Rare Vigilance

by M. A. Grant

  “Stay by the wall,” he told Cristian. “And yell if you hear something odd.”

  He left the wall and the man behind and slowly crossed into the open floor of the warehouse. He didn’t look directly at the ground where his flashlight was pointed, instead checking for details in the outer edges of that circle of light, trying to keep his vision balanced so he could react if anything came for him from the shadows.

  Halfway back, he found a partially collapsed wall. The metal siding had broken free from the aged steel frame of the building, leaving a gaping hole that offered easy access to the outside. There was no blood, but he found shoe prints there, and marks from the thin-fingered hands of whoever had crawled their way inside.

  “Cristian,” he called. “I found something.”

  He tracked the rustling at his back, grateful when he heard Cristian’s footsteps over the dusty ground. He pointed at the tracks. “Mary’s?”

  “Probably.” Cristian stooped closer to the prints and pointed. “We saw those out front though.”

  He was right. The odd animal prints from outside were layered atop the human sign. Atlas followed their progress with his light, skin prickling as the story unfolded. The tracks changed farther in, churning up the dust and dirt, transforming to drag marks. The chilling path led him and Cristian farther and farther into the darkness.

  “Atlas,” Cristian whispered, “I don’t hear anything back there.”

  “You can wait here—”

  An elbow bumped lightly against his ribs. “No,” Cristian said. “I won’t make you look alone.”

  It was a kindness he didn’t deserve, but he took it nonetheless, grateful to bear the weight with someone else.

  They found her in the back corner.

  There wasn’t much left, but Atlas crouched beside what remained and forced himself to look for clues of who Mary had been before her death. There were no pieces of jewelry, no shreds of clothing, and his heart ached for her. There was nothing for those left behind to cling to. At least the families of his platoon mates had bodies to bury, ashes to spread, and flags to frame. “I’m sorry,” Atlas murmured as Cristian knelt beside him, paying no heed to the dirt marring his expensive jeans. He looked fragile, his hair messy from running a hand through it, his usual charm carved away by the reality of Mary’s loss. Human. He looked so human in his grief and all Atlas’s further platitudes caught in his throat in the face of that realization. He, more than anyone, had no right to say such words.

  Cristian reached out and followed the imprint of the body left in ashes on the dirt. He never touched them, but even the disturbance of the air as his fingers passed over sent the ashes dancing, twisting like delicate flakes of burnt paper. “Sunlight,” Cristian said, the word tight and pained.

  Atlas rose and looked out the windows. There, running in a sluggish line was the river, which meant the windows were pointed south. He doubted Mary had been dragged to this spot for the purpose of destroying her body; likely, the animal that did it was hoping to find a sheltered back corner, far from prying eyes, where it could enjoy its kill at its leisure. That observation wouldn’t change anything though, so he didn’t say it.

  “That thing hunted her,” Cristian murmured. “There’s not much that could kill one of us. Whatever left those prints would have to be strong.”

  “And fast,” Atlas said. He looked over the picture again, working through the details. “Have you ever seen anything that could take down a vampire this easily?”

  He looked at Cristian and found the other man watching him already, expression wary. “I haven’t,” Cristian hedged, “but you have.”

  It took a moment for the words to sink in and, when they did, he understood Cristian’s hesitance to broach the subject. Cristian had been in his head, had accidentally invaded his privacy, but he’d also suffered through the memory of the attack. He was the only one alive who had witnessed it through Atlas’s eyes. It was no longer just Atlas who could remember the creatures’ clawed hands and preternatural strength. Only Cristian was brave enough to revisit those memories and put the pieces together.

  Atlas tried to scrape air past the bands of panic tightening around his ribs. “No,” he declared. “They can’t be here.”

  “I’ve never seen anything like them before. It took a predator to kill Mary. Can you think of something else that could do that?”

  “Of course not,” Atlas snapped. “But no one would believe my story.”

  “I believe it,” Cristian said, painfully earnest. “Blood bonds don’t lie, Atlas. You can shift attention, you can guide someone to certain memories, but you can’t change the truth. You saw those monsters and survived them. Your blood is honest.”

  “You don’t know me,” Atlas whispered, rubbing at his chest to ease the sharp pang of guilt clawing against his sternum. If Cristian only knew what he’d just tried to do the other night...

  Cristian’s eyes flashed with a hint of gold, and his frustration was written on every tight line of his face. “I do, whether we want me to or not. I don’t know how they got here, but if those monsters are in Scarsdale, they’ll be hunting others the same way they hunted you. Mary put up a struggle. Other vampires will do the same. What do you think will happen if your monsters learn there’s even easier prey around? If they run across a human one night?”

  They’d ripped through his platoon with thoughtless ease. Nothing had saved him or anyone else, not their training, not their weapons, not their strategy. They had fallen before they knew their lives were over. Civilians wouldn’t stand a chance.

  “What do you propose we do?”

  “I need to tell my father what’s hunting in his territory.”

  “Will he listen to you?”

  Cristian bit his lower lip. “I don’t know. He’s distracted now and—”

  “You can tell him what I saw,” Atlas offered. Every word hurt on its way out, but he pushed on anyway. “If it’ll help convince him to stop these things, tell him whatever you need to about my past.”

  He looked down at Mary’s ashes. “I can’t let this happen again.”

  “Okay,” Cristian said quietly. He lingered over the ashes for a moment before declaring, “We don’t have much time.”

  Atlas hated walking away from the ashes without doing anything, without relying on some tradition or ritual to acknowledge Mary’s death. Maybe finding her ashes was enough. It still felt like too little. He quickly scratched Mary’s name into the dirt beside the ashes with the end of the tire iron. It wasn’t enough to commemorate a life, he knew, but it would have to do until Cristian and Decebal could figure out how to keep others—vampire and human—from meeting a similar fate.

  Cristian would have to face his father alone. Atlas had his own battle to fight. He needed to convince Jasper and his employer to delay their plans, at least until Decebal eliminated this new threat. As much as he wanted Decebal’s influence gone from his hometown, there were more dangerous monsters to fear now.

  * * *

  Cristian’s trust in Atlas’s memories was the only thing that held him together the rest of the night. He survived the end of his shift, with Decebal’s ill-tempered return and the suspicious glances shared by Cristian’s friends over Cristian and his dark moods. When he finally left and returned to his apartment, sleep escaped him. He lay in bed, replaying the night’s events and drafting what he’d say to Jasper’s employer. Bea came over for lunch and he went back to bed the moment she left. When he couldn’t put off getting ready for his next shift any longer, he forced himself up to shower and dress. He bribed himself to get into the car with the promise of picking up a coffee on the way. Getting a second one for Cristian, one of the disgustingly sweet, flavored things he favored for some godforsaken reason, seemed only fair exchange for his handling Decebal.

  For the second night in a row, Cristian surprised him by anticipating his arrival,
this time meeting him a step past the threshold. “Thank God you’re never late,” Cristian mumbled as he snagged hold of Atlas’s arm and dragged him back outside. Decebal’s usual security avoided them as they made their way through the gardens. Well, as Cristian led Atlas forcibly through the gardens. He didn’t let go until they were at the edge of the lawn where it bordered a small copse of pristinely maintained woodland.

  “What’s going on?” Atlas asked, confused by Cristian’s erratic behavior and still juggling the coffees.

  “I needed to talk to you,” Cristian said. He paused, took in Atlas again, and tilted his head. “Why do you have two coffees?”

  “One’s for you,” Atlas said, and handed it over.

  Cristian lit up and took a careful sip. He closed his eyes and hummed in pleasure. Even from a foot away, Atlas could smell the peppermint on his breath when he said, “Thanks.”

  “Sure. Now, why can’t we talk inside?”

  “Father’s on edge and talking about this around him wouldn’t be wise.”

  “But you did talk to him?”

  “Oh, yes. I told him something was hunting vampires in his territory, but when he found out who was being hunted, he told me he had bigger problems to focus on first.” Cristian didn’t bother to hide his resentment of Decebal’s dismissive attitude. “Compassion costs capital, it seems.”

  “Maybe he’ll come around,” Atlas said.

  Cristian traced the top of the cardboard sleeve. “When I told him what I thought was hunting our people, he told me it was impossible. That I was imagining things that didn’t exist.”

  The sharp smile twisting Atlas’s mouth was involuntary, and he tried to hide it with a sip of his drink. “Sounds about right.”

  “He has to be lying,” Cristian said incredulously.

  “Maybe, but if he doesn’t want to give you answers, you’re shit out of luck.”

  Cristian took a slow sip of his drink before glancing away and muttering, “Not quite.”

  “What did you do?”

  “I might have reached out to a few other people. One of them wants to meet to talk about it. She said it was something she couldn’t discuss over the phone. There’s just one problem.”

  Atlas closed his eyes and prayed for patience. “Which is?”

  “Father can’t know. He doesn’t like her, so we can’t meet anywhere nearby.”

  “Where would we be meeting her?” Atlas asked.

  Cristian winced. “The Mollycoddle. A pub outside Desolation House.”

  It was a confirmation of his suspicions, but he balked at the answer anyway. “Wait, Desolation House...that town by the wilderness area?” It was a long drive, far longer than anything they’d done before, including their ill-fated trip to Hahn Lake. “When?”

  “Tomorrow night.”

  “Impossible.”

  Cristian’s mouth set in a stubborn line. God, he was digging in for a fight, which was never a good sign. “Father’s got a donor’s dinner and then has to finish up work at the clinic. He’ll be gone all night. I got his schedule from Helias. If we leave right when you get here, we’ll have plenty of time to get back before anyone knows we were gone.”

  That wasn’t his concern. He was more concerned about their attending a strange meeting in a quiet rural town far away from Decebal and any backup they might need. “Why there?”

  “Neutral territory.” Cristian nudged at the grass with the toe of his shoe. “It’s in the no-man’s-land between Father’s boundaries and some others’ territories. We’re less likely to run into anyone who could cause problems.”

  “This is a terrible plan,” Atlas warned. Cristian nodded, but it wasn’t enough. Atlas needed to see him, to read his face and expressions, to make sure he knew the truth, not the pretty stories Cristian told everyone else. “Well, Mr. Slava?”

  Cristian huffed, but finally looked up, flushed with embarrassment or irritation. “Yes,” he admitted. “But it’s the best I could come up with.”

  “If I refused to drive you there, what would you do?” Atlas asked him. His eyes flicked to the side and Atlas hummed low in his throat. “Eyes front, Cristian.”

  He obeyed beautifully. His relieved exhalation at the command, the tightness that fell away from the corners of his eyes and mouth, even his relaxed stance as he faced Atlas now, all involuntary reactions. A moment later, Cristian realized what he’d done, but it was too late to deny it. There was no way Atlas would make him try to deny it. No, such trust deserved to be protected, not mocked. The more he learned what Cristian did for those in his care, the more he understood its value.

  “Good,” Atlas murmured and he swore Cristian’s pupils dilated even more, until his irises were thin rings of color barely visible from the distant lights of the house. “Now, answer my question. If I didn’t drive you to this meeting, what would you do?”

  “Find someone else to help me get there,” he said.

  “Who?”

  His free hand—the one not clutched around his coffee—clenched into a fist and released. He smelled of peppermint and coffee and cream and desperation. “Probably Andrei. He’s offered to drive me anywhere you won’t.”

  Of course Andrei would make such an offer. He didn’t like or trust Atlas, and this was an easy way to earn Cristian’s favor. “Will you go with me?” Cristian asked when the silence had stretched too long.

  “Yes,” Atlas said, “but I’m going to take precautions. If we’re traveling that far, I want backup. Would Ioana come too?”

  “Probably.”

  “Does Helias know what you’re planning? Is he going to cover for you if your father asks questions?”

  Cristian shook his head. “He’s taken enough risks on me lately. I don’t want him involved in this.” He took one last, long draw on his drink. Atlas grimaced at the thought of all the syrups sitting at the bottom of the cup. When he broke for air, Cristian asked, “So we’re doing this?”

  Atlas sighed. “It had better be worth it.”

  Chapter Twelve

  Desolation House was a small town on the edge of a dark lake. Brochures would have called it quaint and historically accurate, phrases which were signs of inaccurate optimism at best, outright lies at worst. Attempts had been made to restore some of the historic buildings on the main street, though the papered windows and empty sign brackets warned few businesses remained. The roads were cramped, run down, and lacked consistently working streetlights, which forced Atlas to lean forward to scan what the headlights exposed. They almost missed the road for their destination because of it, only making the turn at the last second.

  The narrow lane curled around the edge of the dark lake, opening a little wider when it hit a small parking lot. The Mollycoddle pub stood in all its dimly lit, Adirondack-style, faded glory, like an ancient cryptid emerging from the edge of the forest. Atlas couldn’t put his finger on what made his anxiety spike when he looked at the place until Ioana wrinkled her nose and said, “I bet serial killers come here for summer retreats.”

  In a single sentence, she hit on everything he instinctively hated about the meeting spot. Too many entrances and exits to cover easily. Poor lighting. Remote location. Trees wrapped it in a dark embrace, reminiscent of a different forest where dangerous things had watched him from the shadows before moving in for the kill.

  Cristian ignored Ioana’s complaint and leaned over the console into Atlas’s space, pointing at the black sedan to their left. “That must be her.”

  Ioana frowned, but said nothing. She hadn’t said much since she’d been told they were going to go meet one of Cristian’s friends. When she pressed Cristian for an idea of who they were meeting, she’d been summarily shut down. The tension between her and Cristian had hung thick in the car after that, and her rising nerves put Atlas on edge too.

  His undefined apprehension shifted to blaring warn
ings at the sight of the woman sliding out of the sedan, and that was before four other figures in dark suits followed after her. She somehow crossed the gravel lot without a single misstep of her stilettos. Her dark hair was pulled back in a tight chignon, exposing the graceful curve of her neck. She glanced at him once through the windshield, and there was no escaping the flat look in her eyes. He left the car with Cristian, despite Ioana’s hissed warnings to not get out. Despite standing only a few feet away from the woman, he may as well have been invisible.

  “Cristian,” she said, with a faint trace of an English accent. “Shall we go in?”

  Atlas balked, reaching out a hand to stop Cristian from moving any closer to her. He knew that voice. It was different in person than it was over the phone, but unmistakable. This was Jasper’s mysterious employer, the woman who intended to usurp Decebal. She was here, on pretense of helping Cristian, and he had no idea of her plans for his father. Worse, Atlas couldn’t warn him of the danger without giving away his own part in the mess.

  Movement behind her left shoulder. Atlas tugged Cristian closer. Jasper stood near her, his features partially illuminated by the headlights. He gave no indication he’d ever seen or met Atlas before.

  Atlas wasn’t quite as good at hiding his own panicked reaction, since Cristian shifted in his grip and murmured, “Mr. Kinkaid, what’s going on?”

  He had to warn Cristian. He couldn’t warn Cristian, not without revealing his own part in the betrayal. Think of something, he commanded himself. Think of an excuse, any excuse, but think of something!

  “You said you were meeting a friend,” he croaked. “That usually indicates one other person.”

  At the woman’s back, Jasper broke into a wide, disarming smile. “Apologies for the surprise, Mr. Kinkaid. I am Jasper Rhodes, Ms. Wharram’s assistant. She does not travel without security, much like Mr. Slava.”

  “Wharram?” Atlas clarified, shocked enough to turn to Cristian.