Unbound (10 page)

I moved toward the exit, but a hand clamped around my ankle. A pale, emaciated man, little more than a skeleton, slammed me against the nearest cabinet.

“You’re human.”

I heard his words inside my head. “Mahefa, you didn’t say anything about an undead rent-a-cop!”

“What exactly do you expect me to do from out here, Isaac? Scold it?”

Blue-black lips peeled back from the vampire’s fangs. Cloudy, frozen eyes seemed to peer through my body. His tongue was a pale, desiccated lump of flesh. He moved stiffly, as if his joints were continually freezing and had to be broken loose.
“It’s been four years since I’ve fed. Shall I drain you now, or wait for your blood to freeze, then chew you up like a popsicle?”

I had used up a month’s worth of fear on the way here, and I had nothing but anger and impatience left. I reached into my bag for the shock-gun. The lightning bolt normally required a path of ionized air, which wouldn’t work here, but direct contact with the barrel should conduct the charge into his body. The gun’s insulation would hopefully prevent it from frying me as well.

The vampire yanked me closer, seized the bag with his other hand, and tossed it behind him. Canisters of frozen blood tumbled loose, bouncing soundlessly off the walls. So much for that plan. His reaction suggested he could probably read minds as well as project, and I had no defense against telepathy anymore, dammit.

What else did I know about him? He could dissolve into mist and didn’t need a spacesuit. Or clothes of any kind. That narrowed down the list of possible species, but not enough to figure out how to fight him. The oversaturated market in vampire fiction had led to countless new book-born species of vampire, each with their own customized—and far too short—list of vulnerabilities.

I kicked him in the face, but he didn’t release my leg. His claws pressed harder. Hunger hadn’t robbed him of his strength, which made sense. If you were going to leave a guard in space for years at a time, you’d want someone who could take out an intruder after four years of hibernation.

I grabbed for the fire extinguisher and slammed it against the side of his head.

He smiled. The tip of his tongue poked between his teeth like a swollen blue slug emerging from a cave of yellow bone.

I tried the fire extinguisher again, this time bringing it down on the back of his hand. I bruised my own leg, but his fingers loosened enough for me to pull free.

Four years since he last fed. Four years of starvation, surrounded by blood. What had he done to earn such a punishment, and how did they stop him from gorging himself on bloodsicles? I could feel his hunger pressing into my mind. There was no way he had voluntarily refrained from sampling the merchandise.

I threw the extinguisher at his face and snatched one of the blood canisters. I tried to unscrew the lid, but the gloves of my suit made it difficult, and then he was on me. We flew against a wall hard enough to crack the glass. I hoped it was the glass. It might have been my shoulder.

“Too late, Porter.”
He wrenched his jaw open and brought his fangs toward my neck. I could see his thoughts, his eagerness to bite through my suit and into my neck, to rip me open and gorge himself.

I wedged the metal canister into his mouth. It barely fit, popping into place behind his fangs with what I’m sure would have been a gruesome scraping sound. He jerked back. For a moment he reminded me of a dog with a metal bone. He let go of me and reached for the canister.

I grabbed the top of his head with both hands and slammed my knee into his jaw. Fear and desperation gave me strength, and I felt his fangs punch through the side of the tube.

His mental agony was like a blowtorch to my senses, searing my eyes and forcing acid into my throat. The flesh of his cheeks and jaw eroded like a crumbling sand sculpture. The pattern of dissolution would have probably given me another clue to his species, had I cared enough to watch.

I dragged myself away. Whatever they had added to the blood to turn it toxic, it worked quickly. It would need to be something that could be easily filtered out later. Silver, maybe?
You could probably rig up a way to separate out the silver using electrolysis.

The broken tube tumbled past me. Blood sprayed from the holes like morbid little geysers, boiling away in the vacuum.

When I looked back, nothing remained but a slightly pitted skeleton drifting in a slowly expanding cloud of gray dust.

I brought the skeleton out with me. The idea of leaving his bones trapped in a floating vault in space was too horrific, no matter what he had tried to do to me. Bracing myself in the open doorway, I shoved his remains toward the Earth. He shot away like a torpedo from a submarine. Between the sunlight and the heat of reentry, he should be gone soon enough.

I double-checked my bag and fire extinguisher, pulled myself through the doorway, and yanked the electronic lockpick loose. The door slid shut. I tucked the lockpick into the bag and made sure my gun was at the top where I could reach it.

Mahefa shone a light in my direction to orient me. I crawled to the side of the satellite, braced myself, and jumped. I was a little off course, but Mahefa had no trouble intercepting me. He caught my harness with one hand and reached for the bag.

“Not yet.” I yanked it out of his reach. “Tell me which sample will let me talk to the dead.”

He looked genuinely saddened by my mistrust, like a disappointed parent. “Søndergaard18.”

The name sounded familiar. I prayed it wasn’t the one I had sacrificed fighting the vampire. I dug through the bag, checking one tube at a time. I found it near the bottom. According to the label, this sample was twenty-seven years old.

“Go ahead and hold on to that if you’d like,” said Mahefa. “I’ll carry the rest—”

“Not until we’re on the ground.” I kept my hand in the bag, gripping my shock-gun.

He laughed. It was an ugly sound, heavy with mockery.
“You think I plan to double-cross you? Perhaps to ‘accidentally’ drop you on the way down?”

“Most criminals don’t like letting witnesses go free,” I said warily.

“You’re not a witness, Isaac.”

He was too damned confident. “How do you figure?”

He pointed to the satellite. “If this was simply a matter of bypassing a lock and fighting a single guard, I’d have gotten myself a magical signal dampener and helped myself to their stock years ago.”

It was like the vacuum of space had seeped into my chest. “What are you saying?”

“I needed someone with no connection to me,” Mahefa continued. “Someone who could have plausibly discovered the vampires’ secrets.” He smiled. “Someone who would appear to be acting alone when the controllers in Chernobyl reviewed the video feed.”

Oh, shit.
“And it never occurred to you to wear a damn mask?”

“A mask wouldn’t block the scanner you passed through on the way in. They peeked right through your suit to record every wrinkle and birthmark on your body.” He pulled me closer, until our helmets touched. “You’re not a witness, Isaac. You’re a scapegoat.”

I can’t decide whether to kill him or commit him.

I don’t pretend to know what Isaac is going through. The entire town mourned the loss of so many innocent people, but Isaac hasn’t allowed himself to grieve. He blames himself. I don’t know if he’s searching for punishment or redemption. And then Gutenberg took away the thing that most defined him. I watch him fight to hold on to that world and that purpose, clinging like his life depends on it. He’s lost and angry and terrified.

Isaac isn’t the only one in pain. I lost most of my career. I lost clients and colleagues I worked with for years. Lena was forced to kill Deifilia, the only blood-family she’s ever known. Lena has been spending far more time in her tree than she used to, and grief blunts her joy. Whether that grief is her own or Isaac’s, or even mine, I couldn’t say.

I worry about them both, but if Isaac continues on like this, with the depression eating away at him, his pain could smother Lena as well.

In some ways, his reaction tracks closely to the grief and anger that follow an unexpected amputation. So far, he’s turned most of that pain inward or tried to focus it through action. His tunnel vision keeps him pursuing a vanished child and a thread of hope.

It was a mistake to bring him to Euphemia. The aftereffects of her song have driven his loss deeper, like shrapnel seeking his heart. I want to help Jeneta, too, but not at the cost of Isaac’s life.

I can’t force him to get help. I can’t stand by and watch him self-destruct. And I can’t leave, not without tearing Lena apart. I love her, but that love chains the three of us together, and if Isaac’s downward spiral goes on . . .

He bargained his blood and Lena’s for a chance. What was he thinking? And what else will he sacrifice?

If things don’t improve soon, I may call Jeff and Helen and have them lock Isaac in a damn kennel until he gets his head together.

—From the personal journal of Doctor Nidhi Shah

I
HAD MADE ENEMIES
of an entire species in exchange for a single vial of blood.

How long before they discovered the theft? Whatever alert had triggered the release of the guard within the satellite had likely signaled the vampires on Earth as well. They had an impressive security database, which presumably included records of known Porters and ex-Porters. All they had to do was match the video and scan from the satellite to their information on Isaac Vainio.

Trying to explain Mahefa’s part in it wouldn’t change the evidence. Whatever my reasons, I had broken into their secret satellite. Simply knowing the thing existed was probably enough to earn me a death sentence.

It was almost enough to distract me from our headfirst dive back to Earth.

“Where are we going?” My helmet muffled the wind rushing past.

“Copper River.” Mahefa sounded as happy as a kid going to Disney World. A drink of dryad blood would be the cherry on top of his bloody sundae.

“Not yet. First you’re taking me to Rome.” The bastard had made me a target for every vampire in the world. The least he could do was give me a lift.

“Do I look like a fucking taxi cab?” he snarled.

“How do I know the blood will work?” I shot back. “Once I’ve tested it, then we can go home.”

I half-expected him to drop me. It would be a simpler death than waiting around for the vampires. At this speed, I’d probably fall another hour, but I wouldn’t have time to feel the pain of impact.

“Sure, why not?” he said cheerfully, his annoyance seemingly forgotten. We veered to the right. “I haven’t been to Italy in years. It’s a beautiful country, full of beautiful, delicious women.”

Lower and lower we flew over the blackness of the Atlantic. My stomach lurched as Mahefa flattened out his path, skimming the waves so closely the spray hit my helmet. We had slowed a bit, but the air still battered my suit and helmet, and the harness felt like it was about to sever my legs.

We sped across the water for another hour, with nothing but the waves below and the stars overhead. Monotony dulled my thoughts. I was half asleep when Mahefa struck my shoulder and pointed to lights illuminating the coastline ahead. “Wake up, and welcome to Ostia Beach!”

He unclipped my harness from his, and I went from flying to falling. It was like being on a swing set and feeling the chains snap. I braced my head with my hands and doubled over. The first time I struck the water, I bounced like a stone skipping across a lake. The second time, my arm and shoulder sank
beneath the surface. I flipped heels-over-head and ended up underwater.

Mahefa hauled me to the surface. “Better to be seen swimming than flying. You
can
swim, yes?”

You didn’t grow up in the northern part of the U.P. without learning to swim. I pulled free of his grip. “Shouldn’t you have asked before you dropped me in the ocean?”

Hotels, nightclubs, and bars illuminated the beach ahead. Folded umbrellas lined the sand like soldiers at attention, guarding the nightlife against marine invasion.

By the time I was close enough to shore for my feet to touch bottom, I could hardly feel my legs, and my arms and chest felt like they were on fire. I staggered toward dry sand, one hand fumbling uselessly with the helmet seal.

“Be careful with that,” Mahefa snapped. “It’s practically an antique.”

I considered shooting him, but firing a waterlogged lightning gun while soaking wet probably wasn’t the wisest idea. It wouldn’t be the dumbest one I had ever had, either. But that said more about me than it did about the idea in question.

I finally got the helmet off. The beach smelled of salt and sunscreen. I peeled the suit from my body and grabbed my phone.

“Damn.” The screen was cracked. I doubted the warranty covered getting tossed around a satellite by a starving vampire.

An older couple waved as they strolled past, probably thinking we were out for some late-night scuba diving.

“Where do you need to go to talk to your corpse?” Mahefa asked.

“The Basilica of St. John Lateran.” But not like this. My clothes were wrinkled and reeked of sweat. Now that I was back on solid ground, exhaustion was battering me from all sides. I needed a bed, a good meal, and a hot shower.

Most of all, I
desperately
needed to pee.

Mahefa accompanied me only long enough to deposit his blood in the hotel fridge. He examined each vial closely, opened one, and used a Swiss Army Knife to cut a frozen chip from the end.

“What’s that for?”

After licking the blood from the blade, he sealed the vial and returned it to the fridge. “Blood magic is all about absorbing the strength of the donor. In this case, the vampire’s strength and endurance. As long as I’m here, I’m going to party like the undead.” As he left, he called over his shoulder, “You understand what will happen to you if you touch a single drop of my stock, yes?”

“Whatever. Just be back by morning.” I collapsed on the bed, kicked off my shoes, and reached for my cell phone before remembering it was dead. Groaning, I rolled out of bed and stumbled over to grab the phone on the desk. Lena would be asleep in her oak, so I called Nidhi. She answered after the second ring. She sounded alert and awake, despite it being past midnight in Copper River.

“It’s Isaac. Are you and Lena all right?”

“We’re fine. What the hell have you done, Isaac? Lena said you sold her
blood?
”

A dozen excuses and justifications clambered through my thoughts. I stomped them down. “I did,” I said flatly. After a long silence, I added, “I may have also pissed off some vampires.”

“How many vampires?”

“I can’t give you an exact number, but I’d estimate roughly . . . all of them. You should probably stay with Lena until I get back. If they can’t find me, they might come after one of you. I’m sorry, Nidhi. If I’d known this would put the two of you in danger—”

“Isaac, stop.”

“I got the blood. I’m about twenty miles from the tomb of the man who can answer our questions about Meridiana.” I rubbed my eyes. “No, wait. Don’t stay with Lena. The vampires
know where I live. The two of you should get a hotel room somewhere. I promise I’ll find a way to—”

“Isaac, Elne Cathedral in France was destroyed tonight. Two Porters were killed, along with six civilians. Eleven others were hospitalized.”

My fingers tightened around the handset. “Was Jeneta involved?”

“All I have are the public news reports and secondhand rumors. From the photos, it looks like a sinkhole swallowed the entire cathedral, and then a bomb leveled anything that remained. They’re calling it terrorism, but if the Porters were there . . .”

“Elne Cathedral.” Fatigue blurred my memory, but I remembered the name from one of the books I’d skimmed at the archdiocese in Green Bay. “Miro Bonfill.”

“Who?”

“He was a friend of Gerbert d’Aurillac. Probably a mentor as well. There’s a stone at Elne—was a stone—with their names carved into it.” Nobody knew what purpose it served. It couldn’t have been a magical artifact, or else the Porters would have confiscated it years ago.

“You think I should come home and let the Porters take it from here,” I said. If Meridiana was going after sites connected to d’Aurillac, there was a good chance she’d be watching his tomb as well.

Nidhi said nothing.

“Answer me one question. Given everything we know about the Porters, everything we’ve learned about Gutenberg and his history, do you trust them to take care of Meridiana? Are you
certain
there’s nothing I could accomplish here that they can’t?” I rested my head against the back of the chair. “Tell me that there’s no chance of me digging up some fact the Porters missed or making a connection that might help us save Jeneta. Tell me there’s nothing I can do here, and I’ll come home.”

Nidhi hesitated. “I ought to lie to you.”

“Probably.”

She sighed. “I also know that with your magic gone, a part of you feels as though you have nothing left to lose. I worry that you’ll continue to take more dangerous risks.”

“That’s not why—”

“Shut up,” she said calmly. “Your life has changed tremendously over the past year. Magic or no, you have a great deal to lose. And so do we. Remember that.”

She hung up before I could answer.

I left the hotel hours later, clothed in knee-length shorts and a bright blue T-shirt from the gift shop in the lobby. A shoulder bag with the hotel logo held my clothes, shock-gun, and stolen blood. I bought an enormous croissant and a caffè latte on the way out.

I found Mahefa sleeping on a bench outside, nursing what looked like a grande-sized magical hangover. When he opened his eyes, blackened lines spread like lightning from the irises: charred blood vessels, inflamed by whatever power he had burned last night. He snatched the caffè latte from my hand without a word and downed the whole thing before we were halfway to the metro station.

The subway got us to Rome, and from there we hiked to the Basilica of St. John Lateran, the resting place of Pope Sylvester II. What was left of him, at any rate. When his tomb was opened during the seventeenth century, Gerbert d’Aurillac’s body had crumbled to dust like a staked vampire. I just hoped enough of that dust remained for us to communicate.

When we reached the basilica, I had to stop to absorb the sheer grandeur of the place. Reading about the cathedral hadn’t prepared me to stand on the stone steps looking up at pillars eight times my height. A statue of Christ stood atop the highest point of the façade. To either side, statues of various saints looked out at the tourists.

“While we’re young?” Mahefa muttered.

“Right.” I scanned the crowd for anything or anyone out of
the ordinary, wishing I had Smudge along to warn of danger. I saw nothing unusual, nor did anyone appear to be paying undue attention to us.

Mahefa was already heading inside. I followed, then stopped again once I passed through the entrance. “I have
got
to start traveling more.”

I gawked openly, trying to absorb 1700 years’ worth of history. Every inch of the cathedral was a work of art, from the intricate patterns of the stone tile floor to the fluted pillars and statues on either side of the nave. Gold leaf covered sculptures on the ceiling, which had to be a hundred feet high. Framed paintings hung on the walls above giant statues of the apostles.

Reluctantly, I quickened my pace and made my way past tourists posing for photographs or reading travel guides on their phones. A small crowd had already gathered around the cenotaph of Pope Sylvester II.

Marble framed a stone inscription and a sculpture depicting Sylvester II. I watched an older man press forward to touch the stone. According to legend, the monument wept to foretell the death of a pope. If the stone was merely damp, it predicted the death of a bishop or cardinal.

I pulled the blood from my bag and carefully unscrewed the lid. Chilled air rose from the opening.

“Dumbass. You didn’t let it thaw overnight?” Mahefa snatched the canister away from me. He took a test tube from his shirt pocket and popped the rubber stopper loose.