Haeven (24 page)

“You’ll help me?  How?” I
demanded.  Herrik didn’t answer but he didn’t really need to
either.  I knew he could stir up all my old memories just as
easily as he could cover them up.  “Please, Herrik.  You
can’t do this to me.  Don’t make me forget.  Don’t take
this away from me!”  I used his old trick to hide my
thoughts.  “You can’t,” I insisted, “I won’t let you!”

There was a flash of anger in his eyes
combined with a hint of worry, “Pray that I can, Emily.  Pray
that I can!”

I started to cry then turning started to
run; determined to get away from him and to escape all that he was
saying.

“Emily, wait,” Herrik called in a voice that
froze me in place.  I couldn’t break free from him the way I
sometimes could from Avery. 

“Yes, Herrik,” I said dazedly. 

He was standing directly behind me. 
His hands were on my shoulders and I heard his voice in my ear,
“You are everything to me…” he whispered.

“Everything,” I murmured.

“I love you.”

“I love you, Herrik.”

I felt the backs of his fingers brush the
length of my neck from behind my ear to the curve of my
collarbone.  I leaned my head back against his chest and
closed my eyes.  My flesh shivered beneath the pressure of his
mouth and for the briefest of moments we were one; locked together
in some strange symbiotic ecstasy. 

He whirled me about and taking my face in
his hands he kissed me; softly, solemnly, lovingly. 

“Please don’t,” I whispered.
 “Everything I am, I am because of you; for you, Herrik.”

“I’m sorry,” he was still holding my face in
his hands; his eyes swimming with unshed tears. 

A violent pain began throbbing behind my
eyes all the way through my skull and to the back of my head.
 It only lasted a split second then I heard it.  A shot
in the dark.  I gasped and all the strength left me. 
Herrik and I both fell the pavement.  I vaguely sensed someone
searching through his coat pockets.  Then when they were done
they came to me and went through my purse.  They noticed the
diamond earrings that Herrik had given me and tried easing them
from my lobes.

“No!” I screamed and clawed at the face of
the person as they bent over me unwilling to let go of such a
precious gift after what I had just learned. 

“Fuck!” they howled in pain and reached for
their gun again. 

I heard the click of the trigger, once,
twice.  It was jammed and before they could pull it a third
time it was swatted from their hand and went spinning across the
pavement end over end.  The next thing I knew the body of the
thief was lying broken and battered in a haphazard sprawl beside me
and I saw Avery bent over Herrik.  He gently shook him by the
shoulders and called to him but Herrik did not respond.

Avery slashed his wrist and held it to
Herrik’s lips but as soon as the blood entered his mouth it seemed
to pour out of the wound in his chest.

“Why won’t he heal?!” Avery cried out in
anguish.  “When did he last…?”

I sat up shaking and crying, “I…I don’t
know!” I bawled.

Avery scooped Herrik up, “Where’s the car?”
he demanded.

I stumbled to my feet and kicked my shoes
off, “This way!”  I started running, hiking my dress above my
knees and my bare feet pounding the pavement with Avery half a step
behind me.

“Key!”

It was in Herrik’s coat and I had to search
more than once because my fingers were trembling so badly I
couldn’t come up with it right away.  I unlocked the doors and
Avery carefully arranged Herrik in the backseat.  I slid in
beside him and laid his head in my lap as Avery took the
wheel.  He drove with a frantic, preternatural skill that had
us miles away from the city before I could fully grasp anything
that had and was happening.

“Help him damn it!” Avery snapped me back to
awareness.

“How?” I wailed. “What do I do?!”

Avery’s jaw clenched.  He jostled for
something from under the cuff of his pant leg and handed it to
me.  It was a vicious, thin blade with an ivory handle. 
He looked at me in the mirror and nodded, “Go on!  Do it!”

I howled mournfully as I ran the blade
across my wrist then held the livid, weeping wound to Herrik’s
mouth.  My blood ebbed and flowed but Herrik never made any
attempt to draw more from me than what came out of its own
accord.  Avery glanced back from time to time but there was
never any change in Herrik.  I silently cried and bent over
him whispering words of love and encouragement, praying to whatever
god there was to save him.

By the time we were in the canyon I had lost
a great deal of blood and started to feel weak and faint from all
the anguish and from having given so much to Herrik.  I was
hardly aware but Avery took a sharp turn well before the gate and
was taking us to the summit where the private elevator from
Herrik’s apartment was.  When we reached the plateau the car
skidded to a stop and Avery launched himself out of the driver’s
seat then wrenched the passenger’s door open and gathered Herrik
back up.

“Hurry!” he screamed at me.

I slid across the seat and fell onto the
ground.  Avery whirled about and with a concern I would never
have imagined possible from someone like him, “I can’t carry you
both,” he gently laid Herrik down beside me.  “Here,” Avery
ran his teeth across his wrist and held it out to me.

I shook my head, “I can’t.”

“You must,” he ran his eyes over
me. 

“Herrik…please…” he looked so lifeless
staring blankly up into the night sky.

“Herrik would never forgive me if I save him
only to lose you.”

The way he said it wrenched my heart, “He
knows.” I thought to myself as I accepted his outstretched
arm.  I shivered when all the tiny hairs covering my body
stood on end as Avery’s essence began to course through me
invigorating me from the inside out.  He was so different from
Herrik – so simple.  Everything seemed either just black or
white, there were no gray areas. 

Avery believed what Avery believed and
anything beyond his realm of interest he differed to others to
decide considering them higher matters and unworthy, so to say, of
his particular set of abilities.  I could feel that Avery was
fiercely loyal, too, to Herrik, to Artur, to me and, “Oh, my, he
loves Penny.”  I pretended not to have noticed.  A moment
later Avery helped me up then carefully gathered Herrik back into
his arms.  After a brief search we found the hidden door and I
heaved it open.

Avery flew down the stairs and I followed
two at a time.  He had already called the elevator and as we
stood waiting for its arrival all the horrifying images of Herrik
being shot played over and over in my mind.  Desperate to
block them out I closed my eyes and willed the world away.  It
seemed to take forever for us to reach Herrik’s floor.  Artur
was already there when we arrived in the meeting room.  Avery
laid Herrik out on the vast oval table then came and stood by my
side.

“What happened?” Artur was tremendously calm
as he looked Herrik over.

“He’s been shot.  He won’t heal. 
Emily and I…we both tried.”

“Ssh,” Artur bent his head to Herrik’s chest
and laid his ear against it.  “What is that?!” he asked
mystified.  Artur ripped Herrik’s shirt open to his navel and
gently placed his palm over the gaping wound the bullet had
made.  “Help me,” he commanded Avery.

Together they hovered over Herrik, their
hands one on top of the other.  Concentrating they willed the
bullet loose.  Artur plucked it from hole in Herrik’s chest
and reflexively dropped it onto the table when it buzzed and
whirled slashing at fingertips.  It bounced and rattled
against the wood seemingly with a life of its own.

“What is that?!” Avery frowned at the tiny
orb.

“It’s one of ours!” Artur said aghast. 
“A bullet…a bullet designed to kill vampires.”  Artur snatched
it up and expertly disabled it.  “See,” he pointed to the
device. 

The bullet was shaped like a miniature drill
with half a dozen or so razor-fine blades protruding from the
sides.  Artur placed it on the table and reactivated it and as
the bullet began to spin the blades fanned out.  Artur ripped
a piece of fabric from Herrik’s shirt and held it against the
bullet which instantly tore it to shreds. 

“That is what it did to…”

Herrik gasped and sat upright clutching at
his chest, “Emily!”

“I’m here!” I cried as Artur tried to force
him to lie back down.

“No!  I have to see her!” Herrik was on
his feet and I threw myself into his arms.  “Oh, thank God!”
he smothered me with kisses.  “We have to go!  I have to
get you out of here!”

“You can’t!  Damn it, Herrik!  No
one can know what happened!  Someone tried to kill you!
 One of 
your
 people tried to kill you!” Artur
pointed to the bullet while Avery seized him and forced him into
one of the seats at the table.  The words rang in Herrik’s
head though he tried to shake them away.

“No?!” he cried burying his face in his
hands.  “Why?” he stammered as the weight of Artur’s statement
sank in.

“We don’t have time to think about that
now.  We need to get you cleaned up before anyone sees
you.”

Herrik weakly agreed.  He turned to me
and asked me to stay, made me promise not to go to my apartment
without him then let Artur lead him away.  He glanced back
over his shoulder at Avery, “The car,” Herrik mumbled.  Avery
nodded and moved toward the elevator.

I aimlessly went to the living room to wait
for Herrik and Artur.  I buried my face in my hands while I
considered all that had so recently taken place.  I wondered
if there was anything I might have seen or heard that would help
Artur and the others piece together exactly what happened.

“Emily?” a soft voice came from right beside
me startling me out of my reverie.

“Carah,” I croaked.

 “Are you alright?” she asked sounding
quite anxious.  I couldn’t tell if it was nervousness or
concern but there was something foreboding in her tone.

“She couldn’t possibly know!” my mind
warned. 

“Where is Herrik?” Carah glanced around
expectantly. 

“He’s with Artur,” I figured that much was
at least safe to say.

She knelt down in front of me and brushed
the hair back from my forehead, “What’s wrong?” she asked as she
studied me from head to toe.  I quickly assessed how I must
have looked to her and couldn’t come up with a viable
falsehood.  I shook my head unwilling to share the evening’s
events with her and pulled away from her touch imagining that she
was somehow trying to catch a glimpse from my mind.  I kept my
thoughts obscured so she wouldn’t be able to force them from
me.

“What’s wrong?” she persisted “What
happened?” she clearly looked down at my wrist where I had slashed
it open in my desperation to keep Herrik alive.  It had only
partially healed after Avery helped me and it wasn’t at all painful
so I had completely forgotten it.

I quickly covered the wound with my hand and
just as I did Avery returned saving me the need to explain.

“Kitchen accident, nothing serious,” Avery
hurried over and nipped his fingertip then smothered the sore with
his blood. 

It was hardly believable, dressed as I was
and Carah eyed Avery suspiciously.  She stood up and faced him
then looked as though she was going to question him further but
there was something in Avery’s expression that she was obviously
hesitant to challenge. “Where’s Herrik?” she asked much more
brusquely than when she had spoken to me.

“I’m right here,” Herrik strode into the
room. 

She and Avery turned to look at him but I
kept my eyes on Carah.  Something wasn’t right in her
expression.  She looked scared and surprised when she saw him
walking towards her with Artur close on her heels. 

“What can I do for you?”

She looked as though he was the last thing
she expected to see, “It was you!” my mind accused though I
frantically kept the thought to myself.  Herrik came and took
a seat beside me and Artur went to Avery’s side.  Artur took
him by the elbow and led him away as though they had something
important to discuss. 

Herrik took my hand and inspected my wrist
then looked up at Carah expectantly, “Emily had a little,” Herrik
turned to Avery, “what did you say?  Kitchen accident?”

“Yes,” Avery nodded then turned his gaze
back to Artur.

“Is there something you needed; I’m sorry
we’ve been preoccupied as you can see.”

“Oh, uh,” Carah cleared her throat
uncomfortably, “it can wait.  It’s nothing important,” she
turned intending to hurry away.

“Are you sure?” Herrik persisted. 

“Yes, really.  I’ll come back when
you’re not so…so busy.”

“My door is always open.”

Carah smiled and nodded then slowly walked
away.

As soon as she was gone Herrik, Avery and
Artur all started speaking at once. They obviously hadn’t seen what
I noticed in Carah’s expression or manner. None of them mentioned
or acknowledged in any way how suspicious she looked and sounded.
For a moment I second guessed myself. Carah and I had never gotten
along and I wondered if my distrust was making me see things that
weren’t truly there.

I glanced over at Herrik, he was still
sitting beside me though he was looking at Avery and Artur who had
come back and were standing in front of him. His eyes darted back
and forth between the two of them as they each pelted him with
their theories and ideas. Herrik was thoroughly distressed with the
thought that someone they all knew must have been the one to have
made the attempt on his life.

I couldn’t bear to watch all the anguished
emotions washing over him and knew I had to speak up even if I was
wrong.

“It might have been Carah,” I whispered.