Now Comes the Night (36 page)

“It matters if I say if matters. Answer me.”

“No. You tell me first.”

Conrad blinked in disbelief. He was hearing things. That was the only possible explanation. His requests were rarely refused, but a direct order? Never. “Watch yourself, boy!” He rounded on Marc, glaring fiercely. “You dare defy me? Do you not know who I am? You will stop this nonsense and tell me what I want to know. Now. At once!”

Marc surged to his feet and glared back at him. “It’s not important.”

“I say it is.”

“No. It’s not.”

For a long, long moment neither of them moved. Conrad was so blind with fury, so choked with rage, he barely trusted himself to breathe. There was only one course to take. Forcing himself into action, he crossed the room and flung open the door. “Damian!” he roared, not caring what anyone thought. “Damian! Get in here. Now!”

A crash came from the floor below. “
Ya voy!
I’m coming,” Damian shouted in response. A flurry of footsteps on the carpeted stairs announced his approach. “What’s happened?
Dios mio
. Is everything all right? What are you shouting for?”

Conrad grabbed Damian’s arm as soon as he came into range and pulled him into the room. Then he slammed the door shut behind him. “Deal with him,” he demanded, pointing at Marc. “I have no patience left for this.”

Damian’s gaze flickered back and forth between the two men. “Marc? What have you done now? Why are you upsetting your grandfather?”

Marc’s laughter held a trace of bitterness as well. “Sure. Take his side. What makes you think that’s the way of it, huh? Maybe he’s the one who’s been upsetting me?”

“You dare?” Conrad shook with rage.

“Don’t talk nonsense,” Damian snapped, while Conrad continued to seethe beside him. “Of course you’ve upset him. One need only look at him to tell that—or listen to him, for that matter. What have you been doing? Tell me at once!”

Conrad snorted derisively. “Ah, very good. Why didn’t I think to say that? Let’s see how well that works for you.”

“You think this is funny?” Marc asked, ignoring Damian, still directing his words to Conrad. “I came here to ask for your help. One little favor. You’re treating it like a big joke.”

“Little! Is that what you call it? There’s nothing little about your request, Marc. It’s impossible. I’ve told you this.”

“You’re just making excuses! But, fine! Have it your own way. I don’t even want your help. But since you can’t be bothered helping me, then give me one good reason why I should answer your questions? You’re pissed off—I get that—and I know what it means. You’re just gonna go crazy and end up taking all of that out on whoever I talked to. So, no. I won’t tell you.”

“Well, your concern is certainly laudable, Marc,” Damian said in a tone Conrad found far too reasonable. “But you can’t expect to gain our sympathy using those tactics. And I don’t know who you think is taking this as a joke—whatever ‘this’ is. I see no one laughing. What is it you wanted anyway?”

“A home for the ferals,” Marc replied. “A family. Recognition. They saved my life, Damian, and I promised I’d get them help. I really don’t understand why this is too much to ask.”

Damian shook his head. “That’s a slight exaggeration, don’t you think? They may have been instrumental in your escape,
chico
, but they hardly can be said to have saved your life. Surely you owe your grandfather a much greater debt. If anyone saved your life, it was he.”

“Oh, but you haven’t heard the whole of it yet,” Conrad interjected. “And, Damian, much as I appreciate your coming to my defense, I sincerely hope, for your sake, that you haven’t been ignoring my orders yet again and speaking out of turn.”

“What?” Damian drew back.

Conrad read the fear in his eyes. He knew Damian would have recoiled even further if it weren’t for Conrad’s grasp on his arm. “Now, now,
caro
, no running off. Not just yet. I need you to stay right here and help sort this out.”

Damian shook his head. “I have no idea what you’re talking about. I’ve said nothing I should not have.”

“And yet it seems that Marc has developed the strangest notion. He’s insisting he’s
Infragilis
. Where do you suppose he could have gotten an idea like that?”

Damian blanched. The faintest tremor ran through his frame, but other than that he betrayed no reaction. “Is he? How very odd.” He turned a dispassionate look on Marc. “I don’t know how you came by such an idea, Marc, but I must agree with your grandfather. Why not tell us who’s been filling your head with these silly stories so that we might talk to them and make them see reason?”

“Talk to them? Don’t you really mean assassinate them?” With a disgusted snort, Marc flung himself back in his chair and regarded the two men wearily. “I’d expected better of you. Why, I don’t know. Relax, okay? No one knows anything. You don’t have to ‘reason with’ anybody.”

Damian gazed helplessly at Conrad. The unspoken message in his eyes couldn’t have been clearer.
What should I do? How do you wish me to deal with this
? Conrad wished he had the answers.

“You should have told us,” Marc grumbled, still glaring balefully at them. “Julie and I deserved to know the truth about ourselves. You had no right keeping this from us.”

“I have
every
right,” Conrad replied, the beast within him once again rising to the challenge. “And you will
not
tell your sister what you’ve learned. You answer to me, Marc, not the other way around. I can at least protect her innocence a while longer.”

“
Querido
, please,” Damian murmured. “Softly. The walls may have ears and we’ve already said too much.” He turned back to Marc and shook his head. “It’s just as your grandfather has said, we were only trying to protect you, Marc. You have to know that.”

“So then it’s true. We really
are
in danger.” Beneath the flat tone, the resigned expression, Conrad thought he sensed just a hint of despair.

If only he could still take the boy in his arms. If only he could promise him that everything would be all right—and know he’d be believed.

“Foolish boy.” Heaving a sigh, Conrad crossed back to the seating area. He seated himself on the couch across from Marc and motioned to Damian to join him. “We’re all in danger—and have been since the night you were born. You might want to consider
that
, before you speak any further about this matter—or before you treat us to any more of your rudeness. You spoke of truth just now, but what you fail to realize is that the truth is a perilous business. I saw no benefit in telling you or your sister what could only scare you and I make no apology for that. If I had to do it over, I would make the same choice again. Now that you know, I hope I might trust you to bear in mind that you are not the only one likely to be affected were the facts to become known. You have your sister’s safety to consider. You have your uncle’s safety to consider. In a very real way, their lives are now in your hands.” As was Conrad’s. But he would not beg on his own account. He would fight his own battles, face his enemies alone if he had to, and live and die on the basis of his own strength.

“I’m not a boy,” Marc protested. “And I still don’t understand why everything is such a secret. So we’re different, so what? Everyone’s different, aren’t they? The ferals are different.
You’re
different.”

“What’s
different
in your case is that neither you nor your sister should even be alive right now. You should never have existed. You should not have been able to survive your birth. And, once you had, once I’d recognized you for what you are, I shouldn’t have allowed you to…” Conrad stopped, caught by the startled expression on Marc’s face. He shook his head impatiently. “Never mind. I forgot what I was going to say.”

Damian pressed close to Conrad. “
Querido
? May I try and explain it to him?”

Conrad waved for him to go proceed. “Oh, indeed. By all means. Why even ask? It’s what you’ve been pestering me to allow you to do for some time now, isn’t it?”

Damian eyed Conrad worriedly. “
Sí
. That goes without saying. But, Conrad, I would never have done so without your permission. And I had nothing whatsoever to do with his finding out. I hope you know that.”

Conrad nodded impatiently. “If you say so.” Did he know that? No. He knew
nothing
at this point other than that he
had
to believe it. He
had
to trust that Damian was not lying to him now. It was imperative that he do so. He could only imagine how badly he would react if he learned he’d been betrayed once again. That he would lose control was a certainty. What was doubtful was whether his soul could survive the consequences of his actions. “Well? What are you waiting for? Go on, then. Tell him.”

Damian stared doubtfully at him for a moment longer then turned his gaze on Marc. “You and your sister are miracles, Marc. Most of the world no longer believes in vampires. Over the past few centuries, we’ve become mythical creatures to the general population. But other vampires don’t believe such creatures as
you
can exist. That’s the difference, Marc. That’s what makes the two of you so special, and so very precious to us. Until you were born, until we saw you with our own eyes, neither of us had ever believed it was possible—no one did. To this day, no one else does. We’re the only ones who know of your nature and that’s the way it must stay.”

“Yeah, we’re freaks. I get it. But if it’s so impossible, how did it happen?”

Conrad sighed. “You have no idea how often I’ve wondered that very thing.” He stared off into the distance as memories flooded his mind. “As near as I can tell, it was a one in a million set of circumstances. Your mother must have already conceived you when she convinced me to turn her, but it must have been so recent that she had not yet realized she was with child. We had discussed the subject, so she knew what it would mean for you and your sister if she’d continued with the process. It would have meant your deaths. So she…disappeared. She ran away without a word to me, before the process was complete. Perhaps I should have tried harder to find her, perhaps I should have spared no effort to bring her back but I thought she’d merely changed her mind about becoming Vampire. She was very young, you see, and it was not the first time she’d left me.”

Marc frowned. “So, you’re saying she wasn’t a vampire? She stayed human somehow?”

Conrad nodded. “Yes.”

“How?”

“We never spoke about it. There was never any time to. But, as I’m sure you know, the transformation to Vampire takes several days and is only completed after the fledgling has fed for the first time. So, if I had to guess, which is all I can do in this case, I would imagine she refused to drink any blood and so, as a result, slowly returned to what she had been.”

“What?” Marc stared at him. “No way. You told me that wasn’t possible. You told me years ago that I couldn’t turn back to being human that way.”

“And I meant it. You cannot change back once you’ve been turned. Did you not just hear me say that your mother ran away without completing the process? Even while she carried you, even while you transformed within her, she herself still remained mostly human. It was only towards the end, I believe, that she began to…change.”

“I don’t understand. Who turned us then? Are you saying you’re not our sire
or
our father? Who is?”

“Of course he’s your sire!” Damian insisted. “What are you thinking? Surely you’ve been around enough vampires by now to realize that it’s almost impossible not to sense to whose House one belongs? Your
vampire
parentage has never been in question.
Everyone
who knows Conrad would instantly recognize you as his spawn. And such would be the case whether you were sired by him directly or not.”

“But, as it happens, it
was
I who turned you,” Conrad said quietly. “It was my blood flowing into your veins that made you Vampire, my blood passed to you through your mother. And, while she did not complete her own transformation, choosing to stay human for your sake, it was your mother who made it possible for you and your sister to complete the process she denied herself. It was her very human blood that nourished you while you were still in her womb. That’s what fed you. That’s what made you what you are. It was the two of us together that created you, although I admit it was inadvertent on my part.”

“And then we killed her.” Marc’s voice was bleak. “Is that how it happened? You said we fed on her. Did we take too much? Is that what killed her?”

Conrad smiled sadly at him. “No, my dear. It was no such thing. And I’m sure she’d be quite angry with me for even putting that thought in your mind. Her death was the result of a vicious attack. She was assaulted shortly before your birth and lost a great deal of blood. Too much to survive. But for that, I believe she might still be alive today.”

Marc growled. “Someone killed her? Who?”

“Don’t you think I wish I knew? But I had to make a choice, Marc. I could have stayed here and set all my House to the task of discovering her killer—and possibly alert them to the truth, that she had given birth to the two of you. Or I could choose to protect you and your sister by leaving town with you, as quickly and quietly as possible in order to keep your existence a secret. As she’d already extracted a promise from me on her deathbed that I would keep you safe… Well, let us just say that I felt the choice had already been made for me.”