"To prepare Bucchus for burial, juniper oil was flushed into his innards and then his entrails were washed and teased out with long instruments. He was anointed all over with sacred salts and more oils and set aside so his flesh would dry. Months later six priests carefully wrapped him in lengths of the finest woven cloth. He was buried in Memphis, Egypt's former capital. One day he will be unearthed by archaeologists and modern man will wonder at such loving devotion given to an animal by the pharaohs."
"That's . . . interesting," Mentor said, noting how Vohra seemed to know the future. And if he knew of Bucchus, he must know of the past, too, since according to him the bull hadn't yet been unearthed. The thought startled Mentor. He said, "You were around when they buried the bull in Memphis?"
"Oh, yes, and before that."
When he said no more, Mentor asked, "How long have you been vampire?"
"Since the beginning."
"When was that?" Mentor had to know. He was excited to think he was speaking with someone who might know all about their history.
"During the time of the dawn of man. At that time I was known by another name, of course. I have been called by many names."
Oh, my God, Mentor thought, exhilarated and a little afraid. He couldn't even imagine how old Vohra might be. "Vampires have existed since man first walked upright?"
The Predator nodded. Mentor believed him. There was no reason to lie. Vohra was what he was looking for in his travels. He needed knowledge and understanding. Maybe the ancient Predator had heard of his need and that's why he sent for him.
"The Egyptians honored the divine bull by mummifying him and sending him into the Beyond surrounded by jewels and companion animals and many vessels holding grain and wheat. They had worshiped him."
"Like Baal in the Hebrew Bible," Mentor said.
"A little. Yes, a little like that. Who will you worship?" Vohra asked. He turned his head now and stared straight into Mentor's eyes.
"I . . . I don't know. Must I worship someone or some thing?"
Vohra faced the river again. "That is your purpose. To find who or what you worship and then you'll know what you should do with the gift of life eternal."
Mentor wondered if Vohra meant he was the one who should be worshiped. It might be easy to do if Vohra had really lived as an immortal for so many thousands of years.
Just as he had the thought, Vohra broke the silence. "I don't want your worship. Living longer than you brings more understanding, therefore more peace, but long life doesn't make me a god. You would do as well to worship Bucchus as to worship me."
Mentor thought he talked in riddles, and he could not grasp what advice he was being given. Who, then, should he worship? What should he worship? And then he knew the answers to his questions with a flash of insight. His quest was to find the thing he could devote his life to. He would live hundreds of years or more. Vohra had lived thousands. So might he. He couldn't live if he never found good reasons to go on. He must love someone or something enough to make living worthwhile. He must honor or worship something greater than himself.
Vohra nodded now as if he agreed. The servant who had led him to the river came again and tapped Mentor on the shoulder. He was to leave. His audience was over.
But it was not his last. For many years Mentor stayed close to Vohra in the Egyptian desert lands, listening when Vohra felt like teaching him something, and remaining quietly out of the way when Vohra had nothing to say.
Before Mentor left to go out on his own again, he took with him a vast knowledge of the vampire's history. He hadn't yet found what he should worship, but at least he knew it was his duty to discover it.
Since those years, he had tried to live to honor Vohra. Until now, when Bette asked him, he hadn't known. Vohra was the wisest and most peaceful being he'd ever known. He was a neutral being, neither good nor evil, having lived so long he'd passed those artificial boundaries. Even now he knew the ancient one lived secretly in Cairo, passing for an Egyptian gentleman. Leaders of the vampire sects in every country made regular pilgrimages to see Vohra, to listen to his counsel.
"One day, I'll tell you about the person I live to honor," Mentor said, taking Bette's hands and helping her to stand. "But now you have things to do, and I have to leave. There are terrible things going on outside these walls, and I have to try to stop them."
He kissed her on the cheek and walked into the hallway before he vanished. The last thing he heard was Bette's strangled sob as she broke down into tears once more.
~*~
Dell stood around the hospital bed with her mother and her father. The only mortals in the private hospital room were the patient, Aunt Celia, and, standing at the foot of the bed, Celia's daughter, Carolyn. Celia lay in bed, her chest swaddled in bandages. She drifted in and out of consciousness, her body not fully recovered yet from the operation. The cancer had not spread, thank goodness, Dell thought, but it had taken most of one of Celia's breasts. The good parts left they took with the bad, for insurance.
When Malachi had been just a boy, he'd pointed to his great-aunt and informed her of a growth. Celia had taken him seriously and gone to a doctor for confirmation. It was true. She'd had a small tumor in the same breast she'd now lost years later. They'd taken out the earlier tumor and today, more than fifteen years later, it had returned. This time the breast had to be sacrificed.
Celia opened her eyes, and the first person she saw was Dell. She reached out her good arm, the one not bound to her side. Dell held her hand as tears sprang to her eyes. She wiped them away quickly before a nurse appeared. Blood tears would bring a doctor running, and none of them could have that.
"The doctor says he got it all, Aunt Celia."
Celia smiled a little. "I knew they would. I'm going to be all right."
She was using what strength she had to reassure her niece. That touched Dell more than anything.
Celia's daughter, Carolyn, stepped around the side of the bed and bent to kiss her mother on the cheek. "Mama, I love you."
Carolyn hadn't yet gotten the disease that would have turned her into a vampire. She and Celia were the rare family members who had escaped porphyria's deadly mutation. Dell moved aside to let Carolyn nearer the bed. She saw her own mother gesture toward the hallway and said, "We'll be back in a minute, Carolyn."
Standing outside of the room with her parents, Dell's face showed the worry she felt. Not about Aunt Celia. She believed her aunt would gain back her strength and be going home soon. No, it was what was happening in the city. Though Dell lived far enough away from Dallas that it had taken Ryan an hour to drive them to the hospital, she knew about the sirens that wailed across Dallas throughout the night. She knew about the dozens of fires. She knew of the deaths.
"Have you heard from Malachi?" Dell's father asked.
"Not in days. But I think he's coming home." Dell had reached out with her mental ability, connecting with her son, and had found he was heading east across Texas, the little boy at his side.
"He needs to be with you," Dell's mother said. She hadn't aged a day and neither had her husband. They didn't bother to wear the artfully applied makeup they now wore every day in their normal lives in the city. Soon her parents would retire from their jobs and move away from their home to start a new life elsewhere. They'd been in one place, one house, for all of Dell's life—thirty-seven years. It was time.
"I know. There are hundreds of renegades here," Dell said, meaning Dallas. They'd swooped down on the city and set fire to every building they could find that harbored Cravens. It was rumored they meant to disrupt the delivery lines that supplied Naturals like Dell and her parents with the blood that sustained them.
"What's going to happen, Dad?" Dell asked. She saw past her parents down the hall. The elevator door was opening and Ryan had stepped out. She hadn't told him yet of the seriousness of the renegade situation.
Dell's father turned to look at his approaching son-in-law before answering in a low voice. "It's going to ge
t bad, Dell. No one knows how bad. Ross is trying to keep his Predators calm, but there's a lot of fear."
"I heard about some murders on the radio on the way here to the hospital," Dell said. "They called them 'animal attacks.'"
As Ryan approached, she smiled at him. His presence always restored her. She put an arm around his waist.
"The renegades are leaving them where they take them," Dell's father said. "The police haven't put the murders all together yet, the precincts haven't shared their information, but it won't be long. They're going to know the human deaths can't be the work of just one serial killer or something. They're not going to know what to make of it."
"You should come stay with us," Dell said.
"Yes," Ryan agreed. "We have plenty of room."
"No, we'll stay in case we can help do something. We might be needed in Dallas."
That worry Dell had tried to wipe from her face when she'd seen her husband returned. If her parents didn't get their blood delivered by Ross' Predators, how were they to live? How were any of the Naturals to live?
After saying good-bye to Aunt Celia, Dell and Ryan drove out of the city toward the ranch. Ryan had been unusually quiet. Finally he spoke, his worry as deep as his wife's. "Why is this happening? You need to tell me."
"They say it's the Predator called Charles Upton. Remember him? The Houston billionaire that doctor brought to us when I was finishing high school? He was kept prisoner for years. That's why we never heard of him again. But when he escaped, he brought together a small army of disgruntled Predators. He had the help of another Predator who called himself Balthazar. Balthazar . . ."
"I know. He was the one who sent the assassins for Malachi."
She nodded. "Now Upton's trying to hurt Mentor and Ross, who put him in prison. He wants his revenge."
"He wants to turn Dallas into a hunting ground?" Ryan knew the implications of Naturals thrown on their own to find sustenance. All relationships with humans would take on serious complications. When hungry, a vampire of whatever kind would have no choice but to hunt his own food. Many of them would not feed on wildlife. Many of them would track down and kill humans.
"I think he wants more than that. Much more. I think he's just starting in Dallas because of Mentor," Dell said. "You're saying this could spread? Fires and deaths?" Dell imagined it all in her mind. First the largest cities in Texas, all lines of blood supplies breaking down and going undelivered. Every Craven found and burned to ash. Then the surrounding states would be attacked, the war rippling out from the center of the country to all its borders, north and south, east and west. Finally, if Upton was successful and he wasn't stopped, the whole world of vampires might look at the United States and decide chaos should reign everywhere.
Let humanity beware.
Dell said very little of this to her husband. She didn't want to project the problem they had in Dallas out into the world for him. If it never happened, the worry would have been for nothing. If it did happen . . . well, she couldn't think of that. They had to stop Upton. Here. Now.
"Dell?"
She had been staring out the passenger window at the passing scenery, her mind elsewhere. She glanced at Ryan.
"Will you have to leave the ranch? If Mentor calls you? Will you have to go?"
She reached over and placed her hand on his neck, her fingers softly massaging the muscles there. She wouldn't lie to him.
"I'll have to. If they need me, I won't refuse them."
For the rest of the trip home Ryan drove in silence. At the end of the summer they were going to celebrate their twentieth anniversary. After so many years together, their love had woven them into a couple who accepted the silences that came when they shared their worries. She was more human because of Ryan. He had expanded his perceptions of the world, realizing it contained more mystery than most mortals ever admitted. The two of them were bound by love and parenthood.
He had aged, closing in on forty with such grace she hardly noticed the crow's feet at the corners of his eyes or the weathering of his skin. Together they had strived to educate themselves so they could contribute to society. Together they had lived a peaceful, isolated existence, depending on one another for everything while they raised their beloved son.
The uprising in Dallas threw their lives out of balance, disrupting the peaceful flow. Things were changing for the first time in twenty years, and Dell knew it might be a change that lasted forever if Upton had his way. She couldn't even foresee what she and her mortal husband might have to face in the future if life didn't return to normal for them.
"Whatever happens, I'll be there for you," Ryan said, as if this time he was the one capable of reading minds.
She gave him a tentative smile though her heart ached. He was the most vulnerable person in her life. Malachi possessed so many of her supernatural abilities that he could protect himself. But Ryan was as frail and fragile as a roadside bluebonnet under a scorching Texas sun. Without the shade of her devotion and care, he had no real protection at all.
6
With the sun high overhead, Charles Upton wore dark sunglasses that kept anyone from seeing his eyes. He had caught a glimpse of himself in a passing shop window the night before when the city was on fire. Although at that moment he believed he had let his face return to that of the young Thai man whose body he'd stolen, he was stopped in his tracks. He neared the shop window, staring with surprise into his own eyes. They were no longer human. Perhaps he'd changed into jaguar so often his human features were being obscured bit by bit. His eyes were not Thai, even though the rest of his features clearly were. His eyes, however, were slanted into the flesh of his face, too long and too narrow to fit the sockets. His eyebrows had disappeared so that the bony protuberances looked naked and abnormally large in proportion to his face. The pupils were vertical and of an amber color never seen in a human being.
He looked out of jaguar eyes. He closed them, the long lids lowering slowly. He tried to rearrange the molecules of his body. Maybe he could force the cat to retreat again.
He opened his eyes to stare into the store window. Cat eyes stared back.
So it was true. He couldn't change himself back anymore. It would make life more difficult as he tried to pass through the cities of man. He'd have to wear the dark glasses and never take them off when he hoped to walk among men without them knowing his real nature.
This was disturbing to him, as he loved tricking men into thinking he was just like them. Yet sunglasses were a good replacement and provided enough camouflage. He thought one day he would simply let the jaguar out and keep it as his true face. He would be like an Egyptian cat god, half human, half feline. Besides, men would fear him even more if he didn't look like them. They'd know beyond any doubt that he was the genuine article—a supernatural being far superior to any of them.
He was on his way to a meeting with Mentor. This was not the time to waste any regret on the shape of his face. His intent wasn't to kill Mentor during this private meeting, or to get himself killed, but he still had to be alert. Mentor had taken him prisoner once before. Upton didn't think he could do it again, not alone, but he couldn't trust him for a moment, regardless.
It was Upton who had called for the meeting. Mentor should know they would never surrender. If Mentor called thousands to his aid, Upton wanted to assure him it wouldn't matter. His Predators would simply fade into the background. They wouldn't go away. And they wouldn't be foolish enough to take their numbers into the open against a vast army.
As Upton went up the steps to Mentor's home, the door opened and for the first time in years Upton laid eyes on his nemesis. Mentor still resided in the old body he'd had when Upton had been taken to the Thai monastery. The body did not appear older but inside it had to be slowly crumbling toward decay. Upton wanted to sneer, thinking of the monk Joseph who had loved his body too much to part with it.
Upton kept on his sunglasses until he was inside the house. As he entered the small living area, he remo
ved them. Mentor turned to face him and when he did, he hesitated before speaking. His gaze fastened on Upton's cat-like eyes.
"Your molecular structure is changing," he said finally.
Upton sat down on a sofa near a dead fireplace. He held the sunglasses dangling between his knees. "So what's your point?" he asked with all the sarcasm he could muster.
"My point is you won't be able to control how you look much longer. The jaguar will mix with the human until you'll be permanently grotesque."
"Oh, for Pete's sake, Mentor, let's dispense with the criticism. If I cared to look like you, I wouldn't have chosen the jaguar."
"You're right. That's not my concern. Turn yourself into a South American vampire bat if you want to."
Upton hissed noisily, his lips raising to reveal the fangs. "You know what I want, and it's not to become a bat."
"You're responsible for killing hundreds of vampires overnight. This has to stop."
"Why did I know you'd say that? As for the Cravens who died last night—they didn't have the right to call themselves vampire. Why any of you let them survive is a mystery to me."
"I told you . . ."
Upton exploded from his position on the sofa, rising to his feet to tower over Mentor. His young Thai body was much larger than the one housing Mentor. "I know what you told me! But you're insane. You and Ross and all the rest of them who let the Cravens live. They should have been murdered the day they became vampire. You're weak, Mentor. You're all weaklings who over centuries of time have convinced yourselves that you're moral and compassionate. Who said a vampire has any duty to be either? Who told you this is as it should be?"
Mentor stared at the floor. He did not look up. He said, "I can see you'll never be taught anything."
"By you? I should think not!"
"Then you'll die," Mentor said, raising his head to stare into the Predator's eyes. "Like Balthazar."
The name was like a punch to Upton's solar plexus. He sank onto the sofa, growling below his breath without realizing he was doing it. He hadn't been in contact with Balthazar. He expected him to come with Sereny once they had control of the city. Balthazar hadn't seen any reason to come until then, explaining it was best and less confusing if just one of them led the hundreds of Predators. Upton was happy to command on his own. It was what he planned to do in the end anyway.
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