The Van Alen Legacy (17 page)

And there was no one
there.

It was the last week of
August, and Cotswold had finally sold after the price was reduced another hundred thousand, give
or take. A Russian oligarch bought the Hamptons house and everything in it, down to the last
nautical cushion and including the car collection. The new family wanted possession right away,
so there was a very short escrow period. And ever since the day Bliss had overheard the
conversation in Forsyth’s study, the Visitor had retreated for his longest absence yet. Saturday,
their first day back in New York, made it the fifth straight day that he had been gone.
Almost an entire week.

It was a relief to be back in
the city again. She had gotten tired of the Hamptons, as everyone ultimately does. And while she
had her freedom, Bliss tried to find out what was going on. She had called the Force household,
not sure of what she could say exactly, not that it mattered anyway since their maid told her
that no one was around.

Charles was gone, Trinity was
in D.C., and the twins were away as well. Then she called Schuyler’s cell, but her service had
been disconnected. She called the house on

, and Hattie told her Schuyler was . . . away.
The housekeeper sounded too frightened to tell Bliss anything else. The
Hazard-
Perrys
were spending the summer in Maine, but when Bliss called that number,
no one picked up. There wasn’t even an answering machine. It was all very strange and not
promising.

She had raided Forsyth’s study
before it had been packed up and had tried to call Ambrose Barlow. She had decided that if
Forsyth and the Visitor had mocked him, then maybe Warden Barlow was one of the good guys. But
when she called the Barlow residence, the warden wasn’t there. And she didn’t know what kind of
message to leave that wouldn’t find its way back to the Visitor. She had to make sure he was kept
in the dark about what she was planning as well.

Finally she decided she would
mail an anonymous note. Not an e-mail that could be traced back to her computer, but a note on
some nice stationery so that the
Barlows
would pay attention to it and not think it
was junk mail. Bobi Anne had kept a nice collection of card stock, and Bliss selected
one.

Dear Warden
Barlow,

You
don´t
know me, but I have to warn you about something. Beware of Forsyth
Llwellyn
. He is
not who you think he is.

A friend

God that sounded lame. But
what else could she do without giving herself away? It had as much teeth as
a beware
of dog sign on an unguarded lawn, but Bliss had no idea what else to do. She couldn’t risk the
Visitor being aware of her actions, and if anyone from the Conclave came around asking for her,
Forsyth would know what had happened.

It was better than doing
nothing.

Maybe it would even help. She
hoped so.

After posting the note, she
walked aimlessly up 
Fifth Avenue 
past the
Guggenheim Museum. The weather was sticky and hot, one of those fry an-egg-on-the-sidewalk New
York days, but Bliss didn’t care. She was just glad to be home. Back in the city she had grown to
love so much. Then she wandered back down to the Metropolitan Museum of Art. She walked up the
grand steps, dodging picnicking crowds of tourists sitting out under the bright sun. As she
entered the grand marble foyer and passed the security bag check, waiting patiently as a bored
security guard poked at the contents of her handbag with a baton, she felt a pain in her
heart.

This was where Dylan had taken
her on their first date.

It was too keen to be anything
but grief, as she remembered how Dylan had paid the entrance fee for the two of them with a dime.
But as she walked up to the ticket counter, she found she did not have his audacity, and
surrendered the entire “suggested” fee.

It had been almost two years
ago when he had brought her to the museum. He had been so excited to take her to the Egyptian
wing, and unconsciously Bliss began to walk toward it, passing by glass display cases of scarabs
and cartouche jewelry. She passed the display of sarcophagi. She remembered how Dylan had asked
her to close her eyes and led her through the passageways, and when she had opened them she was
standing in front of it.
The Temple of
Dendur
.
A real Egyptian temple
rebuilt in a room at the Metropolitan. It was like having a piece of history come
alive.

So ancient and
beautiful.

And so romantic.
She remembered how Dylan had stood in front of it, his eyes shining like bright stars. Bliss
walked softly in front of it, remembering. . . . The light slanted into the room, making shadows
on the memorial. She was struck by a sadness so overwhelming she had to steady herself or she
would have fallen.

“Are you all right?” a girl
asked.

“I’m okay.” Bliss nodded. She
sat down on the steps across from the ruin and took a deep breath. “I’m okay.” The girl gave her
another curious look, but left her alone.

Bliss was still rooted to the
same spot four hours later, when the lights started to blink and an announcement came over the
speakers. “The MetropolitanMuseum is closing in thirty minutes. Please make your way to the
exit.” This announcement was repeated every few minutes in many different languages.

Bliss didn’t move from her
seat. Everyone else in the room, art students, a handful of tourists, a docent-led group,
utifully
walked toward the exit. What am I doing? Bliss wondered. I should go
home.

But the minutes passed and the
overhead lights continued to blink in warning, and when Bliss heard the footsteps of the museum
guard, she hid in the temple’s crevice and made herself invisible to human sight. After what
seemed like an incredibly long time, the lights finally went out, it was completely silent, and a
ghostly moonlight streamed into the museum.

She was alone.

She walked right up to the
temple, touching the rough stone, putting her fingers in the grooves of the etched hieroglyphics.
Dylan had kissed her right here, for the first time.

She missed him so
much.

“
I
miss you too.”

What was that?

She looked around the empty
room. The light made weird crazy shadows on everything, reminding her of how she used to fear the
willow tree outside her bedroom when she was a kid.

She walked up to the fountain
on the perimeter of the room and threw a quarter into the water, watching it fall. For a moment
she had thought she’d heard his voice, but now she was really going crazy, wasn’t she?

“You’re not
crazy.”

She was annoyed, agitated.
Whoever was talking to her had to stop it.

“Is anyone there?
Hello?”

Her voice echoed throughout
the still chamber. All that answered was an echo of her question:

HelloHelloHello
.
. .

But if the voice wasn’t out
there . . . then maybe . . . maybe . . . it was coming from somewhere . . . inside. . . . But
that wasn’t the Visitor’s voice, she was sure of it. She closed her eyes. What was the harm? It
wasn’t as if stranger things hadn’t already happened. She looked inward. There was a void where
the Visitor usually was,
an emptiness
. The Visitor was definitely still
away.

But for the first time she
sensed another
presence,
and another and
another’so
very many others,
hundreds of others. . . . Oh god, what was it that the Silver Bloods did? They took the blood,
the undying consciousness, so that their victims lived on inside their captors. Many souls
trapped in one body.
Abomination.

There were hundreds of souls
just below her conscious-
ness
, just like her, they had been trapped in the backseat
(maybe even the trunk?). It was like looking down into one of those mass graves . . . but instead
of corpses, they were all still alive. . . .

She wanted to scream. . . .
This was so much worse than having the Visitor. This was . . . She almost lost it, but then . . .
that voice again. . . . Low, husky, and raspy, as if it had smoked too many cigarettes and had
spent too many nights shouting in a packed downtown bar. It was the voice of a boy who had seen
it all and had lived to tell a funny tale about it, deep and rough but with a sweet edge that
went straight to your heart. Could it be?

How could it?

“Dylan?” she whispered. “Is
that you?”

There was silence.

Then, out of the darkness, she
saw him materialize in front of her, saw his shape, saw his face, his beautiful sad eyes, his
crooked grin, his dark disheveled hair. He stepped out of the void and into the light.

“I don’t have much time,”
Dylan said. “
that
Visitor of yours is coming back soon.”

Mimi felt someone come up
behind her, but when she turned around, it was not the handsome Venator she saw, but a wraith.
A blackened, burned figure.
A walking corpse with sockets for eyes and a slash
for a mouth, and a bandaged torso.
Burned, disfigured, but somehow
stomachchurningly
. . . alive.

“You . . .” The wraith pointed
a bony finger at Mimi, and spoke in a whistling, raspy whisper reminiscent of rustling dead
leaves. “You dare . . .”

That voice. Even in its
present, eerie iteration, Mimi recognized that voice. It had once made speeches in front of
podiums, had once welcomed elite groups of guests to a particularly spectacular Park Avenue
co-op.

“Warden Cutler?” Mimi
whispered. “But I . . . I killed you.”

It sounded absurd even as she
said it. But she had cut Nan Cutler in two, had left her to burn in the black fire in the Almeida
villa. How could the warden have survived? It was ridiculous. And it was equally absurd of Mimi
to parry or banter with a walking and talking death wraith.

“One more step and I’ll have
your blood,” the faceless horror croaked. What was not charred or blistered on her body was bone,
a sickening sight.

Mimi’s hand twitched a little.
She should not have put her blade away. Did she have time? Where the hell was the rest of the
team? Had Kingsley heard her? Where were the boys when she needed them? Why had she strayed from
the group; Venator training taught that you always stayed in twos. How stupid of her to have
followed those footprints. . . . It had
trap
written all over it.

Would she have enough time to
arm up before Nan made a move on her? No time to
think’she
unsheathed
it
?but
even as she did, in that same moment, Mimi found herself locked
in a death grip with the half-dead Silver Blood.

The monster who had once been
the most sought-after hostess in New York was ferociously strong, and as much as Mimi kicked and
clawed, the demon would not release her hold. Mimi could feel its foul breath on her neck, knew
it would not be long before its fangs would puncture skin and draw her blood. . . .

No!

She slammed the warden
backward against the wall with all her might. But Nan had gotten the upper hand and knocked Mimi
against the concrete floor. It would have felled many a vampire, but
Azrael
was made
of a tougher substance. Still, it made her dizzy, and she could feel a crack in her skull and the
wound bleeding out. . . . She was losing consciousness. . . .

At that moment Kingsley
appeared. Mimi thought she had never been so happy to see anyone in her life.

“
Croatan
?” he
ordered.
“
Absed
!
Absed
abysso
!”
 
Go back to Hell! With a mighty thrust of his sword, he stabbed it straight
through the heart.

There was a hissing sound,
like the wheel of a tire deflating, somewhat anticlimactic until the figure suddenly burst into a
bright silver flame, a momentarily dazzling, blinding light, and the temperature in the room rose
to solar levels, as the spirit collapsed into itself in a supernova. Mimi shielded her eyes until
it was safe to open them. She thought the warden would have disappeared, but the corpse was still
there.

Only now there was nothing
menacing about it.
Just a mere heap of bones.
Kingsley wrenched out his sword from
the pile, and it transformed back into the short jackknife he carried in his pocket. “Are you all
right?” he asked, kneeling beside Mimi. He took a look at her head wound, his hands gentle as he
held his thumbs against her temples and slowly massaged them. “Cracked like an egg, but you’ll be
okay. It’s already starting to heal.”

“How did she live? I cut her
in two,” Mimi choked.

“You didn’t stab her through
the heart. It’s the only way. It was my fault. I should have made sure. I thought you knew,”
Kingsley sighed. “Lawrence was right. The Conclave doesn’t bother to teach anything anymore, and
the new crop of vampires has forgotten too many things.”