Pray for Dawn

FIVE

My sleep was disturbed again less than four hours later. Lying on my back, I used my powers to discover James standing outside the door. I released the knife and shuffled across the room, wiping the sleep out of my eyes. I had managed to squeeze in close to seven hours of sleep. With both Ryan and Mira in town, I had a sick feeling that it was the best I was going to get for a while.

The young man smiled at me when I opened the door, easily ignoring my own sour expression as he stepped into the room. Early thirties, with brown hair and thin face, James had been assigned as my assistant less than a year ago and we were still adjusting to the arrangement. I always worked alone, but I depended on a specific contact within Themis to arrange for my travel, lodging, money, research information, and other odds and ends.

But for me, it was more than those basic necessities. James was my tie to the human world. He reminded me of what it meant to be human in the twenty-first century, which was not exactly the easiest thing for me to remember. I would turn 1,866 years old this year. After such a passage of time, things like polite conversation and mundane tasks tended to be forgotten under the relentless grind of life.

“You don’t look as bad as she made it sound,” James said, his sharp eyes skimming over my face.

I hit the light switch, bathing the room in warm, golden lamplight as I walked over to my bag. “She?” I asked, as I jerked the black cotton pants over my hips.

“Mira. She was worried.”

I snorted. Mira’s only concern was that someone would kill me before she had her shot. James also said nothing, but answered the door when another visitor knocked. A member of the hotel staff carried in a large tray with several covered plates, and the smell of coffee that caught my attention. The promise of warmth and caffeine wiped away the last of the fog from my brain. As James signed the bill, I started lifting covers to find a strange combination of breakfast and dinner. Scrambled eggs, sausage, steak with a baked potato, steamed legumes, lentil soup, whole-grain muffins, and a whole pot of black coffee. James was going to work out fine as my assistant.

“I wasn’t sure what you’d want,” James hedged as he came to stand on the other side of the table.

“This is fine,” I muttered, falling into a seat as I dug into the food. Coffee and food would clear out the cobwebs and cure the aches. Then I would be able to tackle the growing mess that surrounded Mira.

“Any trouble with the vampires?” James asked, unable to keep the excitement out of his voice. He was still young and enthusiastic about this dark world in which I worked, wanting to know all the secrets and desperate to dive into it. However, after meeting Mira and some other vampires last summer, he had grown a little more cautious. Of course, he had also had to clean up the multiple naturi corpses Mira and her band had left behind following their last visit. Cleaning up that many dead bodies would have been a harsh wake-up call for anyone.

“Not with the vampires,” I said with a shake of my head as I poured more coffee. “The naturi were another matter.”

James slowly fell backward into the chair opposite me, his mouth falling open and his eyes widening behind his gold-rimmed glasses. “Naturi?” he nearly choked on the words. “I thought you said that these vampires were a part of Sadira’s domain. Why would the naturi go to a known haven for a powerful nightwalker?”

“They might not have known,” I said with a wave of my fork in between bites. “They might not have cared. After the doors opened, the naturi scattered everywhere. I have a feeling that they are going to go where they want to.”

“I always assumed they would stick to wooded areas. I mean, they are nature-based creatures,” James replied.

I stared down at my half-empty plate for a moment. He had just voiced the hope I had been harboring for the past three months: that the naturi would stick to the woods and leave mankind untouched while they worked out their own little political problems. With any luck, it would take years, enough time for us to come up with some solution to the problem of them even being in this world in the first place. But it wasn’t to be.

During the past three months, I had destroyed more nightwalkers than I had naturi, but the number was steadily increasing. They were popping up on the outskirts of town, sometimes just seeming to watch me as I battled the vampires before they finally attacked. The trio in Spain had been the most I had encountered at once since leaving Mira’s presence. But then the nightwalker had a special way about her that seemed to bring out the worst in the naturi. She reminded me of a young man I had trained with in the Legion. He had the same special knack. Every time we were sent ahead as scout, he would literally trip over the enemy. It’s a wonder he lived through half as many battles as he did.

Pushing away those dark thoughts, I turned my attention back to the food that was growing cold before me and switched to a less tasteful topic. “Mira has been with Ryan for the past week?” I asked before shoving a piece of steak into my mouth. It was heaven. I tried to relax and just think about the taste, but I couldn’t. I had to know what was going on before it rose up and bit me in the ass, literally.

“Yes.”

“Why?”

James looked down at the white tablecloth, his hand jumping up to smooth his navy tie against his chest. “I can’t say.”

“And Ryan is here now?”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

This time his eyes darted back up to my face and he frowned at me. “Danaus, I…”

I held up my right hand, my fork still pressed between my thumb and index finger. “Never mind. Forget I asked.”

James slumped in his chair and pulled off his glasses so he could rub his eyes. “You know how he is,” he grumbled.

Yeah, I knew how Ryan worked. He liked to be in control of the flow of information at all times. Ryan was from the school of thought that knowledge is power and he liked knowing more than everyone else.

I pushed aside my empty plate, cleaned of the steak and vegetables, moving on to the eggs. “How did they take Mira’s presence at Themis?”

Resting his elbows on the arms of his chair, James stared at his glasses as he held them with both hands. “She’s a great source of information, assuming she’s telling the truth,” he said slowly. One corner of his mouth lifted in a half smile. “But I think they’re glad that she’s gone.” James looked up at me. I was surprised to find that his gaze was sharp, unlike the unfocused stare of someone suddenly caught without their glasses. Not for the first time I wondered if he actually needed his gold-rimmed spectacles.

“What did she do?”

“Not much.” He shrugged as he slipped his glasses back on his nose. “Just her usual mischief, I imagine. But she stopped sleeping not long after her arrival and I think most people stopped sleeping as long as she was awake and wandering the halls.”

It was on the tip of my tongue to ask how Ryan had managed that unique feat, but I swallowed the question. I doubted if James actually knew even though he doubled as Ryan’s assistant when I was out of town. And even if he did know, I doubt he would be permitted to tell me.

Reaching for the coffeepot, I poured another cup, somewhat relieved to find that Mira hadn’t caused too many problems. It was probably best that she had shaken things up back at Themis. I was learning that their understanding of vampires had little to do with reality, defying my entire reason for joining the society in the first place. “Is there anything else that I should know about?”

“Not much. Ryan has pulled back most of the hunters to Paris, London, or the Compound recently. He believes things have become too…tense at the moment and thought it best if we pulled back to guard our own for now. Last I saw, only Farkas and Collins were left in the field.”

“Doing what?” I demanded, an uneasy feeling slipping down into the pit of my stomach. My right hand slipped from my coffee cup to rest on the arm of the chair.

“Farkas is on a quick scouting mission in Turkey. Something about a shake-up in the dominant werewolf pack in the area. Collins was sent to take care of a vampire hiding out in the Ukraine.” James adjusted his glasses.

“When was Collins put on vampire duty?” I snapped, my right hand convulsively tightening on the chair so that the wood creaked softly.

James swallowed audibly and sat up straighter in his chair. “Last month.”

“He doesn’t have enough experience in the field and should never have been sent alone,” I barked. “Who put him on vampire duty?”

“I think Ryan did.” James scooted back in his chair so that he could put a little more distance between him and myself. “Collins was told to only pursue the vampire during the day. If he can’t locate its daytime resting spot, he is to call for assistance.”

“Collins is going to end up dead,” I grumbled. My grip on the chair loosened and I reached for my coffee in an effort to wash the bad taste out of my mouth.

“I heard it was a young vampire,” James countered, trying to soothe some of my anger. It wasn’t working.

“That doesn’t make them any less dangerous; just a little more careless. I have the ultimate authority over who is on vampire duty. Ryan knows that.” I sat back in my chair, glaring at my empty coffee mug.

Why hadn’t I been consulted? Derrick Collins had been with Themis for only a couple years and just served as backup on vampire hunts on a few occasions. He didn’t have enough experience in the field to handle a nightwalker, even a fledgling. I had always had complete authority over those who served on vampire duty. I was the only one who hunted alone. I was also the only one with the skill, speed, and experience to hunt them at night.

Ryan had overstepped his bounds. The warlock had put an inexperienced hunter in an extremely dangerous situation and a part of me was reluctant to ask why. And this wasn’t the first time. He had also brought James along to Crete, where the naturi were holding one of their sacrifice attempts. In this instance, I had to agree with Mira. The researcher had no business being anywhere near that dangerous situation, and Ryan had brought him along as potential bait.

Ryan was very wise and very careful, but I didn’t always agree with his methods. His conscience had no problem withholding information or sacrificing a few lives here and there to accomplish his greater schemes. And while I wasn’t a pawn, I had no doubt that I was still a chess piece for him to play with.

“When is my meeting with Ryan?” I demanded.

James pushed to his feet, shoving his hands into his trouser pockets. “He said to come down whenever you’re ready. Room 705.”

I needed a shower, shave, a fresh set of clothes, and then I would be ready to deal with a warlock. “Tell him thirty minutes.”

James nodded once and wordlessly left the room. I sat for a minute staring at the rumpled sheets on my bed. An uneasiness twisted in my chest. Themis was no longer the home that I needed it to be. When I had joined centuries ago, it was in the pursuit of more knowledge of the creatures that lurked in the darkness and fed off all that was good in humanity. Now I felt as if I were simply a foot soldier for Ryan in his quest for…whatever he was reaching for next. The information now flowed up to him instead of down through the entire collective. Not for the first time in the past few years I wondered if it was time to move on.

But for now, such thoughts had to be put aside. In thirty minutes, I would discover what had dragged Ryan away from his ivory tower and, hopefully, I would find out how and why he had given Mira the ability to walk around during the day.