Daylighters (28 page)

Michael raised his left arm to protect his throat as Shane lunged for it, and Shane’s teeth bit into his flesh in a violent blur.

Oliver was already in motion. He took a standing leap from halfway across the room, landed on the table, and launched himself like an arrow straight for Shane. He ripped him away from Michael, spun him, and slammed him down. Then he held him there, flat on the floor, as Shane shredded the linoleum with his claws.

“As ever,” Oliver said, “I am at your service, Founder.”

“I know.” There was a shadow of a smile in Amelie’s eyes, and no trace of fear. “Michael?”

“I’m okay,” he said, but it was just an automatic response, not true at all. His arm was bloody, and Eve was already beside him and helping to brace him as he staggered. She grabbed a chair and got him safely into it, and quickly stripped off her hoodie to wrap it around his bitten arm.

On the floor a few feet away, Shane was still changing, triggered by Amelie’s presence. “He’ll need to be locked away,” Amelie said.

“No, you can’t—,” Claire blurted, and even as she said it she knew Amelie was right. Still, it felt wrong. Sick. Horrible. But Shane was dangerous, obviously; he’d hurt Michael, and Michael wasn’t a vampire anymore; he’d just been in the way. He’d have done the same to anyone.

“I don’t think you’d want me to reconsider,” Amelie said, “since the alternative would be to put the boy down, and neither of us wants that.”

“Speak for yourself,” Oliver grumbled, and had to put a quelling hand flat on Shane’s shoulder blades to keep him from pushing up. He was, Claire realized, still changing, his body contorting into a new, horrific shape. “Down, boy. Stay down.”

“Don’t hurt him!”

“Then I need something to tame him,” Oliver said, ignoring her completely. “Quickly, please. He’s strong.”

Mrs. Grant was walking toward them, unsnapping an old-fashioned doctor’s bag—Theo Goldman’s, Claire was surprised to see. She remembered that bag. It even had the vampire doctor’s initials on it in faded gold. “Wait, what are you doing?” Claire said. She didn’t remember moving, but she was clutching the edge of a table now. “Shane, don’t fight! Please!” Mrs. Grant set the bag down and took out an ancient-looking syringe with a hideously long needle.

She caught her breath as Mrs. Grant, with a decisive thrust, stuck the needle into Shane’s back. He let out a howl—an actual howl, pure and shivery—and Amelie herself bent a knee to help hold Shane down as Mrs. Grant depressed the plunger, emptying the contents of the syringe into him.

“Get back,” Oliver snapped. The librarian capped the syringe and put it in Theo’s bag before she retreated, leaving the two vampires to handle Shane as he continued to thrash and struggle for freedom. He was growling now, a low and vicious sound that made Claire feel short of breath.

And then his growling turned to a pained, puzzled whimper, and faded into panting.

Claire gasped and lunged to where Amelie and Oliver were still holding Shane—what Shane had
become
—down. He didn’t look human at all now. He looked more like a black dog, massive and terrifying, with those eerie inhuman eyes staring blearily up at her.

“Muscle relaxer,” Mrs. Grant said. “It should hold him for a bit, but in my experience, with vampires at least, it doesn’t last long. So we’d better find out what we’re dealing with. From the looks of him, there’s no place we can lock him up here that he won’t break through.”

“Oh, I’ve seen something like this before,” Morley said. He was still sitting on the edge of a table, looking mildly surprised but not alarmed. “Ages ago. An alchemist turned someone into a wolf, one of those elaborate demonstrations so popular back in the day.”

“Did he turn him back?” Claire asked.

“Wolves weren’t terribly popular back then. He didn’t have the chance.” He stared at Shane thoughtfully for a moment, then moved his gaze to Michael as Mrs. Grant moved toward him with the doctor bag and unwrapped his wounded arm. She had him wiggle his fingers, and seemed satisfied when he was able to do so without much pain. “But it would seem to me that it’s a similar thing to what’s happened to
him
.”

Claire had no idea what he meant, and she couldn’t take it all in; it was too much, too fast, from the warm, romantic moment outside to . . .
this.
“Michael was healed. Whatever this is—it isn’t being healed!”

“Well, it’s an essential change of state. Vampire to human is just as great a change as what’s happened to your dog boy; perhaps whatever cure Fallon forced down young Michael’s throat might work just as well to change your hound back to his proper form, yes?”

That was . . . crazy. Unscientific. It was the kind of thing Myrnin would think of—but what Claire couldn’t shake was how often Myrnin was right in these situations. “But we don’t have any of the cure,” she said. “And even if we did—it kills most of those who get it.”

“Didn’t kill
him
,” Morley said, nodding toward Michael. “His blood still smells rank with whatever he was dosed with. And young Shane has just consumed a mouthful of it.”

It struck Claire, finally, what he was saying, just as it also struck Michael, who met her gaze, looking horrified. “No,” he said. “It can’t work that way.”

“Tell that to him,” Morley said, and pointed at Shane . . . who was changing.

It didn’t happen as quickly as the shift he’d experienced in Amelie’s presence, and Claire recognized, with a sick horror, the silvery glow that played on his skin underneath the matted coat of fur. She’d seen that before, in the vampires who’d been given the cure.

She’d seen it
kill them.

“Get off him!” she screamed to Oliver, and when he didn’t immediately move, she shoved at him. It was about as effective as shoving at a building, but after an eyebrows-raised glance at Amelie, he rose and let her kneel next to Shane’s quivering body.

She wasn’t afraid of Shane, even though she supposed she ought to be; he wasn’t himself—the fact that he’d attacked Michael was proof enough of that. But she couldn’t think about that, couldn’t worry about that.

She was so afraid
for
him.

Within another minute his body had begun to warp back toward human shape. She watched the claws that had pushed out of his fingers turn glassy and brittle, then break off. The fur that had covered him grayed and fell away, leaving silvery, pulsing skin.

He was whimpering under his breath. She shifted him into her lap. He felt hot and clammy, and she could feel his bones moving and shifting under his skin at utterly wrong, sickening angles . . . until they were right again.

He opened his eyes, took in a slow, deep breath, and said, in a rough but recognizable voice, “Claire?” His eyes were brown again. Human. “Sorry.” He swallowed hard, and she saw that the silvery glow was fading from his skin. “Sorry.” His eyes drifted shut again, as if he was too tired to keep them open.

“No,” she said, and shook him. “No, stay awake! Shane,
stay awake
!”

His eyes opened again, and he blinked and focused on her face. “Tired,” he said. “Hey, did somebody drug me? I feel drugged.” He sounded out of it, too, but peaceful. She checked his pulse. It was slow and steady. His skin had taken on its more usual color, an even, smooth tan. “Did I hurt somebody?”

She involuntarily looked to where Michael was having his arm looked at by Mrs. Grant; he was pale, but he gave her a thumbs-up. “No,” she lied. “No, everything’s okay. You’re okay.”

“Did I turn into a hellhound again? Damn. That’s embarrassing.”

“Just rest.” She kissed his forehead gently. “Rest.” She was afraid to see his eyes close, but he was too high on muscle relaxers to stay awake. His temperature felt . . . normal. And his pulse strong.

“What the hell was in that shot?” He sounded blurred and sleepy now. “Wow. Party drugs. Got any more? Ow.” He raised his arm and looked at it; the bite mark was almost gone, reduced to twisted scar tissue. “That still hurts. Feels like I burned it. You’re pretty, did you know that?” He gave Claire a sweet, sloppy smile.

“What
was
in that shot?” Eve asked. “Because you are high as the space shuttle, dude.” She crouched down next to Shane on the other side and helped Claire get him up to his feet. He felt . . . boneless. “Okay, he’s going to be pretty much useless for a while.”

“We’ve got a place you can all rest for the night,” Mrs. Grant said.

“Any idea how long—this—will last?” Claire waved helplessly at Shane, who was staring at his fingers and wiggling them. He looked fascinated.

“A few hours, most likely. Let me get the keys to the guesthouse,” Mrs. Grant said, and disappeared into an office.

“I have to ask,” Michael said. “Did my blood just . . . cure him?”

“Looks like it,” Claire said. “Morley said he could smell the medicine in you. Maybe it counteracted whatever Shane’s infection was.”

“Let’s be clear about this,” Eve said. “My ex-vampire husband just cured your boyfriend of werewolfism with his blood.”

“Seems about right,” Claire said, and almost laughed. “Typical Morganville, right?”

Eve offered her an upraised fist. “Typical Morganville.” They bumped.

Across the room, Oliver ignored them. He sank to one knee and bent his head to Amelie, the same way some ancient nobleman might have bowed to his queen. She silently offered her hand, and he pressed it to his forehead, then his lips. All weirdly formal.

“I’ve twice failed you,” he said.

“You just stopped the boy.”

“That’s not what I meant.”

“I know what you meant, Oliver. You count too many things as failures when they are merely setbacks.” She beckoned him up, and he stood, still intimately close to her. She didn’t seem bothered. “I feel safer with my old enemy beside me.”

“Then you have a plan?”

“
We
have one,” she said, and cut her gaze toward Morley, who gave a theatrical, fussy little bow that was somehow even more antique than the one Oliver had pulled out. “I trust you’ll help.”

“In any way you deem necessary.”

She nodded, stepped even closer, and put her pale hand on his cheek. “Then eat, and rest until morning,” she said. “In the morning, we are taking back our town.”

M
rs. Grant opened up Blacke’s little bed-and-breakfast for them. Basically, it was a four-bedroom house with doors that locked and a self-serve kitchen, located just about a block from the library. Claire’s exhaustion was starting to make the world seem too bright, and when she found herself standing in the kitchen of a strange house, sipping spiced hot chocolate, it seemed a heavenly, strangely unreal experience. Which, she thought as she leaned against the counter, somehow seemed appropriate.

Eve raised her eyebrows as she drained the last of her cocoa. “What?”

“I’m just thinking,” Claire said. “Thinking that maybe Shane—”

“Might relapse or something? Oh, honey, don’t borrow trouble. We’ve got enough here and the interest rates will kill you. Shane’s tough. He’ll be fine.”

“Right,” Claire said softly. “Eve, about what Morley said back there, about the cure . . .”

Eve turned away and rinsed her cup in the sink, but it was more about avoiding eye contact than anything else. “You think there could be side effects? I don’t believe that. I can’t. I got him back, and that’s all I can think about right now, Claire. I’ve got Michael back, the real one, the one I crushed on from the time I was fourteen, the one I fell in love with so hard when I was eighteen. Anything else . . . anything else is something for tomorrow.”

Claire nodded. She understood that, the need to just block everything out and be
still
. Feel as if there was still hope in the world, and love, and a future.

“Go on,” she said, and finished her own drink. The cocoa was having its usual effect, and on top of the general exhaustion she felt almost as warm and fuzzy as if she’d had a shot of Shane’s happy juice. “I know you’re dying to tell him that.”

Eve’s smile lit up the room. The world. “Oh, he knows, if he’s got a brain in his head,” she said. “But I’m definitely looking forward to saying it, anyway.” She grabbed Claire into a hard, firm hug. “Love you, Claire Bear. See you in a few hours.”

“Love you, too,” Claire said. It felt so good, being together again. “Go on. Michael’s waiting.”

Eve’s smile was still warmer than the sun, and the warmth lingered even after she’d left the room.

Claire rinsed her own mug and put it in the dishwasher, then went to the small central bathroom. There were guest soaps and disposable toothbrushes, and she cleaned up as best she could, then took a deep breath and walked down the hall to the room where they’d put Shane.

She was afraid that he’d be worse somehow, but instead, he was lying curled on his side in the center of the king-sized bed, with blankets piled on top, and he was sound asleep. She pulled off her shoes, pants, and hoodie and climbed into bed next to him. He was warm, but not feverishly hot, and as she snuggled close to him he made a pleased noise in the back of his throat and put his arms around her. He didn’t quite wake up, which was good; she was so tired that she wanted to weep, and the feeling of him, the dreamy gentle warmth—that meant more to her just now than anything else in the world.

She curled against him, pulled up the covers, and was asleep in under a minute.

•   •   •

Claire woke up slowly—not in a panic, for a change, not convinced that there were monsters lunging for her from the shadows. Shane had kept all that at bay. The light creeping through the lace curtains wasn’t yet exactly announcing morning, but it was enough to start her lazy climb up toward it. She was still in the same position in which she’d fallen asleep, she realized, except that Shane’s warmth wasn’t next to her anymore.

She rolled over, and saw that the bed was empty.

That drove the lazy good morning feelings away. She sat up, fast. “Shane?”

The door to the room opened, and Shane came in carrying two coffee mugs. He looked pale and tired, but he definitely wasn’t flying high anymore. He sat on the bed cross-legged next to her and passed her a cup—steady enough to not spill a drop of it.

He’d remembered how she liked it, too. “You’re up early,” she said. “How do you feel?”

“Hungover,” he said, and took a deep swallow of his coffee. His eyes shut in pleasure. “Oh, thank God. I was about a million percent caffeine-deficient. Did I say anything embarrassing?”

“You went all hellhound and attacked Amelie in the library.”

“No, really, did I say anything embarrassing?”

“You said I was pretty,” she said, and smiled.

“Well, you are, even with your hair sticking up funny.” He put his cup down and reached over to smooth it down. She looked at his forearm. The bite was now a faded scar, not red at all. “Yeah, I know what happened. I remember biting Mikey. He’s okay, right?”

“He’s okay.”

“It felt—it felt like I was burning up inside. That was his blood, right?”

“The best I can tell, the cure was still in his bloodstream, and it attacked what Fallon had put into you to make you—change. So they kind of canceled each other out.”

“For now,” he said. He picked at a loose thread on the blanket.

“Shane, you’re okay. Really.”

“Sorry. You’re right. Not enough coffee.” He reached for his cup again and took a long gulp, then set it on the bedside table. “How’s yours?”

“The coffee? It’s great.” She kissed him lightly. “Thank you for bringing it.”

“You’re welcome,” he said, and kissed her back. Oh, that was nice.
Really
nice. Claire broke free long enough to put her cup down, before the coffee ended up all over her chest, and leaned into the kiss as if she’d never left it.

“Well,” Shane murmured against her lips, and brushed hair back from her face with warm, lingering touches, “this is nice. I could almost forget we’re about to go to war. Again.”

“Let’s not think about it right now.”

“Okay.” He leaned forward, and she let herself fall back to the soft comfort of the pillows. “Let’s think about something else, like . . . letting the coffee get cold.”

“It’s good coffee.”

“I’ll make more.”

It was a lovely warm hour, sweet and slow and breathtaking, and Claire thought that maybe it was weird how they knew each other so well now, so that every touch was in the right place, the right pressure. It was exciting, but it was also comfortable in ways she could never have imagined, as comfortable as she could have ever been with anyone. No secrets. No shame. Nothing but complete, sweet trust.

Right up until the knock came at the bedroom door.

They were lying in each other’s arms, pleasantly drowsy, but Claire’s eyes flew open at the sound, and so did Shane’s. They hesitated for only a second before they rolled in opposite directions to fish clothes off the floor and start dressing. “Just a sec!” Claire said, and yanked up her pants, then threw on the hoodie over her T-shirt. The
TPU VIPERS
logo on it seemed appropriate this morning. She jammed her feet into her shoes, but as fast as she was, Shane was even faster. He was sitting on the bed calmly sipping coffee when the door banged open.

“Good morning,” he said to Morley, who looked full-on Vampire Western again in his duster, boots, scarf, and hat. “Kind of rude to come in when the lady asks you to wait, isn’t it?”

“My sincere apology,” Morley said, and did a straight-legged bow, whipping off his hat with a flourish. “But we’re about to go retake the town of Morganville, and manners are not my greatest concern. Might you want to join us, or are you, ah, occupied?”

“Is that a choice? Because if so . . .”

“We’re coming,” Claire said. She downed the rest of her coffee—cold, now—and walked over to Morley. “Come on, Shane. Do you really intend to sit this one out?”

“You’re right. There’s a fight, and I’m not in it? That seems wrong.” Shane made sure to finish his coffee. “Okay, let’s do this thing. Wait, what exactly
are
we doing?”

“I have no idea what you’re doing,” Morley said, “but Mrs. Grant is killing Amelie.”

•   •   •

Claire thought it was a flippant, weird thing to say until she saw Amelie lying on the table in the library, not moving, with a silver-coated stake in her heart.

“What are you
doing
?” she blurted, and pushed forward. Michael and Eve were already there, standing together. “What happened?”

“Don’t touch her,” Mrs. Grant warned. “Trust me, we’ve calculated this very carefully.”

“Stabbing her? With
silver
?” Because even Amelie couldn’t resist that poison for long, not in her heart. She had more of a resistance than most of the other vampires Claire had ever seen, but this . . . this was extreme. And extremely dangerous.

Then she saw the symbol on the side of the stake—an etched-in sunrise.

“You’re a Daylighter,” Claire said flatly, and looked around for a weapon. She didn’t see one handy, so she grabbed a chair. It was heavy, but she raised it anyway. “Step away from her.”

“Put that down,” said Oliver, and took the chair from her with one hand. He placed it back at the table, handling it as easily as if it was made out of matchsticks. “It’s an illusion. A carefully crafted one. The stake
is
silver, stolen from the Daylighters; their weapons come loaded with silver nitrate.” She knew that, because she’d seen one buried in Michael’s chest, back in Cambridge. They were designed to deliver a fatal dose of silver when anyone tried to remove them. “We’ve removed the nitrate from this one, and coated the stake with plastic. It’s not toxic to her, but it’s no doubt ridiculously painful. She’s most convincing in her death.”

Amelie opened her eyes. “I can hear you, you know.”

“Yes, I’m well aware,” he said, and however much he liked Amelie—which, Claire thought, was a lot—he also couldn’t resist taking a little bit of pleasure in her discomfort. “Stay quiet. You’re dead.”

“We could always bury this stake in
your
chest, you wretch.”

“I wouldn’t look half so lovely wearing it.”

Morley shook his head impatiently. “Can we please just get on with it? Mrs. Grant and our humans will take Amelie into town and convince Fallon that they will trade her for some righteous revenge upon the vampires he has penned up in that mall. He’ll believe it; the story is more than convincing, considering the havoc Amelie’s blood-father wreaked upon this town. In the wake of last night’s vampire attacks, who better to swell the ranks of the true believers than the residents of a town already savaged by the monsters?” He looked
very
pleased with himself. Disgustingly so.

“I’m so glad you think so, Morley,” Mrs. Grant said. “Because we had a discussion, and we decided to alter the plan a little bit. As an actor, you understand that we need to really sell the concept.” She nodded, and from the shadows behind the bookcases, two men stepped out, both armed with crossbows.

Morley snarled and snapped to the side, and the bolt meant for his heart missed him. Oliver was slower—probably the result of all the terrible things heaped on him for the past few months—and the silver-tipped arrow sliced right into his chest and dropped him where he stood.

But Morley wasn’t going down without a fight. He rounded on Mrs. Grant, roaring in fury, and she calmly brought up the small crossbow she’d held under the table. As he raced toward her, she sighted and fired.

Morley slumped against the table, eyes and mouth wide, and finally collapsed.

I was right,
Claire thought with a jolt of real fear.
They are Daylighters.
But Amelie wasn’t reacting, even though she could have; the fact that she’d been able to talk proved that well enough.

Which meant that it was Amelie’s plan, and had been from the beginning. She just hadn’t told Oliver and Morley how far it would go.

Shane, Eve, and Michael hadn’t moved to protest, probably all for different reasons: Shane because he wasn’t inclined to protest vampires getting shot
ever
, Eve because she was conflicted about Oliver and had never liked Morley, and Michael because . . . well, probably because he’d figured it out the way Claire had.

Mrs. Grant looked at the four of them. “Don’t just stand there, get them on the tables,” she said. She hadn’t
liked
shooting Morley, Claire could see that. “They’re old, but that wasn’t a bug bite. We need to get the coated stakes into them quickly.”

That was a more clinical process than Claire was strictly comfortable with; she helped pull the arrows out, but pushing the stakes in was a lot more quease-inducing, and she let Michael and Shane handle that part. Not that they seemed to take much pleasure in it, either.

Eve just turned her back entirely. “Are we sure this is a good plan?” she asked anxiously. “Because I’m starting to worry. It seems scary.”

“That’s because it is,” Mrs. Grant said. She walked over to the four of them as Michael and Shane rejoined them. “I’ll have to keep an eye on my two gentlemen here to be sure they don’t do something silly like remove the stakes, but I expect this will appeal to Morley’s acting instincts, and Oliver can surely see the advantages. Now, as to the four of you: I’ll need you to put on a show as well.”

“Wh-what kind of show?” Eve asked. She sounded even more doubtful.

“Nothing too difficult, I promise,” Mrs. Grant said. “You simply have to be our prisoners.” She nodded, and more of her Blacke townsfolk moved up, armed not with crossbows this time but with zip ties. “Sorry about this, but we’ll cut you loose when the time comes. Fallon seems to want you all back—especially you, Michael. He seems to think you’re his new poster child for conversion.”

“He’s not wrong,” Michael said. “Feels pretty good, having a heartbeat again. I was resigned to being a vampire, but I’m not going to lie . . . it was a gift I’m not turning down.”

“Me neither,” Eve said. “You don’t have to put us in cuffs. Really. We’ll go along.”

“Okay,” Mrs. Grant said. “I’m going to trust the two of you. Don’t let me down.”

But, Claire noticed, that didn’t seem to include
her
, or Shane, because the next thing she knew, her wrists were being pulled together and zip ties efficiently applied. She exchanged a glance with Shane, but he shrugged. “Got to admit, Fallon wouldn’t buy either one of us as having a change of heart, especially when he realizes I’m not on Team Hellhound anymore. Makes sense. We haven’t exactly made ourselves potential allies of his, have we?”