Blood and Bite (16 page)

Jack drove Rune to the hospital, following behind Tina as
the woman zigzagged in and out of traffic.

She’d made Ellis stay at the clinic. He’d argued, but in the
end had been satisfied with Jack going along to keep an eye on her.

Tina told her the doctors had done all they could for
Matthew. The first day, they’d actually seen a bit of improvement, but then
he’d backslid into a greedy, dark abyss that Rune wasn’t going to let claim him.

The kid had to live.

“You can’t save everyone, Rune,”
Ellis had said.
“I
don’t want the child to die, either. But sweetheart, you can’t interfere like
this. You’re not…”

Not God.

No, she wasn’t, but she had a gift. She had it for a reason.

She didn’t look forward to the pain that came with feeding,
but would handle it. Matthew had to live.

“It may not save him,” she told Tina, striding into the
hospital. “It may make him feel good for a while, but may not save his life. I
don’t know much about how it works.”

“You brought Lex back from death.” Tina’s face was grim, set
in determined lines Rune had never seen before. And lurking deep in the depths
of her eyes was dread.
Fear.

Rune frowned but asked no questions. Something was going on
and she’d find out soon enough.

She just had to reach Matthew.

The nurses on the boy’s floor stared at them silently,
exchanging confused, sad looks.

“He’s in here,” Tina said, ignoring them. She pushed open
the door and urged Rune and Jack inside. “He’s here.”

Strad stood at the window, his big body held in such a
straight, tight line that Rune knew he was hurting in a way few people hurt. He
was in pain.
Deep, deep pain.

Rune recognized the look.
“Strad?”

He turned to look at her, startled. “What are you—” Then he
glanced at Tina and a terrible understanding dawned.
“Tina,
no.”

Tina stood at Matthew’s bedside, her face calm. “Feed him,
Rune. Save him.”

Rune swallowed, understanding immediately that it was too
late for Matthew. He was dead. She fought back tears and rage.
Why?

He’d been meant for greatness. He had been.

She put a hand to her stomach—her constantly churning
stomach—and tried to compose herself. She had no right to devastation. She had
to be strong.
Had to be.

Fuck me.

“I’m so sorry,” she whispered, aching for the huge berserker
and the little blonde.

Tina shook her head. “Don’t be sorry. Heal him. You saved
him. You brought him back to us once. Do it again, Rune.”

Rune wrapped her arms around Tina. “I can’t raise the dead,
Tina.”

“How do you
know
? You don’t know. Just try. That’s
all I ask. Try.”

Rune felt a presence and looked toward the door,
understanding what she would see before she actually saw it. Her skin erupted
with gooseflesh and her mind seemed to shiver.

Blood and Fire.
They came into the
room silently, faces calm. They glanced at Rune and then their stares went to
the boy’s still form.

He’s ours now.

She didn’t understand. Probably never would.

But a thought slid through her mind, there
and gone.
Maybe he was theirs because they’d saved him. Maybe if he’d
died in the COS inferno, he’d have been lost to them.

The dogs might have planted the thought there.
A sort of parting gift.
Anything was possible. She’d
witnessed enough of the impossible to know that.

“Jack. Do you see Blood and Fire?”

He stared down at her, then glanced around the room,
frowning. “What?”

Strad took Tina from her. “I’ll take care of her.”

Rune nodded. “I’m sorry.”

But Tina wasn’t going to give up. She shoved away from the
berserker and grabbed Rune’s neck, forcing her toward the boy. “Just try,” she
begged. “Try.”

Strad pulled her off. “Tina!
Enough.
He’s gone. He’s
gone
.”

The big man’s voice broke, and it took everything Rune had
not to throw herself into his arms and try to comfort him. But there was no
making it better. Time was all they had. Time might make the loss a little more
bearable. Rune could not.

Tina hit Rune’s face, gently, not to hurt her but to gather
some of the red tears escaping her eyes.

She put her wet fingers to her son’s mouth, wiping his lips,
begging him to drink.

Rune couldn’t take anymore.

“Jack,” she whispered. “I need to go.”

Blood and Fire waited.
Watched.

As Rune turned away, she glanced at them and then stared,
frozen to the spot.

Matthew waited with them.

He stared at her, and then he smiled.

“Tina,” Rune cried.
“Strad!”

Strad strode to her, pulling Tina’s resisting body with him.
“What is it?”

Rune pointed to where Matthew stood smiling between the two
dogs. He and the animals looked as solid and clear to her as Jack did.

“He’s there with Blood and Fire,” she said. “He’s smiling.”
She turned to look at Strad and Tina. “He
is
meant for great things.
Just not here.”

But they couldn’t see him. They couldn’t believe something
they couldn’t see. Not really.

“Rune.”
Jack took her arm, his
voice soft. He thought she’d lost her mind.

Maybe she had.

But as she watched, Matthew left his spot and walked to her.
He pulled her head down, his touch as real as any she’d ever felt, and
whispered into her ear.

“No,” she said. “No.”

He just looked at her,
then
stood
once more between the animals. He hadn’t moved, just was suddenly there. He
nodded, lifted his hand, and was gone.

On to great things.

She realized she was sobbing and felt the heaviness of
Jack’s arm around her shoulders. “He’s gone.”

“Stop it,” Tina cried. “Stop it!”

Rune turned to face her. “I swear it, Tina. He’s okay. He…”
she glanced at Strad, Matthew’s whisper still echoing in her mind. She did not
want to share that secret, though Matthew had insisted.

It would make them believe. It would comfort Tina.

But it would devastate Strad.

Tina went back to the body on the bed, the vessel that no
longer held her child. She began smoothing back the hair from his forehead,
murmuring words Rune didn’t want to hear.

Her heart shattered.

“Tina. He was here. He spoke to me—”

Strad ran a hand over his face. “Be quiet, Rune.”

God, she wanted to. “I can’t, baby. He wanted me to tell you
both something. Something Tina knows but you don’t. He said you both needed to
hear it.”

She had their attention.

“What then,” Tina asked. “What?” She had a look in her eyes
that said she wanted to hurt Rune, wanted to hurt somebody to see if it would
take some of her pain away.

Rune swallowed,
then
forced the
words through a desert-dry throat. She glanced at Strad, but had to look away.
“He said that Tim Emerson was his father. He said no one on earth knew that
truth but Tina.”

At first no one moved, no one breathed. Then Tina began to
shake as Rune’s words sank in. She grabbed Rune’s shoulders, squeezing hard
enough to bruise. Her face was a grimacing mask of disbelief, then hope so
bright it hurt Rune’s eyes.

“He told you? My child really…you did see him? Tell me
everything. Tell me where he was going. Tell me everything.”

She believed.

She believed and was comforted.

Strad believed as well. Rune saw it in his eyes, in the way
he held himself so still and stiff he might have shattered into a million
pieces if someone had touched him.

“Tina?” he asked.

Tina glanced at him. “Yes, it’s true. I was pregnant when I
met you.” But she turned back to Rune, uncaring how that might affect Strad.
She’d lost her baby. She couldn’t worry about Strad. She needed to save
herself. “Where did he go?”

Rune kissed her cheek. “He went to a wonderful place. Blood
and Fire were special.
Guardians, maybe.
I don’t know
what Matthew will be in that world, only that he will
be
. He’s not
dead.” She looked at Strad. “He’s just not here.”

And because Strad’s eyes were so flinching, so filled with
anguish, she lied. “Berserker, he said you would always be his daddy.”

Strad moaned,
then
fled the room.
He wouldn’t want anyone to see him break. She understood that.

She spent the next hour with Tina, explaining over and over
what Matthew had said, how he’d looked, how he’d smiled.

She talked about Blood and Fire, about Gunnar—who Tina
wanted to question as well—and about possibilities.

But in the end, when Jack left to get some coffee and Rune
slipped into the bathroom, Tina left a scribbled note and went to find her son.

He’s out there. I want to be with him. I’m going to find
my baby.

They found her hours later, sitting behind a pipe in a small
basement room, her wrists cut and a smile on her face.

Maybe it was what Matthew had wanted.

Or maybe that was just what Rune needed to believe.

The world was full of grief and pain, but it was tempered by
love and joy and a deep-seated desire, by those who inhabited it, to survive.
Such was life.

And no matter what happened, it went on.

Alone, Rune forced herself to go to the graveyard in which
Amy was being buried, to stand at the edge and watch as a pathetically small
crowd of people said their final goodbyes to the girl.

Amy’s father looked up once, toward Rune, and she thought he
might have seen her. But then he looked down again.

Her eyes filling, Rune murmured a silent goodbye to the
little bite junkie and slipped away. She should have talked with Amy’s father.
Should have.

And three days after Tina and Matthew’s deaths, Rune and Shiv
Crew attended the difficult double funeral. Rune walked away from the cemetery
in which Strad had laid his wife and child to rest, digging deep to find a
bright spot to latch on to.
Anything to keep the darkness at
bay.

It couldn’t
win,
that darkness.

She’d been fighting it for too long to give up now.

Ellis found her a house.

“Not just any house,” he’d said, “but
the
house.”

It belonged to relatives of his, and the owner, a
thirty-something with a need for adventure, was eager to sell.
Very eager.

The relatives were leaving the country and needed to show
her the house that day, so she picked up Ellis and headed to see it. She wasn’t
particular. She needed a place to live and it if even remotely suited her, she
was buying.

The only downside was its location.

“The Moor, Ellie? It’s like moving from a garden to the
wastelands.”

“I know. It’s perfect for you. You’ll see. I have a feeling
about this place. And you need to live where the neighbors won’t blink an eye
if you stumble home with a bullet wound and a pack of ghouls chasing you.”

“I see your point. Why did your cousins build there? That’s
a little weird.”

He grinned. “My cousins are a little weird.”

And Ellis still hadn’t turned. Despite the nagging worry,
she let herself believe that if he hadn’t turned by now, he wasn’t going to.

The house looked odd in the Moor. Most of the houses were
broken and old.
Dark, mean, and ugly.

But her house was all clean lines and landscaped property.
It was only one level—no upstairs, no attic,
no
basement—but that one level was nearly three thousand square feet of hardwood
floors and sunny rooms. It contained three bathrooms, one with a sunken tub
large enough to fit two big men at once—
were
she so
inclined to have them there.

It also had a fully functioning panic room. Living in the
Moor, one might find it handy. Not her, of course, she’d never hide from a
threat. She’d shoot a motherfucking threat.

There was furniture in the house, but not a lot.
An enormous kitchen table, the appliances, a couch in the living
room.
They owners were leaving them there.

Rune had a feeling there was more to the cousins packing up
and leaving the country in such a hurry, but no one was talking.

“I’ll take it,” she said.

And just like that, she had a house.

In the Moor.

Living in the Moor might not have been the smartest thing to
do, but it felt right. In a few days, it’d be her new home.

And Ellie hadn’t fucking
turned
.

There was her bright spot, her light of hope.

That night at the inn she stood naked before the full-length
door mirror and catalogued her scars.

She had no idea why some of them disappeared when she healed
and some of them lingered, but she was amassing a hell of a collection.

It was almost as though her body needed at least one memento
from all the shit she’d been through, all the battles she’d fought. Some lost,
some won.
All of them changing her.

She sighed and turned from her reflection in the rickety
door mirror, grabbing her cell with something close to relief when it rang.

She no longer craved silence.
Or solitude.

Yeah, she’d changed.

She glanced at the display.
“Hey Z.”

“Hi, sweet thing.
How’re you
doing?”

She hesitated. “I’m all right.”
Restless,
anxious, unsettled…but all right.

He knew her, no matter what she said. “You need to work.”

“Always,” she answered. “What do we have?”

“Nothing tonight, Rune.
I’m sorry.
I’m still at RISC. Elizabeth asked me to call you. There are a few things I
need to tell you.”

“Go.”

“First, RISC was contacted by a master vampire looking for a
city. He wants to apply for Spiritgrove. Elizabeth would like you to talk to
him.”

“Apply? Have we started handing out applications?”

She could almost hear him shrug. “It’s not a bad idea. The
bigger cities are being courted by vampires looking for a place to live. She
said he’s very courteous, this vampire, and because of the trouble we’ve had
with Llodra, is asking permission.”

“Bad news travels fast.”

“Yes. And he sounded desperate.”

“Did you find out what his circumstances were?”

“Vampires are the most secretive group on earth. But he did
tell her he’d been forced out of his coven by his former master. He and those
now under his command are looking to for a city to claim. He chose ours.”

She frowned. “I still don’t see the advantages for us,
bringing in another master.”

Llodra wasn’t even dead yet. But now that his children were
dead, Matthew was…gone, and RISC had no more questions for him, he wasn’t long
for the world.

Z hesitated. “I might see one.”

“Tell me.”

“I read that a couple cities have created centers for humans
who have been turned against their will and need some help dealing with it.
They’ve actually hired
Others—
vampires, wolves,
shifters—to teach the new Others. Parent them, in a way. You know what I’m
saying?”

Ellis.

“Yeah.
I do.” She rubbed her temple,
thinking. It was a good idea. Some newly turned humans lost control, went nuts,
or simply lay down and died. They needed help getting through their first weeks
and especially that first night.

Centers for turned humans.

Times were changing.

“Okay, I’ll talk to this master.”

“Let Elizabeth know and she’ll hook you up.
Now, the second thing.”

“Give it to me.”

“Emerson’s brain cancer is still there.”

“Good.” But her blood hadn’t healed him. She couldn’t heal everybody.
Even if she’d reached Matthew in time, she probably couldn’t have saved him.

She dug her nails into her bare thigh, concentrating on that
pain. It was better than the pain of Matthew and Tina.

Oh, Berserker.

“But,” Z continued, “
he’s
so
addicted to your blood he’s going crazy. They have him under suicide watch.
From the information I got, even the coldest of the guards are having a problem
watching him. They said they’ve never seen anyone suffer so much.”

Funny how that didn’t bring her any real satisfaction.
“Good,” she said again.

Lex and Strad were also addicted to her, but it appeared
there were varying degrees of addiction, just as she appeared to be able to
heal some people and not others.

Or maybe it was only
Others
that
she could heal. She sighed. “Everything is fucking complicated.”

“I figured you’d want to know.”

“Thanks. What else?”

“This is about work. The wolf alpha you fought when you
first came home—”

“Darius Elliot.”

“He’s asking for our help.”

She lifted an eyebrow.
“Seriously?”

“Yeah.
Some bad shit happening in
his county.”

“What’s going on?”

“I don’t know much. He told Elizabeth the
Others
are being fucked with. All of them.”

“Dirty county.
And they have yet to
come out of the Dark Ages.”

“That would be correct.”

“So what does he want us to do?”

“He said something about
Others
going missing and that those who disobey—his word—are being sent to the Camp.”

Fuck.
The Rock County Department of Other
Corrections—the Camp—was whispered about by outsiders who had heard the
stories. “We shouldn’t get involved.”

“He was terrified.”

“Still.
Not up to us. We can’t do
it. Not our problem.
Besides.
We have no jurisdiction
over there.”

Z blew out a breath. “He believes COS may be connected.
And…” He hesitated, as though reluctant to tell her anything that might hurt
her. “He said a couple of kids were being hurt.”

Well son of a bitch.

“Okay then,” she said. “I’ll talk to Elizabeth about lending
them a hand.”

She could almost feel his smile.

They were Shiv Crew.

It’s what they did.

“What is RISC saying about Llodra, Z? Why are they keeping
him alive?”

“They’re keeping that to themselves. Elizabeth didn’t really
say—she just said he was being dealt with.”

As tired as she was of the violence, of the nearly constant
emotional agony, Rune wanted Llodra’s death. She wanted revenge.

He was hers to kill.

Let RISC keep him alive. The longer they kept him, the
better her chances of getting to him and taking what was hers. He had to die.

Maybe his madness would die with him.

Llodra had admitted to knowing that SCOS was going to take
Matthew. Little went on in the
Other
community he
didn’t know about. He’d used that knowledge to fuck with Rune. An amusing
little game that kept him occupied in his madness.

“There’s nothing going on tonight, Z? I need to do
something. I’m climbing the walls.”

Restlessness grew inside her like a malignancy. She needed
to do something. Something to make her not have time to think.

Maybe she just wanted an excuse not to read Amy’s emails.
She’d hidden that grief inside her and knew that someday it was going to mess
her up. But not right then. She couldn’t handle it.

“I’m sure we could find something. Want me to come pick you
up?”

“Maybe.
I—”

A knock on her door, insistent and hard, cut her off. “I’ll
call you back.” She hung up, hopping into a pair of jeans and pulling on a
T-shirt before going to the door.

She tapped her gun against her thigh. “Who is it?” The doors
of the inn had no fisheyes.

“It’s me.”

She leaned her forehead against the cool hardness of the
door, her heartbeat suddenly quick and unsteady.
Fuck me.

“Rune.”
His calm, determined voice
seeped through the wood. “Open the door. Let me in.”

She slid her hand to the doorknob, unsure, tempted.

Don’t do it, Rune.

She opened the door.

“Hello, Berserker,” she said, and let him in.