Darkling (17 page)

“Each Vocati has it.”

“Why?”

“We accepted that as our symbol, to differentiate ourselves from the Rogues.”

“There have been no created vampires for a long time, I heard.”

 “Right. A long time,” he said, with an effort.

But his eyes seemed to be telling a different story. Is it possible that the Rogues still existed? Or was I seeing something that wasn’t there? I’d been told that Rogues were extinct. I eyed Tertius suspiciously, but he was looking at the flower. Yes, I had probably imagined it all.

“You can speak much better than yesterday,” I offered.

“I am maintaining my energy.”

“I’m glad. I’d be bored sitting here for four hours without a word from you.” I smiled, realizing that spending time here wasn’t as horrible as I’d feared. It was even pleasant in some awkward way, and definitely much better than a dining room full of vampires.

“Are there differences in blood?” I asked, and he looked confused. “Blood type diet.” I clarified. When had I become so bizarre? But he seemed to like it.

 “Vampires have the same blood type,” he said.

“Really? I didn’t know.”

“And with humans—it really doesn’t matter; it is not proper food, anyway.”

“What do you mean?”

“We could drink human blood in whatever quantity and we would still be hungry.”

“Then why attack them in the first place?”

“Hunger comes in many forms, and satisfying that one is less painful.”

When our time came to an end, I felt like it had passed rather fast.

“See you tomorrow,” I said, on my way out.

Belun was waiting behind the door.

“I thought you were staying in the office.”

“Don’t you ever, ever get so near to him!” His face came too close to mine and he seemed furious, so much so that in the moment I found it funny. But I restrained a laugh, not wanting to embarrass him in front of the two guards. Maybe he was the team leader, but there wouldn’t be a team to lead if there was no me in it. We headed to our office to write reports—in silence, of course.

Our desks positioned us across from each other, and I would be lying if I said that it felt normal and okay. It didn’t, it made me nervous.

“You went running this morning?” he broke the silence.

“Mmm hmm,” was all I said, looking in my laptop, wondering what to write. I wondered if it had to be purely informative or more like a diary. I didn’t want to ask Belun, so I just started to write, not worrying how it would turn out. A half an hour passed.

“Gustavo approached me this morning.” I said, when writing about the dream and the flower. Actually, I didn’t write too much about the dream, only mentioned it. After all, it’s my private business.

“I saw.”

So, he was watching. Okay, I shouldn’t give much importance to that, and he was probably watching Gustavo not me.

“I hadn’t met him before,” I said.

“And what did he say?”

“He came to say hi.”

Belun lifted one eyebrow in disbelief. I have to admit there was a certain pleasure found in teasing him.

“And to tell me to write down my dreams. Weird, right?”

“He said that?”

“It surprised me too. Okay, I’m finished here.” I saved the file and closed the laptop.

“See you at training,” he said, watching me go.

I didn’t see any of my colleagues at lunch, either. I ate some curry, and then went to my room and stretched out on the couch. I had four hours to kill before training. Ugg, why couldn’t we have been in some European capital where I could walk around and shop, instead of being stuck in this wilderness? I sent a text to Doris:
Drinks?

She answered right away, and said that I should have someone bring me downtown immediately. She was with Bryn and Mia, and apparently they were about to do something interesting, so I told them to wait for me in front of that bar I was at with Blake and Tibor a few days earlier. I didn’t know its name, but she guessed when I described its window. Cool! Boredom solved.

I decided to drive myself. If I could stand four hours in a cell with a killing machine, as the vamps liked to call Vocati, why would I need a babysitter on the road? It’s not like I’d never driven before. I missed my car and wondered what had happened to it. Was it still parked in Iowa?

I drove one of the many SUVs out the garage and its pleasant roaring put a distance between the compound and myself. It was dark; not even the sun was on the horizon. After reaching downtown, it wasn’t hard as I thought to find the bar again, and the girls were already waiting, chatting away.

“Nika!” Doris almost jumped on me.

“So what’s this thing we’re doing?” I said, and they all giggled.

“Bryn was bitten by a Love Bug, therefore, no peace is to be had,” Mia said.

Bryn rolled her eyes and added in her defense, “I heard Vuk mentioning some witch from Tromsø, so I asked around.”

“And now, off to a fortuneteller,” Mia said.

They didn’t seem to be kidding. A witch? A fortuneteller? I really hoped they were joking.

“You guys for real?”

“Sure, why not? It’s fun,” Doris replied.

I couldn’t suppress my laugh. “Who’d have thought that vamp chicks could be so superstitious?”

“You’d be too if you had been born when we were.”

“Ay, c’mon, you guys are like babies in your world.”

Despite my words, the excitement grew among them the closer we got. I still couldn’t believe we were actually about to visit a witch. Complete nonsense, not to mention the absurdity of looking into a vampire’s future. But I guess they needed some fun.

Doris knocked on the door of a dark green house. Before long a woman of Julia’s age opened the door. She frowned at first, and then she relaxed and let us in.

“I am Arna,” she said, leading us to the living room, an ordinary one I must add. She offered us a tea—
a
tea
! What kind of fortuneteller was she anyway? Shouldn’t there be tons of bats, spider webs, snakes and such? Well, this wasn’t as fun as I’d thought—there wasn’t even a broom in sight.

The four of us sat on a large sofa. There was a bowl on a nearby wooden table with some handmade jewelry in it. I noticed that each piece contained the same rune, and assumed it must have been some stupid protection charm. I wondered if she sold them or gave the away for free; I also wondered how much the visit would cost.

Arna moved a chair in front of Bryn. We were all silent as she asked for her palm.

“Love troubles, I see.”

Oh, really?! Why else would girls come to such a place, if it were not for love issues? And leaches like this were feeding off their misery and stupidity.

“But don’t worry. Everything will go smoothly between you two. I see he’s very powerful.”

Bryn was already giggling. Even if she wanted to, she couldn’t hide her happiness, she was just that way.

Arna continued, “You will be at peace. However, problems will come. Though, not with you two, but you will both be a part of it.” She let go of Bryn’s hand, looking at Mia who stretched her hand out at once.

“You will meet someone who is not of your matter, but you will find happiness with him. You have been alone for a long time, which will change when you meet him.”

She put Mia’s hand down and Doris eagerly offered hers.

“You have already found your happiness,” Arna said, smiling while looking at the palm. “You will be a part of the big thing that I see with all three of you, but you and your beau will be closer to it than the rest of the girls. You will find out more than you thought you could know and some people dear to you will turn to be what you least expected.”

When Arna looked at me, I kept my hands on my lap. I’d have probably stayed that way if Doris hadn’t shoved me; so I held out my palm. And the witch stared at it for much longer than the rest without saying a word. Then she put my hand down with such tenderness, it was as if it would break into a thousand pieces unless handled carefully.

“Strange.”

“What?” I asked.

“I see nothing.”

“How’s that?” Doris asked, and I stared in bewilderment. What kind of trick was this? Where was my “happily ever after” story?

“I don’t know. It’s never happened before.”

“How is that possible?” I blurted.

“I’m really sorry, but I have no explanation.” Her perplexed face confirmed her words. She tried to keep it calm and polite, but there was an undertone as well. And I could hear fear? Not surprising, people fear the things they don’t understand.

“Please, tell us more. Don’t traumatize our girl here,” Mia said, even though I wasn’t anywhere near being traumatized; however, I was intensely curious.

“It is only with the dead that I see nothing, but you are very much alive.” She gave me an awkward smile. “That is why I don’t understand.”

“I hope this is not some kind of ‘you-will-die-soon’ things,” I said.

“No, it’s not that. It’s not that I don’t see your future. I don’t see your existence at all—in this moment, and in any previous or future ones.”

When we left Arna’s place, the girls were silent.

“C’mon, that was total bull,” I said. Her words didn’t scare me, but they make me feel unpleasant. And the girl’s silence wasn’t helping.

“Whatever it is, it’s beyond her knowledge,” Doris broke the awkward feeling. “Our girl is alive and well, and that’s not going to change. Not any time soon,” she added, putting her arm around my waist.

“We need a drink,” Mia offered, and we went back to the bar where we’d met. There was a painting of a rooster on its window, which was how I’d described the place to Doris. The clock on the wall showed that I had an hour and a half left before training.

“Four gloggs.” Doris ordered mulled wine, but I wasn’t sure that I wanted alcohol now. “To warm us up.”

“Except for the fact that I don’t exist, you girls received some pretty good news,” I said, and Bryn’s face lit up with joy.

“Isn’t it great, he feels the same way I do!”

“Don’t lose it. She said you two will be at peace; who knows what the hell that means,” laughed Mia.

“She also said it would go smooth, and that’s a good sign! Anyway, I can’t wait for you to freak out over that one meant for you.”

“Yeah, right. I’ll fall in love with a tin man.” And we laughed, thinking of her with someone of another “matter,” whatever that was supposed to mean.

The awkwardness forgotten, we returned to our usual chattiness. Laughing, teasing, and one more glogg. None of the girls asked me about Belun, and since such news didn’t normally slide by easily in this company, I guessed Doris had told them not to say anything—then I remembered my training!

“Crap! I’m late.”

“What?”

“Gotta run, girls.”

Their faces fell and even though I didn’t want to go, I had no choice. That was why I was in Norway; I had signed a contract. This was my job, my obligation now. Putting it like that in the middle of all the fun made it seem so dull.

It was freezing outside, which cut through any dizziness I felt from the glogg. I drove fast on my way back, but still, when I entered the gym he was already there. The punching bag had been moved aside and the mats made a big greenish square on the floor.

“Take off your shoes. Today we learn to fight,” he said, standing in the middle of the square. “This is going to be a martial arts mix that I find most useful in various situations.”

The mats were cold under my feet. He showed me some of the stances I could take, and then we moved onto techniques, which I assumed were the basics due to their easiness. He seemed to be surprised with the way I was taking it, and that was rather disturbing. Did he really think I was an incapable idiot?

“I’m a child of the movies, Belun. I’ve seen those moves like a zillion times before.” I think that was the first time I’d said his name aloud. And I think he realized it as well.

“So do you want to spar then?” His upper lip was a bit vicious. You couldn’t pass up something like this.

“Hell, yeah!”

He added more mats and we faced each other.

“Go ahead, attack,” he said, after a few seconds of staring.

“Why should I if I can’t win anyway?” I smirked.

“So that’s your ambition. To beat me?” he said wryly.

“Well, that’s more of a fantasy than an ambition. I know I could never beat you.”

He took a few paces in my direction, and I don’t know what he had been planning to do but I managed to jump, ducking his move. Then he came at me with a jab, which I successfully blocked.

“Ha! Yeah!” My adrenalin kicked in from this sudden turn of luck; however, my guard fell and in less than a heartbeat he was behind me with his arm around my neck. His body against mine, blocking my every move.

I couldn’t make even the smallest movement, with him so close to me. Barefoot, like that night not so long before, when I knocked on his door . . . when I heard Simona’s voice.

And then, I started feeling it again; the same rage boiling under my skin since I had come to this place, or maybe since I’d met him. His being so near was some sort of a trigger.

My breathing deepened profoundly, as if I was someone else. I bent my hips to the side and, using all of my strength, hit him with my elbow. His hold loosened and I wiggled my way out, facing him. He was my target. He was the enemy and my body was fully ready to fight ‘til the death. My vision was slightly blurry, but everything else seemed so sharp.

At first, he looked puzzled, then his face changed shape as well. I wasn’t going to wait for him to start this time; I stepped on his left foot, launching my knee into his chest with my hands aiming at his neck. He didn’t stagger; he just bent slightly backward, pinned by my foot on his. I was keeping him close so I could reach his neck. But he pushed me so hard that I flew back a couple of steps. Nevertheless, I didn’t fall; I kept my balance and landed on my feet.

Belun unlocked his knees. The stance he took probably gave him more stability, but the difference in our height shrunk—and that was in my favor. I launched myself toward his chest, without planning a next move, using only the strength of my rage. I grabbed his wrists hard; I was much stronger than I thought I could be. Still, he knocked me to the ground and wrapped his legs around me, like a snake—like the predator he was.