Shadow's Fall (30 page)

She held on to Stella with one hand and lifted her other arm to her mouth and said into her wristwatch, “Dispatch, I need an ambulance at these coordinates, transport to the Hausmann for two humans, emergency code Alpha Six, authorization Star-three.”

“On its way, Star-three.”

Stella fought to squeeze the woman’s arm to get her attention, but she was too weak. “Please,” she gasped. “Is my friend okay?”

The woman looked over. “She’s breathing. One of my Elite is seeing to her until the medics arrive. Don’t worry, Miss … you’re going to be okay. Help is coming.”

As the world began to go gray and sound became distant and watery, Stella murmured, “Miranda …” and fell forward onto her rescuer, who caught her with strong arms and eased her to the ground.

“What the hell is going on in my city?” David demanded, slamming the car door. “Three attacks in as many days, out in full view of the entire Shadow World?”

Faith walked beside the Prime up the steps to the Hausmann. “Sire, it actually gets worse.”

He paused. “I hate it when you say that.”

“One of the victims … it’s Detective Maguire’s daughter, Stella.”

David let out the breath he’d been holding. “Christ. Has he been notified?”

“He’s already here. The Hausmann contacts APD after every vampire-human incident just to keep open a line of communication, and they gave her ID—Maguire was here in ten minutes. He’s, well, a little upset.”

“Well, no shit, Second,” David said.

The Prime steeled himself for what would no doubt be waiting for them inside the clinic. The receptionist bowed as he passed, headed right into the treatment area, where two of the beds were curtained off. At the foot of one, in a plastic chair, sat the detective, looking pale and anxious … and angry.

“What the hell is going on here, Solomon?” Maguire all but thundered, on his feet the second he saw David. “I thought your job in this city was to keep things like this from happening! I swear to God, if—”

“Sit. Down.”

David fixed his eyes on the detective’s and spoke very calmly; Maguire went white as a sheet and dropped back into the chair without another word.

“Now, tell me what happened,” David instructed.

Maguire swallowed hard and coughed.

“Jackie,” David said, catching the head nurse as she walked by, “would you have a coffee brought in for the detective?”

“Yes, Sire, right away,” Jackie said with her infectious grin. “I just put on a fresh pot before we got the call.”

He returned his gaze to Maguire. “Go on.”

“I don’t know exactly,” the detective stammered. “I got a call on an Alpha Six outside Nepenthe. I don’t know what the hell they were doing there. But the bar manager said there were two vamps outside threatening a couple of girls, acting like they didn’t intend to obey the laws. He didn’t like the look of them so he hit the emergency patrol call button in the bar.”

“And the girls?”

“Both will be just fine,” Jackie said as she returned, handing Maguire a cup. The detective’s hands were shaking, but he drank it anyway, and it seemed the bitterness helped him focus on the nurse’s words. “The taller girl, Renee Sutton, lost a good deal of blood, but we got to her just in time—she’s having a transfusion right now. Stella fared better; I don’t think her attacker had as much time with her. She’s bruised and scratched, so I think she put up a hell of a fight.”

Maguire’s eyes were full of tears. “That’s my girl,” he said.

“And the assailants?”

Faith stepped up. “I killed the one who attacked Stella, and the patrol unit took out the other. They’re finishing up at the scene now, but as far as we can tell, there’s no connection between these and the Alpha Seven the other day; the only commonality is that both occurred in the District. We could easily be dealing with vampires who came to
town for the music festival looking to free-feed, or Signet groupies here for the Council meeting.”

David didn’t say it, but he knew Faith was thinking the same thing he was: This was not random, not groupies. There was something in the air, an unease and electricity he remembered from when the Blackthorn had terrorized Austin.

He put his hand on the detective’s shoulder. “She’s going to be just fine,” he said, echoing Jackie’s words. “And we’ll wipe her memory so she won’t even have nightmares—it’ll be like it never happened.”

“No … you won’t …” came a harsh whisper.

David pulled back the curtain from the bed to reveal a lovely red-haired girl of perhaps twenty-two, freckled like her father, her hazel eyes dull from painkillers but focused on him with almost alarming clarity.

He felt the power in her as soon as he laid eyes on her.
Oh, bloody hell.

“Stella,” Maguire said, pushing himself past David to grab his daughter’s hand. “How are you feeling? Are you okay? They said you’re going to be okay.”

Stella nodded and gave him a wan smile. “I’m glad you’re here,” she whispered.

Maguire looked up at David plaintively. “You can make her forget, right?”

Again, Stella spoke. “No, Dad … they can’t. Mind control stuff doesn’t work on me … I’m psychic like they are. And I’m a Witch.”

Maguire shut his eyes tight and turned his face away. “Stella, we’ll talk about that later …”

“I’m afraid she’s right,” David said. “She’s obviously shielded and trained to her gifts; not to mention she’s very strong. We can deal with her friend’s memories because she’s unconscious and not nearly as powerful. There’s no way a typical compulsion like ours could overcome Stella’s barriers. Luckily … I know someone who’s not typical.”

“No!” Stella exclaimed, the effort clearly making her dizzy. “You can’t do that to me. You can’t screw with my
mind like that—I want to remember. And I want to know … I want to know about Miranda.”

David raised an eyebrow. “What about Miranda?”

“She’s one of you. I know she is. I know she is …” Stella’s strength was failing her; she had been through a lot and was drugged for both pain and anxiety. It was possible she would forget most of this on her own because of the trauma.

David started to say something, but before he could, a soft presence moved up beside him, and with a flash of red hair, Miranda was standing over the bed, peering down at the young human who had whispered her name.

Stella’s eyes went huge, and her hands clenched the sheets. David knew she was seeing … and Seeing … more than just her musical idol, although that would have been enough excitement for anyone.

“You must be Stella,” Miranda said gently. “I’m told you asked for me.”

Stella burst into tears.

Miranda Grey was sitting by Stella’s bed, holding her hand, as if it were the most natural thing in the world.

Miranda Grey, a vampire.

She’d cleared everyone else out of the room, and they all obeyed without question, even Stella’s father, who reluctantly shuffled out to the waiting room for a moment.

Miranda’s hand was warm against Stella’s, not cold like a corpse’s. Her eyes, the same gold-flecked green as in the few pictures Stella had seen, were kind, but there was something alien in them as well that Stella doubted any of her fans had ever been close enough to see.

She was every bit as beautiful in person, up close, both smaller in stature and more massive in energy than any normal woman would be. She listened as Stella told her how she had come to be at Nepenthe with full attention, concern and anger in her eyes when Stella got to the part where the other vampires attacked them.

“I’m sorry that happened,” Miranda said. Her speaking
voice without a microphone was so soft, but Stella had a feeling it could be imperious and hard when it needed to be. “We work very hard to make sure people are safe here—this kind of thing is pretty rare.”

“Are there … are there a lot of you?”

A smile. “More than you would expect. The South is heavily populated because of the weather … we like the heat.”

“Because … you’re dead.”

“No, Stella. I’m alive. Just different. My kind live in a world that touches yours, but they aren’t meant to intersect; we take what we need to survive and try not to destroy anything … or most of us do. I’m a little different in that I chose to have a presence in the Day World, even if I can never walk there.”

“And this thing you have, this psychic gift? What is it? I’ve never Seen anything like it.”

Miranda looked surprised. “You can see it?”

“It’s my gift. Sight. I See things about people—that’s how I Saw your aura change when you got shot.” Stella took a breath; she was tired, but she couldn’t stand the thought of missing a moment of this conversation. “I’m sorry you got shot, by the way … I bet it hurt. I hope they caught the guy.”

“I’ve had worse,” Miranda replied with a smile. “And yes, he’s been … held accountable.”

Stella might have done some dumb shit tonight, but she wasn’t dumb enough to follow up on that sentence. “But I watched videos of you performing, and I could See you doing something, but I didn’t know what.”

A slow nod. “I’m an empath,” Miranda said. “I have been since I was human. I can sense and manipulate emotion.”

“Is that how you could get past my shields and wipe my memories?” Stella asked uncertainly.

“Yes. Empathy as strong as mine is difficult to protect against because it’s so rare. I get in through a different door than the others.”

“Please … don’t do it. I don’t want to forget this.”

Miranda sighed. “It’s for your own good, Stella. People can’t know what I really am. A lot of lives depend on our secrecy.”

“I promise I won’t tell anyone! I swear.”

There was sympathy, and affection, in the singer’s eyes. “I believe you.” She gently let go of Stella’s hand and straightened out the sheets, then laid her palm on Stella’s cheek. “Rest now, Stella … would you like me to sing to you?”

Stella’s heart was about to burst again, but this time with the sudden upwelling of joy after what had to have been one of the worst nights of her life. “Yes … I’d love that. Thank you so much.”

Miranda leaned down and kissed her forehead, then sat back down and said, “Close your eyes.”

Stella obeyed, and as Miranda’s voice wove its honeyed way through the clinic’s cold air, it wrapped its shadowy tendrils around Stella’s mind and coaxed her toward a darkness that was made up of sleep and healing, not fear, a place where she could wrap herself in the song and dream … and forget:

I have no fear of heights,

No fear of the deep blue sea …

Fifteen

Like most of its cousins, the Haven of Eastern Europe stood just at the edge of the city proper, where the comings and goings of its denizens would be less noticeable. They could in fact bypass Prague entirely to reach it from the airport, but Jacob had business in town, so as their driver guided the car along the streets, Cora watched Prague Castle glide by lit up like a cathedral in the night, and seeing it gave her a sense of homecoming she had never felt anywhere else.

She was coming to know the city little by little. She stayed home most of the time, as she was even more sensitive to the cold than most vampires, a consequence of years spent shivering in slow starvation. But as she gained in strength over the months, she grew braver, and as Jacob had pointed out, it was unlikely anyone would bother her with Vràna trotting alongside her.

“Feeling better, my love?” the Prime asked as the car pulled to a stop outside their broker’s office.

Cora nodded. “I really hate flying.”

He smiled and kissed her cheek. “Luckily it should be quite some time before we have to do it again. That’s the nice thing about Europe—to get anywhere in David’s territory he has to fly, but we can tour the entire East via train.” He looked her over. “You still look a little green. We’ll be
home soon, and you can have a long rest in a warm bed. I won’t be long.”

Jacob straightened out the blanket she’d had wrapped around her, which had gotten a bit tangled as she dozed, then ducked out of the car quickly so as not to let out too much heat. It was cool at night here year-round; she didn’t long for the hundred-plus-degree summers of Texas, but she had enjoyed the May nights. There had even been a late snowfall here yesterday.

Vràna grunted in her sleep and pawed at the air. “Chasing rabbits again?” Cora asked, scratching the Nighthound’s head with a smile. It was quite remarkable that in spite of the dog’s size she could fold herself into a very narrow space in the car, though she did tend to jam her bony knees into Jacob fairly often.

Cora leaned back and watched the night go by out the car window for a while, feeling herself relax; the last few days had been far too much excitement for her taste. She had to smile at herself. There had been a time she had worried that she wouldn’t be warrior enough for her Signet, but it turned out a warrior was not what Jacob needed, and she was quite satisfied with the comparatively boring life she had. Perhaps Miranda was a more memorable Queen and had a more interesting life, but given the toll it seemed to take on everyone around her, fame and fortune weren’t as blissful as people were led to believe.

“I do not know how she does it,” Cora murmured, partly to the dog, partly to herself. “How any of them do. I rather like not having so many mortal enemies.”

Oh, she was sure that if Hart had the opportunity, he would gleefully kill Cora, but at least for now she had escaped the madness of his true wrath. Across the ocean and living quietly behind stone walls, Cora wasn’t much of a target.

What was it, she wondered, that had made Hart fixate on Miranda so strongly? Was her outspoken nature, and her Prime’s attachment to mortals, really that much of a
threat? Yes, things were changing in the Council, but surely Hart had nothing to fear from a few Primes following the South’s example. It had to be something else, something personal. Cora was neither an empath nor a strategist, but she knew Hart’s capricious temper. He held grudges—cherished them—but he didn’t jeopardize his own power in their pursuit. He genuinely fancied himself a true nobleman above getting his hands dirty. His behavior in this whole matter was … far too coarse, too petty.