Chapter Fourteen
Zoltan ripped the cap off the first bag of blood and guzzled it down. He was in Neona’s house now, alone at last. He’d managed to grab his jacket before being led here. Lydia was standing guard outside, and she’d closed and barred the window shutters to keep him from escaping. The only light in the house came from a small fire in the hearth.
He squeezed the last drop from the plastic bag, then grabbed the second one. A knock on the door gave him half a second to drop the bags on a bed and throw his jacket on top. The door opened, and Tashi entered with a wooden tray.
“We thought you might be hungry.” She set the tray on a round table in front of the fireplace. “The tea is hot.” She moved the earthenware teapot to a trivet on the table.
“Thank you.” Zoltan inclined his head.
She gave him a curious look. “Are you really Dohna’s son?”
“Yes.”
Tashi glanced at the door, then stepped toward him and lowered her voice. “Did your mother give you something . . . special to drink?”
She had to be referring to the Living Water. The women suspected that was why he was still alive. “Where is Neona?”
Tashi snorted. “Eager to get started, are you?” Her gaze drifted down his bare chest to his jeans. “I wouldn’t be in such a hurry if I were you. The minute she’s pregnant, you’re—”
The door opened and Lydia peered inside. “There is no need to talk to him.”
“Yes, Mother.” Tashi hurried outside.
Lydia gave him a dubious look, then closed the door.
He grabbed the second bag of blood and ripped off the cap. Halfway through it, he was feeling strong enough to slow down. He took sips as he looked around. It was a small house. One room. Years of a wood-burning fire had permeated the walls and furnishings with a rustic scent. There were two beds, across from each other, pushed up against walls that were lined with some sort of woven reed mat. Their form of insulation, he figured. It probably got damned cold here in the winter.
There were a few framed pictures on the walls. Long rectangles of bright silk, embroidered with flowers and butterflies. He smiled, imagining Neona sitting in front of the fireplace on a cold winter evening, creating a work of art with needle and thread.
The bedsheets were unbleached linen, soft from years of use and washing. The pillows and comforters were stuffed with something soft. Lamb’s wool, he guessed from the faint scent. A small table sat between the two beds. On top rested a candlestick and the book Neona had taken from Frederic’s cabin the night before. At the foot of each bed rested a large wooden trunk.
The fireplace was on the far wall, opposite the two beds. In front of the fireplace, a table and two chairs sat. Two beds, two chests, two chairs. Neona must have shared this house with her twin sister.
He finished the second bag of blood and zipped the two bags into a jacket pocket. Then he wandered over to the hearth to put on another piece of wood. The fire greedily engulfed the new fuel and sent flickering shadows across the room.
He eyed the plate of food on the tray. Some sort of flat bread, jam made from berries, and cheese. He picked up the teapot to look at it. Pottery painted in a simple red and green geometric design. Was this the handwork of one of the women?
The trivet caught his eye. It was black and slick. Slate? He set the pot on the table and picked up the trivet. It was slightly pliable, with smooth edges. Not stone. Or pottery. Leather? It seemed too thick for that. He leaned over the fireplace and held the edge of the trivet over the fire. It didn’t catch fire, didn’t melt. It barely felt warm. The floor of the fireplace was made entirely of the odd black tiles.
Another knock sounded on the door. He set the trivet down and picked up the teapot as Tashi entered once again. He poured some tea into a small round cup without handles.
“I thought you might want to clean up.” Tashi placed a bowl and pitcher next to the tray and frowned at the plate of food. “You didn’t eat.”
“I was waiting for Neona. When is she coming?”
“Are you in a hurry to die?” Tashi gave him a wry look. “Neona’s with Freddie and Freya. They’re getting her ready for you. And making a big deal out of it.” She rolled her eyes. “They act like this is a wedding.”
His heart stilled. Would Neona see it that way? Could she accept a vampire for a husband? His groin tightened at the thought of a wedding night.
“But it is more like your funeral,” Tashi continued. “You shouldn’t have come here.”
“I’m in love with Neona. And I want to help you defeat Lord Liao.”
Tashi stiffened. “We don’t need your help.”
“You do. There are only six of you.”
Tashi winced. “You will never convince the queen to trust you.”
“I have to try.” Zoltan looked around the small house. He might be here several days. He needed to teleport back home and grab a supply of blood. And he needed to make plans with Angus. “How long will it take Neona to get here?”
Tashi shrugged. “I don’t know.”
“I should rest before she comes. Can you tell her to come in thirty minutes?”
“Do we look like we would own a clock?”
“Neona has a watch. I gave her one.”
Tashi’s eyes widened. “Really? Is it true what Freya said, that you brought gifts for us all?”
He nodded. “True. I’d like to be accepted here.”
“The queen will never accept a male here.” With a sigh, Tashi walked toward the door. “Some things never change.”
The sad tone of her voice made Zoltan suspect that she might be open to change. “Will you tell Neona?”
Tashi nodded. “Thirty minutes.” She left, closing the door behind her.
Zoltan grabbed his jacket and looked around as he prepared to teleport. The trivet. It was bothering him because he couldn’t tell what it was. He picked it up, checked the time on his watch, and teleported straight to the kitchen of his castle.
Howard had his wife pressed against the kitchen counter as he slipped a chocolate-covered strawberry into her mouth.
Zoltan dropped his bloody jacket and the black tile on the counter. “Sorry to interrupt.”
Howard jumped and turned. “What the—holy crap! What happened to you?”
Elsa choked and swallowed, her eyes watering. “Oh, my God! Do you need a doctor?”
“I’m fine.” Zoltan glanced down and winced. His bare chest was smeared with blood, and more blood had seeped through the bandages Neona had tied around him.
Howard gave him an incredulous look. “Why do you keep seeing that woman? She beat the crap out of you again!”
“No, she didn’t.” Zoltan motioned to the stab wound by his ribs. “Her mother did this. And it was one of her friends who shot me with an arrow.”
“And that makes it okay?” Howard scoffed. “I take it back. You’re not depressed. You’re insane.” He whipped out a cell phone. “I’m calling Mikhail. He has some medical supplies.”
“I don’t need doctoring.” Zoltan pulled a bottle of Blissky from the cabinet. “But do call Mikhail and Angus and anyone else who can come for a strategy meeting. We have to come up with a plan to help the women of Beyul-La.”
Howard frowned. “The same women who just treated you like a dartboard?”
“They’ll come around.” Zoltan poured a glass of Blissky and downed it. The blood gave him a jolt of energy, and the whisky took the edge off the pain. He grabbed the black tile. “Get everyone here now. I’ll be right back.”
“What? Where—”
Zoltan teleported to his office in Budapest. “Milan,” he called as he entered his assistant’s office.
Milan jumped to his feet. “Oh, my God! What happened to you?”
Zoltan shrugged, then grimaced from the pain of moving his shoulder.
“Sir!” Milan ran toward him. “Shall I call a doctor?”
“No, I’m fine. I’m in a hurry. I need to get back to something.”
“A battle?” Milan adjusted his glasses as he eyed the bandages. “Are you sure that’s wise, sir? If I might say so, you appear to be losing.”
Zoltan smiled. “I’m fine. How’s it going with the land deal?”
“Rajiv met with the government officials. He said they wanted an exorbitant amount, about ten million—”
“Send it. I need the deed right away.”
Milan gulped. “Yes, sir.”
“And see what you can find out about this.” Zoltan handed him the black mystery tile.
Milan frowned, turning it over in his hands. “What is it?”
“I don’t know. Send it to the lab at the university. The guys who investigated the arrow. And put a rush on it. I want to know by tomorrow night.”
“Yes, sir.”
“How’s business? Do you have everything under control?”
“Yes, sir!” Milan’s gaze shifted back to the bloody bandages. “How is your . . . vacation?”
“Great! See you later.” Zoltan teleported back to the kitchen.
Mikhail and his wife, Pamela, had arrived and were sitting at the table with Howard and Elsa. J.L. Wang was helping himself to a Bleer from the fridge, and Emma MacKay was pouring herself a glass of Blardonnay.
She gasped. “What happened to you?”
“I met the other warrior women of Beyul-La,” Zoltan explained. “Is Angus coming?”
“Yes, as soon as he finishes his interview with Franklin Chesterton.” Emma poured a second glass of Blardonnay and offered it to Zoltan. “I went with Angus, since my psychic powers are much stronger than his, probably because I was already telepathic before I was transformed. I was able to see that Franklin has quite a few memories of his childhood. Apparently he and his father discussed Beyul-La often.”
“That’s good.” Zoltan took a long drink of the mixture of synthetic blood and Chardonnay, then headed toward the table. “Shall we get started?”
“I brought a medicine kit,” Mikhail said. “Do you want a shot for the pain?”
“I’ll be fine.” Zoltan sat next to J.L. Wang.
J.L., aka Jin Long, had worked for the FBI before becoming a vampire. As an employee for MacKay S&I, he was in charge of security for the West Coast Coven, situated in his hometown of San Francisco. Recently he’d done some assignments in China, since he knew the language.
“We read Angus’s report,” J.L. said, “so we’re all up to date. Amazon women, hiding in a secret valley. Why? Are they scary looking?”
Zoltan shook his head. “Quite the contrary.”
“Did you figure out what Lord Liao wants from them?” Emma set the bottle of Blardonnay on the table along with her glass and took a seat.
Zoltan refilled his glass. “I believe so. The woman I’ve been seeing is Neona. She looks like she’s twenty-two, but she’s over two thousand years old. And her mother, the queen, is even older. I think she dates back to the Iron Age.”
A series of gasps went around the table.
“Holy crap,” Howard muttered. “And I thought you were old.”
Zoltan gave him a wry look. “They have a fountain of youth. Living Water, they call it. I haven’t seen it yet, but I believe it’s a pool in a cave.”
“So Lord Liao wants the fountain of youth?” Elsa asked. “But he’s a vampire. He’s already immortal.”
“I think he’s trying to prove his worth to Master Han,” Zoltan explained. “If they take control of the Living Water, then they could wield a tremendous amount of power over the mortal world.”
J.L. nodded. “Han could make mortal governments bend to his will.”
“No wonder the women of Beyul-La are so distrusting,” Emma said. “Whoever controls the Living Water could potentially control the world.”
Mikhail leaned his elbows on the table. “We need to earn their trust. How many are there? Six?”
“Yes.” Zoltan took another long drink. “I’m trying to convince them I’m on their side. I have an advantage there, since my mother actually came from Beyul-La.”
Elsa gasped. “The mummy was one of the Amazon women?”
“What mummy?” Pamela asked.
“The mummy in the chapel is his mother,” Elsa whispered to Pam.
J.L. snorted. “His momma’s a mummy?”
Zoltan sighed. “As I was saying, I’m the son of one of the original founders of Beyul-La, so they’re reluctant to kill me like they would some other guy. They’ve existed for centuries with the mind-set that men cannot be trusted.”
Emma frowned. “We can’t change something that ingrained overnight.”
“I know.” Zoltan drank some more Blardonnay. “Two of the women would still like to kill me—the queen and Lydia. I think Lydia’s daughter, Tashi, could be open to change. And the two younger ones, Winifred and Freya, were born in the 1920s, so they missed the major man-hating events that the older ones went through. And they grew up with a loving father for a while, so we have a good chance of convincing those two that we’re good guys.”
“They’re the daughters of Frederic Chesterton?” Emma asked, and Zoltan nodded.
“That’s five of the women.” J.L. looked at Zoltan. “What about the sixth?”
Neona. Zoltan wasn’t sure how she felt about him. “I think she’s on my side.”
Howard’s eyes narrowed. “You don’t seem very confident. Is there a problem?”
Zoltan drank some more Blardonnay. It seemed to be helping with the pain. “They don’t trust men. They trust vampires even less.”
Pamela winced. “You haven’t told them you’re a vampire?”
“How did you explain being old enough to be the mummy’s son?” J.L. asked.
“They think my mother gave me some of the Living Water to drink.” Zoltan took another sip.
“Ah.” Pamela nodded. “That would explain it.”
Howard swallowed down some beer. “I wonder what would happen if a Vamp drank the Living Water.”
Zoltan finished his glass. “I wondered that, too. If it enables a Vamp to stay awake during the day—”
“Master Han would have a huge advantage over us.” J.L. grimaced. “He could kill us in our death-sleep.”
Pamela gasped. “This is terrible!”
Mikhail patted her shoulder. “Relax. We don’t know if the Living Water has any effect on a Vamp at all.”
Everyone at the table turned to look at Zoltan.
He swallowed hard. “You want me to try it?”
“We have to know what would happen,” Mikhail told him.
Zoltan frowned.
“Cheer up.” J.L. gave him a wry smile. “It’s not like the water could kill you.”
Zoltan shifted in his chair. The women would kill him if they caught him in their cave, drinking their precious water.
What else were they hiding? “I keep feeling like I’m missing something. Shouldn’t there be a . . . purpose for their long lives? Why live forever in secret?”
The others at the table were quiet as they pondered his question.
Zoltan thought back to what Neona had said. “She said the pact was binding forever.”
“What pact?” Mikhail asked. “With whom?”
Zoltan shook his head. “I don’t know.”
“Maybe they’re protecting someone?” Emma asked. “Or something?”
J.L. hit the table with the palm of his hand. “I know! The abominable snowman!”
Zoltan sat back. “What?”
The women at the table laughed, while Mikhail shook his head.
“I’m serious,” J.L. insisted. “It’s a Himalayan thing.”
“There’s no such thing as an abominable snowman,” Howard muttered.
“Says the were-bear,” J.L. smirked. “You might be related to him.”
Howard growled.
“I have to leave soon.” Zoltan glanced at his watch. “Emma, be ready to come when I call you. Maybe tomorrow night, or the next.”
She nodded. “I’ll be ready.”
“The neighboring valley has a cabin where Frederic Chesteron lived. I’ll try to get the women’s permission for us to use it as our headquarters.” Zoltan rose to his feet. “I’ll be back in a few minutes.”
While the others talked, he teleported up to his bedroom, cut the bandages off, and took a quick shower. Then he dressed, threw some clothes into a duffel bag, and teleported back to the kitchen. Everyone was still talking.
He stepped behind the counter and loaded a small ice chest with bottles of blood and ice.
Howard joined him. “What are you doing? You act like you’re moving to Beyul-La.”
“I have to gain their trust.”
Howard scowled at him. “Talk to them all you want, but when the sun rises, come back here. Do not do your death-sleep there.”
Zoltan closed the ice chest. “Neona tried hard to keep me alive. I think I can trust her.”
“You think you can? You’re going to risk your life on a hunch?” Howard removed a set of silver handcuffs from his jacket. “Don’t make me use these.”
Zoltan stepped back. If Howard managed to get a cuff on him, he’d be unable to teleport.
“Do I have to remind you how completely helpless you’ll be?” Howard continued. “If you must go, take me with you.”
“I can’t take you on my wedding night!”
The room hushed. Everyone stared at him.
Zoltan winced.
Emma stood. “Did you get married?”
“Not . . . really. It’s a . . . long story.” Zoltan remembered the wedding rings he’d admired at the jewelry store. He glanced at his watch. “Howard, tell Domokos to go to the jewelry store tomorrow and pay Janos whatever I owe him.”
With a groan, Howard raked a hand through his hair. “I don’t know whether to congratulate you or use these damned handcuffs.”
“I have to go.” Zoltan grabbed his duffel bag and the ice chest.
“If you get the slightest inkling of danger, teleport back here,” Howard warned him.
“I will. But if I hope to gain Neona’s trust, then I’ll have to trust her.” As Zoltan teleported, Tashi’s words echoed in his head. It was either a wedding or his funeral.