Authors: Alyxandra Harvey
Blood Moon (23 page)
He hissed ineffectually and then shambled off, a slave to the Hypnos. Hunter and Chloe trailed him. They were barely out of sight when a car pulled up from the opposite direction. Kieran hurried to right his motorcycle.
“League,” he told me shortly. “Keep your mouth shut, Lucy.”
I was, frankly, mutinous.
“I mean it,” he said. “These are hunters, not students. Different rules. And not everyone’s pro–vampire treaty.”
“Fine,” I muttered, crossing my arms.
A woman approached us first. She was wearingjeans and combat boots and looked perfectly normal. “Black,” she greeted him. “Got the call.”
Another hunter followed her, young enough to be a new agent. He had that kind of swagger. Kieran had it too when we first met him, but I made it my mission to kill the swagger. I eyed the newcomer consideringly. Kieran stepped back, nudging me. Spoilsport.
“Thanks for coming, Janelle,” Kieran said to the woman. “Mom doesn’t know.”
Janelle looked relieved. “Good.” She nodded to the other hunter. “Diego, take the back.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
Janelle glanced at me. “Student?”
I nodded. “Yes.”
“I’m taking her back to campus,” Kieran lied smoothly. “I need to know my mom’ll be safe when I’m not here.”
“Detail’s here for the foreseeable future,” Janelle assured him. “So go on, before this one gets bathroom duty.” She cracked a smile my way. “Trust me, it’s not worth it.”
Kieran popped his head into the house to tell his mom he was going and then came back, holding a second helmet for me. We drove away, the scratched-up bike grumbling and muttering to itself.
Lee and I came up with another escape plan.
I’d take the screws out of the grate that blocked his cell from mine, but slowly so no one would notice me hunkered down in the same spot for too long. There were enough shadows that one of us could hide. The next time the guards came to take one of us away, the other one would launch out of the opening and take them by surprise. After that, the plan involved a lot of staking and breaking of various bones.
It might have worked.
But we didn’t get the chance to find out.
One of the Hosts came for me before I’d managed to loosen all of the screws. Lee was trapped in his own cell, patiently seething. The Host grinned at me, showing one nicked fang.
“Time to go, pretty boy.”
I got to my feet before he could reach in and drag me out. It just felt better to walk on out on my own two feet, even if my knees felt full of electricity. I wanted to dash for the exit with every bit of my being, but there was another Host guard and two more human hunters in my way. I shifted toward them anyway but the guard at my back kicked me at Frankenstein and one of his metal tables. Ominous instruments clanged together.
Frankenstein looked up from a notepad in front of him. “Excellent. Thank you. Secure him to that post and then give us space, if you would.”
I struggled, determined to make everything as difficult for them as possible. I managed to dislocate the shoulder of the hunter assisting him but the Host guard was too fast. I was chained to the post, the blue-tinted light from the camping lanterns winging over us. It barely took any time at all.
So much for my great revolt.
“Now where shall we start?”
Frankenstein’s ruthlessly pleasant chitchat was grating, building the itch of foreboding. I thought I caught a glimpse of Lee’s grizzled beard out of the corner of my eye, pressed at the bars of his cell. I yanked on the chains once. They were heavy, cold iron, and locked tightly.
“What’s the point of this?” I asked, cringing back away from the sharpened railroad spike he held in his hand. “You won’t get a ransom if you kill me.” Keep them talking, Dad would have said. Keep calm and negotiate.
Mom would say kick him in the balls.
But there were chains looped around my ankles.
Frankenstein used the tip of the spike to pull the frayed edge of my shirt away from the dirt-and-blood-encrusted arrow wound. The rusty point of the spike sliced through the ragged flesh that hadn’t had a chance to knit together. Blood seeped. I gritted my teeth and refused to react. A shrill scream echoed from one of the cells.
Frankenstein smiled, almost gently. “This is noble work Dawn has charged me with.”
“Dawn? Is she the one behind this?” I asked. “What does she want?”
“She’s very clever. She knows it’s not enough to kill the vampire, but one must find out how he works so we might eradicate the plague from humanity.” There was an unholy glint of mad joy in his eyes. Blood and viscous fluid were dried to his leather apron.
“Are you Helios-Ra?” I asked, hoping to keep him talking, desperately searching for a way out of the chains. “Or a Huntsman?”
“I was Helios-Ra,” Frankenstein said, whipping his head back to stare at me. The point of the spike pressed deeper. I clenched my jaw against any sound of pain. It might be the only currency I had left, and I wouldn’t hand it over until I absolutely had to. “Before they kicked me out. Said I was unstable, said I needed help.” He spat. “Bah. They didn’t know genius when they saw it, no one did, not even my own parents. Not until Dawn. Not until the worm in the heart of the Helios-Ra ate at the rose.” He laughed. “Treaties.” He jabbed deep with the spike and I jerked back, grunting.
Muscles split, blood oozed. “They make us weak, vulnerable to the plague.”
“Then why the humans?” I forced out, cursing. “Why do this to your own kind?”
“It’s science. Sacrifice. They are casualties serving a grander purpose.” He wrenched the spike back out, and the yank of iron scraping against my shoulder bone, the tear of flesh, the vicious bite of pain, made me thrash in the chains for a moment. My fangs extended as far as they would go; sweat gathered on the back of my neck.
I tried to remind myself what Mom would do in a tough situation like this, how she’d fight her way free, how she’d survive—but I couldn’t think at all. There was just pain, like fire nibbling at every part of me, consuming, burning, eating away as if I were made of paper.
When the rattle of the links quieted again, the Host guard was grinning at me over Frankenstein’s shoulder. He handed his dagger to the scientist. “Here, use mine.”
Frankenstein circled me once slowly. The dagger darted in and out, stabbing under my other shoulder blade, over my kidney, under my ear. He circled back to the front, slashing shallow cuts on my chest, my neck, my arms, even my palms. I hissed, jerking violently at each slice. I tried to picture Lucy’s face, tried to imagine the exact way she smiled at me.
It helped a little.
I’d used Lucy as a talisman to pull me through the worst of my bloodchange, and I’d do the same now. And all I had back then were mostly memories of her punching me in the nose.
The dagger jabbed into me, and Frankenstein turned it as if it were a key and I the lock.
The way Lucy smelled like cherry bubble gum and pepper.
Blood dripped into the foul trench in the ground. It seeped from leaching strength and healing. I struggled, feeling every drop as it trickled down my body.
The way Lucy giggled when she thought no one could hear her.
Even my pupils dilated painfully when he swung a UV bulb liberated from a tanning bed into my eyes. It seared into my brain, left me feeling weak as if it were noon.
Lucy playing her guitar.
Frankenstein reached for a beaker of clear liquid and dipped the spike in. “Holy water,” he said, almost conversationally.
Lucy and I stretched out on the grass watching the northern lights.
He flicked drops into my cuts, inspecting them curiously as they blistered and peeled. I choked on a yell, gagged, fought.
The way Lucy’s mouth moved under mine, the way her body fit against mine, the way she whispered my name.
He dipped the spike in the holy water and dragged it lightly over the wound, enough to make my eyes roll back in my head, but not enough to cause the kind of lasting damage that might take me out of the game.
Lucy and I sitting in the secret tree fort, listening to music.
Shallow cuts over my heart. More blood, more pain.
Lucy …
Tuesday, 3:00 a.m.
I didn’t know what to do with myself.
The walkie-talkie Dad gave me was wedged in my pocket. I itched to use it. I could call Mom to apologize, or Lucy to help me figure out why I kept insisting on ripping my life apart like I was looking for the caramel in the middle of a chocolate candy. I could call Kieran.
I fisted my fingers together before I could give in. This was no time to crawl back home. There was too much that needed figuring out. Too many questions, too many secrets.
Constantine passed me a wine glass of blood-doctored wine. The others were talking quietly, shooting me curious glances.
Candle flames flickered inside the lanterns, casting patterns of light on the rugs and the tree trunks, like fireflies. It was getting colder, snow sticking to the grass and branches.
“What just happened?” I asked, drinking the wine.
“Destiny.” Constantine sat back comfortably, his leg pressed against mine. “No one said it would be comfortable.”
He’s right. It’s our time now. My time.
Everyone else probably thought I was throwing a tantrum, but he understood there was something else burning under my skin. I just had to figure it out. Sometimes, I didn’t even feel like myself anymore. And I wasn’t sure how to figure out who I was if I wasn’t Solange, rare vampire daughter, Drake princess, baby sister.
“My brothers were nearly staked.” I still felt a little shell-shocked about that.
“An accident,” Constantine said, his hand tickling my lower back, as if I were a wild cat that needed soothing. I did feel a little bit like purring. It was like there were two of me: the Solange who knew better and the Solange who didn’t care. “It won’t happen again,” he assured me. “You have my word.”
I wasn’t worried about it happening again, not with my pheromone compulsion. I was just worried that it had happened at all. It dulled the shine of being on my own.
On my own.
I could make decisions for myself now. Like the one to save Constantine from an unjust execution. I felt good about that. I just had to hold onto that for the moment. It had to be enough.
But I couldn’t help but wonder what Madame Veronique was doing right now.
I shivered. “What do we do when the sun rises?”
“I have a spot, love. Not to worry.”
“So what are we going to do about these disappearances?” Elijah asked. “How do we find Ianthe?”
“We’ve tried tracking her,” Jude said, frustrated. “But aside from her scarf, we found nothing.”
“How many are missing?” I asked.
“At least seven that we know of.”
“Even with the Chandramaa?”
Marigold snorted, stretching her legs out onto the table. There was glitter on her toes. “Chandramaa care about the encampment and the queen, nothing else.”
I frowned. “Wait, so my mom could order them to search?”
“Yes,” Constantine replied.
“
Technically
, yes,” Elijah corrected. “Chandramaa might protect the queen, but they take orders from someone else. Whoever that might be. And they’re not likely to split their focus with the ceremonies and councils starting so soon.”
“That doesn’t seem fair.”
Marigold shrugged. “Doesn’t have to be. But realistically speaking, there’s no need for any of us to leave the camp. It’s secure and they have enough blood for everyone. If we leave and we get nabbed, it’s our own fault, really. They were clear on that when we set up the Bower.”
“But who’s doing it?” I asked. “Hunters? Other vampires?”
“Does it matter?” Marigold yawned, rooting through her beaded bag. “I need more sugar.”
And then my mother, Madame Veronique, and missing vampires were suddenly not the worst thing that could happen to me.