Enemy Within (Vampire Born Trilogy, #2) (44 page)

No, I’m the one on trial here. They should allow me to tell my whole story.

Ivan lowers his arm and continues. “Who struck who first?”

“Jelena threw me from the car, then kicked me. She struck me first.”

Ivan’s gaze drops to something in front of him. A paper, maybe?

“Dikan tells us you used Sanjam on Jelena’s driver, causing him to crash the vehicle. Is this what happened?”

“They kidnapped me by threatening my best friend. Dikan had his fangs to her throat and then they kept me locked in a small room. I tried to escape, but they beat me and dragged me back. It was my only opportunity to get away.” No more yes or no first. I am going to explain my version of events.

“Were you aware that the driver was a Pijawika before breaching his mind?” Ivan asks.

I blink, trying to figure out where he’s going with this.

“I figured he was.” Jelena surrounded herself with only Pijawikas.

“And you were still certain you would breach his mind?” Ivan’s looking at me with interest now. This could be a good thing. My dad said if he found me interesting, he would be more likely to vote my way. But are my answers making me appear as a threat?

I bank on interesting. “I have strong Sanjam.” I shrug. I’m not sure how else I can explain it.

“Like your father?” Ivan asks and looks back over his shoulder at my dad.

I think so. Maybe. “I’m not sure. I haven’t known him for very long.” That’s the truth.

“What about your mother? What of her powers?”

He knows very well my mom doesn’t have any powers.

I fight with myself to keep my gaze locked to his.

Is he really going to make me say it?

He’s silent, waiting for me to answer.

Yes. He is going to make me say it, and I hate him even more for how he’s playing this game. “My mother is a human.”

Gasps echo through the crowd.

I hold my breath.

Chen smiles.

I hate him too.

“This would make you a melez,” Ivan states the obvious.

I don’t answer because that wasn’t a question. I grind my teeth instead. I’m scared, but I’m also angry and frustrated.

Sandor leans over and says something to Ivan. When he pulls away, Ivan stares at me, glances at Sandor, and then studies me again.

“And yet, you have powers, is that right?”

“I have Nestati.”

“And Nestati is what allows you to skip space?” Ivan tilts his head. He’s engrossed now.

“I think it is.”

Ivan stands and looks up to the higher seats. “Gretchen,” he yells. “Come forward.”

A lady with crimson hair in a black dress stands and moves to the aisle. She makes her way down the steps to the Commissioners, her main a traveling flame fanning out behind her.

She bows to him as she approaches.

Crap! I forgot to bow when I came in. Does that say “threat”?

“You have Nestati, don’t you, dear?” Ivan asks her when she stands up.

“Yes, Master.”

“Can you skip space, or must you walk in order to move?” He makes a walking motion with two of his fingers, moving them in front of her.

“I walk,” she answers.

“Thank you,” Ivan says. “You are dismissed.”

She bows to him again, lifts the hem of her dress, and hustles up the stairs back to her seat.

Ivan comes back and sits down. “How is it that she cannot skip space, but you—a melez—can?”

“I don’t know, sir.” He’s looking at me like I’m a threat now, so I add the “sir.”

Appear meek.
Appear meek
.

I slump my shoulders, trying to make myself smaller.

“What else can you do?” he asks like he’s interested, but I still don’t like the way he’s appraising me.

“I think that’s it, sir.” What my dad taught me isn’t technically a power.

“You think?”

“Well, all of this is new to me.”

Sandor leans over again, but Ivan keeps his eyes on me.

I’m squinting to keep the light out of my eyes, but I manage to narrow them further at Sandor. If he has questions for me, why doesn’t he ask me himself?

When Sandor’s done speaking, Ivan nods. “You are a melez who has powers and has killed not only once but twice, is that correct?”

Not really, but I’m not going to mention the man who killed David. I kind of count that one. At least I hope that’s the one he’s unaware of. “The first one was sent to kidnap me, and he had my friend by the throat. I did what I could to save him.”

Ivan looks at Sandor, who nods as if my answer was satisfactory. Ivan turns back to me. “Where do you see yourself fitting in our world?”

“I don’t need to fit in anywhere, sir. I would just like to be left alone.”

Chen chuckles. When he finishes, Ivan continues. “Are you aware that a Pijawika mixing or having relations with a human is forbidden?” He asks it like I’m the one who did it.

This is his segue back to my dad.

Does this mean his mind is already made up about me? “After Jelena tried to kidnap me the first time, I learned that you existed and that I was in trouble because of who my parents are.”

He tilts his head at me again, this time to the left. “So you were unaware of what you were before Jelena came for you?”

“Yes.” Finally something’s going my way.

Ivan considers this for a moment. It feels like minutes before he speaks again. My hands sweat and perspiration breaks out above my lip from the heat of the lights.

Or maybe anxiety? Could be both.

“But now you know about us, you know what you are, and you know that the conduct taken to make a melez is forbidden by our kind.” He’s made his final conclusion.

I step off the stool and rush forward. “I’m not the only melez from the Commission.”

Orell glares at me, so I speak fast. “Sandor made twins with a human. I have a witness. Their mother.”

The crowd roars.

Orell’s face relaxes.

Yeah, buddy. I kept my end, now you keep yours.

“Witnesses are not allowed,” Abdul-Hakeem growls over the echo from the stunned onlookers.

I move forward. “But it’s true and you need to hear it! And he did it way before my mom and dad made me.” Telling them Sandor was the first to break the rule somehow feels like it will give us an edge.

Sandor stands. “Sit down! Witnesses are not allowed. We have heard what we came to hear.”

“No you haven’t—”

“Sit down!” Ivan barks, and the audience quiets.

My eyes narrow and shift from one Commissioner to the next. How can they do this to me? To my dad? To anybody? It’s completely unfair.

Anger warms my stomach. They think they’re going to decide our fates by asking me what, like, five questions?

I don’t think so.

Wrath swells inside of me, so hot and fierce, I’m glaring at the Commissioners and breathing deeply out of my nose.

I recall what it felt like when my dad used his special Sanjam on me to keep me from fighting the SWAT team of Pijawikas who came to arrest him.

I rotate my mind’s polarity. When I think I have it, I yell, “No! You sit down!”

Sandor sits.

Holy shit!

I’m actually using my dad’s special Sanjam on him. I expand it from Sandor to the rest of the Commissioners, then beyond them and out in a circle like a ripple of water, touching everyone within the room. My teeth clench with how much work it is.

Once it’s as far as I can make it go, I tighten it and think about how I don’t want them to breathe. It’s not the same way I did it to Zack at The Base—there’s no pain added within it. I simply want them to know that I am controlling their means to life.

The same thing they’re trying to do to me.

My hands shake with the exertion I’m extending over the room.

I’m scared. If they weren’t convinced before that I was a threat, they will be now. But I already have them. I can’t let them go yet.

“Vasek!” I yell. “Bring her in!”

I’m not sure how I’m going to pull this back enough so Vasek can get Cila in here, but I’m going to have to figure it out on the fly.

I hope.

My breathing is labored, so I let go of everyone’s breath but keep them frozen. My eyes meet Abdul-Hakeem’s. His face is like stone, but fury burns within his eyes.

It frightens me. I wobble backwards and hit the top of my thighs against the stool.

I sit on it, relieved that I no longer have to hold myself up.

Abdul-Hakeem makes me nervous in a way the other Commissioners don’t. No wonder Chen turns to him to get things done.

Abdul-Hakeem pushes against my hold on him. He’s fighting me.

I focus on keeping my polarity the way it needs to be so he can’t push me out. With his unintentional help, I tuck and fold his will into a small crevice in the back of his mind. If I can’t get him to fear me, maybe I can get him to respect me enough as an enemy to think twice before he retaliates later.

Ivan pulls and tugs on my hold over him, but not in an aggressive way or a panicked way like Abdul-Hakeem. It’s full of wonder, as if he is systematically testing my limits. I move my will forward and relax over him enough that he smiles.

I think he can appreciate what I’m doing.

I smile back because that’s good for me. Plus, now I think I know how to control this thing on a micro and macro level at the same time.

Ivan tugs again, similar to how a child tugs the string of a balloon as it floats away.

I do a mental skip across the line he tugged and then I stop and imagine a feather tickling his face.

He twitches his nose and his eyes light up.

I nod at him, letting him know I did that on purpose.

I register a presence at the side door and relax my will. I think it’s a human.

Cila. Good.

“It’s okay, Cila. Come on over here,” I try to say reassuringly. She won’t understand me, but she’ll hear it in my tone. I’m glad Vasek isn’t with her because I don’t think I could pull back this Sanjam thing enough for him too.

Cila limps over to me. I point to the Commission. “Tell them,” I say and nod my head.

She faces the Commission and wrings her hands nervously, but speaks. Everything is in Croatian, but the pain and anger are tangible within her voice.

I’m exhausted and won’t be able to hold on any longer, but I think about what will happen if I don’t. It fuels me to not let go yet. If I were hanging from a ledge, my fingertips would be torn and bleeding.

As Cila continues her story, her voice rises and tears well in her eyes. They stream down her cheeks. She doesn’t wipe them, though. She points at Sandor and yells.

My hold over the audience is slipping, and murmuring starts in the back.

My whole body’s shaking.

I can’t hold my head up anymore.

I drop it back and look up the ceiling, tilting it so the light isn’t directly in my eyes.

Movement in the rafters catches my attention. I squint to see more detail.

Mirko!

He really did keep his word.

I lose my focus, and my awareness snaps back with so much speed, I see white spots dancing in the dark.

Pandemonium fills the amphitheater.

People are talking, yelling, moving from their seats.

It’s chaos.

Cila finishes speaking and stands there, crying and staring at Sandor.