The Immortal Rules (13 page)

A fire flickered in an open pit, and wisps of greasy smoke rose from burning wood and plastic, settling hazily over the room. There were more of them than I had expected. Cardboard boxes, cloth tents and lean-tos had been hastily constructed and were scattered around the fire like a miniature village. I could see dark shapes huddled within, ignorant of the predators watching them sleep from just a few yards away. I could smell their breath and the hot blood pumping beneath their skin.

I growled and eased forward, but Kanin put a warning hand on my arm. “Quietly,” he said, a whisper in the dark. “Not all feedings have to be violent and bloody. If you are careful, you can feed from a sleeping victim without rousing them. The old Masters used this technique a lot, which was why strings of garlic around the bed and on the windowsills were so popular in certain regions, futile as they were. But you must be careful, and very patient—if your victim wakes up before you bite them, things can get ugly.”

“
Before
I bite them? Won’t they wake up when they feel…I don’t know…a couple long teeth in their neck?”

“No. The bite of a vampire has a tranquilizing effect on humans when they’re asleep. At best, they’ll remember it as a vivid dream.”

“How does
that
work?”

“It just does.” Kanin sounded exasperated again. “Now, are you going to do this or should we go somewhere else?”

“No,” I muttered, staring down at the camp. “I think I can do this.”

Kanin released my arm but then pressed a small package into my hands, wrapped in greasy paper. “When you are finished, leave this where your prey will find it.”

I frowned, lifting a corner of the paper, finding a pair of shoes inside, fairly new and sturdy. “What’s this?”

“An exchange,” Kanin replied and turned away as I continued to stare at him. “For the harm our actions will bring them tonight.”

I blinked. “Why bother? They won’t even know we were here.”

“I’ll know.”

“But—”

“Don’t question it, Allison,” Kanin said, sounding weary. “Just go.”

“All right.” I shrugged. “If you say so.” Tucking the package under one arm, I started toward my sleeping prey.

I was maybe halfway to the cluster of lean-tos, the scent of blood and sweat and human grime getting stronger each time I breathed in, when I caught movement from the other side of the room. I ducked behind a corroded metal beam as two ragged figures slowly picked their way toward the camp, murmuring back and forth. With a start, I recognized one of the boys, Kyle, the leader of our rival gang. Snippets of their conversation drifted to me over the rubble pile, talk of food and patrols and how they were going to have to scavenge in other territories soon. It filled me with an odd sense of déjà vu, hearing pieces of my old life played back to me.

When they reached the camp, however, one of them gave a shout and lunged forward, reaching into a box and dragging something out by the ankle. The figure pulled out of his shelter gave a feeble cry and tried crawling back into the box but was yanked into the open by the other two.

“You again! Dammit, kid! I told you, this is my box! Find your own!”

“Look at that,” said the other boy, peering into the box, scowling, “he went through your food bag, too, Kyle.”

“Son of a bitch.” Kyle loomed over the cringing boy, still sprawled out at his feet, and gave him a vicious kick to the ribs. “You miserable little shit!” Another blow, and the cringing boy cried out, curling into a fetal position. “I swear, pull another stunt like that, and I won’t just throw you out, I’ll kill you. You got that?” One last solid kick, eliciting another cry of pain, and the larger boy shoved him aside with his foot. “Go crawl away and die already,” he muttered and ducked into his shelter, pulling the curtain shut.

In the wake of the outburst, the rest of the camp was stirring, faces squinting out of their shelters with bleary, confused frowns. I remained motionless behind the beam, but after gauging what had happened, the rest of the camp lost interest and vanished back into their individual homes. I heard disgruntled murmurs and complaints, most of them directed at the boy lying on the ground, but no one went forward to help him. I shook my head, pitying the boy but not blaming the others for being angry. In a gang like this, you pulled your own weight and contributed to the rest of the community or you were considered dead weight. Stealing, sneaking around and using other people’s things was the quickest way to getting a beating or worse, being shunned and exiled from the gang. I had been a loner in my old gang, but I had always pulled my own weight. And I’d
never
stolen from the others.

Then the boy stood up, brushing at his clothes, and I nearly fell over in shock.

“Stick,” I whispered, unable to believe my eyes. He blinked, gazing around the camp, sniffling, and I blinked hard to make sure it was really him. It was. Thin, ragged and dirty, but alive. “You got out. You made it back, after all.”

I started toward him, unthinking, but something clamped my arm in a viselike grip and pulled me back, into the shadows.

“Ow! Dammit, Kanin,” I said in a snarling whisper. “What are you doing? Let go!” I tried yanking back, but he was much too strong.

“We’re leaving,” he said in an icy voice, continuing to pull me away. “Now. Let’s go.”

Planting my feet didn’t work. Neither did jerking my arm back; his fingers just tightened painfully on my arm. With a hiss, I gave up and let him drag me through the room and out another window. Only when we were several yards from the warehouse did he finally stop and let me go.

“What is
wrong
with you?” I snarled, biting the words off through my fangs, which had sprouted again. “I’m getting a little tired of being dragged, cut, hit, yanked and ordered around whenever you please. I’m not a damn pet.”

“You knew that boy, didn’t you?”

I curled a lip defiantly. “What if I did?”

“You were going to show yourself to him, weren’t you?”

I should’ve been afraid, especially when his eyes went all dark and glassy again, but I was just pissed now. “He was my
friend,
” I spat, glaring up at him. “I know that’s impossible for you to understand, seeing as you don’t have any, but I knew him years before you came along.”

“And what,” Kanin asked in his cold, cold voice, “were you intending to do once he saw you? Go back to your old gang? Join this new one? A vampire among the sheep? How long do you think you would last without killing them all?”

“I just wanted to talk to him, dammit! See if he’s doing all right without me!” The rage was fading now, and I slumped against a wall. “I left him alone,” I muttered, crossing my arms and looking away. “I left him, and he was never good at taking care of himself. I just wanted to see if he was doing all right.”

“Allison.” Kanin’s voice was still hard, but it had lost its frosty edge, at least. “This is why I told you to forget your human life. Those people you knew before you were turned, they will continue living, surviving, without you. You are a monster to them now, and they will never take you back, they will never accept you for what you were. And eventually, whether from age or starvation or sickness or their fellow man, they will all die. And you will continue to live, assuming you don’t decide to meet the sun or get your head torn off by another vampire.” He gazed down at me, his face softening just a touch, almost pitying. “Immortality is a lonely road,” he murmured, “and it will only be made worse if you don’t release your attachments to your old life. To that boy, you are the enemy now, the unseen monster that haunts his nightmares. You are the creature he fears the most. And nothing in your previous life, not friendship or loyalty or love, will ever change that.”

You’re wrong,
I wanted to tell him. I had looked after Stick almost half my life. He was the closest thing I had to family now that everyone else was dead. But I knew arguing with Kanin was useless, so I shrugged and turned away.

Kanin was not pleased. “Don’t go after that boy, Allison,” he warned. “No matter what you think you’ve left behind. Forget about him and your old life. Do you understand?”

“Yeah,” I growled. “I hear you.”

He stared at me. “Let’s go,” he said at last, walking away. “We’ll have to find somewhere else to feed tonight.”

I gave the warehouse one last look and turned away. But before trailing after Kanin, I unwrapped the shoes and placed them on the ground in plain sight, hoping that Stick would stumble upon them the next morning. We left Sector Four, wandered back into gang territory and were eventually set upon by two Red Skulls who apparently didn’t get the note about rogue vampires. They then proceeded to have a very bad night. We returned to the hospital with full stomachs, though Kanin and I didn’t speak to each other for the rest of the evening. Mister Broody Vampire vanished into his office, and I wandered back to the reception area to swing my katana at imaginary enemies with Kanin’s face.

At least he didn’t ask me about the shoes. And I never told him.

* * *

F
OR
THE
NEXT
FEW
NIGHTS
, everything was normal. I continued my lessons, suffering through math and English and vampire history before moving on to training. As I got better with my katana, Kanin would give me various patterns to work on and then leave me alone to practice. He never told me where he went, but I suspected he’d searched everything on this floor and had moved to the lowest floor of the building, past a large red door at the bottom of a stairwell. The one marked with the faded sign that read, Danger! Employees Only. I’d stumbled across it one night, wandering the hospital in a rare moment of leisure. But I’d left it alone when Kanin called me back.

I was curious, of course. I wanted to know what was on the other side of that door, what Kanin was really looking for. The one time I followed him down the stairwell, the metal door was shut, and I didn’t want to risk going inside and having him find me. Ever since that night in Sector Four, there was a wall between us. Kanin never said anything about it and never went out of his way to check up on me, but we were cooler toward each other now and didn’t speak much beyond training. He probably wouldn’t care if I ventured down to the lowest floor, but I wanted to lie low for a few days, let things smooth over.

I didn’t want to give him any reason to suspect that I was planning to do something stupid.

Chapter 8

One night I
woke up, alone as usual, and wandered down the hall to Kanin’s office, only to find him gone. A note sat in the middle of the desk in neat, spidery handwriting:
Down on the lowest floor. Practice patterns 1-6 on your own. You’ve learned all I can teach you about vampire society.—K.

A strange flutter went through my stomach. This was it. Kanin was absent, and tonight I could do what I wanted. I wouldn’t get a better chance.

I left the office and walked to the reception area with my katana, as the note instructed me to do. But I didn’t stop there. Without pausing to think, I hurried to the elevator shaft, grasped the cables and pulled myself up the tube as fast as I could go.

On the surface, the sun had just set over the jagged horizon, and the sky was dark blue with bloodred clouds. It had been a long time since I’d seen anything but darkness and night, and for a brief moment I stared at the splashes of color across the sky, marveling at how quickly I’d forgotten what a sunset looked like.

So you’re going to stand there gaping at some pretty clouds like a moron until Kanin finds you outside, then?
With an annoyed mental slap, I wrenched my gaze from the horizon and hurried away from the hospital, not daring to look back.

I felt a strange thrill, creeping through the shadows and alleyways on my own, the same feeling I’d gotten while exploring beyond the wall: excited and terrified at the same time. I wasn’t supposed to be out here. There was no doubt in my mind that Kanin was going to be
pissed,
but it was too late to worry about that now. I’d been planning this moment for days, and I needed to discover some things for myself. Besides, he couldn’t keep me in that old hospital forever, like some sort of prison guard. Before we’d met, I went where I wanted when I wanted, and no one could stop me. I wasn’t going to start submitting now, just because some moody, evasive vampire told me I had to forget.

I slipped through the sectors, remembering the paths Kanin had used but also my own knowledge from when I was a Fringer. It was much easier, now that I was dead, to move like a ghost through the darkness, to be able to leap onto the roof of a two-story building to avoid the guards, to freeze and become part of the stones and shadows. Unseen and unheard, I crept through the streets, weaving around buildings, until I reached a familiar chain-link fence. Slipping under the links, I crossed the empty lot quickly and walked into the shadowy halls of my old home.

It seemed much emptier than before, silent and deserted. I found my old locker, opened it with a creak and sighed. Empty, as I’d feared. The scavengers had already found this place.

Halfheartedly, I walked toward my old room, knowing I’d probably find it stripped clean. It never took long for scavengers to move in; I only hoped that
maybe
they’d left a certain crate alone, having no use for something that could get them killed.

I turned the knob, swung open the door and stepped inside, not realizing until too late that someone was already there.

A body looked up from where it crouched in the corner, leaning against the wall. I started, automatically going for my sword, thinking for one terrifying moment that it was Kanin. It wasn’t, but it was another vampire, a lean, bony male with white skin and a head as bald as an egg. He smiled, showing perfect teeth, and the moonlight shining through the broken windows fell across his pale features and the vivid web of scars slashed across his face.

“Evening, little bird.” His voice, soft, raspy and somehow very, very wrong, made me shiver. “Out for a midnight flight, on wings of blood and pain? Like razor blades across the moon, they cut the night and make the sky bleed red.” He chuckled, sending chills down my back. I drew away, and the stranger cocked his head at me. “Oh, don’t mind me, love. I get a little poetic sometimes. The moonlight does that to me.” He shook himself, as if shaking off the crazy, and rose to his feet.

I noticed the book in his long, bony hands, then, and stepped forward. “Hey! What are you doing with that? Those are mine.”

“Are they?” The vamp moved, coming away from the wall. I tensed, but he only crossed the room to set the book gently on a shelf. “Then perhaps you should have taken better care of them, love,” he purred, staring at me with soulless black eyes. “The rats here were using them to keep their skinny hides warm.”

He nodded to the corner. I looked over and saw a pair of human bodies sprawled out on my old mattress, pinched and ragged-looking—the scavengers that had moved in. From their unnatural stillness and the scent of old blood, they were obviously dead. I looked closer and saw their throats were gone, the skin around them dark and stained, as if they’d been torn out. Horror crept over me, and I nearly fled the room, away from the vampire who was truly a monster.

But there was a spot on the cement floor next to the mattress that was blackened and charred, and I had to know what it was. As I studied the remains of book pages, scattered among the ashes, my heart sank. All that time, all that work, and in the end my collection had been burned to keep two strangers warm.

The strange vampire chuckled. “They won’t need words now,” he mused. “Not to read, not to burn, not to nibble on. Always nibbling, the rats. Creeping into dark places to get warm, spreading their filth. No more words for them. No more anything.” He chuckled again, the empty sound making my skin crawl.

I resisted the urge to draw my weapon. He wasn’t making any threatening moves, but I felt as if I was standing close to a coiled, venomous snake. “Who are you?” I asked, and his blank gaze switched to me. “What’s your business in New Covington?”

“Just looking for something, little bird.” Another of his eerie smiles, and this time his fangs showed, just the tips. “And if you want my name, you’ll have to give me yours. It’s only polite, and we’re a polite society, after all.”

I hesitated. For whatever reason, I did not want this creepy bloodsucker to know my name. Not that I was worried that he would report it to the Prince who, according to Kanin, did
not
instantly know the name of every vampire in the whole city, especially the Type-3 riffraff. The Prince was concerned only about those in his immediate circle; the common vampires were below his notice.

But I did not want
this
vampire to know me, because I knew, somehow, that he
would
remember, and that seemed like a very bad idea.

“No?” The vampire smiled at my silence, unsurprised. “Not going to tell me? I guess I can’t blame you. I am a stranger and all. But you’ll have to forgive me if I don’t disclose my identity, then. Can’t be too careful these days.”

“I want you to leave,” I told him, feigning a bravado I really didn’t feel. “This is my sector, my hunting grounds. I want you out. Right now.”

He gave me a long, eerie stare, as if sizing me up. He was perfectly still, but I could sense those tendons coiling beneath his pale skin, ready to unleash. And suddenly, I was terrified of this stranger. This thin, motionless vampire whose eyes were as dark and soulless as Kanin’s. My hands shook, and I crossed my arms to hide them, knowing the stranger would see the smallest detail. I knew I stood in the presence of a killer.

Finally, he smiled. “Of course,” he said, nodding as he stepped away, and my knees nearly buckled with relief. “Terribly sorry, love. Didn’t mean to intrude. I’ll be leaving now.”

He stepped aside, moving toward the door, but paused, giving me a thoughtful stare. “Little bird, your song is so different than his,” he crooned, to my utter confusion. “Don’t disappoint me.”

I didn’t say anything. I just held his gaze, hoping he would go away. The vampire gave me one last terrible smile, then turned and vanished through the door. I listened for his footsteps, walking away, but heard nothing.

The world seemed to breathe again. I waited several minutes, unmoving, wanting the creepy vampire to get as far away as he could, before I finally strode to the open crate, lying against the wall, and peered inside.

Two books. That was all that was left. Two books out of a lifetime of effort, and neither was the one that mattered. I sank to my knees, feeling my throat close up, my stomach twisting. For a moment, I wished the two greedy scavengers were still alive so I could hurt them, make them feel the same pain. I had nothing left now, nothing to remind me of my past. My mom’s book, the only thing I had to remember her by, was lost forever.

I didn’t cry. Numbly, I pulled myself to my feet and turned away, stifling my anger and despair, letting cold indifference settle over me. Loss was nothing new. Those two strangers only had done what anyone would to survive. Nothing lasted in this world; it was everyone for himself. Allie the Fringer knew that; Allison the vampire just needed the reminder.

I left the school without looking back. There was nothing there for me anymore, and I was already putting it from my mind, shoving it down into the deepest parts where I kept all the memories I didn’t want to remember. You don’t dwell on what you’ve lost, you just move on. The night was waning, and I had something else to do, one more piece of my past to check on, before Kanin discovered I was missing.

* * *

I
MADE
MY
WAY
to the old warehouse with a growing sense of urgency. Slipping inside the building, I scanned the room and the boxes in the center of the rubble piles, looking for a familiar face. It seemed most of the gang had returned already, for there were about a half-dozen young people bunched together around the fire, talking and laughing. I looked closely at each of them, but Stick was not among them.

And then I saw him, huddled off to the side, his thin frame curled around himself. He was shivering, hunched over and miserable, and I felt a flare of anger and disgust. Anger for these people who shunned him, who weren’t taking care of their own, who would let him slowly die from starvation and cold right in front of them. But I also felt a sudden contempt toward Stick, who still hadn’t learned to take care of himself, who was still relying on others to save him, when it was obvious that they didn’t care.

Quietly, I made my way through the rubble, keeping to the shadows, until Stick was just a few yards away. He looked even thinner than usual, a near-skeleton of a boy with pinched skin and greasy hair and dull, dead eyes.

“Stick,” I whispered, casting a quick glance toward the group by the fire. They all had their backs to me, or to Stick, more likely, and didn’t notice us. “Stick! Over here! Look this way!”

He jerked and raised his head. For a few seconds, he looked confused, gazing around blearily, his eyes staring right through my hiding spot. But then I waved to him, and his eyes nearly bugged out of his head.

“Allie?”

“Shh!” I hissed, drawing back into the shadows as some of the gang members half turned their heads, frowning. I gestured for him to follow, but he just sat there, staring at me as if I was a ghost.

In a sense, I suppose I was.

“You’re alive,” he whispered, but his voice lacked the excitement, the relief, I was expecting. It sounded dull, almost accusing, though he wore a confused expression. “You shouldn’t be alive. The rabids…I heard…” He shuddered violently, curling into himself. “You didn’t come back,” he said, and now there was a definite note of accusation in his voice. “You didn’t come back for me. I thought you were dead, and you left me alone.”

“I didn’t have a choice,” I said through gritted teeth. “Believe me, I would have come here sooner if I could, but I didn’t know you were alive, either. I thought the rabids got you, like Rat and Lucas.”

He shook his head. “I went back home and waited for you, but you never came. I stayed there, alone, for days. Where were you? Where have you been all this time?”

He sounded like a pensive toddler, and my frustration increased. “Near an old hospital in Sector Two,” I snapped, “but that doesn’t matter now. I came here to see if you’re all right, if you’re taking care of yourself.”

“What do you care?” Stick muttered, fiddling with his tattered sleeve. His watery gaze eyed my coat and narrowed darkly. “You never really cared what happened to me. You always wanted me gone. You and everyone else. That’s why you never came back.”

I swallowed a growl, barely. “I’m here now, aren’t I?”

“But you’re not staying, are you?” Stick looked up at me, his eyes hooded. “You’re going to leave again, leave me alone with these people. They hate me. Just like Rat and Lucas did. You hated me, too.”

“I didn’t, but you’re sure pushing me in that direction,” I grumbled. This was crazy. I had never seen Stick like this and had no idea where the sullen rage was coming from. “God, Stick, stop being a baby. You can take care of yourself. You don’t need me around to look after you, I’ve always told you that.”

“Then…you’re
not
staying.” Stick’s voice trembled, and his anger melted away into real panic. “Allie, please. I’m sorry! I was just scared when you didn’t come back.” He scrambled forward, pleading, and I cast a nervous look at the group around the fire. “Please, don’t go,” Stick begged. “Stay with us. This place isn’t so bad, really. Kyle won’t mind another person, especially someone like you.”

“Stick.” I shushed him with a sharp gesture, and he fell silent, his eyes still begging me to stay. “I can’t,” I told him, and his expression crumpled. “I wish I could, but I can’t. I’m…different now. I can’t be seen aboveground. So you’ll have to survive without me.”