Fearless (The Blue Fire Saga) (21 page)

Leesa frowned
, remembering the underground rumblings a short while ago
.
She wondered if Dominic had seen that in his dream.

“
I
thought
my magic was coming more easily
because there was so much magical volkaane energy
here.”

“I think that might
part of it,
but not all of it,
” Dominic replied. “It may also be the reason these ancient powers don’t sleep completely there.
Destiratu
may
be playing a role
as well
.”

Leesa tried to make sense of what Dominic was telling her.
“What will happen if these powers, whatever they are,
fully
awaken?”

“
My dream did not show me that—only that
the result could be deadly. We cannot risk it.
There are enough unknowns at play already.
You need to return home immediately.”

“
Rave brought me
here because the black waziri were prowling around campus,” Leesa told him. “They even sent some zombies into my dorm. Not to my floor, though,” she added, not wanting to worry him. “Rave and his friends took care of them without magic.”

Dominic was si
lent for a moment. “I think my renegade brethren
were probably
trying to
provoke some reaction
with the zombies
, be
cause I used my magic near your dorm
. The danger is gone
, though—f
or
now, at least. I can sense
that
all three
of them
are closer to me than to you
.
”

Leesa was glad to hear
that
the black waziri
were gone, but
not that they were getting closer to Dominic.

“How close
to you are they
?”
she
asked worriedly.

“
Not close enough to be an immediate threat, but one
of them
is
near
enough that I need to get moving. I’ve been zigzagging about this city
all day
on buses and in taxis, hoping to make our foes
think there might be
some reason I’m here, and that there was nothing really special about Connecticut.”

“Go, then,” Leesa said
, sensing the urgency in Dominic’s voice
. “Don’t worry about me. I’ll have Rave take me home as soon as we hang up. Please be careful.”

“I will
. Good-bye for now, Leesa. I do
n’
t know when I’ll be able to check in on you again.”

“Good-bye,” Leesa said, but Dominic had already hung up. She turned to Rave. “You heard all that?”

Rave nodded. “Yes. I’ll take you home as soon as you gather up your things. Then I need to come back here and tell the Council of Elders what Domin
ic said. I’m not sure if there’
s anything we can do about the powers he mentioned, but we need to discuss it, at least.”

Leesa didn’t like hearing that Rave would be leaving as soon as he got her back, but she unde
rstood why he had to return home
.

“
Okay,
”
she said as she
began stuffing her clothes into her backpack. She was disappointed
at having
to leave—she’d planned to stay through the weekend before returning to school. At least
Dominic had assured her that
the blac
k wizards were gone
.
That was certainly good news. She prayed that
he
would be able to continue to avoid them, and that the
Moodus
Noises, whatever they were, would go back to sleep.

15
.
STRANGE STIRRINGS

D
eep in the
bowels of the grotto
that served as home to the three-score vampires
of
the Connecticut coven,
the vampire Marcio
paced back and forth, trying
to ignore the unsettling pull that had been stealing over him for the past few days. The caverns, which had been cut beneath the hills just east of the Connecticut River by an ancient underground river that had long since vanished, consisted of four levels and dozens of chambers of varying sizes. For centuries, the vampires had been shaping the place to suit their needs.

Marcio had been
a
vampire for almost
four hundred year
s. He had been transformed in his early twenties back in Italy, and for several centuries
had been content to hunt the Italian countryside, with occasional forays
into the neighboring countries to the
north.
He had come to America e
arly in the twentieth century
when a need for adventure caused him to take passage
aboard the ill-fated
Titanic.
When the ship went down, he simply swam west
until he reached land
.
He had roamed New England alone for a few decades before falling in with the coven
just after World War Two, when America’s increased military might and
widespread ownership of modern
weapons created a greater need for the safety a
nd security of a group and a place to hide
.

Marcio
was one o
f the more experienced and
powerful members of the coven. Not one of the High Council,
but not far below them in strength
.
As such, h
e should not be so troubled by this strange, unfamiliar urge, but he was. At first, he thought it was simply
Destiratu
fanning his blood thirst, so yesterday
he had
visited
the human feeder he kept chained in
the lowest levels of the cavern. To avoid drawing attention to their existence by constant killings, many of the coven’s vampires kept a human captive as a living blood bank. Others fed mainly on animal blood. Marcio had drunk his fill from his feeder, but
he
r
blood had done nothing to quiet the
strange
feeling
creeping over him
.
The pull
was akin to an urge to hunt, yet
it
was
unlike any hunting urge he had ever felt.
Even more troubling was that the pull
kept getting stronger.

Finally, he decided to fight it no longe
r. He would give himself over to the feeling
and see where it took him. To leave the caverns in these dangerous days required
getting
two more vampires to accompany him.
Unsure exactly what to expect on his foray outside, h
e wanted companions who were
powerful and who
might be willing to bend some of the strictures the Council had put in place
—or
at least overlook it if he did
so
. He
knew exactly who to
approach.

Marcio spun on his heels and headed out into the passageway.
He strode up one level
and stopped outside the entrance to the
chamber
he wanted
. As he hoped,
Dara and Genevieve were inside.

Their chamber was furnished and decorated much more lavishly than any oth
er in the caverns. A large four-
poster bed covered by a black lace
canopy dominated the space. There was also a scallop-backed couch upholstered in
blood
red
leather
against one wall
.
Behind the couch, t
hick velour curtains
fas
hioned of matching
red cloth covered
the
wall, giving the impressi
on there was a window
there
rather than
merely more
rough
stone. The
plush, exotic
décor suited the chamber’s
two
occupants perfectly.

Genevieve lay
stretched out on her back
on the couch
,
her feet
resting
in
Dara’s
lap
. She looked
totally relaxed
while
Dara
gently scrubbed her feet with a pumice stone. Genevieve was wearing an ornate black silk robe embossed with gold trim. Her
shiny black hair
was pinned atop her head. Dara was dressed in a ti
ght black dress that resembled
a
soft
corset. Her long brown hair hung loose over her shoulders. Marcio had never known two vampires who were more comfortable with each other. Genevieve was the domin
ant and more powerful of the pair
, but Dara was strong in her own right.

The two
had
been
together even before they became vampires, working
as a pair in
an
exclusive Paris
ian brothel
.
One night, a particularly seductive
performance
had
caused a vampire client to lose control
.
He quickly drained them of their blood and turned them vampire.
Not long after
, Genevieve drove a wooden
stake through his chest
while Dara distracted him
. They
fled Europe before the vampire’s comrades could find them.