Beyond the Night (19 page)

And the barely audible message in her ear. If she had intuited it correctly.

Ash on his shirt.

She should have listened to Mirya. And Rob.

Where was Rob anyway? She had fully expected questions, scolds, and recriminations.

She should not have gone there. To have seen her twin, dripping with a victim's vitals . . . to imagine it could have been her, had things been just little bit different . . . and her mother's eyes, trying so hard to feel something for the daughter who looked so much like her. Her father, so cold and removed, because he couldn't wait for her to leave . . .

She felt cut open to her soul.

She was done, vampires and all. She didn't care about threats or death or anything. It was over. Mirya was her mother, she herself was what she'd always been, the child of a Gypsy, and the streets, whose life would run the same course, and she should be thankful it was so.

And thinking that, she blindly walked right into Rob's arms.

“Hey.” His voice was gentle in her ear. “Slow down.”

“I'm done.” Her voice was muffled, her head suddenly buried against his chest. “And where were you, with all your dire warnings?”

“I was there,” he murmured, turning her so that he could hold her while they walked. “You weren't alone. I have some powers, which are not public knowledge.”

She fell silent. That capped it. She didn't need to tell him anything. He knew. With his so-called powers. Everything except the still shiver-making brush of that bat wing. Maybe that too, since he knew everything.

Nevertheless, something was reassuring about the way he held her and how efficiently they wound their way back to Mirya's hovel, where Mirya awaited them, her anxiety written all over her face.

“Stupid thing to do,” she muttered as she pulled Rula into the room and pushed her onto the bed. “I told you. You didn't believe me.”

“I believed you. I just had to
see
.”

“Truly,” Mirya spat. “And what did you see? I could even tell you.”

Rula shook her head. “Renk had just returned, saturated in blood. Senna and Dominick couldn't wait for me to leave, and they denied knowing that Charles was even alive.

“But—I think maybe Senna knows,” Rula added, unaware she'd used her mother's proper name. “As I was leaving, she whispered something to me.”

“Senna did?” Mirya asked skeptically.

It did sound unbelievable. Especially after the icy reception they'd given her. “She did.”

“Why would she do that?” Mirya said, still picking and prying.

Rula shrugged. Even she couldn't fathom the reason Senna had given her that message. She wanted to think it was because Senna had had a moment of regret for the daughter she'd abandoned.

But how could that be? Vampires didn't have those feelings.

“She whispered, ‘Ash on his shirt.' ”

Rob's eyebrows rose. “All that? When you were leaving?”

“She turned into a bat,” Rula said hesitantly after a pause. Even saying it gave her the shivers.

“Ah.”

“It was awful. She got in my hair.”

“I see,” Rob murmured noncommittally.

“Eat something,” Mirya said, pushing some bread and soup in front of Rula. She wanted to wave it away, but she realized that Mirya, like her, needed to do something.

Right now, they were at an impasse. They had the intuitive sense that Charles had not perished under Dominick's assault. But nothing much more, except the random raids of the vampire community on the city.

But that had nothing to do with Charles or the Keepers of the Night.

Or did it?

“We keep looking,” Rob said at last. “We examine what the bat told you.”

Rula shuddered. “It brushed my cheek.”

“It
was
Senna, you know,” Rob said. “It was an acknowledgment of something that she couldn't bring herself to do in human form.”

Rula made a face. “I'll never forget the feeling. It was all entangled in my hair.”

“And it whispered, ‘Ash on his shirt,' in your ear?”

“If I even heard it correctly.”

“We're going to assume you did. And we're going to figure out what it means,” Rob said firmly.

“You mean, dig in the dustbin?”

“That, and burned-out buildings and fireplaces and wherever and whatever we can think of. Maybe starting here.”

He got up, knelt by the fireplace and shuffled through the ashes, turned, and shrugged. “Just a thought.”

Mirya handed him a rag. “The Vraq have operated solely on instinct for as long as they have banded together,” she said to Rula. “This wasn't so when I was young. There was no one. Now, there is individual and collective power. There is community, family. And there is a mission—to rid the world of vampires.”

“Even though their existence goes beyond human knowing,” Rob added. “But there will always be Vraq, living in tandem with vampires, in a world beyond our imagining, in a time beyond the night.”

“We will win,” Mirya said fiercely. “And we will wipe the vampire off the face of the earth.”

“We protect each other,” Rob added. “But that means we do what's necessary when necessary. Which means when you join us, you'll have made that ultimate decision.”

Rula didn't dispute his reasoning. She'd felt violent toward Renk. She could have attacked him. Killed him, even. But would she have?

She still hadn't touched her soup, or the bread. She tore off a piece, dipped it in the lukewarm soup, and took a bite. No better or worse than anything else Mirya had ever cooked, but Rula was surprised to find she
was
hungry.

“When you're done,” Rob said, “we'll go for a walk.”

London at sundown was magical. The gaslights were lit. People rushed everywhere. Hansom cabs and drays maneuvered around each other and the passersby crossing the streets. Shouts, curses, conversation.

Something about it reeked of normalcy and belied the idea that vampires existed anywhere in the city.

“But they are everywhere,” Rob said, as if he'd read her mind. “Any one of these people could turn on you in an instant, tear out your throat, and you'd be dead.”

“Charming thought,” Rula muttered. He saw vampires everywhere. If she believed that, and she felt that vulnerable, she'd be living a life of doubt and suspicion until the day she died.

What kind of life would that be?

“Life with me,” Rob said softly.

Surely she hadn't heard him correctly. “You mean a life focused on death every day, all day, all the time.”

“God, I hope not.”

They walked in silence for a bit.

“
Can
the Vraq live a normal life?” she asked at length.

He shrugged. “Probably not. We live how we can as we can. One accepts it or one doesn't. It is the way it is.”

“Will it ever end?”

“Vampires are eternal. And so we must be vigilant in our turn.”

“And when you die . . . ?”

“Our children—”

“A generation removed.”

“It's true. But there will be the children of this generation and others to take on that burden. Our history proves it. However our task now is Charles. Period.”

Silence fell. Always Charles. Always a task. The Vraq never rested, never stopped. She felt like bolting, but there was nowhere to go and she'd never felt more alone than at this moment.

Come . . .

The word felt like an arrow aimed straight into her brain, and she stopped abruptly and looked at Rob with wide eyes.

“
What
was—” she started to say, then suddenly she and everyone within sight dropped to the ground, moaning in pain.

Rob grabbed her shoulders and pulled her to her feet. “Rula! Listen to me. Rest your forehead against mine.” He tilted her head to touch his. “Rula—look at me.” His tone had an urgency she'd never before heard from him. “Rula—focus on me.”

She barely heard him, the pain was so intense.

“Me, Rula—
me
—” He positioned his forehead against hers, tapping her cheek to draw her attention to his eyes and his words. “Rula . . .“ Her eyes started to roll. “Now—”

He closed his eyes and mentally pushed. Hard. Erecting a wall to deflect the ceaseless arrows, the ruthless delving.

Charles. It had to be. As they'd surmised. Who else would target Rula? No surprise he was alive somewhere, somehow. But this mental attack—this was a new weapon in his arsenal, damn the bastard.

It didn't stop either. The mental wall was not a deterrent. Those tendrils kept seeking a way up, over, and around it. It took every ounce of Rob's own cunning and strength to ward off Charles's mind-probing attack.

Dirty bastard. But it meant he was somewhere close. Somewhere they could get to him. He made certain Charles comprehended that they were coming for him, he and Rula.

Find me first.

Oh, we will.

It was like jousting. The tendrils moved one way, Rob blocked. They curled another way, Rob feinted. He walled out Charles every way he could think of as Charles tried fruitlessly to press his way into Rula's mind.

I will have her.

I don't think so.

Rob sensed Charles was getting tired. He was not only expending all this energy trying to reach Rula and get around Rob's wall, he was also holding half of London hostage in appalling brain pain.

He didn't have enough power to keep doing both. If he released them, he would release Rula because their pain and immobility was tied to hers.

And Rob knew it.

Bastard.

DO it, you son of a bitch.

Charles wasn't ready to let go yet. Rob felt it and wondered how long he himself could hold on in this supernatural duel. He concentrated all his power on keeping Charles's probing tendrils away from Rula as he supported her in his arms.

Just concentrate on that. Keep Rula safe.

He felt Charles weakening. Those passersby who had been felled by him were slowly coming out of their trances, still bound by the pain and utterly confused as to what had happened.

“Good girl. It's almost over,” Rob whispered.

Never over.

It was true—Charles would never give up. This was going to be a protracted battle for Rula, and it was no use begging for mercy. He meant to torture and kill her and present Dominick and Senna with her bones.

But just now, his grip on her mind diminished with every awakening passerby who'd got caught in his mind-probe web.

The pain was gone. His powers were weakening. Rob felt it as Charles futilely kept probing at the wall Rob had erected. Then, slowly, the tendrils slipped away and Rula was free.

She felt as if she'd been hypnotized. Rob's forehead still rested against hers, he held her tight, and he was softly murmuring words she couldn't understand.

It was over but she could see people still milling around, trying to figure out what had happened, why they'd wound up on the ground, writhing in pain.

From afar, they saw that the authorities had the same questions; they were weaving through the remaining crowd, pausing to interview people at random.

“We have to go,” Rob whispered. “We don't want to answer any questions.”

They slipped into the crowd and slid deftly around those still discussing the strange occurrence. Too many had been involved in the incident. They couldn't find a single street where people hadn't been affected as they made their way to Mirya's.

Only the alleyway was empty when they finally, thankfully got there.

Mirya was waiting for them.

“He got to you too, didn't he?” Rob guessed.

“Anyone within distance.”

“Ah, but what distance? He's close, isn't he?”

Mirya set down the teapot and a couple of cups. “He's close.”

“You took more than that from what happened, didn't you?”

Mirya nodded. “He's furious, and helpless.” She stopped for an instant as that registered. “I sensed helpless.”

Rob thought about it for a moment. “Mind probe is not a vampire power, so his feeling helpless could mean—”

“He has diminished vampire powers and found a way to compensate,” Mirya said. “But this—this is extreme and something not instantly at his command. This has taken time for him to develop and control.”

“So we can infer—”

“He has been in one place for a very long time,” Mirya concluded.

“He'd have needed that time to heal,” Rula added. “Dominick is still certain as stones he'd killed him, wouldn't even listen to any possibility he'd survived.”

“Well, we now know for sure he's alive, but not in what kind of shape,” Rob said. “But we can deduce one thing—if he's resorted to mind probes and tricks, he probably doesn't have full use of his body. Which means his powers as well.”