Gavin, I think we need to get out of here, I warned as the light began to glow brighter.
"Cara, I don't see, hear or smell anything," Gavin said aloud. Crap. They didn't see it for sure.
"What is wrong?" René asked and then he froze. René was old, as was Gavin. They both recognized the sound, brief as it was, although they hadn't seen what I had. Gavin was already mist and I was rushing toward Tony and René at blinding speed but they'd wandered too far ahead of Gavin—Tony following the directions of his little device instead of paying attention to any of his surroundings. René knew before any of us; he flung himself forward, shoving his youngest vampire child to the ground as the gate opened and the Dark Elemaiya opened fire with bows and wooden shafts.
I lifted René and Tony into my mist and following my instincts, misted right through the gate, picking up a dozen Dark Elemaiya as I did so. Remembering my dream from the night before, I focused on where I wished to go—which was the only other gate I knew. The one on Merrill's property. The one Griffin had closed to all except those of his kind and a few others. I was hoping—no, praying—that I was one of the few others.
It all happened in a blink or two. The second gate was before me and I opened it with a mental flick of power, hoping right then that it would allow me passage. It did. I went right through, Gavin, René and Tony with me. Somehow, the Dark Elemaiya I carried were filtered out of my mist and died as I flew through the gate on Merrill's property; frying on a grid of power erected by my natural father, who knew how long ago. They shrieked and screamed as they died, too, but I didn't have time to worry about that. I'd seen the arrow aimed right at Tony and I had to make sure he was all right.
After setting my burdens down as gently as I could on the damp grass and leaves that littered the area surrounding the gate, I found the damage that had been done. Tony was fine, as was Gavin. Somehow, though, my mist had only delayed the inevitable for René.
A black shaft protruded from his chest and his eyes were wide and filled with pain. "No!" I heard my own harsh cry and I was on my knees next to René in a flash. I'd lost too many people lately. René couldn't leave me, too. Tony loved him. Looked to him as a father. And René was an exceptional parent—kind and loving.
"René, don't leave me," I begged. I was weeping by that time and clutching René's hand in mine. Tony was kneeling beside me and begging as well. Gavin was crouching on René's other side, looking gray.
"Little rose," René whispered, squeezing my hand. "The bloom is on your cheeks, my pretty one," he told me. "I thought you would never come to me." His hand turned to ash inside mine and I sobbed as rain began to fall around us.
* * *
I don't know how Gavin managed to haul Tony and me to Merrill's—it was half a mile away and neither Tony nor I were in any shape to walk. We were sobbing the entire time and Gavin had his own sorrow to deal with. The door was locked and the lights were dim inside the manor, so Gavin had to work to get me calm enough to mist the three of us through the door. I did it finally, but it was painful. The house was completely deserted for some reason and it was near dawn, too. Gavin pulled Tony and me upstairs, tending to Tony first while I wept on Tony's bed. Gavin shoved Tony into the shower, turned it on as cold as it would go, got him out of his clothes and eventually calmed him down.
"Lissy, what am I going to do?" Tony was wrapped in a robe and shivering as he crawled onto the bed beside me. I'd never seen him like this.
"Anthony, should the Honored One allow it, I will take over my cousin's teachings," Gavin's voice was rough with emotion as he sat on the edge of the bed.
"I'm so sorry," I flung my arms around Gavin's neck, shedding even more tears.
"Cara, don't," Gavin wrapped me in his arms. Tony hugged up against my back and that's where dawn found us.
* * *
I got Tony situated on his bed and then carrying Gavin easily, took him down to our shared bedroom, undressing him and covering him up. After that, I wandered listlessly through the house. Deryn and Paul—the two werewolves, were gone. Their rooms were empty on the third floor and their scents were only a memory. Giff's things, too, were all gone, just as Kifirin said. Franklin, Greg and Merrill were also gone, and Merrill hadn't mentioned that they were going anywhere. I wasn't about to go to the basement. It would be weird to find Wlodek sleeping the sleep of the dead so I left that alone. I wanted to call Merrill but it was daylight. I thought about calling Charles and the same reason reared its ugly head. That's why I ended up calling Weldon, who quickly put me on a conference call with Winkler.
"They killed René," I was trying not to cry again.
"Lissa, baby, it's all right," Winkler was trying to soothe me from thousands of miles away. He didn't need to be handling a vampire basket case right now—he was a new father and had his own set of worries.
"Lissa, there's nothing we can say right now that will lessen the pain. All we can tell you is that we love you and we'll support you through this in any way we can. If you need someone to come, then someone will come." Weldon always knew the right words.
"Weldon, I'll have to let you know. Right now, I don't know where Merrill is. And Tony's worse off than I am, I think."
"René was his sire. I figured that out," Winkler sighed. "This is bad."
"Yeah," I wiped a tear away. We talked for a few more minutes and Weldon convinced me to lie down.
"Try to get some sleep, sweetheart. Just close your eyes for a while, all right?" We said goodbye and I huddled on the sofa inside Merrill's large media room on the first floor. That's where Charles found me later when the sun went down.
I jerked awake when his fingers touched my cheek. "Lissa, how are you here?" he asked, stunned wonder in his voice.
"Charles," my heart was pounding now with remembered pain. "René is dead. He was killed with a wooden arrow."
Gavin was shouting my name only a heartbeat later, and he and Tony were both racing downstairs, searching for me.
"I'm here, honey, I'm fine, I just fell asleep on the sofa," I brushed more tears off my face. Wlodek and Rolfe found us there; Gavin sat next to me and crushed me against him while Tony sat on the other side.
"René got killed," Charles passed the information off to Wlodek.
Wlodek sat down heavily in a chair nearby. "Explain, please," he sighed. Gavin was the one to tell the story.
"They came through a gate?" Wlodek asked.
"Lissa saw it, I did not," Gavin said. "Nevertheless, René and I both heard the bowstring as it was drawn back. Lissa tried to gather us up as quickly as she could, but René rushed to protect his youngest. That is how he died."
Tony was the target, I'm sure of it, I sent directly to Wlodek. He never twitched, although I know he heard me.
"Gavin, Anthony, come with me. There are arrangements to be made," Wlodek said after he'd gotten the whole story, asking questions here and there and going over parts of it two or three times. Gavin and Tony rose and followed Wlodek and Charles as they made their way toward Wlodek's temporary offices in the basement. Rolfe stayed upstairs—he would be guarding the house.
"Rolfe, where is Merrill?" I asked.
"Your surrogate sire is in New York at the moment," the tall vampire replied. "He will return tomorrow, I believe." He walked out of the room, leaving me alone with my thoughts.
If Merrill was in New York, then Franklin and Greg were with him. I climbed off the sofa, feeling cold and out of sorts. Nothing was going to make me feel any better—not for a while, anyway. Time was the only thing that would make grief easier to bear. In the meantime, I headed toward the hot tub, and throwing caution to the winds, I dropped my clothes beside it and crawled in naked, doing my best to get rid of the chill that wouldn't leave.
* * *
"Anthony, René's assets will be divided between you and René's other living child, Devlin. Meanwhile, I will be granting temporary custody to Gavin. His claim is strongest—Devlin has never expressed any desire to have a vampire child and in my opinion, he is a bit immature, although he is nearing six hundred. Therefore, pending the Council's approval, your lessons will be with Gavin from now on." Wlodek had lists of René's assets on his desk—Charles had printed them off and handed them over. Tony nodded, not looking at Wlodek.
"Now," Wlodek went on, "we must deal with another death. Gavin knows of this already, as did René, but we held off telling Lissa because we knew it would upset her and destroy her focus, more so in light of recent events." Tony looked up at those words.
"What happened?" He was steeling himself for more bad news.
"Greg, Franklin's mate, has passed. He contracted pneumonia a month ago and the physicians could not find a way to combat the disease since he was already so ill. He slipped into a coma and died four days ago. Merrill and Franklin carried his ashes to New York—that is where Greg wished to be buried. They will return tomorrow and we must inform Lissa somehow."
"This will destroy her," Gavin muttered.
"I know you disagreed with my decision not to tell her, but she needed to focus her mind on what she was doing, instead of worrying over a sick friend. Now we must try to make her see the reason in this, or at least work to convince her to forgive and move past it." Wlodek steepled his fingers and gazed at the two vampires who sat before his desk. "And we have the Annual Meeting in less than two weeks. She must be prepared to attend, Gavin, as I intend to make the announcement then. We have a Queen and she must hold her head up and go."
"Honored One, how many blows do you think she can take?" Gavin rose, pulling Tony up with him. Gavin gave Wlodek a curt nod and ushered his adopted child out of Wlodek's office.
* * *
"Thank you for taking us and bringing us back; I don't think I could have dealt with the lengthy plane rides," Merrill said. Griffin chose to drop Merrill and Franklin inside Merrill's kitchen. Greg's body had been cremated in England, but his ashes had been scattered in a designated place in New York.
"It was no trouble," Griffin replied. "When are you planning to tell Lissa?"
"As soon as she wakes," Merrill sighed. Franklin turned troubled eyes to his vampire father. "Child, would that compulsion still worked on her," Merrill offered. "I also know it will be a fresh blow to you. For that, I am sorry. We must find a way through this."
* * *
"Lissa, Merrill has returned." Gavin had a bag of blood for me when I woke and pulled me inside his arms while I drank. I cleaned up and dressed afterward while he waited. Something was up—he hardly ever waited for me to finish dressing, doing my hair and brushing my teeth. He walked downstairs with me, too. Tony was already in the kitchen, waiting for us. As was Merrill.
"Lissa, we are all troubled by René's death," Merrill said, patting the barstool beside him. I settled there next to him. "But there is other news," he went on. "News that we did not give you earlier as we wanted to keep you focused on your assignment. We did not wish to distract you, causing you to worry over other things."
I was watching Merrill's face closely now and fear gripped my heart. Ever since Griffin told me it was beating again, I'd felt it pounding in my chest when I was frightened. It was pounding now—triple time.
"Lissa, if I could lighten this blow, I would," Merrill toyed with a scrap of paper in his hands. It looked like a note of some kind. "Greg contracted pneumonia a month ago. The antibiotics failed to control the disease and he slipped into a coma. Lissa, he never woke and died five days ago. Franklin and I went to New York to scatter his ashes."
I was on my feet, shaking my head in disbelief. I was numb—completely numb. Greg had been ill and no one had told me. No wonder Merrill hadn't called, or cut off our conversations before I could ask questions. No wonder Gavin wouldn't lend me his laptop the last time I asked.
"Lissa, I was following orders," Gavin said from somewhere far away. That was an excuse and the poorest of excuses on top of that. Greg had been sick and all it would have taken was a plane ride from D.C. so I could see him. To see Greg, once before he died. Yet they'd deliberately kept the information from me. That hurt worse than I can say. It was one more betrayal in a long line of betrayals.
"There," I hissed out angrily, "is no excuse for this." I took a step toward Merrill, and he backed up. "No excuse, now or ever," my voice was rising. "You get what you want, every single time." Claws formed on my fingers and Merrill backed up another step. "When will there come a time when you think of something other than what the fucking Council wants? Were you afraid your plans might be put on hold for a couple of days? Is that it? That Lissa wouldn't go out like a good little girl and do what she's told because somebody she loved was dying?" I was shouting by that time.
Merrill's kitchen island was ripped apart. The refrigerator was lifted and tossed through the back wall. I was screaming and crying the whole time I destroyed Merrill's kitchen, and somewhere inside me, a small voice wept pitifully, asking over and over why they hadn't told me. Eventually I turned to mist and flew right off Merrill's property. Yes, there wasn't a single soul there who could stop me. They should have thought about that before they decided to do what they did.
