“Take my hand, child. Come . . . you have work to do.”
. . . wings . . .
There was the sound of glass breaking, of things falling over—the metal walls of the building shook.
The woman dove into the corner, arms over her head, terror written in every line of her body. “Stop it!” she shouted. “Please, stop!”
Stop?
It stopped.
She peeked up through her arms, her eyes bright with tears and wide with fear. “I’m just trying to help you,” she said quietly. “I didn’t want this.”
Words. “I’m sorry.”
She swallowed hard and unbent herself, rising gracefully. “I should never have brought you in here in the first place—I must have been out of my mind.”
Even as she spoke, though, she was righting the shelf that had tipped over, relighting the candle; she shook her head again and held out her hand. “Come on . . . let’s get you cleaned up.”
The hand that took hers was pale, a little shaky, and strangely bare, missing something. It was, of course, connected to a wrist, and then to an arm, a well-muscled bicep, a shoulder . . .
. . . a body.
Breathing. Alive.
“I’m alive,” he said softly.
The woman sighed. “It was a shock for me, too.”
“Who . . . who are you?”
She looked relieved to get a sensible question. “My name is Olivia,” she said. “You probably don’t remember me, but I remember you.” She seemed to sense what was coming next, because she squeezed his hand firmly, and said, “Your name is David Solomon. You’re the Prime of the Southern United States . . . Does that ring a bell?”
He listened, but didn’t hear any bells. “No.”
Another sigh. “I’m sure it will come back to you. You’ve . . . been through a lot.”
She helped him stand, and the room pitched and spun, but she was strong and held him up. This close, the mingled scents of paint and coffee were both alluring and strangely comforting. Her body was solidly built, curvaceous, and she had a proud bearing, the posture of someone comfortable in her own skin. The best word he could think of to describe her was present; she occupied her own aura, where many people seemed to be halfway aware of themselves at best.
She was very familiar, somehow, almost as familiar as the name she had given him. The memory was there somewhere. Everything was twisted around itself in his mind, like trying to make sense of ten lifetimes at once, a thousand voices clamoring to be heard, a thousand threads of meaning trying to coalesce into a single reality. He sensed it would right itself, given time, but he also sensed he was not going to be patient about it.
Taking each step carefully, she led him down to the bathroom, pausing to grab a shirt that had been tossed over a nearby chair. She sat him down on the closed toilet lid, facing away from her, and soaked a washcloth in warm water.
“You’re all bloody,” she explained, swabbing his back. It didn’t hurt.
“Why?”
Olivia chuckled. “I haven’t the slightest idea how to answer that.”
Sudden discomfort clenched his stomach, a deep hot itching blossoming along his jaw. He felt his teeth pressing down and again, the room swam in his vision, physical sensation fighting its way to the front of the vortex of strangeness in his mind.
Hunger.
She finished her work and handed him the shirt. “Yours,” she said.
It was dirty, he noticed. It smelled vaguely of battle and fire. His fingers stumbled briefly on the buttons as dozens of mental images intruded, flashes of remembered pain, of eyes . . . green eyes, full of fear and anguish . . . a scream . . .
Olivia shook her head and took over buttoning for him, finishing the last few quickly.
Once he had the shirt on, she walked him out into the main room of the loft, guiding him like an invalid. She left for a moment, and he peered around at the paintings, trying to make sense of them. The same figure recurred throughout the series: female, sometimes cloaked, sometimes arising from the night itself, sometimes entwined with serpents or the roots of a tree, much like Olivia’s tattoos.
As Olivia came back down the stairs, he asked, “Who is that woman?”
Her eyebrow lifted in surprise. “I don’t really know,” she replied. “I dream about her sometimes. I always paint from my dreams.”
He turned in a slow circle, eyes moving from canvas to canvas. “She grows closer over time,” he observed. “Why doesn’t she have a face?”
“I’m not sure. Sometimes she almost seems to, in the dreams, but it changes.” She held out the length of black leather in her hands. “Coat.”
It, too, was familiar, as was the weight of it as it settled on his shoulders. He straightened its collar, and one hand came to rest on his throat . . .
“What’s wrong?”
He looked down, seeing nothing where there should have been something. “It’s gone.”
Olivia nodded. “Right . . . your Signet. I’m sure your people have it—we’ll get you fed, and then maybe you’ll be able to remember more and we can get you home.”
“Home . . .”
She held up the other item she had brought from the bedroom: a sword.
“Is that mine?”
“Yes.” She pulled it partway out of its sheath, admiring the blade, which was carved in an intricate design from the hilt midway down. “It’s a beautiful piece,” she noted. “Order of Elysium, looks like . . . and . . . I didn’t notice that until just now, but there are words carved on this side. Gaelic . . . I think.”
Curious, he took the proffered weapon and looked at it more closely. She was right; at a certain angle, he could see that the pattern he had mistaken for vines was, in fact, lettering. Somehow he knew he had never noticed that before.
“What’s so funny?” she asked.
He hadn’t realized he was smiling. “The Oncoming Storm,” he read. “It’s . . . it’s funny, for some reason.”
Olivia went for her own coat, and as she gathered up her keys and phone, he buckled the sword to his belt, his hands moving of their own accord as if the action had been performed so many times it was a reflex.
She eyed him from head to foot. “You look a little less frightful. After you’ve fed, I’m sure you’ll lose that zombie quality.” She turned the deadbolt on the door, slid back a second lock, undid a chain.
“Wait . . .”
She paused with her hand on the doorknob. Their eyes met.
Uncertainly, he asked, “How long was I gone?”
She seemed to understand the enormity of the question, as well as of the answer, and chose her words carefully. “You’ve been presumed dead for three weeks.”
“But . . . where was I?”
Olivia gave him a small but genuine smile. “That’s a very good question. Let’s see if we can find you some answers.”
She reached out and grabbed his hand again and, with another reassuring squeeze, led him out into the night.
Seven
“You’re sure you don’t see anything.”
“I promise you, my Lady, there is nothing on your back.”
Miranda lowered her shirt. “Thank you, Mo.” She smiled slightly at the look on his face. “Do you think I’m cracking up?”
The medic laughed. “I think you are burning the candle at both ends and the middle, my Lady, and you need to get more rest. I also think that, whatever I say, you will keep working yourself past your limits until something forces you to stop. It is a common affliction among Signets.”
He had come running to the suite at her frantic call, and she was embarrassed to have summoned him to an emergency that didn’t exist; but he took it in stride as always and left her to finish getting dressed for her meeting with Novotny.
She had woken in so much pain . . . but this time it was purely physical, an intense burning and scraping all over her upper back. She could feel herself bleeding . . . but there was no blood, no welts, nothing, and now she wasn
’t even sore.
It had to have been a nightmare. She put her head in her hands for a moment, trying to remember what she’d been dreaming about; she’d been reliving that night over and over, but this was the first time she’d felt any real physical pain from it. As far as she could remember, neither she nor David had been injured that way. She’d been shot, yes, but those were arrow wounds and hurt the way stakes did. This was very different.
Her phone rang, and with a sigh, she groped sideways on the bed for it. “Hey, Dev.”
“I have a weird question.”
“Yes?”
“Did you have a nightmare about your back?”
She nearly dropped the phone. “Um . . . yes. I woke up freaking out, but nothing was wrong . . . Why?”
“I did, too.”
“I don’t understand. Why would we both dream that?”
“I’m not sure . . . but Jonathan had a hunch that it happened to both of us. He woke up when I did, but he wasn’t in pain. Maybe I picked it up from you somehow?”
“You mean the way you felt my meltdown at Stella’s the other night?”
“Yes. And the way we all knew that Jacob and Cora’s car was bombed, and . . . about David. I called Jacob, and he said that Cora had some sort of dream that woke her up, but it wasn’t nearly that bad and she doesn’t remember it actually hurting her.”
“I really, really don’t want you guys to have my dreams, Deven.”
He chuckled softly. “Same here, love. But I think it’s something more than that. Jonathan said that when I woke, I called David’s name . . . and I don’t remember the dream, but I know he was in it. What about you?”
She took a deep breath. “I don’t know. I’ve dreamed about him every day, but it’s always the same thing. This wasn’t that. This didn’t feel like a memory—I don’t have any memories of him being carved up with a hot poker.”
“I . . .”
“What? Spit it out.”
“I had a terrible thought, but . . . it’s ridiculous . . . and I don’t really believe it, but . . . what if, wherever he is . . .”
Miranda felt cold inside, understanding what he meant. “You mean he’s in hell.”
“Of course not. I just . . .”
“But we can’t have a physical connection anymore . . . you said yourself his body went to dust.”
“I know. And like I said, it’s ridiculous. If you have another theory, I’d love to hear it.”
“I don’t.” She closed her eyes. “I don’t understand why any of this is happening. Why I’m alive, why we’re all connected . . . I should have gone stark raving insane by now from the power imbalance, but . . . there isn’t one. I’m stronger than I ever was, but I don’t feel unbalanced. I feel . . . right. In fact, that’s the only thing that does feel right.”
“You haven’t by chance been manifesting any new abilities, have you?”
“No . . . aside from whatever I did to Stella. Why?”
He hesitated. “You started moving things with your mind after you Paired, which was unheard of. If we’re all connected, we should keep an eye out for anything like that happening to the rest of us.”
“Did you tell Jacob?”
“Yes. He said if he or Cora starts making things float, he’ll give me a call.”
Her com chimed, and one of the front door guards informed her that Harlan was ready for her. “I’m headed into town to talk to Novotny about the earpiece,” she said, forcing herself to stand up and find her coat. “I’ll copy you on the results.” She grabbed Shadowflame with her free hand and asked, “How are you holding up?”
“Don’t worry about me. I’m fine.”
She smiled. “You know, I can tell when you’re lying now.”
She could hear him smiling, too. “I was afraid you’d say that.”
* * *
It was a cloudy, cold night in Austin, unseasonably so for the beginning of June; it looked like another round of storms was moving in from the north. The wind had an edge of desperation to it, the last gasp of a mild early summer before hundred-degree temperatures took over and suffocated the region for the next five months.
As they walked through the slick, rain-shining streets, Olivia watched the Prime keenly for signs that he might panic again. In her apartment he had only knocked over a few books and paintings, but out here, who knew?
She had heard rumors that he was telekinetic but hadn’t really believed it. There were some powers only Signets had, true, but there were also some things vampires simply couldn’t do, and she had thought it was just another myth built up to give the Prime more of a reputation than he had earned.
It didn’t take long for her to understand that the myths were not myths, at least not where Solomon was concerned. She could feel the power building in him with every step he took, even before he had fed. Something else seemed to be feeding him, some current of energy she couldn’t quite place.
He walked beside her, biddable as a baby chick, but gradually regaining more and more of his confidence. He looked around at the city at first with an almost innocent curiosity, but she could see sparks of recognition here and there the closer they got to the Shadow District.
She didn’t grill him on his identity or history. It would come—it was coming, bit by bit. She wouldn’t call his condition amnesia so much as a state of shock, and she couldn’t blame him . . . if he had, indeed, come back from the dead, whatever had happened to him might be even worse than death . . . and whatever Olivia had witnessed happening to him had taken its toll as well.
“Over here,” she said, tapping his arm lightly. “Humans.”
They looked around the corner of a building at a rather typical Austin street scene: plenty of mortals hurrying to get wherever they went, a homeless man with a dog sitting on a bus bench, a vendor selling tacos from a cart. It wasn’t all that busy; now that the music festival was over and the university out for the summer, the city was quieting down, breathing easier.
“Call one over,” Olivia told the Prime. “Discreetly.”
He was staring at the mortal crowd as if he’d never seen such a thing in his life, his expression shifting from apprehensive to understanding, and then to something like pity.
“They’re all dying,” he said softly.
“Yes. Eventually.”
“They’re afraid.”
“Probably.”
His gaze traveled from human to human, and she wondered what exactly he was seeing, or feeling, that she couldn’t. Like any vampire she could pick out the healthy ones, evaluating them by scent, and she had a talent for sensing energy as well, but it was clear he was looking for something else.
Finally, his eyes narrowed. She saw a silver ring appear around each iris. “You,” he murmured. “Come here.”
A man who was about midway across the park changed his trajectory and veered right. He seemed ordinary enough—a businessman of some kind, midthirties, briefcase in hand, likely on his way home from a late evening at the office.
The Prime stepped back into the shadows, and a moment later the human had reached them. Olivia cast a quick glance around to make sure no one had noticed.
The man blinked, confused. “What’s . . . what’s going on? Who are you people?”
“Be silent,” the Prime snapped.
Olivia wasn’t sure what to make of his behavior. He circled the man, sizing him up, his eyes cold and hard; his innate grace had become predatory, which was normal on the hunt, but there was something strange in his eyes, something angry.
He attacked the man so fast she barely saw him move. The human tried pathetically to struggle, letting out a strangled cry, but there was no escape. The Prime’s mouth clamped onto his throat, one hand snaking up to cover the man’s mouth.
Olivia felt her own body respond to the waves of satisfaction he was giving off. Hunger raced through her, hot and needy. She could barely concentrate enough to return to the corner and call another human over.
She chose
a young brunette woman and dealt with her quickly, efficiently. Blood flowed over her lips and soothed the burning; she wasn’t one to toy with her prey usually, preferring a more clinical approach. Five minutes, not a drop spilled, and the girl was already on her way again, barely wavering on her feet.
Olivia turned back to the Prime and gasped.
The human sank to the ground, released from both the Prime’s power and his bite, his face blank, eyes staring fixedly at nothing.
Solomon stood over him, eyes closed. His tongue flicked out over his lips and he sighed, a slight smile touching his face. Olivia stared, speechless, as the power of the human’s death flooded through him, dark tendrils of energy curling around him that reminded her, unexpectedly, of the design of the raven tattoo that now dwelt on his skin.
The eyes that met hers were black, and she took an involuntary step back.
“You killed him,” she breathed, just at a whisper.
He looked down at the human with obvious loathing. “He raped a seven-year-old.”
“How can you be sure?”
He lifted his eyes back to hers. They were blue again, to her relief. “I am sure.”
“There are laws about killing humans. You made those laws. Even if he had it coming—”
“It was necessary.”
“Necessary for what?” she asked, but she already knew—whatever transformation he had undergone in her loft, if it was anything like becoming a vampire, it needed human blood to seal it . . . and if it was more than that, it might have required death. He didn’t answer her question—it was possible he didn’t really know himself but was simply following some new instinct that had compelled him to kill.
He started to walk away.
“We have to do something with the body,” Olivia hissed. “Someone will find it.”
He paused and looked back at her over his shoulder. “Who?”
“The police, your Elite—”
A moment passed in which he apparently weighed whether to ignore her and keep walking or stay and argue; finally, he returned to the body and, giving it one last disdainful glance, held his hand out over it, and . . .
. . . it vanished.
“What the hell did you just do?”
Of Shadow Born Page 10
