In Blood We Trust (21 page)

“562,” the boyish-looking vampire said without further greeting. “The Civils found out where we were keeping the origin, and we've taken steps to evacuate, even with the mind-wipes going on.”

McKellan nodded, already over his talk with Gabriel. “I assume your twin and Liam are already on their way out of the hub, just until we know GBVille is memory-free for those who need to be.”

“Yes,” Kerr said. “They have Mariah with them, too, but she wants Gabriel with her.”

Mariah.

Gabriel needed to find her, be with her.

Protect her.

He moved past the statue-like mayor and then the elder, heading for the door. “I'm going to her then.”

But McKellan was having none of it. “You will come with me to the asylum to mind-screw, Gabriel.”

And, with that, the elder grabbed a fistful of Gabriel's shirt, speeding off and out of the house while Gabriel kept pace, still determined to find Mariah as soon as he could.

They were at the asylum within moments, on the high walkway circling the structure. Were-creatures, fully changed into forms like hulking pumas and bears and tigers who stood on two feet, slashed out with their teeth and claws at vampires who were darting about, trying to tame them. None of them were taking cover.

It was all out in the open.

Meanwhile, tik-tiks were conspicuously absent, but their pets, the gremlins, were flitting out of the walkway's brick nooks and crannies, latching their teeth to were-creature necks; they tore and giggled and gurgled blood before vampires wrenched them away and glared into the were-creatures' eyes, whispering and mind-wiping.

As the were-creatures self-healed from the superficial wounds, red drops spotted the walkway, just like dots creating pictures Gabriel couldn't quite put together.

Blood.

At the heady scent of it, something in his mind thudded, sending a crash of those spots into a solid picture:
A torch-lit corridor—a flash of a giraffe-man Civil monster turning around as he sensed something creeping up behind him . . .

Gabriel blinked, trying to get the creeping red out of his sight, trying to deny the lure of the blood calling to him as it filled his senses.

Then something tickled the hairs at the back of his neck.

He glanced behind him, preparing to spring while everyone nearby was engaged in clawing, jumping, captivating.

Against the moon, up in one of the watchtowers, he could've sworn he saw . . .

An angel?

But it didn't have wings or dark colors like the Civil quasi-angels. This was a young woman with long, light curls, and behind her, the arches and cranks of a chest puncher peeked over her shoulders while strapped to her back.

Without another thought, Gabriel sped to the tower, clawing at it while climbing up the brick.

But once he arrived, she was gone.

Gabriel shook out his head. Hallucinating. Was this a part of his gloaming—the end of it, when he lost touch with the realities he'd always known?

Then again, McKellan had once speculated that Witches had been treated with the blood that the medicals had drawn from the vampires in asylum captivity—that this was what made them stronger, faster, and more psychic, though they were hardly at the levels of vampires. He'd even thought that Witches might've been the test subjects for plans to sell monster blood to elite human customers.

Thank-all the humans hadn't known that they needed blood
exchanges
, not just infusions, to get the full benefits....

Gabriel tried to scent out the Witch, even while knowing that the upgraded slayers used anti-odor treatments.

She really was gone.

The fighting was near-distant now, away from the watchtower, toward the asylum itself, and the vampires were winning.

Among the blood, Gabriel did lock onto an odor—two familiar ones.

As he scented more, he saw a couple of recognizable, fully changed were-creatures bounding and bouncing into view from a side door in the walkway, then stopping short when they saw the vampires attacking the other weres nearby.

The first was a hulking, bulky were-elk, with tannish brown hair above and darker hair below, long legs, a short tail, and terrible, sharp antlers. He stood on his hind feet, his eyes glowing in a face that was disconcertingly human. Behind him, a huge were–mule deer paused to check out the damage, too, her hair a dark gray-brown, a white patch on her rear near a tipped tail. Her large ears twitched as she stood on her back legs, as well.

Pucci and Hana. Had the blood brought them here?

The male's jaws seemed to be working with the desire for sustenance. Their digestive systems had adapted over the years because blood held water, and no matter what an elk and deer had eaten in the old days, their were-forms just weren't the same.

Blood was all, and it was here right now.

Pucci bent to all fours, licking the ground at a drop of red, but then he gagged.

Poison. He'd tasted a fellow were-creature's blood.

Both of them had no idea that Gabriel was perched on the watchtower, so when Hana leaped away from Pucci, disgusted at his behavior, the big elk-guy bared his teeth at her.

Hana's body shook as she stared up at her partner with wide, angry, light brown doe eyes that glowed in the night.

She bared her were-teeth right back.

The vampires put the finishing touches on the were-creatures over on the other side of the walkway, then glanced over toward Gabriel's area, as if sensing Hana and Pucci, and Gabriel lifted a hand.

I've got this,
his signal said to them.

The vampires wandered off, in search of more victims to be tamed.

Below, Pucci opened his mouth, flashing teeth at Hana.

And that must've been it for her, especially after he'd hit her the other night.

She jumped, stiff-legged, all her feet hitting the ground at once, then turned around, kicking Pucci with her back legs and smacking him in the chest.

Gabriel stiffened. If Pucci struck back, it'd be the very last time.

And, lo and behold, the idiot was already rearing up on his hind legs, threatening Hana.

Blood. Tonight, it was going to be Pucci's.

But Gabriel paused as something else came out of the shadows.

Something that had obviously been trailing Hana and Pucci, watching. Always watching.

It was Taraline, and though she seemed so tiny next to the massive were-elk and his antlers, she wasn't powerless.

Quicker than Gabriel could believe, she took Pucci by the antlers, swung him around, and bashed him into a wall.

For the second it took Gabriel to process what had just happened, Hana let out an animal screech.

Pucci slumped on the ground, stunned, already receding into a less powerful half-form, his face even more humanesque, with crazy bright eyes and grotesque teeth. Swiping up, he snagged Taraline's veils.

He pulled them off and, in one baleful moonlit moment, Taraline's face was exposed.

She was still marred by fiberlike strands of skin over cheekbones that had gained a little shape, and where there'd been the lack of a nose, there was a tiny push of cartilage now.

She pulled her veils back down before Gabriel could see more.

Healing. There'd been some mending from Mariah's 562 blood, and it had repaired Taraline's dymorrdia as much as it could. Yet it'd done something more, too. It had given the shadow woman more strength than any human could possibly hope for.

She wasn't a vampire. Wasn't a were.

Just . . . enhanced, Gabriel thought with distant wonder.

Hana had bared her sharp teeth at Taraline now, as if, for some sick reason, she were going to defend her man to the end, just as she always had.

Pucci was shaking it off, too, starting to change back into his worst form.

Not this time,
Gabriel thought.
Not with Taraline.

Gabriel jumped from the watchtower, landing between Hana and the shadow woman and just in front of Pucci. Then, with one slick movement, he darted out his arm, blading his hand so that it stabbed clean into Pucci's chest, straight to the heart.

He ripped out the organ, held up the beating mass of it, then, with his other hand, snapped Pucci's neck.

The half-changed were-creature's tongue unfolded from his mouth while his body slid back into its naked, human form.

It wasn't silver to the heart, but a spinal break would kill a were-creature fine enough.

So would a missing heart.

Gabriel peered at the still-throbbing organ in his hand as blood rippled down his arm, into his coat sleeve, soaking his shirt with red. Beyond control, he bit into it, so hungry, so . . .

Gone.

Hana screeched even louder—enough so that Gabriel jerked, realized what he was doing, tasted the tough heart and the exquisite blood.

He swallowed, shuddered, because he wanted more.

But Hana was still screaming, all the way humanlike now, her dark skin bare in the moonlight, exposed and victimizing her in the extreme.

He dropped the heart and grabbed her arms, coating them with Pucci's blood.

Sorry,
he thought, blasting into her mind.

But was he sorry?

As she screamed at him now, he pressed his blood-ringed mouth to her ear.

“Shhh,” he said, swaying her.

Mind-wipe,
he thought.
Shut her up.

But with one slam of confusion, his humanity was back, his brain kicking in, and he couldn't screw her over.

Not Hana.

Not even now.

In the meantime, Taraline just stood there as she looked down at the dead Pucci, then back up at Gabriel.

She took a breath so deep that her veils sucked in, and that was when he knew that she
had
realized all along who'd killed that Civil more than a week ago.

A barking sound broke the air, and even before Chaplin bounded around a corner, Gabriel knew that the dog wouldn't be alone.

The oldster was behind Chaplin, his mouth parting in surprise when he saw Pucci on the ground, blood surrounding him like a shroud ready to cover his body after everyone was done looking.

Hana murmured, “Gabriel . . . ?”

And there was hatred just below the bafflement.

Chaplin, who'd probably been protecting the oldster during the vampire mind-screwing spree, posted himself in front of his newest charge. The oldster glanced at Gabriel, and he fumbled for his revolver, hardly forgetting who was a fugitive and who was a law-abiding monster.

Or maybe he was just worried that Gabriel had gone all the way over and was here to mind-screw them all.

Gabriel reached out to Chaplin, who'd been a familiar to him when he'd first come to the Badlands. Nowadays, not so much, especially right this second, as the dog went into a hunched pose, his hair on end, showing his teeth and growling.

Gabriel reached into the canine's mind.

Mariah,
he thought.
We've got to go and find Mariah.

But the dog shut him out.

Shut him down.

Unable to comprehend this, Gabriel looked around him, at the monsters who'd been his friends, his responsibility at one point in time when they'd needed him so badly.

Then he focused on Pucci's blood in his mouth, and with the taste of the man's blood and heart still lingering, that was when it all came roaring back.

That night.

The other young vampires had swarmed over the victim then, just as Gabriel pushed away from the giraffe-man, his hands covered with blood as he wiped it away from his mouth, removing every trace with his clothing, too.

Then. . .

Darkness. His brain blocking it out, as if it could still protect him.

But the memory kept coming back now, once, again . . .

In the rotating void, McKellan's words ghosted through Gabriel.

The last of humanity had blacked everything out until now, as his friends all gaped at him in disbelief and crushed horror.

Except for Taraline.

She'd stood in front of him so the oldster wouldn't shoot.

Gabriel wanted to cry out, just as Hana had when she'd seen Pucci dead, but he couldn't. As something clicked in his mind—as if it were revolving to the last full chamber in an otherwise empty gun—Gabriel only backed away from them.

Hana.

The oldster.

Chaplin.

“Gabriel,” the oldster said, as if he couldn't fathom how his former friend had done this. That this killing hadn't been perpetrated by Mariah, who was supposed to be the tetched, unpredictable one.

Gabriel couldn't stand that look in their eyes—the disgust in Chaplin's, the brokenness in the oldster's, the temporary blankness in Hana's.

The dead glaze in Pucci's.

“I'm the one,” Gabriel said to the oldster. “I was wrong. I'm the one who should've turned himself in all along.”

The oldster was still pointing that revolver at him, but there was one thing still left alive in Gabriel, and he felt it like the lure of a guiding star.

Mariah.

She was out there somewhere, ready to make him feel like he could still mean something good to someone. That he could still be . . .