House of Cards

CHAPTER 21

"Margrit." Alban stepped out of an alley, realizing his error when Margrit shrieked and stumbled away. He knew the pair she was with from glimpses through doors and a few seconds of watching them at the ice rink. The slender blond woman with the broad shoulders was Cameron, and she yelped as well, clutching Margrit’s arm. Their escort was Cole, black-haired, shorter than Cameron, and instinctively protective as he stepped in front of the women. Alban opened his mouth and shut it again, startled at his own loss for words. "Forgive me," he said after a few seconds. "I didn’t intend to alarm anyone."

Cole’s belligerent growl died in his throat, stance relaxing a little as he half recognized Alban, though he cast a glance at Margrit for a cue as to how to behave. She said, "Alban," in relieved exasperation as she edged past Cole. "What are you doing here?"

"No one was home at your apartment." He made a small gesture, more to the sky than the buildings. "I waited, and when I heard your voice, I…" Words failed him again, this time because the truth seemed peculiarly ludicrous in the presence of Margrit’s housemates. It was easy to say "I came down from the rooftops" to Margrit, but not when Cole and Cameron stared curiously at him. "Forgive me," he said again, and drew himself up. "I’m Alban Korund. We’ve never quite met." He offered a hand to Cole, wondering if the human male would take it.

Margrit muttered a curse and said, "Sorry," more clearly. "Sorry, sorry. Cole, Cameron, this is…this is Alban. These are my housemates, Cole Grierson and Cameron Dugan. Shit. Sorry. I’ve had too much to drink."

Cole scowled between Margrit to Alban before Cameron inserted herself in front of him. "Hi. I’m Cam. I’m glad we’re finally getting a chance to meet you." She shook Alban’s hand with an unexpectedly firm grip and offered a warm smile. "We’re on our way to get some ice cream, just to make sure Margrit’s really hungover in the morning. Want to come along?"

"Oh," Alban said. "I-"

"Might as well." Cole, clearly outplayed by Cameron, set his jaw, then shook Alban’s hand without making a contest of it. "Sorry about the last time we met." There was little apology in his voice, but Alban inclined his head, in recognition of the form, if not Cole’s sincerity.

"You had cause to be suspicious. It’s good that Margrit’s friends care enough to protect her."

"That’s ancient history now," Cameron said firmly. "Come on. Grit’s out of money, so we have to buy her her drug of choice. Triple-chocolate fudge ripple with brownie chunks."

Margrit smiled tentatively. "That sounds good. Except…what’s going on, Alban?" Her smile faded. "It’s pushing three in the morning. What’re you doing here? I thought you were watching…"

"I was." Alban’s voice dropped to a rumble. "He gave me cause to seek you out."

Margrit drew in a slow breath, nostrils flaring. Her gaze cleared, as though however much she’d had to drink only needed a firm chastisement to leave her system. A single sip of a vampire’s blood offered health, but whether that chased away the ravages of alcohol, Alban didn’t know. From Margrit’s sudden steadiness, it seemed that it might. She said, "Shit," without the earlier enthusiasm. "Guys, can you-"

"Come on, Grit." Cole’s voice had an edge. "You’re not going to go running off again, are you? We can get some ice cream and chips and beer and stay up all night getting to know each other. Won’t that be fun?"

Cameron elbowed him, then slid her arm through his and tugged. "Sure, Grit. Catch up to us, will you?"

"Cam."

"Cole."

"It can wait," Alban said abruptly. Margrit caught her breath and he offered her a cautious smile. "A little while. Long enough for ice cream, certainly. I can’t stay all night," he added, returning his attention to Cole. "I have to leave before dawn."

"All right." Cameron pushed the store door open and squinted at the brightness within. "Everybody break for the freezer section. I’ll get the chips and meet you at the cash register. Go, go, go!" She and Cole went opposite directions, leaving Margrit and Alban at the door.

Margrit offered a brief smile. "I’ve been eyeball deep in your world. Welcome to mine."

Gladness surged through him at the welcome, surprising him with its strength. A smile that felt foolish worked its way into place. "Thank you. I want to be here." That, too, had a more powerful ring of truth to it than he expected, and for a moment he was relieved that stone wasn’t given to blushing. "Margrit, I am sorry for these complications. For my choices that have made things more difficult for you. For-" He broke off.

"Alban, why are you here? What’d Malik do?" Margrit’s eyes and stance had cleared considerably in the time they’d been together, though the scent of alcohol still hung about her. He refrained from asking after her condition, suspecting she was unaware of her own recovery.

Alban cast a glance over her head toward the convenience store. "Nothing yet, and he won’t as long as I’m with you. Explaining can wait until after the ice cream."

"Oh, so you’re back on my watch, are you?" Margrit’s tone was more laced with rue than acid.

Alban lowered his gaze. "I am, if you’ll have me back."

Margrit sighed. "It’s not as much fun running in the park when I don’t trust you’re there to watch my back. Just try not to do the strong silent hero thing again, Alban. I want a partner, not a protector. Can you do that?"

"I can try." Alban looked up to find Cole watching them from the freezer section, arms folded across his chest. "I think the rest of it should wait a while. Your friend won’t like it if I don’t…"

"Play along?" There was a note of pain in Margrit’s voice and Alban frowned, guessing at its source.

"I would have said ‘participate.’ This is your life, Margrit, not a game."

"But you can play at being human. I can’t even pretend to be one of you." Margrit finally stepped through the door and followed Cole to the ice cream.

Not until she saw Alban standing among her friends had it really struck Margrit how badly he might fit into her world. Awkward as it was, she fit into his better. At least the Old Races knew what she was. There was no pretense, no playing a role to make herself part of a society she hadn’t been born to. No matter what Alban did in the human world, he was faced with either a lie or a truth so overwhelming it was almost inconceivable.

"Earth to Margrit. Hello, Grit? Are you that drunk?"

"What?" Margrit looked up with a blink, her thoughts interrupted by Cameron’s good-natured teasing. "That sleepy, maybe. What’d I miss?" They’d retired to the apartment after buying four individual pints of ice cream, then partitioned the different flavors into bowls and handed them around. Alban had eaten his with the incredulous expression of a child who’d never tasted the sweet stuff before, while Cameron kept an easy conversation going despite Cole’s taciturn responses and Margrit’s tendency to fall silent as she watched the human-form gargoyle.

"An argument over whether pralines or chocolate made the superior ice cream. It’s the kind of thing I’d think you’d have an opinion on."

"Job training permits me to have an opinion on everything." Margrit put her empty bowl aside and rubbed her hands over her face, the chill waking her up. "Pralines in chocolate with a caramel swirl would be most superior of all. Does anybody make that?"

"I do," Cole said from the couch. He hadn’t moved since finishing his ice cream, except to drape an elbow over his eyes as he sprawled in the cushions. "Or I could. For a price."

"A place on Park Avenue?"

"I’m not greedy. I’d settle for…" He yawned, then flapped his hand. "Something less showy."

Cameron laughed. "Alban’s the only one awake anymore. I guess night shift has its advantages. You’re really that allergic to sunlight? What about cloudy days? It must suck, never hanging out on a beach at noon."

"I wouldn’t know," Alban said so solemnly it made Margrit smile. "I don’t miss what I’ve never had. And…yes," he added carefully. "My reaction to sunlight is fairly extraordinary. Clouds, unfortunately, don’t block the reaction."

"Probably caused by UV rays." Cole waved a hand as if trying to encompass information with it. "I thought there were medical treatments for that kind of problem these days. Take a pill, solve all your problems."

Margrit met Alban’s gaze, both of them bemused at the idea. "Imagine if it were that simple," he said.

Margrit huffed. "I can’t. That would be too weird. Like vampires surviving on iron supplements." She eyed Alban, who shook his head, then set his empty bowl aside.

"Speaking of morning, I should go."

"I’ll walk you out." Margrit got to her feet as Alban did. Cole remained on the couch, yawning until his jaw cracked, but Cameron stood, as well.

"It was nice to meet you, Alban. Maybe sometime we can get Margrit’s new boss to send a car with really tinted windows around for you, and you can come to dinner."

"We’ll have to make it a European sort of meal," Alban said apologetically. "Beginning late and ending even later. I simply don’t go out in the daytime."

"We could come in," Cam volunteered, then caught Margrit’s expression and subsided. "Well, I’m glad we met you, anyway, and that you’re not a murderer."

Margrit put a hand over her face as Cole roused himself enough to stare at Cameron. "Even I’ve been more tactful than that, Cam."

"Not much," she muttered, then smiled brightly. "G’night, Alban. G’night, Grit. You can stay up all night," she said to Cole. "I’m going to bed."

"I already stayed up all night. It’s way past all night and seriously into all morning." He dragged himself off the couch to follow Cameron out of the living room.

Margrit swayed in the abrupt silence, as if Cam’s chatter had kept her grounded. Alban murured, "That went better than I feared."

"Yeah. Yeah, I guess it did." She held out her hand. "Come on, let’s get you out of here. Even if sunrise isn’t for another two hours."

"Agreed." He slipped his hand around hers, enveloping her fingers, and she led him from the apartment, automatically choosing to climb rather than descend the stairs. Only on the rooftop did she release his hand and step back, wrapping her arms around herself as she searched for the right words to say.

Alban took away the need, shifting to his gargoyle form as he spoke. "Malik threatened you in daylight hours, Margrit. It’s a gargoyle’s weakness, that we can’t defend what we-" He caught his breath and an anticipatory chill shot through Margrit, thoroughly wakening her. "What we care for," he said after a moment, much more softly. "Everything we hold dear is vulnerable during the day."

Disappointment at what he hadn’t said cut through her. Margrit dropped her gaze to the rooftop beneath her feet, swallowing against a tight throat. "Well, I can arm myself against him, but why go after me now?"

"The selkies have named you as the instigator of their revolution, and djinn and selkie are ancient enemies. You’ve upset our whole world, our balance. That’s reason enough, even if he didn’t already dislike you."

"The feeling’s mutual," Margrit said beneath her breath. "I don’t want to put on airs, but if Malik goes after me now that I’m working for Eliseo, isn’t that just slow suicide? He’s still furious over Vanessa’s death. If I wind up dead, too…."

"It’s not a risk I would take," Alban admitted. "Our laws may demand exile for killing each other, but if Eliseo were to lose two assistants to Janx’s people within half a year, he may not care about the rules."

Cold sharper than the spring night shivered through Margrit. "You don’t think this is all Janx’s idea, do you?"

"No." The immediacy of Alban’s response did more to reassure her than she’d thought possible. "Janx would consider killing you to be shortsighted. Murdering Vanessa was a blow in an eternal game, but you’re still too finely balanced between the two of them."

"Am I? Even if I’m working for Eliseo?"

"You are." Alban’s voice softened. "If for no other reason than you’ve involved me in their standoff, whether you intended to or not, and that’s something they’ve both wanted for a long time. Without you, they have no control over me."

"That sounds like a good reason for you to stay away."

"It is, but my intentions to do so are thwarted at every turn. Perhaps it’s past time I learned from that."

"It is," Margrit echoed firmly. "Alban, hear me out, okay? My life has seemed like a washed-out watercolor for the last three months. I didn’t even notice it until you fell out of the sky again a few nights ago. It all looks fine until somebody throws a splash of real color onto the page, and then everything else looks pale and dull."

"I thought that was what sent you running through the park at night. I thought that was where you drew your colors from." Alban sounded bemused and sad, any flattery taken from Margrit’s comment lost beneath deeper emotion.

She stepped back, gazing up at the gargoyle in astonishment. It took effort to whisper, "Nobody understands that," through a throat gone tight with longing.

Alban’s heavy eyebrows drew down. "Isn’t it self-evident? It’s a dangerous behavior. Why would you do it if not to throw paint on the canvas, to use your words? It’s why I began watching you all those years ago, before any of this." He made a brief circle with one hand, encompassing the two of them. "Before I knew anything about your life, I knew that you ran in the park at night to challenge the order of the world you lived in."

A fluting laugh escaped Margrit. "You should have said hello years ago. Nobody gets it, Alban. Not my parents, not my housemates, certainly not Tony. They just see me being stupid. I can’t explain that I need to-" Her voice broke and she fluttered her hands, tiny gestures of desire as much for the right word as a burgeoning impulse to catch Alban and his understanding and never let them go. "To fly," she finally finished, feeling the explanation was wholly inadequate.

His strength enveloped her, solid as stone, yet filling her with warmth and confidence. A surge of power sent them upward. Alban’s wings snapped open, their apparent delicacy belied by the authority with which they swept down and drove them higher into the air. Margrit gasped laughter into Alban’s shoulder, hardly knowing when she’d wound her arms around his neck. "I thought gargoyles weren’t impulsive."

"Occasionally," Alban growled, good nature in the deep sound, "even stone is inspired to enthusiasm. I told you once you could fly now."

Margrit twisted, looking over her shoulder at the receding city. Hair blew in her face, stinging her eyes as much as the cold wind did. She felt tears slip through her lashes and streak her temples. "You did." The accusation that he’d then left her for months hung unspoken between them, until Margrit dared unwind an arm and wipe tears from her face. "I should get aviator goggles. And warm pants."

She shivered, drawing close to the gargoyle again. He rumbled, tightening his arms around her until she felt his heartbeat, slower and steadier by far than her own. She counted those heartbeats, both his and hers, until they became nothing more than a tangle of shared life, similarities played up instead of differences. Engines and horns honking in the city cut through the sound of wind rushing in her ears, a distant reminder of the world below them. Her world, the one she moved through every day, and at the same time separate from her in a way made clear not just by the gargoyle in whose arms she flew, but by the extraordinary men she’d encountered in the past day.

"Alban." She whispered his name against his skin, nose pressed into his neck so she could inhale his clean earthy scent. He curved his head over hers, listening, and she smiled at the temptation to brush her lips against his throat. His ears tapered to narrow, delicate points just in her line of sight, making an intriguing target. The temptation to discover if gargoyle ears were as sensitive to nibbling as human ones teased her. Alban’s inhumanity seemed less of a barrier than it once had, time helping her to adjust and distance replacing caution with inquisitiveness. In his arms, the possibility of freedom from the ordinary seemed so close that she ached from the burden of wanting it. Margrit turned her face against Alban’s shoulder once more, clinging a few long seconds before forcing practicality and the matters at hand to the forefront. "Where are we going?"

"To see Eliseo before the sun rises."

"He’s going to have guard dogs. Or security. Or both. We can’t just show up on his doorstep. He’s Eliseo Daisani, for God’s sake, and it’s four in the morning." Margrit’s protests were weak even to her own ears.

Alban dipped his head with a reassuring chuckle. "There’s no guard dog in the world that could endanger me. And he may be Eliseo Daisani, but he’s also a vampire, and he’ll certainly see us. I doubt he’ll bother his security. They’re nothing more than showpieces."

"Shouldn’t we at least call ahead?" It was too late by the time she asked, the Upper East Side building Daisani lived in already in view. "Why Daisani?"

"Because he has a deep interest in you, and he can move about in the daytime." Alban came to a landing at the edge of a helicopter pad, avoiding the ungainly white machine’s tail. Without the wind from the flight, the air felt suddenly warm. Margrit shivered as Alban set her on her feet. Arms wrapped around herself, she stared at the helicopter and muttered, "My life has gotten so strange."

"I beg your pardon?"

"Nothing. I’ve just never actually seen a helicopter from this close before."

"Gargoyles and vampires abound, and yet a helicopter impresses you. I will never understand humans, Margrit Knight."

"That’s all right. They’ll probably never understand you." She set off for the rooftop door, which appeared to be half a mile away. "It’s going to be locked. How’re we supposed to get Eliseo’s attention?"

"Oh," Daisani said out of nowhere, drolly, "you have it."