Eternal (6 page)

And then there are those candidates for pleasures beyond drinking. They’re scrubbed cleaner. Their light-blue hospital gowns have been replaced with sheer lavender robes that match the linen napkins and tablecloths.

In a few minutes, they’ll be offered as party favors, and the guest rooms will be opened to those who prefer to indulge their peccadilloes in private.

The party has raged since an hour after sunset, as is traditional — the hour to provide travel and setup time. We can tolerate daylight, but it weakens us and Father despises weakness.

He waves an empty crystal glass, and his personal assistant (PA) refills it with blood wine. They exchange a meaningful look, and then the PA, Harrison, checks the diamond-rimmed face of his Rolex, a Solstice bonus for outstanding service.

I’ve come to rely on Harrison myself. He’s an elegant man — slender, sexy, and always impeccably dressed. At age forty, with great bone structure and better skin, he’s a rather youthful Alfred to Father’s Batman, or so he fancies himself.

We didn’t get off to the best of starts, Harrison and me. He was brusque, I was flailing, and I don’t think he appreciated having to compete for Father’s attention.

Nora says he’s simply suspicious of newcomers. It’s something about his childhood and lingering issues with trust. That makes a certain sense.

Harrison is one of those legacy servants who come so highly prized, the latest of a five-generation line. Still, he and his brother might never have survived if their original mistress, Penelope — she lives in the bungaloid mansion across the street — hadn’t found their resemblance to each other amusing.

I can’t imagine what it must have been like for Harrison as a human child growing up in this world. I like him, though, and at this point, I think he likes me, too. It’s simply as if we’ve mutually decided not to admit it aloud.

Tonight has been a long, chilly one, largely spent making small talk, cooing over the string trio, complimenting fashions ranging from the smashing to the questionable to the clichéd. This is my formal introduction to society, my first public event of any significant scale, and Father is giving me more leash than I expected.

Every time I turn around, I’m fawned over by another guest.

“Delightful gala, princess!”

“A magnificent occasion!”

“Love your dress!”

Sometimes I pause to chat. Usually, I offer only the slightest nod of acknowledgment. Father told me earlier to respond at my discretion.

Worldwide, the aristocracy numbers in the thousands, which of course the courtyard couldn’t accommodate. Consequently, the guest list is limited to a preferred hundred or so, most in the company of their PAs.

To my knowledge, the only Old Blood invited tonight is the infamous Sabine from Paris. So far, her arrival hasn’t been announced. I look forward to meeting her and finding out what all the fuss is about.

Unlike his predecessors, Father tends to socially slight Old Bloods, possibly because they make him uncomfortable and probably because they constitute a threat.

I’m not sure of the political wisdom of his strategy. However, Father defeated an Old Blood predecessor to claim the Mantle. “We must develop our supernatural talents,” he once told me, “but daring, scheming, and opportunism can trump raw ability.”

He should know. Father is The Dracula himself (not that anyone calls him that around the house). The current Dracula, not the original of course. Nevertheless, the reigning exalted master of eternals.

He’s not only powerful for his age; he also has abilities beyond his years. I did some research. An anonymous source told the
Eternal Herald-Gazette
that this was the result of his dabbling in unstable magic — that the price of those spells could prove to be his sanity itself. I don’t know if that’s true, but if so, it explains his unpredictability.

I wander to join the A-list conversation.

Father raises his glass to the latest news from the Middle East. “Our numbers are up there,” he gloats. “Perhaps we should stir the conflict again.”

Many eternals are elevated on the battlefield, as Father himself was. He, despite sometimes affecting a Romanian accent, was born an American and blessed with unholy blood at Fredericksburg, Virginia, during the Civil War. Tonight he’s speaking in his pseudo-European “company” voice. The one he uses to impress.

As a native Texan, I privately think it’s a shame he’s embarrassed by his slight southern accent. However, the aristocracy is influential, prone to stereotyping and utter snobbishness.

“Ah, sugar plum,” Father greets me. “How kind of you to join us! I’ve given this party in your honor, and I’ve hardly seen you all night.”

“Please forgive me.” I feel a flash of panic. I thought I was supposed to circulate. Father doesn’t sound angry, though. Perhaps this time he’s merely teasing. “It’s only that your inner circle is so refined. I’m the only teenage eternal present.” Although a number in attendance could pass for one. “And . . .”

My mind goes blank. I hoped to flatter my way out, but I have no idea how to pull it off. I didn’t grow up around this kind of crowd. Despite Father’s best efforts to train me, I’m still seriously out of my element.

“We old fogies aren’t doing it for you?” asks Elina, in a red sheath with matching spiked heels. She’s all curves and curls, more lush than I am, more woman-shaped. She has painted-on eyebrows, and she’s forked her tongue with a pair of pinking shears.

I wonder how old she is, how powerful. Father presented me with profiles of all the guests to study a few nights ago, but her age wasn’t in her file.

Elina’s consort Victor bends to kiss my hand. “Charmed to meet you, Your Highness.” He’s lithe, but mean and well muscled. There’s a necklace of human baby teeth around his neck.

So far tonight, Elina and Victor are the most normal couple I’ve met.

“Were you criticizing my beloved child?” Father asks her.

At first, Elina shrinks at the suggestion. “No, sire.” Then she regains her bravado as Victor caresses her bare back. “I was simply trying to draw the girl out.”

Father’s fangs descend. “Perhaps this will help.”

At the snap of Father’s fingers, Harrison sets the bottle of blood wine on a passing waiter’s tray; rushes to the middle of the courtyard; and draws back the full-length, silver curtains, revealing a youthful male figure bound on a platform.

That accomplished, the PA strolls through the crowd, ringing a small bell to announce the show.

“Now?” Elina asks.

“Now,” Father replies.

In a puff of smoke and shadows, she transforms from woman to bat.

Older. She’s older and more formidable than I thought. An Old Blood.

Elina careens toward tonight’s sacrifice and rips off his hood with her claws.

Flint, formerly one of Father’s enforcers, strains against the chains. He . . . no, not he —
it.
The condemned are unworthy of a gender pronoun.

In bat form, Elina circles it once, and then the gag is gone, too.

Sometimes Father enjoys the silence.

Sometimes he prefers to hear them scream.

“No, master, please,” pleads the mewling thing. “I’ll be good, I promise.”

I wondered why the curtains were positioned like that, who was to be executed.

Normally, the reflecting pool looks innocuous. Now, though, the dunking platform, triggering target, and heavy iron chains have been released from a curved steel wall that has been rolled into place and locked around it.

“Always remember that you are royalty. You defer to no one but me.” Father hands me a baseball. “Take this.”

I consider the condemned. I don’t know how it fell short. Yet those who refuse to apply for hunting licenses, to pay taxes on their victims, to hunt with discretion, to treat aristocracy and, most important, royalty with respect are to be extinguished. That’s usually the enforcers’ responsibility. Tonight, it’s my pleasure.

“Anytime you’re ready,” Father says, and I suppress the sudden memory of Ms. Esposito calling the same words to me on my high-school stage.

Father loves the dunking platform. It’s his brainchild, his game. A spray of holy water burns like acid, but submersion creates a visual feast as the body evaporates on contact with an impressive
whoosh
noise — a crowd pleaser.

It’s something I admire about Father, his sense of theater.

My midnight gray taffeta gown is tight through the shoulders. If I’d known what he had been planning, I would’ve chosen something more maneuverable.

“Miranda?” Father clears his throat. “Sugar?”

I tuck the baseball under my arm and remove the black-pearl-and-platinum bracelet Father gave me (along with the car) earlier tonight. Harrison’s gloved hand extends to take it for safekeeping.

I weigh the ball in my hand. It’s from the 1908 World Series.

Father is a devoted Cubs fan.

“Something wrong?” he asks.

I shake my head, mindful of our audience. Our favored wait with rapt attention.

I gaze one last time at Flint. He has a broad chest, a mane of blond hair, and pink, bowed lips that have gone white from starvation.

It can’t have been easy for him these past few weeks in the dungeon, separated from our bleeding stock by stone and bars.

The condemned protests again. “Princess, no!” He,
it,
strains against the chains, not much older than me, too new to escape by changing form. “No!”

I toss the ball. Catch it. In life, I wasn’t especially athletic, but I’ve always had good hand-eye coordination.

“Miranda!” it pleads again. “Miranda!”

I can feel Father’s impatience as he crosses his arms in custom formalwear.

Falling snow reflects the moonlight. It smells so fresh, so clean.

“Ten, nine,” the crowd mutters. “Eight.” Their voices rise. “Seven.”

The countdown goes on, louder and louder.

At “one,” I haul off and pitch the ball.

Bull’s-eye.
Whoosh.

I’ve never before killed one of my own kind. I lick my lips, satisfied.

“Nicely done,” Father growls in my ear.

I’m triumphant, resplendent by his side. Our subjects swirl around us — prancing, dancing, swooping, and howling. Living party favors in clawed hands, blood streaming from greedy mouths. We are the calm at the center of their storm.

I fold my hands in front of my waist, prim and demure, feeling utterly comfortable in my skin, however cold it may be.

Our guests throw back their heads and roar through their teeth, “Hail Miranda!”

THREE NIGHTS AFTER MY PARTY
, Harrison delivers a thin girl with smudges beneath her eyes to my bedroom suite. Her blue tunic does little to hide her emaciated physique or the tracks on her arms. She can’t be more than fifteen.

“Mistress,” Harrison begins, “the master’s teleconference with the Brazilians has run longer than expected. He’s still downstairs in the east-wing meeting room.” The PA shoves the girl to the floor, and when she raises her head, she’s crying.

“Thank you,” I say. “That will be all.”

“Very good,” Harrison replies. He shuts the arched door behind him, and, with my heightened hearing, I note that his retreating footsteps are brisk down the hall.

Early on, when I was plagued by soul sickness, it shocked me that our staff could offer up fellow humans the way they do. I’m no longer inclined to dwell on the matter, but I still don’t understand how they live with themselves.

The openly sobbing girl here tonight is tall with long legs and long blond hair. She’s thinner, with less muscle and spark, and yet she reminds me of Lucy. Or at least what Lucy might’ve been if she were poor and abused.

I want the girl to be quiet. I want to pluck out her eyes — hazel eyes like Lucy’s — and suck them dry. But I can’t. Not this time. Not this girl.

I cross to the antique cherry desk and tap a button on the phone. “Nora?”

“What can I do for you, honey?” the chef replies.

“I’ll pass on dinner tonight. Could someone clear her out of my room?”

The hesitation lasts longer than it should. “Did the offering displease you?”

I consider the possibility that the resemblance between Lucy and my dinner isn’t a coincidence, that it’s a test. A test from heaven or a test from hell. It has to be hell, though, doesn’t it? Father is fond of his games, and there’s nothing holy here.

I take a risk and admit the truth. “No,” I say. “I’ve lost my appetite.”