Blood Threads: The Star Seamstress Book One

by Noella Royce

  Yup, they were vampires, all right.

  "I feel like I'm at some sort of inquisition," I said to Leslie with a smile, hoping to break the tension in the air. He smiled at me in response, but it was a strained thing, and the young-seeming Asian man next to him scowled.

  "We're not here for your jokes, human. You're here to explain your involvement with the Ashers, and report on the development of your powers."

  I looked at Leslie. "So you know about the whole Star Seamstress thing?"

  He nodded. "You're like a lantern, Veda, to those of us who can sense auras. You glow with your power, or at least you usually do." He narrowed his eyes at me. "You now appear like everyone else. Has something happened?"

  "Whatever magic I had is gone." I wrapped my arms around myself, suddenly very cold. "Thalia is going to look into it for me, but I can't access my skills." There was a shift in the room, and I suddenly regretted saying that. Damn, maybe I had just threatened my own life.

  I remembered how Adin had said they probably wouldn't let me leave. Maybe 'they' referred to more than the Ash Order.

  "Did she tell you how long that would take?" Lillian asked quietly from the seat she'd taken.

  "She was going to look into it, but—"

  There was another earthquake then, and I bit my tongue and winced at the pain. The walls rattled, and the young woman in the corner swore. Leslie glanced at her, and I suddenly had the feeling that this was where the real power lay.

  Leslie waited until the shaking stopped, ran a hand through his blond locks, and sighed. "Those are becoming so very tiresome. That is unfortunate about your powers, Veda, as I believe whatever the Order is planning is on the precipice of fruition. We were hopeful you could craft armor for us, so to speak, that might assist us in the coming conflict. The balance of many decades is under threat, and the Ashers seem to feel now is the time to wrest control of Maywen University from us. We have no idea what they're planning, however, or what the earthquakes mean."

  "Why do they want the college?"

  "Money." This was Mrs. Kahm, and her voice simmered with rage. "We are the biggest employer, as well is the most lucrative business, here in town, and the necromancers are greedy. Some of our spies within the lower level organization have told us they have big plans, and that their new leader is planning to expand their reach to a more global extent. They own several businesses and are training fellow necromancers in every corner of North America."

  "Global?" I narrowed my eyes. "But shouldn't they possibly start nationally first?"

  "Oh, they have a history of putting the cart before the horse. But they are growing, and apparently that has given them the belief that they are ready to truly take over the university and be the one and only rulers in this town."

  "No, that's not it," the man who'd scowled at me said impatiently. "Some of their members see their mainstream attempts at power as subverting their purpose and insultingly mundane. Not everyone there is onboard with corporate necromancy. This is a serious change of course from the last several decades."

  "We have no proof of that, Peter." Leslie was clearly annoyed. "For all we know, they've been planning this for years."

  "We have enough. The Ashers are deliberate, and this sort of hungry power grab is not their style. Something else is afoot."

  "We believe, or at least some of us do," the girl in the corner said, and I noted that her voice was far deeper than one would expect from a young lady who looked no more than seventeen or eighteen, "that they have a new leader, one who is impatient with the status quo and focused on shaking things up and returning them to their glory days, as it were." She looked at her nails, which were painted a bright orange. "It's quite tiresome, but we must find out who this leader is, and cut them down like the evil bastard they are. Honestly, I believe it's time we make them pay for their forays into our territory. First, we must defeat them, and then we must tear them to shreds."

  "Solal," Leslie said, and his voice was gently chiding, "how many times have I told you, these things need to stay within the board. Veda doesn't need to know our future plans."

  Solal shrugged, unconcerned. "What does it matter what we tell her? She has no true allies, no one to tell. And she's close to Adin, who is aware of everything we do." I would have denied the idea that we were 'close', but wasn't given a chance. Her gaze swept the room. "There are those on this board who still talk to him regularly, as much as they might deny it. And we could bind her to us." The grin she gave me was both toothy and terrifying. "Avoiding any inconvenient betrayals and bullshit like that."

  "Whoa, whoa, wait a second." I held up my hands. "What do you mean by binding? And who is this evil new leader? If you want my help, I need information. If not, you might as well kill me, because I'm not going to flail around in the dark anymore."

  Leslie looked at Soral, who shrugged, and then back at me. "We have no idea who this new, upstart leader is, which is concerning. The Ashers aren't known to break rank or work with outsiders, and yet the traditional leadership has allowed someone to take control of their organization to a startling extent. As to binding, it would put you under our power, absolutely."

  That was to be avoided at all costs. I didn't want to be the vampire gang's bitch any more than I wanted to be the Ash Order's. "Why won't Adin help you directly?"

  There was some murmuring, glances were exchanged. "We don't know," Leslie said finally. "He was our greatest champion, the first of us, until fifty years ago, when his younger sister died. Since then, he's refused to directly fight the Ashers, and left this council." I felt the anger ripple through the room. "He has distanced himself from his duties and his clan, and it wounds us deeply."

  "The first of you?"

  "He is the first vampire of our ilk, the first Daywalker," Solal said, her voice infinitely bored. "We are a newer breed, only a few centuries old, and we began with him." Well, that explained the 'First Changer' nickname.

  "Will you people stop telling this human our secrets!" Peter hissed. "We might as well send out a damn mass email, for fuck's sake!"

  Solal shrugged. "This is not super-secret knowledge, nor the whole story. We wish her to work for us, we have to give her things she doesn't have. It's a hell of a lot easier than the binding ritual; I don't know about you, Peter, but I don't have thirty-six hours and buckets of virgin blood to waste on ensuring her complicity."

  "Fine, but can we please discuss what secrets we're telling her first?" asked Peter through gritted teeth. "Wasn't that the whole point of a board, to make decisions as a group?"

  The young girl smiled, and it was terrifying in its cold and how much older than her appearance it made her appear. "I'm not on your board, dear."

  "For good reason!"

  A squabble began that soon engulfed the whole table, but I was barely listening at this point, my gaze fixating on a light as I absorbed the news that Adin was the first of these vampires, and also appeared to be some form of traitor or deserter. This was disappointing and odd, because he neither seemed to be a coward nor uncaring. What was his story?

  Mrs. Kahm approached me, leaving the vampires to their argument. "Veda," she said quietly and placed a hand on my arm. "Please help my son." She glanced over her shoulder and leaned in closer. "I have never seen them so impotent in my life, and that's made them fractious and testy. While they fight, I worry for the university and even more so for Sun Ji." The fear was clear in her voice. "I fear what they'll use him for, and no one here has an answer."

  "I wish I could help, but my power is gone." I held up my hands. "I'm utterly useless."

  "Not utterly. You're friends with Professor Nieren, closer than he usually lets his casual playthings." Well, that was a less-than-flattering description. For a professional in charge of running a large institution, she was surprisingly undiplomatic. "If you could somehow convince him to help us, in any way at all, it could make all the difference in the world. He is a powerful mage, and one of the very few with the capability to directl
y attack the Ashers." Her eyes searched my face. "Please."

  I chewed on my bottom lip. "I'll try, I really will, but you overestimate our 'closeness', he—"

  Before I could finish the sentence, the ground shook again, but instead of a terrifying, all-encompassing quake, it was a smaller shift. It sounded like there were rocks and boulders being moved directly under our feet, and I looked down to see that individual tiles were buckling underneath us. They cracked upwards with a horrifying sound, and Mrs. Kahm and I grasped each other to steady ourselves.

  "Something's under the floor!" I yelled, and with inhuman speed, the vampires sprung to their feet and began to track the encroaching path of the cracks. I had the terrifying realization the movements were undulating and snakelike.

  As if on cue, a portion of the floor on the opposite side of the door from us exploded and revealed a massive snake head, at least several feet wide and sporting four glowing, purple eyes that contrasted dramatically with its mottled yellow scales. Both I and Mrs. Kahm screamed.

  Its eyes flickered to us and back to the table, and the monster hissed menacingly before striking forward with blinding reptilian speed.

  The room erupted in supernatural, horrifying chaos. Vampires snarled and leapt upon the snake, and I saw Leslie and Solal lift their hands and began chanting.

  Mrs. Kahm and I looked at each other. An understanding of our squishy humanity passed between us, and we both turned and fled out the door.

  I followed her through the maze of tunnels, and I was relieved she knew where the hell we were going. We didn't stop until we hit the main floor and then were rushing out the front door of the same school building that faced the pool Lillian had dragged me through.

  The building shook, and several people on the quad were watching it with wide eyes, turning their stares to us as we came flying out. A man with thick black glasses who looked like faculty started to approach President Kahm, but she held up her hand and shook her head, and the man turned away. Another young man in a blue T-shirt was watching us from a few feet away with disturbing intensity. Man, we must have looked crazy, running out of the building like bats out of hell. "Will they be okay?" I asked President Kahm between gulps of air.

  She shrugged. "They're vampires. They'll probably be invigorated by the whole exercise." Her tone was confident, but her eyes were less than sure.

  "But—"

  "I'm sorry, Miss Geroux, but I have several things I need to take care of." She turned away, but stopped. "Please consider my request. Nieren won't listen to any of us, but he may to you."

  With that, she was gone, striding down the pavement with an air of angry efficiency that cleared the path before her.

  Wow, she pulled herself together fast. Must be the side effect of overseeing a vampire-infested college.

  After taking far longer to calm myself down—I was still stunned from seeing that horrific, dreadful, oddly beautiful snake creature staring right at me—I went to the classics building to hunt down Mr. First Daywalker and see if I could get an answer to any number of questions.

  He, unfortunately, wasn't in, as I was told by one of his peers, a curvy woman with beautiful curly hair piled on top of her head and a dreadfully effective death glare. I forced her to take a message and dragged myself home.

  I had the disturbing but increasingly familiar feeling that someone was following me, but when I whirled, no one was there. Somehow I knew it wasn't Adin. Oh god, I hoped it wasn't the Ashers. Between the undead and the giant snake, I really couldn't handle the very fact of their existence at the moment.

  I ran up my stairs, slammed the newly replaced door shut, and was relieved to see my bedroom door was also new. There was still plastic over the window, but the day wasn't cold enough for me to care.

  Dropping on the bed, I fell into a dreamless, deep slumber.

  I woke up to the sound of the TV on and smiled, figuring it was Breanna.

  "Hey, the doors look great. I hope I—" I stopped, seeing that once again, I was talking to a dude, not my roommate. It was a tall, young guy with shaggy brown hair, a loose blue T-shirt, jeans, and his feet up on our coffee table. He was also watching cartoons and eating Breanna's potato chips, which I wasn't sure was okay. "Who the hell are you?!"

  He looked up at me with large laconic brown eyes, and I remembered him from earlier in the quad, although I swore I'd seen him before that but couldn't recall where.

  The key issue was this guy had been following me. This was really getting old.

  I screamed, and he jumped up with unnatural speed and clasped a hand over my mouth while wrapping an arm around my body so I couldn't escape. I promptly bit it and he swore, but didn't let go. "Come on, stop it; I'm not going to hurt you!" I struggled harder. As if I believed whatever the crazies in this town told me. "Damn it, Thalia sent me!"

  I stopped trying to thrash. "Mmmha?" I asked through his hand.

  The interloper let out a rush of air. "Yes, Thalia! She sent me to watch over you, although I couldn't move fast enough to keep that bloodsucker from dragging you into the pool. She told me you knew!" He looked and sounded very annoyed, and I noted that he'd be very cute if it wasn't for the messy hair, the unshaven face, and the sullen expression on his face. "I'm going to let you go now. Are you going to scream?"

  I shook my head and he released me. I stumbled away from him. "How did you get in here?" I turned to the front door in panic. "Did you break the lock?" Oh god, I was going to owe Breanna my firstborn child at this rate, and I hadn't even planned to have children.

  "No, you left it unlocked. Isn't that really stupid for someone being stalked by mages?" He sounded more incredulous than mocking.

  "Yes, yes it is." I sat down on the chair with a huff. "I am the queen of stupidity, apparently."

  He didn't disagree, just sat down himself and popped another potato chip in his maw.

  "I still don't know why you have to be in here," I continued. "I appreciate her looking out for me, but I've had enough strange dudes lurking and chasing after me recently, and I'd really liked to have known you were there."

  "I knocked, but you didn't answer, so I tested the doors." He lifted the chips and glowered in my general direction. Where had I seen that particular expression before? "I was hungry."

  The memory came back to me through a haze of repressed alcohol-soaked memories. "The Tangerine!" I snapped my fingers. "You're that guy with Kristen, who snarled at me!"

  He perked up at that, sitting a bit straighter. "Yeah, I'm Hal. I'm sure she's told you about me."

  "Not much." He looked disappointed, which I would have found amusing under more mundane circumstances. "But she was very enthusiastic when she did! Wait, aren't you a werewolf?"

  Hal was still pouting. "Yeah. Who else would Thalia send?"

  "I thought she was a witch?"

  He rolled his eyes. "She's both a witch and a werewolf. Everyone knows that. She's our alpha."

  "Huh." That made her doubly terrifying, but then I remembered her sniffing around me and was less surprised than I should have been. "Okay, then."

  Maybe I'd lost my ability to be shocked at this point.

  "She also has a message for you, since you've been ignoring your phone." He pulled out his smartphone. "Tell Veda she has been poisoned, and there's no way to reverse the effects other than one whole passing of the moon. Unfortunately, that will be too late." He put his phone down and gave me a look that might have been apologetic. It also might have just meant he was stoned; it was hard to tell with him. "Sounds like you're screwed."

  "What's a passing of the moon?"

  "A month, kinda."

  "Oh." What else was there to say? The sentence had come down, and I was irredeemable, at least for the immediate future. Neutered and useless but apparently still in mortal danger. Fantastic.

  Hal turned back to the TV, and I watched it unseeing for several moments. "What time is it?" I finally asked.

  "Eight-thirty."

  "PM?"

&nb
sp; "Well, yeah."

  I stewed on that for a moment, and my eyes popped wide open as what I was supposed to be doing that night hit me like a ton of bricks. "Jordan!" I dove for my purse, grabbed my phone, and groaned when I saw that he'd called me at least five or six times, and left several voice mails.

  Hey, Veda, hope you're okay. I'm here at the restaurant, and it's seven forty-five. Will you be coming?

  Are you okay?

  The final voice mail was what depressed me the most and made me feel the worst: Hi, it's me again. I'm at your apartment, but no one's there. Going home. Let me know what's up. Or don't.

  I had stood Jordan—sweet, wonderful, hot, and adoring Jordan—up. I groaned, embarrassed and very angry at myself, and my head fell into my hands.

  "What's up?" Hal asked, his voice curious.

  "I had a date I forgot about."

  "Was that who was knocking on the door a little bit ago? I was wondering about that. Sucks to be you."

  "Very mature."

  I swore he gave a little smile at that, but his eyes didn't leave the TV.

  My finger hovered over the 'call' button, but I stopped myself. What could I say? 'Sorry, got waylaid by vampires and had to escape a giant snake attack, was distracted.' There was no excuse that would make him forgive me for ghosting him. Hell, if it'd happened to me back in LA, I'd put out an APB to all my friends that the slimeball who'd done it to me was an asshat, and ensure his reputation was trash.

  Now I was the slimeball, and I hated myself for it. No, a phone call would just be uncomfortable and weird, especially since Jordan wasn't aware of Maywen's true nature whatsoever.

  I texted him instead. I'm so so so so sorry. Today was a nightmare, and I took a nap to recover that lasted two hours too long. I understand if you won't forgive me - I wouldn't either. But it wasn't on purpose. Sorry again. I'll explain more at work.