Rapture's Edge (8 page)

“We’ve got enough of the serum now to inject all the half-Bloods from the old colony. There’s no reason they wouldn’t jump at the chance to survive past the Transition
and join us. Now we just have to get the word out to them. We’ll have to think of something…special.”

Dismissed. She’d just been dismissed. Without another word, humiliated and burning with hand-shaking, throat-squeezing, chest-crushing anger, Eliana turned and walked away.

Silas’s black, black eyes followed her until she swept out of sight beyond an ivy-draped corner, heading back inside the abbey.

His Gift was subtle, but—on those whom it worked—devastatingly effective.

Less powerful than the outright mind control of the Gift of Suggestion, the ability Silas had learned over long years to wield with the deadly precision a ninja wields a katana was more a whisper than a shout, a gentle nudge than a shove, the coy glance of a maiden that garnered the same result as the bolder, more lusty stare of a whore.

In other words, it was elegant.

He had no name for it and no use for one; it wasn’t as if he’d speak about it aloud, in any case. He wasn’t prone to that horrific new age compulsion so many humans were afflicted with: sharing. He was, however, prone to plotting. Prone to planning. Prone to a dark, satisfied chuckle when some outcome he’d orchestrated came to glorious, inevitable fruition.

Silas chuckled a great deal.

The one black spot in his otherwise great satisfaction with his Gift was its limitation. There were certain minds, certain hearts, too strong or closed or stubborn to be swayed. In Eliana’s case, he suspected it was all three, but
she’d never been affected by the subtle pressure he sent her way, little nudges of intent sent out in invisible waves, gentle as a lover’s touch. No matter how he tried to influence her emotions, she would not be swayed.

Her brother, on the other hand, was an entirely different matter.

Caesar, his eyes lingering on the place where Eliana had disappeared beyond the wall, said, “Still playing hard to get, is she?”

Impossible to get, more like. Silas was no fool; he knew she didn’t love him—would never love him. He knew also that she still pined for that knuckle-dragging warrior they’d left behind in Rome. But no matter. Love was for children and fools, and he was neither. Love didn’t play a part in his plan. Caesar, however, did.

He said in a quiet, dejected voice, “Is it that obvious she doesn’t want me?”

Caesar laughed, delighted. “Don’t worry, Silas. It doesn’t matter what she thinks she wants. She’ll be yours eventually.”

Silas could almost hear the indulgent head-pat in Caesar’s tone. He said innocently, “If only I could be as certain as you are, my lord. She’s damned stubborn once her mind is made up.”

Caesar’s laughter died. He gazed at Silas for a long moment, silent and still as a coiled snake, sunlight glinting blue off his black hair. “She’s only a female, Silas. She doesn’t get to choose her fate.”

Silas raised his brows and blinked, the picture of breathless anticipation, and Caesar said, “Let her think she’s in control for now; it doesn’t matter. In fact, it suits our purposes. We need her content for the time being. But once we get to Zion, she’ll be yours. You continue to oversee the
production of the serum and successfully carry off the little coming-out party we have planned, and I promise you, she’ll be yours.” He smiled, hard as stone. “No matter what she wants.”

A smile crept over Silas’s face. Great Horus, manipulating him was almost
too
easy; the boy’s will was a weak, slithery thing, easily pushed aside. Truly, the two of them were no match for him and everything he had planned. Knight to rook, pawn to queen, it was all just a game, and one at which he excelled.

He was already six moves ahead of them both.

Knowing exactly what Caesar needed to hear, Silas said in a humble voice, “Your father would be very proud of you, my lord. You’re just as ruthless as he was.”

In the morning sun, Caesar’s black eyes glittered with malice. “He was too easy on her. I trust you won’t make the same mistake. My sister requires…a firm hand.” They gazed at one another, and Silas heard loudly what had been left unspoken. His smile grew wider and more rabid.

“I couldn’t agree more, my lord. I couldn’t agree more.”

He looked forward to proving to them all exactly how firm his hand would be.

The best thing about whiskey is the speed at which it works.

“Easy, killer,” said Mel dryly, prying the silver flask from the death grip Eliana had on it. “Don’t make yourself sick.”

Too late,
Eliana thought. But she wasn’t sick from the alcohol. Leaning against the bare rock wall of the fighting amphitheater they’d ironically nicknamed New Harmony, Eliana let Mel take the flask and then wiped her mouth with the back of her hand. Her gaze wandering around the shadowed space, she wondered aloud, “What’s a worse way to die, do you think? Eaten by a shark or burned at the stake?”

Mel paused with her hand in midair, staring at her with one eyebrow cocked. “Ah. We’re in that kind of mood, are we? Let me guess…jerkass number one, or jerkass number two?”

Eliana exhaled hard, and whiskey fumes seared her nose. “Both.”

“Double-team.” Mel nodded sagely. “That’ll do it every time.” She looked down at the flask in her hand and then thrust it back. “You definitely need this more than I do.”

“I’m pretty sure I finished it,” Eliana said mournfully.

She’d fled to the catacombs after her breakfast with Caesar and Silas, and she’d been prowling around for hours, hoping to find someone to spar with, thinking a good fight would lift her mood. No such luck. The candlelit corridors were all but deserted with the exception of the two of them. Mel had found her just a few minutes ago, kicking down a row of empty bottles someone had lined up along a crevice in the rock. Carved gargoyles leered down from the ceiling, staring with empty eyes, and all along one wall someone had painted a beautiful, cresting tsunami, swallowing cliffs and villages in Japan.

Monsters and mayhem. It perfectly suited her mood.

Eliana put her hands over her face, rubbed her throbbing temples, and sighed. “In my next life, I’d like to have a penis. Whoever wrote that song about it being a man’s world was spot on.”

“Death wishes and penis envy. You
are
having a bad day.” Mel’s sarcastic voice gentled as she studied her face. “What happened?”

“What always happens. Caesar happened.”

Mel let it hang there for a minute and then very quietly said, “Eliana, you know you’re the reason we all left Rome, right?”

She lifted her head and looked at Mel.

“Not your brother, not Silas, not this shining great plan to live in the open with humans that you’re all so gung ho
about. None of us cared about any of that. We left because you were leaving.
You
.” Her voice dropped even lower, to nearly a whisper, conspiratorial. “You’re the Alpha of this colony, Eliana, whether you realize it or not. Silas was just one of your family’s
Servorum
back home, even though he acts like he owns the keys to the castle now. And it’s well known that your brother is unGifted and…problematic. You could formally challenge him—”

Eliana clapped a hand over Mel’s mouth and held it there, horrified. “Don’t you dare say it!” Though she’d hissed it as low as she could, her voice seemed amplified in the cavernous, echoing space. She had to take several long, deep breaths before continuing. “He’ll have your head on a stick in ten seconds flat if he thinks you’re conspiring to…to…”

Her voice muffled beneath Eliana’s hand, Mel said, “You’re stronger than he is. You’d win.”

“Shhh!”

Mel shrugged. Above Eliana’s hand, her black eyes were solemn, but filled with challenge. “Besides, you’re the real breadwinner around here. He’d starve to death without you.”

“Mel,” she warned, but before she could say more there came the sounds of voices and footsteps from one of the corridors that spilled into New Harmony. Someone was coming.

Eliana stood and ran a hand through the choppy blue tangle of her hair. “Please, not another word!” Mel rose beside her, folded her arms across her chest, and made a vague gesture with her shoulders that seemed to say
for now
.

“Butterfly!”

Alexi, coming through the low archway of the access corridor, pulled up to an abrupt halt. Beside him
looking around in awe at the graffitied walls and rows of stalactites that hung from the high, arched ceiling like monstrous rows of teeth was a girl in a short leopard-print miniskirt with teased blonde hair and a deep tan that appeared to be sprayed on. She had the kind of voluminous breasts typically seen on models in men’s magazines and long nails painted an alarming neon pink. Their hands were clasped together, but as soon as Alexi caught sight of Eliana, he dropped the girl’s hand as if it burned.

Oh gods. Not today. Not now.

“What fun!” snickered Mel beside her. “Ken and Hooker Barbie!”

Eliana elbowed her in the side. “We were just leaving, slick,” she called out, edging toward the corridor behind them. She reached out and grabbed Mel’s arm, but she wouldn’t be budged. Clearly, she wanted to stay for the fireworks.

The girl muttered to Alexi, “Who’s slick? And who’s
she
?”

Another tug on her arm and Mel relented with a sour look. “I’ve got five hundred on my girl for Friday night, slick, you in?”

Alexi looked at Eliana. “I’m always in,” he said solemnly, and the double meaning couldn’t have been clearer.

“Good luck with that,” said Mel under her breath, and then she smiled brightly and waved good-bye as Eliana dragged her off into the corridor.

When Alexi and his flavor of the week were out of earshot, Eliana said, “You’re terrible. Stop baiting him, will you?”

“Why? It’s fun to poke the bear and watch him dance.”

“Be nice.”

“Is
he
being nice by dragging every single low-rent skank in Paris down here to rub in your face? I think not. Therefore, he deserves everything he gets.” Mel made this pronouncement with a queenly wave of her hand. “God, it’s like he clones them or something.”

“He’s just…trying to get a rise out of me. Because he cares. It’s sweet, in its own sick, twisted way.”

“Sweet? Are you serious?” she scoffed. “It’s a cheap, immature trick. He deserves to have his boy bits cut off for that kind of behavior.”

“
Mel
,” Eliana warned, but her friend only laughed, a merry snort that echoed off the rock walls around them.

“Don’t worry, I’ll leave his boy bits unharmed for the time being. But he’s on my
list
, E, along with a few other people who will remain unnamed.”

She sent Eliana a dark, loaded glance, and she suddenly remembered the task she’d been assigned. “Speaking of those unnamed people, they’ve decided I should hit the Louvre tonight.”

Mel stopped dead in her tracks, and Eliana turned, surprised, to look at her. The corridor they were in was dark and winding, filled with the sound of trickling water and long, crawling shadows, but Eliana could easily make out the dismay on Mel’s face.

“The
Louvre
! Why there? That seems so risky!”

Eliana sighed in agreement. “I’m glad I’m not the only one who thinks so. As if I had a choice,” she muttered as an afterthought. “Anyway, security personnel can’t see me in the dark. Cameras can’t capture an image of me. Plus, I can Shift to Vapor if I need to. Really, what’s the worst that could possibly happen?”

It was a rhetorical question, of course, and one Mel didn’t have an answer to, but as they turned and began the long walk back to the upper levels of the catacombs and the hidden entrance that would lead them into the basement of their abandoned abbey, Eliana couldn’t shake the dark, nagging feeling that, somehow, she was about to find out.

Heart pounding, D shot up in bed and blinked into the cool stillness of the dark room, trying to regain his equilibrium. Trying, without success, to swallow around the cold, devouring terror that clawed at his throat. An echo of a scream died into silence off the curved rock walls as he sat there sweating and panting with the sheets rucked up around his waist, and D realized it must have come from him.