Dark Ascension: A Generation V Novel (8 page)

“He hasn’t done too badly,” Chivalry said. “I mean, that deal he made with Walt Disney certainly worked out well. Plus, air-conditioning really turned things around down there.”

I held up a hand before they got started on that tangent. The delights of climate-controlled living were a favorite conversational topic with my family, challenged only by the thrills of window screens and refrigerators. I’d heard more maggoty food stories than anyone outside the range of a Ken Burns special. “Okay, with background now thoroughly established, why would this guy suddenly clear his territory?”

“Living the dream?” Prudence muttered.

“Be serious,” Chivalry chided her. “Fort has actually brought up a decent point.”

“It’s because he Brooded his first offspring,” Madeline said absently as she adjusted her blankets and reached for her cup of tea. At our expressions, she looked irritated. “Oh, stop playing with me. I must’ve mentioned it as some point. I put your names on the card.”

“We sent a card?” Chivalry asked. Prudence just rubbed her forehead, looking flummoxed. I was equally dazed. While Madeline had often kept many subjects on a need-to-know basis, she’d usually at least known what she had and hadn’t disclosed. This level of absentmindedness was new, and disturbing.

“Well, it seemed like a nice gesture,” Madeline said. “He’d been trying to Brood for over seventy years. Really, it’s a bit of a surprise that it even worked for him. Persistent little thing must’ve quite applied himself to the task. Female offspring, quite nice. Named her Amália—very pretty, I think. One has to at least pretend an interest, of course, so I asked our Patricia for a suggestion for a gift, and ended up sponsoring a tree in Israel in her name.”

We stared at her.

“Patricia assured me that that would be appropriate for a
simcha
.”

The expression on Prudence’s face indicated that she found my mother’s use of casual Yiddish just as disturbing as I did, but she recovered herself first. “Mother,” she said cautiously, “how on earth do you know this? Neither Chivalry nor I had heard any of it, and I wasn’t even aware that you bothered yourself with the other vampires in our part of the world.”

Madeline gave a loud snort of derision as she took a precise sip of tea. “My precious dove, just because I don’t often bring up such a dull topic doesn’t mean that I have willfully blinded myself to our neighbors. Even those that pose no threat should at least receive the occasional check. As for our Floridian and his baby, your uncle Edmund informed me about that. He always keeps track of these things, and he moves through so many different territories that someone mentioned it to him. Of course he was quite excited—Amália is only the fourth vampire who has been successfully Brooded in the New World, after you three of course. And given that Maximilián was the child of a single-host parent—well, he rather beat the odds on that one.”

“What do you mean?” Chivalry asked, leaning forward intently.

“Nothing to concern yourself with, dearling,” she said with a maddening wave of her hand, the kind that indicated that this conversational topic was closed. “Just my brother’s hobby. While I do very much enjoy being able to Skype with Edmund wherever he might be, I do admit that at times I miss being able to skim over the boring parts of his letters.”

“How is Amália only the fourth vampire infant?” I asked, confused. “I’ve seen the territory map. There are a couple of other vampire-held areas. I know we’re operating on a different time scale than humans, but we’re not moving geologically. There should be more.”

Chivalry shifted to look at me. “Not many vampires were ever interested in leaving the old territories in Europe and Western Asia,” he explained. “Mother was the first to come to the Americas, and not many others followed. There’s Caterina on the West Coast, of course, but she’s old, and, according to Mother, was never able to Brood offspring at all. She barely concerns herself with anything outside of Napa Valley. And there’s Gavril in Minnesota, but his daughter, Yelena, emigrated with him. I’m not even sure whether she’s old enough to try to Brood.”

“Yelena is a little older than Prudence,” Madeline said. “She might start toying with the idea.”

“She has already claimed her own territory beyond her father’s borders.” Prudence’s voice had a distinct edge to it.

“In Manitoba.” Madeline was dismissive. “Gavril always had interests there anyway, so he’s almost certainly taking an active hand in helping her secure it. They even share a border, for heaven’s sake.” Then, sounding more pleased, “Though I will at least say that Gavril taught the girl some manners. I got a very polite note when she pushed into Manitoba about ten years ago, and she was careful to leave a nicely sized comfort zone between her territory and where ours ends in western Ontario.”

“Good fences make good neighbors?” I asked.

“When it comes to vampires, dear heart, the fence also needs a hundred-mile buffer unless it’s a Nest member on the other side of it. Close quarters always set tempers on edge—that’s why those in Europe are constantly getting into fights.”

Chivalry interceded, his voice sounding upbeat. “Since Yelena set up territory, she must be trying to Brood. We’ll see the first Canadian-born vampire within the next few decades.”

“I doubt very much that she’ll have much luck with that goal,” Madeline said darkly.

“What do you mean, Mother?” Prudence asked.

“Nothing that merits attention, precious.” Our mother set her teacup down in its saucer with a decisive little clink of china, ignoring Prudence’s frustrated scowl. “Now, I’m sorry to say that that tangent carried us quite far from the topic at hand. Tell me, then, my doves, how do you suggest I respond to the request posed by these succubi?”

“Let them in,” I said immediately. “Minimal risk, shouldn’t create a population explosion, big tithes down the line, and they diversify our portfolio of residents.”

“You just made up that last part,” my sister accused. “And even if we allow Fortitude’s overly rosy assessment of their exposure likelihood to stand, everything else remains doubtful. A tithe is a percentage, and this doesn’t sound like the kind of high-earning business-owning group that we have in the
metsän kunigas
. As for the potential for a population explosion, I’d say that the kitsune have certainly taught us the danger of making assumptions. As for this idea of diversification . . . I fail to see any benefit in bringing yet more potential troublemakers into our territory. Frankly I’d say that Maximilián has the right idea.”

We both looked at Chivalry, catching him just as he took a sip of his coffee. There was a long pause while he held it in his mouth before slowly swallowing, then patting his mouth precisely with his napkin. We kept staring. He heaved a large sigh. “You both have good points,” he said. “Fort, I agree that they could probably be a group that would be very easy to control, and at the very least they don’t seem strong enough to put up any kind of resistance if we decided to expel them at a later date. But”—he saw my expression brighten, and immediately sent me a cautioning look—“I also have to agree with Prudence that there seems to be little in the way of a financial incentive for us in allowing them into the territory—if anything, it’s one more group to keep tabs on.”

Prudence reached across the table and, her every movement indicating her level of pique, transferred several Milano cookies from their current position on the doily-clad nibbles section of the tea tray over onto her plate. She didn’t even try to hide that she was high-grading those cookies from among the less desirable sugar or Danish butter cookies on offer. “Chivalry, you remain the king of the middle ground,” she grumbled. I didn’t say anything, but I found myself in (extremely) reluctant agreement with my sociopathic sibling.

Thirty minutes followed where Prudence and I attempted to shift the other in their position, while Chivalry brokered uselessly from the middle.

“Can you please just pick one side or the other? Preferably mine?” I asked my brother finally. By this time I was nursing my third cup of coffee, and I was not only getting a significant buzz on, but becoming increasingly aware of my impending need for a bathroom break. However, given the very real possibility that a bathroom break would result in a decision against the succubi in my absence, I didn’t dare get up. At least the sight of Prudence making the occasional subtle repositioning that nonetheless indicated bladder distress made me confident that she was in no better position than I was.

“Fort, I see the value in both positions,” Chivalry repeated for the umpteenth time. “I must say that I could be equally happy with either the succubi being allowed in or in them being directed to depart.”

“Then wouldn’t it at least make you happy to make me happy?” I ran my hand through my hair in frustration.

“Now you’re just blatantly appealing to baby brother favoritism,” Prudence accused.

“Well, since no argument that either of us has made has succeeded in budging him, I might as well attempt something else.”

“Both of you have very strong feelings on this,” Chivalry defended. “And I just don’t see the value in getting so worked up at this point. Can’t we please find a compromise position here?”

Prudence made an extremely frustrated sound. “I would be more than happy to boot them out of our territory with a ‘please slaughter’ sign attached, while Fort would probably like nothing so much as to establish a welfare system solely to fund them for the next half century. I’m sorry, brother, but we seem to be making no progress at all now.” She turned to stare at Madeline, who had been listening silently. “Mother, I don’t think that there’s a single facet to this decision that we have failed to punctuate. Fort, would you be in agreement?”

I hated to give up on my attempts of finding some kind of argument that would either entice or strong-arm Chivalry over to my way of thinking, but I had to reluctantly nod. We all looked at Madeline expectantly.

“I’m not going to intercede,” she said quietly.

There was a long pause while that sank in. “Wait . . . ,” I asked, “what do you mean?” My mother had always made the final decisions on everything, and decisively. She could periodically ask us for advice, but I’d always had the sense that that was more like a mother cat presenting her babies with a mostly mauled bird and waiting for them to finish the poor crippled thing off, but always ready to step in and deliver the kill stroke if the kitten somehow managed to still lose control of the situation. And if what we advised her to do went in the face of what she’d already planned for, she had never had a problem with telling us that we were completely wrong, and that she’d be doing it her own way (which, she never failed to assert, was also the
right
way).

Madeline’s voice was still soft, but implacable. “You have presented your arguments, but I am not making a decision. I want
you
, my three offspring, my heirs, to decide what course of action will be pursued.”

Prudence broke in. “Mother, you can’t—”

The gentleness was gone from my mother’s face as quickly as a cloud passing over the sun. “Can’t I?” she asked my sister, and while her voice was still just as soft, Madeline’s blue eyes were glittering dangerously.

My sister backed down. She’d had a taste of our mother’s discipline very recently, and was probably still relishing the ability to walk without crutches. “All right, yes, you can. But we need a decision on this subject now.”

“I don’t see why.” Madeline folded her hands precisely.

While Prudence sputtered, Chivalry moved in smoothly. Looking at my brother, I saw his dark eyes assessing our mother closely, staring at her as if he wished that he could peel back her skin and see into her thoughts. “This isn’t how you do things,” he said carefully.

“No, my darling,” Madeline agreed, her voice pleasant again. “It isn’t. But let us accept and face that, very soon now, I will no longer be here to lead you. I will be nothing but a rotting husk and you, my children, will be choosing what directions you travel in.”

I could feel a hard lump in my throat. No more avoidance. There was what had been becoming increasingly, unavoidably clear for months now, and the subject now lay before us all. Our mother was old, and she was dying. And it would happen soon.

Prudence shifted, the fabric of her skirt scraping against the sofa’s upholstery loudly in the silent room. Her face was hard to read—surprise at the bluntness of my mother’s statement, an unmistakable sadness, but there was something else there too. A confidence. An assurance. Madeline’s death would leave an empty throne, and it was clear who Prudence felt would fill it. “Mother, I will be—”

Again the danger crossed Madeline’s face, and those eyes burned. Her upper lip curled back, revealing her ivory fangs, and she hissed,
“Assume nothing, daughter.”
Prudence rocked back as if slapped, her face paling, and I felt Chivalry’s hand suddenly on my shoulder, squeezing tightly, warning me to stay still. We all pressed back against our seats, and I wished for nothing in that moment more than a few more feet between myself and my mother. Even as weak as she was, in that moment there was no mistaking that there was enough left in her to leave all of us as nothing more than smears on the floor. For a long minute I could hear my heart pounding in my ears, and all I could focus on was the sight of a single drop of saliva slowly dripping down my mother’s left fang as she stared intently at my sister. Prudence dropped her gaze, her body expressing subservience, however reluctantly given. My mother’s lips slowly relaxed, and she seemed to forcefully take control. At last she spoke, and her voice contained a world of sadness and regret. “You are all so very, very young. Had things gone as they should’ve, this territory would’ve passed to Constance, had she lived, and she would’ve been able to protect all of you, guide you, as you grew into adults, ready to face the challenges of this newer world. But she, the sister you never even knew, my true heir, was lost to foolishness.” Her eyes closed for a moment and she seemed to waver. Constance was my oldest sister, born in England during the rule of King James. But she’d died young, killed in some kind of vampire territory clash that I’d never gotten the full details on. My mother had come to America shortly after Constance’s death, and Prudence had been born almost a century later.