Vampire Babylon - Night Rising Part 26

"If you're going to help him, you must rest." His voice was gentle in her ear, fluttering the loose hairs around it. "Rest, Dawn."

He was soaking past her skin, cell by cell, becoming a part of her, feeding off of her just as she fed off of him. And as much as she knew it was wrong to welcome him, she did, loving the joining too much, needing the comfort.

"Rest," she said in agreement, tired of the struggle. "Please."

The request allowed him all the way in, her limbs heavy, shot through with s.e.xual yearning.

In victory, The Voice's essence swirled around her, scented with familiar mystery, tasting of things she recalled only in the back of her mind-things stored tightly away and mourned by her unconscious self. In the lone, unshrouded corner of the mirror, she could see her jeans-covered thigh, and nothing else.

Closing her eyes, she felt the tips of ghostly fingers running up and down her arms, pausing over her burns, then circ.u.mventing them. In the background, the hinges of the bookcase creaked, then stopped.

"I can keep us safe, Dawn," he whispered, his voice mere inches from her ear. "With your help, I can finally do it."

With a heady thrust, he came into her.

Gasping, she tingled, her body like a shower of cinders. But this time, he was on the outside, too. Somehow, he was in both places at the same time, using the physical touch of his hands, his mouth.The pressure of his lips traveled to her neck. At his urging, she leaned her head to the side. She felt the silver-and-gem strands of her earring shift, felt him pause as if memorizing it. Then she felt him against her throat, running his mouth over a vein, exploring the scent of her skin.

Languid, animal instinct got the better of her. She wanted to hurt him as much as he'd hurt her, wanted to punish, so she ground back against him, feeling the stiffness of an erection. With a swipe that seemed to play out in slow motion, she reached back, her fingernails catching a face. Or what felt like a face. Moisture-his blood-immediately dried under her nails.

He groaned against her ear, driving her to erotic madness, getting her damp, ready.

"I'm going to make you tell me everything," she said.

He bit her ear, hard, eliciting another gasp from her. Then he laughed at her pain, knowing d.a.m.n well how much she liked it.

Insideandoutside, she thought. This isn't a mind probe. It's something...different.

Still, she wanted him within her, thrilled to the pulse of him under her skin. It drove her crazy to have a man in her veins, possessing her. She grabbed for his hair, intending to wrench him around. But he knew her too well.

Antic.i.p.ating her violence, he maneuvered her arm behind her back, arching her spine. Her distended nipples brushed against her bra, agonized and raw.

"b.a.s.t.a.r.d," she said, a low, hungry wince telling him that she was lying.

Physically, he eased up on her, but, inside, he was now pooling around her stomach like a jet of warm cream, sliding downward, bathing her s.e.x. With warm, lapping strokes, his essence licked at her.

She cried out.

He laughed again.

In heightened response, she roughly reached behind her, feeling for his erection. When she found it, she rubbed, hard and slow.

Groaning, pushing her forward until she bent at the waist, he buried his face against her neck, nipping. One hand entangled itself in her hair as he carefully undid her ponytail, proving just how much he could take of her torture without giving in. As she continued rubbing him, antic.i.p.ating the moment he'd glide into her, she felt the strands lift from the sensitive spot where neck met spine, felt the weight of him settling his mouth at her nape, forcing heat and tightness to pull at each other in her belly.

Exerting his control again, he deliberately removed her hand from him, guided it to her stomach, slipped her palm beneath her undershirt so she could touch her tender skin, trace the bared plane just above the line of her jeans.

Responding, she swelled, throbbed, grew even wetter.

G.o.d, the texture of his hands...The undulation of his mind swirling against her...

Suddenly, with a whoosh of cold air, his essence retreated from her body, then plunged back into her, making her stifle a scream because of the driving sensation, the simultaneous inner pressure of a nearing climax.

In his flurry of movement, the material shrouding the mirror had flared away, falling to the floor like wings guiding a raven to a landing.

Moaning in her haze, she looked into the mirror. She had to see him, see what he was doing to her.

But... She blinked, bucked back against him.

The mirror showed a woman flushed and writhing, her eyes pa.s.sion-flared, like one of the seductive portraits in The Voice's collection. Her shirt was twisted upward, showing her own hand rubbing her belly, moving as if it were being guided by another.

Her hair was flying free, suspended in air and wavering up and down as if held by fingers.

But there was no hand over her hand. No fingers in her hair. No one behind her.

He was there, but he wasn't there.

A flash of terror and excitement blinded her, seeping downward, through her skin, into the center of her, wet and furious. She started to slide downward, her knees unable to hold up any longer.

In the mirror, she was floating, her body braced by invisible hands that were holding her up.

"What the h.e.l.l are you?" she repeated.

Caught, he sought escape: her hair dropped, and the rest of the pressure lifted off of her body. Fighting for balance, Dawn stumbled around, reaching out to grip his arm, his shoulder...anything.

Nothing.

Popping out of her stupor, she frantically searched the room for any sign of him. Nowhere. The bookcase creaked, and she noticed that it had gone back to its original position, revealing only a dark slat between it and the wall.

Mirrors, she thought. What did movies say about vampires and mirrors?

Turning back around, she looked in the shiny surface again, seeing only herself, posture steeled with ire.

"Jonah!"

A frenetic breeze whipped around the room, a prelude to a storm. On the traces of the wind, she thought she heard a cry of fury that mirrored her own emotions.

Smash.

Books tumbled out of the case as the wall crashed back into itself, closing up the slat.

"No..." She ran to the wall, pounded on it, tried to force it open, but she knew it was useless.

The Voice...Jonah...had left her.

She whipped around, using the bookcase to hold her up. As she tightened her fists by her side, she focused across the room on the mirror again.

But what she saw there made her do a double take.

It was her, all right, yet not her.

Her mind-sheknewit was just her mind-had conjured up an image of Dawn with blond hair, bigger brown eyes. It was what she would've looked like if she'd inherited more of Eva's DNA.

As Dawn stared in horrified wonder, heat soaked her body, beating to a mortifying afterglow. But the vision stared right back, broken-hearted and disappointed in how she'd turned out. "I'm so sorry..." she said.

She was apologizing for a lot of things: being weak, never being good enough to warrant the t.i.tle of Eva Claremont's Daughter.

Like a fatal blow, deep, bone-searing grief broke Dawn in half, reducing her to exhausted tears again. The image hushed to black, and she felt her own soul going along with it.

Fading to wherever movies die after the ending credits have rolled.

TWENTY.

BELOW,PHASEFOUR.

SORIN, the Master, and a guest were in a secret room watching through a trick window that was mirrored on the side of the citizens. Steam from the spa, where the Groupies waited on the Elites, fogged the gla.s.s's edges, yet a view of the baccha.n.a.lia was still clear.

Male Groupies ma.s.saging female Elites, female Groupies bathing female Elites, or any other combination of pleasure they could dream up. As if to provide a beautiful garnish, Groupies huddled in the room's misted corners, stroking each other, giggling, as they waited to be called.

The hidden Sorin and Master were focused on the nearest of the raised beds, where an Elite was bent forward, naked, his arms propped on a column of harem pillows while he rested on his knees. Three female Groupies attended him: one rubbing her fingers over his scalp, one spreading oil over his broad shoulders, one positioned on her back beneath him, in between his parted legs.

Her mouth worked at his p.e.n.i.s, taking him in and out as she lightly squeezed his s.c.r.o.t.u.m with her fingers.

"They are gla.s.s G.o.ds," Sorin said, ignoring their cowed guest, who was huddled on the floor by the Master's feet. Sorin could scent the nervous sweat from the human's skin. "I find it unsurprising that the Elites enthralled Lee Tomlinson to such an extent.

You have created fragile monsters."

In the darkness, the Master's aura pulsed with contained wrath at the mention of the errant Servant.

Due to the spywork Above, they had already seen to Lee Tomlinson's punishment. He had been caught by a patrol of Guards an hour ago, charged with the flagrant murder of Klara Monaghan. Though the Servant's intentions had been n.o.ble, he had done much harm. He had confessed and genuinely believed that quieting the aging actress from speaking of Robby Pennybaker for good would only benefit his Underground. Yet Lee Tomlinson had forgotten his humanity while attempting to prove how much of a vampire he was meant to be: he had ripped out his victim's throat in his pa.s.sion for Underground redemption.

When the Servant had first been caged, he had even then maintained his loyalty to the Underground and pet.i.tioned anyone who would listen to believe that hewasvampire material. His yearning for Klara's blood had proven it, he had cried.

Unfortunately, Sorin and the Master had learned that the murder had indicated vampire activity Above; it had excited the humans who already believed in-and were prepared for-"monsters."

Humans such as the private detectives.

If there were any monsters, Sorin thought, Lee Tomlinson was the epitome. Did he not understand that they were civilized?

Indeed, food came from Above, but they did not feed like crazed creatures. At the risk of penalty, they took a prey's volunteered blood. It was their code.

But there had been no need to explain this to the former Servant after he had secretly been brought to the Master's chambers to have his mind wiped.

Afterward, they had released Lee Tomlinson to the Servant lawyer, Milton Crockett, "The Fixer," as he was known up Above to the Hollywood community. Crockett would see to it that his client settled in to a normal life outside of Los Angeles, devoid of Underground memories. He would make certain that no one-not Lee's lover oranyone-found out about the incident, as well, at the risk of having to perform yet another mind wipe.

After all this, the Master seemed inclined to face the inevitable. "We've withstood more than Lee Tomlinson in the past," the Master had said. "Much more. And if this Servant's carelessness leads to a confrontation, then come what may, Sorin. Because the daywillcome when we have to defend our Underground, but we would be fools to force it to happen without absolute cause.

If we reveal ourselves Above too early, that could bring a premature end for our paradise. You've said it yourself-wemustuse stealth to preserve our secrecy, then, if everything else fails, it's war."

Had the Master become too arrogant recently? Granted, he had abilities not even Sorin could summon, although Sorin had inherited a great deal of his parent's skills through the initial long and proper blood exchange that had birthed him.

All the same, each generation's blood grew weaker, the progeny in need of more protection. Such a pity to lose power as a breed, Sorin thought, remembering his own children.

"Sir?" It was the shaking voice of their guest. "Master?"

Still bruised from the memory of his missing progeny, Sorin reared forward, knowing the human could not see him, but could feel the threat of his blood-laden breath, his hair-splitting power in the dark. "You are not to speak unless spoken to."

"But I've paid-"

"You are makinguspay, human. Remain quiet."

The man shrunk back, chastised for now, his once-neat, finely manicured hair flat with perspiration.

Experienced in the ways of mental torture, Sorin forced the human to wait a few plodding moments before addressing him again.

"You solicit entrance to the Underground, where no human comes unless he is willing to be fed upon. You come without the intention of offering yourself or ever becoming one of us. You plead an audience with the Master you call Dr. Eternity."

Sorin knew the head vampire was listening, though he seemed enchanted by the trick mirror instead. But he was a vampire n.o.ble who need not pay respects to this underling when Sorin was his proxy. His shield who preserved his safety from the public. His devoted bodyguard.

"I need your help," the human said. "That's why I came. And you summoned me back to this country in the first place because you needed me, too."

"I find it odd that you so fear ever becoming a vampire, yet you chose this path for your son."

Nathan Pennybaker looked up at Sorin, his face sorrow-ravaged. "Robby knew his time in the Underground was going to keep his name alive forever. He knew that getting the help of Dr. Eternity was the only answer to his career. That's why we sought you out after we were approached by your Servant-agent."

A man who had left them long ago when his usefulness had expired, may he rest in peace. "Yes, Robby's careerwason the wane, even though he was at such a tender age."

"That's what happens with child stars," the human said, angry. "The audience doesn't want to see them grow up."

And Robby had been growing up, all too fast, Sorin thought, knowing this story-and all the stories-by heart. Nathan Pennybaker seemed to take no responsibility for his reportedly awful part in Robby's fleeting childhood, and that disgusted Sorin all the more, for he had loved his own children once. He had lost them, too. And, unlike Nathan Pennybaker, Sorin would have moved mountains to alleviate anything his daughters might have suffered; never would he have introduced pain to them.

In effect, he enjoyed toying with this bad father, makinghimsuffer.The Master agreed, his aura reddening.

"True, it is not easy watching your children mature," Sorin said. "It would also not be easy to see them loaned out to the highest bidders-unless you have the soul of a demon."

The human choked on his own rage, seeking the words to defend himself, failing.

But Sorin was too occupied with memory to mind the human. Both of his daughters had gone missing years ago, though he knew they still survived somewhere; after all, their own children remained alive here, thus testifying that their parents had not perished.

After they had reproduced here in the Underground, they had left for more thrilling adventures in the Old World, wishing to "explore their roots." Perhaps it had cost them dearly.

The first so-called Groupies had been the result of their fledgling efforts to exchange. More Groupies had followed, each generation losing abilities, the bloodline growing anemic. There had been times that Sorin had pondered the possibility ofhis.e.xchanging with a human again, but the loss of his daughters was still fresh and agonizing, and breeding became too painful an act to consider.

However, if the Underground required more power, he would reproduce in a heartbeat. His own progeny would be strong.