Forever Night

by W. J. May

  “She was never going to come to terms with it,” James told him flatly.

  “She could have,” Liam argued.

  “No.” Kallie felt herself go cold.

  They both looked at her, Liam horrified and James’ face beginning to split in a self-satisfied smile.

  “Kallie?” Liam whispered.

  “He’s right,” Kallie said simply. “I wasn’t ever going to come to terms with killing anyone.”

  “But she needs to die,” Liam said fiercely.

  “Maybe that’s what you think.” Kallie shook her head. She was backing away, her gaze fixed on Liam’s face. Once, he had seemed so familiar to her. Once, he had seemed like a good man—a man who would always do the honorable thing. “But I don’t just sacrifice people. And I don’t just murder them when their backs are turned. If you were all helping me so you could get your revenge, then you can find it some other way.”

  “Kallie, don’t go—”

  But James held Liam back. “Let her,” the older Blue advised. His eyes met Kallie’s, and there was absolute triumph in his smile. “And don’t blame yourself, kid. Witch blood is powerful. We should’ve expected she’d turn.”

  Kallie stared at him for a long moment, trying to come up with something, anything, to say that would show him how wrong he was. But every word, every phrase, came with the knowledge that James would twist it, or outright lie. That he would cast her as the little girl who couldn’t control her emotions.

  There was no winning here.

  “Goodbye, Liam,” she said quietly. “I love you.” Then she turned and left, breaking into a run as soon as she was out of sight. If he called after her, she didn’t hear it, and tears blurred her vision so that she couldn’t even see by the time she reached the road.

  No one chased her. Liam made no attempt to stop her. She found herself wondering if there were Reds still here, and realized with a jolt that she didn’t care. Let them come. Let them attack her. It would be James’ fault if she died here—

  Of all things, that gave her pause. She couldn’t die, not yet. She needed to fix things before she died. She wasn’t going to die like this, like a sheep, for no purpose or end goal. Looking around herself, she felt only silence. She couldn’t smell Reds or Blues. Giving thanks for her quick reprieve, she broke into a sprint—a true vampire sprint. When she reached Liam’s door, she was hardly out of breath.

  “Kallie.” Her mother smiled warmly over at her when she came in the door, but the smile faded at the sight of tears. “What’s wrong?”

  “We have to find you somewhere else to stay.” Kallie tried to keep her voice even, though she could hear the sob there.

  “Sweetheart…why?”

  “Because…because Liam—” Kallie broke off, holding one hand up to ask for time as her face twisted. “I’m sorry. They’re just—they’re not our allies anymore. I ruined it. I’m sorry.”

  “You ruined it?” Disbelief rang clearly in her mother’s voice. “Kallie, I don’t think—”

  “They’re angry with me.” The words were so simple, but they released a flood of tears, and Kallie gave in as her mother’s arms came around her. “They’re so angry. Liam’s—he wanted—”

  “Shh. Shhh.” Her mother rocked her gently. “Shh, just cry for now. Just cry, honey. Get it all out. It’ll be easier to talk about after.”

  Kallie sniffled, holding her mother tightly and hearing the sobs burst out of her. She hadn’t expected it to hurt this much. She hadn’t thought… “They wanted to sacrifice Petra,” she said finally, against her mother’s neck.

  “What?” Her mother drew back. “What?”

  “I wanted to make the Reds and Blues not be at war anymore, and they told me that the spell needed Red blood and Blue blood. One of them volunteered, but they said I needed to—” She took a gulp of breath. “They said I needed to kill Petra,” she finished. “Not warn her. Just kill her during the spell.”

  “And you refused.” Her mother’s face was blank.

  “I didn’t—of course I refused!” She couldn’t tell what her mother thought, and it was terrifying. Kallie shook her head, trying desperately to explain. “They just offered up a Blue, they didn’t even know if the spell would work, and I was just supposed to stab Petra in the back, and I refused to do it! I couldn’t do it, Mom, I—”

  “Kallie.” Her mother’s hands were at her face, cupping her cheeks. She held Kallie’s head still and looked into her eyes. “Kallie. Listen to me. I’m very proud of you.”

  There was a moment of complete silence.

  “What?” Kallie managed.

  “Oh, my daughter.” Her mother pulled her close, hands splayed against her back. “This is a desperate time. We’ve all made choices that… that…” She shook her head. “We’ve made choices we never thought we’d have to make. And you decided, even now, even with people telling you that you need to make hard choices, that you weren’t prepared to kill just for your own good. Kallie…I’m so proud of you.”

  Kallie buried her face in her mother’s shoulder and felt the tears leaking from her eyes. “What if she wins because I wasn’t strong enough?”

  “Then she wins,” her mother said simply. “And I’ll still be proud of the choice you made tonight. Because, Kallie—if you became like Petra in order to defeat her, the world would gain nothing.”

  “I just…” Kallie shook her head. “I don’t know what to do.”

  “Get her back,” her mother told her. “I’ll help. Today, rest. Tomorrow night, you and I are going to drag Petra back to our house. I’ll do it myself if I have to.”

  Chapter 10

  The next day passed so slowly that Kallie wanted to scream. Her mother, insistent, had remained at Liam’s house, and so Kallie found herself with only her father for company. Once, she would have been glad of it, but she could not bring herself to tell him what had happened between her and Liam. She knew that she would see happiness in his eyes, and the thought of it was too much to bear. Worse, thinking of Liam and of her father’s secret happiness only made her think of Caleb as well.

  He’ll survive, Liam had said. Kallie knew her father would say the same thing. Yet none of it changed the fact that Caleb was hurt and captured and in agony, and that it was all because of her. He made that choice himself, Liam and Kallie’s father would both say. But none of that changed it. It didn’t make him safe. If Kallie had never come into his life… Or if Petra hadn’t forced him to protect her…

  He would not be a day-walker. He would just be another vampire in Petra’s organization. Would he, too, be a Rogue Red? The thought chilled Kallie to the bone. Would he hunt humans? Would he have been one of the ones who fed off her father? No, her mind insisted, and yet…and yet. She remembered James’ words, that Petra had failed her vampires utterly by letting them become the worst of themselves. Once, even Petra had been someone Kallie’s father loved. Who was to say that Caleb wouldn’t have gone the same way, in time?

  He wouldn’t, she told herself. And she would find him before they hurt him too badly. She would.

  When her phone buzzed, she jumped. It was her mother. Peering out between the window shade and the frame, Kallie could just see her mother hovering in the darkness outside. She was down the stairs a moment later, with her hand on the doorknob when her father spoke behind her.

  “Where are you going?”

  Kallie jumped and bit back a word her father would not have approved of. “I need to...” In a flash, inspiration hit her. “I’m going to see Mom.”

  She had known her father wouldn’t deny her that, but it still hurt to see him wince. He and Kallie’s mother might not be able to be in the same room together, but there was nothing to keep her from texting him, from speaking with him over the phone—they could find a way. No! They would find a way.

  “How is she?” His voice broke slightly on the words.

  “Oh, Dad…” Kallie was across the room in a moment, wrapping her arms around him. She felt his desper
ation as he hugged her, and she wanted to cry. “She’s all right.” She searched for words. “Well, she’s just like you’d expect after finding out her sister did all that. She’s…”

  “You don’t have to tell me.” He drew away and rubbed at his face. “It wasn’t just Petra who made that mess. I did, too.”

  “Dad…”

  “It was my fault,” he repeated.

  “She knows that—”

  “Kallie.” His voice stopped her. “You don’t have to save me from my mistakes. Go. If she asks, tell her I would give anything not to have done what I did—but that I can’t regret spending those years with her. Tell her, if she asks, how much I love her. Tell her…tell her that I’ll do whatever she asks, even if it means letting her go.”

  Kallie struggled to find words to respond, but he was already gone, and she opened the door and went out into the night with tears on her cheeks.

  “What is it, love?” Her mother’s eyes were sad.

  Kallie looked at her, eyes searching her mother’s face. “Dad,” she said after a moment.

  As she expected, her mother’s face closed off. “I don’t want to talk about him.”

  “I know. I just—”

  “Kallie, listen to me. I could never regret raising you. But I’m not going to live with the fact that I was a consolation prize for your father.” Her mother’s lip trembled. “You’ve never had a sister, so you can’t understand. But growing up with Petra, seeing her always be more, better, smarter, prettier…to know that all of those fears came true, that the man who married me actually wanted her…I can’t live with that. I can’t see him.”

  Kallie dropped her head, trying to find words. She knew her mother wouldn’t accept a long diatribe. She had only a few words to sow the seeds. “He said to tell you he’s sorry,” she said finally.

  Her mother looked like she didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. “Sorry?” she repeated.

  “When I talked about what Petra did, he insisted that it was just as much his fault.”

  “What do you mean?” her mother asked, frowning. “He wasn’t a witch. …Was he?”

  “Not that.” Kallie shook her head. “What she did to you.”

  Her mother froze.

  “He says there aren’t words for how much he regrets it—”

  “Kallie, don’t.”

  “—but that he can’t regret the years you two spent together,” Kallie finished breathlessly.

  There was a long pause. Her mother stared down at her hands, and Kallie saw that she was shaking. For a moment she thought the woman might say something, might confess to the love that was so evident in her grief. But her mother only shook her head. “I can’t…I can’t talk about it, Kallie. We should go find Petra.”

  “Right.” Kallie swallowed her disappointment and jerked her head at the car. “We can go at least a little of the way by car.”

  “Of course.”

  Her mother determinedly did not look at the house as they climbed into the car and drove away. As they turned through the familiar streets, she stared silently out the window, and Kallie wondered what her mother was thinking about. What she’d given up. What it felt like for her to see a world that she wasn’t truly a part of anymore.

  They managed to find a parking spot in a fairly abandoned stretch of streets outside the main strip. Though both of them flinched at the smell of human blood, it was faint enough for them to turn away without trouble, and they walked toward the Red Dragon quickly. Kallie peeked around the last corner and frowned.

  “It’s…closed?”

  “I heard the proprietor has been having some trouble finding good help lately,” her mother murmured softly.

  Kallie was startled into a snort of laughter, and looked over to see her mother’s familiar grin. She reached over to squeeze her mother’s hand and then the two of them crept to the front door of the club, scanning the street for vampires. No one seemed to be there, and the doors were securely locked. Kallie sighed, looking at the official-looking sign proclaiming that the club was temporarily closed.

  “Do you think she’s somewhere else?” her mother asked softly.

  Kallie thought of the room filled with an altar, magical implements, weapons…

  “I think it’s worth trying to get in,” she said after moment.

  “Side door, then?” Her mother looked along the building. “No windows. Of course.”

  “Of course.” Kallie rolled her eyes. “Nothing could be easy with this.

  They made their way around the building, finding another locked door and one window that was too high up to reach. Kallie sighed as she examined it, and then looked around the last corner.

  “There is a door.”

  “Let me go first,” her mother said at once.

  “Nope.”

  “Kallie—”

  “Look, they’re probably not going to believe me, but I can at least reasonably argue that I’m here to be their ally. You…are not going to be able to do that.”

  “I hate it when you’re right.”

  “Yeah, yeah.” Kallie put her hand on the doorknob and leaned her head against it. For a long moment, she heard nothing; then there was the faintest shift, footsteps approaching slowly. “Stay here,” she mouthed at her mother. As the steps came closer, Kallie took a deep breath and tried to empty her mind.

  She wanted to kick the door open with a slam, but she knew she couldn’t bargain on this vampire being alone for now. As she slipped into the hallway, she had one moment to assess her victim. He was one of the bouncers, recovered now, and she saw the instant recognition in his eyes. However common a vampire he might be, he still had the speed of all their kind, and his fist was moving within a split second.

  She was faster. She blocked him in an instant, leg flying out to strike his chin with bone-cracking force. He crumpled to the floor and she delivered another punch to his head for good measure. He couldn’t be allowed to wake up soon. Opening the door again as silently as she could, Kallie beckoned her mother inside and jerked her head down the passageway that led to Petra’s office.

  They didn’t get that far, however, because as they came around the corner that led to the final corridor, Kallie’s mother drew in her breath sharply. When Kallie saw what she was looking at, she froze.

  Petra lay sprawled in one of the cells. Her skin was an unhealthy shade, even for a vampire, and the collar was still fixed around her neck. She had been beaten, but as far as Kallie could tell, not fed from. As they looked at her, Petra opened one eye. The look on her face was halfway between contempt and hatred; there was no weakness there.

  “What are you doing here? Come to finish me off?”

  “We came to bring you back.” Kallie could hear the instinctive rage in her mother’s voice, but the woman spoke quietly, willing herself to stillness.

  “Oh, good. A different cell.” Petra closed her eyes again. “Go away, both of you.”

  “They…they imprisoned you?” Kallie crouched, looking through the bars. “Petra? What happened?”

  Nothing.

  “We thought they rescued you.”

  “I thought so, too. That’s why I went with them.” Petra still did not open her eyes. “I hope you know I could have saved myself from this if you hadn’t put this damned collar on me.”

  “You could also have escaped our house,” Kallie pointed out.

  “Well, that makes me feel better.”

  “We need to get you out of here.”

  “Go away. I’ve no wish to go be imprisoned somewhere else. Especially…” Her eyes opened again and fixed lazily on Kallie’s mother. “Especially by my own daughter.”

  The jab hit home, and Kallie’s mother snarled.

  Kallie wrenched the door open and had Petra against the back wall a moment later, fingers squeezing around her neck. “You, shut up. You want to know why she’s here with me? Because she’s the one damned person who didn’t hate me for refusing to sacrifice you.”

  Ther
e was a very long pause, and emotions flitted across Petra’s face too quickly for Kallie to see them.

  “What?” Petra asked finally.

  “I was supposed to bring you to the forest for a spell, and when they told me that you were going to be sacrificed, I argued. That’s why the Rogue Reds were able to get to you. And you know what? Everyone hated me for it but my mother. So you can hate her all you like, but she’s the only person you can hope to have on your side other than me.” Kallie leaned close, fingers tightening. “Are you coming with us?”

  Petra smiled, and Kallie felt its chill. If she had ever trusted the woman, this smile was enough to banish that shred of feeling. It was the coldest smile she’d ever seen, and the most terrifying.

  “All right,” she said in her melodious voice. “I’ll come with you. Oh, one other thing, Kallie, my dear. Just in case you decide it makes sense to sacrifice me after all…you can kiss Caleb goodbye. I know where he is. And I’ll tell you, just as soon as you let me go.”

  Chapter 11

  Can you get out of the house for a while? Kallie’s mother was driving as Kallie hunched against the side of the passenger seat, trying to keep the phone tipped away so her mother wouldn’t see the number she was texting.

  Sure, why? Who’re you inviting over? The response came immediately, and Kallie wasn’t sure if she wanted to laugh or cry. Her father clearly wondered if Kallie was trying to get him to leave so she could have alone time with a guy. And he was probably worried which one.

  As ridiculous as it was, her father’s normal, human concern was oddly comforting. Once she had thought that sort of problem was the biggest trouble she could get into. She remembered her friends talking about sneaking guys into their bedrooms, and the thought had actually terrified her: getting caught, and how awful it would be to be found out…

  Man, she’d been an idiot back then.

  We got Petra again, she texted a reply to her father. Long story, promise to explain. Mom’s with me, though.

  Ok. Nothing else, and her heart squeezed.