Blood Forever

by Mari Mancusi

  “Exactly.” Sunny nods. “And you know what? I don’t necessarily think that’s a bad thing. Do you?”

  “But Sunny, look what happened the first time around!” I protest. “You were killed. Magnus was brought in for treason. The Blood Coven was kicked out of the Consortium. We don’t want to start the chain of events all over again.”

  “Of course not,” my sister agrees. “That would be crazy. But what if we could do something else? What if we could change things for the better? Figure out a way to not only save the Blood Coven and the rest of the Consortium from Pyrus’s reign of terror but also get our boyfriends back?”

  I frown. “It sounds good in theory, Sun, but how the heck are we going to make that happen? I mean, we essentially tried to do that already, and look what a disaster it turned out to be.”

  “But this time will be different,” my sister says fervently, a strange light in her eyes.

  “And how do we know that?”

  Sunny smiles. “Because this time we know the future.”

  8

  Sunny

  Turns out, once you’ve made the decision to embark on a mission to save the world (once more with feeling), it’s really tough to spend the entire next day locked away in a boring old high school. But unfortunately, since we can’t clue Mom in to our superhero plans, she sees no reason why we can’t make the bus on time. And I suppose there’s not a ton we could do during the day anyway, seeing as all good vampires are fast asleep in their coffins during school hours.

  Not to mention, as Rayne points out, you can’t very well list saving the world from a vampire apocalypse on your college application as one of your extracurriculars. And now that she’s no longer an immortal vampire with riches beyond belief, she’s going to need to score a scholarship or two.

  And so I’m forced to content myself to suffer through endless classes and tedious lunchtime talk, offering up a polite “Mm-hm” at all the appropriate pauses in conversation. But truth be told, if you asked me what my friends and teachers were going on about, I wouldn’t have had a clue. All I can focus on is our master plan and how I’m going to get Magnus to go along with it, without spilling all the time-travel technicalities.

  Rayne and I spent most of last night planning our strategy. Our idea is simple, really. I’ll warn Magnus about Slayer Inc.’s threat to Lucifent’s life and by doing so, earn the respect of him and the entire Blood Coven. Then, once they trust us, we can move on to the bigger fish we’re hoping to fry—well, stake. Pyrus himself. It’s perfect, really.

  Finally the day ends and the sun goes down and Rayne and I head over to Club Fang, the scene of the crime, so to speak. As we get out of the car in the back parking lot, my eyes wander over to the simple wooden post where long ago (or next month, in this case) Magnus accidentally bit me and started my vampiric transformation. At the time, I’d been royally pissed off, not to mention horrified beyond belief. I mean, turning into a vampire one week before prom? So not cool.

  But looking back on it now, after all of Magnus’s and my adventures over the last year, that night will, without a doubt, go down as one of the most romantic in my entire life. I remember leaning against the post, my body pressed up against his, his lips brushing my neck—his fangs scraping my skin. It was the night I met my soul mate. A night that would change my life forever.

  I still wonder sometimes what would have happened if we hadn’t been able to reverse the curse in time. What would it have been like to stay a vampire forever? Living as Magnus’s blood mate for all eternity with nothing to tear us apart. Maybe things would have turned out differently. Maybe Bertha wouldn’t have been able to kill me. Maybe Magnus and I could have fought against Pyrus and saved the Blood Coven right then and there. Maybe we could have lived happily ever after.

  But I can’t think of that now. It does no good. All I can do is focus on our current mission to change history for the better and hope for the best.

  Rayne and I pay our cover and head upstairs into the club, pushing past all the weird Gothy patrons, all doing the same “foot stuck in the mud” dance on the dance floor. Seriously, dancing to Goth music seems like the dumbest thing ever to me. I mean, most of it’s so freaking slow. How do you work up a good sweat just swaying your arms like that?

  We leave the dance floor behind and head through a wooden door into a small coffeehouse at the back of the club. Or what appears, at first glance anyway, to be an establishment that serves coffee. The place actually specializes in a fine merlot that’s not exactly fermented from grapes, if you get my meaning.

  There, among a mess of motley patrons, sits Magnus, as expected, flanked by his two donor chicks, Rachel and Charity. Rayne nods to me and pushes me forward, then slinks back into the crowd, presumably to find Jareth. As I step toward the table, Charity recognizes me immediately from the night before and give out a delighted squeal before running over to hug me.

  “How are you?” she asks, squeezing me with exuberance. “You ran out so fast last night I didn’t even get a chance to say good-bye. Is everything okay?” She peers at me with concerned eyes. “You haven’t changed your mind, have you? I mean, about being a blood mate? Because Magnus really needs a good blood mate.” She glances over at the vampire, a fond look in her eyes. “He’s been kind of lonely, you know? Rachel and I have tried to keep him company over the last few years. But there’s only so much we can do. He really needs that blood bond with another vampire. And you seem like such a nice girl. I think you’d be perfect for him.” She gives me a worried smile. “So don’t back out, okay? Don’t break his heart.”

  I glance over at Magnus, my own heart suddenly feeling a little broken. I had no idea, that night he bit me, how much he’d been looking forward to having a blood mate of his own. And then I went and completely rejected him, demanding to be changed back into a human and treating him like a vile monster who tried to steal my soul. When all along, all he wanted was my heart.

  Charity leads me over to the table, where Magnus is swishing around a goblet of wine. He looks up at me, his beautiful sapphire eyes lighting up as they fall upon me.

  “You’re back,” he says, sounding surprised. “I thought when you left last night…before we could practice…”

  “I know, I’m sorry,” I say, pulling over a nearby chair. “I didn’t mean to abandon you. There was just something I had to work out.”

  “I hope you were successful?”

  I sit down in the chair, drawing in a breath. “Look, can we talk?” I glance over at Rachel and Charity, watching with rapt eyes. “Alone?”

  Magnus nods, then gestures to the donor chicks to make themselves scarce. Charity gives me a secretive wink while Rachel throws me a suspicious glare. I sigh and turn back to Magnus.

  “So,” I say, not sure where to begin. “I wanted to—”

  Magnus raises a hand to stop me. “It’s all right,” he says. “I know what you’re going to say and I understand.”

  “Um, I don’t think you—”

  “I felt you waffling at the church. And then you ran out before the practice bite.” He gives me a sad smile. “I know you don’t want to become a vampire. Not really, anyway. And I want you to know that that’s okay with me. I mean, not that I don’t want you. I’ve been waiting for a blood mate for some time now, after all. But I don’t want you doing something you’re going to regret. As I said last night, this is eternity we’re talking about.” He reaches out and places a hand on top of my own, sending a chill down my spine. “I will inform the council of your decision and they will send you a withdrawal form in the mail. You should expect to receive it between one to three—”

  “Wait, wait, wait!” I cry. “That’s not what I came here to say at all!”

  Magnus drops my hand. He looks at me with a hope in his eyes that nearly kills me. “It’s not?” he asks in a hoarse voice, as if he can scarcely believe his luck.

  Gah. This is so hard. I mean, I don’t want to give him false hope. But at the same time,
we’ve got much more important things to discuss before we go down that whole blood-mate road. And if I tell him I’m backing out now, he’ll never listen to what I have to say.

  “No, I’m still planning on going through with it,” I say, my lie tasting like sawdust in my mouth. I think back to all the times I yelled at him for lying to me. He’d tell me it was for my own good, something I could never understand. Now I think I’m starting to. “But right now we have more pressing matters.” I lean over the table, lowering my voice to a whisper. “Your Master’s life is in danger.”

  Magnus jerks to attention. “What did you say?”

  “You heard me. Your Master. Lucifent. The little-boy vampire who sired you.” I wonder how much I should reveal that I know. I want him to believe me, but I don’t want him to get suspicious because I know too much. “There’s a contract out on his head from Slayer Inc. One month from today they plan to send Bertha the Vampire Slayer into Blood Coven headquarters with a commission to dust him with her stake.”

  I pause, not daring to breathe as I wait for his reaction. Will he believe me? Everything we’ve planned up until this point in our little quest to save the future depends on it.

  For a moment, Magnus is silent. Then he speaks. “How did you come across this information?” he asks quietly.

  I bite my lower lip. How indeed? Obviously I can’t tell him I’m a time traveler. That would just bring up too many unanswerable questions. But what else can I say? How would I know this information? “I can’t reveal my sources,” I say at last, deciding to plead the fifth. “But I can assure you the threat is very real.”

  Magnus frowns, staring down into his glass of wine. I can almost see the thoughts whirling around in his head like a prairie tornado. He wants to believe me, even though he thinks what I’m saying is completely absurd.

  “Look, I’m going to be a member of the Blood Coven soon,” I remind him. “And the last thing I want is for something to happen to our fearless leader before I even get a chance to join.” I look at him pleadingly. Silently begging him to believe me.

  He pushes back his chair abruptly, rising to his feet. “Come.”

  “Um, what?” I squint up at him, confused. Not exactly the reaction I was expecting. “Come where?”

  “Lucifent must be informed of this threat,” Magnus says. “I will bring you to him so you can tell him what you know.”

  Wait, he wants me to tell him? “Oh. I don’t know if that’s such a good idea…” I stammer. After all, though I’d only met the Blood Coven Master once, mere minutes before his death, let’s just say he wasn’t as cuddly or cute as he appears to be. In fact, now that I think about it, he was kind of mean. “Can’t you just, you know, warn him yourself?” In my head I can hear Rayne calling me a wimp, but I push the thought from my mind.

  “I could,” Magnus replies. “But I’m guessing he’d prefer to hear about his impending demise straight from the source.”

  “Even if the source in question is an inconsequential mortal girl he doesn’t know from a hole in the wall?” I know I’m grasping at straws here, but I can’t help it. “Wouldn’t he prefer to hear it from his own progeny, vampire to vampire and all that?”

  “You’re going to be a full member of the Blood Coven and my blood mate in one month,” Magnus points out. “I see no reason why he shouldn’t respect you and hear you out.”

  Sigh. I’m not going to get out of this, am I? I just have to pray Lucifent’s in an indulgent mood and not into killing messengers and such. “Fine,” I say reluctantly. “Lead the way.”

  As I rise from my seat, I expect Magnus to lead me outside into his BMW and drive me over to Blood Coven HQ in St. Patrick’s Cemetery. But it turns out Lucifent evidently enjoys a little night life himself because instead I’m brought back through the dance floor of Club Fang, through a locked door at the other end of the hall, and behind a red velvet curtain, into a small, stark room I’ve never seen before. There, two vampires stand guard before a plain wooden door.

  “We’re here to see Lucifent,” Magnus informs the guards.

  The two vampires look at one another, then turn back to Magnus. “The Master is at dinner. He asks not to be disturbed.”

  Phew. “Oh well, we’ll have to tell him some other time, I guess,” I say quickly, relieved to have an out. “Or, you know, you can tell him when you see him, Magnus. At some point when I’m probably not hanging around…”

  Magnus ignores me. “This girl has vital information regarding the Master’s safety,” he insists, giving the guards a steely look. “I expect he will want to be interrupted to hear her tale.”

  “Fine.” The guard on the left turns and opens the door behind him just a crack, slipping through and yanking it shut before I can get a good peek inside. We wait in awkward silence, the second guard giving us a squirrelly look. A moment later the door opens again. But it’s not the guard—or Lucifent—who steps into the room.

  “Jareth!” I cry out in surprise before I can remember I’m not supposed to know the vampire in question. “Um,” I say quickly. “That’s your name, right?”

  He stops short as he sees me and a flush of anger crosses his face. “You again!” he growls. “I thought I told you to leave me alone!”

  Uh-oh. I glance at Magnus, who’s now looking from me to Jareth and back again, confusion in his eyes. What did Rayne go and do now? I thought it would be safe to leave her alone for a minute or two, but evidently not so much.

  And unfortunately Jareth’s not finished. “I told you. I don’t want to talk. I don’t want to take a midnight walk on the beach. And I certainly don’t want to partake in a quick juicing of your jugular.” He bares his fangs at me, as if to try to scare me off. “I’m a very busy vampire, I’ll have you know, and I don’t have time for any of your shenanigans.”

  “Jareth, I think you have this girl mistaken for someone else,” Magnus cuts in. “This is Rayne McDonald. My future blood mate.”

  “Well, your future blood mate has just spent the last fifteen minutes trying to make me fall in love with her,” Jareth says with a scowl. “Telling me we’re soul mates from another life and that I should dump my girlfriend and hook up with her instead.”

  Oh, Rayne…So not in the plan!

  “That’s impossible,” Magnus protests. “She has been with me this entire time.”

  “Are you calling me a liar?” Jareth demands, his face turning purple.

  “Well, if the cape fits…”

  Jeez Louise. “Um, hello?” I interject. “I can explain?”

  The two vampires turn to look at me. I draw in a breath and address Jareth first. “You have me mistaken for my twin sister. She’s the one who wants to hook up with you.” Then I turn to Magnus. “And I’m your blood mate.” Well, sort of anyway. It’s going to be very confusing if he keeps thinking of me as Rayne. But how can I explain our little switcheroo? It’ll only make things even more bewildering—if that’s possible at this point.

  “Your blood mate?” Jareth snorts. “Wow. They must really be scraping the bottom of the barrel these days.” He gives me a scornful look, as if I’m gum he found on the bottom of his shoe. Nice one, jerk. Way to go judging me ’cause you don’t like my twin.

  Luckily I have my own personal knight in shining armor by my side, ready to defend me. “Jareth!” Magnus cries in a shocked and angry voice. “This girl has done nothing to deserve your disrespect. You will apologize to her and—”

  “Guys, guys!” I interrupt. “We don’t have time for this!” Though, to be honest, I wish we did, as it’s more than a little nice to watch Magnus stick up for me, not even knowing who I really am. “I have to gain an audience with Lucifent and inform him about the threat on his life. That’s all that matters right now.”

  Jareth narrows his eyes. “And where, might I ask, is this so-called threat coming from?”

  “Slayer Inc.”

  “I see.” The vampire general purses his lips. “And your proof?”

 
; Er…Oh crap. I should have known he’d ask for that.

  “I, um, don’t really have any?” I stammer. “But you should take me seriously. I know what I’m talking about.”

  Jareth shakes his head. “Do you know how many false threats we get on the Master’s life every day? I have no time to follow up on each and every one of them. And the last thing the Master needs is to be bothered by some crazy, ranting mortal with an even crazier sister who has no proof to back up her claim. He’s got a very busy schedule, you know.”

  “Well, I can assure you his calendar will be completely clear next month, after he’s been staked through the heart,” I dare to say. “But, sadly, then it’ll be too late to warn him.”

  Jareth rolls his eyes. “Come back with proof,” he says. “And maybe I will see about granting you an audience. Until then, please go away. And tell your sister to go away, too. Magnus, here, may be blinded by your beauty, but I know your kind all too well. You’re trouble with a capital T, and I want nothing to do with either of you.”

  And with that, he storms into the back room, slamming the door shut behind him. “Whatever,” I mutter, annoyed by the whole thing at this point. Lucifent doesn’t want to be saved? Fine by me. We should have just left things well enough alone, I guess, and not tried to go out of our way to save the future. I turn and stomp down the hall, heading back to the dance floor to find my sister.

  But before I can open the door, I feel a hand on my shoulder, turning me around. Magnus has followed me down the corridor, an apologetic look on his face. “I’m sorry,” he says. “Jareth means well. And he’s very loyal. But he can be kind of…rough around the edges at times.”

  “I know,” I say with a sigh. “I mean, I’ve heard,” I correct quickly, catching Magnus’s look. “I mean, he seems that way. To be honest, I’m not sure what my sister sees in him.” I shrug. “But whatever. I’ve done my best. If your coven refuses to take me seriously, then there’s really nothing I can do.” I start for the door again, but Magnus stops me.