“Don’t pout,” she said without remorse. “You’re a perfectly acceptable second in command.”
“As long as Luca Ambrus doesn’t see the error of his ways,” Sorin said sarcastically. “I don’t think that’ll happen; if he had ever wanted to mate with you, it would have already happened.”
Red flashed in her eyes again, and he grinned. Jab at him, and he jabbed back. She was the type who kept jabbing until she got a reaction, so Sorin always gave her one, and if his reaction wasn’t exactly what she wanted, then she’d better learn to stop jabbing. He’d give her respect, he’d give her loyalty, but he wouldn’t be her punching bag.
She fiddled with the amulet she wore. For her excursion away from Council headquarters she had dressed in modern clothing, leaving the identifying robe behind and opting for a hideously expensive and perfectly fitted black suit and very high heels. But the amulet … she never removed it. Every Council member had one as a mark of their position, and her ego wouldn’t let her part with anything that signified her power, her position, her place in their world. She sighed. “You don’t have anything to worry about. Luca doesn’t change his mind. If he’s protecting the humans, he won’t be joining us. That’s a shame; it’s such a waste of strength and possibility.”
“Do you want me to kill him?”
“Of course I want you to kill him.” She lifted her hand in a dismissive wave. “But not just yet. Give him a few days to settle in with our little D.C. conduit. Maybe he’ll get to know her and decide she’s not worth the effort, because Luca’s very pragmatic. He might decide to sit out the action this time, or at the least he’ll relax somewhat. Even Luca isn’t infallible. Assign two or three of our more expendable soldiers to keep an eye on them. If Luca sees reason and gives up on her, then all the better.”
“Expendable?” That was the word which caught his attention. He was a soldier; none of his people were expendable, not in the sense of logistics and strategy.
“If Luca catches them, they will die,” Regina said without even pretending concern. “You might as well not send your best.”
Sorin’s hands clenched and unclenched. “And what am I supposed to do while Luca Ambrus picks off my weakest soldiers one by one?” It went against every instinct he had as a soldier to simply sacrifice his men for no good reason.
She was obviously unconcerned with the loss of a soldier or two. “Another target has been located, one who is apparently further along than Luca’s pet.” She seemed somehow displeased with the news. “I swear, if Jonas doesn’t pick up the pace, the Warriors will start coming in long before we’ve eliminated all the conduits.”
Poor Jonas, Sorin thought. He’d been cajoled, bribed, and then tortured, in order to get what Regina wanted from him. Nothing made the answers come any faster, and it would never occur to her that she was actually slowing down the process.
“I can’t tell you how annoying it is to have the one conduit that’s right under my nose protected by the only creature in the world who might actually keep her safe.”
In his opinion, there was very little chance they’d be able to eliminate all of the conduits in time, but a handful of Warriors, while formidable, wouldn’t be enough to organize the humans and realistically have a chance of winning. Even then, if Nevada didn’t succeed in breaking the sanctuary spell, the vampires were doomed to fail. The war would be costly to the humans, but as long as they could withdraw to a safe place the vampires couldn’t penetrate, couldn’t harm in any way, they would win.
She shrugged then, putting the subject aside for another. “Have you ever been to Atlanta?”
“Many times.” Just not in the past sixty years, or so.
“That’s where the next target is located. You leave tonight, so get some rest today.”
Good enough. At least when he was out hunting he wasn’t called to her audiences. That’s what his meetings with her felt like lately. Instead of being her second in command, nearly an equal, he could tell she was beginning to look at him as merely a subject. She habitually treated everyone as inferior, but lately it had begun to grate.
After she left, he did as ordered and assigned two soldiers to watch Chloe Fallon’s house when night fell. Regina might not approve, but he also warned them to steer clear of Luca, to keep a safe distance, and to inform him immediately if the two separated for any reason.
With that chore done, Sorin climbed the stairs to Nevada’s room. She’d been keeping vampire hours for most of her time here, working at night, sleeping during the day, so he knew she would be hard at work.
Nevada couldn’t remember when she’d last slept well; not since coming to this place, at any rate. She woke often during the night … well, during the day, which had become her night … thinking of her family, of the life she’d lost, of the monsters who held her here. Sometimes she wondered why no one had found her; she wondered if anyone was even looking. Probably not. The vampires had left little to chance. What did her friends think had happened to her? Did they believe she was dead? Touring Europe? Since her family was also being held, did the cover story involve them, too? Probably.
It was likely everyone from the real world thought them all dead. A house fire or a horrific car accident would explain their exit from the world better than any other story. She hoped not, because that meant some other people had died in their places, to provide bodies for the authorities to find. If that was the case, would any of them ever be released?
Since discovering that she had a talent for remote viewing, Nevada had tried to reach out for her family, to see them, to know they were alive and well. Alive, at least. She’d cast her net far and wide, thinking of her parents, her brother and sister, trying to find them in a big, chaotic world, but she couldn’t find any trace of them. She knew they were alive, or had been recently, because Sorin occasionally let her speak to them, very briefly, on his cell phone. But if she could just see them, visit them even if only in spirit, she’d feel better, feel as if something good could actually come from what she was doing.
Though she couldn’t see beyond these walls, and she didn’t have a clock to mark the hours, she was pretty sure it wasn’t full dark yet. At night the vampires became more active, they moved about, made more noise, filled the house with the energy Nevada had learned to feel. So, not yet dark; in these early-evening hours she was rarely disturbed by the vampires. It was easier to concentrate on her task when she didn’t expect to be interrupted for an hour or so.
Instead of searching willy-nilly for her family, it had occurred to her that she might have more success if she started at the center, and slowly widened her net of awareness. Taking a deep breath, she settled herself with her fingertips spread on the proper page in the book of spells, and drew all her energy in. Slowly, slowly, she began pushing it out, taking her time, examining every surge whether it felt familiar or not—
And there they were. Her family. Shock almost broke her concentration, but desperately she gathered all her strength and energy and held on to the vision. They weren’t beyond her, they were below her, in the basement of this very building. Their windowless room was much too small for four people, and the walls were bare and gray. There was little furniture—two cots, some blankets, and a dim light—and no amenities that she could see.
But they were together, and alive, and oh, so close.
She sent her spirit soaring, out of her body and away from the physical world. In a flash Nevada stood in the corner of the gray room, washed in the love and fear her family emitted. She could see and hear them, and in that moment that was all she needed, she didn’t care that they couldn’t see her, that they had no idea she was with them. Anxiously she examined their throats, looking for signs of biting. Sorin had promised her none of the vampires would feed from her family, but why should she believe anything she was told by the monsters? Even though part of her whispered that he was different, he was still a vampire. It was a relief to see for herself that none of her family members bore any marks, no sc
ars or bloodstains.
The tears that ran down Nevada’s cheeks were real. They dripped down the cheeks of the body while the spirit, in another place, felt the pain. She walked toward her parents, who sat side by side on one of the narrow cots. They were both thinner, older, and so very tired. She felt their fatigue, of both body and spirit. They were almost broken beyond repair. Her mother’s hair was now more gray than red, her face deeply lined. Her father had lost what little dark hair he’d had left on his head. Nevada reached out to touch them but her hand fell through their bodies. She didn’t truly exist here; she couldn’t touch them.
Justin, sitting on the other cot, had grown so much taller and thinner since she’d last seen him. He was now seventeen years old, tall and lanky. His auburn hair had grown long and tangled, and the expression on his face was so angry. He had much to be angry about, to be trapped here, to have his life taken away. She couldn’t offer him any comfort, couldn’t reassure him.
Emily sat on the floor in the corner of the small room, her head down, her knees drawn in. Her hair was a fine light red like Nevada’s, her skin was pale … more pale now, since she hadn’t seen the sun in such a long time. Emily was fourteen … no, it was summer now, which meant Emily had just had her fifteenth birthday. They had always been so close, and even though she knew it was useless Nevada reached out to touch Emily’s hair, a gesture she’d been making since her little sister was born. She couldn’t comfort Emily, but perhaps she could comfort herself.
But as Nevada’s hand passed through her little sister, Emily’s head popped up. Her eyes widened and she looked wildly around. “Nevada?” she whispered.
Nevada was shocked out of the small gray room, away from her family and into her own body with a gasp and a lurch. She grabbed the table before her to keep from falling to the floor. Dear God, how was it possible? The others hadn’t realized that she was there, but Emily had known. How?
She swallowed, trying to control her rapid heartbeat. The vampires would hear it, would know she was upset or excited, and they would come to investigate. She needed some time to gather her composure, to think about what could have happened.
And then she knew. Emily had inherited some of the same powers the vampires had discovered in Nevada. The vampires would use Emily if they knew. No matter what, she couldn’t let them find out there was more than one witch in the family, and they certainly couldn’t find out that Nevada had discovered a way to reach beyond these walls. Somehow she had to warn Emily to hide what she could do, what they could do.
The door swung open and Sorin walked in, as if he’d been drawn by her agitation. What she wouldn’t give for a lock on that door! The vampires were constantly in and out; they never knocked, never announced their unwelcome presence. Yes, Sorin was more welcome than the others, but she would rather have privacy.
He was what he was. As much as she’d come to care for Sorin, she knew that if he found out she’d discovered the ability to spy on them he’d kill her, and her family, in an instant. He was too dedicated to his purpose to allow her to spoil his plans.
“I’m leaving for a little while,” he said. “Until I get back, Loman will be in charge.”
There were some days when Nevada thought she might love Sorin, in some weird way. Other days she hated him intensely. But she never doubted that he was the lesser of many evils. She knew full well that inside he was as much a monster as any of the others, but he seemed to be more in control, less openly vicious. She saw the man he’d once been buried deep inside, where in the others she saw only hate and monstrosity. Just because he was handsome and occasionally kind to her, just because she occasionally saw his face when she closed her eyes to go to sleep, that didn’t mean she’d forgotten what he was.
Nevada shuddered. “I don’t like Loman.”
“Do you like any of us?” he asked drily.
“No,” she snapped, lying just a little. “But some of you are worse than the others.” Loman was in the category of “worse.” He was short, squat, ugly, and vicious, as much an animal as a man. He resembled a missing link, as if he’d never been quite human. He was rather troll-like, and openly devoted to the bitch.
She was terrified of Loman, who’d been one of those guarding her since she’d been taken. It wasn’t just his appearance, it was the feral expression in his animal eyes that scared her. She lifted her chin with a forced strength. She rarely asked for any favors, afraid of what the price to her family might be if she overstepped her bounds. Knowing that they were so close, that they were truly alive and relatively well, gave her a new surge of strength.
“Can’t you put someone else in charge, anyone else?” she asked, her voice low. “I’m terrified of him. I can’t concentrate, knowing he might walk in at any time.”
He gave her a shrewd look. “If you study harder and learn how to break the spell, then you won’t have to worry about Loman. Time’s short, Nevada. You have to show us some progress.”
Maybe if she’d spent all her time trying to break the spell she might have already accomplished it, but a lot of her energy had been directed toward other things. She glanced down. “It’s coming along,” she said, trying not to feel guilty.
“It’s been coming along for months. You’ve been close for nearly a year. If you aren’t making progress—”
“I am!” she argued. “Watch this.” She hadn’t intended to show him this just yet, but she had to be flexible in her plans. She made a shooing motion with her hands. “Move back.”
Sorin obediently took a few steps away from her. Nevada closed her eyes and spread her arms. She inhaled, exhaled—five deep breaths—and then she began to chant words in a language she knew he wouldn’t understand, because it was the language of the books.
She didn’t have to open her eyes to know that a green energy was beginning to form and shimmer around her. She could feel it, feel the deep, warm tingle on her skin. It enveloped her, a bubble, a shield, a shimmering force she created with her will and her words and the talent with which she’d been born. The bubble grew until it had expanded several feet around her. Eyes still closed, she whispered, “Sorin, come closer.”
He tried. She could feel him try. His steps were difficult, almost halting, as if something primal inside him was warning him to go back. When he reached the green shield, he couldn’t come any closer to her; it was as if a physical barrier existed. She could sense him pushing against the shield, trying to break it, but even with his enormous vampire strength he couldn’t reach her.
Within the circle, Nevada opened her eyes and smiled. “It occurred to me that I had to be able to cast the spell, before I’d know how to break it. This is a small, a very small, version of the original spell.” She said a few of the old-language words, waved her hand, and the barrier fell. It literally dissolved, drifting down in a cloud of sparkling green dust and then disappearing.
“Impressive,” he said, and she could tell he meant it.
“I might have to recast the original spell, and then remove it.”
“Will that work? Can you remove both your own spell and the original?”
“I don’t know. It’s difficult enough to cast a spell even this small, because it’s so powerful. To cast a spell strong enough to affect the entire world … I don’t know that I can do that.” Nevada glanced down at her worktable. “Some days I think I would be better off dying here, and leaving the spell intact,” she said bitterly.
“Your family would die, too.”
“I know. They’re all that keeps me going.” She squared her shoulders. “Some of the others, like Loman, they’re not like you. They’re dark and mean, and to let them loose on the world …”
“I’m a vampire, Nevada. Never forget that.”
“I don’t,” she said quickly. “But sometimes … sometimes I see a part of what you were as a human. You were a good man, I think. How can that completely go away? Something in you must still care, on some level.”
“No,” he said bluntly. “I do
n’t care for anyone.”
Illogically hurt, Nevada once more looked down. Sorin took her chin in his hand and lifted her face. “I’m a vampire,” he said once again. “For me, time is nothing. For humans, time is an instant in which they grow old and die. It doesn’t make sense for me to care about something that won’t be here very long. I might as well love a squash.”
After he was gone Nevada stood there, breathing deep and trying to control her emotions. She wanted to save Sorin, but how could she save him from being a vampire when his only other option was death? Something in her wanted to love him, maybe did love him in a weird way, but she had to let him go. She had to concentrate on the humans she could still help, like Chloe Fallon.
She had tried several times to reach out, to find the conduit; maybe she could tell whether or not the earlier spell had taken. Unfortunately, sometimes it seemed as if her growing powers and skills were like the tide, coming and going, strengthening and fading. She hadn’t gotten far in her original attempt at contact. Remember. What good would that do the poor girl?
But what if there was another reason she couldn’t reach Chloe? What if the conduit was already dead?
CHAPTER
FIFTEEN
Chloe was vulnerable. No matter how he looked at the situation, Luca kept coming back to that inescapable conclusion. If he wasn’t here, or if he was asleep—and he had to sleep sometime—all Sorin or any other vampire had to do was capture one of her friends, a neighbor, someone off the street … hell, even a puppy would do, and Chloe would try to go to the rescue. They probably wouldn’t go that far, though; Sorin had used that ploy simply because an opportunity had presented itself. A more simple plan of action was to catch her leaving work, glamour her into following, and that was that. No more Chloe.
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