Valentina hit the fast-forward button, speeding through two more performers, before a boy in black climbed onto the stage. She tapped the key to return it to normal speed, and Tana saw Gavriel grinning out at the audience, garnet eyes shining, black curls wild around his face, looking as mad as he’d been caged beneath a Paris cemetery.
He took an extravagant bow, one arm flung out with a flourish. Then turning, he dragged a single chair onto the stage. The stuffing had been ripped out of it, the brocade hanging down in tatters. “I have a performance to offer you tonight. It is not a unique talent that I have, but we marvel not over the man who eats a single meal or who does one meager shot of liquor. We marvel over excess. That is what I would give you.
“Come, let me bite you. Have you ever wanted to be as I am? To be immortal? I will turn you. Any of you. All of you, if you like. Tonight. Come to me.” He threw his arms wide. “I am thirsty. Let me drink. Let me gorge.”
For a long moment, he waited. The crowd had gone hushed. Then a single dark-skinned woman broke from the ranks and started toward the stairs. She walked up the steps slowly, looking back at her friends. She had on a silver-and-black harlequin dress and had painted one of her eyes with a black diamond. Tana could see the fear on her face as she walked slowly to the chair and sat down. Tears glittered in her eyes as she stretched out her long, elegant neck.
Valentina stopped it, freezing the screen as Gavriel bent toward her. “He does it, too. Bites all of them, drinks a ton of blood, and then staggers out. Leaves them alive, every one. They’re saying that’s the Thorn of Istra.”
“He is,” said Tana softly.
Valentina looked at her, surprised. “Wasn’t his job to stop the spread of infection? Stop outbreaks by killing new vampires.”
Tana couldn’t seem to stop from staring at the frozen screen, at the greedy expression on Gavriel’s face. Then she gave Valentina a lopsided grin. “I guess he quit. I mean, that’s like a Coney Island–style hot dog–eating contest.”
They looked at each other for a long moment and then started giggling uncontrollably.
“So you’re still going to Lucien Moreau’s?” Valentina asked, walking to a rack and taking down a long black gown with one hand and a golden gown with the other.
Tana nodded, walking over to pet the nap of the velvet. “If Jameson comes in, though, you better show him that video. The reason he told me about his friend being at Lucien’s was that he worried she’d get caught in the cross fire if Gav—if the Thorn came after Lucien. He wanted to warn her.”
She remembered what she’d said to him about Gavriel—that whatever he would do, he would do alone. But then why turn so many new vampires? Maybe she’d been very wrong.
“I think I’ll come with you,” Valentina said.
“To the party? Didn’t you just tell me that it was dangerous?” Tana tilted her head to one side, trying to puzzle out Valentina’s change of heart.
“I’m going to warn her,” Valentina said. “I saw her that once, so I can find her again. I owe Jameson.”
“Well, that’s good news for me.” Tana bent down and started unlacing her boots. “It’s always more fun to show up at a party with friends.”
CHAPTER 26
POST BY: MIDNIGHT
SUBJECT: SAD VAMPIRE
I thought I would be writing a different post. I know I promised I would tell you guys what it was really like beyond the walls of Coldtown, but I’m not sure I can bear to. In all my imaginings, I never thought it would be anything like this.
Now Winter is dead and I’m a vampire.
I was going to just post the video footage I took and not explain, but that’s not fair to you all who have been my real true Dark Family, supporting me through everything, encouraging me to go on this journey. I know that you’d want to hear about what happened, not just see it.
I’ve posted lots of times about hating how every second I was getting older. You saw all my freak-outs that my cells were dying and my hair was falling out. Every time I woke up with strands on my pillow, I was sure that piece of hair was gone forever and I would go bald and be ugly. Sometimes I thought I could feel the decay inside me, taste the rot in my mouth before I brushed my teeth in the morning. For days before I left for Coldtown, I couldn’t eat because the idea of food disgusted me, the way I could feel it heavy in my stomach.
I know you feel the same way sometimes, like there’s something wrong with us because we’re not the magnificent monsters we were meant to be. Well, you’re right. I can tell you now, from the other side, that we were right. Everything feels right now.
My being bitten is on tape, and I’m going to upload that video as soon as I edit it. It was just as amazing as I had hoped it would be. The pain wasn’t so bad. Your skin gets kind of numb around where the fangs go in, and there’s this amazing feeling, like someone is pulling all the weakness and rot away to make room for something else.