Nightwalker

Eighteen

I slid into the seat to Thorne’s left while Danaus walked around the booth and sat across from me, trapping Thorne and Tristan between us. The faded maroon plastic seat sagged in certain places and had been mended more than once with silver duct tape. The music spun by the DJ crowded the dance floor with scantily clad people. It was a good turnout and would have been a nice place to spend a few entertaining hours if I wasn’t already previously engaged.

Thorne stared at Danaus for a long time, his eyes pinched and narrowed. He sniffed the air, then jumped backward, hissing. He tried to stand in the booth, but I grabbed his arm and jerked him back down.

“I know your smell. You’re the hunter.” His voice was choked as he slid closer, his haunted gaze then slamming back, confusion twisting his features into an ugly knot as he picked up Danaus’s scent on me. “But…why are you traveling with him?”

“Not your concern,” I said, but the sound came out sounding more like a growl than actual words. “Why didn’t you try to protect Tabor when he was attacked? Wasn’t that your job?”

“I wasn’t there,” he said, wrenching his arm out of my grasp. He picked up the mug of beer in front of him and emptied the contents before slamming it back on the table. It was sort of strange. He didn’t expend the energy to breathe but would use the energy to digest alcohol. As far as I knew, no vampire could digest solid food, but we could do liquids. Unfortunately, no amount of alcohol would intoxicate us, but drinking the blood of a drunk human would give you a nice though extremely temporary buzz. Intoxication for nightwalkers had nothing to do with alcohol.

“Where were you?” I laid my hand on the table, then quickly lifted it in disgust when I discovered that the surface was covered in a sticky film.

“I was on loan.” The right corner of his lips twitched as if in a suppressed smile. I nodded, while Danaus stared hard at me, expectant.

“I’m always surprised at how little you know,” I said, setting my hands back in my lap. “It is a common practice among nightwalkers to loan out their pets to others of similar strength. It’s called being polite.”

“And they let themselves be used like that?” There was a curl to his lip as he spoke in distaste. Resting on the table, his left hand tightened into a fist.

“You make it sound like we have a choice,” Tristan softly interjected.

A sharp, bitter laugh escaped before I could clip its wings. “When you are young and weak, you go where you are told and do what you are told. If you’re lucky, you survive the encounter and return to your maker.”

“And if you are killed while you were on loan?” Danaus’s hard blues never wavered from my face.

“Then your maker gets to kill one of the other vampire’s pets. A fair trade,” Thorne said with an indifferent shrug.

“Why? Why do this?” Even as Danaus shook his head, his gaze still never left my face. He watched me closely, as if seeing me or my kind for the first time. I think whatever little bit of respect I had earned was dying before my eyes.

“Why else?” My laughter spiked higher, trying to hide an unexpected stab of pain and embarrassment. “Pleasure and entertainment.” It was time Danaus understood us a little better; the good and the bad.

I looked over to Thorne, who was staring out at the crowd, dancing to the music. His gaze was distant, a smile teasing at his thin lips. His thoughts were lost to another place and time.

“Who did you go to? Claudette?” I prodded. She had a reputation for sampling the children of the Ancients. I’d had the pleasure of visiting with her once. Luckily, it was a brief visit.

“Macaire.” Thorne blinked twice as if trying to free his thoughts of some old memories. “I was sent to help break in his newest Companion.” A smile blossomed on his thin, angular face, his fangs poking a little against his lower lip.

“Lucas is a fool,” I muttered under my breath.

“True,” he chuckled. Thorne stretched out his legs again, toying with a stray bottle cap on the tabletop. “He won’t survive long. He thinks too much on his own.”

It was a sad but true thought. Good servants did exactly what they were told and nothing more. You start thinking and trying to predict the needs of your master, and you’d get crushed when you made a mistake.

“Of course, Tabor said the same of you,” he continued.

My eyes jerked back to his face but I kept my expression blank. “That I think too much?”

“No, that you wouldn’t survive.” Thorne’s brown eyes seemed to dance with malicious glee for a second in the faint undulating light. “He said that without Jabari, the Coven would have killed you centuries ago.”

I had suspected this for a while, but to actually hear the words sent a chill down my spine. “I’m no threat to the Coven.” I tried to sound as if none of this made any difference to me.

“So you say, but Tabor is dead and a seat is still open on the Coven. I may be in London, but even I hear the occasional whispered thought or rumor.” He leaned forward, his chest nearly brushing the edge of the table. “Everyone is watching, waiting for you to make your move.”

Sitting up in the booth so my nose was mere inches from Thorne’s, I tightly gripped the edge of the table for balance. “Well, tell everyone that I don’t want it.”

“No, you just want the colonies.” He snickered, flopping back against the booth, his amusement unbroken. He elbowed Tristan once in the ribs, flashing him a wide grin that the other nightwalker didn’t return.

The colonies had become the last refuge for my kind. The Coven and the Ancients dominated Europe, Asia, and even down into Africa. South America had been abandoned by nightwalkers because of what happened at Machu Picchu…the death and pain that still lingered was too unpleasant, even for my kind.

That left the United States. It was an enticing place, with its lax morals, hypocritical philosophies, and fast lifestyles. In the West, all was still new and precious. It was an exciting place to be, especially when there was little to no threat of encountering an Ancient. I had been part of the wave of young ones to leave Europe in search of my own home, moving out from beneath the thumb of the Coven.

But the newness of the colonies was a curse as well. It lacked the history and long memory of Europe and Asia. The colonists didn’t realize that there were dark corners that should not be illuminated and questions that should not be asked. There was no doubt among my kind that when the Great Awakening arrived, it would start in the New World.

The nightwalkers in the States were different from those in Europe. We were younger on average, and quiet. The families were fewer and smaller in size. We did what we could to safeguard our secret. But our numbers were growing, and the Coven knew it. It didn’t help that I was one of the oldest among those across the ocean. There was some speculation of a coup, and my stubborn silence didn’t soothe any of the frayed, anxious nerves.

“I’m surprised the Coven has not come down on your head,” I said, desperate to change topics. I sat back in the booth and let my hands fall back into my lap. It was one thing to open the door to our world to Danaus; it was another to let him see into the politics. I didn’t want anything to do with the Coven. And I certainly didn’t want to play Keeper for all of the States. I just wanted my little city with its cramped alleys, trendy little bars, and quiet, tree-cloaked neighborhoods.

“For what?”

“Your little show.” I waved my arm to encompass the dimly lit pub filled to the brim with waiting victims.

Of course, I was sure part of the reason Thorne had been overlooked so far by our kind was because he’d settled in London. Between the wellspring of magic that had soaked into every inch of the island and the constant flow of witches and warlocks passing through the city, the whole place was a powder keg waiting for a careless match. No vampire stayed in the city long. If anything went wrong here, we all knew a vampire would play the scapegoat. Few older vampires would hang around, and definitely not long enough to bother with him.

“You know it’s our law to stay in the shadows and never reveal yourself to more people than necessary,” I continued. “I’d wager this crowd is a little more than necessary.”

“Why?” Sitting up, Thorne crushed the bottle cap between two fingers and dropped it on the table. “Why keep hiding? These humans have seen more horrible things in their lives than us. I’ve seen monsters in their movies and on their newscasts that were ten times worse than what I’ve done. It’s time they knew.”

“It’s not for you to decide.”

He hit his fist on the edge of the table, knocking over his empty mug. “Then who?”

“I don’t know. It’s coming, but not yet. There is more at stake than just the nightwalkers. There are things these humans aren’t ready to face.”

“I don’t think they’ll have much choice. Besides, they accept me.”

“They think you’re a fraud,” I reminded him. Slouched in the booth, I tried to avoid kicking Danaus in the shin, but the booth was crowded with long legs.

“Not for long. It’s time we stepped forward. Let them bask in our power. I’m tired of hiding.”

“But it’s what we are, what we’ve always been. We are just shadows and nightmares to these creatures. Nothing more.” I recited words I had heard a hundred times over. I sounded old even to my ears. My rationale was a tired one, clinging to the ways of my kind. I had seen this longing in many of the younger ones as they walked among the humans. Movies were made about us, with only small nuggets of truth permeating their depths. Humans gobbled up books about nightwalkers and magic users, looking for an escape from the mundane. But what if they woke up one morning and realized those things that thrilled and secretly enticed them were real and living next door? Would they still look at us with the same interest, or would we become vermin to be exterminated, like rats or cockroaches?

“Yeah, but it’s like you said. It’s coming.”

“Enough!” I shouted, scratching my nails on the table, picking up a gooey layer of grime underneath them, causing me to grimace. Watching Thorne peripherally, I began to clean out my nails with a matchbook lying in the center of the table. “None of this matters. It’s not why I’ve come. What did Tabor tell you of the naturi?”

At the mention of the naturi, Thorne stiffened beside me.

“He rarely spoke of them and only when he was in a black mood,” he said, his voice barely more than a whisper as he gripped the edge of the table. “It was always at the same time of year; new moon in the middle of summer. He would stay locked away in his private rooms for several nights on end.” His accent had grown thicker and older again.

I paused. “What did he tell you?”

“Nothing that made any sense. Just that if I ever saw one, I was to run. Don’t try to fight. Just run.” He raised haunted eyes to my face. I understood his fear. Tabor was not only his master and creator, but had been an Ancient and an Elder on the Coven. Thorne knew that for something to unnerve Tabor so thoroughly, it had to be bad.

“More than five centuries ago, a triad sealed most of the naturi from this world. They are trying to break through. We need your help to seal them again.”

“My help?” A nervous laugh escaped him and skittered under the table to hide. “What the hell can I do?”

“Tabor was part of that triad. He’s gone, but he made you. As part of the same bloodline, we think you can take his place in the triad.”

“And do what? Tabor was more than three thousand years old when he made me.” He stared wide-eyed at me, confident that I had lost my mind. I couldn’t blame him. Even though I’d said it, I was having trouble believing it myself. Thorne wasn’t a particularly strong nightwalker. He had probably stayed alive this long only because of Tabor’s protection and his own smarts.

“I don’t know. This wasn’t my idea. Jabari sent me to find you,” I admitted, frowning.

“Bloody hell,” he muttered. Slumping back in the booth, he pushed the overturned mug with his index finger, making it rock. Any hopes he might have had about escaping me dissolved to dirty slush. He might have hoped to talk his way out of my grasp, but if an Elder had sent me, there was no escape. I would hunt him until I expired. And in a fight, he had no chance.

At that moment, a waitress in a tight black tank top brought over a tray laden with three mugs of ale. It was the dark type that reminded me more of motor oil than any liquid a human might actually want to imbibe. She leaned forward as she placed the mugs in front of each of us. Around her neck dangled a pentagram; she wasn’t the first one I’d seen in London wearing such an item.

“I thought you might want another pint before going on again,” she said, picking up Thorne’s empty glass. She shuffled away, squeezing between the band members who had come back over to the table.

“We got another set,” announced the man with a purple mohawk who had been playing the drums when we walked in. His brown eyes shifted to my face in an appraising manner, but I could also feel his anxiety. I was threatening his meal ticket.

“We have to go,” I said, drawing Thorne’s gaze back to my face.

“Y’got me,” he snapped. “I can’t outrun you. Let me finish this set before you take me to Hell.”

Frowning, I looked expectantly over at Danaus. He knew what I wanted to know, and I was getting sick of asking. The sooner the naturi were taken care of, the sooner I could go back to trying to kill him instead of depending upon him to watch my back. Danaus shook his head at me, his eyes narrowing.

“Fine. Go. Just a couple songs. It’s late,” I said, irritation clipping my words as I slid to my feet so I could let him out of the booth.

Avoiding Danaus’s gaze, I watched as Thorne quickly downed half of his beer. He slammed the glass mug down on the table, his face twisted in disgust. “Blast, that’s a nasty brew,” he groaned, then said nothing more as he slipped out of the booth. But as he turned to follow his band mates up to the stage, Thorne grabbed my right wrist. He gave my arm a little jerk, but I didn’t move. “Come on,” he said, motioning with his head for me to follow him up to the raised platform.

“I can’t sing.” A swell of panic rose up in my chest and I pulled against his grip, but he didn’t release me.

“You call this singing?” He laughed, his smile widening. Around us, the crowd was screaming and jumping as the other members of the band picked up their instruments. The shouting throbbed and crashed against the walls, threatening to topple the place. Their excitement was a live thing in that large room, pushing against me. Thorne stepped close, pressing his cool, bare chest against my arm. “Come up there. Show them what you are. It’s the next best thing.”

I looked down at his brown eyes, which were now glowing, the irises overwhelming all other color. He was riding the wave of their emotions, and for him it was the next best thing to actually feeding on them. The idea of standing on that stage and screaming into the microphone, purging all the anger I had carried around during the past few days, was tempting. But it would be more than that. I would bare my fangs to them, and those humans would scream for more. They would love me for being a nightwalker. Deep down, they would think I was a phony, but for a moment I wouldn’t be hiding.

“What were you before?” I asked suddenly.

Thorne cocked his head to the side, the glow vanishing from his eyes at the strange question. “Before Tabor?” I nodded. “I walked the boards at Drury Lane,” he said, smiling. For that sentence, the cockney accent disappeared. It was still British, but cultured and precise. Tabor always had snobbish tastes, so I imagined that Thorne had been born to a life of privilege and luxury. I wondered what his companions would think if they knew where he came from. Of course, that would all be moot once they discovered he was roughly two hundred years old.

“Go now before I change my mind,” I said, stepping away from him as I pulled my arm free. Sitting back down in the booth across from Danaus, I watched Thorne jump back on the stage. I wasn’t surprised. He’d been an actor before Tabor turned him. He had been accustomed to being the center of attention, pretending to be something he wasn’t. Watching him now, I wondered if I might have seen him during my brief visits to London during the late eighteenth century. At that time, there were only three theaters: Drury Lane, Hay-market, and Covent Gardens. On several occasions Drury Lane had played host to Edmund Keane, the preeminent actor of his day. And now the emaciated Thorne stood shrieking before a crowd of disillusioned teenagers.

I looked up to find Danaus watching me, his expression again unreadable. A part of me wished I could crawl around in his brain, wrapping myself around his thoughts. The longer he stayed with me, the more he saw of my world, and I wanted to look at it all again with the eyes of an outsider. There was so much I had grown numb to during my long existence. Before Sadira changed me, I’d marveled at her strength and power. I sat in awe of her, amazed at the sheer number of nightwalkers that came to her side and bowed to her. Even before I was reborn, I grew inured to the killing and torture. I had been a gift to those who pleased her and an instrument of torture for those who disappointed her.

With my maker still lingering in the background of my thoughts, I looked over at Tristan, whose interest was starting to make me extremely uncomfortable. He was younger than Thorne, maybe a century, at best, judging by the quiet throb of power that rolled off of him.

“So, where do you fit into all of this?” I asked, dropping my hands down to my lap.

“I don’t,” he replied with a faint shrug of his shoulder.

“Why are you here?”

“I came for the entertainment. Thorne said it would be interesting.”

Danaus snorted and looked back out at the crowd. Interesting. That was an understatement. The screaming crowd wasn’t so much dancing as it was writhing in a giant mass. The array of clothes and colors bore no resemblance to anything I had ever seen in nature.

“Why does Sadira want me to take you to her?” I asked.

Tristan flinched at the mention of the Ancient and lines of tension tightened around his eyes and mouth. “You’ve spoken with her?”

“I saw her less than an hour ago. I came here for Thorne, but I will be taking both you and Thorne back with me to where she is hiding.”

“No,” he whispered. Some of the light that seemed to burn in his eyes when he discovered who I was had died, and a knot twisted itself around my soul. When he spoke again, his voice had hardened with a mix of anger and fear. “No! You can’t! I won’t go back. Mira, please.” He leaned forward and held my gaze when I would have looked away from him. “You know what it’s like. You remember. I can’t go back.”

I sat back against the booth and closed my eyes as it finally dawned on me. “She made you,” I murmured softly to myself. Sadira had made Tristan, and he ran away after being her pet for roughly one century.

“I’ve known about you since almost the beginning,” Tristan said. He reached under the table and grabbed my left wrist, forcing me to open my eyes and look at him. “You were the one that got away. You escaped our maker and have lived your own life. That’s all I want.”

I gritted my teeth and swallowed the snarl rising in my chest. That bitch! That manipulative, evil bitch! I didn’t want to shove a fireball down her throat now. It was too kind a death for her. I wanted a baseball bat. A baseball bat and one endless night.

In one swift move she would accomplish an amazing coup over both Tristan and me. I had no choice but to retrieve the wayward vampire for her. Sadira wouldn’t believe any excuse I gave for not bringing him, and she would disappear from my grasp, putting my head back on the chopping block with Jabari and jeopardizing all the people in my domain. However, if I brought Tristan back to her, it would not only crush his one shining hope of ever escaping her, but prove to everyone that I was still a servant to my maker despite my “escape.”

“I didn’t escape Sadira. I was with Jabari,” I said, but quickly stopped. It wasn’t an escape. Jabari just took what he wanted and that was that.

“So you escaped an Elder?”

“No, it wasn’t like that.” I shoved my hand through my hair and looked around as I quickly scrambled for a way to explain this. Danaus smirked, watching me with his arms crossed over his chest. I wasn’t sure if he fully understood what we were talking about, but he could tell that I was digging myself in deeper.

Dropping my hands back down to the table, I turned back to Tristan, who was watching me with desperate eyes. “This isn’t about me. I can’t help you. Right now, the naturi are making a mess of things. I need Sadira cooperative if we’re going to stop them, and that’s only going to happen if I bring you back to her. And conscious or not, that’s what I’m going to do.”

“Mira—”

“The naturi are my concern right now, not a nightwalker that hasn’t learned to take care of himself,” I snapped angrily, hating Sadira and myself more with each passing second. I wasn’t made of stone. I remembered what it was like living with Sadira. The nights of screams, fighting to stay in her constantly fluctuating favor, abandoning all semblance of pride and dignity just to survive until the dawn. But now wasn’t the time.

“What about after the naturi are defeated?”

A part of me wanted to smile at his innocence. To him, there was nothing so strong that could defeat our kind. Of course, he had yet to face any member of the naturi.

“If I stand with you against Sadira, I would be claiming you,” I said with a weary shake of my head. “I don’t keep a family.”

“But you have a domain.”

“That’s different, and you know it.” Ruling a domain, you were the peacekeeper and arm of the Coven for a specific area. The head of a family was more than that—in general, a family unit protected each of its members against other nightwalkers or families, and none more so than its head. Of course, the family itself could be more dangerous than any other vampire outside the family. There were several families within my domain, and they all answered to me if there was a problem.

I didn’t want my own family. It was enough that I watched out for a large group of nightwalkers within a single area. A family evoked a certain type of intimacy and dependence I continued to eschew. Anyone you took into your family generally lived with you and looked to you for direction. I was still able to keep a distance from the nightwalkers in my domain. Sometimes, weeks passed between my meetings with Knox.

“Tristan, I can’t fight this fight for you,” I replied. But even as I said it, I wondered if I should. Hadn’t Jabari fought for me in his own way when he took me to Egypt and away from Sadira?

I was snapped from my thoughts when a scream tore through the air above the shouts of the crowd, one of flesh-searing pain. My head jerked back up to the stage to see Thorne stagger backward, his left hand grabbing at his chest. His sharp fingernails left a trail of jagged lines in his flesh. Dark blood oozed from the wounds, leaving almost black streaks down his pale white skin. His gaze darted back over to me, filled with pain and confusion. Around us, the crowd went wild. They all thought it was part of the act.

Lurching to my feet, I took a step forward, but was stopped by the press of screaming fans as they crowded the stage. Danaus stood behind me, his body humming with tension, ready for action. Unfortunately, I didn’t have a clue as to what we were fighting. My eyes never left Thorne, who had crumpled to his knees with another scream. His face was now streaked with dark, bloody tears. The cuts on his chest were not healing. By now they should have stopped bleeding and started to close, but the thick liquid continued to seep down his chest.

Reaching out with my powers, I scanned the bar. There were a couple magic users, but not one of them could have taken down a vampire, even one as weak as Thorne. I couldn’t understand what was killing him.

“Naturi?” I shouted over my shoulder at Danaus.

“None near,” he replied without hesitation. Apparently he’d had the same thought and had scanned the area. “How?”

“I don’t know.” My voice sounded dazed and lost as I watched Thorne fall to the stage with a thud. He was dead. I couldn’t sense him anymore. The end had come quite suddenly, as if it had crushed his very soul. He was dead before his head hit the stage.

“We have to go,” Danaus said as the rumble of the crowd started to change to fearful questioning. The act had finally gone a little too far for them, and they could sense that something was off. We had to go before they started to think about with whom Thorne had last been talking. I turned and started to walk past the table when my eyes caught on the mugs of beer. My right hand snaked out and snatched up Thorne’s half-empty glass. Dipping a couple fingers into the dark liquid, I dabbed it on my tongue. I spit the vile liquid back out and threw the mug against the wall with enough force that it shattered in a starburst of glass and dark amber beer.

“Poisoned!” The drink had been laced with enough naturi blood to poison Thorne. Thanks to my lengthy captivity with the naturi, I would always be able to recognize that wretched taste. However, most nightwalkers wouldn’t. The naturi were too few in number, and it had been centuries since I last heard of a nightwalker being poisoned.

“The barmaid,” Tristan snarled as he slid around the booth to stand directly behind me.

The barmaid with the pentagram stood behind the bar looking in my direction. I wasn’t sure she could see me, but she didn’t have to. She knew she had succeeded. Growling, I launched myself into the crowd, tossing people out of my way as I waded through the sea of flesh. Bodies flew through the air, limbs askew as they crashed into the undulating hoard. I was halfway across the room when Danaus finally caught up with me.

“There isn’t time!” he shouted, grabbing my arm.

My gaze never wavered from my prey. Jerking free of him, I roared, “She’s dead!”

“We’re leaving now.” Danaus wrapped one of his arms around my waist and lifted me off my feet. Balanced on his hip, he turned and carried me toward the door. Tristan was right behind us, looking unsure about whether to follow Danaus or go after the barmaid. I screamed in frustration and clawed at Danaus’s arm, but he wouldn’t release me. I was stronger but couldn’t get the leverage I needed to free myself.

Looking up, my eyes met with the blue-haired woman that had killed Thorne. She was smiling triumphantly at me. I should have let the naturi she served have their fun with her, as I knew they would. But I couldn’t. I smiled back at her, my eyes glowing in the semidark. Behind her, dozens of bottles of alcohol exploded in a wall of fire. Glass and liquid fire rained across the bar, raising the volume in the pub to hysterical levels. Thorne’s killer shrieked, her body engulfed in flames.

As Danaus pushed his way toward the double doors, I grabbed the edge of one of the square columns that rose up to support the second floor, abruptly halting him. I pulled my body back into the crush of people running for the exit. We were being pushed and elbowed, but we managed to shrug most of it off. We’d both be a little sore for a while, but I had bigger fears.

“The body!” I shouted above the thunder of cries and screams. Danaus carried me back in so we were pinned against the column, ignoring the angry cries of confusion. “Lift me up!”

Without question he boosted me up so I was sitting on his shoulder. If not for his strength and my superior balance, it would have been an impossible task in this crowd. I looked over the writhing wave of bodies to the stage. Thorne had not been touched and his band mates had disappeared. I still had to see what I was burning if I couldn’t specifically sense it. Frowning, I focused on his body and it was instantly bathed in dancing flames.

Flames were already starting to eat at the walls and lick at the ceiling. In a few minutes the fire would consume this place, but I couldn’t take any chances. I had to be sure the body was destroyed before the local fire department managed to extinguish what I started. They’d have trouble discovering why the fire started, but I was more concerned with Thorne’s corpse. Jumping down from Danaus’s shoulder, I grabbed his forearm and pulled him out the exit door to the left of the stage, bypassing most of the people who crowded the exit at the front of the building. I looked back once to find Tristan following us, thankful that he wasn’t trying to escape in the chaos. At the moment I think he was too shaken up by the attack and death of a fellow nightwalker to be concerned with his own freedom.

In the distance, the high-pitched whine of approaching police cars and fire trucks echoed in the night. We weaved our way through the crowd and down the dark streets, then ran for blocks until we were bathed in the bright lights of Piccadilly.