by Carrie Ryan
“No,” he admitted sheepishly. “I don’t have anything like that.” Then, as though to save face for Alchemists and their usually meticulous style, he added, “Probably because no one ever actually made one. If it existed, we’d have it.”
“That’s going to be a disadvantage,” I mused.
“Not so much,” said Dimitri, finishing off the last of his coffee. “I have an idea. I don’t think we need to go underground at all. Especially with Mark.”
I met his eyes and felt a jolt of electricity jump between us. Part of what drew us together was a mutual love of excitement and danger. It wasn’t that we sought it out, exactly, but when there was a need to respond, we were both always ready to take on whatever was necessary. I felt that spark kindling between us now as this task loomed closer, and suddenly had a good idea of what his plan was.
“Bold move, comrade,” I teased.
“Not by your standards,” he returned.
Henry glanced back and forth between us, totally lost. “What are you two talking about?”
Dimitri and I just grinned.
Of course, there weren’t many smiles when we set out before dawn the next day. Dimitri’s family displayed a conflicting mix of confidence and nervousness. Ostensibly, Yeva’s proclamation that Dimitri would triumph guaranteed victory. Yet neither his sisters nor his mother were totally carefree about sending him off to face an old and powerful Strigoi with a long history of kills. The women showered him with hugs and well wishes, and all the while, Yeva looked on in her smug, knowing manner.
Mark was with us, looking tough and battle ready. Henry had said the Baia dhampirs were “local” to the Blood King, but that was kind of a relative term, as the caverns were still about a six-hour drive away. We were simply the closest, since the caves lay in a remote area with little surrounding civilization. In fact, part of the drive’s length was a result of the roads in that region being so poorly maintained.
We reached the caverns around midday, which was all according to plan. It was a desolate place and really only a small blip as far as elevation went, hardly able to compete with much grander ranges like the Ural Mountains far to the east. Still, it was higher and steeper than most of the surrounding lowlands, with rock-faced cliffsides that were going to require some sure footing. None of the caves were visible from where we parked the car, but a small, worn footpath meandered off between some of the cliffs. From what we’d seen of Henry’s map, this led into the heart of the complex.
“Nothing like a little rock climbing,” I said cheerfully, hoisting my backpack over my shoulder. “This could almost be a vacation, if not for the, you know, potentially dying part.”
Mark held up a hand to shield his eyes from the sun as he regarded Dimitri and me. “Something tells me you’re the kind of people whose vacations always end up that way.”
“True,” said Dimitri, heading out toward the path. “Besides, we’re safe today. We have my grandmother’s guarantee, remember?”
I rolled my eyes at the teasing in his voice. Dimitri might love and revere Yeva, but I knew he wouldn’t count on any vague prophecy to get this task done. His faith was in the silver stake he carried at his belt.
The path started out easy but soon became a challenge as the elevation rose and more obstacles appeared in our way. We had to climb around boulders and manage some tricky parts where the path all but disappeared, forcing us to cling to the rocky sides. When we reached what was apparently the center of the complex, I was surprised to see how level it was. Cliff faces rose up all around us, like we were in some kind of fortress, but this area provided a small measure of tranquility. I wasn’t tired—dhampirs are hardy, after all—but was glad we had reached our destination.
And that was where … we stopped.
We settled down on the ground, sorting out the contents of our backpacks, and proceeded to pretty much lounge around for the rest of the day. Despite the wind blowing up here, the temperature was still summer-warm, and this would’ve almost made a perfect picnic scene. True, the weathered rock and scattered vegetation were hardly idyllic, but we spread out a blanket and ate a lunch consisting of Olena’s fabulous cooking. When we were finished, I lay down next to Dimitri while Mark began whittling a piece of wood.
We kept up a steady stream of small talk. This was all part of the plan too. After Henry had said adventuring humans had gone hunting and been killed, we’d realized that was the downfall: going off and getting trapped inside caves that this Blood King guy obviously knew better than us. We weren’t going to do it. We would stay out in the open, making no effort to hide our presence. While Strigoi loved human blood, they loved Moroi and dhampir blood even more. There was no way this Strigoi would be able to ignore us hanging out on his turf. If the violation didn’t draw him out, the lure of our blood would. He’d eventually come after us when darkness fell, and we’d fight him on our terms.
“Mark, you and Oksana should come to the U.S.,” I said. “Lissa would love to meet you and talk spirit. Lots of people would.”
Mark didn’t look up from his carving. “That’s the problem,” he said good-naturedly. “We’re worried too many people would, now that everyone’s interested in spirit. We don’t want to become science experiments.”
“Lissa wouldn’t let that happen,” I said adamantly. “And think of all the amazing things we might learn. Spirit seems to be able to do something new every day.” Before I even knew it, my hand found Dimitri’s. In saving him, spirit had already done the greatest thing it ever could in my eyes.
“We’ll see,” said Mark. “Oksana likes her privacy, but I know she’s curious about—”
Dimitri shot up from his lounging position, instantly rigid and focused in that way he had. Mark had fallen silent as soon as Dimitri twitched, and now I sat up too. My hand went to my stake, and I saw the guys’ hands do the same. Even as I did, the logical part of me knew there was no need—not when we were out in broad daylight. Whatever had spooked Dimitri wasn’t Strigoi, but the instinct was hard to shake. His gaze fell on a large pile of rocks and boulders sitting near a cliff face. Wordlessly, he pointed to it and then tapped his ear. Mark and I nodded in understanding.
Glancing down at one of Henry’s maps that we’d left open, I immediately spotted the rock formation Dimitri had indicated. It was large and sprawling, with what looked like a small gap between it and the cliff. If there was something lurking and spying on us, it would be possible to sneak behind the formation and catch the spy unawares. I tapped my chest and pointed to the formation on the map. Dimitri shook his head and tapped his chest instead. I glared and started to protest, but then he gestured between Mark and me. In that uncanny way we had of thinking alike sometimes, I immediately knew what Dimitri was saying. Mark and I had been talking when Dimitri had heard whatever startled him. We needed to continue that in order to keep the cover and surprise this potential threat. Reluctantly, I nodded defeat to Dimitri.
He crept away, silent as a cat, and I turned to Mark and tried to remember what we’d been talking about. The U.S.—I’d been trying to convince him he should visit for some reason. Talk. I needed to talk and create a distraction. So I frantically blurted the first thing that came to mind.
“So, yeah, Mark … if you, um, come visit … we can go out to eat and you can try some American food. No more cabbage.” I gave an uneasy laugh and tried not to stare at Dimitri as he disappeared around a rocky corner. “We could, you know, go out for hot dogs. Don’t worry—they’re not actually dogs. It’s just a name. They’re these meat things that you put on buns—that’s a kind of bread—and then you top them with other things and—”
“I know what a hot dog is,” interrupted Mark. His tone was light for the sake of our observer, but his stake had replaced the whittling knife.
“You do?” I asked, legitimately surprised. “How?”
“We’re not that remote. We have TV and movies. Besides, I’ve left Siberia, you know. I’ve been to the U.S.”
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sp; “Really?” I hadn’t known that. I knew very little about his history, really. “Did you try a hot dog?”
“No,” he said. His eyes were on the spot where Dimitri had vanished, but they briefly flicked to me. “I was offered one … but it didn’t look that appetizing.”
“What!” I exclaimed. “Blasphemy. They’re delicious.”
“Aren’t they compressed animal parts?” he pushed.
“Well, yeah … I think so. But so is sausage.”
Mark shook his head. “I don’t know. Something’s just not right about a hot dog.”
“Not right? I think you mean so right. They’re like the—”
My righteous indignation was interrupted by a yelp, reminding me that there’d been another purpose here besides my defense of one of the greatest foods in the universe. Mark and I moved as one, both sprinting over to the rock pile and source of the noise. There, we found Dimitri pinning down a wriggling guy in a leather jacket and worn blue jeans. I couldn’t tell much else about him because Dimitri had the guy’s faced pressed into the dirt. Seeing us, Dimitri eased his hold so that the guy could look up. When he did, I saw that he was my age—and human.
He glanced between me and Mark—or, more accurately, he glanced between the silver stakes we both held. Gray-blue eyes went wide, and the captive began babbling in Russian. Mark frowned and asked a question, but didn’t lower his stake. The human answered, sounding near-panicked. Dimitri scoffed and released his grip altogether. The human scrambled away, only to trip and land hard on his butt. Mark made some comment in Russian, which Dimitri responded to with a laugh.
“Will someone please tell me what’s going on?” I demanded. “In English?”
To my surprise, it wasn’t either of my colleagues that answered. “You … you’re American!” exclaimed the boy, regarding me wonderingly. He spoke with a heavy accent. “I knew the Blood King’s reputation had spread, but I didn’t know it had gone that far! ”
“Well, it hasn’t. Not exactly,” I said. I noticed then that both Dimitri and Mark had put their stakes away. “I just happened to be in the neighborhood.”
“I told you,” said Dimitri, speaking to the human. “This is no place for you. Leave now.”
The boy shook his head, making his unruly blond hair seem that much messier. “No! We can work together. We’re all here for the same reason. We’re here to kill the Blood King.”
I met Dimitri’s eyes questioningly but received no help. “What’s your name?” I asked.
“Ivan. Ivan Grigorovitch.”
“Well, Ivan, I’m Rose, and while we appreciate the offer of help, we’ve got this under control. There’s no need for you to stick around.”
Ivan looked skeptical. “You didn’t look like you had it under control. You looked like you were having a picnic.”
I repressed a grimace. “We were, uh, just getting ready to go into action.”
He brightened. “Then I’m in time.”
Mark sighed, clearly out of patience with this. “Boy, this isn’t a game. Do you have anything like this?” He pulled out his silver stake again, making sure the point caught the light. Ivan gaped. “I didn’t think so. Let me guess. You have a wooden stake, right?”
Ivan flushed. “Well, yes, but I’m very good at—”
“Very good at getting yourself killed,” declared Mark. “You don’t have the skills or weapons for this.”
“Teach me,” Ivan said eagerly. “I told you, I’m willing to help! It’s what I’ve dreamed of—being a famous vampire hunter! ”
“This isn’t a field trip,” said Dimitri. Like Mark, he no longer found Ivan so comical. “If you don’t leave this area now, we’ll carry you out ourselves.”
Ivan jumped to his feet. “I can go … I can go … but are you sure you don’t want my help? I know all there is to know about vampires. Nobody in my village has read as much as I have—”
“Go,” said Mark and Dimitri in unison.
Ivan went. The three of us watched as he hurried down the path, toward where it had to make its way through rocky obstacles in order to get back out to the main road.
“Idiot,” muttered Mark. He put the stake away again and trudged back over to where we’d been sitting before. After a few moments, Dimitri and I followed.
“I feel kind of bad for him,” I remarked. “He seemed so … I don’t know, enthusiastic. But I also start to get why Henry was freaking out so much. If all the other human ‘vampire experts’ that come here are like him, I can see why they’re getting killed off.”
“Exactly,” said Dimitri. His gaze was on Ivan’s retreating figure, almost impossible to see now as he walked around a stony outcropping. “Hopefully he’ll go back to his village and make up some fantastic story about how he killed the Blood King himself.”
“True,” I said. “The fact that we’ll have done it will just back him up when people come here and see no more vampire.”
Still, as I settled back down in our makeshift camp, I couldn’t forget the zealous look in Ivan’s eyes as he’d talked about killing the Blood King. How many others had come in with that same naïve attitude? It was disheartening. I’d grown up with the idea that fighting Strigoi was a duty and a responsibility. It wasn’t something you treated as a game.
Mark and I eventually picked up our hot dog debate, much to Dimitri’s amusement. Dimitri tended to agree with Mark, which I found shocking. I could only blame the cuisine they’d been raised with for such misguided views. Despite the easy nature of the conversation, though, I could feel the tension building within all of us as the sun began moving down toward the horizon. The silver stakes had returned, and even before darkness fell, our eyes were constantly scanning our surroundings. Shadows darkened the stone walls around us, turning them into something mysterious and ominous.
We’d brought along a couple of electric lanterns and turned them on once it grew too dark to see comfortably. As dhampirs, we didn’t need as much light as humans, but we needed some. The lanterns cast just enough to help our eyes without blinding us to our periphery, like a campfire would have. Soon, the skies were completely dark, and we knew we’d entered the time when Strigoi could walk freely. None of us doubted he’d come for us. The question was whether he would wait and try to wear us down or strike suddenly. As more time passed, it appeared as though it would be the former.
“Do you sense anything?” I whispered to Mark. Those who were shadow-kissed felt nauseous when Strigoi were close.
“Not yet,” he murmured back.
“We should’ve brought marshmallows,” I joked. “Of course, then we’d have to build a fire for sure—”
An earsplitting scream ripped through the night.
I jumped to my feet, wincing. The problem with superior hearing is that loud noises are really loud. My companions were up too, stakes ready. Mark frowned.
“Some Strigoi trick?”
“No,” I said, moving toward where the scream had originated. “That was Ivan.”
Mark swore in Russian, something I’d gotten used to from Dimitri. “He never left,” said Mark.
Dimitri grabbed my arm to slow me down. “Rose, he’s in one of the caves.”
“I know,” I said. I’d already figured that out and turned to face Dimitri. “But what choice do we have? We can’t leave him in there.”
“This is exactly what we wanted to avoid,” said Dimitri grimly.
“And likely a trap set by the Blood King,” added Mark, just as another scream sounded. “He wants us but is too smart to come out and get us.”
I grimaced, knowing Mark was right. “But that also means he’s probably not going to kill Ivan right away. He’s just going to mess with him to lure us in. There’s a chance we can save Ivan.” I threw my hands up when nobody responded. “Come on! Can you really leave that inept kid in there to die?”
No, of course they couldn’t. Dimitri sighed. “This is where we could’ve used a map of the caves. Better to set up an ambush.”
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“No such luxury, comrade,” I said, walking toward the cave again. “We’ve got to go in the front door. At least Mark can give us warning.”
A debate then broke out between the three of us over who would lead and who would go last to carry a lantern. Dimitri and Mark came up with lame arguments about why they should go ahead of me. Mark’s was that, as the oldest, his life was more expendable, which was ridiculous. Dimitri’s reasoning was that he was safe, thanks to Yeva’s prophecy. That was even more ridiculous, and I knew he was only saying so to protect me. Yet in the end, I was overruled and ended up behind them.
Darkness far deeper than the night engulfed us as we stepped inside. The lantern helped a little but only illuminated a short distance in front of us as we walked further and further into the unknown. None of us spoke, but I had a feeling we were all thinking the same thing. The screams had stopped. It could mean Ivan was dead. It almost certainly meant the Blood King wanted to lead us as far into the caves as possible.
Trouble came when we reached a fork in the tunnel. It not only meant we had to choose a path; it also meant the Blood King had the potential to double back on us. “Which way?” murmured Dimitri.
I glanced between the two options. One was narrower, but that meant nothing. Lines of thought filled Mark’s face, and then he indicated the larger tunnel. “There. It’s faint, but I can feel him there.”
The three of us hurried forward, and the tunnel soon grew wider and wider, finally opening into a large “room” with three other tunnels feeding into it. Before any of us had a chance to question where to go next, something heavy slammed into me and knocked me to the ground. The lantern flew from my grasp and miraculously rolled away, unbroken.
Instinct made me follow suit. I had no clue where my attacker was, but I rolled away as soon as I hit the cave’s floor. It was a good decision, because half a second later, I got my first glimpse of the Blood King. The stories were true. He was old. Admittedly, Strigoi didn’t age once they turned, and at a glance, this guy had the appearance of someone in his midforties. Like all Strigoi, he had ghastly white skin and the look of death about him. If the light had been a little better, I knew I’d see red in his eyes too. His long mustache and shoulder-length hair were black with gray streaks, looking like something you’d see from the imperial days of Russia. But it was more than the antiquated haircut that marked his age. There was something about a Strigoi you could feel, an ancient evilness that went straight to the bone. Also, as age increased, so did their speed and strength.