by Sierra Dean
A black square with no reflection on it appeared, and I gratefully stepped through into the space waiting beyond. Into a graveyard.
At first I thought I was mistaken. The ground underfoot was real dirt, and there were a dozen graves laid out before me, each one looking frightfully fresh. Even the smell in the air was of fresh earth and night wind.
Once I touched the nearest surface it was obvious the walls were only painted to look like a nighttime sky and the headstones were just well-decorated Styrofoam. I nudged one over with my foot, and it flopped backwards without any resistance. No angry dead rose up to avenge the desecration. I knelt and brushed the dirt back from the mound just to be sure no one was buried underneath. All it revealed was a shipping barrel cut in half with nothing under it.
I sat back on my heels and looked around the room, wishing it would tell me something. I needed a clue as to where I was supposed to be searching.
From downstairs came a riotous crashing noise and the sound of a male voice screaming in pain.
I skidded back into the mirror room, not wanting to risk moving forward when I knew going backwards would at least take me somewhere familiar. My shoulder collided into one of the mirrored walls with staggering force and shards of sharp glass rained down on me, speckling my skin with an array of new cuts. Still I moved forward, with more care now but with no less haste.
I reached the main hall and wasted no time with the stairs. I vaulted over the banister, landing at the foot of the stairs with a loud thud, buried instantly by the newly restored fake smoke. When I got to my feet, I was facing the room with the prop coffin in it.
Only now the coffin was open.
“We’re glad you could make it,” a masculine voice announced from a few feet behind me.
I’d been so preoccupied in hoping to find someone, I hadn’t been paying attention for people trying to find me. I turned around slowly and saw Jameson holding Nolan by the neck in a sleeper hold while the boy kicked at the floor, fighting against the wave of unconsciousness threatening to take him over. Nolan was looking at me wide-eyed, but my sight was all on Jameson.
“I came here to help you,” I said, my voice loaded with the hurt of his betrayal.
Nolan passed out, and Jameson dropped his body to the floor.
“Oh, you will help us, Secret. You have no idea how much you’ll help.”
I saw the wrought-iron fire poker in his other hand a moment before he swung. And then for the first time in my life I got to find out what it felt like to be bashed in the skull with one.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
“This seems like a silly way to spend your last moments,” Brigit said, ever cheerful.
We were lying next to a pool, our skin warmed by the glow of the midday sun while a very handsome young man delivered us mimosas. I’d never had a mimosa before.
“If I make it through this, please make sure I try one of these,” I requested.
Brigit laughed, sipping her own drink and adjusting her oversize sunglasses. Her toenails were painted bright pink to match her bikini. I wore black. I looked out at the blue, blue water, enjoying the way sunlight reflecting off it was so glaring in certain places I couldn’t look directly at it.
“You’ll be fine,” she said.
“That’s what I told Desmond.”
“That boy.” Brigit whistled appreciatively. “You hit some sort of beefcake jackpot there.”
I nestled back into the chair, enjoying the warmth of the sun on my face. “I don’t think anyone has used the phrase beefcake outside of a 1978 Harlequin romance novel, Bri.”
“Beefcake, beefcake, beefcake,” she chanted.
We both sipped our drinks leisurely. My dreams had quite the euphoric quality to them lately. Either I was spending time naked in bed with good-looking men, or I got to sunbathe. Of the two, I think I liked this one best. As Brigit pointed out, I got to spend naked time with hot men in real life.
I’d never been able to bask in the sun before.
“Boss?” she said.
“Mmm?” I didn’t feel like correcting her, so I just rolled with it.
“Not that I’m complaining or anything, but is there a reason I’m here? I was in the middle of a shower and then, like, wham, I’m dreaming. I’m probably pretty pruney by now.” She assessed her fingers as if they would reflect what was happening to her body in the real world.
I’d pulled her into a dream? How was that possible? Dreamy thoughts ebbed and flowed through my mind, reminding me of something Holden had told me.
Of course! Brigit was my ward, like I was Holden’s. I had used my connection with her to reach out for help. My subconscious, as it turns out, is a freaking genius.
“Brigit.” I sat bolt upright in my chaise lounger, knocking my mimosa over.
“That’s me.”
“You need to tell Sig… I… He needs to know where I am.”
“Where are you?”
“I’m in Rhinebeck.”
She wrinkled her nose. “Weird, why would you go antiquing?”
“Brigit…” I warned.
“What should I tell him?”
“If Desmond did his job, you shouldn’t have to tell him anything else.”
“Secret, that’s sort of a weird message.”
“Tell him I have his answers,” I lied.
The sun seemed to grow brighter, and the reflection of it on the water became unbearable. I looked away only to find my vision had been whited out by the brilliance of the sun.
“Tell him I tried.”
Then the intensity of the light blotted everything else out.
Someone slapped me.
The pain in my head was still real outside the dream, and when I tried to open my eyes, only one of them would comply. Any attempts to open the second resulted in a jackhammer annihilating the left side of my skull. I licked my lips and tasted copper. Blood.
I made to lift my hands to investigate the source of the blood but found they were bound behind my back and neither one of them was holding my gun. My fingers brushed against skin, and a little further touching told me another pair of hands was bound with mine.
Well this just kept getting better.
When I lifted my head, something cracked in my neck, but it was nothing pivotal. In fact, a great release of endorphins followed the pop. Through my one good eye I could see Jameson standing a foot or two away from me.
“Good. I didn’t kill you,” he said with a nod.
I spit a mouthful of blood onto the floor and let my head loll backwards so I was staring at the ceiling. Spider-web patterns of light exploded across my vision and an achy throbbing sound pulsed in my ears, but I could at least see who was in the chair behind me.
“Nolan,” I croaked. “Nolan, are you okay?”
The boy was still out cold, his head flopped to one side like his neck contained no bones. But he was breathing, so for the time being I could assume he was all right. My head rolled to the side of its own volition, and I found myself looking out a large picture window.
In the tree outside, a barn owl glared at me.
I let out a small yip of joy, though to anyone present it probably sounded like pain.
Jameson came over to me and pulled my head upright by my hair, narrowly avoiding my attack when I tried to bite his arm open with my still-exposed fangs. He yanked his arm away, then grabbed my face in one of his large, rough hands. He shoved my upper lip up on both sides and gave a long whistle.
“Damn, girl.”
I snarled at him but ended up choking back more of my own blood.
Near my chair was an old, tall brass lamp. I’d only have one chance to execute this plan properly, so I had to believe my rudimentary grasp of physics was enough. I swung the weight of my body to one side, jerking my face out of Jameson’s hand, and then when he moved to grab at me again I tipped the chairs the opposite way, dragging Nolan’s body weight as well as my own to the tipping point.
The chairs tumbled over a
nd the back panel of one broke, but our bonds still held firm. Freedom hadn’t been the point, however. The brass lamp wobbled, and I watched it with one eye wide. It teetered violently, and then it too tumbled. Its fall was much more spectacular because it fell into the big window, creating a triumphant crash. The window wasn’t destroyed, but a large panel of it was now missing.
The owl blinked at me and I blinked back, but given how screwed up my face was it probably looked like I was winking at it.
Jameson pulled our chairs back up with one tug and glared at me.
“You’re supposed to behave,” he snapped.
I laughed. “Whoever told you that either never met me or thought you’d be stupid enough to believe it.”
He looked flummoxed and repeated, “You’re supposed to behave.”
I spit more blood out, then touched my fangs with the tip of my tongue to make sure neither was loose. My human teeth I could get caps for. Vampire fangs don’t regrow if you lose them, and I wasn’t in a position to lose my only built-in weapon. They both felt secure, so at least that wasn’t the source of the blood.
“Jameson,” I wheezed. “Who told you that?”
“I…” He checked the bonds holding me and Nolan and seemed satisfied they were secure. Behind me Nolan groaned, finally starting to come around.
If Jameson was someone’s daytime servant, he lacked any of the sensibilities of the ones I had previously met. Other human servants were whip-smart, devoted and cunning. You had to maintain certain skills in order to survive for centuries without the speed and strength of a vampire. Jameson seemed lost and bumbling. Even during the brief encounter we’d had at Bramley, he had been self-assured and larger than life.
This Jameson was an empty husk of his former self.
A puppet.
“Oh, Jameson, you stupid old fool. You of anyone should have known.”
He stared at me blankly. “I don’t know what you mean.” He still sounded like himself. The Jameson of old was in there somewhere, probably trying to claw his way to the surface. But he had been turned into a Renfield. He was some master vampire’s errand boy now.
“They got you.”
“No one got me.” He walked over to the main doors of the room and yanked one open. “Noriko said you were one of them and she was right. You must be sacrificed for the cause.”
I blinked my one eye uselessly. A giant hand of pain squeezed my skull.
“What cause?”
But Jameson had vanished through the open door, leaving Nolan and me alone in the room.
“Nolan?”
“Uhn.”
“Nolan, wake up. Please.”
“Wuhh.” At least they were starting to sound like real words now.
“Wake up,” I screamed, throwing my head backwards and knocking it against his.
“Ow.” I felt him shake his head and he groaned, but the sound was more frustrated than pained. He’d probably just realized how far up shit creek we were without paddles. “Secret?” He craned his neck back. “Oh, Christ, they got ya.”
“So it would seem.”
“I didn’t think they could.”
“Tell me everything you know,” I demanded.
“He doesn’t know anything,” Noriko announced, stepping through the door. She was followed by Jameson, and two of the vampire ghosts trailed behind them.
Of the two, only one was recognizable as once being human in any capacity. Her skin was still mostly intact, and she had both of her eyes, but they had faded to white. Her hair was patchy and only clumps of it remained, dangling in stringy bunches from her mottled scalp.
The other one was more repellant than the first I’d experienced. Huge chunks of skin were missing all over his body and both of his eyes were gone. His grinning skeletal face was staring at me with his fangs bared and ready. Ready for what, I didn’t want to know.
Noriko wore the same black catsuit as she had the last time I’d seen her. She looked like she should be breaking into a bank vault rather than tormenting captives, but if it was her look, who was I to question it?
“You look like a rejected extra from Mission: Impossible.” Oh, that’s right, I was still me.
“You insolent little bitch,” she spat. “Don’t you know when you’re beaten?”
I thought about it for a moment. “No.”
Nolan was riveted in terror, staring at the two ghosts. For the time being, neither of them was doing anything threatening. They seemed content to just be creepily corporeal in the background. Their presence was threat enough.
Noriko, carrying the same katana with which she’d attacked me outside of Havana, came to stand in front of me. She raised the sword so it was one hard gulp away from puncturing my neck, and gave me a look that was meant to be a challenge.
“Can I ask you something?” I whispered, careful to not engage the blade.
“What?” was her irritated response.
“Why them?”
“I don’t understand.”
“Why Jameson? Why Nolan? Why did you go to Bramley and find them?”
“Because sooner or later, even the most foolish vampire hunter will stumble on to a great prize, Secret. They…” she indicated Jameson and Nolan, “…found the first of the council-guarded vampires for us by sheer dumb luck.”
She’d said us. So that explained her part in this. Noriko was a daytime servant, which seemed quite obvious to me now with her holding a sword to my throat and being followed by an entourage of the undead.
“How old are you?”
She pulled back the sword a bit and contemplated the answer to the question.
“I was born in 1614 in Edo. So, I suppose, I am nearly four hundred.” She was briefly delighted by this, as though it never occurred to her to take stock of something so menial as age.
“Who were you in Japan?” I asked. My knuckle-duster ring had slipped loose, and I had nudged it low on my fingers. When I’d punched Sig earlier that week one of the diamonds had shifted, creating a sharp, blade-like point on the surface of the ring. I was trying to cut through my ropes using that point, plus the broken wood from the back of my chair. Nolan was being no help whatsoever.
Noriko’s eyes clouded and something approaching rage crossed her face. “I was an Oiran. A respected prostitute.” Her jaw was tight. I’d asked the wrong question. Why couldn’t she have been a sweet tea server or someone’s devoted wife? “Enough of this. It’s time for your end, McQueen.”
But she didn’t raise her sword again. Instead she nodded to Jameson, who left the room.
“Noriko?”
“I said enough.”
“If you can even still pretend you’re human, promise me something.”
“I promise you nothing.”
I ignored her dismissal. “Nolan has nothing to do with this. Let him live.”
Her face sank with regret. “It’s too late for that.”
“It’s not too late. Why is it too late?”
“Because the master is here.” She looked over to the door as Jameson reentered, followed by a beautiful, smartly dressed blonde.
My heart stopped and all warmth drained from my face. I would have been less shocked to see my own mother walk in. A lot less, actually.
“Daria?”
Chapter Twenty-Nine
“Daria?” I sputtered again, still unable to connect what I was looking at with the part of my brain that converted seeing to believing. For a minute I thought she was there to help me.
But of course that wasn’t the case.
“Hello, Secret.” She was pristine, as always. Her hair was pulled back into a smooth chignon, showing her dancer’s neck and revealing the delicate features of her face. She wore a simple black dress with a modest neckline. Her lipstick was red, but understated, making her look like the wife of a presidential candidate. She even wore pearls.
This was not the vision of a vampire-killing, diabolical monster I had conjured.
She smoothed her unwrink
led skirt and clasped her hands together in front of her. No part of her seemed shocked by my current condition, and why should it? This had all been her doing.
“No,” I protested. “This isn’t right.”
Daria shrugged, then smiled a little too sweetly for my taste. “This is the way of the world, Miss McQueen.” She indicated the vampire ghosts with a perfectly manicured hand. “The strong survive while the weak perish. Simple Darwinism.”
“This isn’t evolution.” I was shocked by how cavalier she was being. “It’s murder.”
Her hands reclasped. “So be it.”
“Why them? Why would you kill the protected ones? They trusted you to keep them safe.”
Daria huffed. “What fool trusts a vampire? They were idiots to believe anyone could keep them protected forever.”
“What benefit was it to you to kill them? And what are they?”
Noriko shot me a warning look and raised her sword, but Daria stilled her with a flick of the wrist. “No, no, Noriko, let her ask. She may as well know what she’s dying for. She’s been Sig’s pawn for long enough. It’s time we treated her like an equal for once.”
“I’m not Sig’s pawn.”
“You were the council’s pawn, and Sig is the council. If you are stupid enough to believe he wasn’t using you, then you deserve what’s coming to you.”
It felt like she’d slapped me.
“I chose my path.”
“Foolish girl. Did you choose to let Peyton live? Did you decide who to kill? You come at his beck and call. You are the council’s dog. Sig has used you to achieve his ends and he would keep using you for whatever pleases him. You should thank me for releasing you.”
“You’re just as guilty as he is.”
She laughed, clapping her hands together with delight. “You think there is anything approaching equality in the Tribunal? Sig is lord and master, and don’t let yourself think any differently.”
“So this is all about him?”
Daria sighed, exasperated. “It’s about power.”
“You have power.”
