Blood-Kissed Sky (Darkness Before Dawn) Read online

  “The Vampire Process,” I say.

  Clive nods.

  “Would Sin have access to one of these factories?”

  “They were destroyed after the war,” Victor assures me.

  “But if even one remained—”

  “No. The task of destroying them was given to me. I made sure they were all burned to the ground. We had enough mouths to feed; we didn’t need any more.”

  Well, if anything, that puts my mind at rest. If Sin is amassing an army, he’s got a long way to go. But that doesn’t mean he can’t hurt Denver now.

  “What if I just go to Sin?” I ask. I’ve spent a lot of time the past few hours thinking about that. “I know he would probably turn me, but maybe I could use it to our advantage.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous,” Victor says. “I’d walk eighteen miles in the sun before I let that happen.”

  “I have to think about Denver,” I say.

  “Let me do that,” Clive interrupts. “Eris says she’ll spare Denver if you surrender yourself. The very fact that she’s giving us that offer reveals a great deal.”

  “You’re right,” I say, the lightbulb going off. “If Sin could take Denver, he would have done it by now.”

  “Precisely,” Clive says. “It’s a bluff.”

  From his office we have the view of a good portion of the city and its wall, which suddenly seems so fragile. Before, the sun was the greatest deterrent to vampires. Even Victor couldn’t come to this emergency session until it had set. But now, with Day Walkers a reality, it makes little difference.

  “What do you think, Victor?” I ask. “Is it all a bluff?”

  Victor twirls the liquid in his glass, takes a sip. “Sin wouldn’t waste time with deals if he didn’t have to. His big plan was to start a revolution within the city. He was hoping all the teens at the Teen Initiative party would join him.”

  “But they didn’t,” I say, pride in my voice.

  “Now he’s desperate. The bigger question is, why does he want you?”

  “I don’t know. He doesn’t want me dead; he had plenty of opportunities when he was dating Tegan, when we all thought he was human. I had my back turned the whole time.”

  Victor’s silent for a moment. I can tell he’s holding something in.

  “What are you thinking?” I prod.

  “My father was obsessed with your family,” he says slowly, contemplatively. “I think he was afraid of the influence your name had. I mean, your father wrote most of VampHu. Montgomery is a household name among humans and vampires. Maybe … maybe Sin wants you on his side. Maybe he thinks you can convince people to become Day Walkers.”

  “That’s insane,” I say. “I’d never do that. What kind of sense does that make?”

  “Sin isn’t exactly sane,” he says.

  “That means Sin is after me,” I say. “But the city is safe.”

  “For now,” Victor says, standing up. “Although the city is in a danger of a different kind. Sin may not be able to topple the walls, but even a handful of Day Walkers can cause enough fear to throw the city into chaos. Look what he’s accomplished so far with his pranks.”

  “Pranks!” I shout. “People have died.”

  Victor’s face becomes still, unreadable.

  “You’re right,” he says, emotionless, unapologetic. “People have died. As a result, they’re frightened. Already we have fewer donations. Which means less blood for me.”

  The line of reasoning, from the safety of humans to blood donations, worries me. It’s a stark reminder that Victor is a vampire, and his concern must always be for obtaining blood for the Lessers beneath him.

  “I guess Victor has a point,” I say begrudgingly. “After all, without blood, the vampires will start feeding on themselves, and then we’ll have the Thirst to contend with right here.”

  “What is this ‘Thirst’? Eris mentioned it, too,” Clive says. “How does that play into everything? It was in Dawn’s initial report about Hell Night, and her encounter with Brady, but I’m still not sure I understand it.”

  Victor offers the explanation: “When vampires are starving and they begin feeding on one another, it changes them. They become ravenous, addicted to vampire blood. They are incredibly violent, rabid, and beyond all reason.”

  “Everyone is in danger from it,” I say. “Humans and vampires.”

  “It’s true,” Victor says. “But it’s nothing to be concerned with at this moment.”

  My jaw almost drops at those words.

  “It sounds pretty serious to me,” Clive says questioningly.

  “It’s out west right now,” Victor says. “My associates and I thought that it might reach Denver eventually, but I’m not so sure now.”

  “What!” I say, trying desperately to stay diplomatic. “The Thirst is everything! It’s the reason you overthrew your father. He wasn’t taking it seriously. Now it sounds like you’re not, either.”

  “Dawn, your judgment is clouded. Don’t let the Thirst … don’t let it control you.”

  “What are you saying?”

  “Don’t make this into something personal.”

  Victor’s right: It is personal, because I’ve seen its power, and those Day Walkers confronting me this afternoon were nothing compared to the monster Brady became.

  “Your focus, Clive, should be the Day Walkers,” Victor says, turning away from me. “They pose the largest threat to the stability of the city. Find them. I suspect they will hunt during the day and hide at night. Take the few Night Watchmen you still trust and tell them to search during the day. The Day Walkers were probably turned recently. It takes time for a Lesser to be able to control himself around fresh blood. They’ll be clumsy, easy to spot when they strike. Look at the Sunshine Carnival. They’re enjoying themselves and their new abilities too much. Exposing themselves too readily. They shouldn’t be hard to find and stake.”

  “And what do you propose I do when Eris returns looking for Dawn?”

  “Stake her, too.”

  Clive finishes his drink, seemingly satisfied with that answer.

  I’m still in shock with Victor’s dismissal of the Thirst, but then—

  “And Dawn needs to be secured at all times,” Victor says. “I suggest you make a safe room here at the Agency, where Dawn can stay twenty-four hours a day. Only Jeff and Rachel can go in and out.”

  “Why?” Clive asks.

  “I suspect she was the impetus behind the Day Walkers’ strike at the carnival. Sin has probably given specific instructions to all his underlings to capture Dawn. They want to please their master.”

  “No way am I being locked up.”

  “Dawn’s good at taking care of herself, and I don’t like the thought of putting her in isolation,” Clive announces.

  “You like the thought of her falling into Sin’s hands better?” Victor demands.

  Clive pours himself a drink, downs it. He points at the window. “I sent her out there, beyond the wall, to see your father. Her parents died out there, but still I sent her because your father demanded it. Now I’ve got another vampire demanding I turn her over and you demanding I practically imprison her. Quite honestly, I’m getting tired of vampire demands. We thank you for your counsel, Lord Valentine. We’ll take it all under advisement.”

  I’m acutely aware of Victor bristling. I can’t blame him. I want to step in, but Clive is my boss.

  “My apologies if I overstepped,” Victor says, adopting the formality of Old Family vampires. “I want only what is best for Dawn.”

  “That’s all any of us want,” Clive assures him. “Goodnight, m’lord.”

  Victor bows formally. “Director.” Then he turns to me. “It’s late. I’ll see you home, Dawn.”

  “Actually, I need a private moment with Dawn,” Clive says.

  “I see …” Victor says, eyeing Clive suspiciously.

  “If you would be so kind as to wait outside,” Clive says. “I’ll send Dawn out.”

  “
Very good.”

  Victor is heading for the door when Clive says, “Outside the building, not my office. Vampire ears and all.”

  A corner of Victor’s mouth quirks up, and I know he was hoping to eavesdrop.

  I wait a few minutes after Victor leaves, and Clive stands at his window, looking down until Victor is outside and beyond hearing distance.

  “Tell me honestly,” Clive begins, turning back toward me, “what are your thoughts on the Thirst?”

  “It’s a problem. A very serious one.”

  “I thought so,” Clive says. “I could tell from your reaction when I brought it up, and when I read your report, it certainly seemed to warrant more concern than what Lord Valentine was giving it just now.”

  “Well, I was surprised by his casual response.”

  “Don’t be,” Clive says quickly. “Always remember that he is a vampire first and foremost. I think he’s hiding something from us.”

  I should have known Clive’s earlier friendliness was an act. He knows how the dealing-with-vampires game is played.

  “The Old Family fears the Thirst, right?” Clive asks.

  “Yes. It’s the only thing that, arguably, is more powerful than they are. Apparently most think it’s just an urban legend, but if they saw it in the flesh …”

  “Which you’ve done.”

  I nod, swallow hard. I told him about Brady when he debriefed me. “Yeah.”

  “I don’t know this new Lord Valentine, and on the surface he seems much kinder than his father. In fact, I’m sure he is. But that doesn’t mean he sees humans and vampires as equals. That doesn’t mean he trusts us completely. If the Thirst could conceivably be used against him, he would never want us to learn more about it.”

  Taking a mental step back, I put myself in Victor’s shoes and see the image unfolding through his eyes. What if news spread that there was this thing called the Thirst that could overthrow the Old Families? If the humans learned about it, would they try to harness it, try to start another war with it somehow? What if the humans allied themselves with the Thirst-infected vampires?

  That would be insane. It wouldn’t work. Not for us humans, anyway. Then again, we are notoriously shortsighted. I think of Roland Hursch, a man who would do anything to get rid of vampires. Would he join hands with an even more powerful monster, in hopes of being able to control that one? VampHu’s chains are so heavy that many would risk everything to throw them off, even unleashing a powerful force like the Thirst.

  “Victor might have a very good reason for keeping us in the dark,” I say.

  “Yes. But his reasons are not our reasons.” Clive takes a deep breath. “When I think about the war, all I can think about is how ignorant we were. I keep thinking that if we’d only known more about the enemy, we could have won. It’s as if all we were missing was one crucial element, one piece of intelligence that would have given us the edge. We were so close to winning, but it slipped away from us.”

  “And you think this is it?”

  “No. I don’t think that at all. The war is over. We lost. I accept that because I must. But having more information is much better than having less.”

  I couldn’t agree more. That’s one of the basic rules in negotiation—learn everything you can about your opponent and his motivations. Clive is once again in deep thought. He looks up at me and I expect him to speak, but he slowly turns his gaze downward again.

  “The city faces many problems,” he says. “Eris’s threats. The Day Walkers. And now this Thirst. While it seems the most distant, it could be the wave that becomes a tsunami.”

  “Knowing what it did to my brother, I agree.”

  “Then I want you to find out everything you can about it.”

  “How?”

  “Take the Night Train out to Los Angeles.”

  “Los Angeles?” I’ve never been beyond the Denver walls, except to visit Valentine Manor. To travel on the Night Train, to head west to the coast—I don’t know whether to be terrified or excited by the prospect.

  “Sin mentioned that he came from there,” Clive says.

  “It could’ve been a lie.”

  “And it might not have been. All of this is tied together somehow. I want you to find the threads. In Los Angeles, you’ll learn about the Thirst, learn how they’ve dealt with it—because the few reports we get from the LA Agency don’t mention any rampaging vampires—and bring that information back. And if it’s true that Sin came from out there, you may learn something about him and his Day Walkers.”

  “What about Eris’s threats? What will she do when she discovers I’ve left the city?”

  “If you’re not here, she gains nothing by attacking the city.”

  “She might do it out of spite. I don’t think it’s worth it.” Enough people have died because of me.

  “I won’t hand you over,” Clive says, his voice stern. “I’ll tell Eris that you snuck out of the city without my knowledge after she made those threats. If anyone is to blame, it’s her. Trust me, Dawn, dealing with vamps isn’t new to me.”

  He takes another sip of his drink.

  “No one can know about this mission,” he says. “Not Rachel or Michael or Jeff. When Eris finds out you’ve disappeared, she may begin questioning them. I want them to have plausible deniability. Just leave Rachel a note telling her you’ve left town.”

  I gnaw on my lower lip, thinking this all the way through. I understand the need for caution, but—

  “They’ll be worried about me.”

  “I know,” he says, as if realizing how many people this will affect, how many sleepless nights this will cause. “They won’t be the only ones.”

  I know he’s referring to himself. He’s always treated me like a daughter, and now he’s sending me away. For my own safety, yes, but maybe into even greater danger as I investigate the Thirst.

  “I’d send someone else if I could,” he says, as if reading my mind. “But even if Eris never came, I wouldn’t let anyone else go out there but you. Because I don’t trust anyone as much as I trust you, Dawn.”

  Tears sting the backs of my eyes, but Clive’s stoic demeanor inspires me to put up a brave front.

  “I have some arrangements to make,” he says. “I’ll come to your apartment when the Night Train comes in and explain how we’ll handle getting you to LA without anyone knowing. I want you to be like a ghost.”

  Chapter 10

  By the time I hit the lobby, I’ve shored myself up not to reveal anything to Victor. He’s always been able to sense when things are going on with me, and I need to make sure that he doesn’t suspect that I’m about to leave town. My best defense is a heated offense, so I draw on the anger that hit me when we were in Clive’s office.

  I push my way through the door to the outside. He’s leaning against the side of the building. When he sees me, his face lights up and I almost lose my resolve. But I hold firm.

  “Lock me in a room? Seriously? You thought I would go for that?”

  He grimaces. “I can’t stand the thought of anything happening to you.”

  “How about my going insane? Because I would do that if I was contained. I nearly went crazy in the hospital.”

  “Sin is a danger.”

  “Then catch him.” I know it’s unfair to lash out about that, because he’s doing everything he can. My words are meant to distract, so he doesn’t ask about the conversation I had with Clive after he left.

  “Vampires can sense other vampires,” he says, “but we can’t sense the Day Walkers. My hunters are frustrated. They don’t know what to look for, how to track them.”

  Parked on the street is a familiar car: a black Mustang. I don’t know where he gets the gasoline for it, but if I’ve learned one thing about Victor, it’s that he has a way of getting what he wants.

  He opens the door for me and I slide in. The car is prewar, from a time when automobile factories still existed. But the interior carries the scent of new leather—and Victor. I inhal
e deeply as he gets behind the wheel. With the turn of a key, the car hums. I’ve never considered how he keeps the thing running, and I wonder if he works on it himself. Most Old Family vampires are above doing anything that resembles labor, but I can imagine Victor getting his hands dirty.

  “Do you ever wish you were human?” I ask.

  With a squeal of tires, we’re roaring up the street.

  “It’s pointless to wish for things that can’t be.” After a few quiet moments he says, “But I do wonder what it would be like to feel the warmth of the sun instead of its burn.”

  I study his profile, occasionally illuminated by a random light. The shadows move in and out, revealing different things. His concentration. His exhaustion. I can almost see the burdens weighing him down. How much has he been doing behind the scenes that I’m not even aware of? How many other Valentines has he been fending off, each one wanting his throne? Who are his allies? How many foes does he have? I want to stay irritated at him for downplaying the dangers of the Thirst, for suggesting that I be locked away, but it’s a battle I’m quickly losing. “In the hospital, I walked to the window and let the sunlight touch my skin. I was glad that it could.”

  He jerks his head toward me, our eyes lock, and knowledge shatters the tension between us. He could have taken the sun from me. But he didn’t.

  I tear my gaze away and watch the scenery flash by, every now and then catching sight of someone slipping into the shadows. A Night Watchman? A vampire? A citizen just wanting the right to visit the night?

  “Why did you act like the Thirst wasn’t a big deal?” I ask.

  “I’m sorry I said those things,” he says. “But right now, Dawn, the Day Walkers are more of a concern to Clive and the citizens of Denver. None of them have seen the Thirst except you and Michael; none of them can even begin to imagine its horrors. But Day Walkers? That’s something they understand and fear. If you tell them about vampires killing other vampires, do you know what the average citizen will say? ‘Let them go at each other’s throats.’ They won’t care, and why would they? They aren’t seeing the big picture.”