One With the Shadows (35 page)

“Went away … where?” The skeptic in her readied itself for the reply.

“One can only guess.” He looked up at the stars, cold and glittering, with speculation in his eyes. “But the legend says they left from this desert. And the one remaining built a temple in the rose-colored stone of a chasm wall, where he could wait for them to return. He supposedly built a signal so they could find him again, a pulsing fountain of … jewels that sent out light and energy.”

Kate frowned. “And these stones are from his signal?”

“I think they are.”

A signal built of jewels? Hardly. She was breathing hard from struggling through the sand that rose ever higher in the ravine. Still … she had seen such a fountain in her vision of the place … “So Rufford says this was true?” Rufford didn’t seem like one to tell wild tales.

“Yes. He found the temple.”

“And the mummy of the one who was left behind?” Like Egypt and the pyramids. All this was really just conjecture on Rufford’s part. There was no way to know the tale.

“Oh, the Old One was still very much alive, waiting in the temple.”

Kate blinked. My God—for … for ten thousand years? Impossible. Would Rufford lie?

“His blood is very strong. He gave Rufford a cup of it so Rufford could best Asharti.”

No. She couldn’t imagine Rufford lying. The unbearable sadness of being the last, left behind, waiting, struck her. “How … horrible.” She wished Rufford’s story wasn’t true. Maybe he was just … wrong. But Rufford did not seem easily deluded either.

They turned another corner in the chasm. The walls were perhaps only twenty feet above the sand that filled it. And there, in the side of the wall, were … were stairs. There was no other word for them. They were cut out of solid rock, even, flat, smooth. They couldn’t be natural. But they were unnatural in another way as well. The risers of these stone stairs must be more than three feet high. What kind of creature used stairs like that? A giant, or …

Gian stopped behind her, staring.

This changed everything.

“So … so what happened to this temple?” she asked.

“The Old One destroyed it. Rufford said there was some kind of vortex inside and … it just exploded and buried the entire place.” He looked around at the sand. “Hold out a stone.”

They were walking over who knew what, right this very minute. The thought made her want to shudder. She retrieved the ruby and held it tightly so it wouldn’t escape. This time her arms shot out, pointing along the ravine. “Very well. We’re not there yet.”

They stumbled on through the deep sand again, ever upward until the walls of the chasm were no higher than their heads. The walls opened out onto a wide, sand plateau.

And there, ahead, was a striped tent, flags at each corner fluttering in the sirocco. Was it red and gold? She couldn’t quite tell because the moonlight leached the color from it. One thing was not in doubt. This was the tent she had seen when she looked into the ruby. Four camels nestled in the sand to one side. Gian and Kate went still.

The tent flap opened and out stepped Elyta, followed by Illya, Federico, Sergei, and another. The air hummed with energy. They did not have red eyes, but Kate knew they could bring up their power in an instant, and that they would be too much for Gian, even if he was not still depleted from their previous cruelties.

“Welcome, Urbano, and your little scarred friend too.” Elyta motioned the others forward. They positioned themselves around Gian and Kate. “I’ve been waiting for days.”

“How did you get here before us?” The muscles in Gian’s jaw bunched.

“She told me you were taking the stones home. That could only mean to the temple. You did not know its location, so you would go to Rufford in Algiers. Therefore, we sailed on west and landed at Oran. We came up northeast as you were trekking down.”

She strolled forward, the aubergine of her translucent robes ruffling in the breeze. They were lined with thin gold braid, and she had gold loops in her ears and a chain laced with gold beads across her forehead. She looked every inch the Berber princess, except for her milky skin. “Now,” she said to Gian, “give me the stones.” She held out a long-nailed hand.

“You can have them, Elyta,” Gian growled. “And me. Just let Kate go.”

No, she wanted to shout.
You can’t give them to her after all we’ve done to keep them from her
. Maybe he was buying time. She could see he hadn’t given up. His eyes flashed, not with red, but with a glint of anger.

Elyta’s glance flicked to Kate. “How touching. But she has her uses too. You both do.” Kate saw her eyes go red as she stared at Gian. “The stones.”

Elyta would soon realize Kate had them. They were right back where they had been in the Villa Rufolo. Kate felt power hanging in the air until it pressed down on her chest and made it difficult to breathe. Was it Elyta’s power? The stones, in the bag over her shoulder, trembled.

Elyta felt the stones’ reaction shimmer through the power in the air. She turned her head, her eyes now carmine red. “So you have the stones,” she whispered. Her hand caught at the bag.

Gian glared at her. “If you mean to take the stones away from this place, I wouldn’t.”

Elyta tore open the leather pouch and cupped the little boxes in her hands. She opened one. The emerald. Kate could see it winking in reflected moonlight. It trembled in the velvet lining. “Of course I mean to take them away. What good would they do me here?” Elyta snapped the box shut, grinning. “Bring these two along.” She rounded on Gian. “You make any trouble, and I’ll give you a session with the stones. Illya, Federico, break camp. Sergei, keep your eyes on Urbano. You can handle him easily in his condition. And confiscate that horse.”

Kate wanted to shriek and just run back down the ravine. But she wouldn’t leave Gian. The two took Gian’s faithful dapple-gray. Elyta was muttering, half to herself. “I’ll use you hard, Urbano, and maybe your little scarred friend as well. I’ve a taste for a woman once in a while.” She opened up the mahogany box. “We’ll have a lovely time all round.”

Kate glanced to Gian. She could see the muscles in his jaw working. In fact, he clenched his fists. The muscles stood out in his neck.
Just bide your time,
she wanted to say.
We’ll escape her again, you’ll see.
But he didn’t look patient. He looked … furious.

Elyta chuckled in glee, standing in front of the tent as the vampires worked around her. The ruby glistened in its nest. “Oh, dear me, but you will make me powerful, probably even beyond my dreams. And I can dream a lot of power.”

Indeed, power seemed to be ramping up in the air around them, even though the two vampires who were striking camp were not using theirs. The air began to vibrate. Elyta didn’t seem to notice. She opened up the silver filigree box, cooing to the emerald that lay inside. She had a box in each hand now. “You’re going to France, my darlings.”

The wind rose up in a gust from the ravine, swirling sand around their feet. Kate couldn’t take her eyes off Gian. He was staring at Elyta. And as she watched, his eyes turned red. Not the faint rose she had seen in the chapel, but carmine, deepening into burgundy. What was happening here? Had he gotten his power back? There was actually a humming sound in the air now. A gust of wind, harder this time, took the tent right out of the hands of the vampires who were folding it. Camels brayed in protest, tugging at the lead ropes that tethered them to stakes.

Elyta looked up, puzzled.

And the stones bounced out of their boxes to lie in the sand, perhaps six feet from where she stood. She gave a little cry and sprang forward.

As Kate watched, the stones simply …
sank
into the sand. One moment they were there, and the next moment there was just a little vortex like you would see in the top of an hourglass as it was turned and the sand leaked into the bottom half. Elyta threw herself on her hands and knees, digging at the vortex frantically. It widened.

The wind began to howl around them.

“Elyta!” Gian shouted. The sound reverberated in Kate’s chest and echoed through the wind, as though the wind itself spoke through him. “Leave them! They belong here.”

Elyta glanced up. The wind caught at her hair and whirled it around her face. Her eyes, too, went red. Carmine deepened into burgundy. Could Gian stand against her? He stood there, immobile. The wind shrieked. Was it another sandstorm?

“I’ll get them back, Urbano, if I have to dig out this entire chasm!” Elyta would never give up, never let the stones go, or Gian and Kate either.

Gian screamed in rage and frustration. The sound was torn from his belly and carried away in the wind and the sand. Veins stood out in his neck.

Elyta’s dress bloomed flame. It licked up her body and raced toward her hair. She screamed, but already her head wore a corona of fire. The wind tore at the flame and she was engulfed. The sand funnel reached Elyta’s knees. The other vampires stared, transfixed. Gian slumped, breathing hard, then grabbed Kate and pulled her back, shouting something. Kate couldn’t hear it in the wind that raged now around them. Elyta’s features blackened. The O of her shrieking mouth was the only thing visible through the flame. Kate covered her own mouth in horror.

The sand was whirling around in the wind, but it seemed to be coming up from the vortex too. Kate could hardly see Elyta. There was only a gleam of flame in the whirl of sand. She turned to the other vampires. They were dim shapes behind the gray of a sandstorm at night.

The flames that were Elyta sank slowly into the vortex. The only shrieking Kate could hear was the wind and the sand. Gian had hold of her hand and was pulling her away. The image of Elyta’s burning face twined through her mind and wouldn’t let her go.

They bumped smack into something. Gian was shouting. She looked back, and there through the dim haze of sand was a vortex of black where the tent had once been, whirling up into the sky in a widening funnel. He pulled her to her knees and put his arms around her. His burnoose sheltered her from the hissing sting of the sand. The something was a warm wall against her cheek. Gian bent over her. The wind wailed.

It went on forever.

Until it stopped. Suddenly. Without warning, the wind went silent. Gian straightened. Kate looked up. The sand just fell, hissing, from the night sky, leaving a dusty haze behind it.

And that was all.

They were leaning up against the horse’s shoulder. It lay with its legs tucked under it. Gian had covered its head with his left arm and the baggy burnoose had shielded the creature’s eyes and nose, just as his right arm had protected her. The plateau was wiped clean, as though the tent and the vampires and the camels had never been.

She knelt there, stunned. Her senses refused to register the last—what? Moments? Millennia? Gian was blinking with an expression she imagined mirrored hers.

“What … what happened here?” she croaked.

“I … I set Elyta on fire.”

His anger
did
fuel spontaneous combustion. She blinked. “You got your power back.”

He blinked again. “No … not exactly. I used the power already in the air.”

“At least she’s dead.”

How could he look uncertain? “Decapitation is the only way to kill us.”

Her eyes widened. If Elyta wasn’t dead, then she was burned and suffocating below the sand. Not something Kate wanted to think about. “What … what happened to the stones?”

“I … think … they went home.” His voice was shattered with screaming into the wind.

“But … why are we still here?”

“Because we scrambled out of the way of the vortex?” He didn’t sound sure.

“Or because we were the ones that brought them home, and Elyta wanted to take them away.” She couldn’t believe she was saying that. But she wasn’t sure what to believe anymore.

The world holds vampires and spontaneous combustion, and maybe, somewhere beneath your feet, a buried temple, and one entombed alive there, waiting with a tower of coruscating jewels to signal those who left him ten thousand years ago to go to someplace … else
.

She started to argue with herself.

Or maybe not. Maybe there was a sandstorm that created a vortex that sucked everything in sight under the sand and it was all just an accident of fate that left some alive, and some suffocated under tons of sand
.

And what about Elyta being set on fire?

You can’t believe that someone can set things on fire just by being angry. Stupid!

The dialogue between her two halves threatened to tear her apart. She tried to remember that girl who didn’t believe anything but what she could see, who thought people didn’t do anything but what was in their own best interest. Gian had been willing to sacrifice himself to his duty. As a matter of fact, he had offered to sacrifice himself to Elyta to save Kate just moments ago. She’d once thought him selfish and arrogant, but that had never been true about him, though it might well be true about her.

She looked down and saw her reticule still bulging, incongruous, in the pocket of her flowing trousers with her tarot cards, so much a part of her for so long, bulging, square, inside. These were who she was, she reminded herself. A charlatan, self-contained. The cards were only cues about what people wanted to hear, guideposts to the psyche’s need to believe. One couldn’t know the future.

Except that she did, and it had nothing to do with tarot cards. She didn’t know what to believe right now, but the tarot cards seemed to lie when they promised her, as they always had, that anyone who believed what they couldn’t see was a pigeon, ripe for the plucking.

Gian heaved himself to his feet and stretched out a hand to help her. The horse shook, spewing sand, and got his forelegs under himself. She and the horse stood together.

The sand had settled around them, leaving the small, cold moon a silver coin in the sky. The stars hadn’t yet appeared out of the haze of dust. But they would. The world was wiped clean, as if Elyta and the stones had never been.

She looked at Gian. He was gazing around, disoriented, and then his eyes found hers. He blinked several times. She saw the purpose rise in them like a tide.