Queen of Shadows

by Dianne Sylvan

  He didn’t want to open the note, but he knew he had no choice. His fingers were already unfolding the paper.

  The scent that wafted up from the note would have knocked him over if he’d been standing. A thousand blades of longing stabbed him.

  Dear David,

  I’m going to make you promise I’ll see you again, but I won’t say why. I may not even admit it to myself for a while. But if it’s ever safe . . . come to me. If it takes fifty years, I don’t care. Come to me. Maybe by then I’ll be ready to tell you what I’m too scared to say tonight.

  Thank you for everything. I’ll miss you. I know your life is long but please don’t forget me.

  ~Miranda

  He lifted the paper to his lips, closing his eyes, just inhaling the fading wisps of her presence for a moment.

  “Soon,” he said to the empty room. “I will see you soon.”

  Miranda’s fists pounded into the punching bag, each strike sending a cloud of chalk, or possibly dust, into the air. She ducked backward and kicked, causing the bag to shudder and, on the other side of it, Sophie to adjust her stance to hold on.

  “Harder!” the vampire ordered. “Move your feet!”

  A few minutes later Sophie stopped her, and Miranda stood panting, sweat running down her face and neck in rivulets. Her tank top was soaked, and she was burning up despite the fact that it was about thirty-four degrees outside and not much warmer in the studio.

  “All right,” Sophie said, walking over to the electrical panel and flipping several switches. Some of the lights dimmed and others brightened until the entire room was flooded in simulated moonlight. Then Sophie snatched a pair of crossed swords from the wall and handed one to Miranda hilt first.

  Miranda automatically fell into a ready stance, and she sensed Sophie’s approval. She knew that Sophie held back with her—she had to—but it seemed lately that she’d been gradually increasing the force of her attacks, so much so that Miranda went home after every session bruised and sore and cursing like she had their first week.

  She didn’t ask why Sophie was pushing her so hard. She didn’t ask Sophie questions; she did as Sophie said and figured out her own answers one step at a time. It was a maddening method, but an effective one, sort of the anti-Socrates.

  “Time for the inspirational power chords,” Sophie observed. “Do you want me to sing ‘Eye of the Tiger’? ”

  “You’re too young to remember the eighties,” Miranda retorted, earning a snort.

  “Fuck, girl, I barely remember my eighties,” Sophie shot back. “I went through magic mushrooms like Super Mario.”

  With that, she dove in, sword flying; Miranda did her best to parry, making up for the second’s lapse of attention by spinning out of the way. She brought up her blade as she turned, meeting Sophie’s swing with the loud clang of metal on metal.

  The sword was familiar in her hand and, according to Sophie, was balanced just right for her size. She didn’t know much about weapons, but she knew it wasn’t nearly as dangerous as half the objects hanging on the walls; it was a step up from the wooden one she’d started on, though, which Sophie said actually made her more nervous than steel, what with the whole stake-through-the-heart thing. Nevertheless, wood was safer for a human than something with an edge. The blade she was using now was relatively dull.

  The end was a foregone conclusion, of course. Sophie knocked the sword out of her hand, spun around, and kicked her off her feet; a second later Miranda felt the usual pressure of the vampire’s booted foot on her neck.

  Standing on a fallen opponent’s neck was apparently symbolic among their kind, a show of dominance; the Elite hadn’t used it because, philosophically speaking, they were all friends. Miranda had never seen any of them fight an actual enemy. Cutting their heads off didn’t exactly count.

  “I yield,” Miranda panted.

  Sophie stepped back, lifting her foot and letting her struggle to her feet. The diminutive woman’s expression was as calculating as always. “Not awful,” she pronounced. “You stayed on your feet for four more seconds this time. Keep it up and you might actually beat me in about a hundred years.”

  “Thanks a shitload, Mr. Miyagi.”

  She let Miranda take a break for once, and Miranda gulped down half a bottle of water and sank into one of the folding chairs on the room’s perimeter. Sophie, nary a hair out of place, wiped the blades of both swords and hung them back in their spots.

  “If you’re such a great warrior, why don’t you work for the Prime?” Miranda asked.

  “You have a piss-poor memory. Remember what I said about getting involved with Signets? You work for the Prime, you follow his orders and end up taking a stake to the chest before your time. Besides, if I joined I’d have to work my way up through the ranks and what, play second fiddle to someone else when I could be doing my own thing? I’m not really what you’d call a team player.”

  “Good point.” Miranda yanked the elastic from her hair and smoothed it out to pull back again. “Lucky for you they don’t have a draft, what with a war on and all.”

  “War is for people who believe in something. Me, I believe in drinking blood, fighting, and fucking, in that order. I outlived Auren and I’ll outlive Solomon, too.”

  Miranda felt the urge to do something like cross herself. Obviously Sophie saw the flash of anger on her face, because she laughed merrily.

  “Oh, sorry, I forgot, Your Highness.” Sophie bowed theatrically, then dodged the empty water bottle thrown at her head. When she straightened, she looked Miranda in the eye, suddenly serious. “You’re not just doing this for him, are you?”

  “No,” Miranda said without having to think. “Look, I don’t have any control over the war. It could go on longer than I live. I’m not going to lie around on a chaise longue waiting for my prince to come rescue me from my tower. And if he were the kind of guy who’d ask me to, well, he could go fuck himself anyway.”

  Now Sophie gave her a rare, genuine smile. “Atta girl. Now get up—we’ve got to do something about your footwork.”

  Feeling like she’d passed some kind of test, Miranda smiled back and did as she was told.

  Kat had been out of town for more than a month, so the look on her face when she saw Miranda wasn’t entirely surprising.

  “Holy Christ on a tortilla,” the blonde said. “You look awesome!”

  Miranda laughed and fell into step beside her. “Welcome back. How was Beaumont?”

  “Hell, of course. I hate Houston. Even in the middle of January the place feels like a swamp, and I got stared at from the minute I got off the plane. Dreads and tattoos aren’t the norm over there, did you know?”

  “No kidding.”

  “Seriously, you look great—have you been working out?”

  “Yeah. A lot. I got a personal trainer.”

  “Damn, girl. I said you should take a self-defense class, not turn yourself into Linda Hamilton from Terminator 2.”

  Miranda made a face. “I don’t look anything like that. It’s been a month, Kat. I haven’t changed that much.”

  As she said the words, though, Miranda wondered if that was true. She had gained back all the weight she’d lost when she started drowning in her gift, but at least some of that was muscle—she was working out almost every day and all her spare time was devoted to music. She ate like a horse, but to avoid Sophie’s wrath, she avoided most of the junk that she’d stuffed in her mouth the first month back in Austin. She was feeling remarkably well. It was possible that Kat was reacting to her aura more than her physical appearance. That, she knew, was very different than a few months ago.

  They walked up the sidewalk toward Kerbey Lane Café, one of their old haunts from college and a popular all-night eatery for the entire city. Miranda had eaten her way through a thousand plates of scrambled eggs and pancakes in the battered green booths of Kerbey and downed about a million cups of coffee during finals. Kat had been with her for many of those cups.

  “Oka
y,” Kat said, pulling her to a halt before they reached the building. “Um . . . please don’t be mad.”

  Dread. “God, Kat, what did you do?”

  “Well, remember that guy I was telling you about, Drew? The teacher?”

  “Tell me you didn’t.”

  Kat grimaced. “We were working together on starting the center in Beaumont, and I told him how great you are, and he really wanted to meet you, so I kind of invited him.”

  Miranda punched her lightly on the arm—well, she thought it was lightly, but Kat said “Ow!” and flinched. “Kat, I can’t believe you! You know why I don’t want to date anybody right now!”

  “So don’t date,” Kat insisted. “Just be friends. Nobody’s going to force you to hop in bed with the guy. I just think you need to get out more for stuff that’s not playing guitar or lifting weights. I just . . . I worry about you, sugarbean. You get all obsessed about things and you . . . get weird and disappear.”

  The caring in Kat’s voice eased Miranda’s aggravation somewhat, and she relented enough to say, “Okay, okay. I won’t run screaming. I’ll meet the guy. But I’m not dating him. And if he ends up having a swastika tattoo like that guy you tried to fix me up with two years ago—”

  “I had no idea! I just thought he was prematurely bald!”

  “—I am going to kill you,” she finished. “Come on.”

  Miranda steeled herself as she saw the figure waiting for them outside the café. She rolled her eyes inwardly—anyone with brains would have gone inside, where it wasn’t fifty below.

  “Hey!” Kat was saying. “What are you doing out here? You should have gone inside!”

  The guy turned around, and Miranda froze. For just a breath, she thought she was looking at David.

  He had black hair, and was slender, and wore a black jacket, but as soon as he moved, the similarity ended. There was no preternatural grace, no nobility; just the slightly awkward posture of a man who was nervous about meeting a woman. His features were more angular, too, and his eyes, though blue, were pale and had a gray undertone.

  Miranda’s heart still hammered. She had been ready to believe that split-second impression . . . she had wanted to believe.

  “Hi,” he said, offering a hand. “I’m Drew. You must be Miranda.”

  Miranda shook his hand firmly. “Guilty as charged.”

  She made up her mind to be friendly, and over the course of dinner and dessert, she decided to approve of him, at least conditionally. He was well mannered and well spoken, thoughtful, and definitely handsome; he knew music and was enthusiastic about it, avidly listening to her talk about performing. He even had a decent sense of humor.

  Kat kept the conversation light, steering around anything potentially hazardous like Miranda’s entire history, her family, or where she’d been last summer. It wasn’t too difficult; since the interview in the Chronicle, she’d been recognized in public once or twice, and anyone remotely interested in the Austin scene had at least heard her name by now.

  Drew paid for dinner and insisted on walking Miranda home when Kat begged off—Kat’s old heap of a car was in the shop again and she had to hurry to catch the bus or she’d be stranded on South Lamar.

  Drew, it turned out, rode a bike everywhere, but in the ghastly late-winter weather he’d taken the bus. She added that to the approval list: no gas-guzzling car, but he was a licensed driver, which was always handy.

  “Look, I’m sorry Kat’s been trying to throw me at you,” Drew said, walking alongside her.

  “It’s okay,” Miranda replied. “She just wants me to be happy, and she’s really fond of you. She’s played match-maker as long as I’ve known her. She loves seeing people fall in love.”

  “Well, that’s just it. I mean, I just got out of a long-term relationship with April, my last girlfriend, and I’m not . . . I mean, I think you’re beautiful, and you seem like a really fascinating person, but I don’t know if I want to go there yet, you know? And Kat said you’d had some stuff a long time ago and you aren’t much into guys, so I thought it might be safe to get to know each other, be friends. Then someday maybe more, but no pressure.”

  Miranda looked at him, marveling. “Are you sure you’re straight?”

  “One hundred percent.”

  She nodded. “Okay, Drew, I’ll tell you this, then. What Kat’s talking about . . . it wasn’t that long ago. I got hurt, and it left scars.”

  “Literally or figuratively?”

  “Both.” She paused in her walking and lifted the hair off her forehead, showing him the white line.

  “You’re shivering,” Drew said. “Here, take my scarf.”

  She started to protest, but he seemed genuinely concerned with no ulterior motive, so she took the proffered garment. It was hand-knitted and warm, and even one of her favorite colors, dark red. “Thanks. This is nice—where’d you get it?”

  “My grandmother made it for me. She lives in Florida and she’s always worried about me being cold.”

  Miranda smiled. “Must be nice.”

  Drew grinned. “Yeah, it is. I miss her a lot.”

  They reached Miranda’s complex, which was conveniently close to Kerbey, and she said, rather than inviting him in, “So . . . in the spirit of being friends, how about you come to my show tomorrow night? I’ll get them to comp both you and Kat at the door.”

  Drew smiled and nodded, suddenly clumsy in his excitement. “That would be great. Mel’s, right? Eight o’clock? I’ll see you then.”

  Miranda let herself into her apartment, sighing out of her outerwear, hanging Drew’s scarf on the hook under her coat. She’d have to return it to him tomorrow. It was best not to lead him on, even subtly. Friends was fine . . . friends was, in fact, very nice. It had been years since she’d had someone to talk music with, and even longer than that since the friend had been male. She needed to relearn how to relate to the opposite sex even on a purely social level instead of arguing with herself whether to cower in fear.

  Drew was sweet, charming, and touchingly human. Totally harmless to her inner senses, and easy on her eyes.

  He was also safe. She would never get that close to him, never be afraid of his groping hands, because she would never let him get that far with her. She wouldn’t have to worry about him hurting her, as long as she was honest and forthright. She wouldn’t lure him into a false paradise with promises of apples. If he wanted to admire the trees, that was fine.

  She also knew just from sizing him up tonight that if push came to shove, she could kill him bare-handed.

  It was a disturbingly comforting thought.

  Yes, Drew was safe. Drew was safe because he was human, and because she had already decided no human man would ever touch her again. The doors to her body and her heart were already closed and locked, and she would give the key to only one man, perhaps someday . . . perhaps never . . . but all the same, she didn’t care about falling in love, or getting married, or any of that, anymore. It was too late for mortal men to stake any sort of claim to her affections. If she grew old and died alone, it would be in full possession of her heart.

  And if she ever gave it, she would give it eternally, and without regret.

  Thirteen

  Faith sprinted along the street, weaving in and out of the crowds that barely noticed her except for the wind of her wake. Her coat and hair flew out behind her, and her feet hit the pavement with the rhythm of a drumroll.

  “Suspect is approaching Lavaca Street,” the network monitor said at her wrist.

  “I’m closing in!” Faith shouted back, running even harder. Less than a block ahead she could see the thin figure darting from one side to the other, deftly avoiding the humans as Faith did. “Where’s my cover from the west?”

  “Closing from Eighth Street,” came the breathless answer. “You’ll catch her first.”

  Faith pounded around the corner with her arms and legs pumping, adrenaline and wrath fueling her pursuit, her senses in overdrive. The hot, dark driv
e of the predator coursed through her until the universe reduced to her and her prey. Half a block. Closing in.

  Out of either desperation or stupidity, the suspect veered suddenly off to the right, out into traffic. Horns blared all around, but it was just after dark on a Thursday and traffic was so heavy that they weren’t moving very fast to begin with. A skinny black-haired girl running between the cars was irritating but not especially noteworthy.

  “Goddamn it, Sire, where are you?” Faith demanded into her com. “Now would be a great time for that tele-porting thing you do!”

  Before the sentence was even out of her mouth, one of the SUVs on Lavaca screeched to a halt as something heavy landed on its roof.

  The Prime straightened, his eyes flashing silver in the streetlamps, and jumped down from the car right into the suspect’s path. She hissed and threw herself to the left, bouncing off the door of a Jaguar and rolling underneath it.

  “I want eyes on every corner!” Faith snapped. “Twentyeight, Twelve, Nine, fan out!”

  David strode among the cars, lithe and purposeful, and the humans in their vehicles either stared openly at him or turned their faces away in instinctive fear of the one creature designed perfectly to kill them. He paused, breathing in the chilly damp air of an early-spring night. His mouth opened slightly, revealing the curved ivory of his teeth, and the woman driving the SUV in front of him shrieked and covered her child’s face.

  The light in the Signet flared, and he pushed out with one hand, seeming to move only air. The Jag slid sideways with the screech of rubber on pavement.

  The suspect, suddenly losing her hiding place behind its tire, dove for another, getting her feet up underneath her to bolt. She made it about three steps.

  David lifted one hand and made a tugging motion, and the vampire fell to her knees with a scream, dragged back toward him, her fingers clawing desperately at the dirty concrete until the nails broke and bled.