The Van Alen Legacy (22 page)

“This was a bad one,” he said,
as they paid their student fare and found seats at the back.

He was being kind. It was
probably the worst episode she’d experienced. The massive headache, the frothing, the way her
tongue had almost choked her . . . What had Dr. Pat said during her last visit?
That the
vampire strength was a gift, but in her case was also a burden.
Her human body was
treating the transformation as a disease, as something it wanted out of her. . . .

“Are you sure you’re all
right?” Oliver asked again, as Schuyler leaned forward with her head in her hands.

“I’m okay,” she said.
‘
really
I am.” It was the last thing she said before she fainted.

* * *

Back at the hotel, and feeling
much better, Schuyler sat on the little balcony outside their room, wrapped up in a bathrobe.
Inside the tiny kitchenette, Oliver was putting the final touches to his curry. He brought out a
steaming bowl and set it in front of her with a spoon. They had both learned to cook while on the
run. Oliver’s specialty was an Indian
bananaand
-chicken curry, while Schuyler liked
to make interesting concoctions out of pasta and whatever she could find in the fridge.
(Sometimes Oliver said they were too interesting.)

“Thanks,” she said, gladly
accepting the warm bowl of yellow curry and rice. She lifted a spoonful to her lips and blew on
it before eating, so it wouldn’t scorch her tongue.

Outside, sailboats and cruise
ships dotted Sydney’s harbor. The ocean was a deep sea-green, not unlike Jack’s eyes, she
thought, then stopped
herself
. She would not think about him, or what he was doing,
or if he was missing her too. She focused on her food. Oliver was watching her through the
sliding glass door.

He had that look on his face,
and she knew what it meant. He walked out, set a cup of tea next to her, and sat on one of the
plastic chairs.

“Sky, we need to
talk.”

“I know what you’re going to
say, Ollie, but the answer is no.” She took a sip of the tea. Amazing that even with everything
that had happened, Oliver had still managed to buy a tin. He really was a good
Conduit.

“Sky, you’re not being
reasonable.”

“I’m not? They’re going to put
us in jail, or whatever they do to people like us.” Schuyler shrugged. She knew the punishment
for evading Conclave justice: a thousand years of Expulsion. Your spirit locked up in a box. But
what if she wasn’t immortal? What would they do to her then? And what would happen to
Oliver?

“You heard what Jack said. The
Conclave has bigger problems than the two of us right now. Besides, maybe this time they’ll
believe you. The fire at the H’tel Lambert was all over the papers, and the European Conclave is
up in
arms’they
have witnesses who saw Leviathan! They can’t deny it
anymore.”

“Even if they believe me now,
they won’t let our actions go unpunished. You know that better than I do,” Schuyler pointed
out.

“True, but that was when
Charles Force was Regis. No one is leading the Conclave right now. They’re frightened and
disorganized. I think it would be safe to go home.”

“Frightened people make the
worst judgments,” Schuyler argued.
“ I
don’t trust an organization that would make
policy out of fear.
And how about you?
You’re a traitor too, you know. What about
your parents? They’ll go after them.”

So far Oliver’s family had
been left alone, aside from their every move being tracked by the Venators: phones bugged,
accounts analyzed. Oliver’s parents told him on one of their rare satellite phone calls that they
couldn’t go to Dean & Deluca without feeling they were being watched.

Oliver took a gulp from his
big Foster’s can. “I think we can buy them.”

Schuyler stacked her empty cup
into her empty bowl. “Excuse me?”

“Pay them off. The Conclave
needs money. They’re pretty much broke. My parents have a ton. I can buy my way out of it, I know
I can.”

Why was she arguing? Oliver
was telling her what she wanted to hear, that they could go home, and yet it frightened
her.

“I don’t want to
go.”

“You’re lying. You want to go
home. I know it. And we are. End of discussion,” Oliver said.

“I’m booking us on the next
flight back. I won’t hear anything else.”

Oliver didn’t speak to her for
the rest of the evening. She fell asleep with a crick in her neck from the tension. Why
was
she
being so stubborn, she wondered as she drifted off to sleep. Oliver only wanted the
best for her.

Why are you being so
stubborn?

Schuyler opened her
eyes.

She was in New York, in her
bedroom. The faded Broadway Playbill covers that lined the walls were yellow and curling at the
edges.

Her mother was sitting on her
bed.

This was a dream.
But
not the usual one.
A dream about her mother.
She didn’t think about her much
anymore. She hadn’t even had time to say good-bye when they had left New York last
year.

It was the first time she’d
seen her mother since Allegra had appeared on Corcovado holding a sword.

Allegra looked at Schuyler
sternly.

“He is right, you know. The
Conduits always are. You cannot live this way. The transformation will kill you without the
proper guidance and care. You cannot risk your life like this.”

“But I can’t go home,”
Schuyler said. “As much as I want to, I can’t.”

“Yes you can.”

“I can’t!” Schuyler rubbed her
eyes.

“I know you are afraid of what
will happen when you return. But you must face your fear, Schuyler. If you and
Abbadon
are meant to be, then there is nothing that any-one, not him, not even you,
can do to stop it.”

Her mother was right. She
didn’t want to go home because then Jack would be so, so, so very close. Jack, who was still free
. . . Jack, who had kissed her so passionately . . . who could still be hers. . . . But if she
kept away, then she wouldn’t be tempted to see him and betray Oliver.

“You cannot be with someone
just because you don’t want to hurt him. You have your own happiness to think about,” Allegra
said.

“But even if we’re together,
it will only kill Jack,” Schuyler said. “It’s against the Code. And he’ll diminish . .
.”

“If he will take the risk to
be with you, who are you to tell him what to do with his life? Look at me. Look at how much I
risked
to be
with your father.”

“My father is dead. And you’re
in a coma. I practically grew up an orphan,” Schuyler said, not even trying to keep the
bitterness out of her voice. She had never known her
father,
he had died before she
was born.
As for Allegra?
well
, there wasn’t much of a relationship
anyone could have with a living corpse, now was there. ‘
tell
me, Mother, was it
worth it? Was your “great” love for my father worth what has happened to your family?”

She couldn’t keep herself from
saying such hurtful things. But everything spilled out after years of living alone.

She loved her mother, she did.
But she didn’t want an angel who only appeared once in a lifetime to give her some enchanted
sword. Schuyler wanted a real parent: one who was there for her when she cried, who encouraged
and prodded and annoyed her, a little bit, only because they cared so much. She wanted someone
ordinary. Like Oliver’s mom. She had no idea how Mrs. H-P knew where they would be, but every few
months a package would arrive at their hotel, and inside would be chocolates and new socks and
things they didn’t even know they needed, like flashlights and batteries.

Allegra sighed. “I understand
your disappointment in me. I hope that one day you will understand and forgive. There are
consequences to every action. It is
true,
I have deep, deep regrets sometimes. But
without your father I would never have had you. I was only with you for such a brief moment of
time, but I treasured every moment, with you and your father. I would do it all over again if I
had to.
So yes.
It was worth it.”

“I don’t believe you,”
Schuyler said. “No one in their right mind would choose your life.”

“Be that as it may, come home,
daughter. I am waiting for you. Come home.”

When Mimi opened her eyes, the
auction room had slipped away and she was in the sanctuary, a small room with four walls made of
stained glass. Of course, in the glom, it had never been destroyed.

She stood in a circle with the
five other members; Forsyth, the seventh, stood in the middle. They were dressed in long black
hooded robes. Like a bunch of grim reapers, Mimi thought. So much of the Blue Blood ways had
seeped into popular culture, but twisted and stripped of their gravity.

“Welcome, everyone,” Forsyth
Llewellyn said, looking very puffed up and self-satisfied. Perfectly natural, Mimi thought, as he
was assuming the highest office in the land, as head of a secret government the Red Bloods didn’t
even know existed. His work as a senator was completely perfunctory. Mimi heard he had done only
superficial work toward helping to resolve the financial crisis that held the country in its
grip. Mimi had not been a full-serving member of the Conclave when Lawrence had been elected, but
she had a vague idea of the proceedings.

Seymour Corrigan called the
roll and started the ceremony. “Since the early days of this world, our Regis holds the soul of
the Coven in his heart. But before he is chosen, he must be blessed by the Seven, and so we have
gathered here today for the benediction.”

It was a ceremony that went
back to ancient Egypt. Except this time there would be no false beard of goat’s hair, no magic
scepter, no symbolic leather whip, no crown of ostrich feathers. But the fundamentals were the
same.

Warden Corrigan began the
tabulation, calling out to the great houses by their names from the Sacred Language.

“What say you,
Domus
Magnificat
?” The House of Riches was represented by Josiah
Rockefeller Archibald, whose family had built the center on which they stood.

“We say aye,” he
murmured.

“What say you,
Domus
Septem
Sanctimonialis
?”

“We say aye,” said Alice
Whitney, who was the last of the line of the House of the Seven Sisters.

“What say you,
Domus
Veritas
?”

Of course the Venators were
represented on the council, but Mimi was curious as to why Abe Tompkins spoke for them. He hadn’t
been an active Venator for many years.

“We say aye,” old Abe
responded.

“What say you,
Domus
Preposito
?”

The House of the Stewards was
a title that had always been given to the family nearest to the Regis. The
Llewellyns
currently had that honor.

Forsyth
Llwellyn
smiled. “We say aye.”

“What say you,
Domus
Stella
Aquillo
?”

The House of the Northern Star
was one of the biggest benefactors of art programs in the country. Ambrose Barlow looked
nervously at Minerva Morgan. He bowed his head and whispered, “Aye.”

There were only two houses
left. Next to her, Mimi felt Minerva Morgan’s anxiety.

“What say you,
Domus
Domina
?”

The House of the Gray
Lady.
Death House, but no one called it that.
The family that was in charge of the
records, of the cycles of expression and expulsion.

Minerva Morgan did not
respond.

“
Domus
Domina
?” Seymour Corrigan cleared his throat. “
Domus
Domina
?”

Minerva Morgan sighed.
“Aye.”

“
Domus
Lamia says
aye,” Warden Corrigan said, a bit grumpily.

The House of the
Vampyres
; an old title, and the head of the Conspiracy.

Mimi braced herself. She was
next.

Warden Corrigan
coughed.

“What say
Domus
Fortis
Valerius
Incorruputus
.
House of the Pure
Blood, of the Uncorrupted, of the Valiant and the Strong, Protector of the Garden, Commander of
the Lord’s Armies?
What say you?”

That was Michael’s line.
Gabrielle’s line.
The Van Alen line, now bastardized by the Force name.
Mimi raised her voice.

“We say . . .” She wavered.
She thought of Minerva Morgan’s uncertainty. Ambrose Barlow, who was so old they had all thought
he was senile. And yet he had brought in that piece of paper.
Had brought it to her.
They were counting on her.
An anonymous note, but an important one.
They were right.
They could not discount its message.