Deep In the Woods

by Chris Marie Green

  Costin knew that he was talking about more than just the further pursuit of Undergrounds.

  “I will not share her,” Costin said.

  “And you shouldn’t.” Jonah didn’t have a chance with her. He’d always known it. Dawn would always love Costin, even if the two of them had a dysfunctional way of relating. Costin’s pride kept him from admitting that she was his master, even if she tried hard not to act like it. Dawn’s . . . well, her everything didn’t allow her to commit to any man.

  But Costin was far beyond a man, and maybe that was what she needed.

  Jonah was more, too, though.

  “How,” he added, “can you be with a woman you feel mortified by because she can rescue you? And don’t tell me I’m wrong.”

  “I only wish I could.”

  Jonah knew Costin was still coming to terms with the last time Dawn had saved him. Even so, he said, “Let her rescue you, man. Rescue us. That’s who she is, so don’t hate her for it.”

  But the he man soldier in Costin—the way he’d been for centuries—was too ingrained.

  Jonah had one last comment. “You’ve got to learn to let it go.”

  The words echoed between them, and he heard every syllable, taking it to heart, too. Costin wasn’t the only one who had a lot of work to do on himself. Jonah had enough baggage, too: the bitterness of a life that hadn’t turned out the way he’d wanted it to when he was human, the false relief of being something new.

  Costin sensed Jonah’s realization, then the determination to improve. And, for the first time, the Traveler truly admired him.

  They didn’t come to any kind of agreement, because who knew if he and Costin would ever get out of here? Jonah just wished there was some way to communicate with the team, to let them know that they were still “alive” and kicking.

  He closed out his discussion with Costin. “No matter how this ends, it’s been a privilege. I mean that.”

  Costin hesitated, then sighed, as if in appreciation. “Yes, Jonah. You have carried me through some trying times, and I will be ever in awe of how you succeeded.”

  As their thoughts joined in something like an inner handshake, Breisi’s essence came screaming back through the tunnel.

  “Shadow!” she said, posting herself in front of the cage while the other Friends joined her, even as weak as they were.

  But Jonah and Costin weren’t that broken down yet. They’d had plenty of blood before coming here, including Dawn’s.

  The sustenance wouldn’t last for much longer, but it would work for now.

  When the red eyes appeared in the darkness down the hallway, Jonah rose to his feet, bolstered by the handshake he and Costin were still engaged in deep within their body.

  FOURTEEN

  NEAR THE LONDON BABYLON, ANSWERING THE CUSTODE ALERT

  SO one of the old custode traps has snagged fresh meat, Lilly had thought minutes earlier as a door slid shut behind her and she traveled the tunnel, which was located a kilometer from the main Underground.

  She and Nigel had been observing this tunnel’s camera, watching while their prey attempted to escape its cage. The idea was a prudent one, allowing the custodes to inventory the creature’s habits, strengths . . . weaknesses. And they had seen how it was put off by the silver of the cage, unable to conjure the strength to pry apart the bars.

  Initially, the captive’s intrusion had set off a priority alarm that called Lilly away from regular patrol duty in Southwark. Since the trap was so close to the Underground, it was imperative that both custodes investigate what precisely had been caught; they were here to protect what was below the ground, not frolic about in an attack above. Just because the schoolgirls had launched their own rescue attempt up top, this didn’t mean a keeper had any business remaining there instead of doing her primary work down here.

  That was why Lilly had been compelled to leave the action with “Dawn” and rush straight over on her motorcycle. She’d barely even found time to bind her shoulder wound with a shirt she had filched from a drunk who was wandering home on the north side of the Thames. Fortunately, the blade that “Dawn” shot at her had resulted only in a superficial injury, so tending to it had been simple once she had returned here.

  Lilly walked round a tunnel corner, rolling her compromised shoulder, feeling the bite of the cut.

  Dawn. Now she knew who the mind-powered woman was, because Lilly had heard the rest of the hunter group calling to her after Lilly had sneaked into their house along with the vampires themselves. Now she could give a name to the humiliation of being bested and having to desert a confrontation with this female hunter yet again.

  The first time Lilly had run off, it’d been out of prudence. The second time, she’d been called away.

  Next time, Lilly wasn’t going to leave for anything.

  After she turned another corner, the cage with the trespasser came into view. One intruder, its eyes flaring in the dimness beyond the glaring squares of the trap cage. In her goggles, the creature’s gaze burned blue, the color marking it as a vampire, since their eyes retained their true hue in a custode’s night-vision equipment, unlike a human’s.

  Lilly had already made an educated guess as to its identity. Was this the “mean vampire,” as the Underground girls called him? He hadn’t been with his group back in Southwark. . . .

  Then she smelled the jasmine, and her heart beat faster.

  Ghosts? Whatever one called them, the entities were accomplished. Lilly had seen them in action earlier as the spirits had tossed the vampire girls about in Southwark, but she hadn’t witnessed the spirits kill.

  A weakness? she wondered. Or a choice?

  She moved down the tunnel toward the blue eyes, absorbing the vampire’s features with her night-vision, now that she was closer. The camera hadn’t been so detailed with its higher view.

  The creature was a male, with dark, slightly curled, tossed about hair. High cheekbones. Nice, full lips. Very fit under a dashing black shirt, pants, and boots. His long coat bunched on the ground next to him whilst he faced her as if he were in a standoff.

  Ah, yes. He did match the description the girls had provided for the mean vampire, didn’t he?

  When Lilly spoke, her tone was altered by her voice box. “Catch of the day.”

  “Who’s the catch—me or you?” he asked, and she was delighted to note that he didn’t sound afraid.

  This would be much more fun that way.

  Then a blast of jasmine took Lilly off her feet, away from the cage, but she controlled her body, using the force of the attack to roll over the ground and spring back up. When the scent came at her again, it was noticeably weaker, and Lilly sparred with the invisible cloud of it, tumbling with the punches until the entity retreated.

  As she crouched, hands up in anticipation of another attack, her shoulder throbbing, Lilly wasn’t certain of how to fight these creatures. Her training hadn’t covered interacting with ghosts, only solid enemies. Perhaps the copies of old custode files culled from Menlo Hall—a place that seemed a remote memory—and then stored in the computers would hold answers. She would learn the information quickly enough.

  The entities jammed Lilly farther away from the cage, as if they were defending the vampire.

  Afterward, she got to her feet, hardly beaten. The jasmine provided a definite connection between this vampire and the hunters. Not a bad night’s work so far. “Bodyguards, I assume?”

  “Just some good friends,” the trespasser said.

  “They’re not as hardy as I noticed them to be in the building where the rest of your group was fending off the schoolgirls earlier. Pity I had to leave before I witnessed the outcome.”

  She’d meant to draw a reaction out of the vampire, to see how this suspenseful news regarding his comrades would fare with him. But he remained cool.

  Lilly admired that, but she also enjoyed trifling with her prey, so she added, “You don’t seem to care how they might be faring in a conflict. Are you com
municating with them, even from under the ground?”

  His sarcastic side-smile told her he wouldn’t be answering any specifics. “Oh, I care about them.” His tone was tight.

  So he had been affected.

  She added, “There was an alarm that called me away, you see, and I had to come here to inspect what got tangled in this trap. You’ve been a bad boy, sneaking into places you shouldn’t be.”

  “I’ve been worse.”

  In spite of his studied coolness, Lilly could tell he was on tenterhooks because she’d dangled the bait of his mates’ confrontation with the vampire girls in front of him, then yanked it away.

  And she would keep it away for now.

  “So,” she said, “it seems we find ourselves in a situation. Your chums have one of ours and now we have you. What a game of chess this is, eh?”

  “Let’s stop beating around the bush,” the vampire said. “Either you’re going to kill me now, wiping your hands of any trouble I might be, or you’re going to question me about why I’m here, among other things.”

  “Just as I’m sure you’re questioning our vampire. But based on your being here, in a cage, I would say Claudia gave you some false information.” Lilly motioned toward the trap. “This cage was built using silver just in case other vampires did wander here. Most creatures like you are vulnerable to the poison.”

  The vampire remained silent.

  “Claudia, Claudia,” Lilly said. “She’s a brilliant one, setting you up like this.”

  “Claudius does have his attributes,” he said, using the male name of the master, probably just to show how far his friends had got in drawing information out of the master vampire.

  But Lilly was certain Claudia/Claudius would never crumble under interrogation. When push came to shove, the vampire owed her allegiance to the dragon, even above Mihas, for she knew that the dragon would reward her beyond everything else some day. None of them were idiot enough to ever cross the dragon.

  “Just out of curiosity,” Lilly said, “why are you after them?”

  “Them? The vampires?” He cocked an eyebrow. “Doesn’t that include you, too?”

  She would have to watch her phrasing. There was no need for him to know that she worked independently of the Underground.

  “Semantics.” Lilly took a step forward but a wall of jasmine blocked her. She could feel its force, but there was also a sense of melting, as if the entities were losing verve.

  Interesting.

  “You like to avoid questions,” Lilly continued. “But may I point out to you that you’re in a cage and I’m not?”

  “The better for you not to get to me.”

  “If you’re also referring to this jasmine”—Lilly waved her hand in front of her face, as if to chase away a stink—“I wouldn’t depend on it ultimately keeping me away. And as for the cage? I know the only way out of it, and it certainly isn’t through digging or pulling at the bars.”

  “Why does it sound like you’re about to make some kind of offer?”

  Smiling in acknowledgement, Lilly attempted another step, but the jasmine wouldn’t allow it. “You talk, I listen. Then we shall discuss your release.”

  “Release. That’s a good one.”

  Though he’d resigned himself to termination—he couldn’t stay alive, not with all the trouble his group was causing—he didn’t seem defeated.

  She took out the curved knife she used during each night’s mandatory Relaquory ritual. Normally, the blade drew blood during an offering to the heart of the Underground, but the instrument often came in handy in other matters.

  Lilly slashed out at the jasmine, and the essence seemed to part, darting out of the way. Encouraged by this display, she unsheathed a more conventional dagger from her belt, then cut the air with both of them in a swift crisscross.

  But she only found her arms pushed above her head, much as they’d been when she’d fought with Dawn earlier. But this movement lit pain to her shoulder injury, and she allowed herself to fall to the ground in order to relieve the anguish.

  Yet her mind kept working: Was this jasmine prone to wounding? Or had the entity only been beating back an attack?

  Her stronger-than-human body allowed her to get over the pain, and she gained her feet, whirling the blades in her hands just before she sheathed the weapons.

  “Good to know what you’re made of,” she said to the jasmine.

  It seemed to ignore her, even while it rejoined with the others, rebuilding an invisible wall again.

  Lilly’s injury pounded in time with her heartbeat. The wound needed further attention, but she would be back here soon enough afterward. Yet, first she would research the computer files for methods of ghost fighting, then, when she returned, she would get close enough to the vampire to use her tuner on him, persuading him to answer any and all questions.

  Meanwhile, it wouldn’t come amiss to consult with Nigel since this situation had gone beyond all others in the history of this Underground; they had never been attacked. Perhaps she and her brother would agree to bring their own girl vampires here to distract the jasmine so Lilly could make her way through to the cage.

  Or they could even request that Mihas question their visitor from a distance with his greater powers.

  But doing this before the custodes attempted to pull information from him themselves would be daft, for what if this vampire did represent a blood brother and, via proxy, he was able to engage Mihas in an Awareness battle, debilitating the only functional master remaining in the Underground? Lilly had heard of stranger things. Or what if this particular vampire’s master was attempting a slow takeover of the community, as they had been known to do while the ages wore by and greed got the better of them?

  What if this was even another brother in disguise and he was here because of what this Underground had to offer besides girl vampires?

  Lilly didn’t often overreact, but this disturbed her. Without a word to the captive, she turned on her heel and left him to stew about what might happen to him next. He wouldn’t be going anywhere.

  The jasmine followed her.

  How to dodge it?

  Meandering along, Lilly headed for one of the unobtrusive catches in the floor—the type that had tripped the silver cage in which the captive now resided.

  She stepped on the slight indentation in the ground, and a trapdoor opened beneath her. Quickly, she curled into a ball lest the slice of the closing door cut the top of her head as it shut above her, and she landed on a cushion, rolling to her feet again while holding a hand over her swaddled wound.

  Then she waited, trying to detect jasmine.

  Satisfied that none had leaked in with her—the trap had surprised it, opening and closing before the entity could react—she continued on her way to the Underground, staying mindful of the smells around her. But there was only the dank, deadened stench of the tunnel as she followed it past a ramp that led to the Underground rooms, then to the level where the custode area was located.

  She shut more doors behind her, sealing off entries. Gradually, the air grew thicker with vibration because she was close to the core of the community, the center that held the heart of any and all Undergrounds.

  She went to that particular room, unmasked herself as she entered and shut the fortified door behind her. Then, although it wasn’t yet time for Relaquory—the nightly exchange of energies—she approached the altar, her head down.

  It was the second time she’d been here tonight, and she again welcomed the electricity buzzing through her as she kneeled by the coffinlike box. She raised her face only enough to catch a glimpse of the native soil, the nose and mouth peering from the dirt.

  Lilly used her curved blade to cut herself, as she did during a ritual, drawing two drops of blood so it landed on the soil then sucked into it with what seemed to be a yanking heartbeat.

  She laid a hand on the dirt, the vibrations sawing into her as she inhaled, blissful, then scooped up the soil and stood.

&
nbsp; “Thank you,” she whispered while backing out of the room, making certain the door was secured.

  In her quarters, she redressed her wound, removing the old soil and packing the new over the injury, then wrapping it. She tidied up before going to Nigel in the monitor room.

  He was at the console, watching more of the recorded Highgate Cemetery footage, which showed Dawn and her comrades as they wandered among the graves. The other screens were alive with real-time, red-highlighted vampire activity, most of it aboveground in the Lion and the Lamb Pub, where Mihas was accompanied by a crowd of crisped schoolgirls.

  Della? Lilly thought.

  “Mihas has been in fine form,” Nigel said in greeting. He was rewinding footage, so these were recordings pulled up from the vampire alert system. They hadn’t reviewed anything beyond what it had isolated. “Look here.”

  He played a snippet of Mihas speaking to the nine burned Queenshill survivors. There was a new fire in the master as his charges reported to him about how the attack in Southwark had concluded—with the escape of the hunters.

  But since the hunters’ leader might just be a captive of the Underground now, Lilly wasn’t so agitated. Not with the soil healing her wound, with the pulse of the greatest master of all lending strength to her own heartbeat.

  Lilly trained her gaze back on the screen, where the schoolgirls looked the worse for wear as they faced Mihas. She held back a smile. Unbeknownst to Nigel, she had been responsible for this new, feistier Mihas. Hadn’t she known that Claudia’s absence would remind him of who he was and his purpose?

  Now the schoolgirl soldiers only needed to kill Claudia for him to reach the next step toward becoming the blood brother they needed him to be; Lilly had heard in Della’s mind earlier that this was what they planned.

  Then, and only then, would the girls be tuned in to compliance for Mihas’s sake.

  When the recording finished, Nigel said, “That was the good news. Unfortunately, as you heard from the girls, they lost several of their number while attempting to extract Claudia from her captors.”