Last Vampire Standing (33 page)

“Don’t pull anything funny,” Laurel warned.

Marco laughed. “What can she do, you stupid bitch? My Francesca was ever a pathetic excuse for a vampire. She missed being human, but was too much the good girl to end her life.”

I winced at the truth.

“See how she cringes at my barb? She is still the same, oblivious to her powers, or she would have known I had a spy watching her.”

I cut my gaze to Jo-Jo, and Marco laughed again.

“Laurel was the spy, not Jo-Jo.”

“Focus, honey,”
Saber said in my head.
“Play him.”

I fought to wet my dry mouth and scrambled for something to say as I neared the base of the stage.

“If Laurel is your little fanged friend, why have you tortured her? And
what
is with that orange smell?”

He gave me a venomous grin. “You insulted me in the old days when you said my scent offended you.”

Everything about Marco offended me, but I flashed to the last time I’d seen him. He’d been a vampire for more than three years, yet his body held the odor of cumin and datil peppers, the spices his mother had used to cook, the smell that permeated his home. Marco sweated the smell before he was turned, and it lingered after.

“Ah, I see you recall. Sadly, I am still afflicted with my own signature scent. I had to disguise that from you, Francesca, or ruin my surprise. You are surprised to see me, are you not?”

“Brutally so,” I snapped. “Did you wear contacts as part of your disguise, Marco? To change the color of your eyes?”

“Ah, then Jo-Jo did describe me to you. Indeed, I went to much trouble to hide my identity until the time was right.”

“What’s the deal with Laurel?” I pressed as I neared the foot of the stage and a yawning hole beneath it. Marco waved a dismissive hand. “Possessive ingrate, she tried to shoot you. Against my direct orders.”

Anger burned into my fear. “Laurel was the sniper?”

“With deplorable aim. I killed Ike for her and for Vlad, and even left my favorite short sword behind. Yet this cow whines that I have not killed Ray.” Marco spat on the floor. “Laurel is an encumbrance who would get in the way of my plans for you.”

“Plans?” I strove to keep my voice steady, to keep him talking, to stay calm.

But I nearly flew to the catwalk when a shadow startled me from the space under the stage. Triton, in-the-flesh Triton, rose from the shadows just enough to tug at my jeans pocket. He slipped something heavy inside the pocket, patted my butt, and melted into the darkness again.

“Who is there, Francesca?” Marco demanded, taking two swift steps toward me.

“A cat under the stage,” I blurted, winging it. “The thing startled me. That’s all.”

“You lie,” Marco snarled, sword raised.

Pandora meowed, loud and long. I smiled.

“Actually, I don’t.”

Pandora brushed past me and trotted up the stage steps.

With my heart slamming in my chest, I don’t know where I got a spurt of courage at that point, but whatever Triton had put in my back pocket pulsed and grew warmer. I followed Pandora up the five steps, intent on my mission to distract Marco. Did he know I could suck energy? Not unless Laurel had told him. She’d warned me not to try anything, but maybe that had been a hint, not a warning.

“You mentioned plans, Marco?” I stopped on the stage, subtly began drawing his energy, and prayed he didn’t notice. “If you had such big plans for me, why didn’t you come for me right after the villager uprising? I at least expected you to come after Normand’s treasure.”

“Ah, yes, you know me well,” he said, strutting to where Laurel cringed from him. “Come closer, or I will behead Laurel as I did Ike. Or shall it be Jo-Jo and his little friend?”

I gritted my teeth and took the smallest baby steps I could, still sipping his energy, the thing in my butt pocket pulsing with even more heat.

“Your story, Marco?”

“Sadly, the villagers turned on me, as you must have known they would. I was gravely injured by the fire, but my father—you remember my father, Francesca?”

“I remember.” I inched nearer, steadily sucking from Marco, even though each orange-flavored sip made my stomach churn. “Your dad was a Spanish soldier rumored to be a silversmith.”

“The rumor was true. He was a silversmith, and a very fine one in spite of the scandal in
España
.” Marco had drawn himself up straight, ready to take umbrage for any insult, but suddenly laughed. “Ah, yes,
mi padre
. A tender but stupid man. He took pity on me, hid me in his workshop. I begged him not to leave me where the silver would harm me. Do you know what he said, Francesca?”

I shook my head. I was less than ten feet from Marco, and the right side of my butt felt like a vibrating live coal, sending shock waves into bones, my skull. Hell, into my DNA.

“He said perhaps the silver would purify my soul and bring me back to him. Instead, the exposure made me immune. Or perhaps it was the exposure of being in his shop all those years before I was turned, but no matter. My flesh did not heal properly after the fire, but I gained strength enough to kill
mi padre
and feast on his blood.”

I gagged and snapped my psychic shield in place to keep from seeing more of the scene in Marco’s vivid memory.

“So you really are immune to silver?”

Marco shrugged almost humbly. “I did, of course, continue exposing myself to the metal over the centuries to ensure and build my immunity.”

I pulled a little more of his energy, my body throbbing now, a tuning fork on speed.

“Why have you shown up after all this time, Marco? You still haven’t told me your big plan.”

“It is the same as it ever was. I take you, Princess of the House of Normand, and together we rule. It is just as well that the magic symbols stopped me from reaching you before. We will have more influence now.”

“What magic symbols?”

He stared, his eyes unfocused, as if he’d lost his train of thought, then shook himself.

“You might be a pathetic excuse for a vampire now, but day-walkers are rare and have legendary powers. I have been chosen to teach you”—he paused—“to fulfill your destiny as King Normand’s daughter.”

Gads, Marco was slurring his words. Had he noticed? Whether it was me energy-sucking him or the thing in my pocket affecting him, I had to keep him talking.

“Marco,” I scoffed, “Normand wasn’t real royalty.”

“Normand,” Marco said slowly, “was a bastard son of the French royal house.” A pause. He was weakening. “It is the reason I gave myself to the vampires.” Another pause. “I could achieve power I would never have as the son of a soldier.”

Marco weaved on his feet. I took two steps closer to his side, almost within touching distance but out of Saber’s line of fire. I thought we had him, thought Saber would open fire. Instead, Marco whipped the short sword to my throat. His hand trembled, and

I felt the blade slice into the side of my neck.

Rage flooded my vision, my being.

I jumped, pulling hard and fast on his energy. At some point I realized I was hovering eight feet in the air, but I held my focus. I drained Marco.

He dropped his sword and fell to his knees, but I didn’t stop sucking his aura. I couldn’t. Not even when the air between us turned black. My soul seemed to quake with the force of whatever Triton had put in my pocket. I had to hang on until Saber came. Then Marco began to wither like a raisin, and I faltered.

Laurel crawled toward Marco’s sword, and Saber shouted, “Stop her.”

I swooped to the stage and kicked the sword away.

“Kill him. Behead the bastard,” Laurel screamed.

“No,” Triton said, suddenly on my right.

Saber was there, too, on my left. He took my shoulders and shook me.

“Cesca, stop now. Stop pulling Marco’s energy before you kill him.”

“But he must die,” Laurel screeched.

“He’ll be executed legally. Cesca, listen to me. His energy is black. It’s infecting you. Stop.”

“No,” Triton snapped, jerking me from Saber’s arms. “Marco must die now, or he’ll escape execution. The blackness is the sign of the Void. Marco must die and by your hand, Cesca. It’s the only way.”

“Let go!”

I sobbed and wrenched free of Triton, stumbled back. My right butt cheek burned, my throat felt like I’d swallowed oil, and I couldn’t think for the shrieking pain in my skull.

“Triton, I can’t kill him. I can’t.”

“Then give me the disk in your pocket. Now, Cesca. I need the medallion now.”

I expected the disk to burn me. It didn’t, and some instinct made me look at the medallion more closely. Hexagon-shaped, the size and thickness of a jelly jar lid, the clear crystal was shot through with silver and gold lines and framed in copper. A smattering of ancient-looking symbols were etched into the copper rim. I made out part of a musical note, and the Greek letter for
Mu
as the medallion beat its pulse into me, strong, slow, comforting. My heartbeat fell into synch. Just as it did, Triton cupped my hand and jerked me down to where Marco lay on his back. He flipped my hand palm down and pressed the medallion to Marco’s chest, over his heart. With Triton’s hand pushing on mine, he muttered a string of words in a language I didn’t recognize.

Brilliant, blinding rays of white light burst from every surface of the medallion, and beamed into Marco. One moment he was there on the floor, the next he had vanished. I gaped, started to ask what happened to him, but Laurel lurched forward.

“Mine,” she screeched, clawing at the medallion.

At her touch, the light arched into her. She writhed on the stage as if snakes infected her body. Then she, too, dissolved into nothing, and the light collapsed into the disk.

My fingers curled around the medallion as I stared into Triton’s deep brown eyes.

“You killed them,” I whispered. “You made me help you murder them.”

Triton shook his head, and a stray lock of his tobacco brown hair fell across his forehead.

“We didn’t kill Marco, Cesca. We released his soul, and his body left with it. The female released herself.”

I glanced at the stage floor where Saber’s handcuffs lay empty, then at the medallion in my hand.

“What the hell is this thing?”

“I don’t have time to explain.” He snatched the disk and dropped it in his shirt pocket. “Trust me now as you trusted me before. The dark forces have lost two minions.”

He kissed my cheek, murmured in Greek, “Until later, dear friend,” and bolted off the stage before I could react. I don’t know how long I knelt, stunned and alone, before Saber’s arms closed around me and drew me off the floor. I sobbed and buried my face in his shoulder.

“Cesca, honey,” he crooned as he stroked my hair. “Stay with me. I need you. Come on, now. The bad guys are gone, but we have a stage to clean up and people who are still enthralled.”

I blinked at him. “They are?”

“Every damn one of them. I don’t know why they’re still bound, but you have to release them. You can break down later.”

I hiccupped. “I suppose this is a bad time to tell you, but I don’t know how to release them.”

A footstep thudded on the stage.

“I do.”

TWENTY-TWO

029

We whirled toward the baritone voice—Saber tensed to fire his weapon, me darn near fainting when I saw the carriage driver from Wednesday night.

Except tonight he looked completely different.

He wore baggy black pants, a loose white tunic, and a midnight blue, honest-to-gosh full-length cape. His gray hair had seemed thin and dirty on Wednesday, but now it flowed to his shoulders like a white water wave. He stood with his hands resting lightly on Jo-Jo’s shoulders. Pandora in full panther size sat on her haunches beside him. I looked into Pandora’s eyes. “Your wizard, I presume?”

Pandora chuffed, but the man laughed.

“I am Cosmil, at your service. I promise, I offer no harm, only help.”

“If you know how to break a vampire enthrallment, you’re on,” Saber said and holstered his Glock.

“I even know why the spell did not break when Marco vanished. It is because, Princess, in taking his energy, you assumed responsibility for what he left behind.”

A flare of panic burned my gut. “Am I infected with Marco’s dark energy?”

“No, though I will teach you how to release unwanted energy as well.”

“Can we get back on track?” Saber said. “It’s ten o’clock, and a few hundred people are missing over an hour of time.”

“It’s really ten?”

“Time flies when you’re killing bad guys. Did Jo-Jo say when the show was supposed to end?”

“Eleven, I think. Is there a program on the tables?”

As soon as I turned to look, a folded sheet of paper lifted off the nearest table and floated to me. Bemused, I plucked it out of the air.

“Eleven is right. Jo-Jo was supposed to be on at nine and again at ten thirty. But what are we going to do about the clocks and everyone’s watches?”

Saber eyed Cosmil. “How long will it take to teach Cesca to undo the enthrallment and get everyone functioning?”

“Fifteen minutes, perhaps twenty. I will change timepieces, if you like.”

“That’ll do. Let’s move. Cosmil, help me get Jo-Jo and Donita backstage. Cesca, grab the cuffs and sword, would you?”