by Rachel Caine
He bounced up and down in his web, all eight eyes staring right at her.
“You’re hungry, too,” she said. “Right? Myrnin didn’t feed you, either?”
That was really strange. Myrnin might neglect Frank, because he and Frank really weren’t a marriage made in heaven (and Frank could be faking it; he had a cruel and weird sense of humor), but leaving Bob on his own and starving wasn’t like her boss at all. He was ridiculously fond of the thing. She still remembered Myrnin’s utter panic the first time Bob had molted. It had been like a normal person freaking out over the birth of a child.
It was not like him to leave Bob behind if he was really leaving.
Something was wrong here. Very wrong.
Claire pulled out her phone and dialed Myrnin’s speed dial. It rang on the phone, and suddenly she heard an echo in the lab, a ringtone composed of scary organ music. She’d given him the phone and had put the ringtone on it herself.
The phone was lying in the shadows next to a stack of books. It had a cracked screen, but it was still working. Claire picked it up and felt stickiness on her fingers.
Blood.
What had happened?
“You shouldn’t have come,” Pennyfeather said from behind her. His voice, like the rest of him, was colorless, and his odd, lilting accent only made him seem less human, somehow. “But don’t worry. You won’t be leaving.”
Claire stumbled backward in surprise, catching her heel on a pile of discarded volumes, which overbalanced and rained down dusty, heavy tomes on top of her. She yelped and ducked, and realized she had an opportunity as Pennyfeather paused to survey the chaos; she jumped, slid over the top of the nearest lab table, sending books and glass beakers flying, and hit the floor running. She heard soft noises behind her, and in her mind’s eye she saw Pennyfeather leaping effortlessly onto the same table, touching down, and racing after her.
She felt human, solid, clumsy, and utterly outmatched against his eerie grace. Claire was accustomed enough to running from vampires not to be utterly terrified—she’d done it often enough here, in this lab—but Pennyfeather was different from the others. Oliver, Amelie, Myrnin…They all had some kind of humanity to them, some hints of mercy, however hidden. They could be reached.
Pennyfeather was pure vampire-fueled serial killer, and a human, any human, was no match for him.
Claire grabbed for the silver-coated stake in her backpack, but it had rolled to the side, and running and hunting around in a bag and watching treacherous footing weren’t exactly complementary activities. It was inevitable that just as her fingertips brushed the cool metal, her foot would come down on a book that slid greasily to the side, and she’d tumble, off-balance, to the floor.
As she did.
She got a grip on the stake just as Pennyfeather landed on her chest, nimble and startlingly heavy. He easily pinned her arms down. All she could do was rattle the stake ineffectively against the tile. No way could she get leverage to stab him, or even scratch him. She bucked, trying to throw him off, but he rode it out easily.
It came to her, with cold clarity, that she wasn’t getting out of this. No last-minute brainstorms. No clever little science applications to solve the problem. In the end, she was just going to be another Morganville statistic. Score another one for the vamps.
“Hey,” a scratchy, electronic voice barked over Pennyfeather’s shoulder, and a grayscale, two-dimensional image flickered into existence there. Frank Collins, Shane’s absent/abusive dad, looking scarred and scary, was wielding a tire iron, which he swung at Pennyfeather’s head.
Pennyfeather reacted to the thing coming at him from the corner of his eye, jerking out of the way and letting go of Claire to stop the swing of the blunt object…but his hands went right through Frank’s insubstantial arm, and Pennyfeather pitched forward, off-balance. Claire seized the chance to roll away, and Frank flickered between her and Pennyfeather, confusing the issue.
“Out of my way, spirit!” Pennyfeather snarled, fangs out.
“I’m not a spirit,” Frank countered, and his fangs descended, too, as he returned the snarl. “I’m your worst damn nightmare, Skeletor. I’m a vampire killer with fangs and a grudge.”
That sounded so much like Shane that Claire was actually startled. So was Pennyfeather, as a sudden blaze of fire shot up from one of the Bunsen burners nearby. Claire barely glimpsed it before scooping up the rolling stake and her book bag, and lunging for the dark doorway of the portal. Concentrate! she begged herself, shaking all over with adrenaline. She had seconds, at most, before Pennyfeather reached her no matter what kind of distractions Frank might be trying; he didn’t have any actual, physical force to wield on her behalf, even if he was inclined. She needed out of here, fast.
She couldn’t mentally reconstruct the Day House bathroom under this kind of pressure, or anywhere else that Myrnin had established one of his teleportation thresholds. The only one that leaped clearly and instantly to her mind was home—the living room of the Glass House, with its comfy couch and armchair and barely controlled chaos….
It formed in front of her as she plunged forward, trusting somehow, desperately, that she could make it happen.
Pennyfeather lunged forward and caught her foot just as she pushed through the plastic-wrap pressure of the doorway, and she was stuck, mostly out but with her left leg held in a grip so iron-strong, she knew he’d drag her back through.
Or worse. If she was stuck in the portal when it closed, she’d be cut apart.
“Help!” Claire shrieked.
Michael, Eve, and Shane were all in the living room. Michael and Shane dropped the game controllers they’d been holding and twisted around on the sofa to look blankly at her, as Eve—already facing her—clapped hands to her mouth in shock.
“Help me! Pull me out!”
All three of them broke out of their momentary freeze at the same time. Michael scrambled over the back of the sofa and got to her first, grabbing her arm just as Pennyfeather yanked backward, and although Michael held on, they both slid toward the portal.
Claire couldn’t get her breath. “He’s got me; he’s got me; I can’t—!” she shrieked as Pennyfeather yanked hard on her leg, and she felt the strain in her muscles. He was still playing with her. She’d seen an angry vampire rip limbs off a person, and it was frighteningly possible just now.
Shane took hold of Claire and wrapped his arms around her in a grip so tight it felt as if she’d be crushed. “Go, Mike. I’ll hold her here! Get the bastard off her!”
“It’s the lab!” Claire blurted, “He’s in the lab!”
She wasn’t sure Michael could make it through at all—there wasn’t much room—but she twisted over to the side in hopes of making more space. At least Michael knew what he was doing. He paused for a moment, fixing the lab’s location in his mind, then nodded at her and plunged through in a rush.
Claire felt the disturbance of the thin membrane still holding her leg at the knee like a strange tidal wave, and Pennyfeather’s grip tightened. He started to yank her steadily backward, and all of Shane’s strength wasn’t enough to keep them from sliding forward. If anything, Pennyfeather just seemed to be more intent on taking her with him, not less.
Claire screamed and buried her face in Shane’s chest as she felt the strain on her leg increase, going from painful to intensely agonizing, and in one more second she knew she’d feel muscles tearing loose….
But then a second later, the crushing hold on her ankle released. Shane had braced himself and was pulling with all his strength to counterbalance, and when the pressure let go, they both went crashing to the wooden floor with her on top. She was breathless and frightened, but it was still nice to be body-to-body with him, and she saw the pleasure fire in his eyes, too, just for a moment. He brushed her hair back from her face and said, “Okay?”
She nodded.
“Then let’s do this again later,” he said, “but right now, Michael needs backup. Stay here.” He rolled her o
ff him, got to his feet, grabbed the black canvas bag that Eve threw to him from the kitchen door, and dived into the dark.
Eve hurried to her side as Claire tried to bend her leg, and winced at the shooting pains that went through it. “Don’t,” Eve ordered, and dropped down next to her to run her hands over Claire’s knee. “Damn, I can’t believe Myrnin did that to you. I’ll stake his ass myself, if there’s anything left when the boys get done teaching him manners.”
“Myrnin?” Claire asked, and then realized what she’d done. “It’s not Myrnin!”
With a horrible sense of doom, she realized that she hadn’t told them it was Pennyfeather.
And neither of the boys was prepared for that.
ELEVEN
MYRNIN
It was so dark. Dark dark dark dark dark dark. Darkdarkdarkdarkdarkdarkdarkdarkcan’tbreathedarrrrrrrrrrkkkkkkkk…
I gained control of my clattering, chattering mind with an effort that left me trembling. Had I been still human, still breathing—as I was sometimes in dreams—I thought I would have been drenched in the sweat of fear and gasping. I dreamed that sometimes, too, the sticky moisture on my skin, dripping and burning in my eyes, but in the dreams it wasn’t dark; it was bright, so bright, and I was running for my life, running from the monster behind….
So many years running blackness turning red nothing nothing safe no havens no friends lost all lost until Amelie until this place until home but home was gone gone dead and gone…I gagged on the taste in the back of my mouth, the excruciating spike of hunger, and sagged against the wet, slick wall. Don’t remember, I told myself. Don’t think.
But I couldn’t stop thinking. Ever. My mother had beaten me for fancies when I watched the stars and drew their patterns and forgot the sheep while wolves ate the lambs and my sisters with their cruel and petty wounds when no one saw and my father penned up like an animal as he howled all the thinking never stopped never never never a howling storm in my head until the heat burst through my skin and devoured me.
Stop. I shouted it inside my head until I could feel the force of it hammering against bone, and for a blessed moment, I gained the space of silence against all the pressing weight of memory and terror that never, never went away for long.
There was time enough to think where I was and to remember my present situation…not my past.
The prison was familiar to me, familiar not from Morganville but from ancient and heavily unpleasant years past…. My enemy was still a great fan of the classics, because he had dropped me into an oubliette—a round, narrow hole in stone that was deep enough, and smooth enough, to thwart a vampire’s attempts to jump or climb. In less civilized times, one would be dropped in to be forgotten entirely. Humans lasted only days, generally, before the confinement, darkness, hunger or thirst—or simple horror—took them. Vampires…well. We were hardy.
It’s a sad thing for a vampire to confess, but I have always hated the bitter, choking dark. It’s useful to us to hide and stalk, but only when there is a hint of light—a glimmer, something that will define the shadows and give them shape. A blood-hot body glows, and that, too, is a comfort and a convenience.
But here, there was no glimmer, no prey, nothing to relieve the inky and utter black. It reminded me of terrible, terrible things like the grave I had dug my way out of more than once, the taste of dirt and screams in my mouth, vivid and sour, and that taste never went away, leaving me gagging on it, gagging and unable to fight past the choking, awful sense of burial only blood could wash out, blood and searing light….
DarkdarkdarkdarkdarkdarkdarkdarkdarkdarkdarkohmyGodwhy…
When I came to myself, I was doubled over and retching, my hands flat against the wall. I was on my knees, which was even less pleasant than standing. I sagged back and found the cold, wet stone of the wall only a few inches behind me. I could sit, if I did not mind waist-high filthy water, and my knees to my chin. Well, it made for a change, at least.
It was my fault that I was here, entirely mine. Claire always chided me for my single-mindedness and she was right, right, always right, even Frank had told me to go but poor, surly Frank, starving for lack of nutrients no one to change out the tanks and care for him properly, and Bob, what to do about Bob, I couldn’t leave him behind all on his own how would he catch his flies and crickets and the occasional juicy beetle without assistance he was so very much my responsibility and Claire Claire Claire vulnerable now without Amelie without pity kindness mercy no no no I could not go should not…
Chilly skeletal Pennyfeather, with his acid eyes and killer’s smile…
Frank warned me warned me warned me…
Pennyfeather dragging heretics to the flames, hunting me, digging me out of my last safe nest and into burning sunlight where Oliver laughed and then the oubliette the darkness dark darkdarkdarkdarkdarkdark…
I opened my eyes again, eventually, with my screams still ringing back at me from the stone walls. What a noisy chorus I was. It was still complete and utter darkness—the rock I leaned on, the water, my hand in front of my face, all bleak and black, not even a spark of light, life, color.
That was because I was blind. I remembered it with a sudden, guilty shock; it was odd that one would forget something that significant. But in my defense, one doesn’t tend to wish to remember such things (Pennyfeather’s awful pale grin, the flash of the knife, the pain, the fall).
You’ve healed from worse, I told myself sternly. I pretended to be someone clear, someone practical. Ada, perhaps, in her better days. Or Claire. Yes, Claire would be quite practical at a time like this.
Blind blind three blind mice see how they run who holds the carving knife where is the cat Dear God in heaven the cat and I am only a mouse, a blind and helpless mouse in a trap cheese if only someone would drop down a bite of cheese, or another mouse…
The oubliette, I was not a mouse, I was a vampire, I was a blind vampire who would heal, of course, eventually, and see again. Stop, I told myself. I drew in a deep breath and smelled ancient death, crushed weeds, rotting metal, stone. I had no idea where the oubliette was located. I was simply at the bottom of it, standing in cold, filthy water and thinking that this time, my favorite slippers were well and truly ruined. Such a pity.
All the whimsy in the world won’t help you now, fool. I could hear Pennyfeather saying it; I could feel the cold clench of his hands on my shoulders. This town belongs to the strong.
And then the fall.
Well. I was strong. I had survived. I always survived. Not this time never no one to rescue me no one to know I was so alone alone alone darkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkk.
The panic took some time to subdue; it lasted longer each time, it seemed; from a purely scientific perspective, I supposed I ought to have been taking notes. A monograph on the subject of terrors of the dark, with additions for the blind. I could write volumes, should I ever see again to be able to write.
Your eyes will heal, the rational part of me—a tiny part, at best, and by no means the best of me—whispered. Delicate tissues take longer to regenerate. I knew this, but the animal, instinctual part of me still shrieked in panic, convinced that I’d be left in this, choking nothing forever, doubly blind, unable to even make out the blank walls that confined me.
The evil tide of panic rolled over me again, and when it finally passed and my screaming brain stilled, I was crouched low in the water, huddling to the chilly walls and shaking in a near fit. My throat felt odd. Ah. I’d been screaming, again. I swallowed a trickle of my own precious and scarce blood and wondered when Claire would seek me out. She would; she must. I desperately believed she would. Surely she was not so angry with me that she’d spurn me and leave me here, in this awful place.
Please. Please come. I can’t survive this I can’t alone no no no not alone not blind no…
I was not used to feeling this horror, which combined all the fears of my mortal life in a toxic elixir; the closeness of the walls, the darkness, the filthy water, the knowledge t
hat I might never leave this place, that I’d starve here to rags and bones until thirst robbed me of all shreds of the mind I’d struggled so hard to preserve, gnawing my own flesh until it was drained dry.
I have become my father after all.
My father had gone mad when I was only a very young boy, and they’d confined him…not in a well like this, but in a hut, a lightless and chained hovel, with no hope or memory of daylight. When I had nightmares—daily—that was my hell, that I woke dressed in my father’s filthy rags, chained and alone, abandoned to the screaming in my head.
In the dark.
And here it is, nightmare come real, in the dark, alone, abandoned.
Nonsense. Pennyfeather has always worked for Oliver. I tried to focus on logic, anything to prevent myself from sliding over that muddy slope down into the pit of despair again. Ergo, Oliver wished that I be removed. Why would he wish it? Because Amelie trusts me?
It did not feel right. Oliver was not randomly cruel; he enjoyed power, but mostly for what power could do. He’d had many opportunities to remake Morganville in his own image, but he’d refrained, over and over; I’d thought there was genuine respect, even an odd and grudging love, growing between him and Amelie. Yet he’d changed, and through him, so had Amelie. For the worse.
Amelie, my sweet lady, so small and shy and quiet in the beginning when your master and mine had met, when as fledgling vampires we had learned the joy of the hunt, the terror of being owned. I rescued you from your vile father, and lost you, and found you again. Do you remember me at all, as that young and tentative vampire, full of fear and vague notions?
Amelie wasn’t herself. Oliver should not have done this to me; he should not have been able to, without her consent. There was something missing, something I did not yet understand.