In the Dark (30 page)

“He’s
a monster,” Alec began, but I cut him off with a slicing motion
of my hand.

“What he
used to be isn’t important,” I said. “He’s my
friend now.”

Josephine sat
back down on my couch. I leaned against the door, letting my back
slide down it until I sat with a thump.

“We didn’t
kill them for sport or anything, you know,” Alec said, acidly.
“It’s not like it was unprovoked.”

I kept staring
at him.

He sighed. “We
had to. They were running amok. They’d killed other vampires,
humans, and they would have killed us. Kent decided to put a stop to
it.”

“By
killing them?”
Kent?

“I suppose
I shouldn’t expect you to understand,” Alec said.

I felt sick.
Maybe Sebastian could kill someone like that, because they deserved
it. But Kent? My Kent? Maybe we didn’t mean the same man.

“
Rule
number eight – or whatever – do not kill.” He
paused in ticking numbers on his fingers to look at me, while I made
a grossed-out face.

“
Ian, I
am so serious about this,” he’d said, so sincerely that I
quit making faces. “I have seen vampires kill, just once, a
rapist or a murderer. Then once more, maybe a mercy killing, someone
dying, suffering. Then again, and again, until it doesn’t even
affect them anymore. Once you start, it’s so hard to care . .
.”

The memory ended
with a jolt. Alec was still trying to explain some numb thing, while
Josephine frowned at his back.

“How long
had you been a vampire when you did this?” I interrupted. Maybe
this had meant to come later in my own education. More of Kent I
didn’t know about.

Alec stopped
talking as if I’d yelled. “A few years. Four or five.
Why?”

I clutched my
knees, my hands trembling. “That’s how old I am! He
always told me to be careful not to hurt anyone!”

Alec’s
eyes slid away. “Yes, well, he had changed a bit before he made
you.”

“Yeah, I
guess he did.”

Silence. I tried
to imagine the Kent Alec was talking about. Bloodthirsty. Out for
revenge. The image wouldn’t come.

“Regardless,
we’re getting out of here before Cain comes back and that’s
final.” Alec crossed his arms.

“Says
who?” I asked.

He aimed a
finger at me. “I am the older sibling here. Kent made me for a
reason. Gave me a spare key to your home for a reason. You aren’t
well enough versed to look after yourself yet and she definitely
isn’t.” He aimed his finger at Amanda. “So when I
say we’re leaving and you ask says who, the answer is Kent.”

I stared up at
him, unmoving. He didn’t try to pick Amanda up again. I could
tell he wanted to. My opinion of Alec lowered another notch.

Kent says.
Yeah, right Kent says –

– and
something else clicked.

“Why
didn’t Sebastian know you?”

Alec stared at
me stupidly.

“When you
came to the house earlier. He had no idea who you were. Why didn’t
he recognize you from when you hunted him?”

“They
never saw us,” Alec said, as if it should be obvious. “We
watched them from a distance, and used this –” he tapped
the side of his head – “to lure them out.”

That psychic
thing. The one I might be able to do. They used it to draw people –
other vampires – out of their hiding places and kill them.
Alec. And Kent.

Alec actually
raised his nose half an inch. “Cain would have every reason to
kill Kent himself, then get close to you to do the same.”

I snorted. “He’s
had lots of opportunity to kill me, Alec. Lots.”

Alec looked away
again. “If you think.”

“Whatever,”
I said. “I’m not going anywhere until Sebastian gets
back.”

He threw his
hands up. “Get yourself killed, then. But don’t think
this is what Kent wanted, and don’t think for a minute I’m
going to join you.”

“No one
asked you to, Alec,” I said. “Not even Kent.”

Instead of
storming off, like I expected, he reached into his coat pocket. With
an angry yank, he pulled out a manila envelope, folded and
much-abused. He held it out imperiously to me. I looked up his arm at
him, frowning.

“I found
this in Kent’s belongings,” he said. “There’s
a card for legal counsel, among other things. It’s for you.”

I stared at it
and did not reach up to take it. “Why didn’t you give it
to me last night?”

“I thought
it might have been meant for me.”

“You took
something from my house without even talking to me about it?”

His eyes flashed
at that. “I took it because I thought it might have been for
me. It wasn’t, so I’m returning it.”

I wanted to ask
why he thought it would be for him, why he took it, if he stole that
copy of my house key, too . . . but I felt pretty sure I wouldn’t
like the answers. I took the envelope. Once I had it I glanced down
at it, only then wondering what it contained. If I wanted it, given
what I’d just learned about Kent.

“There.”
Alec said. “Thank you. And now if you’ll excuse me, I
have other things to do than commit suicide. Good night.”

He waved me away
from the door. I moved. Just before he stormed out, he paused to give
me a serious look. “Remember what I said about Cain,” he
said, and took himself out.

I glared after
him for a good minute, then sighed and looked down at the envelope in
my hand. Just a plain manila envelope, opened, nothing written on the
outside at all.

“Do you
know what this is?” I asked Josephine, holding it up.

She shook her
head. “Kent never said anything about it to me.”

With my teeth
clenched, I opened the flap and riffled through the stack of papers
inside. A card for legal counsel, as Alec had said, was paper-clipped
to the top page. Aside from that, I could only make out a bunch of
official-looking documents.

No letter.
Nothing personal. I kind of wanted something personal. Josephine
looked over my shoulder and nodded. “Your inheritance,”
she said quietly. “These are legal records of Kent’s
property and the contact information for his attorney. He had this
all set up already.”

That should have
been good news. Instead, it made me sad and more confused. He had put
together a will, leaving me his things, but he hadn’t told me
that he was in any danger. I set the envelope on the floor next to
me.

Sunrise kept
getting closer. We had been waiting for Sebastian for hours.

“Do you
think he’s okay?” I asked out loud, glancing at the
window.

Josephine must
have known which “he” I meant. She stared out the window
with reddened eyes and shrugged.

N
ow
that Sebastian was alone, a different emotion pressed hot against the
inside of his ribcage, spreading up to clench his shoulders. A
familiar feeling. Anger.

He pulled the
Vector over and let himself out. He was uncertain where he might find
Specter, but he had an idea. The images left at Ian’s house
held a message. Amanda was part of that message, as much a part as
the word on the wall. Not just in that she provided her blood, though
that also played a part. Her relationship to a vampire indicated
Specter’s interest in that vampire. Ian. Amanda’s death
meant something else – first, that Ian was marked for death.
Second, that Specter would await Sebastian in the nearest cemetery.
And so Sebastian had come.

The rain had
stopped, taking with it the sounds of stormy weather. Aside from a
few crickets, the night was still. Sebastian stood before the marble
gate posts, arms crossed. This was the nearest resting place. If he
did not find them here, he would need to rethink his interpretation
of the message. If he did find them . . .

Then I shall
see them.

He rested his
hand on the hilt of his sword and stepped between the stone columns
into the graveyard. He did not bother hiding himself. That was not
the point of this visit. Nor did he silence his steps. Let them hear
him coming.

Within a handful
of paces, he caught sight of them. He watched them from the corner of
his eye as they watched him, hidden in shadows where mortals would
have missed them. Members of his pack. Vampires he had once fought
beside, whom he had not seen in at least five decades. He still
recalled their shapes, their postures – as they surely recalled
his.

There were some
few he did not recognize. New ones. These did not hide themselves
half so effectively as those he had trained with, but their ability
did not interest Sebastian so much as their very presence. It meant
Specter’s pack had grown in Sebastian’s absence.

All in all,
Sebastian counted two he found familiar and three he did not. There
were more, he knew, off elsewhere. On missions, guarding territory in
the Old World, pursuing other ends. Others that could, nonetheless,
be summoned to aid their pack in a matter of days. A separation of
even entire continents did not mean losing contact. The pack needed
one another, needed the ability to become greater than its individual
members. To call for help meant losing face, but it was more
foolhardy to refuse to do so.

As, he could
only guess, the shape-changer had known all too well.

A disturbing
thought. If the shape-changer truly had belonged to the pack, when
had he called for help? Only a night or two ago? Or when Sebastian
had first become involved? How long had the pack been here? The
answer tried to unsettle Sebastian. He did not let it. The pack had
been here for as long as they had been here. They had chosen to
reveal their presence tonight, and it was tonight he must worry
about.

He was deep
inside the cemetery now. The shadow-shapes became clearer, growing
bolder about showing themselves. Sebastian let them. He had not come
for them. He followed the path that led past the stones, nearing the
center of the cemetery –

And there,
sitting atop a monument that put him above the others’ heads,
was Specter. A tall man, wiry and well-built, raven’s-wing
black hair tied back behind his head.

Sebastian paused
on seeing him again. Something, he could not say what, felt as though
it crashed into him when he laid eyes on Specter for the first time
in decades. He shook it off, disturbed, and moved forward again.
Specter remained exactly as Sebastian recalled him. Not simply a
result of immortality, but also in his posture, his expression.

He has
learned nothing in the time I have been away.

And yet, neither
had Sebastian, beyond what his own heart held. The workings of his
heart would not keep him alive tonight.

“Cain!”
Specter greeted, loudly, jovially.

Sebastian
glanced up at him, then around at the others who had started to form
a loose circle around them. He stayed ten paces from the monument
Specter perched on, watching.

“Sebastian,”
he corrected, instead of responding in kind.

Specter made a
rude face. “Oh, so you’ve gone and changed your name. As
if that changes who you are.”

Sebastian said
nothing.

Specter waited
for him to respond, sighing theatrically when he didn’t. “I
suppose I must yield to these little idiosyncrasies,
Sebastian.
A rose by any other name is still a killer, after all.” He
waited for that to have some impact. When it didn’t, he sighed
again, more frustrated this time. “Don’t you even have a
hello for your old master? Or are you more concerned with the whelp?”

Aha. As he
thought. Specter was interested in Ian. Almost definitely the one who
had sent the shape-changer.

“I have
nothing to say to you, Specter. I came in answer to your challenge.”

There. It was
out. He had accepted challenge before, issued many himself, fought
and won against vampire and mortal. Never against Specter. Though he
had not entertained the notion of refusing the challenge, accepting
it out loud nonetheless gave the impression of a difficult decision
resolved.

Specter smiled,
pretending to surprise. He jumped down from his throne easily,
landing with a light thud in the grass before Sebastian. Sebastian
waited to see if Specter would draw his weapon. They had been nearly
evenly matched when Sebastian left. Part of him wondered if he had
improved enough to defeat the one who had taught him. Another part of
him did not believe in his chances.

Instead of
drawing his sword, Specter cocked his head to one side. “What
is she to you, Cain? She’s little more than a child. You aren’t
. . . nibbling on her?” He made an almost worried face.

Sebastian
refused to move.

Specter breathed
a mock sigh of relief. “I hope not. She can’t have left
her Daddy too long ago.” His eyes flashed wickedly.

A small growl
rumbled deep in Sebastian’s throat. Playing at insults. He
remembered this game. Specter needed to prove that he had the upper
hand, a quicker wit, plenty of information. Knowing it was only talk
did not lessen the anger.

“I believe
you know enough about her,” Sebastian said. “I am here to
answer challenge.”

Specter stabbed
an angry finger in the air between them. “I may know enough,
Cain, but do you? You must know who her father was? What went on?
What he did?”

“I have
nothing to say to you, Specter,” Sebastian repeated. “I
do not believe you have anything to say that I care to hear.”

“You’re
a traitor,” Specter tossed off. “A murderer of your own
pack.”

Sebastian
narrowed his eyes against the verbal slap. Forced himself to lift his
shoulders in a shrug that he did not feel. “So the
shape-changer
was
one of yours,” he said. “Interesting.”
He had not guessed until tonight that his pack might be involved with
either Ian or Kent.