The voice on the phone at her ear snapped, impatiently, “Would you come, then?”
Claire blinked and saw that Ada was drifting in the middle of the room, staring at her in naked fury. “They’re not going to—”
“They will not hurt you,” Ada said. “Don’t be absurd.”
It really wasn’t all that absurd. Claire had seen some of these same vampires clawing gouges in stone with their fingernails, and gnawing on their own fingers. She was like a doggie treat in a room full of rabid rottwei lers.
None of them lunged at her. They stared at her as if she was a curiosity, but they didn’t seem especially, well, hungry.
She followed Ada’s image across the room to a small stone alcove, where she saw Dr. Mills lying very still on a cot.
“Oh no,” Claire whispered, and hurried over to him. “Dr. Mills?”
He groaned and opened reddened eyes, blinking to focus on her face. “Claire,” he croaked, and coughed. “Damn. What time is it?”
“Uh—almost five, I think. Why?”
“I just went to sleep at four,” he said, and flopped back to full length on his cot. “God. Sorry, I’m exhausted. Forty-eight hours without more than a couple of hours down. I’m not a med student anymore.”
She felt a wave of utter relief. “They didn’t, you know—”
“Kill me? Other than by working me half to death?” Dr. Mills groaned and sat up, rubbing his head as if he was trying to shove his brains back inside. “Amelie wanted to use the serum to treat the worst cases first. I got everyone housed here, except for Myrnin. I have two doses left. There won’t be any more if we don’t get blood from Bishop to culture.”
She’d almost forgotten about that. “Have you seen Myrnin?”
“Not since Amelie brought me here,” Dr. Mills said. “Why?”
“He’s sick,” Claire said. “Very sick. I was looking for you to try to help him, but I don’t know where he is now. Amelie took him, too.”
He was already shaking his head. “She didn’t bring him here. I haven’t seen them.”
Claire sensed a shadow behind her and, turning, came face-to-face with a vampire. A smallish one, just a little taller than her own modest height. It was a girl barely out of her teens, with waist-length blond hair and lovely dark eyes, who smiled at the two of them with an unsettlingly knowing expression.
“I am Naomi,” she said. “This is my sister Violet.” Just behind her was a slightly older girl, same dark eyes, only a little stronger in the chin, and with midnight-black hair. “We wish to thank you, Doctor, for your gift. We have not felt so well in many years.”
“You’re welcome,” Dr. Mills said. He sounded tense, and Claire could understand why; the vamps were all on their best behavior, but that could change, and she saw a shadow of it in Naomi. “I’m sure Amelie will be along to get you soon.”
The two vamps nodded, bobbed an old-fashioned curtsy, and withdrew back into the main room. There was a soft buzz of conversation building out there, a kind of whisper that sounded like a calm sea on the shore. Vampires didn’t have to speak loudly to be heard, at least by one another.
“Is Amelie coming?” Dr. Mills asked. “Because I’m starting to feel like the special of the day around here.”
Oh. He thought Claire was the scout riding ahead of the vampire cavalry. She looked around for Ada, but she didn’t see any sign of her now. She’d just faded out. Claire folded up the phone and put it back in her pocket, feeling a little stupid. “I don’t know,” she said. “I was told you needed help.”
He gave a jaw-cracking yawn, murmured an apology, and nodded. “I’ve got sacks of crystals, and some of the liquid. We need to distribute it all over town, make sure everybody who needs it gets medicated. It won’t last for long, and it isn’t the cure, but until I can get Bishop’s blood, it’ll have to do. Can you help me measure it into individual doses?”
Claire realized, as she was scooping measuring spoons of red crystals and putting them in bottles, that the burning urgency in her guts had finally, slowly faded away.
She pulled up her sleeve.
The tattoo was barely a shadow under her skin.
As she stared at the place where it had been, Naomi the vampire leaned over her shoulder and studied it with her. Claire flinched, which was probably what the vamp had intended, and Naomi chuckled. “I see Bishop marked you,” she said. “Don’t fear, child. It’s almost gone now. He marked my sister once.” The smile left her face, and it set in hard, cold lines. “Then he marked us both forever. Sister Amelie told us he was dead, long ago, but he isn’t, is he?”
Claire shook her head, unable to say anything with fangs so close to her neck. Naomi didn’t seem to be threatening, but she didn’t seem to be comforting, either.
“Then it’s come to it,” Naomi said. “It’s time for us to fight him. Good. For my sister’s sake, I’ll be happy to face him again.” Naomi’s cool hand stroked Claire’s cheek. “Pretty child. You smell warm.”
Claire shuddered. “Yeah, well, I, uh, am. I guess.”
“Warm as sunlight. So was I, once.” Naomi’s sigh brushed Claire’s skin, and then the vampire was gone, moving in a blur. The vampires were all moving faster now—recovering, Claire guessed. Growing stronger.
Dr. Mills was looking at them in satisfaction, but Claire couldn’t quite get there from here. Great, they were feeling better; she could get behind that.
But now they were healthy vampires. Which meant they could make more vampires, and that changed everything. It changed the entire dynamic of Morganville.
Didn’t it?
Her phone rang. No number displayed on the caller ID. Claire flipped it open and said, “What, Ada?”
“You must take Dr. Mills and leave,” Ada said. “I will dial the portal for you. Go now.”
“Would you mind telling me what—”
“Do as I say or I will leave you both alone in a room full of vampires who may crave an instant hot meal.”
Myrnin’s computer was such a bitch.
Claire snapped the phone shut. “Grab what you need,” she said. “It’s time to go.”
Dr. Mills nodded. He’d loaded the individual doses into a couple of duffel bags, and he handed one to her as he hefted the other. He opened up a padded silver box and checked the contents.
Two syringes.
“Those are the last two doses of the serum, right?” Claire asked. “Maybe I’d better . . . ?”
He handed them over. “Make sure Myrnin gets one, and Amelie gets the other,” he said. “Oliver will try to hijack one for himself. Don’t let him.”
Like she stood a chance of saying no to Oliver on her own, but she nodded anyway. Dr. Mills seemed relieved to have the stuff out of his hands. He looked around at the vampires, who were all turning toward them. “Maybe we should be going,” he said. “I’m sure they’re all grateful, but—”
“Yeah,” Claire said. “Let’s.”
Walking through the crowd was like walking through a giant pride of lions. They might be calmly observing, but there was no mistaking the predatory gleam in their eyes as they did it. Claire caught the glitter of fangs in one or two mouths, and made sure not to make eye contact.
Naomi stepped into her path. The young vampire—well, young-looking—blocked the way out. “May I beg a favor?” she asked. “A small one, I assure you.”
Claire licked her lips. “Sure.”
“Give this to my sister Amelie,” she said, and lifted a silver necklace off of her alabaster neck. It was a beautiful little thing, thin as a whisper, and it had a white cameo dangling from it. “Tell her that we are with her if she requires it.”
Claire put the necklace in her pocket, and nodded. “I’ll tell her.” Naomi didn’t move. “Did you want something else?”
“Oh, yes,” Naomi said faintly. “Very badly. But you see, I know my sister. I know she would not forgive me if I did anything untoward. So you and your kind doctor must go, before we forget our promises.”