by Karen Lynch
“You have some potential, but it will probably take us years to polish you up.”
“Gee thanks,” I replied. “Maybe after a few hundred years, I’ll be as good as you.”
Desmund pursed his lips. “Doubtful, but you will make a decent opponent.”
I shook my head at his cockiness. “How old are you anyway?” The Mohiri didn’t have the same hang-ups about age as humans so I saw nothing wrong in asking.
He paused as if he’d forgotten the answer. “I was born in sixteen thirty-eight.”
Wow. “I can’t imagine living that long. I only found out a few months ago I was Mohiri.”
“Ah, you are that orphan. I knew there was something different about you.”
“That’s me.” I couldn’t help but think that it’s probably not good when someone as eccentric as Desmund thinks you’re different. “I’m not exactly like the other trainees here; they are all such good fighters. I don’t think I’d make a good warrior – or know if I even want to be one.”
He gazed out the darkened window. “‘It is better to fail in originality than to succeed in imitation.’” When he looked back at me, he wore a little smile. “Melville. Words to live by.”
I smiled back. “I’ll try to remember that.”
“So, shall we have a rematch?” He deftly rolled one of the ebony pieces between his long fingers.
“Not tonight,” I said with real regret. Desmund was a little unbalanced, but he was also intelligent and interesting and I couldn’t help but like him. I began gathering checkers to put them away. “It’s getting late and I have training in the morning.”
“Another time then?” His question was casual, but he was not able to hide the glimmer of hope in his eyes. It struck me that he must be lonely up here, even though he drove everyone away.
My smile widened. “Definitely. I need to practice if I’m ever going to beat you.”
He let out a short laugh, the first since I’d met him. “You have your work cut out for you.” He helped pick up the pieces, placing his in the box and holding it out to me. I reached over to drop mine in and my fingers brushed his hand.
Cold sickness assailed me. My heart fluttered, and my skin felt like there were cold wet things crawling over it. I shuddered and leaned back as sweat broke out on my upper lip and blackness swam before my eyes. Taking a gulp of air, I braced my hand on the edge of the table and fought off the faintness threatening to swallow me.
“Are you unwell?” Desmund’s voice sounded worried, and he reached for me.
“I’m fine!” I managed to stand before he could touch me. If this horrible attack was from a brief touch, I did not want to know what longer contact would do. He seemed oblivious to the real reason for my distress, and I didn’t want to alarm him. I gave him a shaky smile. “I probably shouldn’t have skipped dinner.”
His brow furrowed. “I can have food brought up for you if you wish.”
“Thanks, but I can grab a muffin from the dining hall on my way.” He did not look convinced. “I’m okay, really.”
He stood and followed me to the door. “You still look pale. Are you quite certain you don’t want to sit and rest a little?”
I gave him what I hoped was a reassuring smile. “I’m starting to feel better already.” It was partially true; my body was already recovering from the strange illness even though I was still a bit shaken up. “I’ll see you again soon.”
I slipped out of the library and hurried toward the stairs. What the hell was that? The Mohiri had no special powers – unless they were some kind of half breed like me – but I’d definitely sensed something off when I touched him. Was he something more than a Mohiri, or could this have to do with his illness? I needed to ask Tristan about it as soon as I saw him again. If Desmund was dangerous, it wouldn’t be smart to spend time alone with him. It didn’t make sense because Tristan had urged me to get to know Desmund. I found myself hoping I was overreacting, because Tristan had been right; I did like Desmund once I got to know him.
Chapter 5
“I HEAR THERE was some excitement in training yesterday.” Tristan peered at me over his glass of red wine. It was our first time talking since we met two days ago, and we were having dinner in his apartment. I still wasn’t sure how I felt about suddenly having a grandfather – especially Madeline’s father – but I was trying to get past my reservations and give us a chance to get to know each other.
I looked up from my salad, prepared to defend my actions. I wasn’t surprised that Celine had complained about me. She had made it clear from the first time she opened her mouth that she did not like me. I still stood by my decision not to kill the bazerats, even though they were demons. Being demons did not make them inherently evil like vampires. The world is full of demons and many of them are more of a nuisance than a real threat. I used to live in a house infested with imps, and though they were sometimes annoying, they had never shown any real malice.
Roland hadn’t agreed with me when I told him about the bazerats last night. Werewolves have more of a black-and-white view when it comes to demons, even if my friends made an exception for me. Roland thought I should have killed the bazerats, and it rankled me that he seemed to be siding with Celine. We’d argued about it for at least thirty minutes before we agreed to disagree for the sake of peace. He was actually more interested in how I’d zapped the bazerats and knocked them out than whether or not I’d killed them.
“Did you really throw a knife at Celine and urge the other trainees to refuse to complete the task?”
My mouth fell open. “I did not throw a knife at anyone. I tossed it on the ground. And all I said was that I didn’t believe in senseless killing. Okay, I might have told Terrence it was easier to kill something than catch it, but that’s it, I swear.”
Tristan’s laugh took me by surprise. “Celine always did have a flair for the dramatic. She is a skilled warrior and a good trainer . . . most of the time.”
“I must have gotten her during one of her off times.”
“Celine is . . . well, let’s just say she has a better rapport with men than other women.” He set his glass down. “I can speak to her if you’d like.”
“No, I can handle it on my own. She’s no worse than some of the girls I knew in high school.”
His eyebrows rose. “High school sounds like a rather perilous place.”
“You have no idea.” I went back to my salad, feeling a little more at ease. Tristan was surprisingly easy to talk to, and it almost felt like I was hanging out with a cousin instead of a grandfather.
“How are your new pets doing? Sahir tells me you named them.”
“Hugo and Woolf. They’re really smart and already know some commands.” I was always happy to talk about the hellhounds. “I just wish they didn’t have to stay locked up in that cage all the time. They need fresh air and space to run around.”
His brow furrowed. “I’m not sure that is a good idea. We don’t know if we can trust them not to kill the first person they see.”
“I go in the cage with them every day and they are gentle with me.”
“They have imprinted on you and you are their master now. They would never harm you.”
“They’ve stopped growling at Sahir when I’m there.” I leaned forward earnestly. “I really believe they just need to get used to being around people. I can’t bear to think of them locked up for the rest of their lives.”
“I’ll talk to Sahir and see what he says. I cannot make any promises.”
“Thank you.” I was confident that once he saw they could be trusted around others, he would give them more freedom. “You have miles and miles of woods out there, perfect for them to run in. I could take them out every day without bothering anyone.”
Tristan laid down his fork. “It is not a good idea for you to be out in the woods alone.” I started to protest, and he said, “I know you are unhappy with the restrictions placed upon you, but we are only trying to keep you safe after everything
you’ve been through.”
“But everyone thinks I’m dead, including the vampires.”
“You will have to forgive me for being a little overprotective. I believe that is a grandsire’s right. Just be patient a little longer until we can be certain this Master is not still searching for you. We are monitoring activity around Maine, and so far it is very quiet there.”
“I could have told you how quiet it is in Maine.” I shrugged at his questioning look. “I have werewolf friends there, remember? Anyway, trust me; no one wants the Master to think I am dead more than I do. I can’t even go for a walk without one of the warriors escorting me back in irons.”
He laughed. “I’ll tell them to lay off the irons. In the meantime, why don’t I arrange for a day out for you? How about a day trip to Boise? With supervision, of course.”
“Okay,” I conceded, excited about the possibility of a change of scenery, even if it was only for a day.
He got up to take away our salad plates, and my eyes wandered around his apartment, which had a decidedly masculine décor. It made sense since he had been a widower for so long. There were some softer touches like a pale-blue throw on the back of the couch and a number of framed photos and paintings on the mantle and walls. One photo in particular caught my eye, and I knew immediately who the blond woman was because I had seen the faded picture of her that my dad used to carry in his wallet. Madeline was stunningly beautiful – even Celine could not compare – and the happy smile she wore did not reconcile with my image of the woman who had hurt me and my dad so much.
Questions that had hovered in the recesses of my mind for weeks finally pushed their way to the forefront. My dad and Madeline met in college, according to Nate, and they’d dated for several years before they married. They were married for two years before they had me, and she left when I was two. In all those years with Madeline, didn’t my dad realize she was not aging at all? How did Madeline hide her strength and control her Mori without him ever suspecting she was not human? Or had he known what she was all along? I bit my lip and looked away from the photo. There was no sense pondering over questions that would never be answered.
Another picture got my attention, a painting of the same blond girl from the portrait in Tristan’s office. “Is that your sister?” I asked him, and he turned and followed my gaze to the painting in question. “Nikolas once mentioned his friend, Elena, who died a long time ago, and he said she was Madeline’s aunt.”
He laid a plate of salmon and rice in front of me and took his seat again. “Elena was my younger sister, much younger. I was almost two hundred years old and quite surprised when my parents told me they were having another baby. It is not unusual for Mohiri siblings to have many years between them, but my parents love to travel and they are not what you would call the most affectionate people. They were already here exploring America by then, and I decided to come here to be with them when the child was born. Elena was the most captivating little baby, and of course I adored her immediately and spoiled her excessively. When she was five, my parents decided they wanted to continue their travels, and it didn’t take much convincing to get them to leave Elena with me.”
“A warrior raising a little girl?”
He cut into his salmon. “My sister, Beatrice, would have taken Elena, but she was in South America at the time. I lived in a family compound in Virginia back then, and it was more of a community than this one. There were other children for Elena to play with and women to go to when I needed advice. It was a lot more suitable for a child than travelling the world, and Elena had a very happy childhood there.”
“Nikolas told me very little about her,” I said softly. “But it sounded like he cared about her a lot.”
Tristan nodded. “I am not surprised he mentioned her. Nikolas came to our compound when Elena was nine, and he spoiled her like the rest of us did. She was like a little sister to him, and he took her death very hard. He blamed himself even though I and everyone else told him it was not his fault. My sister was beautiful and used to people doting on her. She was precocious and charming, but she was also willful, and I blame myself for that. She never should have left the compound alone, and she died because of it.”
“Why did Nikolas blame himself?”
“As I said, Nikolas loved Elena like a sister, but Elena, she adored him and she constantly tried to get his attention. By the time she was sixteen, most of the boys in the compound believed themselves in love with her, but she only had eyes for Nikolas. He knew how she felt and he always deflected her attentions gently, but she was determined to have him and nothing would dissuade her. Her schemes to get him alone grew more creative every day until even I began to tease him about us one day being brothers if he was not careful. If only I had known the lengths she would go to be with him, I might have intervened before her games got out of control. I might have saved her.”
“What happened?”
“Elena knew how protective Nikolas was of her. She concocted a plan to sneak away from the compound, and she had her friend Miriam go to Nikolas and tell him Elena had run away. Miriam confessed later that they were hoping the thought of losing Elena would make Nikolas realize his true feelings for her. But Miriam could not get to Nikolas because he was giving a report before the Counsel at the time. By the time she found him, four hours had passed and she was in a panic because it was nearly dark. Nikolas raised the alarm, and a group of us rode out after Elena. We picked up signs of vampires, and we split up to cover the area faster.”
Tristan paused, and I saw raw pain on his face as he continued. “It was Nikolas who found her. What they did to her . . . it was beyond inhuman. After they had finished their fun, they burned what was left of her until my beautiful little sister was unrecognizable. They left her horse unharmed and tied to a tree, a message to us that her life meant less than an animal’s.”
“God . . . ” I had seen what vampires left behind of the people they killed. I also knew they took special delight in killing young Mohiri.
“Nikolas took her death as hard as I did, and he blamed himself for not making her understand that there could never be anything romantic between them. He stayed out for months until he had hunted down every vampire in a hundred-mile radius. I tried to convince him that he was not at fault and that no one blamed him for her death, but he would not listen. He was different after that, harder. A year later, I left Virginia and came here to build this place, and he came with me. We both wanted something that did not remind us of Virginia, which is why we made this into a military stronghold instead of a community.”
“I’m sorry about your sister,” I said, not knowing what to say about someone who’d been dead for so many years. “It’s no wonder Nikolas gets so overbearing and angry with me all the time.”
“Sara, do not compare yourself to Elena. Don’t get me wrong, I loved my sister with all my heart, but I was not blind to her faults. Elena was beautiful and spirited, but she was also spoiled and selfish. You have done some reckless things in the past, but you are also very loyal to your friends and you have a kind heart. Sahir tells me you bring raw meat treats for the wyvern when you visit the hellhounds, even though that creature would likely try to kill you given the chance.”
“He can’t help what he is, and I know he must get lonely in there, especially not being able to fly. Don’t worry, I don’t expect him to eat out of my hand or anything, and I’ll be keeping my distance. I like my body parts where they are.”
We laughed and turned the conversation to other things. He wanted to hear more about my life, so I described what it was like growing up with Roland and Peter. And Remy. I told him about Roland’s recent trip to the cave and how much it meant to get the message from Remy.
We were in the middle of our dessert when I remembered something I’d been meaning to talk to him about. “I saw Desmund again last night.”
“Did you?” He took a sip from his wine glass. “And how did it go?”
“Better than I ex
pected. We both like books and Tchaikovsky, so he thinks I’m not a total lost cause. We even played a game of checkers.”
Tristan’s eyes widened. “You got Desmund to play checkers? I haven’t seen him play anything but chess since I’ve known him.”
“I don’t know how to play chess, so it was checkers or nothing at all.” I dabbed my napkin to my mouth then laid it beside my plate. “Honestly, I think the only reason he played with me is because he’s lonely. Why does he stay up there all alone like that? I mean, I can tell he’s not well, but he’s not that bad, is he?”
Tristan settled back in his chair. “You might be the first person in a long time to feel some kind of empathy for Desmund. He goes out of his way to frighten most people away.”
“Why? He’s obviously intelligent, and he can be nice when he wants to be. Why does he drive everyone away?”
“Desmund is not the same man he was before he became ill. He was charming and outgoing and one of the finest warriors I’ve ever met.”
During my time with Desmund last night, I had seen tiny flashes of the man Tristan described, and it was sad to think of how much he had changed. “What happened to him?”
There was a short pause before he answered. “It was a Hale witch. Desmund and his team were in Algeria hunting a nest of vampires that had wiped out over half a village. The witch took offense to them being in his territory even though they were there to help his people. Desmund confronted him to draw him away from the rest of his team, and he took the brunt of the witch’s attack. He spent many years in confinement before he was stable enough to be released. It’s a testament to his strength that he has come this far, but I fear he will never be the man he once was.”