Blood Rules (27 page)

The silver-haired creature continued staring through its hair, eyes oceans of red.

The color reminded Gabriel of bloodlust. Of what he'd committed at that asylum tonight.

Pucci interrupted. “Just let the thing rest.
I'm
gonna be tuckered out for the next few nights with all this changing we did. You all will, too.”

“Pipe down,” everyone told him.

Gabriel gestured toward 562. “Mariah, you look into its eyes now.”

“
Her
eyes,” Mariah said softly.

Gabriel couldn't say for certain what 562 might be in any shape or form, but he wasn't about to make an issue out of it.

He guided Mariah in front of 562. Chaplin woofed under his breath, but didn't make a move.

“Show her what you showed me?” Gabriel asked 562.

When he let go of Mariah, she stiffened. But he'd bet it was because she was receiving the image/thoughts, not because he'd stopped touching her.

When 562 ultimately averted its gaze from Mariah, it left her green eyes wide.

“That injured woman with the arm . . .” Mariah said. “She was healed through an exchange. And that vampire man—it looked like he was on cloud nine after taking 562's blood . . .”

“Are you thinking 562's a cure-all?”

Her eyes went glassy. “That employee at the asylum pointed out 562 when I asked for cures for were-creatures, vampires, or dymorrdia.”

Hana, the oldster, and Pucci seemed to hold their breaths.

Gabriel hated to break their hearts, but... “We didn't see what happened to that male vampire after it took her blood. And just because 562 healed a woman's arm, that doesn't mean anything to us preters. Don't make what it showed us into what you need to see, Mariah.”

The oldster said, “But what if Mariah's on to something?”

“I'm saying you all shouldn't get your hopes up,” Gabriel said. “We don't know what 562's all about. He or she might be sending false images . . .”

Mariah had furrowed her brow. Her connection to Gabriel was just as sore as the rest of her body probably was.

He was real sorry about that, but he didn't want her jumping into a no-win situation. Mariah would do anything for that cure, even mess herself up further, and that worried him.

“Did you see the rest of the image/thoughts?” he asked her. “The part with the blood exchange? The raising of the dead? Then the full moon?”

“There was that, too . . .” Mariah began before Pucci interrupted.

“Vampire? Werewolf? What's this now?”

Gabriel described what 562 had shown them, and the Badlanders got real thoughtful. None of them offered a theory about what 562 might be . . . or what it'd turn into come the next full moon.

Chaplin woofed again, getting their attention, and Gabriel found 562 watching him, as if the creature had been wishing that he'd return his attention to her. Or it.

Or . . . hang, he didn't know.

At any rate, as he looked at 562, he latched onto a wispy thought, and he emerged with what felt like the most solid answer the creature had offered yet.

“We're to keep calling it 562,” Gabriel said. “It doesn't have any other name.”

The oldster had wandered closer. “No name, huh?”

He smiled at 562, as if reaching out in camaraderie. For some reason, Gabriel thought the creature smiled big and wide, welcoming the oldster's attention, though he really couldn't see what it might be doing through all that hair.

But then he felt any hint of a smile disappear as the creature caught Gabriel's gaze and extended more thoughts to him.

“562 was caught,” he heard himself saying from that hazy place. It was as if it was using him to talk.

“Caught by what?” Mariah asked.

“Original Shredders.” Just as his own maker had been?

As Gabriel was about to ask 562 why the government wanted to pack particular monsters away in asylums, the creature flashed him another image/thought.

He hesitated to repeat this. It'd slay Mariah and the others. Gabriel wasn't even sure he wanted to hear himself speak it.

“Gabriel?” Mariah asked.

He couldn't keep the information back, so he relayed it to them.

It was as if the air had been let out of the mine shaft, leaving the atmosphere deadened. He felt the same anesthetic disbelief in Mariah, too.

She was shaking her head.

Then 562's eyes fixed on something behind him.

He should have registered Taraline's scent long before now, even with her liberal use of tawnyvale, but he'd been too preoccupied.

She started talking, as if thinking an explanation for her fast journey—which should've taken days, thanks to her human slowness—was primary. Obviously, she hadn't seen 562 behind them all yet.

“I caught a ride with an escaping were-puma as I made my way out of the hub,” she said, short of breath. “He saw me stranded and brought me out of the city. A gallant. Who would have guessed? I had him drop me a half mile back, and he didn't even ask me what I was doing around the asylum tonight. No questions at all. I only told him I had a home out here, but he was too excited to get back to the hub to listen to any more explanations.”

Pucci said, “Not all monsters are gallants, Taraline. You could've been killed.”

But Hana was more concerned about the bigger news. “Most of the escaped monsters stayed behind?”

Taraline didn't answer, because she'd caught sight of 562.

And 562 couldn't take its eyes off her. It was even making a sound with its tongue, though not quite talking.

Gabriel turned to see Taraline in the shadows, just under a beam from a hanging lantern. She was carrying her own light, and it threw a sheen over her veil, lending nefarious angles to the curves and slopes of her hidden face, making it seem as if there were nothing but a skull beneath the material.

“It seems you found a cure,” she said in that deep voice.

Had they? At least for Taraline?

But it looked as if that old woman with the injured arm in the image/thought had become a vampire after drinking 562's blood....

Gabriel went very still. All along, he might've been able to offer Taraline a fix for dymorrdia since vampirism healed, though maybe not enough for the damage done to Taraline. But it wasn't in Gabriel to offer salvation for the price of a soul in exchange. He wasn't any kind of cure.

When he glanced back at 562, its eyes were on him again, locking him in, wishing to communicate.

“Tik-tik . . .”
It kept making that sound. Then it sent an unadulterated thought to Gabriel, and he found himself talking.

“There's nothing that will turn you into the human you were before, Taraline.”

Maybe he'd been thinking that, too—that even if he, the vampire, were to try to heal her with his blood, she'd probably never be what she once was. Dymorrdia was too damaging.

He switched his gaze back to Taraline just as she jerked, as if hit, the light from her lantern squiggling over the walls. He felt another burst of the same jagged disappointment in Mariah, too. In himself.

An awkward moment passed. Then another.

“Well,” the oldster murmured, clearly trying to save them all from depression. “I suppose this means no champagne tonight.”

His comment fell like a ten-ton rock.

As Taraline moved to a side tunnel, where she obviously intended to be alone, 562's gaze followed, as if it were fascinated. Then it uttered a tiny cry, trying to regain Taraline's attention.

She paused, the lantern light casting rays over the walls as 562 parted its hair, revealing its face.

Gabriel could feel Mariah's shock through their link. Then it mellowed to a sense of wonder.

562 had the face of a half-human, but with downy silver gleams of hair and a nose that resembled a small snout. Black lips. Unblinking red eyes that Gabriel had never seen on any of the were-creatures he knew.

Delicate, Gabriel thought. 562 looked as harmless as a pet from yesteryear except for those eyes.

As 562 kept its hair spread, it was as if it were inviting Taraline to show her face, too.

But the mysterious woman only paused, the lantern hanging in her hand.

Then, without further response, she retreated into the side tunnel.

562 blinked only once as it looked after Taraline, then finally allowed its curtain of hair to fall back over its features, those red eyes not giving away any other reaction. After a few seconds, the creature seemed to shut down, no matter how hard Gabriel tried to win its focus again.

That weight continued pressing down the air as Mariah led Gabriel away while Chaplin kept guarding 562.

“Should we give up for the night?” she asked. “Let 562 sleep?”

“Probably. But what about after that?”

Mariah got real hushed. Gabriel tried to read their link, but she'd made it go numb.

“Mariah?” he asked.

“I say we find out anything we can from her, no matter how long it takes. We also need to find out more before we talk to Taraline about the possibilities.”

So she'd caught on, too.

He sought input from the others. Hana and Pucci were holding each other as they lay on the floor, silent, which Gabriel took to mean that they agreed with Mariah. Neither of them had their eyes closed, though they were struggling to keep them open. Gabriel was pretty sure he'd be the only one knocked out once dawn broke, since he couldn't fight off vampire rest.

As for Mariah, she looked beaten, so Gabriel put his hand on her arm. His flesh seemed to flame through her shirt and into her skin, but he didn't remove himself this time, even if he could feel them both pulsating.

The oldster was no dummy, and he pushed Gabriel's hand away.

Right. He was being stupid, forgetting how he'd glutted himself on those Witch Shredders back at the asylum. He shouldn't be touching anyone, most of all Mariah.

Separating himself from her further, Gabriel was thankful that at least the oldster had his head about him.

“Listen,” the old man said. “According to 562, there isn't a cure for us, so we need to talk about taking care of business here before we move on.”

“How do you mean?” Gabriel asked.

“Did either of you take a look round GBVille? Did you see what I saw? And, if you did, can you honestly say that you can live the rest of your days with that on your mind?”

The oldster was talking about those kids who'd sold themselves for water.

Gabriel had known that the other man had been ill at the sight, but just look at how things had turned out back in the Badlands, after he'd told the community to fight Stamp. Letting 562 go its own way, then lying low, wouldn't come amiss.

It'd sure help Gabriel to get his own bearings back.

“Oldster,” he said, “sometimes you have to pick your battles. There's sure to be trouble in the hub right now. Everyone's going to be watching everyone, and it's the last place we should be.”

“Eh,” the oldster said, waving a hand at Gabriel as if wishing him away. “All your talk about standing up and fighting. Who knew a vampire could rustle up that much hot air?”

“Oldster—”

“You know, Gabriel, you're a real cold vamp, through and through.”

The accusation should've hurt more, but it didn't. Gabriel knew he was right about staying in hiding, just this one time. He'd learned.

As the old man plopped to the ground, turning his back on them all, Hana and Pucci looked to Gabriel, as if his opinion about the subject still mattered.

Then they looked to Mariah, and he realized that there might be a place for her in this community after all. She'd always been the lone wolf, but they needed a leader, and maybe Gabriel wouldn't always be it for them.

She'd shut off her emotions, fully closing down their link, but he could sense confusion in her gaze, as if she didn't like what she'd seen in the hub just as much as the oldster.

Without comment, she went to Chaplin, digging her hand into her dog's brown fur as they both sat in front of 562 to guard their guest.

Gabriel sought his own position, away from the group, far enough so that Mariah's heartbeat faded inside him.

When he drifted into the darkness of rest, her vital signs grew even fainter, but he still held on as long as he could.

W
hen the power had gone out, Stamp's leg and personal computer had done the same.

Fortunately, as the gears in his leg ceased to work while he and Mags were scouring the western fringe of GBVille for that blip he'd seen on his scent tracker, she'd been there to act as his crutch.

While darkness had swallowed the hub, she'd tucked him into a space between two boulders near Little Romania, then told him to stay put while she hit the road to the hub and procured materials for two makeshift crutches—steel rods that she'd padded on top with small pillows.

Stamp hadn't asked about the details of her scavenging because his leg felt as if it were burning off—same with his left arm, which had held his computer. Thank-all the doctors had put plating over most of the gears in his leg, because it seemed to protect at least some of his mechanical abilities, allowing him to at least walk like a gimp.

Yet who cared about poles and pillows and even a power strike when he was on the scrubs' trail again?