Marked

by Dean Murray

  It was cruel. Donovan had raised Alec. He was the last person who should have been forced to stand by and watch, powerless, as Alec slowly slipped away from us.

  Alec's breathing had become shallow and fast, but that didn't scare me even half as much as the fact that he'd stopped fighting the restraints that we'd put on him so that he wouldn't damage anything if he started flailing about in his sleep.

  "Very well, Mistress Paige. I admit that Master Alec appears to be on his last legs. What do you propose? I've been texted alerts that there are road blocks being set up on all of the major roads within thirty miles. We are quickly being surrounded and even if we succeed in breaking out of the perimeter we'll be on the run and likely be forced to deal with local and possibly even federal law enforcement. Even our resources have their limits…"

  "We'll use Lori, but we won't try to break through the blockades. She'll be in the first vehicle and she'll simply tell any police at the blockade that our group isn't the one they are looking for, that it's all been a colossal mistake."

  "And if there are Coun'hij enforcers there?"

  "Then she will tell them to kill each other. I want her guard doubled, and I want them within arm's reach of her the entire time. If she so much as blinks wrong then we're going to be forced to kill her."

  "We can't continue on like this forever, Mistress Paige. Sooner or later you're going to have to decide whether or not you can trust her."

  I gave Donovan a sad smile. "She's just too dangerous, Donovan. If Alec was conscious and able to keep her honest then things would be different. Ditto if she had a better history. As it is, there is just too much chance that she's going to turn on us at the worst possible time."

  "Very well, I'll begin using one of the burner phones to make the arrangements with Mallory. With any luck she'll already be there in the vehicle with Lori."

  "Thanks, Donovan. Make sure that she lets Lori know that we aren't going to stand for her collecting any pawns. The humans are all to be allowed to go back to their normal lives with nothing more lasting than an order not to report that we were ever in the area. Any enforcers are to be killed on the spot."

  Donovan nodded. "What about once we are past the blockade? We're going to need to leave the communications suite off for an extended period of time still if we're going to remain under the Coun'hij's radar. I'm not sure that goal is compatible with the amount of time Master Alec has left."

  "Once we are outside of the Coun'hij's secure perimeter, I'll be taking Alec with me and breaking off from the rest of the group. I'll need one of the SUV's and some cash. Eighty thousand dollars should be more than enough."

  "No."

  "Excuse me? You agreed that I would be giving the orders around here, Donovan, you can't go changing the rules on me now."

  "Is that so, Mistress Paige? Not even if you change the rules yourself? I will not let you take Alec away from the safety of the group."

  "There isn't any other choice, Donovan. I have to do this."

  "You're going to try and rejoin him in his dream, aren't you? Even though he didn't want you to risk it."

  "Of course I am, but this is bigger than that. Part of what is keeping Lori in line is the idea that there are some lines that she can't cross, lines that will cause Alec to come after her. We can pile women around her until they are twenty deep, but all it would take is her getting her hands on a male hybrid with the right power to foil all of our security efforts.

  "Alec is the one person she'll always have to be worried about. As long as you can make sure that she doesn't get her hands on Puppeteer or Dream Stealer she'll know that Alec could always cut through her defenses like they didn't even exist."

  "But how will she continue to…ah, I see. You wish to introduce an element of doubt as to Master Alec's ultimate fate."

  "Yeah. It's risky, but there will always be a chance that I succeeded in besting Dream Stealer and maybe that will be enough to keep her from giving into the worst inside of her."

  "You really think that Alec would stay away from his people if you succeeded? He's not the kind to shirk a responsibility."

  "I know, but there is a chance that I can convince him that he'll be able to do more good striking from the shadows. If the Coun'hij believes that he's dead then there is a chance that they'll lower their guard. Don't you see, Donovan, this is the best of both worlds. Regardless of whether I succeed or fail, Alec will still have created a legacy that has a chance of doing you some good. I've told you that I'm going to do my best to convince Alec to disappear if he survives, so you'll always have to wonder. Every time a group of vampires turns up dead you'll wonder if it was Alec."

  "You'll have to make arrangements to make sure that your corpses don't turn up if you fail. That would ruin everything."

  "I know. Program Sergio's number into my phone. I won't use him, but I'll get him to give me a list of people he thinks are trustworthy. I'll have one of them dispose of us."

  Donovan looked different in that moment. Despite the gray hairs and wrinkles, he looked like a lost little boy. "Master Alec would never have contemplated something like this. If you're successful you will have turned him into something uncomfortably close to a religious figure."

  "I know, he never would have wanted that for himself, but it's the best thing for our people. If things go as badly for the rebellion as I suspect they will, then they are going to need something bigger than themselves to believe in. If that means you and Mallory have to create the church of Alec Graves, then so be it."

  Whatever Donovan was about to say was preempted by the ringing of the burner phone on the table next to Alec.

  "I thought you said this was a clean phone, Donovan. We can't afford to get traced right now."

  "I just pulled it out of the manufacturer's packaging myself this morning, Mistress Paige. It's as clean as it's possible for one of our phones to be. There is no possible way for the Coun'hij to have that number."

  I frowned at the phone. Lately all of the surprises in my life had been bad ones. That didn't stop me from answering the phone though.

  "Yeah?"

  "I won't use names, that would be incredibly imprudent."

  It was a man's voice, one with a slight accent I couldn't place, one that was vaguely familiar.

  I cleared my voice, unaccountably uncomfortable. "Fine, no names, but you're going to give me an idea who it is I'm talking to. Where did we first meet?"

  "I'm not sure that telling you that would mean anything, but more recently we ran into each other in a Manhattan park. I apologize—it was an unexpectedly stressful night and I wasn't at my best."

  It was the old man, the one who had saved Isaac, Jasmin and me from the werewolf. I recognized his voice now, but I still wanted to be sure.

  "Who were you expecting to see that night?"

  "Your friend from south of the border. To be honest I'm still not sure of long-term implications of that change, but we've come much too far to try and pull out now. There's nothing to do but continue forward the best we can and hope that things turn out okay."

  "What do you mean by that?"

  "I'm sorry, that's not something I can tell you right now."

  "Then why did you call?"

  "I called because you're about to make a very big mistake. You're planning on taking your fiancé and leaving your friends. That's the right decision, but you need to go now, within the next fifteen minutes, or everything will unravel."

  "How could you possibly know what I have planned? Do you have some kind of bug planted in here?"

  "No, my dear. There are no bugs in your vehicle. As to how I know, you're already starting to suspect, but something is holding you back from believing."

  "If what I suspect is true, then you should have called ten minutes ago before I told my friend my plan. It would have done a lot to increase your credibility."

  "Would it? I think you're just stubborn enough to get everyone you care about killed just to prove that you make your own decisio
ns. I needed to call now, after you'd already made up your mind, not earlier when the decision was still uncertain."

  "You're asking me to take a lot on trust for someone I've met only once, twice if you're to be believed."

  "Indeed, but I did save your life the last time we met. Surely that buys me some kind of credibility. If I'd wanted you or your friends dead, I could have easily accomplished that very thing merely by failing to intervene on your behalf."

  "That's fair, but before I decide one way or another I need to know why you're doing this."

  "I'm helping because I'm an incredible fan of you and your fiancé both."

  "That's not much of an answer."

  "I'm sorry. There is more to my reasoning than that, but the rest of the answer isn't something that you're capable of understanding. Will you heed my advice?"

  "Yeah. Call me crazy, but I will. Anything else you want to tell me?"

  "Only that you and your fiancé must go by yourselves. Anyone you bring with you will be killed and could very well result in everything being thrown off."

  Donovan looked like he was going to pop a cork. He'd been obviously unhappy with the idea of me taking Alec away from him and his displeasure had only gotten worse as my caller had told me that I needed to leave even before I'd been planning on leaving. The idea that I might actually agree to this, might deliver Alec into the hands of someone Donovan didn't know or trust, was obviously too much.

  I sighed. "You don't ask for much, do you?"

  My sarcasm seemed to throw him for a loop. "I would not ask it if it were not vitally important."

  "Yeah, I know. I wasn't planning on taking anyone else with us."

  "Good, this isn't the last time we will talk."

  "Yeah, unless we're off your script more than you think. All right, unless you're going to tell me something else—something useful—I need to go deal with an impending mutiny."

  Donovan waited until I hung up before speaking. "I know that I agreed to follow your orders, but I must protest this decision in the strongest way possible. This is likely one gigantic trap."

  "It's a possibility."

  "And yet you are going to go through with your plan of leaving the rest of the convoy?"

  "Yes, Donovan, I am. I can't explain why, but for the first time in weeks I feel like I'm doing the right thing."

  "You're acting on faith, Mistress Paige. I understand the desire to put your fate in the hands of someone else, the desire to give up the crushing responsibility that you've been forced to bear, but this isn't the right choice. Don't give up now."

  That hurt more than I'd expected it to. I'd thought Donovan had been proud of me, thought that he'd been happy with my efforts not to collapse under the stress this time around. Apparently I'd been wrong. I'd given up once and therefore I'd failed to measure up. I knew I was no Alec Graves, but apparently I was much less in Donovan's eyes than I'd realized.

  "It's nice to know how you really feel, Donovan. Now that we have that out of the way, are you going to tie me up on the bed next to Alec or are you going to get out of my way? Those are your only two options, because I'm done talking about this."

  Donovan stared at me with a stiffness that he hadn't displayed since my first few days at the estate. Donovan was always a little stiff with everyone, but this was more than that. This was Donovan's way of retreating into propriety, his way of keeping everyone around him safely confined in little boxes where they belonged.

  "I will not break my sworn word, Mistress Paige. Nor will I attack a woman who has offered me no harm, no matter how much I might disagree with her actions."

  "Well then, I guess we're not as different as we might have thought. You've got your own brand of blind faith too, yours is just in the rules of courtesy."

  I brushed past Donovan without another word. I knew that if I survived I was going to regret what I'd just said, but I was too angry to care right then.

  "James, could you please strap Alec to the rigid stretcher that has wheels on the ends of the handles? I'm going to need to move Alec and that's the only way I can think of to do it by myself, especially since I only have one working hand."

  He gave me an odd look, but he didn't argue, which was a miniature miracle in and of itself. I pulled my phone back out as I walked up to Ruby who was driving again.

  "Ruby, be looking for a spot where we can safely pull off to the side of the road, please. It doesn't need to be for long, but it needs to happen in the next five minutes."

  Ruby opened her mouth as though she was going to ask me what was going on, and then closed her mouth again and simply nodded. Addison wasn't as timid.

  "Where are you taking Alec?"

  "Despite knowing full well that we are in the middle of a secure perimeter established by the Coun'hij, a perimeter that she can't possibly escape on her own, Mistress Paige is going to leave the convoy and strike out on her own with Master Alec."

  I shot Donovan a dirty look, but before I could respond Addison jumped back in. "No, that's not acceptable. Samantha would never countenance something like that."

  "In case you've forgotten, Samantha Graves is currently in a coma, and up until recently she couldn't have cared less about what happened to Alec or Rachel either one. I don't think her wishes should weigh into this decision."

  "She's back now and eventually she's going to wake up again. When that happens I'm not going to be the one to tell her that you ran off with her son and got him killed."

  A phone was ringing, but I ignored it.

  "Fine, then don't tell her. I'm sure Donovan will happily tell her how foolish I was."

  "I don't know why Donovan has let things get this far, but I'm not going to just stand by and let you walk off with Alec."

  "Don't try and stop me, Addison. I'm warning you."

  "You don't have your precious gun, Adri. I may be old and half crippled, but I'm still a shape shifter. I'm still going to be more than strong and fast enough to stop you."

  I shifted slightly, moving my weight over the balls of my feet.

  "Stop right now!"

  James didn't sound amused at the fact that his mom and I had been seconds away from trying to kill each other with our bare hands. He held up a burner phone, brandishing it as though it was a magic talisman that could force the two of us into compliance with his will.

  "Go ahead, Rach. I think we've got their attention finally."

  Based on the looks on Addison, Andrew and Donovan's faces, I wasn't the only one he'd taken off guard. It wasn't until I heard Rachel's voice that I realized the phone was on speaker mode.

  "What just happened, Adri?"

  "Addison just threatened to throw down against me."

  "No, that's not what I'm talking about. Something big just changed."

  Donovan cleared his throat. "Mistress Paige just took a call from an unknown individual who counseled her to leave the rest of us and strike out on her own. She wants to heed his advice against the better judgment of every other person here."

  "Hmm, so that's not what changed. For a minute there I was worried that you'd decided to stay with the rest of the caravan. You're still taking Alec with you, right?"

  I was experiencing a weird sense of déjà vu. It took me a couple of tries to respond. "Yeah, that was my plan. Are you saying that I'm right? That I need to leave just like I'd originally planned on doing?"

  "Five minutes ago I would have said yes, but I'm not so sure now, Adri. You've changed everything somehow. All I know is that before everything went dark, you leaving was the best path. Now I'm not so sure. You're still planning on taking James, right?"

  "I was never planning on taking James. This is supposed to just be Alec and me, especially after the call I just had. He said that anyone else I brought along would be killed."

  Rach didn't seem to hear me. "James, you'll go with her, won't you?"

  Donovan didn't give James a chance to respond. "Mistress Rachel, your place is with us. When will you be returning home?"


  "I'm not sure I'll ever be returning home, Donovan."

  "That is unacceptable. Your mother needs you."

  For the briefest of moments the hurt child seeped through Rachel's newfound confidence. "My mother has never needed me, Donovan. I doubt she even knows that I'm gone."

  "You're wrong, Mistress Rachel. She is much improved, she seems to be back to her old self and she's going to need you even more once Alec is gone."

  Rachel was silent for several seconds. "You do know your audience, Donovan. Out of all the things you could have possibly trolled out there to shake my resolution, that is the only one that had a chance of succeeding."

  "Have I succeeded? Will you return to us?"

  "No, Donovan. We all have sacrifices to make—apparently mine are more numerous than I'd realized."

  "I will not allow Mistress Paige to take your brother away."

  "Poor Donovan. So scared of facing a future without your wards, a future where you've failed in the task my father laid across your shoulders so many years ago. You can't save Alec now. Nothing you can do will stop the inevitable from playing out. You need to let Adri take him away. Her plan is the best option we have left to us."

  "It will work then? She'll convince everyone he's still alive even after he's dead?"

  Donovan sounded like someone who'd lost their faith, someone who was desperately looking for something to believe in.

  "I can't see that, Donovan."

  "What can you see, Rach? If I go with Adri am I really going to die like she said?" James sounded oddly detached. There was none of the anger that had characterized him for so long.

  "I don't know, James. I know what was supposed to happen a few minutes ago, but that's gone dark to me and with every second that passes we are further and further away from the future I thought I could see."

  "You're not coming off as a very good seer, Rach. If you really want to convince people to go throw themselves into hopeless situations you need to practice your delivery."

  "I never said I was a seer, James. I'm not here to take away people's choices. I'm just trying to nudge you all to the best possible outcome."