by Rachel Caine
“Are you sure?”
“Yes. Jester.” Vassily smiled and beckoned someone over from the shadows, where he was leaning against the wall. As the man crossed into the light, I recognized the pale skin, the slightly too-bright eyes. Vampire. Unlike Gloriana, I didn’t feel warm and fuzzy about him, not at all. “Jester, meet Shane. You’ll be sparring.”
Jester glanced at me, dismissed me, then stared at Vassily. “Hell no,” he said. “I’m not fighting some punk human. They break.”
“Suit yourself,” I said. “Saves you a good ass kicking.”
“What did you say?” Jester looked honestly surprised and puzzled, as if he couldn’t believe I’d had anything to say, much less something that wasn’t exactly complimentary. I shrugged.
“I can take you,” I said. “Believe it.”
“Prove it, Blood Bag,” Jester said.
Gloriana laughed and waved. “Boys, boys, there’s enough time for that. Today, you just…spar.” She turned to Vassily. “I have places to be. But I believe that my work here is done for now.”
“Yes,” he agreed. “For now. Come back soon, lovely girl. I’m going to need your help with the old man. He’s been getting a bit…impatient.”
I watched her walk away, still feeling that subtle buzz of her presence, that seductive thrill…and it didn’t go away when I looked at Jester and said, “Let’s go, Fang Boy.”
And that was the beginning.
Pain, yeah, there was a lot of that, but it seemed like the more time I spent in the ring, facing him, facing everything that I’d ever hated on such a primal level, the pain meant less and less. What mattered was letting the monster out from inside me, the one I’d been starving for almost a year.
I’d come to Morganville to take down vampires.
And Vassily and Gloriana were giving me the chance to do just that.
And oh, God, I loved it.
On the way to Common Grounds, Claire texted Shane—just a quick message to say she loved him. No immediate reply, but one buzzed through by the time she’d walked the distance to Common Grounds.
Shane’s message said, Be home late luv u.
She was still smiling and feeling almost completely happy when she opened the front door of the coffee shop and heard the bell tinkle to announce her arrival. This time of day, it was full of students gathered together at tables, books and computers out. Study groups, mostly.
She spotted Gloriana right off, because she was at the traditionally vampire tables, in the deepest shadows at the back of the room…and she was surrounded by other vamps. All male. There must have been five or six of them at the table, more than she’d seen gathered together anywhere but in Founder’s Square—old-looking, young-looking, all with identical expressions of rapt interest on their faces. All staring at Gloriana, who sat comfortably with one leg folded under her, sipping whatever was in her plain white mug, smiling, and talking. She really was pretty, and unlike a lot of pretty vampires, she came across as nice. Sweet, almost. Claire had good reason to think she wasn’t, because Eve had taken an instant dislike to her, but still.
It was impossible to resist her charm.
The proof was that one of the guys sitting at the table was Oliver, still wearing his long, tie-dyed Common Grounds apron. He was staring at Glory with a small, bemused smile on his lips, as if he couldn’t quite believe that she was here in front of him.
He glanced over and saw Claire standing there, and the smile disappeared. He stood up and came over to her. “What?” he asked. The warmer side he’d been showing to Glory was all gone in a flash.
“Uh, sorry to bother you, but could I get a mocha?” She was buying time, because looking at the situation in front of her, Claire honestly couldn’t see how she was expected to get in close enough to talk to Gloriana, let alone gain her trust, or grill her discreetly about Bishop. Wasn’t that Oliver’s job, anyway?
But maybe Myrnin didn’t trust Oliver with Glory. That would make some sense, given what she’d seen. She adjusted her earbuds. Nothing but a low hum of static on them so far, which was bugging her; she’d rather have her music on, but the idea of Frank interrupting it sounded worse than boredom.
Right on cue, there was Frank’s voice, whispering to her through the magic of technology. That was creepy, with an extra-strength dose of frightening. She still had nightmares about Frank Collins sometimes. And she thought he’d probably be happy to know that. “Right. You should be able to see her now. According to the records, she looks harmless, but she ain’t. Some female vampires have a thing called glamour, and she’s got it more than most. She can make anybody like her, including other vampires.”
Claire turned away a little, pretending to fiddle with her book bag. “Can you hear me?”
“Yeah, through the microphone on your cell.”
“What about Amelie? Could she make Amelie like her?”
“Probably not. Amelie’s got a thing vampires call compulsion; she can force people to do what she wants when she has to. Compulsion trumps glamour every time.”
“Does anybody else have this compulsion thing?”
“Oliver,” Frank said. “Not as strong, though. But Oliver’s a lost cause, anyway. He’s an old friend of Glory’s, if you know what I mean by friend. Looks like he’s given it up already.”
Yeah, she knew about that. She could have guessed it just from seeing the smile on Oliver’s face as he looked at Gloriana.
“Just be careful with her,” Frank said. “If she tries to glamour you, pain may break you out of it—it sometimes works for girls. Not so much for boys, for some reason—probably because she’s not as good at tapping into the girls, or they’re wired up differently. But she probably won’t glamour you, anyway. She doesn’t think much of humans in general, and girls are definitely not her thing.”
“Wait a minute. Back up. Your answer to how I’m supposed to resist is to hurt myself? How is that helpful? Do you think I want to be in pain?”
“Fine. Deal with it on your own, then. Enjoy the ride.” And the hiss was back in her headphones, constant and featureless.
About that time, Oliver gestured impatiently at the counter and thumped a cup down for her. Her mocha, presumably, although she wasn’t putting much faith in a decent brew, not with the scowl he was giving her. Her stalling tactic was pretty much dead in the water, and she couldn’t think of a single reason to walk over there to join Gloriana’s exclusively testosterone-filled—and pulse-lacking—admirers.
And then Gloriana looked up as Oliver slipped back in his chair, saw Claire watching her, and smiled. Their eyes met.
And Claire found herself walking toward the table. She wasn’t afraid, and she wasn’t thinking at all—she couldn’t remember the last time when she’d felt this kind of peace. Freedom from thinking all the time.
Just acting.
“Claire, isn’t it?” Gloriana said. She had a low, pleasant sort of voice, and her smile was bright. “Please have a seat. Oh, Jules, please bring another, would you? I don’t want to leave little Claire standing! So rude.”
Oliver wasn’t scowling anymore, but he wasn’t smiling, either; when he looked at Claire, it was an entirely neutral expression. Another vampire—Jules, presumably, although Claire didn’t know him—brought her a chair and she sat down, sandwiched between two strangers who almost certainly would have been inclined to drink her dry under other circumstances.
And she didn’t feel even a twitch of uneasiness.
I’ve been glamoured. That thought came from somewhere deep inside her, a kind of whispering doubt, but it wasn’t strong enough to make any difference. Not when Gloriana was smiling at her, those wide blue eyes so warm and welcoming. “I’ve heard so much about you,” she said. “So many people speak well of you. Even my old grouch Oliver, here.” She laughed and put her hand on top of Oliver’s in a gesture that was affectionate and, at the same time, a little bit patronizing, like an owner petting a dog. He gave her a quick look and a belated smile. “S
o, tell me, Claire, what do you think of Morganville?”
Normally, she would have been careful about what she said, but here, under the warm glow of Glory’s eyes, she just…spilled. “I love the people I’ve met here,” she said. “But I hate how it all works. I hate how humans get treated. I hate that it’s okay to hurt us. That has to change.”
Gloriana raised one eyebrow. “I thought it already had,” she said. “So Amelie tells me. No hunting without permission, and then only in restricted zones. It’s all perfectly tiresome, but I do understand the need for conservation, of course. Or are you saying that we should never hunt?”
“Yes,” Claire said. “Never.” There was a low growl from around the table. And she still wasn’t afraid. “Never,” she repeated. “You get your blood from taxes. You don’t need to do that to us. There’s no reason.”
Glory smiled. It was still a warm, charming smile, the kind that invited you to feel part of it. “Of course we have to do it,” she said. “Ask anyone who works with predators; suppressing the instinct to hunt is very, very tricky, and some animals never quite manage it. You must provide a controlled outlet, or inevitably someone will run wild. That would be much worse. Don’t you agree?”
“No,” Claire said. “If somebody breaks the rules, then he’s a criminal. And you ought to treat him like any other criminal.”
“How amusing you are, little one,” Glory said, and laughed just to prove it. “You’re Michael’s friend, aren’t you? One of those who lives in his house?”
“Yes.”
“And the other boy is called…?”
“Shane,” Claire said. She felt a pulse of dread, deep down inside, but it was just a twinge. “His name is Shane.”
“I’ve seen him at the gym,” she said. “He’s got good instincts, I must say. A good fighter. He’d be very valuable, in the right situation.” There was a glint in those lovely blue eyes, and Claire knew, in that same distant, unimportant way, that Gloriana was playing with her now, batting her around like a mouse. “Yes, I can see how he’d be very profitable to have in your corner.”
Oliver leaned back. “Too bad you don’t still own the boxing clubs that you were so fascinated by in Victoria’s time. Those were very lucrative for you, weren’t they?”
“Oh yes, quite profitable,” she said. “Too bad. He’d be quite an asset, wouldn’t he? And an orphan, too, I understand. So sad. Not having good influences makes one so…vulnerable.” She leaned across the table, and the warm intensity of her gaze on Claire’s cranked up so high that it felt like being bathed in pure, warm light, floating in it without a care in the world. “I understand you know my old friend Myrnin. How is he? I do so adore that mad old man. Is he working on anything…interesting?”
“Claire,” said a voice in her ears, a metallic voice that took her a second to place. Frank. “Claire, you can’t answer that. Snap out of it. Do it now.”
But she couldn’t. Even though Glory was talking about Shane as if he was a side of beef, even though she was asking questions about Myrnin, Claire still felt calm and entirely comfortable. She just couldn’t bring herself to feel anything else. Frank sounded angry and upset, but she couldn’t understand why. Glory was the best friend she could imagine having, better than Eve, because Glory would never judge her, never make her feel bad or guilty.
Claire said, “He’s working on—”
“Claire, sorry, but you need to stop this before you get in over your head,” Frank interrupted. And in the next second, she felt a burning, hissing pain that zipped through her body in a flash so fast, it was over before it registered. A shock coming from her headphones. Claire jerked a little, blinked, and her heart rate sped up with a jolt. She yanked out the earbuds, shuddering, and the calm fell away like a shed blanket.
Fear closed in, icy and sharp. Gloriana was still smiling at her, but it didn’t look warm anymore. It looked…predatory. And cruel. Claire swallowed and stood up. Her chair scraped back loudly. All of them were staring at her now, and the only one who didn’t seem to be on the verge of flashing fangs at her was Oliver. He was frowning, but now it was aimed at Gloriana.
“Glory,” he said. “Were you glamouring the girl?”
“A little,” she shrugged. “I just wanted to play.”
“Oh, for pity’s sake, play with someone else. She’s Amelie’s property. And she’s hardly worth your efforts.”
Glory laughed. “I know. But I didn’t hurt her, did I?” She turned that smile back on Claire. “Leaving us so soon, little one?”
Claire took a giant step back. The smile didn’t work now, probably because she had so much adrenaline racing through her body. “Stay away from us,” she said. “Stay away from Shane.”
Glory rolled her eyes. “I don’t want your boy,” she said. “Whatever would I do with him? He isn’t good for very much except violence. So much of that inside him.”
Claire left her mocha sitting on the table and moved for the door as fast as she could. She looked back over her shoulder as she left, but nobody had moved, not even Oliver, although he was watching her go. Glory was laughing and seemed to have forgotten all about her already.
Claire stepped out into the sunlight, ran half a block down, and leaned against the rough bricks between two storefronts. She closed her eyes and concentrated on breathing and controlling her shaking. Then, finally, she put her earbuds back in place. It took her two tries, thanks to her unsteady fingers.
“I didn’t get anything,” she said to Frank. “I didn’t know she could do that, make me feel like that. I didn’t know anyone could do that. Bishop couldn’t.”
“It’s a pretty rare power, even among vampires,” Frank said. “I only knew of three or four who had it. Killed two of them. Too bad I didn’t make it a clean sweep.”
“I didn’t even know what she was doing. I had no way to fight it.” Claire took a deep breath. “Thanks for snapping me out of it.”
“She wasn’t even trying,” Frank said. “If she had been, you wouldn’t have left that easily. Like she said, she was just playing.”
That was awful. Awful. Claire felt ill and filthy, as if she’d drunk a gallon of sewer water. She wanted to throw up, thinking about how easily she’d been walked around like a puppet. About how she’d felt everything that Glory wanted her to feel. “It didn’t do any good,” she said. “We didn’t find out anything.”
“Maybe we did,” Frank said. “She mentioned that she saw Shane at the gym, didn’t she?”
“So? Even I’ve been to the gym. So has Eve. Lots of people go there. Including vampires.”
“But why would Glory? She doesn’t fight. She makes other people do her fighting for her.” Frank’s voice sounded oddly preoccupied. “I’ve been going over the rolls of vampires in Morganville. Looks like some haven’t been surfacing in their usual routines recently.”
“You mean…you mean they’re missing?”
“I don’t want to jump to that conclusion, but I found five—no, six—that aren’t following their usual patterns.”
“Well, some left, you know. With Morley. They’re in Blacke, that little town outside of—”
“I know about Morley. I’m not talking about his people. These are other vampires that haven’t surfaced in the past three weeks. No checkouts at the blood banks. They haven’t shown up on surveillance. They’re not communicating at all on the phones or computers.”
“How can vampires go missing? Who are they?”
“Nobodies, in terms of the Morganville hierarchy. Just your regular vampire working class. And they haven’t been missed all that much. Vampires may socialize, but not like humans do; they’re used to not seeing each other for long stretches. Doesn’t raise any questions.”
“So where are they?” Claire asked. “Do they have any connection to Bishop?”
“Not that I can find. In fact, looks like they were on Amelie’s side in the conflict with her father.” Frank was silent for a moment, then said, “It bothers me that I do
n’t have eyes inside the gym. I can’t see or sense anything within those walls.”
“What?”
“It’s recent construction. No cameras. No portals. No way of observing what’s going on there. It seems like a lot of this connects through there, some way. I wish I had some devices there.”
“Inside the gym.” She thought about it for a second. “You want me to…what? Put cameras in there?”
“What, you’re scared to act as my spy?” Frank sounded amused now. “Knowing you, that doesn’t stop you. Never seen a kid so fearless, deep down. Not even my son.”
Shane. Claire remembered Glory talking about him, and felt a little sick—not because Gloriana was drooling over him, as Ysandre had, but because she wasn’t. Because to her, Shane was just another piece of meat, something she might get some use out of. Or not.
Whatever was going on, Gloriana was in it up to her pretty little neck. Claire was sure of it.
“All right,” she said. “If you want eyes in the gym, I’ll make sure you get them. Somehow.”
SHANE
I felt like I was cheating on Claire, and I couldn’t figure out why. All I did was fight…and I did damn good, too. Jester didn’t totally wipe the mat with me, and I was able to keep on going. When I got tired, Vassily passed me more protein shakes. I didn’t like the way he smiled or the way he watched me, like a proud owner of a pit bull in the ring…but that didn’t mean I didn’t like being in the ring, either.
So why, on breaks, did I go sit down with my phone and text Claire? It was like I’d been out kissing some other girl and felt like I had to tell her I did love her, no matter what I’d been doing that she wouldn’t like.
Well, she wouldn’t like this. I knew that without any doubt at all.
“Hey, meat! You done pushing buttons yet?” That was Jester, dancing around in the ring, looking lean and dead-fish pale, punching the air in a blur. “I’m ready to push yours!”
I shot him the finger and finished sending my message, took another drink of my protein shake, and felt the aches and pains magically recede. Not that they were healing, exactly…maybe they weren’t as bad as they should have been, but I was going to have bruises tomorrow. Lots of them.