It was slow going. The men were older, packing a decent bit of dead weight between them. Thad was young and swift. More than once her turned a corner and had to jump back as to not collide with them. If they knew he was following them, they made no mention of it, keeping on their chosen path for this lonely funeral march.
Thad watched every closed door he passed, as if it might spring open suddenly and the grasping hands of one of the many vampires in the house would take hold of him. But no door opened and he never crossed paths with anyone, vampire or human.
Finally, the pallbearers came to a set of elevators. They set the dead men on the floor, with no more care than if they were bags of flour and stretched their backs as they waited for the door to open. One of the pallbearers flinched, perhaps catching a glimpse of Thad from his peripherals. Thad pulled his head back around the corner and stood with his back pressed against the wall, fearful that his breathing was as loud to them as it was to him.
No one said anything and Thad didn’t hear anyone approaching. Still, he couldn’t muster the courage to glance around the corner again until he heard the ding of the elevator car announcing its arrival to the floor.
Thad chanced a peek. The men were gone. He moved to the elevators, which were old but not the most ancient set he’d ever seen. Over top each of the doors was a semicircle of numbers with a brushed copper arrow indicating the floor the car was on.
Thad watched, in fascination, as the arrow fell farther and farther, until it landed on the floor marked B3. It thrilled him to think this house had almost as many floors below ground as it had above. He reached over and pressed the button between the doors and the arrow that had been still came to life. The door to his left slid open. Thad took a deep breath and stepped inside. His hand trembled so much he almost tapped the button for the wrong floor. His finger hovered over B3. He took a deep breath and pushed the button.
The doors pulled shut and the elevator dropped slowly, as if it were still contemplating its decision to allow Thad a ride. The elevator passed through all of the floors without stopping and coughing him out. Three floors below ground, the elevator doors opened to darkness.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Jerusa was almost as surprised to see the ghost as he was to be seen. He looked around and noticed Alicia and Foster. He came close to them and the trio exchanged some silent communication that brought a frown to the new ghost’s face. Jerusa wondered if the man realized he was dead. From his fangs, she could tell that he had been a vampire when he had died.
The new ghost was not much taller than Alicia. He had a piebald set of eyes, one brown, one blue, which didn’t seem to line up symmetrically. His hair was a mess of thinning tangles, giving him the look of someone long on the run. He might as well have had UNACCEPTBLE branded on his forehead.
After a bit of time, another ghost appeared inside the room. This one was an elderly woman, toothless, except for her fangs, with a long hoary shock of hair running down her back like a silver waterfall. More and more ghosts began to appear and before long the room was full. The restless spirits of countless vampires milled around each other, shoulder to shoulder, prattling on in silent voices. Jerusa could feel the weight of their raucous conversations, but couldn’t detect even a whisper. Several times she had to close her eyes to shake off the sensation that she had gone deaf.
She breathed a sigh of relief when she caught the sound of the men coming to remove the dead bodies from Shufah and Taos’s rooms.
She glanced around at the mob of murdered vampires and felt a deep stitch of pity for them. Why had they all lingered here, in the place of their execution? Did they not know they could leave, that they were free? Or had they been confined in darkness, afraid to venture out, but were now drawn to her like hordes of insects to a solitary candle flame?
The crowd of ghosts stopped suddenly, like a herd of spooked deer. They stood still, watching the far wall of the bedroom. Jerusa stood on her bed to get a better look over their heads, but couldn’t see what had caused such a strange reaction.
Something entered the room—several somethings—passing through the wall as though it wasn’t there. At first, Jerusa thought it was just another group of vampire ghosts, but when the crowd of spirits began to rush away, she caught a glance of what was frightening them.
Four, five, six, a dozen came into the room, all slumped and bewildered, eyes burning with hatred and unfettered hunger. These were not the ghosts of blood-drinking vampires, but of flesh-eating savages.
The savage spirits were more gossamer, less defined than the vampire ghosts, sometimes flickering in and out of existence. Several were missing limbs, but not in the sense of an injury. Legs and arms were not hacked off, leaving gory stubs. They were just gone, as if these demonic apparitions were not complete souls.
The crowd of ghosts rushed about the room in a panic and had they been corporeal, they would have trampled Jerusa into a fine paste. Instead they passed through her body without disturbance, bringing only a slight chill to her skin. They moved about, like a great shoal of frightened fish, incapable of fleeing too far from the light that Jerusa gave them.
The savages chased the vampires, catching more than a few and tried to feast on flesh that was no longer there. The savages didn’t seem to understand why they were unable to devour the vampires they caught, just as the vampires didn’t realize they were safe from the savages’ bites.
It was a macabre production spilling out before her. Jerusa stood fascinated and appalled. She called out to several ghosts, trying to explain that they were safe, but none listened.
Jerusa hopped down from the bed, rushed to the aid of a child vampire being mauled. She reached down, knowing she could not touch the child ghost and the savage turned his wrath on Jerusa.
Jerusa was thrust backward, not by any physical touch, but by a blast of frigid malevolency such as she had never felt before. The other savage ghosts, seeing Jerusa on her back and flailing, gave up the assault on their spiritual victims and rushed to join the attack on a living creature.
The world filled with dead eyes and the gnashing of festering teeth. Jerusa swatted at the snapping jaws, but her hands passed through without impact. They tore at her with their mouths, their hands, their feet and though they caused no physical damage to her, each blow pressed her soul deeper into black, icy waters. And though they took no flesh from her, it was clear the ghostly savages were feeding on her nonetheless, for they grew clearer, more defined and their missing limbs were coming into focus.
A bright light erupted over Jerusa’s head, spilling the savages backward. They shielded their eyes, as if the sun itself rushed upon them to melt the flesh from their bones. In the light that should have brought clarity to their form, they instead bled away like silt settling to the bottom of a still pond.
Jerusa looked up, not at all surprised to find Alicia with her arms stretched wide, her body aflame with spectral light.
With the savage ghosts gone, the spirits of the vampires filtered back into the room. Their movements were slow, their faces full of awe. They circled around Alicia, forgetting Jerusa on the floor and seemed, for the first time, to notice the young ghost in the prom dress was somehow different than they were.
The light emanating from Alicia faded away and she regarded the crowd of spirits with a stern look. Her eyes conveyed some message of authority to them that they recognized. One by one the vampire ghosts vanished, slipping from Jerusa’s sight like mist in the moonlight, yet she sensed they were all still there watching her.
Alicia extended her hand and helped her up from the floor. Jerusa wondered if she would ever get used to it. “Thanks.” Alicia smiled. “Well, that was new.”
Alicia swatted at the air, her way of saying “don’t worry.”
Foster caught Jerusa’s attention then pointed to the back corner of the room. The vampire ghost with the piebald eyes, stood kneading his hands together, shuffling his feet from side to side. He watched Jerusa with
his brown eye and Alicia with his blue eye. The sight made Jerusa’s head hurt. She thought to ask him to stop, but didn’t want to seem rude.
The ghost moved to the door, passed partway through the solid oak door, then leaned his upper torso back into the room and motioned for Jerusa to follow. Jerusa looked at Alicia and Foster. They seemed unsure, but both nodded.
The ghost vanished through the door and Jerusa followed him. The heavy door slid silently on its hinges. Thad’s scent hung heavy in the air. He had left his room not too long before. A stab of panic wriggled through her midsection at the thought of him happening upon the wrong group of vampires. Was this where the ghost was leading her? Was Thad in danger?
The thought of being lead to Thad was dispelled when his scent turned a corner going in the direction of a set of elevators and the ghost motioned for her to continue straight on. She stood in place for a moment, glancing between the ghost and the elevators. The urge to follow Thad boiled in her blood, but it was not just a desire to make sure he was safe that pulled at her. She recognized the low fires of the thirst hiding just below the surface.
She turned away from Thad’s scent and followed the ghost.
With the ghost leading on, Jerusa maneuvered a series of hallways, some broad with many unmarked doors, others narrow and dark. He moved fast, causing Jerusa to run to keep up. They came to a staircase, though not the one they had used to get to their suites. This one was made of dark stone that seemed out of place in this bright and lavishly decorated house and more at home in a long forgotten castle. They moved down two flights before the ghost continued down another narrow hallway ending in a plain looking metal door. The ghost passed through the door. Jerusa followed at a run and found herself in a large utility closet where a group of humans stood talking.
The humans stood frozen with shock, gawking at her as if she had appeared in a burst of flame and smoke. Jerusa glanced back at the door she had come through and watched as it pulled closed, seamlessly blending with the wall. She thought to apologize for her intrusion, but the roar of their hearts, the aroma of their blood, caused her to rush from the room before it could fuel the blaze of her thirst.
Jerusa fled the utility closet by the regular door, slamming it behind her. The ghost glanced back at her, his duel colored eyes begging her to hurry. He passed through an adjacent door. Jerusa followed the ghost as he once again maneuvered through a series of halls and down another flight of stairs, this one not so deserted.
Several vampires were milling around this part of the house, as though it were the lobby of some common hotel. They watched with gossiping interest as Jerusa rushed down the stairs. She reined back her speed, taking to a gentle walk as though she was just taking in the sights and in no rush at all. This had the opposite effect making the gawking vampires all the more interested in her.
The ghost urged her on, but she maintained her casual stroll. The others couldn’t see the spirit with the piebald eyes, nor could they see Alicia and Foster trailing behind Jerusa. All they could see was the panic stricken fledgling running through the halls as though she was looking for a way to escape. She didn’t care for their greedy eyes or the way they whispered to each other in languages she couldn’t understand.
Whatever the ghost had to show her must be important, but Jerusa couldn’t bring herself to run with the crowd watching her. She had given them enough to gossip about for one night. She could only hope that word of this didn’t reach the Stewards. She had a feeling the ghost was leading her someplace that she would not want the Hunters to find her.
She continued down to the first floor where the ghost led her to a door beneath the stairway. A set of spiral stairs made of that same dark stone descended into the murky gloom. The air felt cool and musty, ancient as the stones forming the walls and stairs, as if the levels below ground had been sealed away for centuries.
She rushed after the ghost down the spiral steps so fast that when she reached the landing at the bottom she nearly spilled face-first onto the floor.
The room she now stood in was round, with doors circling all about her. Candles burned in sconces near each door and a war of shadows waged upon the walls. The ghost motioned her toward one of the doors, but she couldn’t tell one from the other nor what direction she was heading.
She stepped inside the room, cringing at the loud squall of the hinges and pulled it shut behind her. It was another circular room, except that there were no other doors and the floor cascaded down, creating a miniature coliseum. The room stank of soot and char. Opposite the door was a small stage, built of wood, that overlooked the lowest part of the floor. The wood of the stage looked old but sturdy and all around the edges was a great, colorful curtain, embossed with the symbol of the Stewards, which reached from the platform to the floor.
The ghost motioned for Jerusa to hurry to the stage. She circled around the room instead of going down and through the middle. There was something about the lowest part of the floor that she didn’t like. It was the blackest part of the room. The stones looked brittle and well-worn and it just felt wrong to tread upon them.
She came to the stage and the ghost motioned for her to climb beneath the curtain.
“What? In there? I don’t think that’s a good idea. Maybe I should just go back to my room.” Her voice echoed around the room.
The ghost looked at the door in a panic, then dove beneath the stage, as though he wasn’t invisible to everyone except Jerusa. She was about to point this out to him when she caught the sound of approaching footsteps.
Jerusa stood frozen with fear, her heart racing and might have stayed that way had Alicia not given her a hard shove to the back. Jerusa scrambled forward on hands and knees searching the curtain for a seam she might slip through. When she could not find one, she gave up and crawled beneath the heavy fabric on her stomach, snaking her way between the beams of the stage. The hinges of the door cried out in alarm just as she pulled her feet beneath the curtain.
“I offer my deepest apologies to the Council.” It was Ming’s voice. “I didn’t mean to hide anything from you. I only thought—”
“We don’t care what you think,” said a male voice Jerusa didn’t recognize. “It’s not your duty to think. Yours is to obey. If this is too much for you and your little scrabble of hideous misfits, then I shall gladly see you and your team standing in the pit of judgment.”
“Calm yourself, Cot,” said a voice Jerusa recognized as Marjek. “The human is confined to the observation ward, just as I said. She shows no sign of regeneration. Ming and her team have been warned. There is nothing to worry about.”
Jerusa’s heart leapt into her throat at the mention of her mother. She slithered her way to a crack of light breaking through the curtain and watched as Marjek and the other four members of the High Council marched around the outer wall toward the stage. Ming and the Crimson Storm followed along behind, like hungry, yet timid dogs.
“We shall see,” said the vampire, Cot. He was a tall, thin vampire with a youthful face, full lips and a shock of black hair hanging loose upon his collar. His features were handsome, yet cruel, as though he had been chiseled from ice and all warmth disgusted him. “I still say they should be excused from this session, as punishment.”
“I disagree,” Marjek said. “They did well. It was no easy task bringing Shufah to us.”
“Your infatuation with that woman will be your undoing,” said a female vampire, though her tone was light, almost mocking. “I don’t see why she is so important. We should just be done with her small coven and send her on her way.”
“Because, Othella,” said a voice Jerusa recognized as Heidi’s. “She may be able to root out her brother. If you destroy her coven, do you think she will aid in his destruction?”
“We’ve been over this at length,” Marjek said, the finality in his voice falling like a gavel. “The decision has been made. Now let us get on with the judgments. Bring in the first.”
Celeste sprang up as if
startled by Marjek’s voice. Jerusa wasn’t sure, but she thought Celeste had been staring at the crack in the curtain that she was spying from. Jerusa’s mind reeled at the mention of Shufah’s twin brother. Suhail was still alive? True he had escaped that night they had battled Kole, but when Jerusa later asked what had become of him, Shufah assured her that Suhail was dead.
Did Shufah know her twin brother was still alive? And if so, why would she have lied about it? Was it because of Suhail that the Stewards had fled to the Ice Sanctuary? These questions, and more, swirled within her and the more she thought about it, the more she dreaded their true purpose for being here.
Heidi had said something about needing Shufah’s assistance, hadn’t she? That destroying their coven was not an option? For the first time in months, Jerusa felt the flicker of hope. Perhaps she, Thad and Taos would escape judgment after all. If they couldn’t rely on the mercy of the High Council, maybe they could barter out a treaty.
Jerusa was so engrossed in this train of thought that she almost didn’t notice when Celeste returned, marching a human girl down into the sooty pit.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Thad stepped out of the elevator, glancing about the room. Not much could be seen outside the spray of light spilling from the elevator doors, but he could tell the room was large and open, with high ceilings. He couldn’t see the walls, but the floor was made of large, ancient-looking stones. Every instinct in him said to flee back into the elevator, and he might have, but before he could turn, the doors closed, pinching off the light.
Thad spun toward the elevator, clawing at the doors, but it was too late. They were sealed shut and the sound of the car ascending to the upper floors echoed all around him. He groped along the wall for the call button, but there didn’t seem to be one. The sound of his frightened breathing and the slap of his hand against the elevator doors seemed magnified, but whether that was due to the cavernous room or his ears compensating for his blinded eyes, he couldn’t say.
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