Black dawn (27 page)

He was facing her squarely, his jaw set and his
mouth as grim
as
she had ever seen it. His eyes
were hooded, a dull and eerie gold in the shadows.
He looked every inch the dark and mysterious vam
pire prince.

And here I am, Maggie thought. Looking like
...
well, like vermin, I bet. Like something fished out
of the gutter. Not much of a representative for
humanity.

She had never cared about clothes or hairstyles
or things like that, but just now she wished that
she could at least look presentable. Since the fate
of the world might just depend on her.

Even so, there was something in the air between
Delos
and herself.
A sort of quivering aliveness that
quickened the blood in Maggie's veins.
That stirred
something in her chest, and started her heart
pounding with an odd mixture of fear and hope.

She faced
Delos
just as
squarely
as
he was facing her.

"I know some things that I think you need to
know," she said quietly.

He ignored that. "I told you what would happen
if you came here. I told you I wouldn't protect
you again."

"I remember. But you
did
protect me again. And
I thank you-but I really think I'd better tell you
what's going on. Sylvia is the suspicious type, and
if she's gone to Hunter
Redfern
to say that you
don't want people looking in your closet-"

"Don't you
understand?"
he said with such sud
den violence that Maggie's throat closed, choking
off her words. She stared at him. "You're so close
to dying, but you don't seem to care. Are you too
stupid to grasp it, or do you just
have
a death
wish?"

The thumping in Maggie's chest now was defi
nitely
fear
.

"I do understand," she began slowly, when she
could
get her voice to work.

"No, you don't
,
"
he said. `But I'll make you."

All at once his eyes were blazing. Not just their
normal brilliant yellow, but a dazzling and unnatu
ral gold that seemed to hold its own light.

Even though Maggie had seen it before, it was
still a shock to watch his features change. His face going paler, even more beautiful and clearly defined, chiseled in ice. His pupils widening like a predator's, holding a darkness that a human could
drown in.
And that proud and willful mouth twist
ing in anger.

It all happened in a second or so. And then he
was advancing on her, with dark fire in his eyes,
and his lips pulling back from his teeth.

Maggie stared at the fangs, helplessly horrified
all over again. They were even sharper than she
remembered them looking. They indented his
lower lip on either side, even with his mouth
partly
.
open
. And, yes, they were definitely scary.

"This is what I am,"
Delos
said, speaking easily around the fangs.
"A hunting animal.
Part of a world of darkness that you couldn't survive for a
minute in.
I've told you over and over to stay away
from it, but you won't listen. You turn up
in my
own castle,
and you just won't believe your danger.
So now I'm going to show you."

Maggie took a step backward. She wasn't in a
good position; the wall was behind her and the
huge bed was on her left.
Delos
was between her and the door. And she had already seen how fast
his reflexes were.

Her legs felt unsteady; her pulse was beating er
ratically. Her breath was coming fast.

He doesn't really mean it
he won't really do it.

He isn't serious....

But for all her mind's desperate chanting, panic
was beginning to riot inside her. The instincts of forgotten ancestors, long buried, were surfacing.
Some ancient part of her remembered being
chased by hunting animals, being prey.

She backed up until she came in contact with the tapestry-hung wall behind her. And then there
was nowhere else to go.

"Now,"
Delos
said and closed the distance be
tween them with the grace of a tiger.

He was right in front of her. Maggie couldn't help
looking up at him, looking directly into that alien
and beautiful face. She could smell a scent like autumn leaves and fresh snow, but she could feel the
heat from his body.

He's nothing dead or undead, some very distant
part of her mind thought. He's ruthless, he's been
raised to be a weapon, but he's definitely alive
maybe the most alive thing I've ever seen.

When he moved, there was nowhere she could
go to avoid him. His hands closed on her shoulders
like implacable bands of steel. And then he was
pulling her forward, not roughly but not gently ei
ther, pulling her until her body rested lightly
against his. And he was looking down at her with
golden eyes that burned like twin flames.

Looking at my throat, Maggie thought. She could
feel the pulse beating there, and with her chin tilted
up to look at him and her upper body arched away from him, she knew he could see it. His eyes were
fixed on it with a different kind of hunger than she
had ever seen in a human face.

For just one instant the panic overwhelmed her,
flooding up blackly to engulf everything else. She
couldn't think; she was nothing but a terrified mass
of instinct, and all she wanted to do was to
run,
to
get away.

Then, slowly at first, the panic receded. It simply
poured off her, draining away. She felt
as
if she
were rising from deep water into air clear as
crystal.

She looked straight into the golden eyes above
her and said, "Go ahead."

She had the pleasure of seeing the golden eyes
look startled. "What?"

"Go ahead," Maggie said distinctly. "It doesn't
matter. You're stronger than me; we both know
that. But whatever you do, you can't make me your
prey. You don't have that power. You can't con
trol me."

Delos
hissed in fury, a reptilian sound. "You are ".

so

"You wanted me scared; I'm scared. But, then, I
was scared before. And it doesn't matter. There's
something more important than me at stake here.
Prove whatever you've got to prove and then I'll tell
you about it.

"So completely stupid,"
Delos
raged. But Maggie
had the odd feeling that his anger was more against
himself than her. "You don't think I'll hurt you,"
he said.

"You're wrong there."

"I will
hurt you. I'll show you-"

"You can kill me," Maggie said clearly. "But that's
all you can do. I told you, you can't control me. And you
cant
change what's between us."

He was very, very angry now. The fathomless pu
pils of his eyes were like black holes, and Maggie
suddenly remembered that he wasn't just a vampire, or just a weapon, but some doomsday crea
ture with powers meant for the end of the world.
He hovered over her with his fangs showing.

"I will
hurt you," he said. "Watch me hurt you."
He bent to her angrily, and she could see his intent in his eyes. He meant to frighten and
disillusion ...