Myrnin had developed a maintenance drug, but they needed a cure. Badly. And with Myrnin slipping fast, Claire was the key to getting that done.
There was a profound silence in the room, and for a second, Claire’s angry resolve faltered. Then she saw the look in Oliver’s eyes. Oh no you don’t, she thought. Don’t you look smug.
“We do this my way,” Claire said, “or I’ll destroy all the work and let you all die.”
“Claire,” Myrnin murmured. He sounded horrified. Good. She was glad. “You can’t mean that.”
“I domean it. All your work, all your research. If you let Bishop kill Shane, none of it matters to me anyway.” She was scared to say this, but in a way, it was a relief. “It’s not all about you and your stupid ancient feuds. There are living people in this town. We have lives.We matter!” She’d let the lid off her simmering, terrified anger, and now it was boiling all over the place. She whirled on Myrnin. “ You!You gaveus to him! You turned on us when we needed you! And you”—Amelie, this time—“ you didn’t even care.Where have you been? I thought you were different; I thought you wanted to help—but you’re just like the rest of them; you’re just—”
“Claire.” Just the one word, but from Amelie that was all it took to stop Claire in her tracks. “What else could I do? Bishop turned enough of my followers that any action I would take would have been against my own people. It would have been a fight to the death, and that fight would have destroyed everyone you or I love. I had to withdraw and allow him to think he had triumphed. Myrnin did what he could to protect you and all your friends, while we found another way.”
Claire snorted out a bitter little laugh. “Sure he did.”
“You’re all alive, I believe, unlike most who’ve crossed Bishop throughout his life. You might think on how unlikely that is, so long after he should have lost interest and torn you and my town apart.” Amelie’s face was as hard as carved marble. “My father has no interest in administering.Only in destroying. Myrnin has been persuading him to at least try to keep Morganville alive, and putting himself at constant risk to do so.”
Claire didn’t want to believe it, but when she actually thought about it, she remembered how often Bishop had ordered people killed, and how often Myrnin—or Myrnin and Michael!—had managed to distract him from carrying it out. “Michael,” Claire said slowly. “You turned Michael back, didn’t you? He’s not really Bishop’s anymore.”
Amelie and Oliver exchanged looks, and Oliver shrugged very slightly. “She is a quick study,” he said. “I never said otherwise. Unless the boy’s a bad actor.”
“If he were a bad actor, he’d be long dead by now,” Amelie said. “Claire—you must not treat Michael any differently. For his life’s sake, you must not. Now, I need you to go with Myrnin. The serum you’ve cultured from Bishop’s blood is of vital importance to us now; we need to treat all those we can reach, and we must have enough of a supply to do the job. I rely upon you for that, Claire.”
“Why should I help you at all?” Claire asked, and felt a tremor of pure chill along the back of her neck when Amelie’s gray eyes sharpened their focus on her. “You haven’t promised me anything. I want you to swear you’ll get Shane and his father out of there alive.”
Oliver growled, and from her peripheral vision she saw the ivory flash of his fangs. “You’re going to permit this puppy to bark at you?”
“What I do is my affair, Oliver.” Amelie let a long, long moment pass before she said, “Very well, Claire, you have my word that we will retrieve Shane and his father before they are executed. What else?”
Claire hadn’t really been prepared to win that argument. She blinked, searched for another demand, and came up with nothing in particular.
Then she did. “I . . . want you to promise me that when this is over, you’re going to change things in Morganville.”
Amelie looked, for a moment, perplexed. “Change things? What sort of things?”
“No more hunting humans,” she said. “No more owning people. You’ll make everybody equal around here.”
“You’re speaking of things you don’t understand. These things are required for us to survive in relative security. I won’t put my people at further risk, nor leave them at the whims and mercies of yours. I’ve seen too many centuries of death and destruction.” Amelie shook her head. “No, if that is your price, then it’s too high for me to pay, Claire. Do as you will, but I won’t betray all we’ve built here to accommodate your sentimental idea of modern life.”
Claire had been raised to be kind, to agree, to help, and for just a second, locked in a stare with the Founder of Morganville, she wanted to give up.
The only thing that stopped her was imagining what Shane would have said, if he’d been standing in her place.
“No,” she said, and felt her heart flutter madly in panic. Her whole body was shaking, pleading for her to run, avoid the confrontation. “You hear what you’re saying, right? You want to save your people at the cost of human lives. I won’t agree to that; I can’t. Deal’s off. I’m not helping you anymore. And the first chance I get, I tell Bishop about Myrnin, too.”
Amelie turned on her hard and fast, and before she knew what was happening Claire felt a cold hand around her throat, and she was smashed up against the wall. Claire screamed and slammed her eyes shut, but not fast enough to block out the rage on Amelie’s face, or the wicked-sharp white fangs and staring eyes.
She felt Amelie’s cool breath on her throat, and heard Myrnin murmur something under his breath, something in a language she couldn’t understand. He sounded horrified.
Amelie’s hard, cold hands let go of her throat. Instead, they fastened around Claire’s shoulders and shook her. Claire’s skull bounced off of brick, and she winced and saw stars. “ Open your eyes!” Amelie barked. Claire did, blinking away confusion. “I have nevermet such a vexing, foolish human being in my entire life. There are eight hundred vampiresin the world, Claire. In the world. Fewer each day. We are hunted, we are sick, we are dying.There are billions of you! I will notput you first!” That last was a raw, furious hiss, and it sparked something terrible in Amelie’s eyes, something out of control and hungry. “I willsave my people!”
Behind her, another vampire stepped out of the shadows and said, very quietly, “Amelie. None of this is Claire’s fault. You know that. And she’s right. It’s the same thing I told you fifty years ago. You got mad then, too, as I recall.”
The vampire taking Claire’s side was Sam Glass, Michael’s grandfather; he still looked college-age, even after all these years. He was probably the only one of the nonbreathing who could have stepped in on Claire’s behalf—or would have.
He touched Amelie’s shoulder.
She turned on him, but he wrapped her in his arms, and for a second, one second, Amelie let herself be held before she pushed him away and stalked to the far corner of the room, agitation in every movement. “Oh, just get her out,” she said. “Myrnin, get her out. Now! Before I do something I regret. Or possibly, which I don’t.”
Claire could hardly breathe, much less protest. Myrnin took her hand in his and yanked, hard. She brushed by Oliver, whose eyes were flaring in hunting-vampire colors, and felt a low-decibel growl fill the room.