“You haven’t heard? Jeez, it’s all over the news!”
“What?” I said.
“There’s been another killing.”
Lomen and I both started talking at once, and Amanda held up her hands. “I’ll tell you about it in the car. Let’s go.”
Lomen grabbed his pack, and I picked mine up, too. We followed her to her car. Lomen climbed in the back and I got in next to Amanda.
“It happened last night,” she said as she drove east. “Near the business school, which has got me freaked out.”
My throat was dry, and I was having trouble concentrating. “Same M.O.?”
“No, but Caeran went by the scene and he said there was alben khi there.”
“Wait, what?”
“Energy,” Lomen said.
I’ll explain later.
“There’s another alben in the area, then.”
“Couldn’t it be the same one?” I asked.
“No. The first one would not be hungry again so soon.”
“Yeah, and this time the victim’s a guy,” Amanda said.
I’m not following this.
Alben often hunt the opposite sex, because they can use sexual allure to bring their prey closer.
I thought about that.
That doesn’t mean it has to be boy-girl.
True, but the majority of humans are heterosexual. Alben tend to hunt accordingly.
Amanda pulled up in front of Len and Caeran’s house. We hurried up the path and Amanda went straight in without knocking or ringing.
Caeran was sitting in the living room, dressed in black jeans and a green caftan-looking shirt. A savory smell wafting from the kitchen made my stomach growl. I had sort of forgotten about lunch.
“I’ve called Madóran,” Caeran said, looking at Lomen. “Bironan and Faranin are on their way. They should be here tomorrow.”
“Does Savhoran know?” Lomen asked.
“I called him,” Amanda said.
“He will join us after dark, and will try to bring Pirian,” Caeran said.
Feeling cross, I glanced at Lomen.
Who are all these people?
Members of the clan. Pirian is in Clan Ebonwatch with Savhoran. Guarding against alben is their traditional duty.
Will they bring more people from Ebonwatch?
At the moment, they are all of Ebonwatch.
Great. Clan Ebonwatch consisted of two guys? This was the start-up’s mighty namesake?
It is an expression of hope.
The others had fallen silent. Amanda was messing with her phone. Caeran was watching us, and I had the feeling he knew we were talking.
I did a little white-light shield thing, feeling silly. Better late than never.
Caeran stood and went to a cabinet by the fireplace. He opened it, revealing a flatscreen TV. He turned this on, changed the channel, then muted it, bringing the control with him back to his chair.
Earliest news was at 4:30, unless they did a breaking news flash. I wondered what time it was. I’d forgotten my phone.
It wasn’t like me to be so scattered—but then, I’d just had my brain rearranged by psychic sex. And Lomen was on the couch just a couple of feet away, and we had very unfinished business.
“Amanda said you’d been to the scene of last night’s killing,” Lomen said.
Caeran nodded. “The body was gone, but there were still traces of khi. It was a ... vicious killing.”
“You are certain it was done by an alben?”
“Oh, yes. One who likes knives, apparently.”
“Oh, great!” said Amanda. Her hand went to her neck, taking me back to the summer day when I’d pressed a handful of paper towels to the bleeding slash there.
“Most alben use knives in their hunting,” Lomen said.
“This one used it more than necessary.” Caeran glanced at Amanda, then looked back at Lomen. “There was a crowd of onlookers at the scene, so I was able to stay and pick up a little from the thoughts of the police. The killer took her time.”
“How do you know it was a woman?” I asked.
He looked at me. “I’m not certain the killer was female, but it is a reasonable assumption, given that the victim was male. It is not common for alben to torment their prey, but in this case she did so, using her knife. The police were horrified.”
I took a slow breath. “Um, forgive me for asking what may be a stupid question,” I said. “I’m sorry to hear about another killing, but why does it necessitate this meeting?”
Caeran turned to face me. “For our own safety and that of our clan. We are in the process of establishing a territory, if you will. When an alben begins to hunt here, we take action to discourage them.”
“How?”
“The first step is to find them,” Lomen said.
“Yes,” Caeran said. “Savhoran and Pirian patrol the city, but it is a large area. Until these alben are located, they will need help.”
He went to the kitchen and returned with a tray of glasses and a pitcher of tea. I accepted a glass and chugged half of it. Caeran refilled it without commenting.
The cold hit my belly hard enough to make me shiver. I set the glass on the coffee table and leaned back.
“So,” I said, “if I understand correctly, this is the third time in a year that alben have started hunting here. What’s attracting them to Albuquerque? And to UNM in particular?”
Caeran and Lomen exchanged a glance before Caeran answered. “A university campus is an ideal hunting ground, a concentrated population of young and healthy adults who are enjoying an independence that is new to them.”
“Less likely to be cautious than older humans,” Lomen added.
“As to what brings the alben to this city,” Caeran said, “they tend to travel. Too many attacks in one area arouse the attention of police. It may be that the interchange of two interstates makes it more likely for them to pass through the city.”
Lomen shifted on the couch, and I saw his brow tighten in a frown.
“But the first two alben who came here were looking for Madóran,” Caeran added.
“Madóran?” Lomen had mentioned that name earlier.
“A friend of ours. We came here seeking him ourselves.”
I glanced at Lomen. “Popular guy. You think these new alben are looking for him, too?”
“We have no way of knowing.”
Caeran’s attention shifted to the TV, which had just flashed a “breaking news” slide. He turned on the volume.
Video of yellow tape, on campus, surprised me. My gut tightened. There was nothing to see—a few police standing around—and apparently not much to tell. The voiceover gave the brief details I’d already heard from Amanda and Caeran, without mentioning the knife work.
The news shifted to another story. Caeran muted the TV.
I shook my head. “I don’t see how we’re going to find them. There are almost a million people in Albuquerque.”
“A million humans,” Caeran said.
“So? Except for the white hair, an alben looks a lot like a human, and the hair can be changed.”
“But their khi marks them as different.”
Khi again. Energy, Lomen had said.
“You mean chi?” I asked, avoiding the hissing consonant of the ælven word.
“The concept of chi is based on khi, yes,” Caeran said. “Ælven khi is distinct from that of humans, and alben khi differs from ælven.”
“What are you going to do? Walk around campus looking at everyone’s khi?”
A brief look of impatience crossed Caeran’s face. “The alben will not return to the campus until they hunger again. Meanwhile we will search the places where they are likely to seek shelter. Unless they are unusually integrated with human culture, they will be limited by lack of identification. They are unlikely to have funds other than cash. This narrows our field.”
“Well, I’ll help however I can, but it sounds like more than a handful of us can do.”
Everyone was silent. I had said something wrong.
“You cannot help us, Steven,” Lomen said quietly.
“Sure I can.”
“No,” Amanda said. Her voice sounded choked.
Caeran turned to me. “I am sorry, Steven. You are too vulnerable to assist us in this—search, and far too valuable to be risked. We must ask you to remain here.”
“Look, I’m no prize fighter but I’m not a wimp either.”
“It is not a question of your strength,” Caeran said.
“No human can resist an alben,” Amanda said flatly.
I turned to her, surprised. “What are they, supermen?”
“Compared to us, yeah. They can control us with a thought.” She drew her knees up and hugged them. “The freeze. You don’t even have time to yell for help, usually. There’s no way for us to fight it. They’re too powerful. They can even control ælven, sometimes.”
“That depends on the relative strength of the individuals,” Caeran said.
I looked at Lomen.
“Yes,” he said, looking unhappy. “They use khi to control their human prey. It is against the ælven creed to do so, but most alben do not honor the creed.”
I remembered Kimberly, lying in her own blood. No sign of struggle, except the broken glasses, but that could have happened when she hit the ground.
A door in the south wall opened and Len came in, carrying car keys and her pack. Caeran got up to greet her, then turned to me. “This has reminded me that we should allow Steven to bring some clothing and whatever else he needs to the house. It’s best to go get these things before dark. I can drive you now,” he said.
“Uh...I’m OK at my place, really.”
Caeran shook his head. “I am sorry, but until we locate the alben you will be safer here. Amanda, you will stay as well.”
“Yeah, I brought a bag over.”
“Excellent.” Caeran looked at Len, who handed him her keys.
I was thinking about refusing. These people had turned my life upside-down already; now they wanted me to move in with them?
Please go with Caeran, Steven. He wants to talk to you.
I looked at Lomen. His face didn’t show much, but his eyes were pinched with concern. I would do pretty much anything to wipe away that anxiety.
I got up and followed Caeran through the door Len had come in, which led to a garage. We got into a Lexus sedan and the garage door rolled up. Caeran seemed at ease, and I wondered how long he’d been driving.
Strange, because he looked so similar to Lomen that they could pass for twins, but I wasn’t attracted to Caeran at all. I wasn’t repulsed by him either, mind. Ælven are easy on the eyes. But sitting in a car with Caeran just made me miss Lomen.
The sun was still up but it was definitely slanting. The breeze had grown stronger, tossing stray leaves around in the gutters.
“You may be wondering who elected me president,” Caeran said as he drove toward my apartment. His voice was a little lower and throatier than Lomen’s, I noticed. “I was the one who chose to act, is all. When we first arrived here, one of our clan was ill. I knew that Madóran, who is a healer, might be living north of this city. Indeed, we decided to come to New Mexico because Madóran had done so, centuries earlier.”
Centuries. They tossed that word around pretty casually.
“So I went to the library at UNM to look for information that would help us find him.”
“And met Len.”
Caeran nodded, and a smile softened his face. He was silent as he concentrated on turning right onto a busy one-way street.
“She helped us find Madóran. He lives well to the north, past Mora. Do you know where that is?”
“Not really. I’m a Cruces kid.”
He accepted that without comment, and I wondered if he knew what it meant. My home town, Las Cruces, is in southern New Mexico.
“Sadly, we were not the only ones seeking Madóran,” he continued. “A former lover of his, one who had become alben, also came here looking for him.”
“The first campus killer?”
“Yes.”
“The one who attacked Len.”
Caeran inhaled deeply. “Yes. And others, including Madóran.”
“What happened to her?”
“Him.” Caeran pulled up to the curb outside my apartment, turned off the engine, then turned to face me. “We killed him.”
Holy crap.
“We do not kill lightly. The burden of taking an ælven life, or a human life, weighs heavily on us. Gehmanin left us no choice.”
“What about the second one?” I asked, my voice rough.
“Kanna. She followed Gehmanin here. Their relationshp was...complicated. Kanna fixed upon Amanda shortly after she arrived.” He ran a hand over his face. “That was our doing, I fear. Len and I convinced Amanda to join us in donating blood. Kanna spotted her as she was leaving the donation center. The scent of fresh blood was on her, and Kanna was hunting.”
“Bad timing,” I said. “Not your fault.”
He shook his head. “It began that way, but Kanna soon learned that we were involved in Gehmanin’s death. She decided to kill Amanda in order to hurt us.”
“So you killed her, too?”
“Savhoran killed her. She was hunting him and Amanda. It was self-defense.”
A gust of wind buffeted the car. “What about these new ones? Are they looking for Mad—Mad—”
“Madóran. I hope not. We won’t know until we learn who they are.”
“Are you going to kill them?”
He hesitated, but didn’t deny it. “Only if we have no other choice. We will first try to convince them to hunt elsewhere.”
Hunt elsewhere? Where? How far away was far enough? Santa Fe? Denver? They would still be killing humans.
“But before we can do that we must find them.” Caeran looked at his hands, lying in his lap. “I know it is annoying for you to be asked to leave your home. I promise you it will be temporary. Your safety is our main concern.”
“Honestly, I don’t see how your house is safer than mine. You’ll be out hunting these alben.”
“No. I will stay to watch over you and Len and Amanda while the others hunt.”
My first thought was why couldn’t Lomen stay, but that was selfish. Len and Caeren were an established couple. And it was their house.
“We should go in,” Caeran said. “If you have more questions, I will answer them while you pack.”
I opened my door and got out, looking around for any lurking homicidal alben. The wind was getting stronger, and the sky had clouded over. The air smelled like rain—life-giving rain, always welcome in the desert. I sucked a deep breath, then led Caeran up to my door.
My neighbor, a freshman with freckles and a Marilyn Monroe figure, came up the path at the same time. She welcomed me with a big “I like you” smile, then stopped in her tracks when she saw Caeran, eyes wide and her mouth making that classic “O” shape that drives straight guys crazy. I gave her a non-committal wave and unlocked the door.