Lysander reached up to grasp my hand. I dropped the box as I grabbed hold of him.
Suddenly the pressure at my throat left and the three of us crashed to the floor, landing in a heap.
“What the hell happened?” I moaned.
“Let’s get out of here,” Fallon called from the doorway. She looked ready to go. A purse was slung over one shoulder and her laptop bag criss-crossed the other. “We need to get as far as we can from this thing.”
“I’m with you.” I shot up to my feet. “I don’t know what made it stop, but we need to get while the getting is good.”
Lysander nodded and stood. “Let us not take any more chances.”
Nicholas bent over the fallen box, lying open on the ground. Anger still burned red in his eyes. He pounded his rock hard fist into the lid of the box, but it didn’t break. It didn’t even crack.
“Leave the box,” Lysander commanded. “We must go now, before it attacks again.”
“Don’t you need it?” Nicholas growled the words.
“I believe the spirit is tied to the box. It might follow if we take it. There has already been enough death for one evening. Let us go now!” Lysander waved his arm toward the door.
“Hold on.” Fallon dug into her laptop bag. “I’ve got a camera.” She pulled out a silver camera, barely the size of a credit card. “Pictures might help in our research, right?”
“Fallon, we don’t have time for this shit!” I reached out and grabbed her shirt, pulling her back as she snapped off a few quick shots of the box. “We have to get a move on.”
Lysander crouched in front of Rozaline. “Nicholas, help me with her body.”
Nicholas slumped to the ground and pulled a green blanket from underneath the upturned futon. Without a word, he quickly wrapped her head and body.
He and Lysander hoisted Rozaline onto their shoulders, and we all headed out the front door.
Crystal and Drew were just walking up the driveway as we folded Rozaline’s body into the back of Lysander’s Jeep. They were arm and arm, chatting and strolling like lovers after an excellent first date.
I knew the second they caught the smell of blood. Their faces contorted in a mix of confusion and excitement. That smell is so hard to ignore, even for a vampire who is sated from recent hunting. Just like alcohol to an alcoholic or a cigarette to a smoker, it was easy to have “another for the road.”
Drew, a giant of a man, seemed to shrink as he caught the scent. He crouched down a bit as if ready to pounce. Crystal, who looked as tiny as an elf standing next to her mate, became rigidly still. She stared at the back of the Jeep like a cat watching its prey, waiting for the right moment to make her move.
“We need to go someplace safe, now,” I told them, letting the urgency in my voice snap them back into reality. “Get in. We’ll explain on the way.”
Without another word, Fallon, Crystal, Drew, and I all squished into the back seats while Nicholas collapsed into the front passenger spot. Pain radiated so sharply from him it was hard not to feel it. I reached out to squeeze his shoulder, and he jerked away from me with a growl. “We’ll get our revenge on that ghost,” I said, trying to sound reassuring though I couldn’t help but feel that we were completely screwed. I didn’t have the slightest inkling of how to fight off a spirit.
“Ghost?” Crystal asked.
“Fallon and Alyssa unknowingly opened a Pandora’s box,” Lysander replied, his voice still rough with anger, or maybe sadness? Rozaline had been his long-time friend too. He’d been her maker, turning her to save her life when Nicholas couldn’t. I could only imagine how much her death affected him, but he was an expert at holding back emotions.
“I see,” Drew said.
I couldn’t tell by his tone if he was angry or intrigued.
“That body in the back, please tell me it’s not…” Crystal choked up, as if she couldn’t say the word.
“Sadly… yes,” Lysander responded as he backed us out of the driveway. Tires screeching, he took off down the street.
“No! It can’t be. Rozaline. Please tell me it was at least quick and painless.” Crystal’s voice rose a few octaves. She sounded as if she was fighting back tears. I dropped my head. I didn’t want to look at her and see the pain in her eyes or the tears I knew would soon follow. Guilt churned in my stomach. Heat rushed to my face, tears again welled in my eyes. My throat burned. The dam broke and I crumpled over in the seat, bawling like a little child. “It was all my fault. It should have been me, not Rozaline.”
“It wasn’t just you, Alyssa,” Fallon said somberly. “If I hadn’t opened the box...”
“But I should have stopped you,” I wailed.
“Enough blaming ourselves,” Lysander said. “What is done is done. We have to find out what it is and how to stop it, before it does any more damage.”
“Okay,” Fallon said. “Take me to a hotel with an Internet connection, and I can start some research with my laptop.” She sounded sad, but she hadn’t known Rozaline like I had. She couldn’t possibly be feeling the weight of guilt as strongly as I was. It appeared she was in “fix it” mode, which was helpful. We needed someone with a clear head to help figure things out.
After settling into a cheap, extended-stay motel, Fallon, Crystal and I decided to stay behind while the men went to take care of the sad business of burning Rozaline’s body. I was glad when they didn’t argue about us staying. I just couldn’t bear to see her like that.
I wondered what life would be like without her calming influence in the clan, and on Nicholas. Just the thought of her not being around caused a fresh downpour of tears. I couldn’t shake the terrible memory. Over and over it played in my mind. I watched her struggle, heard the echoes of her moans, and then, in slow motion, saw her head crashing to the ground. She had died so needlessly, and I had helped to cause it. The guilt was a soul-crushing weight on my shoulders.
Crystal, it seemed, was feeling Rozaline’s loss just as deeply as I was. She sat balled up on one of the queen-sized beds, sobbing into a pillow.
On the other bed, Fallon sat rigidly, still hugging her laptop bag as if it could give her comfort.
I took a deep breath and wiped my eyes. “I have to get my mind onto something else, before I became a useless emotional mess. Fallon, you want to get back to research?”
“Yeah… sure.” Her voice was weak, but she looked eager to have something to do. She walked over to the small table and chairs and pulled out her laptop.
More than just “something to do” to keep my mind occupied, research would help us all get vengeance for Rozaline’s death. I washed away the bloody tears in the bathroom while Fallon booted her laptop and started uploading the pictures she’d taken with her camera.
“Crystal, can you read any of these symbols?” Fallon asked as the pictures flashed across her screen.
Crystal wiped her eyes and cleared her throat. She stood and took a few wobbly steps toward the table. “Let me have a look.”
Fallon turned the laptop.
“Sorry, no.” She rasped the words, her voice thick with grief. “This language is something before my time.”
“Fallon.” I joined them at the table. “Do you remember what Lysander had us look up before we took off? Maybe there’s something we missed?”
“Sure, let me pull up a few searches.” Fallon clicked away at the keys and in seconds had a search engine page with multiple results.
I forced a smile on my face. “You’re so good at this stuff.”
“It’s not like I’m doing anything special. The search engine does all the work. I’m just typing in keywords.”
“I just want you to know I appreciate all you do to help the clan.” If that thing attacked us again, I wanted to make sure Fallon knew how much I cherished having her around. I’d never gotten to tell Rozaline that before she died.
Fallon stared at me for a moment, her eyes narrowed, and a mixture of confusion and worry flashed across her face.
“So what was it you were researching?” Crystal asked, bringing us back on task.
Fallon turned toward her. “Lysander deciphered two words on the box. One was a name I can’t remember, the other was a place. Arcadia. That led us to werewolves and Kallisto. However, there was nothing other than Kallisto’s name to connect vampires and werewolves. Nowhere in any of the legends does it mention why a spirit would be involved with both.”
“Kallisto was a very old and powerful vampire. At least the one we knew was. But what would she have to do with werewolves?” Crystal pursed her lips and turned to walk to one of the two beds against the wall.
Fallon clicked on one of the links. A new page loaded on her screen. “According to one search...” She quickly skimmed over the results. “Kallisto was the daughter of a guy who was turned into a werewolf. But he was turned after she was sent to the stars. Something having to do with being romantically involved with Zeus.”
“Lysander said the interpretation means she was turned into a vampire, not literally sent off into space,” I added.
Crystal sat down at the edge of the bed. “Well, that would certainly be a good interpretation if his Kallisto is
the
Kallisto from legend. There may have been other women named Kallisto throughout history.” She twirled a lock of her curly brown hair around her finger and stared off into space. “Even if she is
the
Kallisto, that still doesn’t explain the correlation with the spirit. It only connects vampires and werewolves in mythology. I’m sure just about anything supernatural can be connected by myths. That really doesn’t give us much to go on.”
“Aren’t werewolves and vampires supposed to hate each other?” Fallon clicked on random links as they popped up on her screen.
“Why would you think that?” Crystal asked with a hint of confusion in her voice.
“I’m trying to see if there might be more involved with this legend. What if the werewolves hated that Kallisto became a vampire? What if they held a grudge? I don’t know.” Fallon groaned in frustration and threw her hands into the air. “I’m not finding any answers here. The movies always portray them as enemies.”
“Don’t believe everything you watch in movies, dear.” Crystal’s lips tightened. “Vampires and werewolves are no more enemies than you and I. In all honesty, Fallon, you’ll find very little prejudice among the supernatural races.”
“Really?” Fallon turned around to face Crystal. “You’re all friends?”
“Well, potentially, yes.” She let out a soft laugh. “Our communities are smaller. We are a minority, if you will. Also, given our longevity, we’ve had a longer time to deal with each other. It’s hard to hold grudges for centuries.” She gave Fallon a teasing wink.
“Yeah I guess eighty to a hundred years isn’t long at all,” Fallon smiled weakly. “Compared to immortality, that is.”
Crystal shook her head. “The reality is, we have no reason to hate each other. Vampires are solitary creatures. Unless we try to live in covens, which never works well, long-term. Too many vampires in one area cause problems with hiding our kill… er… rationing the food supply.”
“But Kallisto had a huge coven,” I blurted out.
“And how many times in the history of her coven were there problems? I know Lysander has told you about their beginning. Vampires draw too much attention in larger numbers and the older they get, the less tolerant they become of following others’ rules.”
I nodded in agreement. Lysander had told me of his early history with Kallisto and the many times the coven warred within itself and split into various factions. “Yeah, I guess you’re right.”
“It takes a supremely cunning leader to hold a coven together for a long time and keep their hunting habits hidden. Frankly, it’s not worth the effort. Clans, however, are different. Smaller groups resembling family units are easier for us to deal with. We feel we have more freedom. That’s why our small group works so well. But the best situation for a vampire is to be alone or to have a partner. Werewolves, however...” She pointed to Fallon’s computer screen, which had a picture of a gray wolf on it. “They’re the opposite of vampires in that respect, and furthermore, their presence in human society is unobtrusive. They can live among humanity without the need to hide. Because of their unique nature, though, they live in close-knit packs and rely on each other for stability and camaraderie. They thrive in groups and very rarely venture out beyond their borders.”
“So they’re like real wolves?” Fallon asked.
“Yes. They are exactly like real wolves. Just not all of the time.”
Fallon left her laptop on the table and joined Crystal on the bed. She leaned against the wall, sitting cross-legged like a child awaiting story time. “Tell me more.”
Crystal waved me over to join them both on the bed. “My mate and I lived with a pack of wolves in Colorado for a short time.”
I gave her a quizzical look. “But I thought you’d always traveled with the Peregrinus.”
“That is the beauty of our clan. We respect each other’s need for freedom. We don’t force our members to stay together at all times. We wander as we wish. Peregrinus is a Latin word meaning just that. ‘Wanderer.’”
“I feel like I should be taking notes here,” Fallon joked. “I still can’t believe there is so much of the supernatural world out there. And somehow you all manage to keep it secret from humans.”