“Kik, could you do me a favor with Eva when things calm down?”
“Name it.”
“Could you visit her? Try to get some kind of reading to see if there’s anything I can do to help?”
Kiko agreed, yet Dawn could see his puzzlement. But none of them had been with her on the night she’d brought Eva back from running away, after her mom had attempted to seduce Frank with her blood. They hadn’t seen how weird her mother was acting, all giddy and girlish, a one-eighty from sorrowful, wistful Eva.
What had happened in that wine bar she’d run to? What had caused her to turn around her attitude like that?
Dawn gestured toward the tape markings on the floor, knowing there was nothing much else she could do about anything until Friend Evangeline got back with news about the alarm. Or until they heard something from Costin. For all Dawn knew, he was on his way back from the Underground and there’d be a big party in store.
But just in case, she’d keep detecting.
“Want to tell us what you found out about Shadow Girl?” she asked Kiko.
He rubbed his hands together. He loved Sherlock Holmes-ing. “I think we reconstructed Shadow Girl’s attack on you. How’s that for a start?”
“Truthfully? It’s not that helpful. I already know how we fought.” Shadow Chick, looking like an evil Spider-Girl and sounding like a tangle-voiced assassin, had almost kicked all kinds of ass until Dawn had used her mind powers to level the playing field. Breisi had charged into Eva’s flat to chase Shadow Girl out, yet they hadn’t caught her.
“But,” Kiko said, raising a finger, “do you know why she fought you?”
Okay. Interested now. “Do you know?”
Kiko went from looking hugely superior to deflating a bit. “Kind of.” But then he puffed up again. “See, while I went around Eva’s flat touching things and receiving images and vibes, Natalia opened herself up for impressions, too.”
The other psychic held up her notebook. There were numbers as well as what looked to be a running commentary. “Every numeral that’s written on the tape matches an impression we received while concentrating on that particular location.”
Kiko moved to the left, where the number one was written on some tape that was strung from the top of one computer screen to another. “Let’s start right here. This is the window where Shadow Girl first looked in to get a peek at you.”
“I caught what was in her mind,” Natalia said.
Dawn waited, but the new girl hesitated.
Kiko rolled his eyes. “Nat’s too much of a lady to say it, but when the shadow thing saw you, she thought, ‘Well, fuck me!’ But it was a happy, excited ‘Well, fuck me!’ like what a hunter thinks when it spots its prey. Pure elation and anticipation.”
“Never thought of myself as prey,” Dawn said. Watched. Tracked. Shit.
“She’d been observing you way before you got into Eva’s flat,” Kiko said.
As Dawn held back a shiver, he moved to number two written on some tape on the floor.
“And here,” he said, pointing, “is where Shadow Girl landed after she crashed through the window. Now we find out that you were in for a real battle, Dawn.”
Natalia spoke up. “She wanted you to fight her with all you had. We felt that this shadow thing takes great satisfaction in stalking, in trapping. She was going to capture you, Dawn. Question you.”
Dawn had already known about the questioning part since Shadow Girl had taunted her with that bit, but she tried not to let the reminder creep her out, too.
“Let’s get to the nitty-gritty,” she said, thinking they could be here all night if she allowed Kiko free rein to show off everything he and Natalia had sensed. “Is this shadow girl on the side of the vamps or is she a rival hunter?”
“No confirmation either way,” Kiko said.
Natalia was shaking her head.
“What?” Dawn asked. “You disagree?”
“Somewhat. I felt a vague defensive instinct in her. I would interpret it as her wishing to protect the vampires.”
“Not the answer I was hoping for.”
Somewhere in the house, she thought she heard a door slam, and she spun toward the room’s entrance.
Costin? Had he already come back?
Then her blood turned cold. Costin wasn’t a slammer.
Frank had heard it, too, and he was already on his feet, his knit cap tossed to the ground as he headed toward the room’s exit. Dawn followed, a stake already drawn from its holster.
“Stay in here,” she said to Kiko, who already had a revolver loaded with silver bullets in hand. He was in front of Natalia like a bodyguard.
Dawn gave Frank the lead, since his vampire senses could pick out scents and sounds way beyond her reaches.
The tripped alarm, she thought. Had an intruder decided that now was a good time to come out of hiding?
Or did the team have company of a different sort?
When Frank and she got to the foyer, they found the source of the sound.
“Dawn!”
It was a Friend, and from the inflection, Dawn could tell it was Evangeline.
“Do you know who might’ve tripped that laser alarm?” Dawn asked. Maybe the slamming door had been caused by Evangeline’s windy speed after she’d reentered the house through one of their activated entrances.
“It was due to none of the Friends,” the spirit said, her voice spinning, ethereal. “Dawn, we must—”
She was drowned out by the forceful trills of other Friends as they entered the room, their jasmine swirling around Dawn and Frank. One even knocked down a pewter vase balanced on a shelf.
“Lock down!” she said as she passed Dawn.
“They’re coming!” said another. “And they’re not alone!”
“Who? Vamps?” Even though Dawn had half expected them, she still couldn’t believe that this relatively flagrant Underground would be moronic enough to attack in public, whether it was the dead of night or not.
“Charmed humans,” Evangeline said. “The vampires seem to be rounding them up!”
Charmed humans?
Dawn should’ve known. If the vampires were coming, smart ones wouldn’t be doing it so obviously at first—not until headquarters was broken down enough for them to easily enter, under quieter cover. The humans were probably going to do the dirty work for them.
So. How did a person fight other humans who were on the side of vamps? How did a hunter avoid killing innocent bystanders caught in the crap?
Frank strode to the weapons cache near the door, opened the safe, then extracted two machetes and a couple of earpieces, one of which he handed to Dawn.
“Those vamps’re here to get Claudius,” he said calmly. “And they’re gonna be spanked for it.”
Some of the Friends shot off to different areas, no doubt to guard Kiko and Natalia while the rest of them zoomed toward the walls, positioning themselves on high ground.
“Is my mom going to be covered in her room?” Dawn asked.
One of the Friends answered; Mary-Margaret, with her Georgia accent. “We’ve been leaving Eva alone since she’s been bed-bound, but one of us has gone to her now, Dawn.”
“Good.” She knew what she had to do next, where to position herself.
Dawn fitted the earpiece into her ear, then headed toward the lab and the vampire Claudius.
EIGHT
ABOVEGROUND, I
A lineup of Queenshill schoolgirls loitered in a dark alleyway, thirty meters from where they thought their target to be in a brick building across from the gated concrete slab known as the Cross Bones Graveyard.
Back in the Underground, the vampires had taken merely five minutes to come up with a plan that was sure to alleviate their problems. First, they would indeed utilize their animalistic vampire senses to track Mrs. Jones, thus obeying Wolfie. But when they found their former housematron, they would finish off what they hadn’t been able to accomplish last night: her death.
Wolfie
would never know, for he and Mrs. Jones would have too much distance and earth between them to communicate with each other, mind-to-mind. And the schoolgirls would always keep her fate amongst themselves. They had vowed it to each other.
Since Mrs. Jones had been bleeding when she had been disgorged from the community, the hunt had been rather simple, the schoolgirls’ noses leading them from Highgate to an abandoned building in Dalston, to the edge of the building here in Southwark where the scents disappeared. Much to Della’s excitement, there was a bonus in this hunt, for what else did she and Noreen discern but the smell of those attackers who had trespassed on the Queenshill campus nights ago.
For some reason, they were with Mrs. Jones in the building.
Though Della was excited, she was also afraid. The mean vampire—the lean one with the dark hair who had killed the dogs at Queenshill, exhibiting such bloodlust—would surely be inside, too. But the girls numbered twenty-five, whereas there were far fewer of the others.
Yet, how would the girls go inside without being invited? This was the quandary. Their head girl, Stacy, had also noted the presence of well-camouflaged light sources near the door, and Della frightfully recalled the UV grenades that the attackers had used on them during the melee.
So the schoolgirls had stayed hidden at first, heeding Della’s warnings about these attackers and their possible motivations. Della had believed the group might even be from a rival Underground intent upon taking over Wolfie’s community. In any case, if they were entertaining Mrs. Jones, or keeping the old vampire against her will, they were to be treated as the enemy.
Stacy—smarter, wiser, savvier Stacy—had suspected that the girls probably wouldn’t be able to sashay into this building without a care. It was only a shame that they couldn’t shift into any other human shape, as Mrs. Jones clearly could; their blood was weaker and they had inherited merely the ability to take animal form.
But the head girl had come upon an idea certain to maintain their safety, as well as their identities, while gaining access.
Charmed humans, she had said. Though the older girls weren’t at the level of Mrs. Jones’s charm, they had honed this power far beyond the ability to keep prey quiet. Plus, in the dark of night, outside the closing pubs, at a time when most wiser men and women had already taken to their homes, it hadn’t required much effort to approach several plastered subjects who still hadn’t abandoned the streets.
Easily persuadable. Easily charmed to do a vampire’s bidding so the girls could take care of Mrs. Jones, once and for all. They must use charm sparingly, though, as it could require the task of erasing the thrall from the human. And if that wasn’t done thoroughly, it could result in trouble for their kind. In spite of occasional missteps, the girls had been taught to avoid producing any suspicion of strange, paranormal activity that would put the public on alert, though Wolfie had always promised that, one day, they could be more open about their abilities.
One day.
At the moment, Della watched from the very rear of the pack in the alleyway as Stacy extended her hand, inspecting her nails from beneath a large, hooded coat, the better to hide her skin from any ultraviolet attacks. She was listening for their humans, who had already been charmed to enter until commanded to retreat. One of them was to attempt a peaceful entrance at first—a lone person knocking and crying at the door for the help of a Good Samaritan. All the girls required was for one sympathetic, unaware occupant to open that door so a vampire could persuade him or her into permitting them admission. If that did not work, the other humans were to try to find an alternate way in, as they would be able to enter windows or other doors with the crazed strength the girls had lent them. Then they would isolate a resident and bring them to where a vampire could work their charm on a member of the attacker group.
With this human aid, the girls would find Mrs. Jones . . . and perhaps then finish the fight with those Queenshill attackers.
Many of the older vampires, clothed in gaping, head-covering coats, too, were staring up at the sky between the buildings, impervious to the post-midnight cold, nightdreaming to pass the time away. A distance away from Della, a similarly covered Noreen fidgeted, no doubt missing Polly, who had stayed with a few of the other schoolgirls to keep Wolfie occupied.
Della wandered farther away from the group, where she could compose herself without anyone noticing. She was hungrier than usual, and her body growled with it. She hadn’t hunted, ripping into flesh and gnawing to the bone, for nights now. She longed for just a bite. Two.
More.
As she pressed her arms over her tummy, she listened to the slow, measured footfalls of the charmed humans in the near distance. They were certainly taking their time in getting to the building, and she sighed, leaning her head back.
Then she heard it: a movement beside her, round a corner.
She began to stand away from the wall, but she was pulled behind the corner so subtly that she doubted her mates had even noticed.
In a flash, her hood was pushed back from her head, and something touched her temples—a brace of sorts—clamping and then sending her into a numb zone of compliance. There, she existed only in the black cove of her mind, where the snaky, warped sound of a voice echoed.
Was it coming through whatever had been attached to her head . . . ?
“Della,” it said.
Fear waved over her flesh, and she couldn’t even turn round to focus on the entity that had put this captivating instrument on her.
Yet she already had a good idea of what the creature might be. She thought of the red eyes she’d seen one night when she’d found herself too far off the main paths of the Underground—the murky fright, the quivering and oppressive air, the terror.
But now . . . Now she didn’t feel the same slippery push against her skin and bones that she had back then.
Out of the corner of her eye, she dared a glance. And she found just what she’d been dreading—red eyes coming from the blackness.
A scream lodged in her throat.
Make a sound and I’ll make you sorry, the custode said in the thickets of Della’s mind. The caretakers were known to keep guard for the Underground, though Della didn’t feel safe round them in the least, so obedience came easily. The other vampire girls would not even know the caretaker was here, as the custodes carried no scent and took such care to remain nothing more than a shadow.
As Della sank further into the depths of her captivated mind, she answered, but only in her head.
I won’t tell anyone you’re here.
Good, it said. I didn’t expect to find the group of you aboveground until my partner communicated that Mihas had requested you retrieve Claudia. You tracked her here, didn’t you?
Yes.
The custode didn’t comment, and in that pause, Della could have sworn there was menace.
Why? Was the caretaker angry with them for being here? Angry with all of them for getting so far into a compromising situation?
Della panicked, thinking she should do all she could to help the custode and land on its positive side. We believe Mrs. Jones is in a building with those attackers from Queenshill. They’re shielding her or holding her, I’m not certain which it is.
It mind-spoke again. Hear me well, Della. You tell your chums not to kill those attackers. Then the caretaker seemed to reconsider. Well, perhaps you can do away with their vampire. Frank was his name, yes? The same goes for that more lethal one who hurt the dogs.
Della could only hope she would be able to face up to the mean vampire. I understand.
I want the remainder of the group for questioning. And be quiet going about this. I know what you girls are doing with those charmed humans, using them to get you into that building to Claudia. That was clever in this case. Your efforts could take any fight or exposure indoors, where the public won’t bear witness. But if your humans should attract any attention outside, call them off, Della.
We will. It’ll be as if we were never here. We in
tend to erase all evidence of our presence—
Della stopped herself. She’d been about to tell this creature that the girls intended to kill Mrs. Jones. In fact, she feared that the custode might have already gleaned the information.
She held her breath, hoping, hoping . . .
Yet, from the way the custode didn’t comment, Della wondered if the caretaker even cared that Mrs. Jones would die.
But that was ridiculous. Of course it would care, and Della shut down her mind, lest the caretaker access any further plans for Mrs. Jones.
I’ll be near to see that this remains a private affair, the custode mind-said. Do you understand me? Secrecy in this is imperative to the continued survival of your community.
We stay quiet. We withdraw if the trouble spills into the streets.
Yes, the caretaker thought, tweaking Della’s cheek. Precisely.
The custode released the contraption from Della’s temples, pulled the hood back over Della’s head, then seemed to fade into the dark of Della’s mind.
The rest of the night world rushed back: The swick of what sounded like outside lights turning on in the distance. The shuffled steps of the charmed humans as they halted. The knock one of them pounded upon the front door as the other ones hopefully hid themselves from view, as instructed.
Della crept back round the corner to her mates, just in time to smell jasmine and to see that Stacy was missing, having already hidden near the building’s front door now that the humans were stationed.
The rest of her pack crouched, their backs arched in readiness for what was to come, and Della joined them.
AS Dawn walked down the stairs to the lab, saving her energy, she heard Kiko and Frank over the earpiece, checking who had what weapon, communicating with the Friends as another knock pounded on the front door.
A charmed human. The vamps had no idea that the scouting Friends had seen what they were up to outside.
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