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Jivaja (Soul Cavern Series Book 1) Page 20
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Claude shrugged. “I’ll work something out. But if Mecca happens upon the Gathering, I don’t want her seeing me in the midst of it. It would ruin things.”
“I understand. She would no longer see you as a potential ally,” Salas said. “Do you think Emilia knows she is here?”
“I suspect not. I substituted my blood for hers many times. I don’t think she has as strong a bond as I do. But that remains to be seen, I suppose.”
Salas nodded. “It’s getting close to time. I’ve laid out your clothes for the evening, if you wish to dress. I will get one of the cattle handlers to hose these beasts down.” He waved a hand toward the pens.
“Very good. Guests should be arriving soon.”
The silk slid against his skin like the light touch of a lover. It brought him back to memories of Rome and its bathhouses—glorious times. Claude sighed as he fastened the buttons on the well-tailored shirt. The present—which had been the future then— hadn’t turned out the way he’d hoped. However, silk shirts did indicate a significant improvement over togas.
He pulled on the light linen jacket that Salas had placed on his bed and looked himself over in the mirror. He took a moment to fasten his hair back with an antiquated leather thong, his accessory of preference. From the dresser, he took an ancient silver coin. It depicted two men on a chariot, one holding the reins on a pair of horses, the other with a bow outstretched. Though it predated Claude's birth by many hundred years, he always carried it with him. It had been his mother's.
Claude dropped the coin into the pocket of his matching ivory slacks. Into the other pocket went his small key ring with the security fob attached. Before leaving his room, he turned on the concealed alarm he’d had Salas install when they’d arrived. The Egyptian had many, many talents.
Emilia caught up with him at the elevator three minutes later. She’d taken the time to change as well, having donned a pair of dark silver, form-fitting slacks and a sheer, brick red, button-down blouse. Her sleek, black hair framed her face in the most exquisite way. For a moment, Claude felt the old lust well up in him, but he tamped it down. He had no place for those feelings any longer.
“Everything is ready?” he asked.
The elevator doors slid open, and she answered as they stepped inside. “Yes. This will be a successful Gathering, I think.”
“Your Gatherings are always successful.”
She flashed a smile. “And you'll be playing tonight?”
“I don’t think so.”
She raised one thin eyebrow. “No?”
Claude leaned a shoulder against the lift wall. “I didn’t see any that struck my fancy. You know I prefer my meals a little more plump. That’s one of my complaints about this place, this era. Everyone must be so thin. It’s like feeding on a dusty skeleton.”
“But the object isn't to feed,” she said with a smile.
The doors opened with their soft sound and Claude motioned forward with an open hand. Emilia stepped off the elevator, the fabric of her slacks swishing with the movement. He loved the style she’d adopted since coming to Atlanta. Very polished and elegant. A far cry from the young, demure peasant girl he’d discovered so many years ago crying over her dead mother’s body.
“Are you concerned about what will be said at the assembly?” he asked.
Gaiety drained from her face, and her brow tightened. “I'm concerned more about what I won't be hearing. I know we have purist sympathizers among the leadership, but I don't know how deep that support runs. And I doubt they will be candid in front of the half-breed who controls the largest city in the south.” Her scowl made her face ugly.
“Yes, it wouldn't benefit them to voice their opinions about that in front of you. Though their tongues may be looser later, after a bit of drink and revelry.”
The lift doors opened and he rested his hand on her back as they entered the second floor's lit hallway. Her muscles tensed when they approached the room where they would meet with the Visci who controlled other southeastern cities.
“I may be more successful in finding out who supports which faction,” Claude said.
Emilia stopped, mid-step, and Claude almost strode past her. When he stopped and turned she scrutinized him, openly. He only stared back at her and waited. In this time, with the open slaughter of anyone not of pure blood, he knew she distrusted everyone.
“Yes,” she finally said. “I would appreciate that.”
They surrounded a sturdy, mahogany conference table, Emilia and a dozen or so others who controlled various cities across the southeastern United States. They came from as far north as Virginia and as far west as Louisiana. Claude, and five other non-official attendees, stood against the walls. Two looked like bodyguards, but the rest seemed to be companions.
Not all of the leading Visci were in attendance. Many didn't often travel away from their cities, so there were a number who were never expected. But one who always attended Gatherings had not come to Atlanta: Tony Mercado, from Miami. Claude wondered whether Mercado, a pure blood, had stayed away for political reasons. And he wondered, also, whether this would be the start of something no one would be able to stop.
They dispensed with the ordinary business, then Thomas Eli, who ruled in Charlotte, brought up the topic Claude knew would have most of them shifting in their seats.
“We've had three more killings.” He stood, a short man with flaming red hair, ruddy skin and eyes the color of deep ice, which flashed with anger. “Two mixed bloods and one full. We are assuming that the full blood was murdered in retaliation for the two last month.”
Emilia bristled. At least Eli hadn't called them half-breeds—those who came from a pairing between a Visci and a human. Claude supposed that was the only good part of what Eli said.
The random murders of mixed blood Visci had begun in the northwest and moved to New England within a decade. The killings in Charlotte, only 200 miles from Atlanta, hit closer to home for Emilia than any others. Claude watched closely.
“These extremists need to be rooted out,” Eli continued. “One more killing and I will lock the city down.”
“How do you plan on finding them?” This came from Arabella Connelly, from Memphis, a beautiful mixed-blood with a classic southern drawl. “Even if someone is of pure blood, that doesn't mean they're fanatics.”
Eli sat down. “I don't know. But these murders must stop.”
“They've become more organized, I think. The purists, I mean,” Arabella Connelly said. She had everyone's attention. “Last month, we caught a human as he was fixing to set a house on fire. The house is owned by—well, it don't matter whose house, but she’s of mixed blood.”
“A human?” Wide eyed, Eli shifted to the edge of his seat, leaning on the table. “Who brought a human in?”
Arabella, a petite, delicate woman, looked down for a moment from where she sat beside Eli. Claude admired the calculated move, which made her look demure and refined.
“We later found out that he had been hired by Jarot Kendling, a purist who'd moved to the city from Seattle.” She pushed a lock of sandy hair back from her face. “We tried Kendling, of course. Quietly.”
The room remained silent. Claude studied each face around the table. In their own ways, he suspected they were all coming to the same conclusion. War could not be avoided. It was coming, whether the leadership wanted it or not. And from more than one of the faces Claude could see, some didn't seem to mind.
“Where is Mercado?” Eli broke the silence with his accusatory tone. Others around the table exchanged glances, but eventually all eyes turned to Emilia.
“He didn't respond to the invitation,” Emilia said, her voice flat.
“He's a pure blood,” Eli said. The muscles in his neck tightened and his face reddened. One hand curled into a fist on top of the table. “This is an insult!”
Murmurs enveloped the room. Many of those gathered nodded, including Arabella Connelly. Others remained silent and still. Claude understood the be
nefit of choosing either reaction. However, he thought those who remained silent, in this assembly comprised mostly of Visci with some human heritage, could be construed as having purist sympathies.
Emilia raised a hand. “If it is, Thomas, it is my insult to attend. I will speak with Tony when I am able. I'm certain he did not mean for his absence to be a slight.”
This had a calming effect on the room, though Thomas Eli still glowered but at no one in particular.
“We all must attend to our own cities,” Emilia continued. “And we will need to be creative in dealing with the threat of extremism. I believe that most of us simply want things to remain as they have for centuries. Some may disagree, however.” She scanned the room, settling on each face for a heartbeat before moving on. “Violence against Visci is not tolerated unless sanctioned by the city elder. This has been our rule of law. These purists who have resorted to killing other Visci have begun working outside of our established order. Therefore, they must answer for their actions. For their crimes.”
No one disagreed. No one spoke. Just by the stances they took in their chairs, Claude could see that most agreed with Emilia's assessment. But not all.
“We must think of creative ways of finding the criminals among us, but we have to adhere to our laws. Discover them and bring them to trial.” She paused and then smiled at the group. “So let's adjourn now. We will have a pleasant evening at the Maze Gathering, then we will go to our respective cities and consider how we might find those who would kill others of the Blood and bring them to justice.”
When Eli began to bluster, Arabella Connelly put her hand on his forearm, leaned over and whispered to him. He looked around the table, wild-eyed, then sighed and leaned back in his chair. Arabella stroked his arm and smiled at him.
“We are all concerned, Thomas,” Emilia said. “And I suspect we will need to work together on this, in the end. But for now, let's enjoy the night.”
Chapter Twenty-One: Mecca
At the back of the property, the stone wall cut through the forest about two hundred yards east of the back gate. Tree branches from both sides canopied over the wall. Mecca scrambled up an oak tree and inched forward onto a thick branch. Darkness made the ground seem farther than ten feet below.
The branch extended a couple beyond where the barbed wire topped the wall. Mecca crawled along, her movement slow and deliberate. The oak, old and sturdy, held her weight without bending until she'd gotten past the sharp wire. The branch sagged as Mecca hung and then she dropped to the ground. Pain twinged the soles of her feet in memory of her escape, but she ignored it.
She sprinted away from the wall but then slowed to a walk, her pace dictated by the darkness of the night and the heavy leaf cover. A chill breeze brought gooseflesh up on her skin. She wished she’d thought to bring a jacket.
She found the fire road that would lead her back to the main house. Mecca didn’t walk along it, but beside it, retracing her earlier steps when she’d fled her captors. At least it felt better to have shoes on this time, even if her feet still stung from her first trip through.
To keep her mind off her dad — and whether what she was doing was stupid or just crazy, she concentrated on not tripping over the exposed roots and fallen branches. The filtered moonlight threw gruesome, misshapen shadows against tree trunks and bushes. Leaves crunched beneath her rubber soles.
Mecca stopped and leaned against a tree, the cold seeping through the thin shirt covering her. She closed her eyes and wondered what she’d do when she got back to the house. Should she sneak in? Maybe she should sit outside until the sun came up. Would it be safer to go in during the day?
Mecca sank to a crouch, her back against the tree. “What was I thinking, coming back here?”
What did she hope to accomplish? She didn’t even know how many people Emilia kept in the house. Were they human or Visci? She didn’t know the floor plan. Hell, she may not even have made it out the first time if Claude hadn’t given her directions.
Why had Claude helped her escape, for that matter? Did he know she’d be returning? He couldn’t. Not really.
Could he?
When she thought of him seated in the library, reading, her belly flip-flopped. And what the hell was that reaction all about? It pissed her off.
“Too many questions.” Her brain hurt, thinking about it.
She pushed off from the tree, stood and strode along the side of the fire road. She’d deal with whatever she found when she found it. Maybe it would get her killed, but she’d take a few of them down with her, damn it.
Her decision felt very final. But that was okay.
Another five minutes went by before she realized that music floated on the air, light and bantering, from the direction where the main house lay.
Without warning, she stepped into the small clearing that made up the guest house’s back yard. She hadn’t realized she’d gone this far. The walk turned out to be much shorter going in than it had been coming out.
Here, near the well, the music sounded louder, closer, a tinkling mix of drum machine and strings. Not something Mecca would choose to listen to, but it sounded tight in the night air.
As she crept around the guest house, the enormous tract of land behind the main house came into view. Festooned with party lights, the slate patio looked like it came off a movie set. Lanky, but beautiful, men and women milled about in their haute couture. Plants in thick stone pots glittered with the twinkling bulbs below a canopy set on the lawn in case of rain.
The first time she’d come through here, she’d passed a very high hedge. Now it stood, decorated with the same white lights and Mecca could see a gap centered in the length of it about eight feet wide. Beyond the eight foot gap, she could see more hedge inside. The end closest to her turned back at a ninety degree angle. The lights in the hedge only seemed to go a few dozen yards toward the back, but Mecca could make out the shadow of the hedge much farther than that. She couldn’t see the end in the darkness.
A hedge maze? Seriously?
People milled about near the entrance, sipping on dark red wine in fine crystal glasses. It looked like any formal evening party, but everything about it made the hair on Mecca’s arms stand up. Tucked in moderate safety behind the corner of the guest house, she watched for several moments, trying to find Emilia or Claude among the guests.
One familiar face caught her eye. The tall, dark-skinned man who’d been with Claude in the library. He stood, speaking with a woman who looked no more than seventeen. He inclined his head toward her as he spoke, and she tilted her own back and laughed. The sound didn’t reach Mecca’s ears over the low thrum of the music, but she recognized the flirting between them. Moonlight made the scene look romantic, but it didn’t allay Mecca’s sense of things being Not Quite Right.
She scanned the crowd once more and then made her way back around the guest house in silence. She wanted to get a closer look at the back part of the hedge, so she followed the line of the cottage until she reached the other side.
As she suspected, though the lights only went a short way, the hedge itself extended for dozens of yards toward the woods in the back. On this side, she saw another open gap just like the one in the front. A lone man, dressed in conservative slacks and a dark blue button down shirt, hung around the gap, a rifle held comfortably in one hand.
As quietly as she could, Mecca doubled back through the cottage’s yard, into the tree line.
Emilia had armed guards on the hedge. What did that mean? Mecca wanted to get a look at the back. The more she saw of it, the more it made her think of a maze. Hedge mazes creeped her out. All mazes creeped her out, really. They reminded her of that movie with Jack Nicholson where he went crazy in the snow-bound hotel.
She made her way around and had to go several yards out of her way to stay within the safety of the tree cover. The back of the hedge came into view, small ground lighting casting hazy illumination on the third entrance to the maze.
It had to be a
maze. No other explanation fit.
Four hundred feet back from the hedge, a barn squatted in the clearing. Dark green paint tried valiantly to cling to the weathered wood, but seemed to be losing the battle. A few windows scattered along the walls, the pale wood of new shutters pulled tight, not giving Mecca a view inside.
She ducked deeper into the shadows of the woods. A few more people gathered here, but not the elegant guests of the party. These men and women dressed as workers and each wore a pistol in a waist harness. Most were busy setting up portable fencing which made a corridor from the front door of the barn to the maze’s entrance. It reminded her of corralling bulls and horses at a rodeo.
The hair on her arms rose again and dread crept into her veins. What are they planning?
Moving with as much care as she could, Mecca crept through the woods toward the back of the barn. What were they corralling here? The horror of possibility tugged at her mind’s corners. She pushed it away, resolute that she wouldn’t jump to conclusions.
But there’s really only one thing you’re going to find here, Mec. You know that.
She ignored her own voice in her head and found herself looking at the backside of the barn. Large double doors dominated this wall, locked with a silver padlock, but a smaller, person-sized door with a knob was tucked near the right corner. Surprised that no one guarded this side, Mecca decided to take advantage while she could.
She launched into a sprint and covered the few dozen yards in several seconds. Her skin tingled with adrenaline and danger.
Up close, the barn didn’t look in any better repair. The weathering of the wood left gaps between some of the slats. Mecca peered through one. Inside, the only light came from a single bare bulb hanging from a rafter. Where horse stalls would be along the left wall, she saw cages, with several dark shapes inside. They looked like people, but Mecca couldn’t tell for sure.
That tickling horror nibbled on her conscience again.
A loft extended above the cages and she could make out squared bundles up there. Hay, probably, but she didn’t really see Emilia as the farming type. Across the way from the cages, proper stalls lined the wall and the sounds of horse drifted to her ears. She didn’t think anyone else wandered around inside. Only those in the cages and the horses in their stalls. She tried the doorknob and was shocked to find it unlocked.