Rising Son (The Juliana Lucio Series) (5 page)

“No, I’m fine.”

“He’s on the phone. He won’t hear you.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Ok, well when you decide you do. You can talk to me, I will probably understand better than you realize. He did break my heart once too, remember.”

“It’s not that ...” I was starting to tell her what had happened when William came striding into the kitchen with a definite purpose to his abrupt interruption.

“That was Sebastian on the phone. He wants to meet Juliana.”

“What!” Ana and I exclaimed together.

“Sebastian, the Director of the Council, that Sebastian? What does he want from me?” I asked looking between them both for answers.

“He didn’t say, he just said he wants to meet you, and we’re supposed to bring you to the New York office in two weeks.”

William, Ana and I had made our way back into the library. We each held a cup of coffee up to our noses as we sat in silence staring off at nothing, trying to figure out what this meant.

“Do you think he knows?” I was
,
unsurprisingly
,
the first to break the silence.

“Which part, exactly, are you referring? The fact that you can compel me, your maker, which has never happened in all of vampire history; that you are resistant to all forms of compulsion, even from a 400-year-old master vampire; that we killed said master vampire or that your human son discovered your existence? None of them are good Juliana, even if you did compel Christian into forgetting,” Ana said exasperated.

Ana
seemed especially stressed out.
She
had put her coffee down, it was obviously not helping, and began to massage her temples. William still hadn’t said anything and was continuing to stare ahead. This was a moment of truth for me. I had told them that I had compelled Christian, when I really couldn’t. After what Ana just said they had obviously believed me.

“Why isn’t it good? That I can compel and resist it? Won’t it be helpful in the fight against The Coven, can’t I help you guys?”

“No. You are not going to be a part of this,” William said just as firmly as he had when he gagged me last night at the hotel.  He stood up and started pacing the room, roughly running his hands through his hair. He always did that when he was stressed or looking for the right answer to something.

“I don’t understand. I thought you said these were supposed to be the good guys, the ones who ordered my death, but still according to you two they are the lesser of two evils, right?”

“Yes, they are the good guys, but they will use you nonetheless. Once you’re in Jules, you’re in for life, there is no getting out. I want you to be free. Free to choose, free to live and do whatever you want.”

William was looking at me with the full focus of his deep brown eyes. He had small specks of gold that shown throughout them, and every once in a while I’d get to see the true depth of his emotions that lay hidden within. It broke my heart to know he didn’t want to be with me anymore.

“And what if what I want is to choose you, William, what then?” My response took him by surprise as he gave me a look of shock
,
his eyes opened wide.

“This isn’t about that, and I do still want you Jules. You know why I can’t be with you right now.”

He turned away from me
,
arms bracing himself on the fireplace mantle. I was about to bring up the subject again when Ana interrupted me. I had almost forgotten she was there.

“I’m not sure what you guys are talking about, but William is right, as soon as they find out about your abilities they will pull you in, and there will be no getting
out for you,
ever. None of us want to see that happen. Then there is the issue of Nathaniel."

“Sebastian is going to be pissed we killed him. He was a higher up who was leading The Council to the final plans of The Coven. He shouldn’t even have been here in Chicago, and now that he’s dead I’m not sure what will happen. We don’t know when or where the big outing of vampirekind is going to be, and everyone is losing their leads since he was killed.” William finished for her.

Ana had taken to pacing opposite of William and was leaning against the bookshelf leaving me sitting on the couch alone. I had once thought the bookshelf was just that, a huge floor-to-ceiling inlaid bookshelf, but William later revealed to me it also doubled as a secret passageway to a weapons stockade underneath the house as well as an escape tunnel that opened up in the separate garage out back.

She stopped her pacing and came to sit in front of me on the couch.

“My role in the Council is to work in the ER, and morgue, in order to pick up any patterns of attack that fit those of vampire attacks. If I am ever approached or come across a rogue vampire working for the Coven I act sympathetic to their cause garnering any information I can. I pass the information along to William whose role is to actually infiltrate a
nd attend meetings;
he is slowly moving up the ranks of the Coven itself. The Coven’s purpose is to out vampires to the human world, but they want to do it on a massive scale bringing humans cowering on their knees in terror
, l
eaving no room for an uprising.

They believe that will be the only way to ensure humans don’t rise up and war against them. The only thing standing in the way of the Coven taking over many of the major cities of the world right now is the Council. Our two factions of vampires are on the brink of starting their own war with each other, just to prevent humans from ever discovering our kind. Nathaniel was a high ranking member of the Coven, not to mention a master vampire. When we killed him, all of our Coven contacts in the city of Chicago went underground. We were supposed to be mon
itoring another faction of the C
oven that has fled since Nathaniel’s death. I can’t find them anywhere or get any leads on where they’ve gone.”

“What do you mean by all of them?”

    
“Just that, we haven’t been able to contact a single
one.”
“This means either they know we had something to do with it, and that’s why they are avoiding us --”

“Which is also why you can’t be alone until we know what is going on. If they know we had a part in it, they know about you, and will be coming for you,” Ana interrupted.

“As I was saying,” William continued, “it could also mean that this is just the standard M
.
O
.
, if a higher up is taken out, the rest of the rats flee. We simply don’t know at this point, but we need to find out quick, before Sebastian or Martin intervenes.”

“Oh God, I really messed everything up.”

“Don’t. We knew what we were getting ourselves into when we agreed to help you. We didn’t think all of our leads would up and flee without a trace, but still we knew the risks. It was worth it to help you Jules,” William said. He was finally looking at me again, I looked over at Ana and she nodded her head in agreement.

I leaned my head back on the couch
and blo
w
ing
out a breath of air. I believed what I was about to do was the right thing, and so help me God, if I was wrong I would kill every last one of them.

But I knew I could trust William and Ana. I knew they would never betray me, even though I had just accused them of that and fled, not twenty-four hours earlier. I looked from William's eyes to Ana’s as they looked back at me steady and sure. They knew we were about to be up against something big, but weren’t even thinking of backing down.

Yeah, I could trust them.

“Well, I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but . . . well, I am. You see, the thing is . . . when I went to see Christian, I went to compel him into forgetting Victoria, Nathaniel, and me. Pretty much everything vampire related . . .”

“You told me this earlier at the hospital,” Ana interrupted.

“Right. Well, it didn’t exactly work,” I told them cringing waiting for the fight to begin.

“Which part didn’t work?” Ana asked me narrowing her eyes.

“Um, all of it, none of it. I tried to compel him every way I could think of, and nothing would work. I even started to wonder if perhaps I could compel him into doing something physical, and it was just the memory I couldn’t affect, but that didn’t work either. I told him to lie if anyone came to see him, and I lied as well. I didn’t know what would happen, and I didn’t know what your whole story was at that point. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you sooner.”

They just stared back at me, expressionless. They didn’t give anything away as far as how they were feeling, I didn’t know if they were pissed, surprised, about to throw me out of the house. No clue whatsoever. The only thing I did know, and that was only because of the blood bond with Ana, was
she
wasn’t feeling surprised.

“We know this already Juliana. We couldn’t be sure of the extent that it didn’t work, but we knew Christian still knew of your existence, and mine as well,” Ana finally said at last.

“What! How did you know?” I jumped up to face them both.

“I went to see him last night after my shift was over. I told him I was a doctor on call and one of the nurses asked me to take a look at him. He did a great job of hiding his recognition of me outwardly, but his heart started racing the second he got a good look at me. When I nonchalantly mentioned you, and that I was sorry for his loss, he started to sweat, and his heart rate almost became erratic. To any human in the room he would have appeared calm, bored even. He is very good at covering his emotions, but to a vampire you can’t hide your physiological response. He knew what I was, and who I was. I knew instantly you didn’t compel him. What I wasn’t sure of was whether you didn’t do it and lied or couldn’t do it.”

“I couldn’t, trust me when I tell you I tried. I want him to forget. I want him safe!” I was almost yelling I was so adamant in my response.

“I know. I believe you now,” she said.

“Why didn’t you say anything to me sooner?”

“You just got here!” Ana yelled back at me.

“That was my call,” William started saying at the same time, “We already knew he hadn’t been compelled. The reason was the only thing missing. I wanted you to trust us enough to tell us the truth. We can’t work with someone that’s afraid of us or can’t be honest with us.”

“Well, what about now? Do you trust me again? Is this why you started acting indifferent toward me since this evening? Is that when Ana told you?”

He remained silent while looking at me before deciding to answer. He was uncharacteristically solemn tonight.

“Yeah, she called and told me right before you rose, and whether I trust you depends on why you’re telling us the truth about Christian. Why didn’t you say anything earlier?”

“Because I trusted you both with his life once, and I know I always can. I’m sorry I forgot that. I didn’t say anything last night because I was pissed off and let my emotions keep me from thinking, and tonight I was too distracted by you treating me so coldly.”

He eyed me for a moment trying to gauge the truth of my words before he finally softened his stance, just before responding he looked to Ana and she gave him a nod telling him I wasn’t lying.

“Yeah, I believe you, and we’ll do whatever we can to keep him safe again.”

“Great, so now what do we do?” I asked them.

“Now, we get you ready for New York. That means shopping and sparring.”

“Why sparring? I thought this was going to be like a business meeting or something.”

“Technically it will be, but lesson one for you is to always be prepared for the worst. You may be a naturally good fighter, but we need to pick it up a bit. Training starts today, you never can tell
what you will be involved with
especially when it comes to the Council. Everyone immediately underestimates you which you can always use to your advantage. Don’t let them know the full extent of your abilities, or Christian's either for that matter. Don’t let them know we’ve been training you for anything other than how to survive as a vampire.”

“It sounds like you’re starting a coup,” I told William half joking.

“There are no coups or uprising within the Council, there are no resignations, only a silver stake in the heart for trying it,” he told me seriously.

“Got it,” I replied solemnly, “and you are sure these are the good guys?”

I silently wondered what my own fate would be at the end of this meeting. I could understand what the Council was working for, and that they were trying to prevent a vampire-human war, but the measures they went to to keep their soldiers in line was a little extreme for my liking.

Ana spent the next few days dressing me at various desi
gner shops; I swear she was in h
eaven. We went to the Magnificent Mile in downtown Chicago and spent most of our time looking through the racks to find something suitable to meet the head of the entire vampire community.

“I hate shopping off the rack,” Ana told me as she was pushing her way through various dresses and skirts at Michael Kors. “I guess we don’t have much time before we have to leave though, so it leaves us no other choice.” She threw a few dresses in my direction without looking to see if I was still there.

“Hey, where’s the rest of it?” I asked her while holding up a very small, off the shoulder charcoal colored dress.

“That is all of it. You’ll look great in it.”

“Yeah, but what’s going to cover the bottom half of me? I can’t wear something like this.”

“Sure you can
,
you have the legs for it, and besides it’ll be perfect for fighting if it comes to that. You can kick, run and move it in.”

“Yeah, while flashing everyone within eyeshot,” I replied incredulously trying to hand it back to her.

“If it comes down to that it won’t really matter will it? Besides nothing will happen while we’re there, William and I are just being paranoid. Try it on
,
I’m sure it will look great.”