Allegiance (2 page)

Viggo’s unsettling icy blue eyes analyzed me, scrutinized my face. He was likely trying to read my emotions. Vampires could do that. When used on a human, it bordered on mind-reading, made easier when the subject was a human who wears her emotions like an apron—as I tended to do. I fought against the urge to flinch under his gaze. So unfriendly, so cold. Not surprising. He was a psychopath, after all. Less than a day ago, he would gladly have killed me to get what he wanted. In fact, that was his plan. Now, though, for the first time in a long time, he wasn’t trying to kill me. He had basically ignored me since I’d woken up in his jet. I was more than fine with that.

“What’s in Paris?” I forced out the question and self-consciously smoothed out my sweater and jeans, silently thanking Amelie for switching clothes with me earlier. Even cocooned within a navy wool blanket, I was constantly fidgeting, checking to see that I wasn’t exposing myself to Viggo and Mortimer. After an hour of watching me fret, Amelie had all but dragged me back to the jet’s only bedroom to swap clothes, insisting I was a prude. Of course the risqué Tribal outfit didn’t bother her. She could strut unfazed down a catwalk in front of a million gawkers in nothing but a thin layer of mud. And upon her return to the main cabin, she certainly did strut … all the way back to Julian’s side. Other than an occasional furtive glance down at a smattering of my dried blood on the material, Amelie was too busy fawning over him to mind wearing what was hardly more than a chewed-up bikini.

Julian certainly didn’t mind the outfit switch. He didn’t mind anything about Amelie, including the fact that she was a vampire. Julian, my partner-in-exile who hated vampires, was twisted into amorous knots over Amelie. Julian, the secret Sentinel spy who would be skinned alive if anyone on board discovered his dirty little secret, was busy fumbling with Amelie’s springy blond curls and giving her googly eyes. But Julian was in rough shape, still healing from Ursula’s attack. He would be dead if not for the Tribe’s crazy body-burning voodoo magic. Unfortunately for him, that same Tribe magic that saved him from dying now kept Sofie from healing him. He was just like me.

But in his few bouts of consciousness, while he stared up at Amelie as if she were an angel descending from the heavens, whose sole purpose was to rescue him, anyone could see he was fully enamored. I could see it in his eyes, in his smile, in the way his fingers cautiously grazed her hand. It was like watching longtime friends who had just discovered their love for each other, though they had only met hours ago.

But Julian had a secret and I was the only one who knew. He was the enemy. The People’s Sentinel spy, marked by them to collect information on Viggo and Mortimer. He said it meant nothing, but I didn’t know if I could believe him. I discovered it back in the Tribe’s camp, when he was left with me, his body scarcely covered with a blanket. The telltale curved cross tattoo on his butt told me immediately who he was. How could I forget? The Sentinel had already tried to kill me once. The mark was firmly emblazoned on my mind.

And now Amelie, my other best friend, the one who had waited seven hundred years in a humanless Hell to find another boyfriend after accidentally killing her own, was falling fast and hard for Julian, and there was nothing I could do. Say anything and it was a death sentence for him and heartbreak for her. I didn’t want to be the one to deliver either of those verdicts. So I averted my eyes and tried not to think about it for fear of someone reading my mood and figuring it out. How on earth they hadn’t yet was beyond me … It was only a matter of time.

“Do you have a house there?” I asked Sofie, eager for a distraction. It would make sense if she did, being Parisian.

“I used to,” she answered cryptically.

“I still don’t understand why we’re not heading back to New York to blow those miserable witches to smithereens,” Viggo said in his casually suggestive tone. “It would be such a shame for that beautiful home, but it’s replaceable. A much faster resolution, if you ask me.”

“And you’ve proven yourself to have wise judgment time and time again,” Mage answered from her corner of the plane, in her typically tranquil voice. I instinctively shrunk against Caden’s chest as I felt her cold, almond-shaped orbs shift to me. I still didn’t understand why Sofie trusted her now.

“It’s too risky to Veronique, even if she’s in a statue,” Sofie agreed with a warning tone.

Oh no … dirty little secret number two
. My stomach tightened as visions of the Fifth Avenue mansion engulfed in flames swarmed my mind.
Not too risky, Sofie. Deadly
. A hundred and twenty years ago, Sofie magically encased her sister in a white marble statue, frozen in time until she could fix the vampire venom issue she had created with her magic. The plan was to release Veronique once it was solved so she could choose who she’d spend her eternal life with—Viggo or Mortimer. Little did they know, the protective marble walls of that statue came crumbling down when the Tribe chief used his magic to free me from the pendant’s curse. I don’t know how or why. It had something to do with our hearts being linked because of the Causal Enchantment Sofie cast.

It didn’t matter. What mattered was that Veronique had been released from her protective cocoon and was now in the clutches of our enemies. No one except Caden and I knew.

I pumped Caden’s hand once in a nervous gesture. His responding squeeze pulsed serenity through me. With every fiber of my being, I knew we had to keep that knowledge buried. If Viggo, Mortimer, or Sofie found out, blowing up a square block of Manhattan would be the least of our problems. From what Caden had told me earlier, that retaliation was exactly what could spark the end of the world.

“Well, there’s no reason we need to go to France. North America has enough cover for us,” Viggo muttered sullenly.

“You know why, and you agreed to go along without complaint, remember?” Sofie answered through clenched teeth. Viggo had that effect on her. A permanent effect.

“Yes, I recall. On penalty of death … And I warned you we’d be better off creating our own group of young followers than trusting
her
,” Viggo pressed.

Her? Who is he talking about
?
What are they conspiring over now?
I looked at Caden but he shook his head.
Not now
, he was saying.

“We don’t have time to babysit a bunch of blood-crazed babies!” Sofie spat back. “This could spiral down in months! Weeks! Days! We have no idea what they’re planning …”

“That’s exactly how the mess in our world began,” Mage added in a low, steady voice. “One trigger, one attack, and our fate spiraled out of control. Are you trying to end this world faster, Viggo?”

Viggo sniffed but otherwise remained silent, moping. His words finally clicked in my mind.
Young followers
. Viggo’s strategy was to create an army of vampires to fight against the witches. Now I understood. I watched Viggo and Sofie share a silent look. Tension sat heavy in the air, as thick as smog. I didn’t know what was going on, why Viggo was here, why Sofie trusted him, why Viggo seemed compliant to Sofie. Viggo, compliant? And what was that “penalty of death” comment? Sofie was always threatening Viggo with death. What made him listen this time?

It seemed that Sofie had somehow appropriated the role of leader now, instead of ceaseless rival and combatant. I figured it had something to do with her continued control over Veronique’s situation, being the only one who could release her. But still, this was beyond bizarre … How long had I been unconscious for?

Amelie broke the pending conflict with her sweet, excited voice. “We had a city named Paris. It had the best shopping and nightlife and …” Her eyes twinkled with delight as she reminisced, her cheeks crinkling in a large smile. But then something dawned on her and her voice trailed off. “I guess they’d be the same Paris, right?”

Mage offered Amelie an apologetic smile and a slight nod. I had caught little bits of how the ancient Council leader had compelled them all to believe it was a different world by the name of Ratheus. It wasn’t, though. It was Earth in an alternate universe. Same Paris, same world, same doom.

And I would be an instrumental part of making it happen again. That fact burdened me like a concrete block on my shoulders in the bottom of a lake. All I wanted was Caden, my friends, and a life without the handcuffs of this curse. Was that too much to ask? I’d already lost so much. Part of my childhood, my mother …

A soft finger running along my bottom lip drew my attention to Caden. Beautiful, sweet, thoughtful Caden … I had him … Had I known what my choices could spark, would I have chosen differently? Would I have left him in Ratheus? Deep down in my heart, though I abhorred admitting it to myself and could never confess it to anyone else, the answer was no. And now my selfishness could lead to the demise of the world.

Mortimer’s booming voice yanked me from my silent torment. “We’re not going there to frolic about, Amelie.” The dark, brooding vampire had remained the silent observer in the entire exchange between his rival and his redheaded nemesis. In fact, he had remained in a corner, silent, for most of the flight.

Amelie scowled at Mortimer’s brusque reminder. She turned away from him, seemingly disgusted, to peer down at a dozing Julian. The scowl instantly disappeared, replaced by a grin of unabated adoration. A grin that slid into my heart like a long, thin needle.

So glad to be back with Mr. Chuckles
, Max grumbled in my head, no doubt referring to his previous master. With a sigh, I smiled and leaned down to give the giant werebeast’s thick neck a squeeze. My guardian, my sanity, my friend, all in the form of an immortal canine who could communicate telepathically and hadn’t left my side in over a month, risking his safety for me countless times, saving me from death more than once. It was because of him that I had survived for this long. Max, Sofie, Julian, Leo … all of them had played a hand.

But not everyone had been so lucky …

With reluctance, I peered over to where Bishop sat huddled in a ball. I choked back a sob for the hundredth time. His angular cheekbone rested against the window as he stared out vacantly, a million miles away. Or at least a few thousand, back in Manhattan where his true love lay, charred in a heap of ash. He had watched Fiona burn, struck down by the witches, unable to do anything to stop it, and now he was lost. He hadn’t spoken a word since. He refused all offers of blood with nothing more than a growl. My heart ached every time I looked over at him, hoping this was all a mistake, hoping that I’d see Fiona’s violet eyes twinkling back at us. But I had seen those eyes firsthand, and they were no longer twinkling. She was never coming back.

We had lost Julian’s sister, Valentina, as well as my dear grandfatherly guardian Leo, in the mountains. Fiona in Manhattan … so many and the war hadn’t even begun. Who would be next?

The plane’s lights flashed and reflected off the bed of clouds as our plane cut through. “Fifteen more minutes,” Sofie whispered. I couldn’t help but sense trepidation in her voice. Weird. Sofie was normally so good at hiding her unease. Suddenly, Mage and Sofie vanished from their seats. They reappeared in Bishop’s corner opposite each other, Bishop sandwiched in the middle. Sofie loomed in front of him, Mage behind. Bishop’s cold charcoal eyes narrowed suspiciously as they raised to meet Sofie’s. She met his look with one of intense determination and I saw recognition flitter on his face, his expression and posture changing to that of a caged animal, ready to spring. Wild eyes darted around the cabin as if searching for an escape route.

“What’s going on?” I whispered to Caden, gripping his muscular forearm tightly. Too tightly probably but, then again, I couldn’t hurt him.

Caden pulled me closer until my back was pressed up against his chest, but he said nothing. Amelie mimicked the protective position with Julian, now conscious and sitting up wide-eyed and confused.

Sofie’s lips began moving subtly, inaudibly. Her hands rose, her fingertips spread apart. A deep growl of protest escaped Bishop’s sullen mouth. Mage instantly pounced on him, one delicate arm wrapped around his neck in a headlock while the other pushed down on his shoulder. Bishop fought back, his tall lean body thrashing from side to side, attempting to twist out of Mage’s grasp. Her knuckles whitened as her fingers dug into his collarbone.

And then Bishop stopped moving. Mage backed away, freeing him to run. He didn’t. He was stationary. Not a twitch of a finger, not a shift of a foot. Nothing but his pupils rolling over the cabin.

Instantly, I knew what had happened. “A spell,” Caden whispered, echoing my bewildered thoughts.

“But … why? I don’t understand. He’s not going to hurt us!” I said.

With strong, forceful hands, Caden gripped my arms and turned me around to face him. He gently caressed my cheekbone with a single finger. “That’s where you’re wrong,” he answered softly. A shiver ran down my spine. “Bishop has only one thing on his mind, Evangeline … revenge. He’s been eyeing that emergency exit since Sofie announced we weren’t going back to New York.”

I frowned, shaking my head. I hadn’t noticed. But … that didn’t make sense. “He could have done a swan dive from thirty-thousand feet and survived, so why wait?” I argued.

“You. You stopped him.”

My face pinched, my confusion deepening.

“If he broke the seal of the door up here, we would lose cabin pressure and the plane would crash. You wouldn’t survive. He knows that,” Caden explained, squeezing my shoulders. “But I’m sure he was planning on bolting the second he thought it was safe enough.”