s why Henric was trying to keep this from you. Because he realized it was the one thing that might help you remember what your mother always taught you. You, of all people, really do have a choice. You can choose to be good . . . because you are part good. No matter how hard you try to be the devil’s son, you’ve still got an angel for a mother.”
She could see that he understood now. That he not only understood, but that the knowledge had always been there, just beneath the surface, like the Minetta Stream.
It had only needed to be released.
Lucien lifted his gaze from the golden pages of the book she was holding to look into her eyes.
