Except he wasn’t in a tower, was he? But a basement. She imagined it: windowless, slimy stone walls. And he’d said chains, too, hadn’t he? Oh, God.
She swallowed the lump in her throat. “I’m glad you’re here. I wanted a chance to apologize for the things I said to you at the hospital. I never should have–” He didn’t meet her eyes, instead studied a place on the rug. “You are real. I know that. I shouldn’t have said otherwise. I was angry, and scared” – no, really, she’d been nothing, fighting the void – “and I lashed out at you. You didn’t deserve that, and I was wrong. I’m sorry.”
He held still a moment, not even blinking. And when he lifted his head, he moved as if it was heavy on his neck. Something about his edges weren’t right…as if they bled. She squinted and saw the tiny feelers of smoke lifting from his shoulders. The projection wasn’t strong, it didn’t want to hold. She must have made a face, or some kind of noise. She caught her hand lifting away from the bed, wanting to reach for him.
He nodded. “Do you want to see what I really look like?” Before she could answer, he flickered, like the image on an old TV, and then he was no longer the polished prince he’d always presented. He was no longer even standing.
He sat cross-legged on the floor, hands in his lap. Like the first time he’d appeared, it was his hair that caught her eye first. Not the sleek cascade, or the tidy braid, but a greasy, snarled rat’s nest that poured over his shoulders in knots. Frizzy and unkempt, and dull. Gaunt-faced, glassy-eyed, he wore heavy smudges of dirt, and raw, reddish patches that might have been burns or bruises. His clothes were rags, rotting off of his body. His long, beautiful fingers were grubby. And his wrists, she noted, were connected by a length of chain, and two heavy, flashing silver cuffs. Those cuffs were the only clean things on his person.
She knew she made a sound this time, low and choked, a sudden sob caught in her throat. “Val.”
“This is me,” he said, turning his palms up. The chains hooked to his cuffs rattled. “Behold: Radu the Handsome. Prince. Hostage. Whore. Brother-killer.” His smile was a horrible, emotionless facsimile.
She trembled silently a moment, and then she realized the shaking wasn’t fear; it was rage. She wanted to throttle whoever held him captive. “Who did this to you?” she asked, and the ferocity in her tone lifted his head, widened his eyes a fraction, so he almost looked alive again.
He blinked at her a few times. “It doesn’t matter–”
“Yes it does!”
Another blink. He shrugged and looked down at his grimy palms. “The first time – the initial capture – that was Vlad’s people. His Familiar, and his humans, and they knew – they knew how to subdue me. They kept me for a while, and then passed me along to some monks…” He shook his head. “It’s been many people. It doesn’t matter.”
She wanted to scream. Wanted to throw up. She curled her hands into fists and squeezed until her nails bit into her palms.
“Is it true?” he asked. “Are you–”
She shut her eyes, briefly, because how did her traitorous brain even begin to compare to five-hundred-years of captivity? But he’d asked, and he sounded like the answer matter. She nodded and met his gaze. “Yeah. Inoperable brain tumor. They can try chemo and radiation, but…They don’t think that will do anything but buy me some time, and I…” She took a deep breath and pushed past the wall of emotion that threatened to crowd out the nothingness inside her. “Whatever time I have left, I want to enjoy it. Not lie around in a hospital being sick.”
He stared at her with open sorrow. “Oh, Mia. I’m sorry.”
“I’m sorry, too.”
There was nothing else to say after that. They sat there in companionable, if grievous silence. Until exhaustion pulled her down sideways onto the bed.
Val was still sitting there, watching her, when her eyes finally closed.
~*~
She was awakened an indeterminate amount of time later by the ringing of her phone. She floundered a moment, slapping across the bed for it, noting in the process that Val was gone, and that the time flashing on her nightstand clock read 3:14 a.m. She squinted at the phone screen, trying to place the unfamiliar number, and finally just thumbed to answer; Dr. Patel had said he wanted to pass her case along to another specialist in Pennsylvania, and maybe…
Her sleep fog evaporated and she realized no doctor would call her in the wee hours just as she was saying, “Hello?” heart thudding fast now. This wasn’t a professional call. Maybe a wrong number…
“Hello? Mia?” her father’s voice asked, and suddenly she was wide awake.
She scrambled up onto her knees and gripped the headboard tight with her free hand. Her lungs contracted, and she fought to keep her breath slow and regular as it left her mouth. She didn’t want him to know that he caused her any kind of anxiety. “Dad,” she greeted, with what she hoped was a neutral tone.
Silence a beat, one she wasn’t willing to fill with idle chatter. She felt a stab of betrayal; obviously, Kate had called him.
“Your mother called me,” he said, finally, in confirmation. “Honey, I’m–”
“No pet names. We don’t have that kind of relationship.”
“Oh.” He sounded startled. Off-kilter. “Oh, okay. Well.” A breath that sounded pained, almost a whimper.
It angered her. He was the one who’d abandoned them. He didn’t get to act hurt.
“Mia, I’m so terribly sorry. This is just…it’s devastating.”
Mia closed her eyes, because the worst part, the absolute worst, was that he sounded sincere. Actually devastated. And he’d always had this soft, pleasant voice to go with his soft, pleasant face. Not a tall man, nor an imposing one; always smiling, wire-framed glasses always spotless and reflecting the light, screening his eyes – and whatever emotion might have lurked in them – from view. He bore all the superficial markers of a good father, but he hadn’t been one. Not ever. Somehow, she’d always found his unfailing politeness more offensive than outright cruelty.
“Yeah, well, I figured this would happen someday,” she said. “Not a surprise, really. It’s fine.”
“No. No, it’s not fine at all.” Heavy emotion; he sniffled audibly, and her hand tightened on the phone. “But it could be.”
Her anger caught, suspended for a moment in surprise. “What?”
“Mia, I know that you and your mother never saw the importance of my work–”
“You never saw the importance of us.” A low blow, but a satisfying one.
“That’s not true,” he said, smoothly. “I always loved you both, dearly, but your mother couldn’t be patient. She couldn’t see that I was on the edge of a breakthrough.”
She didn’t snap back this time; what was the use? Every time her mother asked him for even a scrap of time, he politely told her that she couldn’t possibly understand the magnitude of his research. How earth-shattering it would be. But he never told them anything about it; spent all his time at the lab; cut down their intelligence and understanding in a thousand little smiling slights.
“The last few years,” he continued, excitement coloring his voice now, “we’ve made some marvelous progress. There’s a new drug – a wonder drug! Mia, my colleague in New York attached a donor foot to a wounded war vet, administered this drug to her, and her body accepted the new limb. Flawlessly. We’ve returned a man’s sight. We’ve – we’ve–”
“Not interested.”
“No! No, Mia, listen to me, please! Let me explain. This is truly, truly a miracle drug. It’s not chemo, honey. It won’t make you sick. There aren’t any side effects at all! It’s not available to the public yet, but I’m the initiator of the trial; if you come here to Virginia, to the lab, I can administer it. Honey, this serum eats tumors.”
She allowed herself a moment of hope. To imagine that what he was talking about was true. A miracle, tumor-eating drug with no side effects.
She shook her head. “You sound insane.”
“I
know I do, I know. And if I told you the kind of research it took to create this drug, you’d think I sounded even more insane. But, Mia, I’m telling you the truth. I can cure you. You’ll be strong, and whole, and you can live your life.”
“I could never get onto the trial.”
“You’re not listening. You don’t have to be a part of the trial. You can just walk in.”
“That’s not how this sort of thing works.”
“I don’t have to play by other people’s rules.”
Her breathing had accelerated, she noticed, and fought to even it out again. This was…it…
“I don’t believe you.” She meant it as a forceful statement, but it left her lips as a murmur. She’d believed crazier things; she believed Val existed. So why not believe this?
It was more that she didn’t trust this. Him. Didn’t trust Edwin Talbot to do anything for her out of the kindness of his heart.
“Please believe,” he pleaded. “Please.”
“What’s the catch?”
“Pardon?”
“The catch, Dad. You act kind, but you aren’t. If you have some miracle drug that you want to give to me? There’s an ulterior motive. What is it?”
He took a deep breath that rattled across his end of the connection. “Mia. I can’t believe you think…”
“Thanks for the offer, but I’m going back to sleep.”
“No, wait! Please just tell me you’ll consider it. You don’t have much time. Let me do this for you. I…I know I couldn’t be the father you wanted. But I can help you now. Please let me do at least that much.”
She hung up.
The silence afterward seemed crushing. She could hear the fridge droning out in the kitchen, just audible beneath the crashing of her own heart against her ribs.
She knelt there for a long time, trying to decide if she should believe him. A part of her wanted to, desperately. A part of her that knew her time was short; and a part of her who had never forgiven the father that abandoned them.
But a larger, more insistent part knew that, father or not, Edwin wasn’t to be trusted. He didn’t do things for other people. Not even his own daughter.
Angry, confused, sweating a little, she slid back down and clicked off the lamp.
It was a long time before sleep found her.
7
WISH YOU WERE HERE
Donna let her hang out at the barn as much as she wanted, still taught her lessons, and let her ride Brando – in the indoor, where it was shady and the ceiling fans were going –, but she’d been officially banned from working. Mia hated being cut off like that, ostracized. The other students gave her sympathetic looks; all of her own students had called to express their condolences. Monica had baked her cookies. It was like everyone was paying their respects before she was even dead, and it got under her skin.
But there were bittersweet moments of goodness. She’d never gotten to spend so much one-on-one time with Brando. Riding him, bathing him, grooming him for long hours, working Show Sheen through his tail until it was gleaming and tangle-free.
She hand-grazed him now, on a low hill overlooking the rest of the farm, the Rockies a dark stamp along the horizon. Mia sat in the grass, lead-line held loosely in one hand, other wrist propped on her raised knee. The wind played with Brando’s mane, sweeping his forelock off his face, so she could see the bright white star that lay beneath.
Val lay on his back beside her, hair spilling across the grass, gaze trained on the tattered clouds that trailed by lazily overhead. He wore his modern jeans and tee ensemble today; Mia kept glancing over for glimpses of sharp hipbones.
They’d been quiet for several moments, just enjoying the sunshine and one another’s company. But then Val’s head rolled toward her and he said, “There’s nothing they can do?”
She didn’t have to ask for clarification. She took a quick breath, nerves shivering low in her belly. She hadn’t told him about her father’s offer yet. Since that first phone call, Edwin had left three voicemails and sent her five texts. Outright begging now. Please, Mia. Let me help you.
She shuddered.
Val noticed, sitting up suddenly, gaze going intense. “What?”
“My…” She had to wet her lips. “Remember how I said that I don’t get along with my father?”
She could never smell him, never sense him like she could a real person who was truly there. But she had the sudden sense that he stiffened. His voice came out flat. “Yes.” His eyes were trained to the side of her face, though. Very blue in the sunlight. “I remember.”
“Remember how I also said he was a scientist?”
“Yes.”
“Well, he…he called me. The other night. When I got back home from the hospital. He said that he – well, I never knew what he was working on. He would never tell us, only that it was important.” Shit, she was babbling. “Anyway, he said that he’d been developing an experimental drug serum. Miracle drug, he called it. He said that if I went to Virginia, he could give it to me, and that it would shrink the tumor. That it would cure me.” She finally turned to meet Val’s gaze, and was startled by it; the raw, unnamable emotion in it. “I don’t even know how that’s possible,” she said, just a murmur, pinned by his wild expression.
He swallowed several times, throat bobbing, and glanced away; his eyes darted back and forth, gaze shifting across the grass. He looked paler – more like his true color, the day he’d shown her how he really looked.
“Val?”
“That…that…” He panted, mouth open, flash of pink tongue sliding over his fangs. “Yes, okay. Yes.” He looked at her again, eyes feverish. “You should take him up on it. Let him give you the medicine. Yes…”
Mia frowned. “Val–”
“No! No, wait!” He shut his eyes, shook his head, winced. “Side-effects,” he hissed mostly to himself.
“He said there weren’t any.”
His eyes popped open. He reached to grab her shoulders, but the touch never came, hands flickering above her, trying and failing to land. “You can’t know that,” he said, frantic now. “There are side effects. Everything has consequences, Mia, everything. Especially miracles. Those never come without strings.”
She’d never wanted to touch him so badly. “I know. Believe me, I know.”
They stared at one another, her questioning, him reaching.
“I don’t want to do it,” she said. “I don’t trust him.”
His mouth pulled to the side, half-grin and half-grimace. “I understand.”
And somehow, she thought that he did.
~*~
“Hi, sweetie,” Kate greeted when Mia opened the door. She had three suitcases on the ground at her feet, enough clothes and personal effects for an extended stay. An extended stay that wasn’t enough time.
Mia stepped back and opened the door, knowing a pang of guilt, and a deep, deep frustration. “Here, let me get your bags. It’s the least I can do since I couldn’t pick you up.” She wasn’t allowed to drive anymore, doctor’s orders. She’d been taking Ubers everywhere, and Javi had given her rides to and from the barn.
Kate waved her off as she stepped inside, juggling the handles of the three rolling cases expertly. “No, no, I’ve got them.”
Mia closed the door, locked it, and reached for one of the suitcases – which her mother promptly pulled out of her reach. She didn’t want Mia exerting herself, not even wheeling a bag across the floor. It stung more than it should have, her pride getting the best of her.
“I can still do normal things, Mom.” Except for drive. Or ride unsupervised. Or leave the house without texting someone before and after. Fuck. She was an invalid.
“I know sweetie, I know,” Kate hummed. “Where am I sleeping, on the foldout?”
~*~
Mia hadn’t spent this much time with her mother in years. Kate had always been the best kind of sick-patient parent: always trying to find normal, distracting things to do, not hovering or making her fe
el like she was made of glass. They played countless games of doubles solitaire at the kitchen table sipping wine; watched all their old favorite rom-coms; went for long walks on the nature trail that started just at the edge of the apartment complex’s property, enjoying the first cool touch of fall on sunkissed summer skin. Mia hadn’t realized just how much she missed her mom until now.
But Kate being around all the time meant that Val couldn’t be, and that…bothered her more than it probably should have. She debated telling her mother about her spectral visitor, but ultimately decided “Mom, I’m in love with a vampire who can only visit me mentally” wasn’t the best way to prove that her tumor was under control.
Val had other ideas, though.
“I’m very charming, though,” he said, pacing back and forth across the living room rug one afternoon while Kate was at the grocery store. He wore the velvet today, sable cloak – she’d asked, and he’d said it was real sable, inspired by his adventures in Russian dream-walking – flung out behind him with one long arm so that it rippled around his calves in dramatic fashion. He turned to her, posed with his shoulders and hips cocked, head tipped to the side, grinned toothily and winked at her.
“Hmm, yes, very charming,” she deadpanned.
He huffed. “Very. Women love me. Men, too. Who wouldn’t?” He tossed his hair, and she couldn’t hide her laugh anymore.
He smiled in response, a smile that started cutting and wicked and all playboy…and melted into something soft and true.
It warmed her. “You know I would love to introduce you to Mom. But, um, I think she might…”
“Run screaming?” he suggested.
“Probably, yeah.”
He sighed and threw himself at the counter, sprawling all the way across it like he’d swooned. “Always so terrifying,” he said with mock anguish. He cracked an eye and looked up at her through a screen of hair. His tone changed, became serious. “You’re not terrified of me, are you?”
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