Masquerade by Melissa de la Cruz
For my brother, Francis de la Cruz,
stalwart ally and kindred spirit
And for my husband, Mike Johnston,
without whom the Silver Bloods would not exist
We become so accustomed to disguise ourselves to others,
that at last we are disguised to ourselves.
—Fran?ois Duc de la Rochefoucauld
. . . the thing I am becomes something else. . . .
The shadow is cast.
—Bauhaus, “Mask”
ONE
The pigeons had taken over St. Mark’s Square. Hundreds of them: fat, gray, squat, and silent, pecking at the pieces of sfogliatelle and pane uva bread crumbs that careless tourists had left behind. It was noon, but the sun was hidden behind clouds, and a gloomy pall had fallen over the city. The gondolas were lined up on the docks, empty, their striped-shirted gondoliers leaning on their oars, waiting for customers who had not arrived. The waters were in low tide, the dark stain of the higher levels visible on the building facades. Schuyler Van Alen rested her elbows on the rickety café table and put her head in her hands, so that the bottom of her chin was hidden underneath her oversize turtleneck. She was a Blue Blood vampire, the last of the Van Alens— a formerly prominent New York family whose influence and largesse had been instrumental in the founding of modern-day Manhattan. Once upon a time, the Van Alen name had been synonymous with power, privilege, and patronage. But that was a long time ago, and the family fortune had been dwindling for many years: Schuyler was more familiar with penny-pinching than shopping sprees. Her clothes—the black turtleneck that hung past her hips, cutoff leggings, an army flak jacket, and beaten-up motorcycle boots—were thrift-store castoffs.
On any other girl, the ragged ensemble might look as though it had been thrown together by a homeless vagrant, but on Schuyler it became raiment equal to royalty, and made her delicate, heart-shaped features even more striking. With her pale, ivory complexion, deep-set blue eyes, and mass of dark, blue-black hair, she was a stunning, impossibly lovely creature. Her beauty was made even more benevolent when she smiled, although there was little chance of that this morning.
“Cheer up,” Oliver Hazard-Perry said, lifting a small cup of espresso to his lips. “Whatever happens, or doesn’t happen, at least we had a bit of a break. And doesn’t the city look gorgeous? C’mon, you’ve got to admit being in Venice is so much better than being stuck in Chem lab.”
Oliver had been Schuyler’s best friend since childhood— a gangly, floppy-haired, handsome youth, with a quick grin and kind, hazel, eyes. He was her confidant and partner in crime and, as she had learned not too long ago, her human Conduit—traditionally a vampire’s assistant and left-hand man, a position of exalted servitude. Oliver had been instrumental in getting them from New York to Venice in a short period of time. He had been able to convince his father to let them accompany him on a business trip to Europe.
Despite Oliver’s cheerful words, Schuyler was glum. It was their last day in Venice and they had found nothing. Tomorrow they would fly back to New York empty-handed, their trip a complete failure.
She began ripping apart the label on her Pellegrino bottle, tearing it carefully so it unwound into a long thin strip of green paper. She just didn’t want to give up so soon.
Almost two months before, Schuyler’s grandmother, Cordelia Van Alen, had been attacked by a Silver Blood, the mortal enemies of the Blue Blood vampires. Schuyler had learned from Cordelia that, like the Blue Bloods, Silver Bloods were fallen angels, doomed to live their eternal lives on earth. However, unlike the Blue Bloods, Silver Blood vampires had sworn allegiance to the exiled Prince of Heaven, Lucifer himself, and had refused to comply with the Code of the Vampires, a stringent rule of ethics that the Blue Bloods hoped would help bring about their eventual return to Paradise.