Bloodline (7 page)

He sat on the ground, but he didn't lie down. Overhead, the stars gleamed bright, flickering like fireflies on the velvet blanket of the night. In the distance, a night bird mourned.

“And if I failed, they wouldn't change me. I would stay as I am. I don't see that as such a bad thing.”

“If you fail, Ethan, your fate will be far worse than death.”

“What could be worse than death?” he asked, arrogant laughter in his tone. But when Callista met his eyes, the look in hers made his blood turn cold.

“They would transform you anyway. And then they would drug and starve you to keep you weak, and drain your blood whenever they needed it to create another
vampire. You would be nothing more than a machine to dispense blood, your entire existence lived in a tiny cell with no light, no heat, no human contact.”

He blinked and gave his head a shake. “Is that…is that how they do it? They have a captive vampire somewhere?”

“Mmm,” she said with a nod. “But he's not going to live much longer. They need…new blood, if you'll pardon the pun.”

He swallowed, his eye drawn to the bags. “This came from him?”

“With his blessing,” she said. “He wants you to get out as badly as I do.”

He licked his lips, then looked away from her very quickly. “I can't go. I can't leave her behind.”

“I told you, she's too weak tonight.”

“Then I'll just have to pass this challenge of theirs and stay in their good graces.”

“Pass the test and they'll send you away all the same, but in their employ, not as a free being. But you won't pass the test Ethan. You won't.”

“How can you be so sure?”

She met his eyes, at the same time pressing against his chest to get him to lie down. He resisted, and she whispered, “Their plan is to order you to kill Lilith. They make every test fit the person, and they know you feel something for her, so asking you to kill her will test you in a way nothing else can.”

The strength went out of him, along with his breath, allowing Callista to push him flat on his back. Before he could even blink, she was rolling up his sleeve and sinking a needle into his arm. It led to a tube, which led
to a pit he hadn't noticed before, dug in the sandy soil. And even as he watched, his own blood began to seep along the tube until, within seconds, it was trickling out the other end into the two-foot-deep hole.

“And if you refuse to kill her, they'll do it for you. She'll be dead either way, and you'll either be expelled from here to do their bidding or held captive until you die. It's better this way, Ethan. I change you, and you escape.”

“What about Lilith?” he demanded, lifting his head. Dizziness hit him, and he quickly let it drop again.

“I'll watch over her as best I can. I'll try to keep her safe until the opportunity arises to get her out, as well.”

“You're risking your life by doing this,” he told her. His words were becoming slurred with weakness.

“Yes, I know. That's my choice.”

“But why? You're not even…one of us.”

“A so-called Bloodliner? No, that's true enough, I'm not. But there's right and there's wrong, Ethan. And what's happening here is wrong.”

He nodded.

“You've no idea how wrong,” she added.

He tried to nod again, but nothing happened.

“Listen to me,” she told him. “You're going to want to sleep right after this is finished, but there's a burst of strength, and you have to use it. You have to jump that fence. You have to be brave and take a leap of faith, believe you can clear it—because you can. You will.”

He looked up at the looming fence and doubted.

“Once you get over, run as fast and as far as you can, fight the sleep hard. And then rest only when you've found a place where you will be sheltered from the sun. Do you understand?”

“I…under…” His lips went numb, then, and he gave up trying to reply. Soon he felt her sliding a fresh bit of tubing between his lips and heard her telling him to drink. He did, sucking until he tasted fluid that made him want to retch—because his mind knew what it was—but also to guzzle it all at once—because his body craved it.

He drank. Callista withdrew the needle from his arm and taped the pinprick hole with as much care as if it were a terrible gaping cut. All the while he drank until the fluid was gone, and he was still trying to extract more when she took the tube away.

“You have to go now. I promise I'll do what I can for her. But you must never come back, Ethan. Never. They wouldn't let you leave a second time. And I tell you truly, that if I
can
protect her, she'll be safe, and if I can't, she'll be dead long before you can make your way back here. So don't try.”

“I can't believe I'll never see her again.”

“Then don't believe it. Maybe you will. This place won't stand forever.”

He frowned at her then, shocked to realize he could suddenly sense her thoughts, though he was having trouble deciphering the specifics. “Who do you really work for? Does anyone else know where you are? I could contact them, tell them—”

“I can't tell you that. Now go.
Go.
”

He tried to probe her mind, but he could feel her blocking him and, already overwhelmed and distracted by all he could feel and see and hear now, he stood, took a deep breath and bent his knees. He focused on clearing the fence and pushed off. And then he was sailing straight over top, through the night, hearing the wind whistling
past his ears as he landed hard on the freedom-scented grass on the other side.

Then he got up, ran—and left Lilith.

Now, more than anything else, he wished he could keep her from ever knowing any of that. And yet, sooner or later, she was going to have to know.

Leaning close as she stirred awake, he pressed his lips to hers and whispered. “I'm going out to put the horses in. We'll talk when I get back.”

She nodded, and closed her eyes again.

* * *

Gone. He was gone, and I couldn't believe I'd let him go. Last night he'd seemed on the verge of telling me why he seemed familiar to me, why he—

Wait!

I frowned, hard, because there was new knowledge inside my brain. I felt as if it had been told to me—no,
shown
to me, like the film reels they'd shown us during our lessons…I
remembered
those films. The classroom.

Ethan.

But this new bit, this was not a memory. Or…not
my
memory. It was Ethan's. And I realized that he must have been lying there, holding me in his arms and thinking or dreaming or remembering, and that I, being a vampire like him and no longer truly asleep but only enjoying being held in his arms, feeling safe enough to linger there, had been reading his thoughts without even intending to.

I saw what had flickered through his mind. I felt him staring at me as I slept. I saw the woman—Callista, her name was Callista!—leading him away. I saw her take him into the brush and drain his blood, then feed him
more. I saw her talking to him. What she said, though…
that
I did not know. I could
feel
its essence, though. He had no choice. He had to go.

And then I felt him leaping the fence and running away into the night.

I felt him abandoning me to my prison—or whatever that place had been.

How could he? And how could he lie to me
now,
when I had no clue who I was, and he knew? He'd known the entire time and let me suffer. How dare he?

Furious, I flung back the covers and stalked to the closet. There were no clothes that would come anywhere close to fitting me, but I yanked down a T-shirt, a sweatshirt with a hood, a pair of jeans that would be far too long and a belt I could use to hold them up. I located a pair of socks and wished for women's underwear. I took it, all of it, with me into the attached bathroom.

And then I paused and stood staring in wonder. My God! The bathtub was huge and square, the shower stall small and private, with frosted glass doors. I dropped the clothing I'd pilfered and opened those doors. Though the thought of a long soak in the oversize tub tempted me, I was in too much of a hurry to take the time. Cranking on the shower's taps, I stepped under the deliciously hot spray. All my anger melted as I relished a shower all to myself, the fruity smell of his shampoo and the herbal smell of the soap. Oh, it was heaven, all of it, right down to the thick, fluffy towels I wrapped myself in when I emerged.

Smiling, I decided that I'd never had it this good before—at The Farm. The place from whence I—and he—had escaped. I didn't know what it was, or what went
on there or how we'd come to be there, but I knew more now than I had before. And I would make him tell me the rest of it before this night was done.

I dressed quickly, brushed my hair more slowly, and then decided to bundle up a bit and walk down to the stable, rather than putting our conversation off until he returned. I would need footwear, and some sort of a coat.

I found a pair of hiking shoes, which I laced up as tightly as I could, and then I clomped down the stairs and went to peer out the window.

And then I froze, because I saw what I should have sensed far sooner. Ethan was standing beside a car I'd never seen before, talking to the stranger behind the wheel.

Every nerve in my body began to tingle with warnings. The car was small and blue—nothing like the one that had accosted me under the bridge. I narrowed my unnaturally keen eyes as its window lowered, and I saw the woman who occupied the driver's seat.

Maybe it had been a woman in that other car, too. A deep-voiced female, or someone disguising the sound of her voice by trying to sound like a man. How could I know? I never saw the face, only the black barrel of a gun.

She had auburn hair, with strands of gray here and there, which I shouldn't have been able to detect from this distance. She had a gentle face, and kind eyes with crow's-feet at the corners. She also had a dire, desperate feeling about her that belied the smile she wore.

As I watched, the woman spoke to Ethan and held something up for him to look at.

Pressing still closer, I honed my senses and found that, if I tried, I could hear her voice. I could feel his thoughts. I could…

“I'm looking for this young woman,” the stranger in the car told him. “She could be in danger if she's not found. Have you seen her?”

Snapping my vision to the object in the woman's hand, I saw that it was a photograph. And it was of a face that was familiar to me in a way no other face could be. There had been no reflection in that cursed mirror of Ethan's, but the photograph in the woman's hand was of me. I knew it. I'd seen my face before I'd been…made over. I knew it well. Knew it deep in my gut.

And even as I stared at it, the memory of
me,
of how I looked and, more, how I thought and felt about things, came surging back to me, almost as if it had never been gone.

“No, I haven't seen her,” Ethan said. I heard his voice, but I heard his thoughts, as well.
This is exactly what I was afraid of.
And then, aloud again, “What makes you think she's in this area? It's pretty remote.”

“She was spotted by some locals who said she was headed this way.”

“Well, she must have veered off, or else your witnesses were mistaken. You say she might be in danger. From what?”

“I'm afraid I can't go into any detail on that.”

“I see.”

“But she
is
in danger. Dire danger. And so is anyone who might be with her. Please take my warning very seriously. I want nothing but to help. There are people after her. People who—are going to find her quite easily.”

I felt Ethan frown as his suspicions rose. “How?”

The woman twisted her car key. “If you see her,
please,
give me a call.” She lowered the photograph and handed him a card instead. “It's important.”

Yeah, I'll just bet it is.
Aloud, Ethan said, “May I keep the photo?” The woman frowned at him. “Just in case,” he added.

The woman handed it to him with a nod, then put her car into gear. “Don't try to help her on your own, or you could both end up dead. Call me. I can protect her. Both of you, if need be.”

“Thanks for the advice.”
But I can protect her just fine all by myself.

Yes,
I thought furiously.
Like you did when you ran away and left me in that prison? Was that your idea of protection, Ethan?
And then other thoughts rushed in. Since when had I ever needed anyone to protect me? I still didn't remember everything, but I
did
know myself, at long last. And as I watched the woman drive away, I knew I wouldn't want anyone's protection but my own.