"He's taking advantage of the opportunity for a nap," DeShawn said. "He's a greedy little bugger, he'd suffocate you in your sleep if it meant his nap was more comfortable."
I shook my head and sat up on the bed, coming to a cross-legged position. The wound in my bicep pulled, the flesh taut around the puckered hole. Silver-inflicted wounds would take a lot longer to heal than the bullet hole, and all my other scratches.
"Cats purr to facilitate healing," I said. "Maybe he is getting a nap out of it, but he really was helping."
DeShawn raised a skeptical brow as he looked down at the cat purring contentedly in his arms. "Didn't know there's another medic in the house."
"All cats are descended from the same god. They don't have a lot of magic left in their bones, but they know a like creature when they see one, and sometimes they try to help. Sometimes not."
DeShawn's eyebrows really hiked up his forehead then. They rose so high I thought he would get a new hairline. "It doesn't matter if Mr. Pips is the son of a god, he is still not getting fresh salmon every night for dinner."
Mr. Pips made a soft chattering sound in the back of his throat and wriggled free of DeShawn's arms, leaping to the ground. The cat flicked its tail twice, then strode out of the open door. We watched him go until he disappeared down the hallway. DeShawn shook his head to clear it, put his hands on his hips, and gave me a solid once-over.
"You want to tell me what in the hell happened out there?"
"How about you tell me how you found me first?"
"You honestly think I haven't been tailing you since the day we met? Please. Now tell me what happened."
I poked at the wound in my arm with two fingers, not knowing where to begin. I didn't know how much he'd seen, and I also didn't know how much he knew. Although I didn't care much for the restraint of Adelia's veil, I didn't think letting information go without being under duress was a very good idea. But DeShawn had come to my rescue, and as much as it chafed me to admit it, I would be dead right now if it weren't for him.
"How much do you know?" I asked. If we were going to have this conversation, I didn't want to waste time treading old ground.
He crossed his arms over his chest and tipped his head to the side. "What I know, is that Adelia promised me when I first took over this department that I wouldn't have to worry about supernatural freaks tearing up the streets at all hours. I gotta be honest with you Mags, things have gotten pretty rough for me around here since you showed up."
I huffed and pushed my hair out of my face. "I didn't cause the situation. I woke up just as blind to what's going on as you are. And if I didn't do my job, then things would get worse here quickly. Is that what you want to see? London overrun by nightwalkers?"
"Fine," he said and held up both hands to me, palms facing outward. "You and I are both victims of Adelia's screw-up. But what are we going to do about it now? It looks to me like we're in the middle of a shitstorm here, and I don't know about you, but I'm not a big fan of inclement weather."
"Seems a funny job for you to take on, if you're not big on messes."
"Even though you've given me a few gray hairs already, this is a whole lot easier than my old job."
"Which was?"
"None of your goddamn business."
"Whoa. I didn't mean to pry. I'm sorry."
He grimaced and pinched the bridge of his nose between two fingers while keeping the other arm crossed over his chest. He stayed there for a second, just breathing through whatever his thoughts were, and I held my tongue. That's one thing about being immortal, it gives you a lot of patience.
"No," he said eventually. "I'm the one who's sorry. I shouldn't have snapped at you, it's just been a long day and… Well, I'm just giving you excuses now. We both know I was an asshole there. Sorry."
"Forgiven. Let's start again. You wanted to know what happened back there. There's no good way to say this, but the Sun Guard is under attack. A large chunk of the local London branches are already dead. I went to St. Martin's today, and the mortal staff had already been slaughtered and the sunstriders taken.
"Seamus did something with the computers—I couldn't tell you what—but he figured out the likely location of the next strike. We didn't have a lot of time, the sun was going down and if things were as bad as we thought they were, I knew I would need every ounce of strength the sun could get me to fight off the nightwalkers. I understand that I broke the veil, and I'm sorry about that, but I had to run across the city to reach Chatham House in time."
"And did you make it in time?"
I dropped my head, staring at my hands folded in my lap. It was not the answer he needed, he could see it on my face as clearly as I could read the annoyance written on his. I hadn't made it in time. I was close, so close. But close didn't bring the sunstriders back. Close didn't save the humans who had died in the fight.
"I was too late."
He exhaled heavily, his shoulders slumping from the effort, and shook his head. "How many dead?"
"I don't know. I don't know how many people worked at that compound. Seamus would know that, you have to ask him."
He nodded. "I'll do that. But in the meantime, you and I have to have a little talk. Why are the nightwalkers lashing out now? What happened to make them want to take you all down at once?"
"I honestly don't know." I laced my fingers together and squeezed tight. The bones of my knuckles cracked. "I wish I knew. If I knew that, I might know where to look for them."
"You don't even know where they are? Where they hole up at night?"
"I've only been awake two days, and I've done everything I can to stop the bleeding in this city. I was too late, yes, but I squeezed some information out of the…" The word froze my throat, Lucien's face looming over my vision. I took a breath, even though I didn't need to, and steadied myself. "I got some information out of the nightwalker. It wasn't much, but at least I saw what they were doing. The missing sunstriders aren't dead, they're taking them alive."
"Why? What the hell would the nightwalkers want with a bunch of living sunstriders? Wouldn't it be a terrible idea for them to gather their enemies close to hand?"
"They're not conscious. I don't want to believe it, but I think I have to accept that it's true: I'm the only sunstrider awake."
"You're all we've got?"
I shrugged, holding my hands out to either side. "I'm afraid so. And I wish I could tell you why. There aren't a lot of things that can make a sunstrider stay asleep when the balance has shifted so far. Every last one of them should be thrumming with the desire to break out of their sleep."
"So what's keeping them?"
"The nightwalkers have figured something out. I don't know what it is yet, but I intend to discover the reason. The ghoul at Club Garnet was insistent that the night would be completely theirs. That could have been bravado, but I don't think so. Lucien—" The name caught in my throat and I coughed over it. "The nightwalker I ran into at Chatham House. He seemed to be annoyed with me for being awake. He said it wasn't ready yet."
"What's not ready?"
"I have no idea. But I've known him a long time, and I don't think he'd lie to me."
DeShawn narrowed his eyes. "I may not be up on the particulars of your order, but it seems to me a little strange that one of you could 'know' a nightwalker. I thought you all kill each other on sight?"
Guilt made my chest ache and I looked away from him, focusing my gaze on the narrow band of streetlamp light filtering through the half-opened window.
"I knew Lucien when he was human. He was mortal when I went to sleep. After tonight, I wish he had died a mortal death while I rested."
DeShawn sucked air through his teeth, making a sharp whistling sound. "Seems a funny coincidence that somebody you knew when they were human just happened to show up as a nightwalker 200 years in the future."
I lifted my head to meet DeShawn's eyes. He returned my gaze, steady and level. I found it impossible to lie to him. "Lucien was important to
me. I think somebody intentionally turned him, to hurt me."
DeShawn's face fell and he looked away. "I'm sorry, but I have to ask. Why would someone do that to you? I've come across a lot of nasty scenarios in my years, but revenge like that takes a special kind of anger."
"I wish I knew."
"You don't forget something nasty like that."
"If you're a sunstrider, you do. Something I did, some time around 1830, got me in so much trouble with the Sun Guard that they deemed it necessary to put me into the oubliette."
"What's the point of that?"
"The point is to forget. The sentence is determined by how long it would take your fellow sunstriders to forgive you, and for the sleep to erase the memory of what you've done. The sunstriders are a small order, we rarely turn new initiates. If we didn't have a way to atone for our crimes, we would have torn each other apart long ago."
He shook his head and stretched, then sat on the edge of the bed. The mattress springs creaked under his weight as he reached over to roll up the sleeve of my shirt, revealing the deep gash on my bicep. While all the other wounds on my body had sealed up, the cut on my bicep still leaked.
"This is in a bad way," he said, shaking his head. "We should get you to a proper doctor. I know someone down at emergency, someone who'll keep their mouth shut."
I pressed my hand over his and squeezed my thanks, then shrugged off his grip and pushed to my feet. I swayed at first, but stability came back to me quickly. Mr. Pips trotted into the room and twined around my ankles.
"No need, that will heal like the rest, it just takes longer. Silver is poison to sunstriders, gold to nightwalkers. I got sloppy after I encountered the ghouls and they didn't know what I was. It didn't occur to me to keep a look out for the old ways to be used against me. It won't happen again."
"Gold poisons nightwalkers, huh?" He pressed his hand against his chest, gripping the vague outline of a cross hidden under his shirt, a hint of glittering chain around his neck.
"Yes," I said, and inclined my head to the pendant. "But don't get your hopes up about religious symbols. Those are useless."
He snorted. "Figures."
"Can you take me back to Somerset House, now?"
"Yeah, but I'm going with you. Whatever happens next, I want in. Full input. You don't move without me now, understand? This city is jumpy enough without having to deal with reports of spirits leaping across the rooftops. And anyway, if you're going to do some damage to those nightwalker fuckers I want in, too." DeShawn stood and scooped up Mr. Pips, plopping him down on the bed to keep our feet clear.
"You're mortal. They'll tear you to pieces."
"Let 'em try. They'll regret it after I see a friend of mine about getting some golden shot for our shotguns."
I raised my brows. "That... is a very good idea."
He extended a hand to me. "Partners?"
I caught myself smiling as I shook his hand. "Partners."
Seventeen: Cast the Second Stone
DeShawn had sent my clothes out to be cleaned, but they couldn't do much for the bloodstains. Not to mention the giant hole in my leather jacket. But at least my boots were looking shiny and new. So far those had to be my favorite thing about the modern world. He led me down the steps of his apartment building and out into a side alley where his car waited.
I didn't know much about cars, save that they can sometimes get you places very fast and other times get you there in longer than it would take to just walk, but I had a feeling DeShawn's was… less than the average vehicle.
It was a small thing, a simple two-seater with a boxy shape, the black paint peeling and faded in many places. I squeezed myself into the passenger seat, not bothering to comment on the lack of legroom. It wasn't my legs that were hurting anyway, and I had plenty of room to lean my arm against the ragged cushion of the seat. DeShawn piled in beside me and slapped a conical yellow-white light onto the roof of the car. He hit a button, and the light began to spin, throwing shadows in all directions.
"What's that?" I asked.
He grinned at me and patted the hood of the car through the open window as he took off down the alley. "That, my dear girl, is how we're going to make it to Somerset House in 15 minutes during rush hour."
I revised my earlier estimation of how good DeShawn's car was as it peeled out onto the road, tires squealing as they gained traction against the asphalt. I had a split second to take in the neighborhood around me—his drab building, a faux-Greek structure called Locke Banking—and then the landscape smeared. He barreled into the traffic. I swore, grabbing the handle on the inside of the car's cabin.
"Are you trying to get us killed?"
"What? You have something against going fast?"
"You realize that the fastest thing I've been on is a horse, right?"
That probably wasn't the smartest thing to say. I watched as the thought settled into DeShawn, and I could see the moment he decided what he would do. A huge grin split his face, and he narrowed his eyes, leaning over the steering wheel as his hand reached down to a knob on a stick attached to the floorboard between us.
"Let me show you what a couple hundred horses can do."
He got the car up to speed so fast I jerked back against my seat, a spark of pain igniting in my arm. I cut him a look, but his eyes were focused on the road, which was probably for the best. Cars honked at us as he blasted through them, swerving to get out of his way. The light on the top of his car seemed to do the trick. As soon as people saw it, they dove to the sides of the road to let us pass. Never mind that I was a sunstrider, I didn't much like the idea of putting my life in the hands of a simple light.
"If you patched me up just to get me killed out here—"
"Calm down, woman. I trained for this." He grinned, showing all of his teeth, and the car's tires squealed once again as he increased the speed. I shut my mouth, realizing that if I said any more he'd just go faster.
Despite the gripping terror that had nested in my chest, I caught myself beginning to smile. London breezed by so quickly that its colors merged together, and even though it was night, the false lights of the city made those streaks brilliant.
Orange, red, yellow, pink, even a blue brighter than any sapphire I'd ever seen. London was a great city, I called her my Gray Lady, and I didn't do so with disdain. But the speed at which DeShawn drove showed me all of her in a fresh light. These modern accoutrements hadn't cheapened her, as I'd first thought. They melded with her, maybe even enhanced her. They couldn't take away from her beauty. Nothing ever really could.
DeShawn yanked on the steering wheel, sending the car slewing around a sharp corner and I let out a wolf of a laugh. A burst of exhilaration filled me for the first time since I had awoken. At least, it was the first time that sensation had nothing to do with an impending slaughter.
"You see?" DeShawn shouted. "It's fun, right?"
I laughed in response, sticking my arm out the window to feel the wind thread between my fingers. DeShawn pulled the car into a crowded road that ran parallel to the river Thames. The river had never been beautiful, not by conventional standards, not even in my day. Arguably, in my time it had been worse.
Back then it had been used as a sewage depository, and people only approached it if they absolutely must. Which was a lot more often than people liked. London existed because of the Thames. All commerce ran through that river, sending money and goods into London from whence it would speed up the tributaries into the rest of England.
Moonlight glancing through the clouds made it gleam like silver. I didn't have a very good relationship with silver, but I could appreciate the look of it at least. Maybe it was better to say that the river gleamed like steel. A well-oiled blade was something I could appreciate.
DeShawn slowed the car as he brought it up to Somerset House. I was loath for the drive to end, knowing what awaited me once we went inside. Every one of the Sun Guard would look to me to solve the problem. I didn't blame them. They were support
staff, facilitating what I needed to get the job done. But I was never meant to work alone, I should have my family with me, or at the very least the core members of my coterie.
Without a knowledgeable group of sunstriders to bounce ideas off of, I felt unmoored, blinded. I didn't even know what the nightwalkers wanted. I suspected they were trying to damage the sunstrider order—for why else would they kill our mortal contingent—but I didn't think they were trying to wipe us out completely. At least, that didn't make much sense. If they wanted to wipe us out, they could've killed us in our coffins. The Sun Guard certainly wasn't able to mount a defense.
DeShawn brought the car to stop on a crunchy, narrow gravel road just outside of the main door to Somerset House. I stepped out and raised my arms above my head, stretching as hard as I could despite my wounds. The slash in my bicep burned, but I enjoyed the tingle of pain. It meant, at the very least, that I was still alive.
"Allow me to get the door," DeShawn said and opened the front door to Somerset House with a grand flourish and a deep bow.
I laughed at him and stepped into the foyer. DeShawn came right behind me, shutting the door and locking it. It was only then that I realized the door had been unlocked to begin with.
The small hairs on my body stood up, a trickle of anticipation shuddering through me. I reached for the grip of my blade, but did not draw. DeShawn raised his eyebrows at me in question, knowing not to speak since I was obviously on my guard, and I tilted my chin at the door he had just locked.
His joking smile faded in a flash, and he reached to his hip, settling his hand over the grip of his gun. I motioned for him to stay put and began the slow creep up the stairs to the room that Seamus and Talia worked in. I could hear movement above and smell the distinct scent of the humans I'd come to know. None of them seemed distressed, but a lot of things could mask distress. Soft voices reached me, animated and intense. It was Adelia. She was shouting at Seamus.
Sun Cursed (Shades of Blood Book 1) Page 9