Vampire in Atlantis wop-7

by Alyssa Day

  Marie looked down at Brandacea for a long time, and then she finally nodded. “I can feel her growing weaker every minute. I agree that she will not last the night unless some solution is found. I vote yes, as well.”

  Riley clasped Marie’s hand in one of hers and Erin’s in the other, and Erin took Keely’s hand, and Keely took Horace’s hand. They stood there together, in silence, each of them occupied with his or her own thoughts or prayers, and then Riley looked up.

  “Let’s do this, and please, God, let us be right.”

  Horace placed both of his hands, palms down, on the cover of the pod, and he chanted quietly, in what Riley recognized by its cadence must be ancient Atlantean. A shimmering silver light appeared and surrounded the pod and its occupant, until Brandacea’s still form glowed as if lit from within.

  “Now,” Horace said, and four of them lifted the crystal cover from the pod, carried it to the side of the room, and propped it up against the wall while Marie kept watch over Brandacea.

  “It’s so light,” Keely said. “It doesn’t seem like the door to a prison should weigh so little.”

  Horace bristled. “It was never meant to be a prison. They agreed to do this, for the good of Atlantis.”

  “Seems like somebody should have been more worried about the good of these women,” Erin said.

  Riley put a hand on Horace’s arm. “It’s all right. Nobody blames you, Horace. We’re just upset and frustrated and more than a little bit scared.”

  He nodded. “I know, Princess. So am I.”

  Marie called out, “She looks strange.”

  Erin pulled a handful of precious gems from a pouch she’d carried tucked into her belt. “Is it okay if I put these in there with her?”

  Horace started to answer but stopped and shrugged helplessly. “Honestly, I don’t know. Will the resonance of your gems or your singing interfere with the Emperor’s magic or will it help? We’ve never tried this before, so I have no idea.”

  “You have to try, Erin,” Marie said urgently. “She’s starting to hyperventilate.”

  Erin quickly placed the gemstones around Brandacea on the silken pallet, humming as she did so. As soon as she’d arranged the gems to her satisfaction, she began to sing a song of healing and hope. Marie took Brandacea’s hands in her own and added her own song. She was no gem singer, but she had vast powers of healing, and Riley hoped Brandacea would respond to the combination of both types of healing magic.

  The song filled the chamber, and Horace added his own counterpoint through his chanting, but Riley could see no difference in Brandacea. If anything, her breathing became more labored.

  “It’s not working,” Keely said, grabbing Riley’s wrist. “We’re making her worse.”

  “Give it time,” Riley said. “They just got started. I’ve seen Erin and Marie at work with women in childbirth; I’ve seen how they helped me. We have to give them a chance.”

  “I’m not sure we have time to give them,” Keely whispered. She pointed to Brandacea, who suddenly arched up in the pod, her eyes still closed, gasping for breath.

  “It’s not working, Riley,” Erin said, clutching the side of the pod. “We’ve got to put the lid back on and get her back into stasis.”

  Marie cried out. “Now. We’re losing her. Put the lid back on, now, now, now!”

  Horace shook his head, tears running freely down his face. “The Emperor isn’t helping. Without it, nothing we do will matter. Once the stasis is broken, we can’t restore it without the Emperor’s magic. We tried before, you understand.”

  “What about good old CPR?” Keely said. “I’m not as ready as all of you to give up just because the mumbo jumbo doesn’t work. Move.”

  She shouldered them out of the way, bent over the pod, and prepared to administer CPR to Brandacea. “Riley, get over here and be ready to do mouth-to-mouth if she quits breathing.”

  Brandacea made a horrible groaning noise, arching up again, and then she collapsed back down and the light covering her body vanished. Her face, without the glow of light, was a deadly pale bluish-gray, as if she were a corpse that had died days before.

  Riley flinched back for an instant at the sight, before she put the whimsical notion out of her mind and began artificial respiration while Keely began the rhythmic push and release of CPR. Long minutes went by, Riley didn’t know how long, until finally she heard Erin shouting at her.

  “Riley! Riley, stop. It’s been way too long. There’s no hope. Riley, you have to stop now.”

  Riley lifted her head to see that everyone was staring at her. Keely had stopped CPR and every one of them, even Horace, was crying. Numbly, she looked down at Brandacea, only to see that the maiden’s eyes were fixed and open, staring at nothing for eternity.

  Riley shook her head, back and forth, as if denial would make reality change to suit her. “No. No, no, no. She can’t be dead, not because of me. No.”

  Erin took her arm and tried to pull her away from the pod, but Riley violently shook her off. “No! We have to try again. Try something else. Erin, more diamonds or emeralds or something. Sing louder. Keely, start CPR again. She’s not gone, she’s—”

  “She’s gone, mi amara,” Conlan said from behind her, and suddenly her husband’s strong arms wrapped around her, as he tried to pull her away from Brandacea.

  Riley fought him with every ounce of her strength. “No! Leave me alone. I can do this, it’s my fault, I said to open the lid, take her out of storage. We had to try, but it’s my fault. I have to fix it. I have to save her. I have to—”

  “You cannot, my love. Some things cannot be fixed.” Conlan’s face was grim; a forbidding study in grief and despair. The lines around his eyes had deepened, almost overnight, and Riley had a moment of clarity in her own grief as she realized that the job of high prince was killing him. “She’s gone. All we can do now is find the Emperor and save the others.”

  Riley wanted to lean on him and cry, but she forced herself to stand on her own. She had done this. It was her responsibility. Her failure.

  “We need to help her. Give her a proper burial,” she said, and her voice only wobbled a little. Only a little.

  “No, Princess,” Horace said gently. “As you see.”

  She glanced down at the crystal pod, only to see that Brandacea was gone. Vanished completely, as though she’d never been there.

  “Without the magic to sustain her, the weight of thousands of years settled on her all at once,” Horace said. “She is gone, returned to dust as she would be if she had lived and died so long ago.”

  Riley walked over to the stasis pod next to Brandacea’s and stared down at the golden-haired woman inside. Merlina.

  “We won’t fail you, Merlina,” she promised. “Or Guen or Helena, either. No matter what it takes.”

  Conlan took her hand. “I swear to you that we will do everything we can.”

  “I know, because I’ll be there with you,” Riley said.

  Conlan shook his head, but Riley held up a hand to forestall any protest. “Ven said he couldn’t find Serai’s trail. I’m an empath—aknasha—so I can maybe find her emotions even if nothing you can do works. We have to find her and the Emperor, Conlan, and I’m going to help.”

  A muscle in Conlan’s jaw jumped as he clenched it, but he finally nodded. “You may be right. Let’s go through now and see if we can pick up her trail, and then I’ll return for Ven and the warriors.”

  He called to the portal and then turned to the rest of the women and Horace. “Please don’t take this as your personal failure, Marie, Erin, Keely, Horace. Something had to be done, and you four were very courageous to even try.”

  “Kind words, Conlan, but meaningless to Brandacea,” Marie said, her tearstained face pale and grave. “We all bear responsibility for these deaths.”

  Erin and Keely nodded, and Riley wanted to scream. “It doesn’t matter whose responsibility it was right now, does it? All that matters is that we stop this before anybody else di
es. Let’s go. Call the portal, Conlan.”

  He turned to her, his brows drawing together. “I called the portal. It should be right—”

  They both looked where he was pointing, at the empty space where the portal’s oval shimmer should have been forming.

  “There,” he continued slowly. “No. Not again. Not now.”

  He called again, louder. “Portal, heed my call. Answer to the need of the high prince of Atlantis.”

  The silvery shimmer began to form, and Riley sighed in relief.

  A female voice called out from the middle of the ovoid sphere. “Prince, indeed, and yet so ignorant of your heritage, Conlan of Atlantis. Know you not that I heed no call unless I deem it worthy?”

  “So my relief was premature,” Riley said, putting her hands on her hips. “Could we possibly have one single day without something going wrong? Look, portal, women are dying. You pick now to do this? Also, I’m arguing with a glorified elevator?”

  She could hear the way her voice was rising in nearhysteria, but she didn’t seem able to control it. She’d just caused a woman’s death, and the damn doorway was going to argue with her?

  “I have no desire to cause you distress, Princess of Atlantis, but you do not understand our ways,” the portal said. Instead of the oval shape it had always taken before, the light shimmered into the shape of a slender woman, not much taller than Riley. “I was created by the gods themselves to serve as test of whether or not a chosen one was worthy of the task set for him or her. Poseidon bent me to his will when Atlantis sank beneath the sea, and I have long since grown bitter and yet resigned to my role as portal . . . or ‘glorified elevator,’ as you so succinctly named me.”

  Riley did something she never would have imagined herself doing. Ever. She apologized to the doorway.

  “I’m sorry. I didn’t realize—We’re very upset, after Brandacea’s death—”

  “Do not apologize to me, nor will I apologize or give quarter to you,” the portal, or woman, or demon from hell, continued.

  Riley shot a glance at Erin, to see if the witch had any ideas, but Erin shrugged helplessly.

  “My magic can’t touch this, Riley. I’m sorry,” Erin whispered.

  “Wise that you do not try, human witch,” the portal said, pointing at Erin. “I enjoy your presence here and would regret destroying you, I think, although regret, like so many emotions, is only a faded echo of what it once was.”

  Conlan stepped forward, between the portal and Riley, and bowed deeply. “You honor us with your presence and shame us with our lack of knowledge of your existence and purpose, my lady.”

  The portal actually laughed. Sharp, silvery laughter, like the sound of glass bells, pealed out and Riley shuddered as if a shadow had crossed her grave.

  “Such pretty words to go with such a pretty face, Conlan of Atlantis, but you shall not charm me. I will not let you pass until the test set for Serai of Atlantis has been passed or lost.”

  Riley pushed past Conlan. “Lives depend on finding the Emperor, and whoever you are, however old you are, surely you can’t condemn those women to death on a whim?”

  The portal’s light wavered, and the figure bowed its head.

  “Their death is no more my responsibility than yours. The task is set for Serai. She will pass it or not. Just as Alaric of Atlantis will pass or fail his test, and Jack of the nearly lost tiger tribe will face his challenge. The time of the final crisis is near, Conlan of Atlantis, and the gods would have me determine if those who support you in your quest to bring Atlantis to the surface are worthy.”

  “What? What about Jack? Did you see my sister?” Riley wondered if asking questions of an ancient being made up of light and bad temper was particularly intelligent, but she was past caring.

  “Good-bye for now, lords and ladies of Atlantis. I must follow another path, for the tiger has lost one part of his soul and I have found it in my keeping. I will leave you with the magic of the portal while I am away, but it will not come to your call until Serai has accomplished her quest.”

  “Stop! You can’t just leave like that. We need—”

  But the portal didn’t care what Riley needed, or what any of them needed, because one moment the woman made of light was blathering on with her cryptic BS about the tiger’s soul, and the next moment she was gone. She was gone. The shimmering light flicked off like a cheap lightbulb.

  Conlan called and called, in every way possible, for the next half hour, until he was hoarse with shouting, commanding, and finally pleading, but it made no difference. The portal didn’t return.

  Serai and Daniel were on their own.

  Chapter 29

  Serai woke up first from the exhausted sleep they’d fallen into after the epiphany of the soul-meld. She still could hardly believe it. Even in her time, to reach such a joining had been a rare occurrence, and for it to happen with a nightwalker—a vampire—was so incredible, so unprecedented, that she was amazed Poseidon himself wasn’t swirling up a typhoon here in the middle of desert country to punish her for her transgression.

  She curled closer to Daniel, wrapped securely in his strong arms, and opened herself to the magic surrounding them. The vortex magic she’d sensed before was stronger now, due to geography or due to her own willingness to open herself to it, she didn’t know. The day was fully on its way now, it must be mid-morning, and Daniel slept soundly, a smile on his face.

  He looked peaceful. Content. Descriptive terms she certainly couldn’t have applied to him even once since she’d found him again in Atlantis mere days before. The soul-meld and the realization that she would never leave him seemed to have calmed something dark and tortured inside him. She sent a silent prayer of thanks to the gods again that she had found him, and then she turned her senses outward again, seeking the Emperor.

  It was there. Still in the same place, she realized, and relief poured through her. Not calling her, though. Almost silent. Faint, as if resting or recharging, if she could apply anthropomorphic terms to what was, essentially, a rock. Such a rock, though. Its power surged once, when she reached out to it, and she briefly connected with the maidens back in Atlantis. The four of them were . . .

  The three of them. Brandacea was gone. Her life force extinguished. Vanished, as if she’d never lived at all.

  Serai cried out as the pain seared through her, and Daniel instantly woke up and scanned the room for danger.

  “She’s dead, Daniel. Brandacea. Another one of my sisters. She’s dead.”

  She sobbed in his arms for a long time before she could talk or even breathe again. “She’s gone,” she said, over and over. “I failed again. I was making love when my sister was dying.”

  “No, mi amara. You were healing yourself and me. All of the responsibility for your sisters cannot rest on your slender shoulders. The damn portal is to blame for not allowing you to call for help.” He jumped up and reached for his clothes, but she held up a hand to stop him.

  “It’s still daylight, so we can’t go anywhere. We need to eat something and have a shower,” she said. “We’ll get cleaned up, and then we’ll decide what to do next. It will be dark soon, and we’re going to find the Emperor tonight, or die trying. I’m not willing to let anything or anyone else get in my way.”

  He nodded, anger and determination stamped on his face, and held out his hand to help her up. She called to the elements and especially to the water surrounding them, the life-giving water that answered so quickly when Poseidon’s children called.

  The spray of water danced over them like a shimmering cloak, and this time Daniel wasn’t startled, but simply stood, holding his arms out to his sides, under the shower. She watched him for a moment and wondered again how this beautiful, deadly man could truly be hers, but then he opened his eyes and smiled at her and she cast aside her hesitation and stepped into his arms.

  “There’s soap in the backpack,” he said, running his hands down her arms. He kissed her and then retrieved the soap, and they wash
ed themselves and each other, delighting in the joy of touch, even in the face of what they had to endure. Perhaps especially because of that.

  “Affirming life,” she said solemnly. “It does make sense. We cannot bring Brandacea back by sitting and crying, but only by taking action. We will affirm life by finding the Emperor.”

  “About that,” he said, pushing the waves of dark hair away from his chiseled face. “I have an idea. Are you up for trying something that might be a little dangerous?”

  “More dangerous than escaping stasis, casting a spell on the high prince’s brother, and falling in love with a vampire?”

  His lips quirked up in a grin. “Well, when you put it that way . . .”

  She sent the spiraling curve of water through their clothing to clean it, and then reversed the magic to remove every drop of water and dry the clothes and their bodies and hair.

  “This is a wonderful bit of magic,” Daniel said fervently. “It sounds stupid, in the face of so much tragedy, but I am very happy to clean the sweat and dust off myself.”

  “Little things mean so much more when you’re deprived of them,” she said. “For example, I really, really need food other than these apples and, what did you call the hateful dry sticks?”

  “Granola bars. I agree. Worst food, ever, but very useful at a time like this.”

  After they’d dressed and partaken of the bars, apples, and water, she was ready to ask again.

  “Try what?”

  “I think we should pool our magic. Like we did before, although I didn’t know it at the time, when Justice attacked. This time we do it on purpose, and hopefully it will strengthen both of us.”

  Serai tilted her head and watched as he pulled on his boots, admiring the long, muscled length of his leg even as she considered his words. “Do we need to exchange blood again?”

  He dropped his boot and stared at her. “No. Don’t even think of it, not ever. If we do a third blood exchange, you could die. Or become a monster. We don’t have any idea what happens to an Atlantean turned vampire. Under no circumstances can I ever, ever do a third blood exchange with you.”