A Shade of Vampire 7: A Break of Day (8 page)

“I don’t know that we want cooperation yet,” she said. “I must call a meeting back in my realm with my council. Until I’ve done this, I can’t reveal anything to you about Sofia. That would be a signal to the Elders that we are no longer neutral.” Then she paused and looked intensely into my eyes. “But I will call this council, Derek. You have my word. And if this plan meets with approval, I will return to you.”

Before I could open my mouth, she had vanished just as suddenly as she had appeared.

“Curse you!” I yelled, stamping my foot.
Sofia could be dead by the time you’ve finished with your damn meeting.
I climbed off the terrace and ran to the ocean. When I dove in, my body hissed like a hot pan splashed with water.

I floated on my back and reflected on the witch’s proposal. Even if the council agreed that it was indeed in their best interest to eliminate the portals, how did I know that, once the Elders and Guardians had been banished, the witches wouldn’t have some other hidden agenda for us?

When you’re drowning and all you’re handed is the end of a sword to pull you up above the waves, do you take it?

But at that moment, I had no idea whether the witch would keep her word to call a meeting. And even if she did, how long would that take? Every second that went by was a second that Sofia could be suffering somewhere, in need of rescue. What aggravated me most was the fact that the witch hadn’t denied knowing where Sofia was. My gut instinct told me that she knew very well what had happened to Sofia during her initial time in Cruor, and why Sofia had been taken again. Yet the witch refused to give me even that much relief.
After everything she’s done
.

What am I to do in the meantime?
I floated for hours. But once the sun had ducked beneath the horizon, I decided that there was simply no way I could stay in that place any longer. I’d be of far more use travelling back to Headquarters and working with Aiden. I’d leave a note for Sofia telling her where I’d gone and I’d travel back to the cabin every two days to check if she had returned.

On arriving at my bedroom, it turned out that leaving a note wasn’t necessary. For there lay Sofia, sprawled unconscious on the bed, her skin covered with blisters and blood seeping from a deep wound near her abdomen.

As the blackness gave way to fluorescent white lighting, the first thing that came into focus was a set of bright blue eyes. A warm hand brushed against my cheek.
Derek.
Relief overwhelmed me, but as I came further to consciousness and realized what a danger I was to my loved ones, it transformed into horror.

Derek’s face lit up as soon as I stirred. He bent down and his lips pushed against mine. I wished I could have returned his embrace with as much passion. Instead my lips and arms remained stiff. The Elder retained full control of my movements.

“Sofia!” my father gasped.

Oh, no. Not you too.

I turned my head to see Aiden on the other side of my bed. He clutched my hand, leant down and kissed my forehead. Pain was etched in his eyes. He’d already lost his wife to the curse. Now he was watching me suffer under it.
Thank God he doesn’t know my situation is even worse than Ingrid’s was. I don’t know how he would survive it.

“You’re going to be okay, my darling,” Aiden said. “We’re going to find a cure for you, just as we did for Derek. And then we’re going to bring your beautiful baby boy back to your arms. How does that sound?”

I was desperate to ask about my son, but my lips remained tightly sealed. I looked around for the first time. We were in the emergency room at Hawk Headquarters.

Why does it want me here?

A nurse walked over to me and helped me into a sitting position. It was then that the remains of a mouthful of blood trickled down to the base of my tongue.
Sweet. Succulent.

“You’re lucky we retained some of Anna’s blood from the lab when we were doing tests on her.” The nurse smiled.

Anna’s blood.
Although I couldn’t deny my craving for more, I felt disgusted.
Whatever did happen to Anna? And what about Kyle who accompanied her here all those months ago, just after he became a human?

Aiden must have guessed such questions would have been running through my mind. “Anna and Kyle are okay, Sofia. They’re in Aviary right now. Arron brought Ian there too. But they will be returned unharmed. They are just assisting the Guardians with some testing.”

Aviary? Guardians? Testing?
I had no idea what he was talking about, but none of it put me at ease for my friends’ safety.

His face betrayed realization that he’d implicated himself in a longer and more complicated discussion than he had intended. “But all that, my dear, is a topic for another day. We need to get you better first.”

“How long before I can leave this bed?”

“Immediately,” the nurse said. “Take a look, you’re all healed.”

The blisters and all traces of my wound had vanished. I shivered internally as I recalled my trip to the witch in The Cells who, in exchange for some more dried bread, had carved the wound into my body and covered my skin with blisters as soon as we had returned from our… expedition.

“Where did you go, Sofia?” Derek must have been burning to ask.

“I-I don’t know, Derek.” I felt myself frown. “The last thing I remember was you leaving me in the bedroom. I was upset that you were refusing to bring me to see everyone here at Headquarters… I probably ran outside into the daylight. I suppose I worked myself up into a state and didn’t know what I was doing. But I think that what we can learn from this is: don’t make me upset again and I won’t go anywhere.”

Disappointment shrouded his eyes. He knew this wasn’t his Sofia he was talking to. He wanted me back.
I
wanted me back.

“How did you get back to the cabin?” he pressed.

How did I get there?

The truthful answer was that I didn’t know myself. After creating my wound, the witch had put me into unconsciousness and after that I remembered nothing. I guessed that Liana and her submarines must have had something to do with my journey.

“Again, I don’t remember anything. My guess is that some humans from the local village spotted me and brought me there.”

Derek was about to interrogate me further, but Aiden came to the Elder’s rescue and interrupted him. “There’ll be time for more questions later, Derek. Sofia has been through an ordeal and, although her body is looking better now, she clearly still needs some mental rest.”

“Rest is exactly what I need. Thank you.” I put my arms around my father’s neck and kissed his cheek. Then I turned to speak to the nurse. “Where will I sleep?”

“What? With me in my quarters, of course.” Derek didn’t even give the woman a chance to answer. “I’m not letting you leave my sight after having you slip from my grasp twice already.”

“No, D-Derek,” I stuttered. “I c-can’t sleep anywhere near you. I don’t want to risk doing more harm to you than I’ve done already.” I placed a hand underneath his shirt and traced my fingers over the scars I’d created on his torso. Then cold tears started to fall from my eyes. “P-please, I can’t sleep anywhere near you.”

Again my loving father came to the aid of the Elder. He gathered me in his arms and said, “Derek’s not going to make you stay with him if you don’t want that, honey. You can sleep wherever you want.”

“No, she can’t!” Derek hissed. “Aiden, are you mad? I am
not
going to let her out of my sight. Especially not during the long hours of the night. That’s when she’s most vulnerable! She needs supervision.”

Aiden placed a hand on Derek’s shoulder. “As long as she’s within the boundaries of Headquarters, she’ll be fine. I’ll have security positioned at all exits to the main building during the day so she won’t be able to go out into the sunlight, and around the outskirts of the entire grounds at night so she won’t leave the campus even once it’s dark. There was nothing stopping her leaving that little hut. You’re forgetting that it’s different here at Headquarters.”

“I still don’t trust…” Derek began, but Aiden cut him off.

“And,” Aiden said in a low voice, “you know very well that there are other reasons why it’s better that Sofia is kept away from everybody… why it’s better that as few people as possible realize that she’s back here.”

At that, Derek remained silent. Then Aiden turned to me once again. “You can stay in whatever apartment you want while you’re here, okay, darling?”

“Thank you, Dad,” I piped up, giving him a cuddle. “I’d like to be in the quietest part of the building. I just feel that I need time alone to recover. I can move in with Derek when I’m ready.”

Derek scowled, but he decided not to argue with Aiden in front of me. I was sure that a heated discussion would take place between the two men as soon as they were alone.

I hoped that Derek was now beyond taking my words and behavior seriously. I hoped that he simply accepted that I was deranged and needed some kind of psychiatric doctor.
Or do I dare hope that he might have guessed by now that I’ve been possessed?

As the nurse guided me out of bed and set me on my feet, I felt relieved that this time, the Elder had decided to keep me apart from Derek. But a darker question entered my thoughts. The Elder had never had any qualms about hurting my husband before. Indeed, the Elder had willfully made me inflict suffering on him and I had felt the Elder shiver with pleasure.

Why does the Elder want to keep me completely isolated?

Aiden took hold of my hand and led me out of the emergency room, Derek following behind us. In the hallway, I was met with a group of familiar faces: Vivienne, Cameron, Claudia, Gavin, Eli, Shadow and Landis.

“Sofia!” they exclaimed and rushed forward to greet me.

They all looked delighted to see me, except for Shadow. His first instinct was to arch his back and snarl. Eli tugged on his leash.

“Come on, boy. Stop that. Don’t you remember your friend, Sofia?”

Shadow’s snarls turned into barks, then whimpers. He dragged Eli away from me.

Eli glanced in Vivienne’s direction. She too looked perturbed by Shadow’s restlessness. Then Vivienne’s eyes fell on me again.

Vivienne, if there’s anyone in this place who can see through me, it’s you. Please, Vivienne. Understand,
I thought, hoping that she’d somehow read my mind.

Then I addressed the Elder directly.
Why do you want me apart from Derek? I thought you wanted him as protection?

There may come a time when he will prove to be useful. But in the meantime, he’s just an obstacle. And so are your other friends. We can’t have anyone hampering our freedom of movement or monitoring you during the night,
he replied to me silently.

Once the group had finished greeting me, Aiden said, “All right, guys, Sofia needs some rest. No doubt you’ll have time to catch up later once she’s feeling better.”

Derek’s hand found the small of my back as he walked on one side of me, with Aiden on the other. We made for the elevator and Aiden punched in the button for the top floor of the building. Once the door opened, we took a right turn and headed toward the very end of the long corridor. Despite staying at Headquarters for weeks at a time in the past, I’d never been to this part of the building before. We stopped in front of door number 721. Aiden pulled down on the handle and led us inside.

“Here you go, darling,” Aiden said. “I hope everything is to your liking. This is one of the quietest apartments we have in Hawk Headquarters. Nobody will disturb you here.”

I looked around the place briefly; there was a double bedroom with en suite bathroom, a kitchen area and a cozy sitting room. These living quarters were small compared to others that I’d seen in the building, but all the Elder cared about was its location.

“And where are your and Derek’s apartments?” I asked Aiden.

“If you need me, I’m currently in room number 120 and Derek is number 219. Vivienne and your other friends are occupying rooms 340 to 346, in case you want to visit any of them. Don’t worry, I’ll write all this down on a piece of paper so you don’t forget. And, of course, I’ll be leaving you with the direct landline codes so you can call us whenever you want.”

My father scribbled some numbers on a scrap of paper, which he slipped into a drawer. Then he pulled a phone out of his pocket and dialed a number. “Sarah, bring some goat blood up to room 721 as soon as you can.” He hung up and looked at me again, pulling out two keys from his pocket and handing them to me. “Here’s the key you should use whenever you leave the room. It locks the door from the outside. And this key you should use if you want to lock the door from the inside. Having two makes for better security. I’ll put them in this drawer here. Okay, darling?”

I nodded and thanked him politely once again. But Aiden hadn’t yet finished.

“Also, I’ll leave you a spare key to my office as well as to my own apartment, so if you feel like it, you can go and hang around in either place in case I’m not there. And here’s a spare key to Derek’s apartment… So you’ve got plenty of places you can go to relax. I just need you to avoid all the main communal areas like the reception and training rooms.”

Derek had remained silent the whole time. But his intense gaze bored into me. I didn’t believe for a moment that he wouldn’t still keep tabs on me.

“Okay, that’s all clear,” I heard myself say. “I’d like to be alone now. Please give me at least five days. I’ll come find you when I’m ready.” I walked to the door and held it open for them. “Thank you both for understanding.”

Aiden walked out first, followed by Derek. I had almost closed the door when Derek’s hand appeared through the crack. He pushed the door ajar just enough so that his face was visible.

“I’m going to find you again, Sofia.” His look of determination sent chills running through me. Then he pulled the door shut and his footsteps disappeared down the hallway.