Burn the Night

Twenty-eight

Danaus’s mental and vocal screams for me were almost deafening when I awoke the next night. I lay still in my bed in my house outside Savannah, trying to sort out the cacophonous noise, when I realized that both Knox and Gregor were mentally reaching out for me as well.

I’m here, I wearily replied to the group as I opened my eyes to the usual total darkness of the room. However, something was horribly different. There was the distinct acrid smell of burnt wood all around me. In addition, it seemed warmer than usual, as if the heater had been left on high all day.

Are you hurt? Danaus demanded.

Where are you? Knox quickly followed before I could answer.

I’m fine. I’m in my room in the basement. I’ll be up in a minute, I said warily, unable to understand why they were acting so strange. I did a quick scan, extending my powers to their fullest extent, and sensed only those three in the immediate area. There were no naturi or humans that could cause problems. Just Danaus and a pair of anxious nightwalkers.

Stay where you are, Gregor directed. We’re coming to you.

Closing out the other nightwalkers, I directly touched Danaus’s mind so the others could not hear us as we privately spoke. What is going on? Why is everyone here and in such an uproar?

I could feel Danaus hesitate to answer me. His mind was a jumble of images and incoherent words. But the one thing I could pick out clearly was the image of bright, dancing flames. I’m sorry, Mira. Your house was burned down during the day.

“No!” I gasped both aloud and mentally. My hands flew to my mouth as if to stop the scream of pain that had risen to my throat. My home was gone? How could my house burn down? My mind just kept stumbling over those thoughts over and over again. This was the twenty-first century. I had a security system on the house that alerted the fire department at the first sign of smoke. Gabriel had once set it off while cooking in the house and had to shoo the fire department away. How could they have let the house burn down?

Danaus, how bad is the damage? I asked, though a part of me didn’t want to know. I was sitting on the edge of my bed now, my eyes clenched shut as I tried to block out the smell of burned wood.

Just wait until we come and get you, Danaus firmly replied, causing my heart to sink in my chest. I pulled back from his mind as I struggled to get hold of the emotions rising within me. His avoidance of my question was enough of an answer.

After taking a slow steadying breath, I touched Danaus’s mind again so I could see through his eyes. I could sense his heart pounding in his chest and sweat dripping down from his brow despite the fact that there was a chill in the evening air. His hands were black. After a moment the hunter finally paused to catch his breath and looked around. There was nothing left of the house but the random black timbers stretching up to where the second floor had been. Furniture was reduced to ash, books were mere cinders, and the second floor was now open to the starlit sky above me.

With shaking hands, I fell to my knees as I choked back a sob. My collection of nearly a lifetime was gone. So many memories that I had saved and protected were now turned to blackened ash. Tristan’s room had been wiped from the earth along with the last of his scent. Lily’s room was gone. I was left with only their ghosts haunting my memories.

Cracking wood nearby was quickly followed by the sound of pounding on the metal door that blocked entry into my secret room. I had made it of steel and concrete so it was fireproof, but a part of me had not expected such an eventuality.

“Mira, are you all right?” Gregor demanded, shouting from the other side of the door.

“Get me the hell out of here,” I replied as I picked myself off the floor. I had been betrayed by someone. Gabriel would never turn his back on me, but he was the only person I could think of that should have been there and wasn’t.

Metal screeched and groaned as it was pulled and bent, and then dim light finally penetrated the darkness. Danaus was the first one in the room, his arms sweeping around me in a tight embrace that threatened to crack my ribs. The pounding of his heart had nothing to do with exertion, but with fear. Despite being mostly human, he had developed the same sleeping habits as the nightwalkers. If the house had burned during the day, he would not have found out about it until the sun set. He hadn’t known whether I was destroyed until that second when my mind finally touched his.

“I’m fine, Danaus,” I said, snuggling my head against his neck and refusing to let go.

“When I saw the house . . .” He trailed off.

“I know. I’m fine,” I replied, my voice a little firmer. I pushed away so he could look me in the eye. “I’m safe.” The hunter nodded and slowly released his tight hold on me. To my surprise, he took a step back and pulled off his light leather jacket before stripping off his shirt. He tossed the sweaty cloth to me and then donned his jacket again. It was only then that I remembered I was wearing only a pair of panties and a thin lace bra.

“Let’s get out of here so I can survey the damage,” I said, taking my first step toward the door. The other nightwalkers preceded me, while Danaus followed behind me. As soon as I stepped outside my private chamber, a sharp gasp escaped my throat. The room had been destroyed. The wooden timbers and drywall were gone, revealing blackened concrete. Part of the first floor had collapsed into the basement. I could see a broken shell of the desk in my study, along with a couple of blackened bits of furniture the parlor. Overall, it was a black mess that I was hardly able to discern, though I had spent more than a century picking out the special items that comprised my house.

Danaus stepped in front of me and hoisted me over his shoulder before making his way across the basement, which was covered in smoldering bits of wood, broken glass, and twisted nails. With a little help from Gregor and Knox, the hunter managed to get me unscathed to my yard, where I could look on the burnt remains of my house in shock. Words escaped me for several minutes—I had spent seemingly countless years there, accumulated all the knickknacks of a life well lived, and in the blink of an eye they were all gone. Just a distant, heart-wrenching memory.

“This was Nick,” I whispered mostly to myself as I clenched my eyes shut to keep the tears from falling.

“This wasn’t Nick, Mira.” Danaus’s slow voice sent a shiver up my spine. I didn’t want to know the answer to the question I was about to ask, but it came tripping off my tongue before I could stop it.

“Who burned down my house?”

“Aurora,” Knox said, causing my head to snap around to him. “She and other members of the naturi moved into the city during the day. They burned down more than a dozen homes in the historic district. The fire department was kept so busy trying to put out the fires that most of the homes burned straight to the ground, along with a few others that weren’t intentionally set.”

“How did she know which one was my house? I’m nowhere near the historic district!” I shouted, waving one hand back at the burnt remains of my home.

Knox swallowed once and looked away from me, seeming unable to speak.

It was Gregor who finally answered. “Amanda told her.”

“Are you sure?” I whispered, unable to believe I had been betrayed by the nightwalker. Amanda and I had our differences during the past several months, but she’d always been loyal to both me and the nightwalkers of Savannah.

“Her body was found half burned in the backyard, under a thick grove of trees,” Danaus replied. “Aurora must have gotten hold of her before the sun rose and beat the information out of her before leaving her to the sun. Archie called to tell me he was incinerating the body before there could be an investigation.” I nodded, grateful that Archie Deacon, the coroner for the county, was still covering my back.

A deep heavy sigh slipped past my lips as I shook my head. “Amanda gave up my private home to Aurora. Was the town house torched as well?”

“The town house is fine. No one approached it during the day,” Danaus said, helping to ease some of the tension from my shoulders.

“Where is Gabriel?” I asked. “He would have been the first to be contacted and told the house was on fire along with the fire department. He should have been here to try to get me out if it was at all possible. Where is my bodyguard?”

Silence was my only answer as Danaus looked to Knox and Gregor, who only looked down at the ground. My stomach twisted in fear and the world seemed to spin around me. Gabriel. My sweet guardian angel. I couldn’t lose him too. Not both him and Michael in less than a year. I needed my bodyguard. I needed his knowing smirk and dry humor. I needed his cautious nature to balance my reckless nature. I needed him guarding me when I slept and needed him waiting for me when I finally opened my eyes each night.

“Gabriel is in the hospital,” Danaus said.

“Oh, thank God!” I cried, putting a steadying hand on his shoulder. “I thought he was dead.”

“He’s hanging on by a thread, and from what the doctor told me, things don’t look good.”

“What happened?” I choked out the words in my clogged throat, looking anywhere than at the men around me.

“From what I can guess, Gabriel was one of the first on the scene when the alarms went off at your house. The naturi attacked him and slashed his throat and then pinned him to a tree with several swords stuck through his body. The fire truck arrived with an ambulance, so they were able to get him to the hospital before he bled out, but he was in bad shape.”

“I’m assuming you’ve been to the hospital. What’s the doctor’s prognosis?” I said in a low, even voice as I struggled to keep the last bit of my temper under control.

“Not good,” Danaus replied. “If he survives the next couple of days, he might make it. One of his lungs collapsed and several of his other organs are in distress. The doctor also thinks that if he survives, he’ll never speak again.” His explanation put more fuel on the fire building within me. It was one thing to destroy my home and threaten my life, but Gabriel was mine and I would not tolerate any harm to him.

“Knox, Shelly will be with Cynnia. I want you to personally take her to Gabriel’s side and make her to heal him,” I bit out in slow, clearly enunciated words so there could be no mistake.

“Shelly is with Cynnia and the other naturi at Mira’s town house,” Danaus interjected, saving the nightwalker some unnecessary searching.

“What if she can’t—” Knox started, but I quickly cut him off.

“She healed Barrett the night we were attacked in the tunnels by the naturi,” I snarled, taking a quick step over to stare directly at him. “She can at least try to heal Gabriel. Don’t let her leave that hospital room until she has given everything she can possibly give to heal him!” So far as I was concerned, Shelly had to heal Gabriel.

“I’ll get her, Mira,” Knox said, meeting my glowing gaze. “She’ll find a way to help Gabriel.” Then he paused. “But, if it’s not enough . . . if it looks like we’re going to lose him . . .” He paused, licking his lips. “Have you ever discussed changing him?”

This time I was the first to look away, lowering my eyes to the trampled grass. The earth was squishy and cold beneath my feet from where the hoses had been brought in to spray down the fire-engulfed house.

“We’ve discussed it and he’s said that he would be proud to die in service to me. He said he wasn’t interested in living forever and one lifetime was enough for him.” I forced the words past the lump in my throat.

“If Shelly has any kind of problems, I will ask him a second time just to be sure,” Knox reassured me, placing one of his hands on my shoulder and squeezing. “I would be honored to bring him over if he makes that decision.”

“If you ask him, remove the pain first. I don’t want his decision to be a pain-addled one,” I murmured, still unable to raise my eyes to meet his. Equal parts anger and pain burned through me as I thought about my bodyguard dying slowly, alone in a hospital room. He deserved better than this after all his years of service to me.

My emotions were mixed. A part of me wanted Knox to bring him over, to make him a nightwalker so I couldn’t lose him. But another part of me knew that Gabriel wouldn’t take the offer. He was content with being human, and living a human’s short, fragile life. I didn’t expect him to take Knox’s offer and I respected him for that bravery. He was willing to face whatever awaited us after death. It was something too few of us could claim.

“What do you want me to do?” Gregor demanded, surprising me. His black jacket and waistcoat were tossed over his arm, while his pristine white shirt was streaked with soot. His carefully coiffed hair was askew. The nightwalker perpetually trapped in the nineteenth century was starting to look as if he’d embraced the modern world. Gregor ran with a group of reckless nightwalkers consumed with only their own amusement, but his presence here tonight told me he was finally willing to step up. It was about fucking time.

“I want you to return to Savannah. Gather together all the nightwalkers you can find within the Savannah region. Find out who didn’t make it through the night and send the survivors to my town house,” I directed. “I will be there with Cynnia, making final plans on how we are going to deal with Aurora. We will have our vengeance against this attack. She didn’t just attack me, she attacked our city, our home, and we will not stand for it.”

“You will have your army at your doorstep before the moon reaches its peak tonight, coven Elder,” Gregor said with a slight bow before he hurried across the yard toward a black car parked in the driveway.

“Do you need me for anything else?” Knox asked one last time.

“Just do what you can to save Gabriel,” I said. “I will understand if he cannot be saved, but we must at least put forth all the effort we can muster. He deserves that.”

“I will do everything within my power,” Knox said. He pressed his right hand to his heart before bowing to me. He then ran across the yard and jumped into the passenger seat of the car Gregor was driving.

Danaus and I stood in silence, watching as they disappeared into the night, heading back toward the city. I managed to push aside my anger and hatred, but I knew that bottle would quickly come uncorked the moment I was finally faced with Aurora. She had struck first, but she’d failed. She should have killed me. She should have personally seen to it that I was destroyed by the fire, or at the very least cut off my head as I slept. But she didn’t and now she was faced with my fury.

“What’s our next step?” Danaus inquired.

“We meet with Cynnia. She better have a plan. If not, I will. Aurora struck first and struck hard. She is threatening to expose not only her own race, but also the nightwalkers. Such actions will not be tolerated by the nightwalkers, lycanthropes, or the magic users. It’s time for her to be put down before we find ourselves faced with the Great Awakening.”

And no matter how badly we wished it to be true, everyone knew that mankind was not ready for the Great Awakening. They had recently survived floods, earthquakes, and economic turmoil that left thousands homeless and helpless. Humanity wasn’t ready to know that its nightmares were real as well. We needed to kill Aurora before the truth was finally released to the world.