Blood Born (31 page)

“If that’s the case, why would Luca tell us about the revolt?” Theodore asked.

“Perhaps to confuse us,” Benedict said. “To throw us off his scent.” He grimaced. “Hell, he might’ve come here to gloat.”

They were all definitely confused, she thought with amusement.

“Maybe Enoch simply left of his own accord,” Pablo suggested. “He and Hector were close. I’m sure he was
upset; the fact that both Luca and Enoch disappeared at the same time could be coincidence, nothing more.”

Regina ground her teeth. Enoch was dead, not missing, but she couldn’t say anything without giving away that she knew more than she’d let on.

“Why don’t we contact Jonas and have him pinpoint Luca’s location?” Eleanor said, her voice deceptively sweet. Bitch. Jonas had worked with Luca in the past, helping him locate rogue vampires, so of course it followed that if Luca had gone rogue Jonas was the one who could locate him.

Good luck with that …

“He’s not answering his cell,” Benedict grumbled.

Nor would he, Regina thought.

“Perhaps we should ask ourselves what we would do if we did locate Luca Ambrus?” Eleanor continued, pursuing another line of thought. That was what she did, offering first one argument and then another, until no one knew where she stood on anything. “In my opinion we’re fortunate that Luca simply left. Who among us can take down Luca Ambrus, if it becomes necessary? Increasing our efforts to find him is rather like a human coming after one of us. The odds are
not
in our favor.”

Regina rose slowly. She didn’t have an imposing height like Benedict or Theodore, but the Council members respected her. The eyes of the other females were all on her; they would allow her to speak for them. She’d laid the groundwork for a division between the males and the females of the Council long ago, and stoked the fires when she got the opportunity. In the end some of them would come with her, though they would not be her equal in the new order.

“Eleanor’s right,” she said calmly. “Whoever you send to collect Luca will die.”

“He isn’t so strong,” Benedict began.

“He is.” Regina stared at him. “Don’t you remember that he used Voice on us—and there was nothing we could do? We’re strong, all of us, but he has powers that we don’t. Luca isn’t entirely like us,” she added softly, though those words were more powerful than the ones that had preceded them. “He won’t answer the phone if it doesn’t suit him, and he won’t come running because we call. He served the Council for a very long time, but only because it suited him. He doesn’t care what we want, he never has, and I hope none of you were foolish enough to believe otherwise. Leave him be, for now. If he isn’t involved in the rebellion, he’ll likely come back to us soon enough.” Not if she had her way, but the others needed to believe that Luca’s return, and allegiance, was possible.

Her strength and calm had gained the attention of the others. They all looked at her expectantly, as if she had all the answers to their problems. “What should we do about this revolution?” Benedict asked. He was trying to take control of the meeting, trying to assert his authority, but he didn’t have any answers to all of the questions they faced.

“How do we know for certain there is a rebellion?” she asked reasonably. “Hector apparently told Luca there is a rebellious faction, and maybe it’s true, maybe it isn’t. We told Luca to bring a rebel to us and he hasn’t, so maybe they don’t exist. If that’s what he found, it’s possible he’s simply disappeared for a while. He’s done it before.” They all thought she and Luca had a special connection, which they didn’t and never had, but they thought it because over the centuries she had carefully cultivated that perception. She leaned forward. “However, we must also consider that it’s possible Hector never called Luca, and his presence here is a part of some plot we do not yet understand. Is Luca tired of answering to us? Does he think himself better,
more capable of leading? Perhaps the revolution, if there is one, begins and ends with Luca Ambrus.”

She continued to remain outwardly calm, carefully controlling her breathing and the beat of her heart, as she remembered stepping into the doorway of Hector’s room as Enoch drove Hector’s own sword through his heart, watching with some satisfaction as the Head of Council exploded into a spray of fine gray dust. Hector’s talents had told him there was a traitor near, but he hadn’t seen that it was her, had never even suspected her. He’d sensed that death was coming, but he hadn’t realized until Enoch walked into his room that death had come for him at the hands of an old friend.

She’d felt such satisfaction in watching Hector die. He’d been an old fool, and weak. There wasn’t any place in her order for weakness.

There were others at this table who could ferret out the truth if they put in the effort, but they, and their gifts, had atrophied over the years. Accustomed to having their food brought to them, used to having others of their own kind do their bidding, they had become lazy. Their talents slept and faded. More than a thousand years of peace and loyalty within the vampire community had spoiled them all—except for her.

When the matter of Luca was dismissed they moved on to the next order of business: the election of a new Head of Council. Regina knew the position could be hers if she fought for it, and she would not have to fight very hard. The others respected her; they saw her strength. But she didn’t have the time or the patience to take on that duty, even for a short while. She had too many other things to do. Besides, in such a position of authority she’d be watched much too closely. So she nominated Pablo, who had a Napoleon complex and a sick fascination with one of the blood donors kept on site. His ego and the glamoured girl would keep him
occupied and out of her hair. Benedict was annoyed that the others, who were thinking only of Pablo’s age and experience and who knew nothing of his latest obsession, didn’t see fit to champion him as an alternative.

They decided to take their time before choosing a ninth Council member to replace Hector. Regina knew it didn’t matter, because soon the Council would be irrelevant … and then it would be destroyed.

    Sorin returned from his latest assignment anxious to see if Nevada had made progress while he’d been gone, but she wasn’t his first chore of the day. Traveling in daylight was tiring, but these days, every minute was precious. It had been too long since he’d slept, and he couldn’t see a time for sleep coming. Not that he couldn’t function, but he had to be careful not to let himself get so tired, or hungry, that he made mistakes. A single error could bring it all crashing down around their heads. That mistake would
not
be his.

When he returned to the mansion, his first order of business was to see Jonas, who looked as if he was about to have a nervous breakdown. The rate at which conduits were being activated had increased to the point where he could hardly handle the influx of information—mentally or logistically. The vampire was rightly terrified of disappointing his queen, horrified to think that he might be too late in some instances.

Because Jonas would also be able to sense the energy when a warrior came into this world, the rebels knew they had not yet been too late in taking out any of the conduits. Not yet, anyway.

Not so long ago, Jonas had been a relatively strong vampire, though his powers were more mental than physical in spite of the young age at which he’d been turned. His smallish stature and long brown hair gave
him a deceptively safe appearance, which he’d used to its full advantage. The life of a vampire had agreed with Jonas, until now. He’d worked for the Council, alongside Luca on occasion, and spent his leisure hours glamouring pretty girls and leaving them brokenhearted—and oddly weak and pale, though not so drained or brain-damaged that they wouldn’t soon recover. That had been before this new twist to his gift had been uncovered, before Regina had discovered that his talent for pinpointing energies extended well beyond rogue vampires, to conduits and their warriors.

The queen’s initial recruitment of Jonas hadn’t gone as planned. Jonas didn’t want to be a soldier; it wasn’t his style. Instead of cajoling or making reasoned arguments, Regina had kidnapped and tortured him in order to get what she wanted.

Sorin wondered if Regina realized that with a little effort she could’ve coerced Jonas to her side. She probably didn’t care. The rebel leader much preferred a show of strength to coercion. She didn’t ask twice.

Regina wasn’t present now. She had an important Council meeting today, one she’d said she could not miss; her absence left Sorin in charge, thank God. He enjoyed being in charge, always had.

Jonas flitted about the small basement room where he worked, slept on a hard cot, and fed on the donors Regina had sent to him—just often enough to keep him alive and functioning. Gone were the days when he’d fed at will, leisurely and with great pleasure. These days he didn’t receive a human for feeding until he was near starving, which didn’t bode well for the human.

This was Jonas’s world for now. Maps covered two walls, and a large corkboard hung upon another. A long plain table in the center of the room held notepads, pens, and pencils. Regina allowed Jonas the use of a laptop computer, but only when he was being
closely supervised. That computer, and his carefully programmed cell, were his only contacts with the outside world. There was not a stick of comfortable furnishing, no rug to soften the concrete floor. It was a prison, as stark as Regina could manage to make it.

The thin, harried vampire flitted from one map to another with a handful of pins. Yellow for the recently activated, red for one who was close to bringing in a warrior, black for those who’d been eliminated. Sorin was glad to see that there were a fair number of black pins in Jonas’s maps. He was disturbed to see a new profusion of yellow, as well as a dozen red.

“How can we stop them all?” Jonas asked softly, as if he were talking to himself. “They’re everywhere. Paris, this morning, and now London. Why? The rebellion is here, in this country. Warriors are supposed to come in close to the site of battle, right? They don’t have the time to be traveling all over the world. It’s not like they can hop on a plane, not without money and identification and … and why are they starting to come in so far away?”

Sorin suspected that the warriors, who resided in a very real world beyond this one where they lived, waited and watched, realized what was happening and were taking drastic measures to ensure that some of their number arrived in time.

And look at this!” Jonas flailed a hand toward one map. “Eight in New York. Eight! How are we supposed to stop so many?” He shook his head. “She’s going to be so mad. She’s going to be angry as hell.” His entire body shuddered. An angry Regina had become his greatest fear, and with good reason. While no scars were left behind, thanks to Jonas’s vampire blood, the pain she inflicted upon him when it suited her was very real.

Sorin was concerned by the new developments, but
he wasn’t alarmed. Regina had spent the last several years bringing over subjects, her own devoted children, who would serve her faithfully when she ruled. She treated them better than poor Jonas, and thereby kept them loyal, but at the same time she made sure they always knew who was in charge. Their numbers had grown, and though many in her army were newer vampires who had not yet discovered extraordinary talents, humans didn’t have a chance against even the weakest vampire—as long as they didn’t know what was coming and how to fight it. There were a number of veterans among the rebels, too, ancient vampires like Sorin who were tired of hiding in the dark corners of the world. He’d send veterans to handle the red, fledglings to the yellow. Soon they would all be black.

There remained only one pin in the D.C. area of the map that was not black, and it was an unalarming yellow. Sorin hoped Regina was right and Luca would soon tire of the human. It would be much easier to eliminate Chloe Fallon and stop her ancestor from coming in so close to the seat of the rebellion if she were not in the protection of one of the most powerful vampires in existence.

Sorin left Jonas to his mumblings and pins, issued orders to those who were waiting for them, and then swiftly climbed the stairs to Nevada’s quarters. In a few hours he’d leave for New York. Before then, he needed to do what he could to spur her on.

While he’d always championed a more subtle approach with Nevada—out of necessity, as a wounded and weak witch would be of no use to them at all—he sometimes wondered if Regina’s methods would be more effective. He shuddered at the thought of one so young and vulnerable in the kind of pain Regina could inflict, and he found himself glad that it had never come to that. Nevada was soft, her emotions her weakness. The
threats to her family kept her in line. If one of those family members was disposed of before her eyes, would she work harder to save the others? Or would they lose her entirely? If he threatened to allow Loman to feed from her, would she find a reserve of strength to complete the spell?

He couldn’t allow her scent to distract him. Now that he’d identified why that smell was so familiar, he should be able to dismiss the memories and the unwanted weakness those memories brought forth. Nevada was a tool, nothing more.

One of the new guards was at the door, bored and disdainful of her new position. She’d rather be killing conduits, had all but begged to be taken on as a hunter. Sorin nodded to Danica and walked into Nevada’s room.

Nevada’s head snapped up in obvious alarm, her eyes widened. Was it his imagination or was she thinner than she’d been just a few months ago? He pushed the thought aside. He didn’t care, as long as she ate enough for her body to function until she’d done what she’d been brought here to do.

He was surprised that she didn’t glare at him for entering without knocking, as if her complaints had ever made a difference. “Wait right there,” she said softly.

“I don’t wait,” Sorin responded, but he did stop several feet away from Nevada and her worktable.

Nevada closed her eyes, stretched out her arms. She looked ethereal, with her fine red hair hanging around her shoulders, with the loose robe she wore clinging to her body here and there, flowing freely in others. Yes, she was thinner than she’d been, even a year ago. She hadn’t seen the sun for three years, and her naturally pale skin was delicately creamy, unblemished, and unmarked but for those light freckles. He might turn
her, he thought idly. Then she’d be more pale, more beautiful, more powerful. If she kept her witch’s powers after being turned, she would be incredibly important in the new order.