by Tanith Frost
“Okay. So we get caught by a human—assuming, of course, that these things don’t somehow wake up and fight back while we’re dismembering them. What happens then?”
I feel as if I’m in training again, running through a scenario. It feels good, though. Like familiar territory when everything else is both literally and figuratively so up in the air.
“The security guy dies.” Maybe it’s because it’s still a hypothetical situation, but I feel nothing when I speak the words. “We kill him to protect ourselves. Someone else comes down to check on him, they die as well. We keep working, smashing crates and possibly fighting off wakened zombies, just the two of us. Eventually, we’re left with maybe just a pilot and co-pilot.”
“And they know something’s up, of course.”
I sigh. “What are the odds that they have orders to proceed with plans as assigned if they have reason to believe there are enemies on-board?”
“Slim to none,” Daniel acknowledges. “So this likely turns into a suicide mission for us, one way or another. Either the pilot turns around and lands someplace where Lachlan’s goons can be waiting for us, or we end up in a crashed plane—unless you know how to fly this thing?”
“Afraid not.”
He shrugs one shoulder. “A crash it is, then. We’ll have dealt with this batch of zombies, but we won’t have warned Miranda.”
“Leaving Lachlan free to give it another go.” We stand in silence for a minute before I speak again. “Option two, I guess, is to ride this bird until it lands, get out, and call Miranda while they’re unloading crates. Then we follow them and see how we can deal with things once they’re on the ground. We might still be able to wreck their weapons but in a situation we’re more likely to escape. And maybe even with back-up.”
Daniel tenses. “I don’t like it.”
“I know. I won’t feel comfortable as long as these things are still out there. But we can’t handle this on our own—not unless we take the suicide mission option, and even that’s not a sure win. We’ve underestimated Tempest’s stock of these things once already. I’m not willing to leave Maelstrom unprepared if it turns out they have a few dozen more in reserve.”
Daniel glares at me as though speaking the idea out loud might make it true. “Fine, then. We’ll hide here, and as soon as we land, we’ll pass everything on to Miranda. Do we know where we’re landing?”
“No. Billy did mention Deer Lake, though. Sort of.”
The corner of Daniel’s mouth quirks upward. “You had time to get his name?”
“No, he looked like—never mind.” I doubt Daniel was into popular music back in the eighties any more than he is now. “Even if we don’t land there, we at least know where these things are headed, right?”
“Right. So I suppose all we can do now is wait.”
“And rest.” I gesture back toward the cramped cupboard.
“After you,” he says, and meets my frown with an uncharacteristically sheepish smile. “You let me oversleep yesterday. It’s your turn. I’ll wake you when I need to squeeze in.”
There’s no point arguing or trying to decline when he shrugs out of his massive jacket and lays it on the cupboard floor to soften my temporary bed.
I close my eyes, but sleep isn’t going to come easy this deep into the night.
“Daniel?” I ask.
“Hmm?” He’s settled himself on the floor just outside the cupboard. I can’t see him, but he’s letting me feel his presence, and the sound of his voice is reassuring. It seems silly to be so glad that I’m not alone with all of these bodies. I want to reach for him, to invite him in so I can rest my head against his arm, but I won’t pester.
“We’re going to be okay now, right?”
He’s silent for a little too long before he answers, “If we’re right about Lachlan’s plan, it depends on the element of surprise. If we can get out of here without him knowing we’ve found out where the zombies will show up, I’d say we have a shot. We’ll need to get word to Miranda, get teams organized…”
I don’t have to ask what he’s thinking when he trails off. We’d be better off if we had the vampires he took to Ontario with him, the experienced, well-trained hunters who finished off the Blood Defenders before the vampires of Tempest caught them.
The ones who were tortured and murdered. The ones he was responsible for.
I reach a hand out toward him and rest it on his arm. “We’ve got the advantage, now,” I tell him, though that doesn’t feel true yet. “He’s going to fail. And we’ll find a way to make him pay for all of it. Bethany, too.”
Daniel’s fingers brush over the back of my hand. Then he pulls away and stands up. “I’m going to look around some more.”
Reasonable, I guess. He needs to keep his mind on the job if he doesn’t want it to go to more dangerous places. He’s wounded, but not in a way I’ve been trained to fix.
I twist onto my back, feet braced against the cupboard wall, and stare up at the underside of the counter. I’m exhausted, sure, but I’m not going to sleep when I’ve got so much on my mind.
I might as well be on a plane packed with boxes full of live bombs. I’ve escaped from the frying pan without knowing what kind of fire I’m jumping back into—a fact that recent events have kept my mind off of, but that I’m going to have to face up to at some point. When I left Maelstrom, I was a wanted criminal. My clan-mates were actively trying to murder me.
It’s as if I’m watching over a stove and all of the pots are suddenly boiling over at the same time.
And there’s a fire in the oven.
And the roof is collapsing.
I wish I thought things couldn’t get any worse.
4
The fear only hits me as the plane begins its descent. The feeling is ephemeral at first, a passing tightening of my chest and turning of my stomach that I attribute to the mild turbulence and natural nervousness provoked by a situation where an accident could mean the end of even a creature as nearly immortal as I am. But it works its way through me, like vines rooted in my heart, tightening and strangling every part of me in their icy grip.
I remind myself that, for the moment, all is well. Nothing has changed that should make me feel this way now. It does no good. The vines squeeze tighter, mocking my rationalizations.
My mind races. Problems I was able to hold at arm’s length an hour or two ago now buffet me like waves in a storm, pushing me off my feet and dragging me under. It’s a trap. Miranda spared me because I was useful. She wanted me to spy on Lachlan, but what use will I be now that that work is done? Daniel has all of the information she needs. She’ll welcome him back and make an example of me, using me to solidify her position again. My chest tightens painfully as images flash through my mind—the guards who took such delight in beating the shit out of me before Miranda’s trial, the goons who tried to put a stake through my heart before I escaped the island. I’m walking right back into it. Delivering myself to them. I’m—
Something moves outside the cupboard, and I sit up so quickly that I bash my head on the underside of the counter. I hardly notice. If the zombies have wakened, if the humans are back and Daniel hasn’t warned me, if there were vampires upstairs this whole time and I was unaware of them…
Daniel crouches, and I nearly punch him in the face before I realize who it is and stop myself. He looks better—or at least, his wounds do. A few more hours of healing have done wonders, though the strain still shows around his eyes.
His brow furrows. “Aviva? What’s wrong?”
It’s hard to draw a breath to speak. “Nothing.”
“Bullshit. You look like you’re—”
“Trapped miles above the ground in a flying catacomb full of corpses just waiting to be reanimated?”
He smiles, but he’s clearly forcing it. “And yet you were fine with all of that an hour and a half ago.” He holds up a hand to ward off my objection. “Or if not fine, you were at least keeping your shit together. You look like h
ell now.” I sit up, and he seats himself beside me. “So what’s going on? Besides the zombies.”
This is good. Old times again. Daniel the trainer, here to help me make sense of chaos. I shouldn’t need this. Not now, not after I’ve accomplished so much on my own. But then again, I do need a friend, and he probably needs this moment of purpose and control as much as I need to talk.
“When you talked to Miranda earlier, did you have a chance to ask about me coming back?”
He shrugs. “Nah. I figured we’d leave that to chance. What fun would our homecoming be without the threat of your immediate capture and execution?”
“Daniel, I’m beyond the point where I can tell whether you’re joking.” It pains me to admit it, but it’s true. My brain is willing to accept any threat as real at the moment.
Which is weird. Really weird.
“We didn’t have time to exchange details,” he says. “Not once we had an enemy to deal with and a plane to catch. But she did assure me you were in no danger if you returned. And between you and me, she sounded relieved to hear we were both on our way back.”
This should comfort me. It does not.
The plane judders beneath us, and my stomach flips as our angle of descent sharpens. This is fine, though. Normal. Unrelated to my fear. I could pin the feeling on this, on my uncertainty, on the zombies, but…
Oh. Right.
And there it is. I’ve been keeping myself closed off, saving my energy, and it’s left me insensitive to changes that go beyond the pressure in my ears and the roller coaster dips in my stomach. But when I open myself to more, the answer is clear.
I’ve spent more than a week in enemy territory where they’ve all but eradicated powers outside of life, light, and the void. The moment I left Newfoundland and felt the emptiness on the mainland, I realized how strong the energies are here—I’d always been so immersed in them that I’d been unaware of their presence, noticing them only in places like Bloody Bight where they felt particularly strong and unusually dense. Now that I’ve been away, though, now that I’m returning to the island, I feel all of it. I understand what Bethany meant when she said the island reeked of werewolf; even here, presumably far from the sanctuary, I catch a faint hint of the fire that those hot-blooded beings anchor to the land. There’s void. There’s something that feels like my memory of afternoon sunshine when I was alive and free to enjoy it. And now there’s a hint of the heavy vibration I felt in the lair of the ancient monster that lives under the city of St. John’s and guards Maelstrom’s archives.
And most significantly, there’s magic, a power from another world entirely, and one I have a complicated relationship with. It should feel as external as any power besides void and fire, but thanks to an accident involving a knife coated in a dragon’s blood, I’m connected to it. It doesn’t inhabit me, but it affects me in ways other powers don’t. It makes me hyperaware—a gift when I’ve needed to call it to me during daylight hours to help me fend off the grogginess the sun brings with it, but a terrible curse when that awareness becomes anxiety, fear, even terror.
I reach for Daniel’s hand and grip it tight, tethering myself to reality. Maybe there is nothing to fear but fear itself, but it just so happens that fear can be a hell of a lot to deal with all on its own.
“It’s the magic.” I almost laugh. “Goddamn.”
Daniel frowns. “You said you didn’t notice it when you were away from the rift.”
“I’m not used to it anymore. I guess I’ll just have to give it time.”
He doesn’t have to tell me that I need to pull myself together before we run into any other vampires. I’ve been taught to feel shame over many things I’ve felt since my death—the empathy I felt for humans, and the love I feel for Daniel, which enemies could easily have used against us if they’d known. But there’s one thing a monster shouldn’t feel, one that I’ve overcome many times—fear.
I am what others should fear. Enemies should tremble before me. I’m strong, clever, clear-headed when I’m well fed. I’m powerful in ways that set me apart even from other vampires, for fuck’s sake.
I’ve learned to embrace empathy and love and use them to my advantage even if I still hide them from others of my kind who would see them as weakness, but it seems right that I should feel ashamed of this irrational terror of nothing.
The landing gear clunks heavily.
“I’ll be fine,” I tell Daniel, sounding steadier than I feel. This is no worse than what I felt at the rift, and it seems safe to assume this hypersensitivity isn’t permanent. Rationally, at least. The thin coating of sweat on my skin and the screams in my head insist otherwise.
There has to be a way to be rid of the effects of this power. If the connection to light can be severed in humans, there’s surely hope for me. True, Bethany’s procedure turned them into veritable zombies even before death, but that’s because she removed a connection that was essential to them. I just want things to go back to the way they were before magic infected me.
I’ll ask Imogen. The young enchantress still has a lot to learn about magic and her own gifts, but she’ll be a good starting point.
The plane slows and stops. I tell myself that what I’m feeling is normal—we’re in a dangerous situation, and I should be on alert for threats. I can use this. It’s fine.
The engines shut down. We wait, hidden, unwilling to tip our hand and alert Lachlan to the fact that we’ve been spying if there’s any way we can avoid it. We’ll hear when the cargo bay doors open.
And we wait. And wait.
“They’re refuelling,” Daniel whispers.
“And unloading soon enough, no doubt,” I add. I close my eyes, searching for the courage I know is buried under this mess of unnecessary emotion. “Maybe one of us should stay here with the plane in case they take off again while the other gets out to contact Miranda.”
“No.”
“Daniel—”
“No,” he repeats, not just more firmly, but with something in his voice that reflects my own fear and desperation more than I’m comfortable with. “Splitting up is too dangerous for whoever stays. Either we both go, or we both wait here to see what happens next.”
“Fine.” I feel as if I should argue but can’t remember why. All I really want is to be off this plane, and it’s clear that all he wants is to protect me as he couldn’t protect his last team. Win-win.
I give Daniel a little shove. “Let’s go, then, before they find us.”
We creep out of our cabinet, ignoring the crates that now seem more like insultingly rough coffins, and move toward the front of the plane. The door opens easily, revealing a room full of electronic equipment I assume is important for the plane. I hesitate, contemplating doing serious damage to it to prevent deliveries, but that small victory would come at too high a cost—they’d know they’d been sabotaged, and they’d figure out that we knew their plans. The zombies would be delivered to alternate locations. We’d lose our advantage, and… no. Not worth it.
A ladder leads to a hatch above us. Daniel goes first, cracking it open and waiting before he signals to me that all is well. I follow him up into the cockpit. No signs of life at the moment, here or in the passenger area, which contains more crates.
I wonder whether the pilots know what they’re transporting.
Daniel hauls on the lever that opens the exterior door, allowing a gust of refreshingly cold air to enter. It smells like jet fuel, but I can imagine what awaits us once we’re free of this flying mausoleum: a hint of salt, pine trees, the blood of our prey.
He nods back at me, and we make our way halfway down the stairs that have been rolled up to the plane before vaulting over the side and running into the darkness beyond the runway.
God, it feels good to move. Even my increased perception of the magic around us can’t keep me from feeling thankful. This action, this momentum, is making the fear seem less critical, if no less strong.
My steps slow. “This isn’t Deer Lake.�
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“No. Looks like they brought us all the way home.”
I look over our surroundings, focusing on the back of St. John’s airport—small by big-city standards, but the largest on the island. “Think they’re unloading them all here?”
“We’ll see.” Daniel jogs back toward the airport, aiming for the end of the building so we can approach from the front, hopefully drawing less suspicion. “Let’s find a phone.”
I’m not looking forward to going inside. It’ll be too bright, and there will be too many people even at this quiet hour of the early morning. Most humans won’t take particular notice of us—one of the many adaptations that allow our species to fly under the radar as long as we don’t draw attention to ourselves—and will forget us quickly if they do, but I don’t like to risk it if we don’t have to.
“They’ll still have payphones, right?” Daniel asks, speaking over the noise of the hard layer of snow crunching beneath our boots as the passenger drop-off area comes into view.
“I don’t know. I’ve never been here. Hang on.”
There aren’t many people around, but there is a family unloading themselves from a station wagon parked a good distance from the terminal. Mom’s got her hands full with four kids, one a baby in a car seat, two others definitely not yet school-aged. Between diaper bags, suitcases, and the ridiculously large stuffed hippopotamus that a sleepy-looking little boy won’t let go of, this mama’s going to have some trouble making it in by herself.
I pull my hood up, shadowing my face, and run toward them. Daniel has no choice but to follow.
“Hey, folks! Need a hand?” I offer the friendliest smile I can without showing my teeth. They’d definitely remember fangs if they saw them.
The mom looks up, wary but interested. “I’m sure I could find a luggage cart…”
“It’s really no trouble,” Daniel says, and I’m struck by the warmth and humanity he can bring to his voice when he has a role to play. He’s got his hood up, too, but the mom still seems a little flustered when she processes what she can see of him. “There are carts at the terminal. I could go grab one for you, but it’s just as easy if we help carry the load that far.”