Daysider (Nightsiders)

by Susan Krinard

  No, he wasn’t evil. Not even close. In her heart, she’d known it all along, even though she’d fought every minute to remind herself what his kind had done to her mother. To Garret.

  But he wasn’t a Nightsider, either. He hadn’t made the rules that condemned human convicts to eternal slavery. Nothing could change what had happened to the people she loved. Damon was not to blame for the sins of those who could never fully accept him. Even if he was capable of becoming something savage and unpredictable for reasons she didn’t understand, she knew she could never go back to hating him.

  Michael hadn’t experienced what she had. He still loathed Damon with every fiber of his being. If he did try to kill Damon—if he provoked the Daysider far enough—maybe he could provoke the shadow inside Damon, as well. She’d been a fool to think Damon could speak for that other side of himself. If it came to a fight, one of them would surely die.

  However, she would do everything in her power to prevent that from happening. Neither blood-sickness, invisible snipers nor even Damon himself would stop her.

  Lurching back to the bushes, she crouched to dig in her pack for a spare shirt and took off her jacket, wincing at the pain, and then put on the fresh shirt. She strapped the VS to the back of her pack and dragged it over her shoulders. Finally, she picked up the weapon Damon had given her and tucked it in her belt.

  Inhaling a deep lungful of air, she set out after the men, praying she would reach them in time.

  * * *

  If there had been any other way, Damon would have taken it. For Alexia’s sake.

  But he had to know. And though he and Carter had made it well away from the area of the colony and over the hills to their western border without once being attacked, they both knew there would be no fond farewells between them.

  And Carter was still prepared to fight. He moved fast against Damon the moment he had the chance, and his speed was almost enough to let him shed his pack and slip Damon’s grasp. He managed to work his knife free during the struggle and slash Damon’s arm before Damon got his hands around Carter’s throat and slammed him up against the nearest large tree.

  After that, it was as if the dhampir had given up. He let Damon remove his weapons and stood quiescent in his enemy’s hold, breathing hard but offering no further resistance.

  It was if he’d wanted to be defeated.

  “What did you do?” Damon asked, staring into Carter’s catlike eyes.

  “I don’t...know what you’re talking about,” the dhampir said without inflection.

  “When you uncovered Alexia’s other wound,” Damon said softly, “you were shocked.”

  Carter gave a choked laughed. “She’s my partner. What did you expect?”

  “It was not your concern that was strange,” Damon said, “but the way you expressed it.”

  “Naturally. Your kind doesn’t have normal feelings. You wouldn’t know a real one if it hung you up and left you out to dry.”

  Damon didn’t rise to the bait. “I was trained to understand human feelings,” he said.

  “Funny. I’m not human.”

  “But in many respects you are as much one of them as if you had been born of two human parents. And I know you were overreacting. The way a man does when he isn’t as surprised or shocked as he wishes to appear.”

  Carter spat. Damon dodged, and the shot went wide.

  “There isn’t much you wouldn’t do to hide your own part in this,” Carter said, grinning like a death mask. “Just because she doesn’t believe you betrayed her—”

  “That is an interesting word, betray,” Damon said, returning the operative’s smile. “I had understood the loyalty between Aegis partners to be virtually unbreakable.”

  “And there’s nothing you can do to change that,” Carter said. “Alexia and I would die for each other. That’s a concept you couldn’t possibly comprehend.”

  “Perhaps. Unless your commitment has already been given to someone or something else. Or your hatred is too powerful to bind you to anyone.”

  Carter lunged against Damon’s grip, but Damon held him fast.

  “I was born to a mother who was abused and abandoned by a bloodsucker, like all of my kind,” Carter rasped. “If we could find a way to wipe you out once and for all—”

  “Again,” Damon said. “Too histrionic, like your accusations against me. Even Alexia discounted your charges because you were clearly not rational.”

  “I saw you grunting on top of her.” Carter pushed forward again, seemingly indifferent to the risk of strangling. “Whatever you did to her back there, it only worked because she’s—”

  “Weak?” Damon finished. “Too trusting? Yet, in spite of your mistrust of me, you were willing to leave her to my mercy.”

  For the first time Damon saw uncertainty in the slight twitch at the corner of Carter’s mouth. “I didn’t have much choice,” he said. “She’ll die for certain if I don’t get another patch. But you always knew that, didn’t you?” He displayed his teeth like a Bloodmaster challenging a rival. “I swear I’ll come back and skin you alive if you hurt her.”

  Damon’s heartbeat began to rise. “It would be foolish of me to tell you I’ll hunt you down if Alexia dies, but I will do it, even if you spend the rest of your days cowering in the Enclave.”

  Carter’s sandy brows lifted. “You’re good,” he snickered. “I admit you’re almost convincing.”

  Bearing down on the pulse points in Carter’s neck, Damon shoved the Enclave agent back against the tree. “I know you took the patch,” he said evenly. “You were also one of those shooting at us.” He pressed on the arteries until he could feel them begin to close off the blood supply to Carter’s brain. “Who are you working for?”

  Carter closed his eyes and began to wheeze. “I work...for Aegis. For my people.”

  “Tell me who took the patch, and I may let you go.”

  “If you...don’t let me go,” Carter grunted, “Alexia will die.”

  That was the ugly dilemma, and Damon knew he’d underestimated Carter’s will to resist.

  “How can I be sure you’ll return with the patch?” he asked.

  Carter’s lips twisted in a grotesque grin. “You can’t.”

  A pulsing shadow fell over Damon’s vision. Alexia had said it was hatred, and he knew she was right. He could feel it trying to seize his mind with claws of iron.

  Protect Alexia. That was everything. For the first time in his years of field work—here in the Zone, where he was free—he didn’t know what choice to make. If he dared leave Alexia alone, he could go with Carter all the way to the Border and make sure the agent did what he said he would.

  But if he left her, and she died...

  His fingers loosened on Carter’s neck. The dhampir jerked up his arms, striking Damon’s with the stiffened edges of his hands. Ordinarily it wouldn’t have been enough, but Damon had been off guard for a fraction of a second, and in that infinitesimal span of time Carter broke free and was sprinting in the direction of the Border, leaving pack and weapons behind.

  He didn’t go far. Half a dozen running strides away he faltered, came to a sudden halt and spun around. Damon nearly ran into him.

  Carter scrambled just out of reach. “What is it?” he asked, his voice rising. “What’s coming?”

  Expecting some kind of trick, Damon tensed his muscles to attack. But then he smelled the thick, acrid odor and heard the tread of something neither animal, human nor Opir.

  Lamia.

  Chapter 7

  The monster wasn’t even trying to disguise its approach, and that was Damon’s only advantage. He unslung his rifle and backed away, facing the unseen enemy. Carter dove for his own weapons.

  The Lamia pushed out from behind a dense screen of scrub oak and lunged toward Damon. He got off four rounds, each one hitting its mark, before the thing reached him, swinging its distorted hands with their razor-sharp nails in wide arcs. Damon jumped back and swung the rifle like a club, striking
the monster across its shoulder and the side of its grotesque, vaguely humanoid head.

  It slowed, its red, almost pupil-less eyes glaring with hatred. Blood flowed over its leathery skin, but already the bullet wounds were beginning to heal. Its lips moved as if it were trying to speak.

  Damon stepped back, leveling his gun to shoot again, but the Lamia came to a stop, nostrils flaring, and swung its long, almost skeletal face toward Carter.

  The dhampir stood well out of the way, his rifle at his shoulder. “Orlok,” he said hoarsely. “I’ve never seen one this close.”

  Orlok. That was the human name for the monsters who roamed the Zone, killing animal and human, dhampir and Daysider with equal relish. But the Opiri called them Lamiae after legends of child-eating demons, driven mad with hatred and grief.

  Damon continued to retreat until he stood level with Carter. “The last report said they had moved out of this region,” he said.

  “I guess your report was wrong.”

  Perhaps fatally so, Damon thought. “Where there is one,” he said, “there are usually many.”

  Breathing raggedly, Carter looked wildly in every direction. “Your bullets hardly had any effect,” he whispered.

  “They heal even more quickly than we do,” Damon said. He watched the creature’s face, seeking some indication of what it would do next. But its mouth continued to work, bringing forth low grunts and growls that almost sounded like words.

  “It’s trying to talk.” Carter’s face blanched. “What in hell—”

  Damon fired again, but he was not fast enough. The Lamia charged past him, straight at Carter. The dhampir went down in a flurry of striking limbs and blood.

  Aiming with swift precision, Damon peppered the Lamia’s back with a dozen bullets in rapid succession. The creature barely seemed to notice. It bent over Carter, its serrated teeth at the dhampir’s throat.

  Damon threw his rifle aside and drew his knife. He flung himself at the Lamia, stabbing down between the creature’s shoulders. It shook him off without even turning around. Damon tried again, grabbing hold like a tick on a dog’s back and bringing the knife around to the Lamia’s throat.

  The blade bit into tough flesh, and the Lamia hissed in pain. For a moment it forgot about the dhampir sprawled beneath it and twisted around to claw at Damon’s head and shoulders.

  Holding fast, Damon adjusted his grip and pulled the blade across the Lamia’s throat a second time. With a gurgling roar, the creature fell away from Carter and rolled onto its back, nearly crushing Damon beneath it. In a matter of seconds the Lamia would turn and tear him apart.

  But Damon had something it didn’t have: the ability to reason. He let himself go limp, waited until the Lamia had lifted itself to its haunches, and lunged up to drive his knife into the creature’s chest. He felt the blade skitter against bone and drive deeper, reaching the heart at last.

  With a hiss like air escaping a valve, the creature fell hard, flailing in its death throes. Only when Damon was sure it was truly dying did he crouch beside Carter, quickly checking the extent of injuries.

  Carter was still alive, but barely. His throat had been slashed, and though his body worked to mitigate the damage, it could do little against the severing of veins and arteries except slow the loss of blood. Bright and dark, it pumped slowly out of his wound, and Carter stared at the sky without seeing.

  Still with half an eye on the dying Lamia, Damon went after Carter’s pack, tore it open and found the agent’s field dressing. He knew it would only slow the dhampir’s death, but there were things he still needed to know. Perhaps now Carter would tell him.

  He pressed the bandage against Carter’s throat. The dhampir tried to move his head, and his lips parted.

  “Can you speak?” Damon asked.

  Carter tried to grin. “What...do you want now?” he rasped.

  “Who are you working for?”

  “No time,” Carter said. “Alexia...”

  Red froth bubbled up from the agent’s mouth. Damon bent his head close to Carter’s face. “What about her?” he asked urgently.

  “You can help her.” Carter choked and tried to swallow. “The patch... Drugs were derived from Daysider blood. If you let her...” His breath rattled. “Let her drink, and she...may survive.”

  Damon pushed aside his shock. “Who has the patch?” he demanded.

  But Carter’s eyes were already glazing over. “If you care...about her,” he said, “save her.”

  Then he closed his eyes, shuddered once and died.

  Damon rocked back, remembered the Lamia and reached for the rifle.

  The creature was gone. It had left multiple trails of blood, but somehow it had managed to skulk away on two feet, surviving its terrible injuries as Carter had not.

  It would not be returning anytime soon. Unless it brought back others of its kind.

  Damon looked down at Carter’s body. He almost felt pity for the man. He had died an ugly death, and yet Damon’s conviction that the dhampir had been partly culpable for the stealing of Alexia’s patch hadn’t diminished in the slightest.

  Nor had his astonishment at Carter’s claim about the nature of the drugs in it. The implications were staggering. The only way such a thing would be possible was if Aegis and the Enclave had had access to a Darketan after the War. It suggested that there could be some connection between dhampir and Daysider no one had ever suspected.

  And it made perfect sense that someone from Erebus—Colonists, Council or Expansionists—would want to get their hands on the patch, since it could be used not only to increase Opir knowledge of dhampir weaknesses but as a foundation for sanctions against Aegis, setting off a potential wave of political consequences Damon couldn’t begin to imagine.

  But for the moment, for Damon, this knowledge meant that he wouldn’t have to leave Alexia and go to the Enclave in Carter’s place. Her partner’s death didn’t mean she would die, too.

  Damon could save her himself. And he couldn’t waste any more precious minutes brooding over what Carter had told him, certainly none to see to his body according to either human or Opir custom. If the Lamia returned to finish him off, so be it.

  Retrieving Carter’s pack, weapons and his own bloody knife, Damon focused on clearing his mind. He had to decide quickly how much to tell Alexia. The knowledge of Carter’s death might further weaken her, but eventually she would learn the truth. She would wonder why he’d kept it from her, and any trust she might have begun to feel would—

  “Michael!”

  Gasping for air, Alexia stumbled toward Carter’s body and fell to her knees, her hands hovering over her partner’s face.

  “Michael,” she said, her voice breaking.

  Damon started toward her. “Alexia! What are you doing here? I told you—”

  “You told me?” She looked slowly up at Damon, the grief in her eyes turning to accusation. “You killed him.”

  Damon was utterly unprepared for her arrival and had no ready answer. He dropped the knife and began to move in her direction again, but she pulled the gun he had given her from her jacket and pointed it at his head.

  “I didn’t kill him, Alexia,” he said. “And you should not have left camp.”

  “That’s funny,” she said. “I thought Michael would try to kill you, but I didn’t really believe—” She swallowed and glanced at Carter’s face. “I didn’t think you’d go through with it.”

  “I didn’t.” Damon crouched some distance away, trying to catch her eye. “We were both attacked by one of the creatures you call Orloks.”

  She met his gaze again, her body trembling with shock and anger. “Orlok? Are you telling me some monster did this?” She balled her other fist and punched at the ground. “Where is it?”

  “It got away,” Damon said. He indicated the area around him, where the creature had torn up the earth in its struggles and left trails of its blood. “It attacked me first, and then it went for Carter. I tried to stop it.” He sighed,
very much aware of the racking grief Alexia was trying so hard not to let him see. “I’m sorry.”

  “Are you?” she asked. “Do you still deny that you hated him?”

  “His death was unnecessary, and it has caused you pain. That is enough to make me regret it.”

  “What about the Orlok?” She stared at him as if he were something far worse than Carter’s supposed murderer. “We know they come from Erebus. Some believe they have been created and bred to hunt down and kill any human or dhampir they find in the Zone. Is that true?”

  He shook his head vehemently. “They are monsters even to the Opiri. They cannot be controlled.”

  Damon felt her absorbing his words, taking him in, noting the fresh, blood-rimmed slashes that had reduced what was left of his shirt and jacket to tatters. It was not something Carter could have done, even with a knife.

  “You have blood on your face,” she said.

  He lifted a hand to rub at his jaw. Dried blood flaked off in patches and fell to the ground like scarlet rain.

  No wonder Alexia had assumed he had killed Carter. He could have ripped the dhampir’s throat out almost as easily as the Lamia if the hunger was on him.

  But it wasn’t. And he still hadn’t convinced her of his innocence.

  “There was a great deal of blood,” he said. “His jugular...” He hesitated, unwilling to burden Alexia with the ugly details.

  Alexia leaned over Michael again, the muzzle of her gun beginning to drop, and she touched the bandage at Carter’s throat with her other hand. “You did this?” she asked, her green eyes glistening with unshed tears.

  “Yes.”

  “If I’d been here—”

  “You could have done nothing,” Damon interrupted. “And now you risk your own life. Carter would never have wanted that.”

  As if to prove his point, Alexia’s fingers spasmed in pain. She dropped the gun and made no attempt to pick it up again.

  Damon stood. “You must lie down,” he insisted, starting toward her again.

  Alexia raised both hands and leaned away as if to fend him off, and he stopped. “Alexia,” he said, “I did not kill him.”