by Raven Hart
Iban stared into the grave as if he could see through the solid wood of the coffin lid. “I vow to you that I will avenge you. I will suck your blood from the veins of your murderer and rend his flesh from his bones. That I swear upon my immortality.”
“Thank you, old friend,” I repeated for Sullivan. “Don’t blame yourself. It was me who made the fatal mistake by letting down my guard. I knew what Will was. Don’t risk your living death for me. You should get on with the rest of your existence. As we say in the movie business, that’s a wrap. Adios.”
“Vaya con Dios,” Iban said through a sob. He stalked off in the direction of the house, but stopped after a few steps and walked back to us. He extended his hand to Connie, and when she took it, he raised her hand to his lips and kissed it with a bow. “Thank you for coming, my dear. I know it means a lot to Sullivan, and it means much to me as well.”
Connie nodded. “I’m very sorry for your loss. I know you loved him.” She glanced at me sidelong, her dark Latin gaze locked on mine. If I’d had a working heart, it would’ve been skipping like an old eight-cylinder in need of a tune-up. I know you loved him, I repeated in my mind. Her message was clear. She now believed what I’d told her: a demon can love. She’d seen it in Iban.
He nodded and released her hand. “Good-bye,” he said. “I’m glad he had the friendship and company of a woman as beautiful and delightful as yourself in the last few days of his life.”
“It was a pleasure to know him, if even for a few days.”
With a last courtly bow, Iban headed for the house again.
“Let me walk you to your car,” I told her. I wanted to ask her if she was okay, but I thought better of it. She’d just faced down half a dozen vampires without flinching. On top of that she’d found out I could talk to dead people and the dead people talked back. That alone would give someone a lot to think about. As soft as her expression had been just minutes ago, her eyes were getting flinty as she stared straight ahead. You could almost see the wheels of her mind turning at a thousand RPM.
“I’m glad someone has the balls to go after that murdering monster.”
I winced, feeling the jab just as she intended. “Like I keep telling you, me going after Will is complicated. It has to do with William and vampire politics, and someday I’ll explain everything.” But I could feel that something besides my fortitude—or lack of it—was uppermost on her mind. “What are you thinking?” I asked her. “I mean really thinking.”
By that time we were at her car. “I’m thinking about everything I’ve seen in the last few days. Most especially what I just saw and heard at this funeral. I’m thinking about your ability to talk to the dead, and about possibilities I never dreamed existed until now.”
“What possibilities?” I asked. She got into her car and gave me a last, hard look before she started the engine.
“Do you think you could…interpret for me some time? There are a couple of people I have to contact. It’s a matter of life and death.”
“Yeah, I guess. What’s the story?”
“It’s complicated.”
William
The rest of us gathered in the living room. After moving Diana and Will into town the night before, I’d had Chandler bring a group of professional cleaners into the plantation house to straighten out most of the mess while we slept through the day. The broken furniture had been removed and the holes in the walls and ceiling had been patched, although not repainted. Much as our group differences had been cut open but not healed.
I used my role as host to open the conversation. There were things I wished to say that had to be said quickly before Iban returned.
“Thanks to Gerard’s brilliance, we believe we’ve found an antidote to the killing plague. In many ways it was a lucky thing the first strike landed in California—”
“Not so lucky for them,” Lucius cut in.
I frowned him down. “It could have just as easily been delivered to New York.” Then I addressed the group in general. “Have each of you heard from your respective kin in the last few hours?”
Gerard and Lucius nodded. “Iban also heard from Tobey and Travis. They’re well and investigating the massacre,” Lucius said. I of course knew what had happened since Will had practically confessed. But this would be a very bad time to introduce that particular bit of information if I had any hope of keeping Will alive.
“We still have to be very careful. The cure so far has worked on a one-on-one basis. But we’re limited as to how many we can treat because of the scarcity of pure voodoo blood. If we have another entire clan infected before I return home and increase our stocks, we’ll be in deep trouble.”
“And we’ve used what little cure we have to save one who deserved to die,” Iban said, coming up behind me.
“Will was our guinea pig—after you, that is,” Gerard said. “Now we know it’s the blood and only the blood that can affect a cure, which is further borne out by the fact that William seems immune—to infection by bite, that is. I don’t know about feeding from infected swans.” He frowned. “I’ll need to develop an easier test for carriers.
“William? Is there any way Melaphia might be persuaded to come with me back to Minnesota to—”
“No way in hell,” Jack answered before I could. He pushed past me. “I don’t care if all our sorry asses rot and die. We’re not causing Mel any more pain.”
“That’s easy for you to say, Jacko, since you’re probably immune, too,” Lucius answered. He pushed to his feet. “And I believe William turned over the leadership of the New World clans to me, so it’s my decision.”
Jack started forward. “In your dreams, asshole—”
The annoying ring of the telephone interrupted the conversation. Everyone in the room stopped but no one seemed inclined to answer it. On the third ring I felt a weak thrum of distress from Werm. He wasn’t very good at projecting his thoughts yet, but he could project fear.
“What is it?” I said after jerking up the receiver.
“William! Something bad—your house—”
“Slow down and speak clearly. What about my house?” A flicker of unease ignited inside me. Diana. Had Hugo come back for Diana? Reyha wouldn’t have let him in…
“I don’t know. I got here and—” He sobbed once and had to gulp in breath. “All the doors and windows are standing open. I’m afraid to go in. Something bad—”
“Find a place out of sight and keep watch. I’ll be right there.”
Twenty minutes later, five of us stood in front of my house. I could feel Werm nearby but had no time to locate him in the shrubbery. Stay where you are, I ordered. If you’re invisible, stay that way. The house radiated menace even though every light in every room seemed to be on. The doors and windows standing wide open reminded me of the Alabaster. Instead of a ghost ship, we had a ghost house, abandoned in a hurry. Werm was right: Something bad had happened. I could only be glad I’d banished Melaphia and Renee from here when I’d brought Diana and Will home and that Eleanor had stayed away on her own. It had to have been Hugo. Everyone else had been at the plantation. If he’d hurt Diana, no one would be able to save him from me.
With a nod to the others I moved forward.
I’ll go around back, Jack whispered in my mind.
In a few short moments, we ascertained that the aboveground levels of the house were empty. I made my way downstairs with the others following. Another ominous sign: The candles usually burning on the array of Melaphia’s altars were dark. I could remember only one other time in this century that had occurred, and it was the night when Melaphia’s mother, Seraphina, died. A thumping sound reverberated from the vault and I readied myself to attack whoever might have caused this disruption.
Stepping into the room seemed to suck the air from my lungs. A battle had taken place here, physical and metaphysical. I felt sick with dread. Melaphia would have stayed away—she knew the danger—
Jack clattered down the stairs behind me. “Where’s Rey
ha and Deylaud?” he asked, not bothering to keep quiet.
The room itself was empty but at the sound of his voice two things happened. The thumping began again, stronger but slower, and the high-pitched whine of a dog made the hair on the back of my neck prickle. Both sounds came from one of the closed coffins. I tried to push the lid open but it was locked. Rather than bother looking for a key, Jack jerked up the iron bootjack near the fireplace and brought it down, once, twice, then a third time on the lock. The wood splintered and the lock fell out onto the stone floor.
Diana—With her name on my lips I shoved the wood backward. The sight that greeted me nearly sent me to my knees.
Melaphia, hands bloody, face battered. It had been she who made the thumping sound—pounding with all her remaining strength against sturdy English oak. Next to her lay Reyha in dog form. Her face was bloodied as well, and it looked as though both her back legs were broken. She whimpered, looking up at me in confusion. Her injuries had to be grave for her to revert back to her dog self.
“Bloody fucking hell!” I pulled a handkerchief from my pocket and tried to stay the trembling in my fingers in order to wipe the blood bubbling from Melaphia’s mouth. The others who’d followed me here to fight all began to speak at once. “Quiet!” I demanded. “Search every inch of this place! Jack, see what you can find in the tunnels.” When he turned to do my bidding I added, “Don’t go far alone.” He nodded. With one furious look at the damage done to our family he stalked off. Hugo had better be long gone.
While the others looked for clues, I rested a comforting hand on Reyha’s shoulder but kept my gaze on Melaphia. “What happened, love? Who did this?”
Tears rose in her eyes and her first attempt to speak failed. She coughed up more blood and said the one word with enough power to finish the job of killing me.
“Renee—”
Jack
God help any and all of those three limey bloodsuckers if I found them.
The tunnel door was unlocked from the inside. That could mean they went out this way or simply that someone in William’s household had been careless. The lingering scent of vampire wouldn’t be unusual either since William, Werm, and I all came and went that way often. Still, I closed my eyes and inhaled deeply to see what I could smell. The scent of vampire was there all right, but so was something else.
Eleanor’s perfume.
When had she last come this way? With my sense of smell—at least twice as good as that of the average vampire—I might be smelling her having been there days ago for all I knew. Or not.
I took a quick look around the tunnels, not wasting the time it would take to venture too far in any direction since my gut told me they were long gone whether they’d come this way or not. The whole time I searched I knew there was something I was missing about this disaster—something my mind wouldn’t let me consider, much less believe. I didn’t want to know what it was, but I knew I was about to learn.
After a few minutes I raced back to the vault. The first thing I saw was Gerard feeling gently along the whining dog’s abdomen, trying to assess any internal injuries, I reckoned. At the same time, he whispered instructions to Werm as the youngster tried with shaking hands to splint the dog’s legs with a roll of gauze and what looked to be broken-off spindles from the kitchen chairs. The sight of Reyha’s gentle eyes in pain almost made me physically ill with rage and sorrow.
But it was seeing Melaphia that did me in. From the easy chair where she sat covered with a blanket, she stared straight ahead while William questioned her about what happened. I could hear the strain of forced calmness in his voice and something I had never heard before: panic. My fearless, indestructible sire was trying to beat back the panic he was feeling.
I then knew what it was that my mind had tried to protect me from.
Renee was gone.
William glanced at me. I shook my head. “Nothing” was the only word I could manage.
He turned his attention back to Mel. It was like she’d used up all her strength to signal us that she was in the coffin. When she finally was freed, she lost it. “Try again, my darling,” William pleaded. “You must. What happened and where were they going when they left here?”
I got down on my knees in front of her. “Please, Mel, try for Uncle Jack. Tell us where they went with her.” I reached out to her with the blood of Maman Lalee. Speak, I commanded.
Her eyes began to focus on mine, then she started to scream. “They charmed my baby! The red-haired devil enthralled her and she went with the four of them out to the tunnels even as Reyha and I were fighting to get her back!”
“Four?” William’s red mist was rising, I could tell, but he was also confused. I caught Melaphia’s meaning, though, remembering the scent I’d picked up in the tunnels a few minutes before.
“Eleanor,” I said.
Melaphia nodded and broke into hitching sobs that brought on another fit of bloody coughing. She glared at William. “Get her back, or by the souls of my mothers—”
“I will. I make you this solemn promise: I will get your daughter back if it takes my immortal life.” William rose up from where he’d been crouching by Melaphia’s side, and I stood at the same time.
Through the decades I thought I had seen my sire at his deadliest. I’d seen him eviscerate murderers, skin rapists alive, set rogue vampires afire and watch them writhe in a horrifying death dance until they burned clean to ash, impervious to their screams. I’d seen his rage billow out of him in a red mist of blood and fury that turned a harmless crowd into an angry mob bent on mayhem.
But I had never seen him look deadlier than he did at this moment. His face went as pale as marble and his pupils elongated like a cat’s and turned bloodred. When he finally opened his mouth to bark orders, his saberlike fangs shone sharp and snow white in the dim light of the vault. He looked ten feet tall although he was only levitating a foot off the floor.
“Gerard, take care of Melaphia and Reyha. See to their injuries and guard them with your life. Werm, help Gerard and do whatever he tells you to do. Jack, come with me.”
Lucius and Iban met up with us in the driveway. “We found nothing outside,” Lucius reported.
“Not a footprint, not a scent of vampire,” Iban added.
“Come,” William said, heading for his Mercedes. “Jack, drive.”
“Where?” I asked, leaping over the hood to the driver’s side.
“The docks,” William said. “As fast as this machine will go.”
Any other night, that would be as funny as all get out. Not tonight. I cranked the sedan and we were off like so many immortal bats out of hell.
Poor bastards. I couldn’t help feeling sorry for them.
We found two humans cowering in a storage cabinet in the ship’s main cabin but not a sign of the vampires. When we busted the humans out of the cabinet, they started jabbering in Russian. “Nyet Angliski!” they both said.
When William bared his fangs at them and told them they’d better come out with anything they knew about their night-loving traveling companions or he’d eat them alive, they shut up and just stared and gaped and at least one of them pissed himself. Sometimes a heightened sense of smell wasn’t a blessing.
“William, I doubt if these are vampire compadres. If they know anything about vampires, they would have known we could smell them out no matter where they tried to hide. My guess is that they’re just sailors who got shanghaied to drive the boat.”
“Leave them to me,” Lucius said. “I’ll get what information as can be gotten out of them.”
I opened my mouth to protest that Lucius would torture them and turn them into his own personal slaves, but William held up a hand to silence me. He let me read his thought that he didn’t give a damn what happened to the mortals at this point. To Lucius, he said, “Very well. Report back to the main house if you learn anything of use.”
When William, Iban, and I reached dry ground again, Iban shouted out his frustration. “Where the he
ll could they be? If you had let Jack or me kill that evil son of yours, this wouldn’t be happening!”
Iban’s simmering resentment toward William was so strong, I could feel it even though I wasn’t particularly close to him bloodlinewise. My sire’s emotions were near the boiling point as well, but he kept himself in check. For now. I jumped into the strained silence.
“There’s one place I can think of,” I said, and led the way back to the Mercedes. “When I took Hugo and Eleanor hunting in the tunnels, El refused to go back to the main house. She said she wanted to go to her place even though it’s just a basement at this point. Hugo saw where it was. It’s the only place I can think of to look.”
“Very well,” William said. If it occurred to him to berate me for letting Hugo too near Reedrek on that trip, he didn’t show it. He was too acutely focused on Renee.
“Besides,” I said. “We need to see what’s become of Deylaud.”
“If that hound had a hand in this—”
“You know he would never do anything to hurt Renee. Please don’t hurt him,” I pleaded.
William looked pained. “I won’t have to.”
The vampires and Renee weren’t at Eleanor’s either. But Deylaud was, and he was in such bad shape I couldn’t bear to look at him. Whatever anger William had felt toward Deylaud disappeared the moment he laid eyes on his formerly loyal servant. Unconscious and in his human form, he lay shivering on the concrete floor of the basement. His breathing was shallow and rapid, his pulse thready and weak.
“What the hell is wrong with him?” Iban asked.
“He’s paying the price for his defiance,” William said.
“What does that mean?”
“Deylaud and his sister—his littermate—Reyha are fey, mystical creatures. They were sworn to my service by a king of Prussia who willed them to me on his deathbed,” William said. “They guard me in my daytime resting place as their ancestors guarded the tombs of the pharaohs. In exchange for their service they were given two gifts—the ability to assume the form of both a human being and an animal, and immortality. If they break the vow of their former master the king, they forfeit both gifts. Deylaud knew that when he left my home without my permission to be with Eleanor. That’s how much he loves her.”
