Shadowflame (36 page)
“I’m sorry about Lalita,” Deven told her.
Faith nodded. “So am I . . . you lost her, too.”
“Thank you for not being pissed off about that,” Jonathan added. “Like Dev said . . . her commitment to her post was genuine.”
“I know.” Faith raised an eyebrow at Deven and said, “But we’ll be changing our employee screening methods from here on out.”
The Prime smiled. “Don’t worry, Faith. She was the only agent I had here.”
Now she gave him a look. “Please, Sire. Surely you know that nothing you say is ever going to go without question again.”
The smile widened. “Good.”
Jonathan winked at her. “Take care, Faith. And keep an eye on those two.”
“As always.”
Their guards started to open the door, but Faith asked, “Can I ask you something, Sire?”
Deven turned back to her, lifting his chin inquisitively.
Faith moved close enough that her voice wouldn’t carry through the hall. “Why didn’t you ever try to recruit me for the Shadow? Was I not a good enough warrior? Not trustworthy enough?”
Deven regarded her silently for a moment, considering her question. “You are an excellent warrior, Faith. You would have made a superlative agent.”
“Then why . . .”
Deven’s gaze traveled up the stairs, to where Faith realized David was standing at the balcony rail. He smiled and gave Deven a little wave before walking on toward his workroom.
When Faith looked back down, Deven was watching her face carefully, and he said with equal care, “Because I demand absolute loyalty from my agents, Faith . . . and I knew that you were already devoted to someone else.”
Faith frowned. “What does that—”
Deven shook his head, smiling. “Don’t insult your own intelligence, Faith, or mine. We both know why you’re really here.”
She started to stammer a rebuttal, but he gave her a knowing look that silenced her; then he turned back toward the door, took Jonathan’s arm, and left Faith standing in the doorway with her face turning scarlet and her heart in her throat.
“It’s over.”
Kat looked up from the box of books she was taping, unsurprised to see Miranda standing in the doorway, resplendent in her long black coat. “Good.”
Miranda didn’t ask what Kat was doing; she didn’t protest or try to change Kat’s mind. She offered no apologies. She simply sat down on the arm of the couch, silent, and watched Kat pack.
“I’m going to stay with my mom until the baby’s born,” Kat said. “I don’t know exactly what I’ll do after that. I might do private counseling. Or teach.”
No reply.
Kat wrote
BOOKS
on the box with a fat Sharpie, then capped the marker and looked at Miranda. “I can’t do this anymore.”
Miranda nodded. “I understand.”
Kat looked down at the pile of books that had to go in the next box. The one on top was an old Robert Jordan hardcover. It had been Drew’s. She rested her hand on the dust jacket for a moment, then said, “Tell me this is all a nightmare, Miranda. Tell me I’m going to wake up a year ago, before any of this happened.”
She raised her eyes to Miranda, whose expression was strange: not disdainful, exactly, but distant, perhaps detached . . . no, that wasn’t it. There was plenty of emotion in Miranda’s face, but there was something else as well . . . and it wasn’t human.
The woman sitting on her couch wasn’t human. She might look like one to most people. She might pass for one onstage. She might drink a beer or eat an ice cream sundae. But everything about her, from the tumble of her dark red hair to the almost predatory grace in her posture, was carved out of something ancient and alien . . . something that, Kat had finally realized, was going to kill everything mortal she touched.
Something in Miranda had changed, and it would continue to change long after Kat had died of old age. Slowly, the darkness within her was unfolding, its tendrils curling around Miranda’s soul, giving her strength, but also stealing her away, the way children in fairy tales had been stolen by elves in the night, leaving a changeling in the cradle.
This was a woman with work to do, and that work had no room in it for pregnant best friends, or anything that would bind her to the world she had left behind. She had killed people, had beheaded a woman, would probably kill more, in the name of law and order and justice in a world so far beyond Kat’s grasp it might as well be the gilded halls of the gods themselves.
Suddenly Kat couldn’t look at her. She stared, instead, at the door to the guest bathroom . . . where Miranda had turned into a vampire. “Aren’t you going to say anything?”
A sigh. “I said I understand.”
“And that’s it?”
Miranda’s fingers absently touched the stone of her Signet. “You have to do what you think is best for you and your daughter. I don’t blame you for being afraid, or tired, or wanting to run. You’ve lost so much because of me . . . and the truth is, you will probably lose more if you stay.”
Kat took a deep breath. “Are there any vampires in West Oak?”
Miranda smiled slightly. “Not that we know of.”
Kat nodded, swallowing. She wanted to say she’d e-mail or call. But she knew—they both knew—it wasn’t true.
Still, Miranda made the effort. “If you or the baby need anything, ever . . .”
“Yeah. I’ll call.”
Silence stretched out between them, but finally Miranda said in a soft, sad voice, “Thank you for being my friend, Kat.”
Kat felt tears burn her eyes, and she started to say something, looking up at Miranda . . .
. . . but the Queen was already gone.
Miranda closed the front door of Kat’s house behind her. She leaned back against the door for a moment, eyes shut tightly, and took a deep breath.
It was raining, slow and steady, a quiet rain that seemed to blur everything, make it softer and gentler, even emotions that were hard and jagged and felt like teeth ripping through her heart. She tried to breathe in the softness, to release the pain.
When she opened her eyes again David was standing by the curb, hands in his coat pockets, watching her silently.
She reached up and wiped impatiently at her eyes. David sighed and opened his arms.
Miranda walked down the steps and into his embrace, and they held on to each other for a long time, her face buried in his shoulder, his hand stroking her hair.
When she drew back, she didn’t speak, and he didn’t expect her to. He simply took her hand and walked with her down the street away from Kat’s house, into a cold and rainy night at the receding edge of autumn, one year turning slowly into the next, one season at its end, another just beginning.
Epilogue
She watched from the roof as the dark red-haired figure ran down the street, her leather coat flying out behind her, her boots striking the pavement with deadly purpose. Behind the Queen a cadre of black-clad warriors followed at speed.
They chased the man almost to the end of the block before the Queen drew up short, her hand shooting out in a quick flicking gesture, and a trash can flew from the side of the building onto the sidewalk, right into the path of her prey.
The man hit the trash can hard and fell over it, landing in a sprawl. He tried to get to his feet and run again, but by the time he got up he was surrounded. Rough hands grabbed his shoulders and hauled him to the red-haired woman, whose green eyes were those of a serpent, coiled, hungry.
The Queen removed something from her coat. “Do you know why we came for you, Mr. Shikai?”
The man stammered something. His eyes were huge and he was drenched in cold sweat.
“Weeks ago we showed you this sketch, Mr. Shikai, and asked if you had ever seen this woman before. You said no.”
“Don’t know her,” he panted. “I swear, I don’t.”
The Queen tilted her head to one side, considering the man before her dispassionately. “Trace evidence found on her corpse links her to your building, Mr. Shikai. We know she lived there. We searched the building and found nothing, so I have to ask you: What did you do with her belongings?”
“Nothing! She didn’t leave anything!”
“Ah, but we know you’re lying,” she replied, stepping closer. “We tracked a particular artifact to that building—an amulet that gave off a very distinct energy signature. It was there yesterday, long after she was dead. It was gone tonight. What did you do with her things, Mr. Shikai?”
“Nothing! I swear, I—”
“Do you remember the night your wife died a hundred years ago?” the Queen cut in coldly, moving so close she was inches from his ashen face. “Do you remember the pain you felt holding her lifeless body in your arms?”
“How did you know—”
“I can make you relive that night over and over again,” she said, lowering her voice until the moment felt almost intimate. “I can trap your mind in a loop of grief and agony that never ends. I can go through your memories and find every hurt you’ve ever caused, every one you’ve ever felt, and you’ll spend the rest of your immortality there.”
He was shaking, staring at her, her power gradually amplifying the fear he already felt until he was so petrified he could think of nothing but escape—and the only way to escape was to give the Queen what she wanted.
“I moved them,” he said in a hoarse whisper. “Storage unit. Number eighty-five. Victory Storage on Burnet.”
She stared at him a moment longer, ascertaining whether he was telling the truth, and then took a step back.
The man’s relief was immense, and his knees seemed to give out. He knelt on the sidewalk panting.
The Queen gestured for the others to move back out of the man’s way, saying, “Next time my Elite question you, Mr. Shikai, I suggest you simply tell the truth. Ovaska may have terrified you into keeping her secrets, but I was the one who took her head . . . and if you lie to me again, I’ll take yours.”
He said something that was either gratitude or an apology, then lurched to his feet, staggering away as fast as he could.
The Queen spoke quietly into the band on her wrist, and her warriors began to melt back into the night that had created them.
Then, as if she’d sensed something, perhaps some movement on the roof above, or perhaps someone watching her, the redhead looked up at the building’s roof, eyes narrowed, her gaze penetrating.
All she saw were shadows.
Lydia smiled from the darkness.
Let her wonder . . .
The Queen would know her soon enough.
Ace Books by Dianne Sylvan
QUEEN OF SHADOWS
SHADOWFLAME
