“Better in my position than in yours,” he tells me, with an air of finality.
The rest of the walk back is done in silence. After what seems like forever, we emerge in the large, open plains near the apartments.
When I see what’s been done to them, I come to a staggering stop.
“What the hell has happened here?”
The whole ground is scorched as if by lightning. The grass is burned, the vegetation black and ashened. Great pits of upturned earth scatter the field.
But amongst all that destruction lie bodies, thousands and thousands of bodies, all a sickly, pale white, all destroyed, and all looking like they are minutes way from disintegrating completely and being lost on the wind.
“The Tentoria,” Raul says, his voice hushed and awed.
My eyes scan the ground. There are five thousand littered here, at the very least.
“What happened?” I demand.
“The Queen saved us from the threat,” Geordam says, respect clear in his voice. “She destroyed all of them with a storm called out of the heavens.”
“All by herself?” I question. “How? The precision needed for something like that…”
My words die on my tongue when I see another group of guards ringing the hidden entrance to the secret chamber where I left Mother.
“So, it’s all out in the open now,” I murmur, shaking my head. “No wonder Eleira was pissed.”
It’s Raul’s turn to laugh. “Pissed? She was murderous. Let’s hope the boon of reviving the Forsaken Sisters tempers her nerves, before she comes back to deal with you.”
“Yes,” I say. “Let’s.”
Geordam and the guards escort us to the apartments. We come upon very few vampires. The ones we see all seem quiet, subdued.
“There was a battle,” I say. “How many of ours were lost?”
Geordam shakes his head. “There was no battle. Eleira dealt with the threat single-handedly. The only casualty of it all was Riyu.”
My eyebrows go up. “Damn,” I say. “He could have been very useful to us.”
“To us, or to you, brother?” Raul wonders.
I give him a dark look. We reach the base of the trees. I am gladdened to find that my generator is still running. Geordam calls down the elevator. We file into it and shoot up.
There is something more dignified, I think, about this mode of travel as compared to scaling the bark of the tree.
The doors open and we emerge into the hallway. The doors to the other apartments are closed, but I only feel a few of them occupied.
If there are no vampires outside, and almost none in here, where are they?
We reach Eleira’s door. Geordam opens it with a key. I think the formality is wholly unnecessary. I don’t remember the last time any of our vampires used keys.
But when I see the woman in red seated on the couch opposite us, facing away, I understand why. I am not the only one to be Eleira’s prisoner. The woman’s hands are bound by silver cuffs, and she is looking out the window, her long, sleek, black hair cascading down her spine.
She turns her head gracefully at the intrusion. When I see her face, I nearly stagger back from shock.
“Rebecca?” I stammer out.
She smiles, the smile that is so familiar to me from all the times she’d tried to coax me out of my blood celibacy. Images flash in my mind, long-forgotten memories, of all the many hours we’d spent together, bonding over our shared distaste for vampirism. The difference was, she’d embraced it as inevitable and glorified in being able to make use of it while still feeling morally in the right—something I could never do.
“Here I leave you,” Geordam says. Raul is standing beside me, an expression of equal shock on his face.
Geordam closes the door. Rebecca smiles at us both and settles back.
She looks extraordinarily composed for somebody in cuffs.
As I take another step into the room, the bonds of Air wrapped around me suddenly release. I stop and give myself a shake, thankful to be able to use my arms again.
“How good to see you again, Phillip,” she says. She looks me over. “You’ve changed. And you, Raul—you’re much the same as I remember.”
He grunts, noncommittally. “You missed the interval where I was softer,” he says with a smirk. “You weren’t around for Liana.”
I’m impressed that he can bring the girl up with so little emotion in his voice.
“How are you here?” I wonder. “Here, now, in the flesh? Mother severed your soul. There’s no coming back from that.”
“Remember that I was the first,” Rebecca says slyly. “The process had not yet been perfected.”
“Are you cloaked?” I ask. “Why can I not feel you. I know you had some magic back in the day. But not enough for a self-cloaking spell.”
“I’m not cloaked,” she says. “You cannot feel me because I draw on the essence of another. She is far away.”
“Cassandra,” Raul says darkly. His eyes harden. “It was you who commanded the hordes of Tentoria beneath the earth. You were the one who loosed them on the stronghold. They attacked on your command, and—” he takes a looming step forward, appearing very threatening, “—and you are drawing on the power of my blood. My blood mixed with Cassandra’s.”
“Well, aren’t you a sharp one,” she coos. “Very well done. How did you figure it out?”
“It’s the only thing that makes sense. I was there when they discarded your body into the earth. I was there when the Tentoria took Cassandra away. And my own gifts were weakened, just enough so that I couldn’t heal.” He glances at me. “It was a mighty wound, to be sure, but it should not have put me that close to death. The one reason it did was because my power was being leeched.”
“It is true that fledglings take on power from their maker,” I consider. “But I always thought it was only a small amount.”
“It usually, is,” Raul says. “Not in this case.”
Rebecca arises, her bound hands locked in front of her. “You must consider the possibility that this was all meant to be.”
“How did you do it?” I ask. “How did you come back from what Mother did to you?”
“I told you. The process was incomplete. Your mother’s great flaw was always her arrogance. She made a mistake with me and left a sliver of my soul in my body.”
“We saw what was done to your creatures outside,” Raul informs her.
For a millisecond, the corners of Rebecca’s eyes tighten. “I made a deal with your Queen,” she says. “One that she reneged on entirely.”
“I did not renege on anything,” Eleira announces.
I spin around and see her step into the room through a newly-formed portal.
She is trailed by the three Forsaken Sisters.
Rebecca shoots her an evil glare, then harrumphs and sits back down.
“The screechers were a threat I could not live with,” Eleira continues, I think for our benefit rather than Rebecca’s. “They had to be destroyed. You promised not to bring harm to any of The Haven vampires. This was the only way to guarantee that. I promised you access to Morgan.”
“Which you didn’t give,” she says, venom on her tongue.
“Not yet. But I will. Earlier, I promised the Forsaken Sisters that I would leave Morgan alive.”
I whistle. “You made that promise and then you got angry with me for preserving her life?”
“You did it behind my back, behind everybody’s backs. You murdered the four guards who helped you do that. You left no witnesses. You did not mean for your treason to be discovered.”
I shake my head sadly. “You mistake me once again, Eleira. I told you many times that my loyalty is yours.”
“Then why did you let Morgan live? Why did you bring her to that chamber where the torrials would keep her alive?”
“Because I knew that her knowledge should not die with her,” I say, improvising on the spot. “You are very capable, very strong, but even you need a mentor. Somebody to show you the way.”
“And you thought I would accept Morgan for that role?” Eleira sneers.
“Just like Felix did with the villages, I wanted to give you the choice.”
Eleira shakes her head. “Spare me, Phillip. I don’t know the last time a single honest word has left your lips.”