Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data:
Neill, Chloe.
Drink deep: a Chicagoland vampires novel/Chloe Neill.
p. cm.—Chicagoland vampires; 5
ISBN : 978-1-101-54566-9
1. Merit (Fictitious character: Neill)—Fiction. 2. Vampires—Fiction.
3. Chicago (Ill.)—Fiction. I. Title.
PS3614.E4432D75 2011
813’.6—dc
22 2011026918
Set in Caslon 540
Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise), without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.
PUBLISHER’S NOTE
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party Web sites or their content.
The scanning, uploading, and distribution of this book via the Internet or via any other means without the permission of the publisher is illegal and punishable by law. Please purchase only authorized electronic editions, and do not participate in or encourage electronic piracy of copyrighted materials. Your support of the author’s rights is appreciated.
http://us.penguingroup.com
To Jeremy, with love.
(Now can I borrow twenty dollars?)
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I have a wonderful team of people who helped with the writing. Some suggested a phrase, some kept me sane when the writing got tough. Jessica, my editor, and Lucienne, my agent, provided invaluable advice. Marcel and Laurence (and undoubtedly others) translated Merit’s adventures overseas. Sara kept the Meritverse consistent from novel to novel. Kevin, Brent, and Miah assisted with magical and military strategy. Krista and Lisa kept order in the Meritverse Forums (
http://forums.chloeneill.com
) so I could keep the word count flowing.
Thanks as always to Team Eel, the readers who encourage me with their kind notes and generosity, and keep reading Merit’s adventures. Without you, there would be no M
erit.
“A little learning is a dangerous thing; drink deep, or taste not the Pierian spring. . . .”
—Alexander Pope
CHAPTER ONE
GRAVITATIONALLY CHALLENGED
Late November
Chicago, Illinois
T
he wind was cool, the fall night crisp. A waxing moon hung lazily in the sky, so low it seemed close enough to touch.
Or maybe it just seemed that way because I was perched nine stories in the air, atop a narrow metal grate that crowned Chicago’s Harold Washington Library. One of the library’s distinctive aluminum owls—either one of the best architectural features in the city or one of its worst, depending on who you asked—sat above me, staring down as I trespassed in his domain.
This was one of the few times I’d ventured outside my Hyde Park home in the last two months for a reason unrelated to food—it was Chicago, after all—or my best friend Mallory. As I glanced over the edge of the building, I began to seriously regret that decision. The library wasn’t exactly a skyscraper, but it was tall enough that a fall would most certainly have killed a human. My heart jumped into my throat, and every muscle in my body rang with the urge to kneel down, grasp the edges of the grate, and never let go.
“It’s not as far as it looks, Merit.”
I glanced over at the vampire who stood to my right. Jonah, the one who’d convince me to come out here, chuckled and brushed auburn hair back from his perfectly chiseled face.
“It’s far enough,” I said. “And this wasn’t exactly what came to mind when you suggested I get some fresh air.”
“Maybe not. But you can’t deny the view is fabulous.”
My white-knuckled fingers digging into the wall behind me, I looked out across the city. He was right—you couldn’t fault the intimate view of downtown Chicago, of steel and glass and well-hewn stone.
But, “I could have looked out the window,” I pointed out.
“Where’s the challenge in that?” he asked, and then his voice softened. “You’re a vampire,” he reminded me. “Gravity affects you differently.”
He was right. Gravity treated us a little more kindly. It helped us fight with more verve and, so I’d heard, fall from a height without killing ourselves. But that didn’t mean I was eager to test the who theory. Not when the result could be bone-crushingly bad.
“I swear,” he said, “if you follow instructions, the fall won’t hurt you.”
Easy for him to say. Jonah had decades more vampiric experience under his belt; he had less to be nervous about. To me, immortality had never seemed so fragile.
I blew the dark bangs from my face and peeked over the edge one more time. State Street was far below us, mostly deserted at this time of night. At least I wouldn’t crush someone if this didn’t work.
“You have to learn to fall safely,” he said.
“I know,” I said. “Catcher trained me to spar. He was big on falling down correctly.” Catcher was my former roommate and best friend Mallory’s live-in beau. He was also an employee of my grandfather.
“Then you know being immortal doesn’t mean being careless,” Jonah added, extending a hand toward me, and my heart jumped, this time as much from the gesture as the height.
I’d put myself—and my heart—on a shelf for the last two months, my work as Sentinel of Chicago’s Cadogan House mostly limited to patrolling the House’s grounds. I could admit it—I was gun-shy. My newfound vampire bravery had mostly evaporated after the Master of my House, Ethan Sullivan, the vampire who’d made me, named me Sentinel, and been my partner, had been staked in the heart by my mortal enemy . . . right before I’d returned the favor to her.
As a former grad student in English literature, I could appreciate the perverse poetry of it.
Jonah, captain of the guards in Grey House, was my link to the Red Guard, a secret organization dedicated to providing oversight to the American vampire Houses and the Greenwich Presidium, the European council that ruled them from across the pond.
I’d been offered membership in the RG, and Jonah was the partner I’d been promised if I’d accepted. I hadn’t, but he’d been nice enough to help me deal with problems GP politics made too sticky for Ethan.
Jonah had been more than happy to act as Ethan’s replacement—professionally and otherwise. The messages we’d exchanged over the last few weeks—and the hope in his eyes tonight—said he was interested in something more than just supernatural problem-solving.
There was no denying Jonah was handsome. Or charming. Or brilliant in a weirdly quirky way. Honestly, he could have starred in his own romantic comedy. But I wasn’t ready to even think about dating again. I didn’t think I would be any time soon. My heart was otherwise engaged, and since Ethan’s death, mostly broken.
Jonah must have seen the hesitation in my eyes. He smiled kindly, then pulled back his hand and pointed toward the edge.
“Remember what I told you about jumping? This is the same as taking a step.”
He’d definitely said that. Two or three times now. I just wasn’t buying. “It’s a really, really long step.”
“It is,” Jonah agreed. “But it’s only the first step that sucks. Being in the air is one of the greatest things you’ll ever experience.”
“Better than being safely on the ground?”
“Much. More like flying—except we don’t do ‘up’ nearly as well as we do ‘down.’ This is your chance to be a superhero.”
“They do call me the ‘em"l me thPonytailed Avenger,’” I grumbled, flipping my long dark ponytail. The
Chicago Sun-Times
had deemed me a “Ponytailed Avenger” when I’d helped a shifter in a bar attack. Since I usually wore my hair in a ponytail to keep it away from the errant katana strike (my bangs not included), the name kind of stuck.
“Has anyone ever told you you’re particularly sarcastic when you’re scared?”
“You’re not the first,” I admitted. “I’m sorry. I’m just—this is freaking me out. There is nothing in my body or mind that thinks jumping off a building is a good idea.”
“You’ll be fine. The fact that it scares you is reason number one to do it.”
Or reason number one to turn tail and run back to Hyde Park.
“Trust me,” he said. “Besides, this is a skill you need to master,” Jonah said. “Malik and Kelley need you.”
Kelley was a former House guard now in charge of the House’s entire guard corps. Unfortunately, since we were now down to three full-time guards (including Kelley) and a Sentinel, that wasn’t exactly a coup for her.
Malik was Ethan’s former second in command, Master of the House since Ethan’s demise. He’d taken the Rights of Investiture, and the House had been given to his keeping.
Ethan’s death had sparked a nasty case of vampire musical chairs.
As a Master, Malik Washington had gotten back his last name; Masters of the country’s twelve vampire Houses were the only vamps allowed to use them. Unfortunately, Malik had also gotten the House’s political drama, which had thickened since Ethan’s death. Malik worked tirelessly, but had to spend most of his time dealing with the newest bane of our existence.
Said bane was Franklin Theodore Cabot, the appointed receiver of Cadogan House. When Darius West, head of the GP, had decided he didn’t like the way the House was run, “Frank” had been sent to Chicago to inspect and evaluate the House. The GP said they were concerned Ethan hadn’t effectively managed the House—but that was a total lie, and they’d wasted no time sending the receiver to check our rooms, our books, and our files. I wasn’t exactly sure what data Frank was looking for—and why so much interest in a House an entire ocean away?
Whatever the reason, Frank wasn’t a good houseguest. He was obnoxious, autocratic and a stickler for rules I hadn’t even known existed to the exclusion of everything else. Of course, I was becoming pretty well acquainted with them; Frank had papered one wall of the House’s first floor with the new House rules and the punishments that went along with breaking them. The system was necessary, he’d said, because House discipline had been lackadaisical.
Maybe not surprisingly, I had taken an immediate dislike to Frank, and not just because he was a blue-blooded Ivy League business school graduate with a penchant for phrases like “synergy” and “out of the box thinking.” He’d salted his introductory comments to the House with those words, offering up the not-so-subtle threat that the House would be taken over by the GP on a permanent basis—or disbanded—if he wasn’t satisfied with what he found.
I’d been fortunate enough to come from a family of means, and there were other vampires in the House who had old money backgrounds. But it was Frank’s attitude of entitlement that really irked me. The man wore deck shoes, for God’s sake. And he was most definitely
not
on a boat. In reality, despite the role he’d been givethed beenn by the GP, he was actually a Novitiate vampire (if a wealthy one) from a House on the east coast. A House, granted, that had been founded by a Cabot ancestor, but which had long since been given over to another Master.
Worse, Frank spoke to us like he was a member of the House, as if his money and connections were a passport to status within Cadogan. Frank playing at House membership was even more ridiculous since his entire purpose was to itemize the ways we weren’t following the party line. He was an outsider sent to label us as nonconforming and pound us, square pegs, back into round holes.
Out of concern for the House and respect for the chain of command, Malik had given him the run of the House. He figured Frank was a battle he couldn’t win, so he was saving up his political capital for another round.
Whatever the drama, Frank was back in Hyde Park. I was here, in the Loop, with an ersatz vampire partner determined to teach me how to jump from a building without killing someone . . . or pushing myself beyond the limits of immortality.
I looked over the edge again, my stomach curdling with it. I was torn by dueling urges to drop to my knees and crawl back to the stairs and to hurl myself over the edge.
But then he spoke the words most likely to get me moving.
“Dawn will be here eventually, Merit.”
The myth about vampires and sunlight was true—if I was still on this roof when the sun rose, I’d burn up into a pile of ash.
“You have two options,” Jonah said. “You can trust me and try this, or you can climb back through the roof, go home, and never know what you might be capable of.”