“Yes,” he agreed. “For now. Come back soon, lovely girl. I’m going to need your help with the old man. He’s been getting a bit…impatient.”
I watched her walk away, still feeling that subtle buzz of her presence, that seductive thrill…and it didn’t go away when I looked at Jester and said, “Let’s go, Fang Boy.”
And that was the beginning.
Pain, yeah, there was a lot of that, but it seemed like the more time I spent in the ring, facing him, facing everything that I’d ever hated on such a primal level, the pain meant less and less. What mattered was letting the monster out from inside me, the one I’d been starving for almost a year.
I’d come to Morganville to take down vampires.
And Vassily and Gloriana were giving me the chance to do just that.
And oh, God, I loved it.
On the way to Common Grounds, Claire texted Shane—just a quick message to say she loved him. No immediate reply, but one buzzed through by the time she’d walked the distance to Common Grounds.
Shane’s message said, Be home late luv u.
She was still smiling and feeling almost completely happy when she opened the front door of the coffee shop and heard the bell tinkle to announce her arrival. This time of day, it was full of students gathered together at tables, books and computers out. Study groups, mostly.
She spotted Gloriana right off, because she was at the traditionally vampire tables, in the deepest shadows at the back of the room…and she was surrounded by other vamps. All male. There must have been five or six of them at the table, more than she’d seen gathered together anywhere but in Founder’s Square—old-looking, young-looking, all with identical expressions of rapt interest on their faces. All staring at Gloriana, who sat comfortably with one leg folded under her, sipping whatever was in her plain white mug, smiling, and talking. She really was pretty, and unlike a lot of pretty vampires, she came across as nice. Sweet, almost. Claire had good reason to think she wasn’t, because Eve had taken an instant dislike to her, but still.
It was impossible to resist her charm.
The proof was that one of the guys sitting at the table was Oliver, still wearing his long, tie-dyed Common Grounds apron. He was staring at Glory with a small, bemused smile on his lips, as if he couldn’t quite believe that she was here in front of him.
He glanced over and saw Claire standing there, and the smile disappeared. He stood up and came over to her. “What?” he asked. The warmer side he’d been showing to Glory was all gone in a flash.
“Uh, sorry to bother you, but could I get a mocha?” She was buying time, because looking at the situation in front of her, Claire honestly couldn’t see how she was expected to get in close enough to talk to Gloriana, let alone gain her trust, or grill her discreetly about Bishop. Wasn’t that Oliver’s job, anyway?
But maybe Myrnin didn’t trust Oliver with Glory. That would make some sense, given what she’d seen. She adjusted her earbuds. Nothing but a low hum of static on them so far, which was bugging her; she’d rather have her music on, but the idea of Frank interrupting it sounded worse than boredom.
Right on cue, there was Frank’s voice, whispering to her through the magic of technology. That was creepy, with an extra-strength dose of frightening. She still had nightmares about Frank Collins sometimes. And she thought he’d probably be happy to know that. “Right. You should be able to see her now. According to the records, she looks harmless, but she ain’t. Some female vampires have a thing called glamour, and she’s got it more than most. She can make anybody like her, including other vampires.”
Claire turned away a little, pretending to fiddle with her book bag. “Can you hear me?”
“Yeah, through the microphone on your cell.”
“What about Amelie? Could she make Amelie like her?”
“Probably not. Amelie’s got a thing vampires call compulsion; she can force people to do what she wants when she has to. Compulsion trumps glamour every time.”
“Does anybody else have this compulsion thing?”
“Oliver,” Frank said. “Not as strong, though. But Oliver’s a lost cause, anyway. He’s an old friend of Glory’s, if you know what I mean by friend. Looks like he’s given it up already.”
Yeah, she knew about that. She could have guessed it just from seeing the smile on Oliver’s face as he looked at Gloriana.
“Just be careful with her,” Frank said. “If she tries to glamour you, pain may break you out of it—it sometimes works for girls. Not so much for boys, for some reason—probably because she’s not as good at tapping into the girls, or they’re wired up differently. But she probably won’t glamour you, anyway. She doesn’t think much of humans in general, and girls are definitely not her thing.”
“Wait a minute. Back up. Your answer to how I’m supposed to resist is to hurt myself? How is that helpful? Do you think I want to be in pain?”
“Fine. Deal with it on your own, then. Enjoy the ride.” And the hiss was back in her headphones, constant and featureless.
About that time, Oliver gestured impatiently at the counter and thumped a cup down for her. Her mocha, presumably, although she wasn’t putting much faith in a decent brew, not with the scowl he was giving her. Her stalling tactic was pretty much dead in the water, and she couldn’t think of a single reason to walk over there to join Gloriana’s exclusively testosterone-filled—and pulse-lacking—admirers.
And then Gloriana looked up as Oliver slipped back in his chair, saw Claire watching her, and smiled. Their eyes met.
And Claire found herself walking toward the table. She wasn’t afraid, and she wasn’t thinking at all—she couldn’t remember the last time when she’d felt this kind of peace. Freedom from thinking all the time.
Just acting.
“Claire, isn’t it?” Gloriana said. She had a low, pleasant sort of voice, and her smile was bright. “Please have a seat. Oh, Jules, please bring another, would you? I don’t want to leave little Claire standing! So rude.”
Oliver wasn’t scowling anymore, but he wasn’t smiling, either; when he looked at Claire, it was an entirely neutral expression. Another vampire—Jules, presumably, although Claire didn’t know him—brought her a chair and she sat down, sandwiched between two strangers who almost certainly would have been inclined to drink her dry under other circumstances.
And she didn’t feel even a twitch of uneasiness.
I’ve been glamoured. That thought came from somewhere deep inside her, a kind of whispering doubt, but it wasn’t strong enough to make any difference. Not when Gloriana was smiling at her, those wide blue eyes so warm and welcoming. “I’ve heard so much about you,” she said. “So many people speak well of you. Even my old grouch Oliver, here.” She laughed and put her hand on top of Oliver’s in a gesture that was affectionate and, at the same time, a little bit patronizing, like an owner petting a dog. He gave her a quick look and a belated smile. “So, tell me, Claire, what do you think of Morganville?”
Normally, she would have been careful about what she said, but here, under the warm glow of Glory’s eyes, she just…spilled. “I love the people I’ve met here,” she said. “But I hate how it all works. I hate how humans get treated. I hate that it’s okay to hurt us. That has to change.”
Gloriana raised one eyebrow. “I thought it already had,” she said. “So Amelie tells me. No hunting without permission, and then only in restricted zones. It’s all perfectly tiresome, but I do understand the need for conservation, of course. Or are you saying that we should never hunt?”