Hunter's Rise (31 page)

The words, so flatly spoken, ripped a hole in him. Crossing the room to stand near her, he pulled her back against his body and pressed his mouth to her ear. “Syl… you’re not a monster.”

“You don’t know what he made me do.” Sylvia bowed her head, staring at the floor. “You don’t know what I
let
myself do…”

Was it any worse than what
he
would have done? he wondered.

“I was a teenager when I was bitten.” He turned her around and lifted her chin, stared into her eyes as he spoke. “Five weres attacked me.”

In the mirror, he saw her blink, watched as her face went blank, then watched as understanding bled into her eyes. “Did you say
five
weres?”

“Yeah. Five. They left me dead in an alley, my head split— brain scrambled.” He shrugged and added, “The years before that are lost to me. I don’t know who I was. What I was. If I had family… none of it. The woman who found me was a Hunter. And the first thing I did after she saved my life, nursed me through the fever, all of that…? I tried to rip her throat out.”

“Five—” She shook her head, her tone faint. “I didn’t think it was possible to survive if more than a couple bit you. The virus is too high.”

“If I hadn’t had pretty much the strongest healer around on hand to nurse me through it, I wouldn’t have made it.” He shrugged. “And when the fevers got bad, she was still there. When I almost went mad from it all and tried to eat her? She was still there.”

“You tried to eat her.”

He grimaced. “It was driving me mad— the hunger, the need for meat. That was what she was— I looked at her and saw meat. It lasted for months. And she stayed with me anyway. And then one day… it was easier, I could breathe, I could think. The next day, it got better, and then the next…”

He shrugged, staring at the wall past her shoulder without seeing it. “Eventually the good days outweighed the bad and I no longer looked at every breathing thing as a possible meal. I could control the hunger. But if it wasn’t for Nessa, I wouldn’t have pulled through. I was on the edge of turning feral— the madness was trying to eat me up inside from almost the minute I was attacked. If she hadn’t been there to help me through it, I would have been put down.” He reached up and touched her cheek, stroking the pads of his fingers along the soft, silken skin. “You didn’t have anybody there to guide you— you were locked up, made a prisoner, tortured… and you pulled through sane. You’re not a monster, baby.”

N

She wanted to believe that.

But she couldn’t.

Curling her lip at him, she knocked his hand away and turned back to the mirror. “You pulled through because you’re destined to be a tried-and-true do-gooder. That’s why you pulled through, Hunter. Me? It was just luck, but that doesn’t mean I’m not a monster.” In the mirror’s reflection, she met his gaze and asked softly, “What if I told you I’d killed a child? If I told you that my maker threw some poor, stupid kid in there and I killed him? Would you still say I’m not a monster?”

“I’d say it’s a miracle you didn’t snap completely— he’d starved you.” Toronto shrugged. “Then I’d ask if he’d made the child bleed first— if he’d pushed you to bloodlust first, all he did was aim a pointed gun and pull the trigger. He made you into a weapon and used it. You stopped giving him control all those years ago. Don’t give it back, not even to a memory.”

She stared at him. “Didn’t you hear me?” she demanded. “I killed a child! Fuck, you’re a Hunter, you ought to just kill me
now
.”

“I heard you.” He came up and dipped his head, murmured in her ear, “You’re not the first vamp who was pushed
into bloodlust. The question is this… did you learn to control it? Yes. You did. So you can’t be controlled anymore. Will you let that bloodlust control you again? I think the answer is no. We don’t kill because of one
break
, especially when somebody was tortured. We go after killers, monsters and murderers. We don’t go after victims, unless the victims have become monsters themselves.”

He nudged her aside and started poking around the mirror. “Since you’re feeling sorry for yourself, I’ll go downstairs and look around. Then I’m heading out. I’ve got an idea of where we need to go now.”

F

She watched, her jaw hanging open, as he fiddled around with the mirror. “Jackass,” she muttered. “I’ll do it. You’re not even clo—”

The door opened with a whisper.

As he shot her a look, she glared at him and then pushed past him. “I’ll have you know, I’m
not
feeling sorry for myself.”

Jerk. Who in the hell did he think he was?

That burn of anger managed to carry her all the way down the stairs. But once she reached the lower floor, she froze. Cells. Rows of them. Each one not much bigger than a closet… and each one had bars in place of a door. “I guess he’s into the retro look,” she said quietly.

“Looks like a dungeon.”

“It is.” She closed her eyes, recalling the endless nights, the hunger, the pain. “It looks like the place where I was made. It was a dungeon as well. Although sometimes I was certain it would be my crypt.”

“It wasn’t. This one won’t be.” He stroked a hand over her shoulder and then surveyed the room. “And I can make sure of that. I’m going to have the place torched.”

“Torched?”

“Yeah.” He paced around, eyes half-closed, as he breathed the air in. “People died here. He brought victims here, bled
them, killed them… and he made a vampire here, too. You smell that?”

“So you’re burning it.”

“Not me. That would be too fucking dangerous. I’ll have the Council send a witch, somebody who can bring the fire, then shut it down before it spreads past the house. Whoever built this place won’t ever use it again.” He turned and looked at her. “So get what you need from here— look around, if you need closure. Hell, if you want to trash the place or go punch that fucking mirror, do it. Do it fast. We need to get on the road.”

She clenched her jaw, tempted to tell him to shove it. What if she needed more time?

We don’t have time…

Taking a deep breath, she turned and studied each cell, walked in front of them. There— she smelled that faint scent. Death, then the faintly stronger scent of vampire. The second vampire she’d smelled earlier. She hadn’t caught that. Yeah, a new vampire— she could still smell the scent of him as a mortal.

“While I’m totally flattered that this has you so hot under the collar, have you forgotten we have a monster to catch?” she asked him as she finished her circuit around the room, coming to a halt in front of him.

“No.” Stroking his hands down her shoulders, he lowered his head, pressed his brow to hers. “There’s a connection between all of this… Angel wouldn’t have brought you here if there wasn’t. She wants Pulaski found, the same as we do. And I was already thinking there was a connection.”

She frowned and looked back around the cell. “A connection between this place and Pulaski?” What in the hell was he… wait. Shit.
No.
Shit. Staring at the cell, she whispered, “Can you tell how long ago the vampire was made here?”

“Not long. No more than a month, I don’t think.”

She met his eyes.

“Right about when Pulaski went missing.” She closed her eyes. The ankle bracelet had been found broken…“A vampire could easily break the ankle bracelet they put on him.”

“Yes.”

“Shit.” The monster that was her fury started to roar inside her head as she thought about what vampirism could do to somebody who was already a monster. Already terrible and perverse. “If he was made into a vampire…”

“Then we find him and kill him.” Toronto lifted a brow. “That’s all there is to it. You wanted him dead anyway— this just makes it that much more urgent. We need to go. Are you done?”

With the bitter wave of fury and fear riding her, she turned in a slow circle, studying the underground room. It would have been hell, she knew. People would have died here, knowing this was the last thing they’d see— that nobody was coming for them, that nobody would save them.

“Angel said there was something here I needed to see. I don’t know if this is it, or if there’s more.” Stopping, she stared toward the cell where the vamp had been made. “All I’m finding are bad memories. I don’t see anything that will help me find Pulaski.”

She didn’t tell you that you’d find Pulaski
, something inside her whispered.
She just said you’d find something
…

Yeah. She’d found something all right. A reminder of hell on earth. Setting her jaw, she turned to look at Toronto. He wasn’t looking at her, though. He was staring off at nothing in particular, a distant look on his face.

“Don’t worry. I already know where to look.”

S

Rolling off the bed, she landed in a crouch. A bed— wait, what? She hadn’t fallen asleep on a bed— she’d fallen asleep next to one, shielded from the rays of light that might come in through the curtains.

What the hell? Fuck it. She already had a blade in her hand and was staring around, trying to get her bearings.

The bed made sense— she was in a hotel room. And it definitely wasn’t the hotel she’d fallen asleep in earlier. It was nicer, for one. And cleaner. Newer.
Louder
—

It had that fake rustic thing going and was a little nicer than some, but still a hotel room. And the screaming was coming from just outside the windows. Unconsciously, a snarl pulled her lips back from her teeth and her fangs slid down. Rising, she made her way to the windows. Faint light streamed in from underneath, but it was faint. Her internal clock told her that it was still day. The sun was still up, although not for long.

Easing the curtain aside, she flinched as she saw the light pouring in through skylights. Her eyes watered at the
brightness, but it was indirect— she could do indirect light. What in the world…

Suddenly, the screams made sense.

Screams. Laughter. The air was heavy with the scent of chlorine, burgers, pizza.

A water park. Somehow, Toronto had managed to get her to one of those weird water-park hotels. With a frown, she turned back and studied the room. The only windows were the ones at her back, opening up not to the outside where direct sunlight could pour into the room and leave her with a nice, crispy burn, but to the water park. No direct sunlight.

She didn’t remember getting here, but she wouldn’t.

They’d stopped driving about twenty minutes before dawn. It had been one of those little cheap, roadside motels, the kind of place she hated and tried to avoid, because she was never sure she’d be safe there.

But she’d been fine staying there with him. Because she knew she
was
safe with him.

She checked the time. It was after seven. She didn’t have that weird, unsettled feeling that she sometimes had when her sleep had been disturbed or when she hadn’t been able to settle for fear of the sun.

Hearing something at the door, she turned just as he opened it. In one hand, he held a box of pizza. She eyed the pizza enviously. Those things always smelled so good. She could swipe a small taste of the sauce, but anything more than that would make her sick.

He lifted a brow at her. “You’re awake.”

“Nah. Just sleepwalking. Dreaming about pizza and big hotels. Because I’m pretty sure I went to sleep in a rinky-dink one.” Spying the water on the table tucked up against one wall, she went and grabbed herself a bottle. She needed to feed. Water would help the thirst, but she really needed to feed.

She barely managed to twist the cap off before he was there.

“You probably need to feed, don’t you?”

Wrinkling her nose, she brushed around him. “I’m pretty sure mind reading is a vampire thing, not a wolf thing.”