Ghost Town mv-9 Read online

  The grip around her throat eased just a little, and she was able to gasp out, “Myrnin, please stop. Please. You know this isn’t right.”

  “You know what isn’t right? Waking up to find everything changed, to find Ada missing, to find humans breaking into my last safe haven intent on destroying what I hold dear? Does that sound right to you?”

  “It’s not what you think,” Claire said desperately. “Ada’s not here. She’s not coming back. You have to understand that what’s down there isn’t something you should be protecting; it’s something you have to stop!”

  He was silent. Frank Collins took a step forward, then stopped, watching Claire’s face. She frantically shook her head.

  “You do sound convincing,” Myrnin said. He put his head down, mouth very close to the side of her throat, and took in a deep breath. “You do smell familiar, I admit. Your scent is all over the lab, and I confess, I have no explanation for that.”

  “Because I work here. For you,” Claire said. “You know that. Myrnin, you have to remember. Please try.”

  All of a sudden he let her go and shoved her forward, hard—straight into Shane’s arms. Shane dropped the stake to grab her as she fell, and held on.

  Myrnin stood there for a moment, head cocked to one side, staring at the two of them. “I have the oddest feeling,” he said, “that I’ve seen this before. Seen you before.”

  “You have,” Claire said, and cleared her throat, trying to ignore the ache. “Myrnin, you know us. Stop. Just stop and think, okay?”

  He stared at her, and she saw that he was trying—groping for the lost threads of his life. She saw how it frightened him to feel this way, too. Maybe he’d enjoyed it, on some level; maybe it had felt like freedom, not worrying about anyone but himself and Ada.

  But that wasn’t him. Not anymore. It hadn’t been for years.

  “Claire,” he said, and took a step forward. “Claire, I think . . . I think I . . . forgot something . . . about—I don’t think this is right. I don’t think any of this is right. And I think I know . . . I think I know Ada—”

  He stopped and turned to look at the portal an instant before Claire felt the flash of power from it. “No!” he snapped, and stretched out a hand toward the doorway, which was starting to spark and flicker with color. “No one else comes in!”

  She couldn’t let him stop this, no matter what happened, but she felt sick about it. She’d been close, so close to breaking through . . . and now it was gone again.

  Claire scooped up the fallen stake and lunged for his back.

  She didn’t make it, of course; Myrnin was too fast, and too alert. He whirled, grabbed her arm, and held the point of the stake an inch from his chest, staring right into her eyes.

  “Oh, child,” he said. “You shouldn’t have done that.”

  But she’d done exactly what she’d meant to do, and in the next second, power rushed through the room, crackling along her skin, and Amelie stepped through the portal behind Myrnin, shining like a white diamond in the dim light. Behind her came two more vampire guards, and Oliver. But Oliver wasn’t going to be any help, because he was wearing silver chains on his wrists and ankles.

  He could hardly stand, Claire realized. He looked terrible.

  Myrnin forced Claire to drop the stake, and held on to her wrist as he turned to face Amelie, bowing low from the waist. “Founder.”

  “Myrnin,” Amelie said, as the portal dissolved into black behind her party. “I seem to have interrupted. I recognize the girl you have in hand, and West, of course.” West, looking very unhappy, loosened the bow and removed the arrow from the string, bowing to Amelie. With a glance at Frank, she walked over to stand with the new arrivals, signaling a change in her allegiance. Amelie fixed her attention on Frank, and then Michael, who was still on the ground. Eve was kneeling next to him, trying to help him get up. “This doesn’t seem to be going well for you, Mr. Collins,” she said. “I suggest you take these children and withdraw while you have the chance.”

  “No,” Michael said raggedly, and staggered to his feet.

  And Shane said, “We’re not going without Claire.”

  “I assure you, boys, you will be going, one way or another,” Amelie said. “Myrnin. Give the girl to me, and I will deal with this intrusion.”

  “But—”

  “Do you doubt that I will act in the best interests of Morganville?” she asked, holding his gaze. “Have you ever doubted that, in all our years together?”

  “But they have Ada,” he said, and his voice was small and lost and plaintive. “You have to make them give her back. Please.”

  “I will,” Amelie said. “But first, let me have the girl.”

  Myrnin nodded and shoved Claire at her.

  Claire tried to twist aside, but Amelie, without seeming to move at all, was somehow in the way. She took hold of Claire’s arm in an ice-cold iron grip, and looked at her with even colder eyes. “Be still,” she said. “I’ll deal with you in a moment.” Claire felt her last hope die, because there was no hint of real recognition in Amelie’s face.

  Frank said, “You’d better deal with me before you settle with some little schoolkid, or I’ll get offended.”

  “You’d better deal with all of us,” Shane said. “I’m not going to let you hurt her.”

  “You sound brave, Shane, for someone who doesn’t remember being in my presence before,” Amelie said. “But I won’t hurt her. Or any of you.” She looked at Claire again, and this time there was warmth in her eyes. A kind of comfort. “I assure you, I am fully aware of what I am doing here.”

  She remembered. Relief hit Claire, and she sighed as the tension left her body. Things were still dangerous, no question about that, but with Amelie on their side, surely it was going to be all right. She could convince Myrnin to do the right thing.

  “They have Ada,” Myrnin said. “You have to find her. Please.”

  Amelie let Claire go and moved her off to the side, out of Myrnin’s reach. “There’s no need,” she said, and the compassion in her voice was a kind of pain all its own. “We both know where Ada is, Myrnin. I know you remember.”

  He didn’t move, and didn’t speak, but there was a frantic, feverish glitter in his eyes.

  “You’ve been ill. Ada was caring for you, but she fell ill as well. Weakness has always triggered bad things in you, and she grew weak. One day—“

  “No,” Myrnin said. It wasn’t so much a denial as a plea for her not to keep talking.

  “One day I came here and found her dead. Drained of life.”

  “No!”

  “It was too late to save her, but you’d tried, once you came to your senses. Heaven knows you’d tried. You did your best to preserve what you could of her—don’t you remember?”

  “No, no, no!” Myrnin sank down to a crouch, hiding his face in his hands. “No, it isn’t true!”

  “You know it is,” Amelie said, and walked forward to put a gentle hand on his shoulder. “My friend, this isn’t the first time we’ve had this conversation. You become ill, and you forget, and you wait for her to come back. But Ada isn’t coming back, is she? She’s gone.”

  “No, she’s not gone,” Myrnin whispered. “I saved her. I saved her. She can’t die now. She can’t leave me. She’s safe. I’ll keep her safe. No one can hurt her.”

  He still thought Ada was in the machine. That hurt worse than his grief, somehow; it was another tragedy in slow motion, because Claire knew she’d have to see him remember, see him lose what he loved all over again.

  Just like everyone else.

  But the difference was that Myrnin wanted to hang on, had to hang on. He was three years in the past, and sick, and crazy.

  He’d do everything he could to stop them from taking Ada away from him. That was why he’d treated Claire like an intruder in the first place . . . because on some level he was still trying to save Ada, and he knew that Claire intended to destroy her.

  “You can’t take her,” Myrnin
whispered. “You can’t take her away from me. Please don’t do that.”

  Amelie’s expression had slowly gone still and cold. “There’s nothing to take,” she said. “Ada’s gone. Three years ago you wept in the corner and ripped your own skin. I had to stop you from killing indiscriminately to keep from drowning in your pain. I won’t let you go back to that . . . beast. You deserve better than that.”

  Myrnin shuddered and dropped his hands limply to his sides. “What are you going to do?”

  “Turn it off,” she said. “Stop this madness while we still can. You’ll be better once it’s done.”

  Myrnin’s eyes flared bright, shocking white, and he leaped for Amelie, fangs sliding down. She twisted out of the way, pulling Claire with her. Her guards jumped into the fight, but Myrnin was strong, and as full-on crazy as she’d ever seen him.

  He tossed one the entire length of the lab, and staked the other with a broken chair leg, and screamed at her in defiance.

  She didn’t move.

  “Let me go!” Oliver yelled at Amelie, and shook his chains impatiently. “You can see I had nothing to do with any of this, and you need my help! Let me loose!”

  She hesitated, staring at him, and then bent to expertly unlock the chains, which dropped from his wrists and ankles to the stone floor. Oliver staggered a little, gasping out a breath of relief, and Amelie reached out to take hold of his arm.

  “Oliver,” she said, and held his gaze. “I remember what happened. I remember, and I am sorry.”

  He hesitated, then nodded in response. It was as if he was waiting for her to make some decision—something more than simply letting him loose.

  Amelie said, “I won’t be your servant in Morganville. Nor should you be mine. Equals.” She offered her hand to him, and he looked down at it, clearly taken aback. But he took it. “Now defend what is ours, my partner.”

  He grinned—grinned!—and whirled to meet Myrnin in mid-leap as Myrnin attacked.

  He had Myrnin down in seconds, but it was a rush of adrenaline that faded, and Claire realized that the pain of the silver chains was taking its toll on him. He slowed down. Myrnin didn’t, and in another few deadly seconds, Myrnin’s clawed fingers slashed at Oliver’s face. Oliver ducked, but lost his balance as Myrnin threw him backward in a rush.

  Oliver crashed with deadly speed into a wall, and Myrnin ran in a blur for the back of the room. “He’s going downstairs!” Claire yelled, and grabbed Oliver’s fallen silver chains as Myrnin yanked the rug away. She heard the beeps of the code being entered in the trapdoor lock. “Stop him!” He’d had days here by himself, doing who-knew-what. Creating . . . things. Letting him go down there was dangerous, even more so than facing him up here.

  Somehow, she still wanted to reason with him. It isn’t Myrnin, not really. She remembered the Myrnin she’d gotten to know, the kind, almost gentle man, the one who’d brought her soup and held her upright when she’d been too tired to stand on her own. The one who’d fought for her time and time again.

  She had to fight for him now. She had to defend him against himself.

  Frank Collins almost made it to the trapdoor, but it slammed shut at the last second, and Claire heard the lock engage with a sharp, buzzing snap of power. “Don’t touch it!” she yelled, as Shane’s dad reached for the keypad. “It’s electrified!”

  “It’s the only way in,” Oliver said as he climbed painfully to his feet. “Someone has to open it.”

  “It’s not the only way,” Claire replied, and looked at Amelie. “There’s a back way. Isn’t there?”

  Amelie hesitated, then nodded. She turned and headed for the portal on the wall. Rudolph’s body was lying there—well, half of it—and she moved it aside and stood in front of the black doorway. Colors shifted, pulsed, and faded into darkness again.

  Claire found she was holding on to someone’s hand. It turned out to be Shane, who’d come up beside her. She could feel how tense his muscles were, and how fast his pulse was going. Hers was at least twice as fast.

  “There,” Amelie said. Nothing seemed different about the darkness on the other side of the doorway, but Claire felt a kind of energy radiating out of it. “I warn you, it’s not a safe course. Go quickly. I have to hold it open, or he might remember to block it.”

  Oliver gave her a doubtful look, but plunged past into the darkness; it swallowed him up like a pit full of ink. Frank and West followed, and then Claire and Shane. Before they stepped through, Shane hesitated and looked over his shoulder.

  Michael was right there—pale, a little unsteady, leaning on Eve’s shoulder. “Right with you, bro,” he said. “Go.”

  “Are we totally sure this is a good plan?” Shane asked, quietly, to Claire. The fact that he asked her made her feel a little faint; it felt like . . . trust.

  No, it was trust. Trust she hadn’t earned, but something that felt unbearably precious to her.

  Claire tried to sound confident. “I think so,” she said. “Just watch your back, okay?”

  “Nah, Michael’s got mine.” He looked straight into her eyes. “I’ve got yours.”

  Shane jumped into the darkness, and took Claire with him.

  On the other side, it was just as black—a kind of darkness that made panic twist up in a hard, hot knot in Claire’s stomach. She knew this darkness. She’d been in it before.

  “Easy,” Frank Collins said, and she felt his hand grab her shoulder to keep her still. “Don’t move.”

  “There are holes in the floor,” she said. “Pits. Can you see them?” She hoped he could; all the vampires she’d ever known could. She and Shane and Eve were about as blind as it was possible to be.

  “Yeah, I see it. Hang on; I’ve got a light.” That was Frank Collins speaking from somewhere right behind her. Light blazed out in a pure white cone that lanced out over rocks and pale, angular juts of quartz, sharp as razors. They were in a big cavern, silent except for the echoes of their movements and voices. “Nobody move.”

  He was right, because the area where they’d come through was the only reliably safe spot in the room. The rock floor was pitted with inky black holes that led, for all Claire knew, down to the center of the earth and out the other side. Not only that, but she knew from experience that where the rock looked solid, it probably wasn’t. It was like a maze, and the last time Claire had been here, Myrnin had helped her through. He wouldn’t be doing that now. He’d be trying to send her screaming to her death, along with everyone accompanying her. She swallowed hard; in the distance she saw a metal eyebolt driven deep into the rocks, and a length of silver chain. He’d been imprisoned here, once, when he’d been . . . more himself.

  But he might not remember that now. Or care that he’d tried to save her life.

  “I know the way,” she said softly, and took the flashlight from Frank. She tested every step carefully; some of the solid-seeming rock was fragile, eaten away beneath by unseen underground rivers that were long gone. Her foot broke through twice, and only Shane’s grip on her arm kept her from falling forward the second time.

  It seemed agonizingly slow, making their way along the little path. Even the vampires seemed to take each step with great care. Claire supposed it might be an even worse nightmare for them, plummeting down an endless black tunnel; what if they couldn’t get back out? How long could they survive down there without blood, or light? And if they did survive . . . that might almost be worse.

  Claire was worried most about Michael. He’d taken a lot of abuse already, and now Shane was quietly taking his other arm, helping Eve, who was starting to stagger under Michael’s weight. He’ll be okay, she thought. She had to believe that, and focus.

  A sound went through the cavern, like a sigh; she frowned, wondering what had caused it. It wasn’t wind; there was no breath of a draft in here, just cool, damp air that weighed down heavily over her skin. She shivered and waited a second, but the sound didn’t come again.

  Then she felt a whisper of air against her face�
�an unmistakable stirring that ruffled her hair. Claire pointed the flashlight in the direction from which the wind had come, but she saw nothing there. Nothing but the treacherous rock floor, the glittering quartz crystals jutting from the walls, and the dark, silent chasms that spread out in sheets.

  Claire made her way carefully toward another patch of apparently solid rock, and as she did so, she felt the breeze again, more strongly.

  It wasn’t coming from above, or even from the walls.

  It blew up straight out of the darkness. Claire braced herself carefully and turned the light downward, into the pit, trying to see what might be going on. Nothing. The darkness swallowed the flashlight’s glow without a trace.

  Claire put out her hand. Definitely that was a cool breeze blowing up, as if a fan had been turned on.

  She felt a little funny, suddenly. A little faint. A little . . . woozy.

  “Hey!” Shane said, and grabbed her shoulders to drag her back from the edge. “What the hell are you doing?”

  She took in a deep breath. Her head hurt a little. “Looking,” she said, and coughed. It hurt. “Sorry. This way.”

  Moving away from the chasm seemed to make her feel better, though she now had a kind of odd, twisting nausea inside, and she wanted to breathe deeper and deeper, even though she wasn’t tired. Claire focused on each step, every careful movement. She heard someone stumble behind her, and Frank Collins’s quiet curse.

  And then she heard West cough, an explosively loud sound. “Sorry,” West said, but then she coughed again, and again, and when Claire looked back she saw that the tall vampire woman was hunched over, hands on her thighs.

  She was retching up blood.

  It was in that moment that Claire realized that something was very, very wrong. It seemed obvious now, but she wasn’t sure why she hadn’t understood before. Her brain didn’t seem to be working quite right. Her vision swam in and out of focus, and now Oliver was coughing, too, deep, tearing sounds that left him gasping and wiping his mouth. Claire caught the red glimmer of blood.