Blood Fever: The watchers (31 page)

“T
wo go in, only one comes out.” I stared at the notice, posted outside the gymnasium. “Sounds like a nineteenth-century circus playbill.” I felt a slender hand on my shoulder. Emma’s. I turned to her. “This is my fault.”

“Don’t be ridiculous.”

“No. It is.” It was never a good idea to cross a vampire. First I was a less-than-enthusiastic recipient of Alcántara’s kiss. Then Masha had gone off after me and never come back. “It
is
my fault. This is Alcántara’s way of punishing me. I’ll make it right.”

“You bet you will,” Yasuo said.

I glanced over Em’s shoulder to find his eyes glittering cold on me. Everyone knew she and I were besties, just as they knew I’d beat her in a fight. But never in a thousand years could I hurt her. Though, just in case I did, there was Yasuo, ready to thrash me quicker than you could say
catfight
if anything happened to her.

Disturbed, I tore my eyes from him to look back at my friend. “We’ll find a way so you don’t get hurt. I’ll throw the fight.”

“Or else,” Yasuo said.

“Please,” Emma told him in that quiet way of hers. “Trust Drew. I do. We’ll figure this out. We have before.”

“Yeah, Yasuo.” I tried my best playful scowl. “We have before.”

It didn’t bring a smile to his face. “You have to let her beat you.”

“I will.”

“How?”

“I don’t know, Yas. I’ll figure it out.”

“Well, you better figure it out now,” he snarled, “because the fight is tomorrow.”

“It’s okay,” Emma said soothingly, taking his arm in hers.

He glared down at her. “It is
not
okay. You read the freaking poster. Two in, one out. Are you really going to kill her? Is she going to kill you?” He turned his glare on me. “I know how this’ll play out. Miss Selfish here will win the day, like she always does.”

The comment felt like a Mack truck rear-ending me. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

Emma looked distraught now. “Please stop, Yasuo. You’re not helping.”

“Well, somebody needs to do something.”

I put my hands on my hips. “I will so totally do something.” My mind raced, and a plan began to form. “Emma
will
take me down. We’ve been studying the vascular system in Combat Med. She can get me in a hold, pin me down, and make like she’s choking me.” I spoke faster, the idea taking hold. “Listen, this could work. If she cuts off the blood flow to my carotid artery, I’ll pass out. I’ll look dead, but the moment she lets go, it’ll be all good.
I’ll look pretty blacked out for a while, and by the time I come to, she’ll be out of that ring. Okay?”

“Wow, that is good,” Emma said. “So simple.”

I hoped it was simple in an elegant way, and not simple in a stupid way. She’d need to time it just right—if she waited too long to let go, I’d be dead, and if she let go too soon, then we’d both be dead.

“What happens when Alcántara realizes you’re not dead?”

“I’ll take the heat for that,” I assured him, though I left the rest of my thoughts unspoken. Namely, if I got in trouble, Carden could always swoop in before my punishment and we could make a break for it, maybe find those mysterious
friends
of Tom’s. “Don’t worry.”

Emma smiled up at Yas. “See? All good.”

“It’s me Alcántara wants to punish,” I assured him. “Not Em.”

He didn’t speak, though. His eyes were narrowed on me, and for an instant I saw something flicker there. Red. Like the rogue.

Goose bumps crept along my skin, and I fisted my hands to get the blood flowing again. This was Yasuo. My pal. He was just playing the part of protective boyfriend. Still, it took a mental effort not to take a step back from him.

I was still chilled from that exchange and headed back to my dorm when I ran into Alcántara.

“Greetings, Acari Drew.” He bowed his head, looking the part of chivalric fourteenth-century courtier. “I see you are recovered from your ordeal.”

“Recovered, yes,” I said, mustering a weak smile, then added with a little chuff of a laugh, “Though I’d feel a lot more recovered if I didn’t have to fight my friend.” It was a stupid thing to say, but I felt like I was at the end of my rope. I was done lying down and taking it from these guys.

I’d watched Mei escape—I’d learned there were options. I’d learned hope.

“You do not wish to fight your friend?”

Was he being serious? Would he give me an option? “Not particularly, no.”

“You have no friends.” He gave me a chilling smile. “This is merely my way to prove it to you, once and for all.”

He’d liked me once. With that in mind, I tried a different angle. “And what if I die instead?”

His lip curled. “You’re a trying girl. There was a time I enjoyed the challenge you pose. Now I tire of it.” He began to walk off. “What will be shall be.”

Carden. I needed Carden. He’d be my comfort.

Somehow he knew. “You’re sad,” he whispered to me later that night. Lights-out had come and gone hours ago, and it was dark, with just a blade of moonlight cutting in to light my room. His being able to sneak in after hours was the one consolation for losing Mei-Ling.

“We have to enjoy this while we can,” I said, avoiding the topic. “I’ll graduate to Initiate at the end of this term.” Soon I would get a new room. A new roommate. New fights and new enemies.

“Initiate.” He sighed. “Such tomfoolery. The Directorate would have you think this is boot camp. While most of those creatures have never seen a day of battle. But, Annelise?”

“Yes?” I asked, staring at the ceiling. I felt full of emotion and, even in the dark, I couldn’t bear facing him for fear of letting it show.

“Annelise.” He cupped my shoulder. “Face me.”

I couldn’t resist that husky voice in the darkness. I rolled to
face him, and it took a moment to get adjusted. He was ever the gentleman, and refused to lie under the covers with me. The old-fashioned gesture touched me.

“You’re avoiding what’s really troubling you,” he said.

“What’s the real trouble?”

He raised his brows, waiting for me to come around.

I sighed. “Okay, yeah, I am sad. And more than sad.” The rogue vampire was dead, and the Directorate ruled a return to normal. They’d proclaimed Carden innocent. This was an aberrant event, they’d said. Carden and I were left only with our suspicions and no proof that Alcántara had anything to do with the killings. Now all I needed to do was fight Emma; then it’d be back to our regularly scheduled program. If we both survived. “I’m worried about who planted the rogue. I’m worried Al has you in his sights. I’m worried I’ll accidentally kill my best friend.”

“First,” he said, “you shouldn’t worry for me. You’re a braw spitfire of a woman, but I’ve survived for hundreds of years without you. I imagine I’ll get through the coming weeks as well.”

I felt a tiny smile begin to play at the corner of my mouth. “I’m a woman?”

He chucked my chin. “You know you are. And you’re strong. Do you know there was once a time when we Scotsmen went to battle, leaving our women to protect the home? It was
women
who ran the homesteads, raised our children, fought for our land. And from what I’ve seen, you are stronger even than that. Braver than that.”

I bit my lip, feeling that emotion trying to bust through. “I just…I worry, is all. I worry I won’t be able to find a way to survive this. For Emma to survive it. I’m sick of losing people—even the girls who’d see me dead. I’m sick of all of it.”

“You will do what you always have done, which is what is necessary to survive. I cannot predict what will happen in your fight. There is no plan Hugo has not yet conceived himself, and I fear he will stand in your way.” He cupped my cheek, holding my gaze to his. “But whatever happens, hear this: I will not watch you die.”

I turned and pressed my lips to his palm. I thought of stoic prairie-girl Emma. I had a centuries-old vampire secretly in my corner—whatever my best intentions were, it wouldn’t be a fair fight. I couldn’t bear the thought anymore. “Take my mind off this,” I pleaded. “Show me your powers.”

“My powers?”

“You know. Your Druid powers. Predict the future or something.” I blinked my eyes shut. “Tell me what I’m thinking.”

His hand ever so gently cradled my neck. “I’m thinking perhaps you’d like me to kiss you.”

I opened my eyes and what I saw blew me away. His features had gone soft, as though he were glimpsing heaven. And heaven was
me
. There’d been a time when I thought I didn’t want to kiss a vampire. Now it was all I wanted.

I slid my hand over his. “I would like it, yes.”

He kissed me, and there wasn’t the hunger of our previous kisses. This was a tender kiss. A bolstering kiss. A kiss to give me strength and tell me I wasn’t alone.

When we parted, I stared at him, memorizing him. How strange to find myself with this creature, whispering intimacies in the darkness. “How is it you’re so different? I mean, all the other vampires come from another time and they’re all sexist pigs.”

He smiled at that. “They’re naught but frightened boys. They don’t know what I do.”

“Which is?”

“That in the body of a wee blond spitfire lies the heart of a warrior.”

Just then, hearing his conviction, I felt that warrior’s heart. In Carden’s words, I heard how he’d once had a mother, a sister. Aunts and grandmothers whom he’d honored.

Someday I’d ask him for his history, but I didn’t think he was ready to tell me, not yet. And I wasn’t ready, either. Because somewhere in his stories, I imagined how a girl might find love for a vampire. And that was something I definitely wasn’t prepared for.

“D
on’t worry.” I gave my friend an uneasy smile. It was surely the strangest prefight march this island had ever seen—two competitors, about to fight to the death, clinging together like they were each other’s life raft. “It’ll be just like in
Star Trek
.”

“What do you mean?” Emma asked nervously. “I don’t understand.”

She sounded nervous, and I chattered in an attempt to calm her. “You know, like Spock. You hit the right pressure point, and
boom
—I’m out cold.” She still looked blank, so I said, “You didn’t watch
Star Trek
, did you?”

She shook her head.

“Of course you didn’t.”

“But I know what to do. I grip your neck.”

“No, you’ll
pinch
my neck. There are two carotid arteries, one on each side. Doubles your chances, right? Pinch, and I’ll black out.”

“What if you don’t wake up?”

“Just don’t hold on too long. If you let go in time, I’ll be fine.” I gave a brittle laugh. “Several thousand brain cells short, but alive.” What I didn’t mention was that it could also stop my heart, send me into shock, and kill me. But I pictured Carden, remembered his words.
I will not watch you die.
I gave her an encouraging smile. “Seriously. Don’t worry about me. I’ll be fine. Just make it look convincing.”

“Convincing.” She nodded solemnly. “I can do that.”

We’d reached the gymnasium, and I could hear a commotion inside. A crowd had gathered already.

We stopped and locked eyes. We’d been distant lately, but it hadn’t been because we were mad at each other. It was purely due to circumstances—class schedules for one, though Yasuo was the biggest reason. Him, and Carden, too. She’d been enjoying having a secret boyfriend, while I’d been in my own weird world. But I
knew
Emma. Emma was my friend. We’d get through this.

She held out her pinky. “Friends forever?”

“Forever,” I agreed, twining my little finger with hers. “Pinky swear.”

I opened the door for us, and the shouts and taunts of the crowd swelled—mostly girl voices. Neither of us had many friends in the audience. It girded me. I needed to do this, to fake my own death, to save Emma.

“Ladies,” Alcántara greeted us from his perch outside the ring.

The crowd hushed as we climbed in between the ropes. I caught Emma’s eye. We were together. We could do this.

“Two girls in,” he announced like a boxing emcee. “One out.”

We went to opposite corners of the ring and stood there unmoving, staring silently at each other.
Friends forever.

He tipped his head toward us in a dramatically somber gesture. “Commence.”

Emma slid her Buck knife from a holster at the back of her belt. It was thick and serrated, and just seeing it gave me a shudder. She gave me an apologetic shrug.

I flexed my foot, feeling the stars in my boots. I bent to pull one out. My aim would need to be better than ever—not in an effort to kill my friend, but rather to make sure I
didn’t
kill her.

I stepped forward and gave her a small, reassuring smile. We’d agreed we had to make it look convincing before she pinned and pretend-killed me. Which meant we’d have to draw some blood. I just hoped that, when the time came, she remembered not to twist that knife.

She advanced a few steps, looking reluctant to leave her corner. As she moved, the gym’s overhead lights gleamed white on her wide blade. She might’ve been unwilling, but there was nothing uncertain about the sharpness of that steel.