White Winter (The Black Year Series Book 2) (13 page)

Wow
, he thought, feeling the edge of hysteria as well as hearing it. “I’m sorry. It’s been a busy month.”

“Too busy to answer a text message? I thought you died.”

“No, that was last week,” he said with a grin. Amelia’s eyes widened, and he immediately realized he’d said the wrong thing. “Sorry.”

He’s reading my mind,
she thought, and leaned away from him.

“I’m not… I mean, I am, but… never mind, let’s just start walking,” he said. She nodded, biting her lip, and they headed toward the bus stop.

This was a mistake. This was such a horrible mistake. I’m so stupid. What the-

“How’s school?” Jonas asked. The more she got worked up, the louder her thoughts were.

“Fine,” she said. “I’m doing a campus visit at University of Florida during spring break.”

“Really? I never thought you’d go to a party school.”

“They have a great chemistry program.”
And vampires don’t like heat.
“Besides, there’s a lot of stuff you don’t know about me.”

“Oh yeah? Like what?” he said, grinning, like he hadn’t heard her think. She saw through it and clenched her purse strap like she was strangling a snake, but she smiled and said something about her first ice-skating lesson on the pond behind her grandparents’ house in Vermont.

Guess we’re just going to pretend things are normal,
he thought. He was starting to notice humans did that a lot.

“Anyway, that’s why my ankle rolls so easily,” she said.

“That sucks,” he said.

“Yeah.”

They stood at the bus stop. A minute later, they got on the M15 heading south. Amelia sat, Jonas stood next to her.

“Mike Jeffries asked how you were doing,” she said.

Jonas rolled his eyes. “That figures.”

Amelia tilted her head slightly. “What figures?”

Jonas shrugged. “He likes you. He was always hanging around us when we started going out. As soon as I leave, he’s all over you. It’s just kind of pathetic.”
And I don’t know why I’m so angry about it. I mean, I left her for Eve, and I’m happy, but-

Amelia was staring at him, thoughts full of laughter tinged with bitterness. “Jonas, Mike’s gay. He’s dating a sophomore; has been for over a year.”

“Oh.”

♘

“What happened then?” Amelia asked.

“Jonas punched her,” Kieran said.

“He what?”

“He punched her so hard he broke his hand.”

“It’s already healed,” Jonas said.

Amelia looked appalled.

“No, no, no! That was totally the right thing to do. My dad got into a fight with Nell at least once a week before… Anyway, it was the right thing to do. It pretty much got my whole family back to normal,” Kieran said, which made Jonas feel slightly better about the whole thing.

“That’s weird,” Amelia said. “Interesting, but weird.”

Kieran shrugged. “If you say so.”

Jonas looked at Eve. She squeezed his hand on the table, and Amelia’s eyebrows twitched.

Amelia had a pumpkin spice latte; Kieran had a glass of milk and a blueberry muffin; Eve had a glass of water she wasn’t really drinking; Jonas took a sip of his chai latte and looked around the room. The Starbucks was crowded, as usual, but they’d managed to find seats before Kieran and Eve joined them after sundown. By then, some of the awkwardness of being around Amelia was gone; there was still an anger to her he didn’t understand. He could have popped into her head and found out, but he didn’t feel right doing it and their friendship would never have survived her catching him in the act.

I’m going on another trip next week
, Eve said.

Really?

Yeah. Your mom is having me follow up on one of the non-militant branches of the Order.

“They’re talking to each other in their heads, aren’t they?” Amelia asked Kieran.

“Yeah, it looks like it,” he said. “You can tell by the way their throats move.”

“Sorry,” Jonas and Eve said together.

Kieran smiled. Amelia did too, but it felt strained.

“I was just telling Jonas I had to leave town for work.”

“You don’t work together?”

Eve brushed a strand of hair back. “No, we’re working on different cases. Or rather, Jonas
is
his own case.”

“Guess things haven’t changed too much in that area.”

Eve smirked. “Tell me about it. At least his mom is cool.”

Jonas looked at Kieran and raised an eyebrow. Kieran shrugged.

“I thought she kind of shut down after Jonas’ dad died?”

“She only pretended to so her enemies would come out of hiding.”

“That’s awesome. I mean, I always knew she was tough, but wow.”

“Yeah. She’s totally my hero,” Eve said.

Jonas drank more of his tea, sharing an amused look with Kieran at being cut out of the conversation.

His stomach cramped hard, and heat spread from his gut up his throat.

“Sweetie, are you okay?” Eve said.

He leaned forward. It felt like someone was dragging barbed wire through his intestines. “I don’t feel so good.”

“I’ll take you back to the Agency. Kieran, can you stay with Amelia?”

Kieran gave Jonas a panicked look, and Jonas caught a glimpse of his friend’s mind. He liked Amelia. He’d liked her from the first time he smelled her in Grand Central. And Jonas was surprisingly okay with that, almost proud, though the “why” of it was beyond him.

“Can you do that for me, Kieran?” he said. “I need you to make sure she gets home safely.”

Amelia looked annoyed and afraid at the same time. Kieran’s expression was even more complicated. “Yes, clan leader.”

♘

I think she hates me
, he sent Eve.

You didn’t look?

No. You did?

Oh, yeah. I peeled her head open like an orange. She doesn’t hate you.

They were halfway back to the Agency. Eve had her arm under his, hand on his forearm, like he was being a gentleman when she was really keeping him steady. She’d had to do the same thing the last time they met Amelia at a coffee shop. It wasn’t a great track record.

If she doesn’t hate me, why is she so angry?

Because you owed her and you left anyway. Because you don’t notice things you should. Because she thinks she’d be a better vampire than you, and she’s afraid of dying.

Jonas looked at Eve. She looked back, deep green eyes steady. The intimacy of discussing someone else’s thoughts was like the world only existed around the two of them. Her mouth quirked into a smile.
Would she? Would she be a better vampire than me?

Eve shrugged slightly; he felt it more than he saw it.
She’d be a different vampire, Jonas. There’s no real way to tell how people will turn out. You could turn her in 34 years and find out, but you won’t, and she knows it.

How could she-

Because you chose someone else over her once already.

He thought of Amelia, the planner, the perfectionist, the girl who did everything right and got it done early.
She hates herself,
he told Eve.

Eve squeezed his arm. They walked home.

♘

The Sorcerer strode out of his inner chambers, a heavy fur cloak fastened about his shoulders by a silver clasp that reflected the guttering light of torches. Talismans clicked against each other on a small loop he’d fastened to his belt and his boots clacked harshly on the fitted stones, announcing his mood to the menials assigned to cleaning the temple. They scattered out of his way, as they should, but he could feel their eyes on his back after he passed.

It was an unthinkable insult. He’d fed them, clothed them, given them small tasks to occupy their time, yet they resented him. They knew, in spite of their blunted senses and general ignorance, that magic was bleeding out of the world. He’d be as weak as they were, and illusions of freedom and revenge danced within their wretched grasp.
Fine, then. Dream of a world without me. I’ll see you choke on it.

“You’re free,” he said to an old woman gripping a broom next to him, her back to the wall, her eyes fixed firmly on the ground.

She looked at him, eyes wide and mouth open.

“Free!” he shouted, his eyes challenging them each in turn. “All of you! Tell the others! Any man, woman, or child within sight of the temple by dawn will be food for the wolves.”

The old woman’s lower lip trembled, and she pulled the broom closer to her chest. “But-”

He backhanded her, the heavy silver bracelets on his arm lending weight to the blow, and her neck snapped. He absorbed her life force on contact, out of habit. She was a dried husk by the time she hit the floor, but only a trickle of power flowed into him and he stared at his hand in shock.
I would need to kill hundreds for the simplest -

He felt their eyes again. “Clean that up before you leave,” he said to the others, then stormed out without waiting for an answer.

Jonas watched him go, watched the slaves gather the old woman’s body before leaving through a passage cleverly concealed in the wall.
Madoc, was that you?
The specter had showed him things in his dreams before.

No one answered. Another vampire watched impassively from the shadows.

CHAPTER 16

Monday night, Jonas stumbled into the cafeteria for his liquid breakfast. He grabbed two bags from the fridge and sat across from Frank.

“Hey, Jonas.”

“Hey, Frank. How was your weekend?” He prepped the first pack and sipped on the straw.

“Good. Friend from my military days was in town. You?”

Jonas shrugged. “Same old. Actually, that’s not true - I went out with Eve, Kieran, and Amelia.”

Frank raised an eyebrow. “Your ex?”

“Yeah.”

“How’d that go?”

Jonas finished the blood pack. “Complicated. I need to head to the training room.”

“Sure. Busy week?”

“Pretty calm, actually. Eve’s traveling until Wednesday. I might visit the Macreadys, but other than that it’s pretty much train, study, and sleep.”

“Have fun with that,” Frank said, grinning.

“Yeah, you too,” Jonas said, absently. It was all so
normal.
He wasn’t sure how to feel about it.

♘

Jonas slammed into the training room wall and rolled to the side before Damien could push the advantage. The expressionless instructor nodded in approval, standing just out of reach with his weight on his back foot and his eyes on Jonas’ shoulders. It had been unnerving at first, as if the older vampire was looking right through him instead of meeting his eyes, but after a couple hours of getting his butt kicked Jonas decided he was better off mimicking Damien than worrying about eye contact.

Jonas stepped to the right, and Damien mirrored him, setting one foot down before lifting the other in a motion that reminded Jonas of a spider. If he backed himself into a corner, Damien would be all over him, so he pushed off his back leg and closed, throwing punches as Damien parried and stepped back. The instructor ignored strikes that fell short, deflected those that would hit, and kept circling to put Jonas in the worst position possible.

Jonas feinted, and Damien immediately advanced, shoulder checking him closer to the wall.
I’m really starting to dislike that wall
, Jonas thought, recovering his balance only to have Damien land two hits on his left side. Without thinking, Jonas blurred away from the third punch and into Damien’s swinging forearm. He landed flat on his back. It drove the wind out of him.
Not a big fan of the floor, either,
he thought.

“Good,” Damien said, offering him a hand. “That was a nice shift, but make sure you know where you’re going.”

He took Damien’s hand and stood, panting. Vampires couldn’t sweat, so the only way to cool down was ambient air and panting like a dog, which probably drove werewolves into hysterics. Jonas felt like hamburger meat under a heating lamp. Damien looked flushed but comfortable, probably because he used a fraction of the effort Jonas did.

Muscles produced heat. Shifting produced heat. Burning blood for healing or mental attacks produced heat. He’d learned vampire brawls in anything but snow or freezing water were fundamentally about heat management.

Of course, Jonas wasn’t just any vampire. Focusing a small amount of will into the pattern he’d learned from Madoc, he pumped the heat out through his shoulder blades like they were radiators sticking out of his back, and a pleasant chill moved through his body like he’d stepped in front of an air conditioner. It wasn’t a perfect system; he burned through a small part of his blood supply every time he did it, and the whole room got hotter. Damien would get him eventually.