Night World - The Chosen Part 10

"I'll leave a message that everything's going to be ready for the big day."

"Do that."

"You're awfully moody, you know. It's not just me who's noticed it."

A pause, and Rashel imagined Quinn giving one of his black looks. "I was j ust thinking it was ironic. I turned down a job as a slave trader once. Th at was before. Do you remember before, Lily? When we lived in Charlestown and your sister Dove was still alive. A captain from Marblehead asked if I wanted to s.h.i.+p out to Guinea for some human cargo. Black gold, I think he called it. As I remember, I hit him on the nose. And Fight-the-Good-fight -for-Faith Johnson reported me for brawling."

"Quinn, what's wrong with you?"

"Just reminiscing about the old days in the sunlight. Of course, you would n't know about that, would you? You're lamia; you were born this way. Tech nically, I suppose, you were born dead."

"And technically, I suppose, you're going peculiar. My father always said i t would happen."

"Yes, and I wonder what your father would think about all this? His daughte r selling humans for money. And to such a client, and for such a reason-"At that moment, while Rashel was listening desperately, hanging on every w ord, heavy footsteps interrupted. Ivan had returned. Quinn broke off, and he and Lily remained silent as another body thumped on a bed.

Rashel cursed mentally. What client? What reason? She'd supposed the girls w ere being sold as regular house slaves or food supplies. But clearly that wa sn't the case.

And then something happened that drove thoughts of the future right out of her mind. She heard footsteps next to her bed, and she was aware of someo ne leaning close. Not Quinn, the smell was wrong.

Ivan.

A rough hand grabbed her hair and pulled her head back. Another arm slid und er her waist, lifting her up.

Panic shot through Rashel, and she tried to push it away. She forced herself to stay limp, eyes shut, arms dangling pa.s.sively.

I ought to have been prepared for this.

She'd realized from the beginning that playing her part might include allowing herself to get bitten. To feel vampire teeth on her throat, to allow them to spill her blood.

But it bad never happened to her before, and it took every ounce of her will to keep from fighting. She was scared. Her arched throat felt exposed and vulnerable, and she could feel a pulse beating in it wildly.

"What are you doing?"

Quinn's voice was sharp as the crack of glacier ice. Rashel felt Ivan go still.

"I've got something to settle with this girl. She's a smarta.s.s."

"Take your hands off her. Before I knock you through the wall."

"Quinn-" Lily said.

Quinn's voice was painfully distinct. "Drop her. Now."

Ivan dropped Rashel.

"He's right," Lily said coolly. "They're not for you, Ivan, and they have to be in perfect shape."

Ivan muttered something sullen and Rashel heard footsteps moving away. She lay and listened to her heart slowly calming.

"I'm going to get some sleep," Quinn said, sounding flat and dull.

"See you Tuesday," lily said.

Tuesday, Rashel thought. Great. It's going to be a very long two days.

They were the most boring two days of her life. She got to know every corne r of the small gla.s.s-windowed office. The windows were a problem, since she was never absolutely sure if Lily or Ivan were outside one of them, standi ng in the warehouse proper and looking through. She listened carefully for the warehouse doors, froze instantly at any suspicious sound, and trusted t o luck.

Daphne woke up Monday morning. Rashel had her neck twisted sideways and was staring through the office gla.s.s up at the one tiny window set high in the warehouse wall. Just as it turned gray with dawn, Daphne sat up and screamed.

"s.h.!.+ It's all right! You're here in the warehouse with me."

"Rashel?"

"Yeah. We made it. And I'm glad you're awake."

"Are we alone?"

"More or less," Rashel said. "There are two other girls, but they're both hypn otized. You'll see when it gets lighter."

Daphne let out her breath. "Wow ... we did it. That's great. So how come I'm so completely and utterly terrified?"

"Because you're a smart girl," Rashel said grimly. "Just wait until Tuesday when they take us out."

"Take us out where?"

"That's the question."

CHAPTER 11.

The U-Haul whirred across smooth resonant pavement and Rashel tried to g uess where they were. She had been drawing a map in her mind, trying to imagine each turn they made, each change of the road underneath them.

Ivan sat slouched, blocking the back doors of the truck. His eyes were small and mean, and they flickered over the girls constantly. In his right hand he held a taser, a hand-held electrical stun gun, and Rashel knew he was dying t o use it.

But the cargo was being very docile. Daphne was beside Rashel, leaning aga inst her very slightly for comfort, her dark blue eyes fixed vacantly on t he far wall. They were shackled together: although both Lily and Ivan had been checking Daphne constantly for signs of waking up, they were dearly t aking no chances.

On the opposite side of the truck were the two other girls. One was Juanita , her wavy bronze hair tangled from two days of lying on it, her bee-stung lips parted, her gaze empty. The second girl was a towhead, with flyaway ha ir and Bambi eyes staring blankly. Ivan called her Missy.

She was about twelve.

Rashel allowed herself to daydream about things to do to Ivan.

Then she focused. The van was stopping. Ivan jumped up, and a minute later he was opening the back doors. Then he and Lily were unshackling the girl s and herding them out, telling them to hurry.

Rashel breathed deeply, grateful for the fresh open air. Salty air. Keeping her gaze aimless and gla.s.sy, she looked around. It was twilight and they wer e on a Charlestown dock.

"Keep moving," Ivan said, a hand on her shoulder.Ahead, Rashel saw a sleek thirty-foot power cruiser bobbing gently in a sli p. A figure with dark hair was on the deck, doing something with lines. Qui nn.

He barely glanced up as Ivan and Lily hustled the girls onto the boat, and he didn't help steady Missy when she almost lost her balance jumping from the dock. His mood had changed again, Rashel realized. He seemed withdraw n, turned inward, brooding.

"Move!" Ivan shoved her, and for an instant, Quinn's attention s.h.i.+fted. He s tared at Ivan with eyes like black death, endless and fathomless. He didn't say a word. Ivan's hand dropped from Rashers back.

Lily led them down a short flight of steps to a cramped but neat little cab in and gestured them to an L-shaped couch behind a dinette table. "Here. Si t down. You two here. You two there."

Rashel slipped into her seat and stared vacantly across at the sink in the tiny galley.

"You all stay here," Lily said. "Don't move. Stay."

She would have made a great slave overseer, Rashel thought. Or dog trainer.

When Lily had disappeared up the stairs and the door above had banged shut , Rashel and Daphne simultaneously let out their breath.

"You doing okay?" Rashel whispered.

"Yeah. A little shaky. Where d'you think we're going?"

Rashel just shook her head. n.o.body knew where the vampire enclaves were. A n idea was beginning to form in her mind, though. There must be a reason t hey were traveling by boat-it would have been safer and easier to keep the prisoners in the U-Haul. Unless they were going to a place you couldn't g et to by U-Haul.

An island. Why shouldn't some of the enclaves be on islands? There were hu ndreds of them off the eastern coast.

It was a very unsettling thought.

On an island they would be completely isolated.

Nowhere to escape to if things got bad. No possible hope of help from outsid e.

Rashel was beginning to regret that she'd brought Daphne into this. And she had the ominous feeling that when they got to their destination, she was goi ng to regret it even more.

The boat sliced cleanly through the water, heading into darkness. Behind Q uinn was the skyline of Boston, the city lights showing where the ocean en ded and the land began. But ahead there was no horizon, no difference betw een sky and sea. There was only formless, endless void.

The inky blackness was dotted with an occasional solitary winking light-he rring boats. They only seemed to make the vastness of empty water more lon ely.Quinn ignored Lily and Ivan. He was not in a good mood.

He let the cold air soak into him, permeating his body, mixing with the cold he felt inside. He imagined himself freezing solid-a rather pleasant thought.

Just get to the enclave, he thought emptily. Get it over with.

This last batch of girls had upset him. He didn't know why, and he didn't w ant to think about it. They were vermin. All of them. Even the dark-haired one who was so lovely that it was almost too bad she was certifiably insane . The little blond one was crazy, too. The one who, having had the luck to fall out of the frying pan once, had come right back, coated herself with b utter and breadcrumbs, and jumped in again.

Idiot. Someone like that deserved . . .

Quinn's thought broke off. Somewhere deep inside him was a little voice say ing that no one, however idiotic, deserved what was going to happen to thos e girls.

You're the idiot. Just get them to the enclave and then you can forget all this .

The enclave ... it was Hunter Redfern who had first thought of enclaves on i slands. Because of Dove, he'd said.

"We need a place where the Redferns can live safely, without looking over their shoulders for humans with stakes. An island would do."

Quinn hadn't objected to the cla.s.sification of himself as a Redfern-although he had no intention of marrying Garnet or Lily. Instead he said, practicall y, "Fishermen visit those islands all the time. Humans are settling them. We 'd have company soon."

"There are spells to guard places humans shouldn't go. I know a witch who'll do it, to protect lily and Garnet."

"Why?"

Hunter had grinned. "Because she's their mother."

And Quinn had said nothing. Later he'd met Maeve Harman, the witch who ha d mingled her blood with the lamia. She didn't seem to like Hunter much, and she kept their youngest daughter, Roseclear, who was bein g raised as a witch, away from him. But she did the spell.

And they'd all moved to the island, where Garnet finally gave up on Quinn and married a boy from a nice lamia family. Her children were allowed to c arry on the Redfern name. And as time went on, other enclaves had sprung u p. ...

But none quite like the one Quinn was heading for now.

He s.h.i.+fted on his seat in the c.o.c.kpit. Ahead, there was a horizon again. A l uminous silver moon was rising above the pond-still dark water. It shone lik e an enchantment, as if to guide Quinn's way.

Scrrrunch.Rashel winced as the boat docked. Somebody wasn't being careful. But they'd arrived, and it could only be an island. They'd been heading east for over two hours.

Daphne lifted her head weakly. "I don't care if they eat us the minute we get off, as long as I get to feel solid ground again."

"This practically is solid ground," Rashel whispered. "It's been dead calm t he whole way."

"Tell that to my stomach." Daphne moaned, and Rashel poked her. Someone was coming down the stairs.

It was Lily. Ivan waited above with the taser. They herded the girls off the b oat and up onto a little dock.

Rashel did her vacant-eyed staring around again, blessing the moonlight that allowed her to see.

It wasn't much of a dock. One wharf with a gas pump and a shack. There wer e three other powerboats in slips.

And that was all. Rashel couldn't see any sign of life. The boats rode like g host s.h.i.+ps on the water. There was silence except for the slap of the waves.

Private island, Rashel thought.

Something about the place made the hair on the back of her neck rise.

With Lily in front and Ivan in back, the group was herded to a hiking trail th at wound up a cliff.

It's just an island, Rashel told herself. You should be dancing with joy. This is the enclave you wanted to get to. There's nothing . . . uncanny . . . about this place.

And then, as they reached the top of the cliff, she saw the rocks. Big rocks.

Monoliths that reminded her eerily of Stonehenge. It looked as if a giant ha d scattered them around.

And there were houses built among them, perched on the lonely cliff, look ing down on the vast dark sea. They all seemed deserted, and somehow they reminded Rashel of gargoyles, hunched and waiting.