“Giovanni and Beatrice will be on their way to Penglai.”
Cheng’s eyes went wide. “She won’t be able to see him. She cannot see him.”
“She won’t. They’re not idiots. But after they see Ben, they’ll return her to Rome.”
“I would have assumed they’d be taking Ben back to Los Angeles or one of their other safe havens.”
Tenzin cocked her head. “Why?”
Cheng frowned. “He’s their son, Tenzin.”
“No. He’s Zhang’s son now.”
“Is he?” Cheng took a step back. “You made whatever deal you made with your sire, Cricket. But Giovanni Vecchio is the son of an ancient, just as you are.”
She scoffed. “His sire is dead.”
“But his sire’s sire is not. And Kato is as old as you and Zhang. Perhaps older.”
“It doesn’t matter. Giovanni is a fire vampire who belongs to a water clan.”
“You think they don’t have wind vampires loyal to them?” Cheng said. “Of course they do.”
Tenzin thought about all of Giovanni’s connections. While he might not be as old as Tenzin, there was a reason she’d once chosen him as a partner when she’d been an assassin. What he lacked in power, he made up in political connections, discipline, and sheer ferocity.
“What are you trying to say, Cheng?”
“I’m saying that Ben might not be in Penglai by the time you get back with your father’s sword. Be prepared for that.”
Tenzin stared at the horizon, watching as the sky lightened to a dark, pearlescent grey.
“I am prepared for Ben to hate me quite thoroughly. In fact, I expect it.”
“So why—?”
“I did what I had to do, Cheng.” She turned and walked to the stairs that led belowdecks. “Ben is alive, and I will not regret it.”
She was staring at the painted white bulkhead, drifting in a heightened level of consciousness. She saw the room from above, floating over her body. Saw the neatly stacked books, the spinning basketball, and the young girl cowering in the corner.
Wait.
She blinked awake, came back to her body, and stared.
What was that?
The basketball was between her palms and she was pushing the current of air around it, spinning it in an endless spiral. She heard footsteps approaching and knew who would open the door by the rhythm of the steps.
She didn’t knock. Impertinent. Then again, Fabia was trying on wrath for a change.
“You should not have come back here.” Fabia stood over Tenzin, putting her hands on her hips. “How could you do it? You knew what he wanted.”
“To die?” Tenzin said quietly. “Do you really think he wanted to die?”
“No one wants to die”—tears filled her eyes—“but you knew he didn’t want to be a vampire. You knew it, Tenzin.”
“I know he didn’t want to die.” She turned back to the corner where she’d seen the vision of a girl. “Go away.”
“You should go away!”
Tenzin looked back at Fabia. “You’re young and you love him. But don’t test me.”
“You called him your friend”—tears were running down her face—“but you are the one who killed him.”
“Johari killed him.” Her patience was wearing thin. “I saved his life.”
“You ended it.” Her voice broke. “Don’t you know why he didn’t want this? He worked every day and every night to prove he wasn’t like them. And you’ve taken that away.”
“Now you are being foolish.” Tenzin rose and walked to Fabia. “Go away before you try my patience.”
“You think you know him—”
“No,” Tenzin said firmly. “I do not think I know him. In fact, I know I do not.” She walked toward Fabia, who backed up to the door. “Your mistake, Fabiana Teresa Salvadori, is thinking that you do.” She shut the door in Fabia’s face and leaned against it.
Why was she so tired?
She locked the door and walked back to the soft pallet where she’d been meditating. She lay down on her back and closed her eyes.
And then Tenzin fell asleep.
She woke with a gasp, confused and uncertain where she was. She looked around and locked eyes on the one thing that made sense.
Basketball.
Metal room.
Benjamin.
She reached for the shirt she’d taken from his room and put her face up to inhale the familiar scent. She took a deep breath and let it out.
Ship. She was on the ship, and she would need to search Johari’s compartment that night when the sun went down. She glanced at the battery-powered clock on the box by her books.
5:41 p.m.
Tenzin blinked. “Cara?”
“Welcome, Tenzin.”
“What time is sunset in… wherever I am right now.”
“Sunset was at 5:40 this evening.”
She sat back on her knees. She’d slept for over an hour. An hour. And she’d woken at sunset. “How did this happen?” she whispered.
“I’m sorry,” Cara said. “Can you repeat the question?”
She’d slept. She had closed her eyes and lost time that hadn’t been spent in meditation or zoned out doing another task like weaving or playing music.
What was happening to her?
You took his blood. He took yours.
Once. She’d taken his blood once.
You took from the vein. He took from yours.
“That shouldn’t matter,” she muttered.
She rose and smoothed a hand down her clothes, straightening the tunic and leggings she’d put on the night before. She needed to visit Johari’s room. She needed to find out if Sina had any news about the sword or the vampire who had sealed Ben’s fate.
That was you.
“Cara, call…” She stopped before she finished the question. “Cara, call Andrew Leu.”
“Calling… Mister Stuffy.”
“Who—?” Oh, that’s right. That’s what she’d nicknamed her father’s friend in her address book. “Cara, he can’t see his nickname when you call him, can he?”
“No, Tenzin. Nicknames in your address book are private.”
“Probably a good thing.”
A few rings and Andrew picked up. “Hello, Tenzin.”
“Andrew. I am assuming my father has told you.”
Andrew’s voice was cautious. “He has.”
“There is no need to express any personal thoughts. I will likely need to speak to Benjamin later tonight once I go through Johari’s room. Please make sure he is in the phone room at the palace.”
“I will convey your message to Zhang.”
“Thank you. End call.” Better to not let Andrew express opinions. He tended to be far too insightful. Not unlike Cheng’s annoying butler, Jonathan. Or Giovanni’s Caspar.
What was it with the men in her life all having world-weary, insightful servants with charming English accents? Was Ben going to get one in a few years? Or was every vampire in her life slowly turning into Batman?
Tenzin turned off her tablet and packed what she could into the backpack she’d brought on the ship. She would likely be leaving after she searched Johari’s quarters, and she needed to travel light. She left the backpack in the hold and walked up the stairs to Cheng’s office.
He opened the door before she could knock. “Good evening, Cricket.”
“I need to see her room.”
“First you need to see this.” Cheng opened the door and gestured for Tenzin to enter.
Sitting at the desk, Kadek was writing in a notebook. He glanced up, grunted, then went back to work.
“Friendly as ever, I see.” Tenzin walked over to the long table where a bright blue tarp had been laid; a dozen or so plastic buckets sat on top.
“Kadek believes you should not have changed Benjamin.”
“I didn’t change Ben.” Tenzin started looking through the buckets. They contained artifacts. Glass lamps and platters. Porcelain. More gl
ass.
Cheng coughed slightly. “It would be more correct to say he thinks you shouldn’t have had Ben changed.”
Tenzin looked up at Cheng. Then to Kadek, who was glaring. Then back to Cheng. “Is there a reason I am supposed to care what Kadek thinks?”
“Shouldn’t have happened,” Kadek muttered. “Boy didn’t want it.”
“I suppose you could try to kill him,” Tenzin said, looking in one bucket that held what looked like old-fashioned glass floats. They weren’t round; they were flattened and pocked from age and saltwater. “He is more powerful than you, Kadek, and he is only two nights old.” She glanced at Cheng. “He’s more powerful than Cheng too.”
“More powerful than you?” Cheng leaned against the table. “Tell the truth.”
“No.”
Kadek asked, “No, he’s not more powerful than you? Or no, you won’t tell the truth?”
“Either,” Tenzin said. “What are these?”
“They’re boxes,” Cheng said. “This is what I wanted you to see.” He walked over and lifted one glass piece from the bucket, carefully inspecting it and holding it in two hands. “It looks like an ingot, doesn’t it?”
“Yes.” The color was brilliant, but the glass was pockmarked from hundreds of years of soaking in seawater.
Cheng twisted the glass, and the two halves split apart, a seam appearing out of nowhere.
“How—?” She gasped. “Oh. Clever, clever.”
He held it up to her. The glass inside the box still shone. “Harun made glass boxes with seams so fine they lasted a thousand years and protected the objects inside.” He walked over to the desk where Kadek sat. “Look.” He placed an object in her hand. “Do you know what that is?”
“Prayer beads? They’re beautiful.” Tenzin turned them in her hand. “They’re wood and lapis lazuli. Beautiful. I can’t determine their origin.”
“The wood is ebony,” Kadek said. “And we found them in one of the boxes.”
Tenzin looked up with wide eyes. “Impossible.”
This was what her father had said. The sword is in an oblong glass case. Now Tenzin understood what she was looking for.
“Look at the inside of this one.” Cheng lifted another from the bucket and handed it to Tenzin.
She looked for a seam but couldn’t see it. But she held the glass in both hands and twisted. With some effort, the glass fell into two pieces with a perfect seam. She held the glass up to the light and saw that the inside of the box was a work of art in itself. The interior was inscribed with flowers and pomegranates, filigreed words from an ancient Syrian poem.
Cheng handed her a necklace made of wrought gold and rubies. “This was inside the box.”
“He sent treasures stored in treasures.” They were so beautiful her heart hurt. “Take pictures and send them to Ben. He has to see this. Also, everything in glass must go to my father. This was the true gift. Everything else was simply filling the boat.”
“I would not think of keeping it,” Cheng said. “Though I may request to buy some of these pieces for my collection.”
“Understandable.” She wanted the ruby necklace for herself.
“Do you realize what this means, Tenzin?” Cheng said. “If your father’s sword was in a case like these, the Laylat al Hisab could be in nearly perfect condition.”
“Yes. But that’s not all it means.”
“What else?”
She remembered Ben’s words exactly. “We found the sword. It was with the glass like you thought. Glass ca-cash. Case. Like… bubble. Bread. Weird.”
Ben hadn’t known what he’d been looking at. Not at first. And Tenzin would never have imagined it without seeing these pieces. But Johari had known immediately what they had found, because she wasted no time eliminating her competition.
“Johari knew exactly what to look for,” Tenzin said. “That means whoever sent her knew exactly what Harun packed in that caravan a thousand years ago.”
30
Tenzin was staring at the day quarters of a vampire she didn’t know. She didn’t know Johari’s history or connections. She didn’t know anything about her training or her power. She was a vampire who had changed elements. She had switched loyalties, which meant she was not to be trusted.
She looked for clues in the things left behind. Johari’d had no opportunity to take her belongings after she stole the sword, leaving a few clues to where she might go.
There was a book about Taiwan and another about Macau. There was a map of the region with no markings on it. There was another book of nonfiction written by an Indian journalist. It was about refugees surviving in East Africa.
Interesting. And unexpected.
Tenzin picked up the book and paged through it, looking for pages that had been read, minute marks on the paper, and creases. The book might have been random, or it could offer a clue about who Johari truly was.
A picture fell from the paperback.
She stopped it before she lost the page, opening it to the beginning of a chapter entitled “The Good Doctor.”
She skimmed the pages of the chapter detailing the work of one man in Uganda, a doctor who focused on women and children in the refugee camps, but nothing stood out as unusual until she came to one paragraph.
Dr. Zuberi, born of an Arab father and an East African mother, sees it as his mission to help these women in need, though a rare skin condition keeps his clinic operating almost entirely at night. Nevertheless, he manages to…
Manages to be a doctor and a vampire at the same time. Tenzin flipped over the picture, which was yellowed with age. A tall, attractive man in a formal, long-sleeved thobe stared back at her. The long, off-white robe contrasted sharply with the man’s dark skin. His bearing was regal, and he did not smile. The picture was taken in a studio, no doubt at night using artificial light if it was the same ageless man. She looked at the back of the picture.
Zuberi in Lamu, 1934.
So this Zuberi was important enough to Johari to keep a picture of him, and also a book.
Interesting.
She searched the rest of the quarters, but there was nothing else of importance to note. Tenzin took the book and the photograph back to her hold and brought out her tablet.
“Cara, call Penglai.”
“Calling.”
The phone started to ring. Tenzin pictured it in the small room off the palace. The old landline was the only telecommunication off the island for the vampires who resided there, and the room was staffed by humans most of the time, polishing and cleaning the old rotary phone to keep it shining.
The ringing stopped and there was silence.
“Hello?”
She closed her eyes when she heard his voice. Tenzin couldn’t think of a single thing to say. She saw his face. His fine, graceful fingers holding the phone handset to his ear. His lips waiting to speak.
“Tenzin, you wanted me here, so I am. I’ve been waiting for an hour and a half. What do you want?”
She swallowed hard. “Did Johari ever mention a man? A doctor in East Africa named Zuberi? He is a vampire.”
“No.”
Damn.
“But she did mention a lover. He was the reason she changed, but they weren’t together anymore.”
“Did she say where he was? Did she tell you anything more?”
“No.” His voice turned hard. “Is that all?”
No, that wasn’t all. “Benjamin, I am going to find her. I am—”
“I don’t care.” The line went dead.
Tenzin sat frozen. A minute later, her tablet buzzed.
“Incoming call from… Penglai.”
“Answer.”
He didn’t wait for her to speak. “If you’re still on the ship, have Fabi pack up my stuff so she can give it to Gio. If she can’t do it, I’ll have Zhang contact Jonathan.”
She took a breath. “I can—”
“Just pass the message along.” The line went dead again.
Ben sat in th
e hard, straight-backed chair in the telephone room. His throat was on fire. Zhang and Tai stood over him, watching his every move like he might fly out of control at any minute. Ben didn’t feel out of control—he felt numb.
She’d left, just as he’d anticipated. But then she called.
And all she cared about was finding the sword.
Ben didn’t give a shit about the sword. He’d slept a dreamless sleep the day before, falling asleep like an exhausted child. He didn’t dream. He didn’t wake until the sun went down, but when he opened his eyes, her scent surrounded him and he ached for her.
The aching only led to anger. She was in his blood, and he wanted her desperately. Almost as much as he resented her.
“Are you ready to go?” Zhang said. “I will have Tai wait here. If she has any more questions, he can relay them to you.”
“If she has any more questions, she’s out of luck,” Ben said. “I don’t know anything more about Johari than what I told her.”
That wasn’t strictly true. He’d chatted with Johari on and off, but he didn’t want to think about that because it was probably all lies. He’d thought they were friendly. He’d thought she was a good person he could trust, even if she was a vampire.
But no, Tenzin had been right.
Again.
Which was just fucking annoying.
Instead of allowing himself to feel the anger that burst out every time he thought of Tenzin, Ben had taken Zhang’s advice and focused on the mechanics of existing as a vampire, especially a wind vampire.
Feed on blood, which wasn’t as gross as he’d imagined. Oddly enough, it tasted a little bit like warm milk now, only a little saltier. Describing it wasn’t easy. Ben couldn’t say the blood tasted good; he could only say it was satisfying.
And it was very, very satisfying.
Pull his amnis around him like a shield, but don’t let it make him float away. That one was harder. He wished there was some kind of button he could push to turn it on or off, but all he could do was work with his mind. The level of awareness in his body was at an all-time high.
He had to focus on the weight of his body against the ground. Going barefoot helped, but his feet were cold all the time. If he used amnis to heat them up, he started floating again. He felt like a kid learning how to ride a bike that was actually a unicycle, and by the way, it also had no brake.
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