Black Dawn: The Morganville Vampires

by Rachel Caine

  Oliver snarled, showing teeth, but Amelie held out a hand toward him. “No,” she said as Jason aimed the shotgun. “He’s quite serious. He will fire. He’s too close for it not to do significant damage to at least one of us.” She considered him for a moment, then gave him a slow, cool smile. “Very well.”

  “Very well what?” Jason didn’t lower the shotgun. His eyes were wild behind it. “Swear. Swear as the Founder that you’ll turn me.”

  “I swear as the Founder that you will be turned,” Amelie said. “I need the blood, and we have lost significant numbers of our ranks in this war. You will be … useful.”

  Jason nodded, took a deep breath, and lowered his weapon. “Let Claire go first.”

  Amelie opened both hands and spread them wide, stepping away from Claire. She stumbled forward, not quite daring to come near Jason, either. He gave her a disinterested glance, then moved away from the stairs.

  He walked straight toward Amelie.

  She came up in one smooth, vicious motion, and all the restraint she’d shown with Oliver was suddenly, awfully gone. Her eyes flared bloodred, and she buried her fangs in Jason’s neck. Claire couldn’t look away, somehow; that could have been her, should have been her.

  It didn’t take long. Jason collapsed, and Amelie took his weight in her arms, drinking until finally she shuddered, pulled away, and let him fall limply to the carpet.

  She looked at Oliver as she wiped the blood from her mouth. She seemed almost herself again. Almost. But there was something savage and bright in her eyes that Claire had never seen before.

  “He’s yours to finish and raise,” she said to Oliver. “I’ll not have him as my get. He’s damaged.”

  He nudged Jason with a foot. “I’ll find good use for him,” he said. “We need new, strong blood in Morganville.” Oliver’s shining, alien gaze came up to rest on Claire. “You should go now if you want to survive.”

  For the first time in a long time, Claire turned and ran … from the Morganville vampires.

  And straight into Shane’s arms, as he came charging up the stairs to her rescue.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  SHANE

  It hadn’t been much of a fight, because it isn’t a fight when your enemy just completely ignores you. I’d never seen anything like that …. Magnus was hard to see—he kept slipping in and out of shadow, blending into the background—but whenever I caught a glimpse of something, I nailed it with buckshot.

  I might as well have been tossing rose petals at him, for all the good it did.

  I’d tried to cover Claire’s retreat, but the fact was, I couldn’t stop him from going after her. None of us could. I was still in shock from seeing how fast, how easily he’d killed Miranda; it wasn’t as if she was my friend, exactly, but nobody deserved that, and it was a terrible end to what must have been a pretty hellish life.

  I’d tried. I’d jumped onto Michael’s chair, swung onto the banister, and then onto the stairs, halfway up. Shotgun ready. I hadn’t wanted to die, especially not with the cold, stinging horror of the draug closing over me. But I’d known it would be better than living with knowing I’d let it get Claire.

  I’d fired at Magnus, knowing it wasn’t going to do any good, and closed my eyes.

  And then something—not Magnus, not even one of my friends or allies—tossed me like a rag doll off the stairs into a windmilling, uncontrolled fall that ended in a bouncing landing on the sofa.

  Saved my life.

  And that was when I saw her. Miranda. Pale, flickering, translucent. Holding a hushing finger up to her lips, and giving me a sweet, crazy smile.

  The Glass House had a brand-new resident ghost. Too late for me to stop Magnus, who’d already passed us by and gone upstairs; Jason, who’d been about as useful as snowshoes in the whole fight, had run up after him. I rolled off the couch and saw that Michael and Eve were standing together near Myrnin; Michael’s arm was around Eve’s shoulders, and she was crying a little.

  Myrnin should have looked sick, or horrified, or something, but instead, he just looked … smug.

  I wanted to break that grin in pieces, but when I lunged for him, Miranda was in my way again. Granted, she couldn’t stop me, but she could chill me to the bone, and she did. No, I heard her say. This has to happen. She didn’t sound especially happy about it.

  “Claire will be all right,” Myrnin said. He sounded unbearably happy with himself. “We planned this, Oliver and Amelie and I. We needed him here, in her place of strength, and Claire was the only bait tasty enough to lead him to the trap.”

  “Then you don’t need her up there!” I said. “She’s done her job. I’m going to get her.”

  “No, not yet,” he said. He was looking up, as if he could see through the ceiling. We all instinctively looked up. Even Ghost-Miranda’s glowing form, which was starting to gradually take on flesh and substance, like a real live girl. Drawing on the power of the house.

  “We have to wait,” Miranda said. “It’s not done yet.”

  The hell with them. If Jason could go up, I could, too. I headed that way, but Myrnin’s room-temperature hand shot out and locked me in place. “Not yet,” he said. “You heard the girl.”

  I put my shotgun business end against his chest. “You’re going to want to stop touching me now. And I’m getting Claire. You know, the one you’re willing to let Magnus eat.”

  “He won’t,” Miranda said, with that same eerie calm that she’d always had. “Wait. Please.”

  I should have pulled the trigger. Thought about it, real hard. But instead, I looked at Michael, who was always the one with the cooler head, and he said, “She’s always right, isn’t she?”

  She always was. Damn her.

  When Miranda finally said, “You can go now,” Myrnin let go of my wrist, and I took the gun from him and ran for the stairs. I don’t even remember pounding up them, just landing at the top, and seeing, in the murky shadows, Claire running toward me.

  Into my arms.

  I dropped the shotgun and hugged her close, but I kept watch down the hall, just in case. There was no sound. I saw a glow of electric light cut off as the hidden door to Amelie’s upstairs room slid shut.

  Whatever had just happened, it was over.

  I picked up the gun one-handed, held on to Claire’s waist with the other, and walked her downstairs. The others were gone, except for Miranda, who smiled at Claire. Claire, after a shocked second, smiled back. “You’re—here.”

  “Yes,” Miranda said. “I’m home. Right where I’m supposed to be. Don’t be sad. It only hurt a little.” She twirled a little, and vanished in a sparkling haze. I was pretty sure that when Michael had been a ghost, he hadn’t been able to vanish at will. Or, for that matter, sparkle.

  She popped back in, just her face hanging in midair. “They’re in the parlor.” Poof. Gone.

  “We are really going to have to tell her to stop doing that,” I said. “Because it’s upsetting.” I turned to Claire. “Are you okay? Really?” I couldn’t stop touching her, smoothing my hands over her skin, her hair, her face. She had red marks on her wrists, and a nasty bump on the head. They’d tied her up, and she’d struggled. None of that surprised me, although I was going to take it out of Myrnin’s hide.

  “I’m fine,” she said, and I sensed that it was half a lie, but considering how much I’d faked it since the water treatment plant, I could cut her some slack for now. “Hannah. She was in the front room …”

  I hadn’t seen Chief Moses anywhere, but then, I hadn’t gone in the parlor. According to Miranda that was where we’d find the others, too, so I led her that way.

  Hannah was the first one I saw. She was lying on the floor with her head in Eve’s lap; she was alive, too, but just barely. She’d lost a lot of blood from a gash on her leg, and Michael was twisting a belt tourniquet around her thigh to slow the flow. He looked relieved to see us. “Hold this,” he said. “How are you at field sutures?”

  “Lot of practice,�
� I said. Michael handed me a sewing kit—probably Eve’s, since it was in black patent leather with a death’s head sticker on the back—and went to wash his hands, or lick them clean, whichever. I tried not to think about it. I took his place at Hannah’s side. “Is she awake?”

  Hannah’s eyes slowly opened, and she gave me a hard-edged smile. “Still here,” she said. “Lost more plasma than this in the last blood drive.”

  “I think you’ve got a sliced vein,” I said. “I don’t know if I can fix it. Either way, it won’t be pretty.”

  “Do your worst, kid.” She shut her eyes again. “Scars are the least of my problems.”

  I gritted my teeth and pulled the wound open, and immediately saw the vein. It wasn’t far beneath the surface, and it hadn’t been sliced through, just nicked; if it had been an artery, though, she’d have expired already. I handed the sewing kit to Eve. “Fix me a needle,” I said, and grabbed the vein. Claire was still next to me, hovering. “Towel. Clean one. I need something to mop up the blood so I can see.” She dashed off.

  Myrnin settled himself in the corner. He’d been to the kitchen, I saw, and come back with a blood pack, which he opened and chugged. I glared at him as Eve handed me back a threaded needle with a thick knot. “Thanks for your help,” I said, as sarcastically as I could. Which was pretty damn sarcastic.

  “If I had come near her in my present condition, I wouldn’t have been able to swear to her safety,” Myrnin said, and took another drink. “It’s been a very long, trying day. Proceed.”

  I did. The vein was tough to hold on to and stitch, but I managed—it wasn’t pretty, but it held when I let go. I started in on the cut itself, sewing the edges shut. “Hey, Hannah,” I said, “Eve gave me yellow thread. Sorry about that.”

  Hannah dredged up a dry laugh. “Festive. I like it.”

  Eve watched me anxiously, bottom lip between her teeth, as I finished off the stitches. Claire came back with a towel and I cleaned up the mess as best I could. It wasn’t leaking much now.

  “Amelie and Oliver,” Claire said. “They’re upstairs. Someone should see—” She was staring at Eve, but looked away when Eve glanced her way. “See about Jason.”

  “What happened to Jason?” Eve asked. She sounded almost resigned, though. As if she already knew.

  “I’ll tell you later,” Claire said.

  “They made him a vamp,” Eve said, and Claire looked up, fast. “I already knew he wanted it. It’s not a good thing. Not for us, anyway.”

  “Definitely not,” Michael agreed, from the doorway. “I checked upstairs. Nobody’s there except a pile of rotting slime. Amelie doesn’t clean up after herself.”

  “She doesn’t have to,” Claire said. “She’s the founder. The queen.” There was something about the way she said it that made me wonder what she’d seen. And what was coming.

  Myrnin finished his blood pack and said, “They’ve gone to hunt.”

  I closed my mouth on the question of Hunt what, exactly?

  Because I figured I already knew.

  The draug were finished. All of the vampires’ enemies, gone.

  The rules of Morganville were changing, and I had the feeling that they wouldn’t be in our favor.

  EPILOGUE

  CLAIRE

  “You’re certain,” Father Joe said. He stood across from Michael and Eve, lit only by the candles burning in the holders on either side of the altar and the sunlight bleeding through the stained glass. “I haven’t seen any paperwork from Amelie allowing you to do this.” Father Joe, Morganville’s resident priest, looked exhausted. They all were exhausted, Claire thought. The lights still weren’t functioning reliably; most of Morganville was in the dark at night, and deserted, though the first buses were scheduled to return today to bring those who’d evacuated back to town. Water was on, and the pipes had been flushed, tested, and declared clean.

  Not that Claire was taking any chances yet. Bottled water was a must.

  “Amelie’s not the boss of me,” Eve said flatly. She was, Claire thought, very angry about her brother, though she hadn’t talked about it. At all. She looked at Michael. “Or him, either.”

  Father Joe gave him a long, considering look. “If Amelie is against this, there’ll be trouble, Michael,” he said. “What you’re asking is binding not only for the church and by law, but in ways that I can’t explain among the vampires. You’ll be … elevating Eve to a new status. It could protect her, or it could make her even more of a target. You understand?”

  Michael nodded. “I understand,” he said.

  “And you don’t want to wait.”

  “No.” Michael didn’t say anything else, but, Claire thought, he didn’t need to. He’d come ready for this. There weren’t any tuxedos, or gowns; Michael had pulled out a dark suit, a gleaming white shirt, and a nice tie. He’d forced Shane to wear one, too, somehow; there must have been some arm-twisting that Claire hadn’t been privy to, but then she’d been busy rooting through Eve’s closet with her, trying to come up with something wedding-appropriate at a moment’s notice.

  Eve had her gown. It was red chiffon, and it fell in waves from a beaded bodice. Her arms were bare, and she hadn’t gone with a veil at all. The dress, Claire thought, made her look about six feet tall, and incredibly graceful, but it was shockingly not wedding wear.

  Which was what Eve had wanted, of course.

  Claire was wearing her best dress—one with buckles, one that Eve had bought for her—and high heels that were higher than anything she’d ever tried before. She felt awkward, until Shane looked at her, and then the feeling changed into something hot and proud.

  “You promised,” she said to Father Joe. “You said that you’d do this if they wanted it. Well, they want it. We’re here. Official witnesses.”

  He sighed and nodded. “I’m only warning you that what you’re doing may make complications you haven’t considered. For you all.”

  “Don’t care,” Eve said. “We’re ready. And we’re not letting them stop us again.”

  Michael was holding Eve’s hand, and although he wasn’t saying much, he was utterly still and solid and there. If he was scared, or worried, it didn’t show at all. He glowed like marble and gold, and for the first time in the light of the candles Claire noticed there were threads of copper in his hair, like his grandfather’s much redder hair. He even looked like Sam just now; Sam, the kindest and best of the vampires, who’d died at the hands of humans.

  She hoped that wasn’t some kind of omen.

  “Then let’s proceed,” Father Joe said. “Are there rings?”

  Shane dug in his pocket and held it up—not the traditional diamond, Claire saw. Eve must have insisted on a ruby. And a skull.

  “Then I suppose there’s no turning back. Let us pray,” Father Joe said, and bowed his head.

  The door at the back of the church opened, admitting a burst of pure white sunlight, and out of it came four figures. Two were holding umbrellas to shade the others in front, and as they shut the doors behind them Claire recognized the ones in the back as Amelie’s security, dressed in their dark suits and glasses again.

  Amelie was wearing white, a blinding white silk suit that tailored itself perfectly to her body. Her hair was up in a pale blond crown around her head, and she wore a ruby pendant in the hollow of her throat.

  Oliver was next to her, wearing black leather.

  “No,” Eve whispered. “No, not now …”

  The vampires walked down the aisle and came to a halt a few feet away. Amelie’s eyes were wide and cool gray, no hints of red, at least. She was wearing white gloves to match her suit.

  “What’s this?” she asked in a very neutral tone. “Father?”

  “They’ve come before the altar to be joined in marriage,” he said, and for the first time Claire heard strength in his voice. Real strength. “They’re in the presence of God now, Amelie. And not under your control.”

  She raised her pale eyebrows and fixed Michael with a
stare. He met it without wavering. “And yet,” she said softly, “they must leave this church, and live in Morganville, and I assure you, that is utterly under my control. I put out a call for all those in town to help us restore the town. Yet I find you here.”

  “We’ll help,” Eve said. “But first we’re doing this. And you’re not stopping us.” She sounded brave. And very certain. “You can’t.”

  There was a little sparkle of red in Amelie’s eyes—or it might have been the candlelight. Claire hoped it was, anyway. “Can’t I? That is … debatable. But I grant you this hour. Enjoy your … respite. Tomorrow begins the dawn of a brand-new Morganville. We will rebuild.”

  “Together,” Claire said, and drew that cool, icy stare.

  “Perhaps,” Amelie said. “And perhaps that is one of many things that will change.”

  Oliver spoke up for the first time. “The next time you do something without permission,” he said, “it’ll be the last. New rules, children. Brand-new rules. Remember that.”

  And he escorted Amelie out, trailed by the guards. The doors boomed shut behind them.

  Eve let out a shaking breath. “So, that’s … not so great,” she said. “Michael, maybe—”

  He raised her hand to his lips and kissed it, looking straight into her eyes. “No,” he said. “No more letting the world tell us what we ought to do. We know, Eve. I know.”

  For a moment she didn’t move, and then she smiled, and it seemed to light up the whole church.

  “Yes,” she agreed, and turned to face Father Joe. “We’re ready.”

  Are we? Claire wondered, but she quickly buried the thought as he began the prayer.

  They had to be.

  Because now there was no going back.

  TRACK LIST

  Music is important to my process of writing. It’s the first thing I do before I start a new book … pick at least ten songs for this track list. Then, as I go along, I search for more music to fill it out and keep the soundtrack in my head going. I think I got some particularly juicy songs for this one! Hope you enjoy them … and please, remember that, like writers, musicians exist on the money you pay for their work. So please pay to play.