Kay expected cold, dripping, gray stones. But the room they were locked into could have been a suite in a luxury hotel, with a few exceptions. There were no windows, the air was damp and almost frigid and a small freezer unit hummed just inside an empty closet. She stared at the freezer for a long moment before deciding she didn’t care to look inside.
“Emergency rations,” Trevor explained with a thin smile. He took her in his arms and held her for several minutes. “I’m so sorry, Kay. I should never have involved you in any of this.”
She clung to him, feeling safe for the moment in his strong arms. “Stealing the files and the crystals was the right thing to do. No matter what happens, we’ll have changed the future for the better.” Tilting her head back, she gazed up at him, her eyes brimming with love. “Oh, Trevor, I wish we could kiss.”
“So do I.” A grin curved beneath the tips of his teeth. “And I wish to hell I didn’t lisp every damned time I hold you. It does a number on my manly image.”
Kay laughed and pressed closer to him, her fingers trailing along the line of his jaw. “Quite honestly, I don’t notice the lisp anymore.” All the vampires experienced difficulty speaking when their fangs extended. It suddenly struck her as ludicrous that she and Trevor had been condemned by a council of ancient men, all lisping like babies.
Trevor’s hands slid from the sides of her breasts and curved over her waist to her hips. “What I’d like to do is ravish you,” he said, his voice a low rich nimble. He glanced at the bed behind her. “But...”
“We need to figure out the crystals,” Kay agreed, but she didn’t step out of his arms. When he held her, an excited thrill heated her body. She loved the solid vibrant feel of him.
“Are you trembling with passion?” he murmured against her hair. “Or are you freezing to death?”
“A little of both,” she admitted, smiling against his chest. After another moment, she reluctantly moved away from him, wishing she had a cup of steaming coffee. But this was a vampire’s lair; few mortal comforts had been provided.
“Here. Wrap up in this.” Trevor stripped a decorative spread from the bed and draped it around her shoulders. When she sat down, he tucked the bedspread around her legs. “Better?”
“Thank you.” Thick maroon carpeting covered the stone floor and richly woven tapestries trapped some of the chill along the walls, but the room was still very cold. The bedspread felt good. “Where do we start?” Kay asked, looking up at him. Loving him.
Reaching into his pocket, Trevor withdrew the crystal Von Lichten had agreed they could examine. He studied it with awe.
“We all half believed these crystals were only a myth,’ he marveled softly. “But they exist, and they will change our philosophy and our lives. From this moment forward, vampirism will not—cannot—be the same.”
“Unless we fail to decipher how they’re used,” Kay reminded him quietly. They each looked at the crystal in Trevor’s palm. And suddenly the tremendous weight of what was at stake descended on them both. It wasn’t only their lives that hung on the question of the crystals’ use, but the possible future of vampires all over the world.
Trevor turned the small stone in his hand. His energy level was too high to ponder the question while sitting. He dropped down and performed a few rapid push-ups, then paced the length of the room, passing in front of Kay, his brow furrowed in thought.
“All right. How to use them. Rub them on the body?” Absently, he moved the small stone over the back of his hand. “Too obvious. Burn them and inhale the smoke? Do crystals burn?”
Kay racked her brain. “Maybe you have to combine them with something.... Maybe they dissolve?”
Instantly, Trevor lifted the water pitcher atop the bureau and filled a glass. He dropped the crystal into the water and watched. It lay there like a rock in a glass, doing nothing.
“Maybe you swallow it,” he suggested after a minute. Fishing the stone out of the glass, he dried it on the tail of his shirt, then frowned in thought. But he didn’t swallow the stone.
Kay rubbed a hand over her forehead, trying to concentrate, but no answer came to mind. “I have a strong suspicion that the council is absolutely confident we can’t figure it out.” Eleander Mondrake’s hot eyes rose in her mind. “Therefore, I doubt the answer is an obvious one.”
“I’m not sure. It seems to me the answer should be obvious,” Trevor said after five minutes of thinking and steady pacing. “I keep coming back to your point about something happening to the council. Let’s assume you’re correct. Let’s assume the council has protected the crystals for centuries to give themselves the option of changing their minds about making them available, or in case something happens to the present council members and they don’t want the crystals lost to a future council.”
“I see where you’re going. You’re saying, what good are the crystals unless you know how to use them?”
“Right.”
Kay considered, watching him drop to the carpet for another series of push-ups. His shoulders swelled and the muscles on his neck stood out. He made adorable little puffing sounds. “The problem with the most obvious answers is the destruction of the crystals. Burning, dissolving or swallowing destroys a crystal. There are only six of them.”
“It’s a problem in today’s world,” Trevor agreed, sitting up and clasping his arms around his knees, “but maybe it wasn’t a problem in the beginning when there weren’t many vampires.”
Kay told him about sending the second crystal to Carl for analysis. “With luck, the elements can be reproduced in the right combination and we’ll be able to ensure a plentiful supply. We should know more by the time we get home.” If they got home.
Trevor came to her. Kneeling, he wrapped his arms around her and the bulky bedspread, and dropped his forehead into her lap.
“I’m so sorry, Kay. I’ve seen the cages,” he said in a low voice. “The bars are thick steel. I can’t break them. There’s no escape.”
“Don’t talk about it,” Kay whispered, stroking his hair.
“About a minute before the sun lifts above the horizon, there’s a glorious infusion of warmth. Memory floods back. You want that rapturous moment of forgotten warmth to last forever. It won’t be that way for you since you know how it is to feel warm inside, but that’s how it will feel to me.”
Kay closed her eyes, letting her fingers explore the fine silken texture of his hair.
“Then, seconds before the sun rises, the heat begins to sting. It’s like a million hot needles stabbing the skin inside and out. A second later... it’s like roasting in the flames of hell.” Kay felt his horror and the tensing of his body. “Hollywood aside, death does not come quickly.”
They sat in silence.
Finally Kay cleared her throat and spoke in a strangled voice. “What will it be like to be made into a vampire?”
He hesitated and held her tighter. “There is pain involved, but it’s slight compared to sunlight. Whoever does it will drain your blood almost to the point of death. Then you will drink from him. The mixing of blood is volatile and turbulent. You’ll lose consciousness for a brief period. When you awaken you will immediately be aware of enhanced sight and hearing. For a short period, even artificial light will sting your eyes.”
“I won’t drink Eleander’s blood!”
“I’m sorry, Kay, but you will,” Trevor said harshly, lifting his head to look into her eyes. “Once you’ve lost your own blood, you’ll crave replenishment. It’s a compulsion you won’t be able to control.” He hesitated, then forced himself to continue in a whisper. “And you will enjoy it.”
“Never!” Kay swore, staring into his eyes.
“You will meld with the vampire who makes you a new-made. You will penetrate his very soul and find rapture. It will be unlike anything you have ever experienced or imagined. It’s orgasm and ecstasy, joy and splendor, something transcendental that cannot be described. It’s the satisfaction of a hunger you didn’t know you had, and a thirst so deep, it feels like part of your being. Your mind soars and spins through the universe.”
Kay stared. Nervously, she wet her lips. “You make it sound...” No, she didn’t dare think about it. “Have you ever made a vampire?”
“No,” he said hoarsely, gazing intently at the vein throbbing on her throat. “I would have made Diane a vampire, but she refused.”
“I... Why didn’t you make others?”
Sudden anguish darkened his eyes. “The loneliness! The godawful, terrible misery of solitude!” The words burst out of him, erupting from a deep reservoir of suppressed pain. “The hiding, the fear. The fight to hold on to human emotions.” He stared at her. “Oh, God, Kay. I’ve been deceiving myself for so long!”
She framed his face between her trembling hands and gazed into his vibrant blue eyes, filled with anguish. “My dearest, darling Trevor, listen to me. You mustn’t allow yourself to think like this. No regrets, remember?” A tear brimmed over her lashes and slipped down her cheek. “You can see! And you’re not alone. You have friends.” Other vampires who moved in and out of his life with little impact, sometimes with a gap of several decades between visits. “And you have me.” Who would occupy but an eye blink along the vast span of his life.
With a tortured sound he scooped her into his arms and carried her to the bed, placing her gently on silk sheets.
“Kay,” he whispered, stroking shaking fingertips along the length of her throat. “My beautiful, wonderful, brave Kay. My love, my hero.”
“Your hero?” she whispered, touched.
“It was you who stole the crystals and changed history for my kind.”
With every fiber of her being, Kay yearned to wrap her arms around his neck and kiss him. The longing was so strong, it was painful. A powerful desperate need to kiss him deeply, passionately, to say with her tongue and lips what mere words could not express. As if he guessed the urgency of her need, he hastily covered his lips—and his emerging teeth—and sorrow darkened his eyes.
“No,” he whispered hoarsely. “Kissing would repulse you and embarrass me.”
“Just hold me, Trevor. Hold me.” Opening her arms, she enfolded him within the spread and pressed her body along the hard length of his. He held her tightly, his face buried in her hair.
Then his arms slackened. Surprised, Kay eased back to examine his face. His eyes had grown heavy-lidded and his gaze was slightly unfocused. His teeth retracted as she watched, and she could once again see the firm shapely curve of his lips.
“Trevor?” Concerned, Kay lifted on an elbow. His hand fell away from her swollen breast.
“Damn,” he muttered, blinking and struggling to hold his eyes open. “What time is it?” Rolling away from her, he let his head drop on the pillow. “I’m sorry, my darling Kay....” He yawned helplessly and his eyelids closed. “Damn! Sun... must be rising... embarrassing... make it up to you... and the crystals! I...”
Kay stared in amazement. In less than an eye blink he was dead asleep. She called his name and gave him a tentative shake. Nothing. Half-panicked, she shook him hard, and when he didn’t respond, she pressed her ear against his chest. She started breathing again when she heard his steady heartbeat.
Still; it was simply astonishing. Kay had never seen anyone fall so soundly asleep so fast. And she couldn’t believe that even a vampire could sleep when his life hung by a thread and the fate of thousands of fellow creatures rested on the solution to a puzzle that had to be solved in a few hours. Or that he could fall asleep in the early exciting stages of lovemaking.
Dropping back on her own pillow, she watched him sleep, studied the way his eyelashes formed a thick dark crescent against his cheeks. In sleep, his mouth was soft, his lips slightly parted. Leaning forward, she gently kissed him, fighting the excitement she immediately experienced.
He didn’t respond, didn’t stir, and it occurred to her how helpless and vulnerable he was in this state. No wonder vampires hid away during daylight hours, or locked themselves behind impenetrable metal doors.
Watching Trevor sleep made Kay yawn, and she felt the depth of her own fatigue. After removing his shoes and her own, she loosened his collar, then nestled her head on his shoulder and draped his arm around her. Her body pleaded for sleep, and she was sorely tempted. She smothered another yawn.
But there were the crystals. And not much time to solve their mystery.
Instantly all thoughts of sleep vanished from her mind. Trevor had no choice, but she did. She had the rest of her life to sleep. But there would be no rest of her life unless they figured out how to use the crystals.
Panic brought her out of the bed. Trailing the bedspread like the train of a gown, she paced up and down the windowless dungeon room, chewing her fingernails and commanding herself to think. She had to unravel the secret of the crystals.
How many different things could you do with a little rock?
Kay couldn’t drag up a single idea that they hadn’t already discarded. Instead, her mind wandered along mundane paths.
She felt guilty about taking the bedspread and leaving Trevor uncovered, although she knew he didn’t feel the cold. She longed for a pot of coffee and something to eat that was loaded with fat and cholesterol, something like a tray of chocolate doughnuts. She suddenly missed her mother, and experienced a tide of regret that things were not right between them. If somehow she survived the council’s test, she vowed to mend her relationship with her mother.
Gradually she noticed the deep intense silence, and grew queasy at the thought that she was the only person awake in the entire castle. No one knew where she was. She wasn’t sure herself. The only thing she knew about Magyar’s castle was that it was situated on top of a hill two hours outside of Budapest and sleeping vampires littered the place.
Sitting on the side of the bed, she took Trevor’s lifeless hand and held it in her lap so she wouldn’t feel so terribly alone.
“Focus! Think about the crystals, damn it, the crystals!” She rubbed her eyes and fought to point her tired mind toward the problem.
Okay. What good are the crystals without instructions as to how to use them? No good at all. Okay. Therefore, it followed that instructions would be included. As with medicine. Except, of course, no instructions were etched on the crystals.
Just to be sure, Kay checked the crystal they had been given, looking for any kind of etching. There was none. Then she held the cloudy stone to the bedside lamp, hoping to spot something embedded inside. No such luck.
But she sensed she might be on the right track. If the way to use the crystals was not obvious—and they had rejected the obvious possibilities—then there had to be instructions. And the instructions had to be on, with or near the crystals. It was the only logical conclusion. Except—and here came the brick wall again—there were no instructions.
She fell back on the bed across Trevor’s legs and stared at the ceiling as if the answer could be found in the gray stones overhead. Instead, her mind veered.
They had no future together. Trevor had been right. He was the ultimate night person. She was the ultimate day person. They would never sleep or awake at the same time. The things they could do together were limited by their wildly variant inner clocks.
He was correct about other things, as well. The idea of becoming a vampire frightened and horrified Kay. She could never do it. The possibility of Trevor returning to mortality—and blindness—was unthinkable. He couldn’t even consider it.
Their love was hopeless.
“Think about the crystals!” she insisted aloud, wiping tears from her eyes. She kissed Trevor again, wishing with all her heart that he could kiss her back. Then she resumed pacing, wading through waves of fatigue.
“Instructions, instructions, instructions. There must be instructions. Where would they be?” Rubbing hard at her forehead, she tried to think. “Picture the museum display, see it in your mind.”
Straining, Kay tried to recall if the crystals had been arranged on a sheet of paper, something with printing on it. Her mind was too tired to be exact, but she didn’t think there had been any paper inside the glass window she had smashed.
“Wait a minute!”
Spinning, the tail of the bedspread flapping around her ankles, she searched the room for her purse, excitement thudding behind her chest. When she found it, she tossed out her wallet, her checkbook, her keys, her makeup, praying she still had her notepad.
When she found her notes, a huge sigh collapsed her shoulders. Falling into a chair, she pored over the paragraphs she had copied from the legend beneath the crystals’ display.
This museum owns the only hold of Vlad Diamonds. Note the fingernail shape, length, width and small size of the six pieces of crystal. The original cache was discovered on the east side of the Tongue Carpathians by brothers Johan and Will Zerotski. Zerotski Company elected to dissolve following disputes over the crystals in 1698, causing dissension and spilled blood.
Financial gain, however, was always uncertain due to the lack of success in cutting the Vlad Diamonds. Shattering occurs on cutting, eliminating all possibilities for commercial or industrial use.
Kay read the words again and again, feeling the hair rise on the back of her neck. Every excited instinct insisted she was staring at the answer. If only she could decipher it. Using notepad and pencil, she tried copying every other word to see if a message was hidden within the legend. No. She tried every third word. Nothing. Then she listed the first letter of each word, hoping instructions would emerge, but nothing came of that idea. Nor of trying to build new words from the last letter of each word.
Although instinct insisted the solution had to be simple, she advanced to more difficult and complicated code systems. None worked.
Finally, frustrated and depleted to the point that her mind reeled and the words blurred on the page, she threw the pencil and notebook across the room, then dropped forward to rub her burning eyes. A yawn felt so good, and her eyes turned longingly toward the bed.
She was too exhausted to think. Maybe if she dozed for a minute... she’d bounce up refreshed and ready to tackle the problem from a new perspective.
No, she couldn’t waste a single minute.
But by now she was nestling her head against Trevor’s shoulder and pulling his arm back around her. She yawned, unable to recall crossing the room or climbing into bed. She curled against him.
She would just close her eyes for one little minute...
* * *
“Kay? Darling?”
She came awake with a start to find Trevor leaning over her. Struggling to sit up, Kay rubbed her eyes, which felt as if sand had been poured into them. “What...? I just... What time is it?”
“Eight o’clock.”
“Oh, no!” Her hands fell limply to the bedspread and she stared at him in horror. “We only have a few hours left! Why didn’t you wake me?” Throwing back the spread, she bounded to the floor, gazed wildly around her, then sank back to the bed and dropped forward, burying her face in her hands. There was no place to go. No answer to the riddle of the crystals.
Sitting beside her, Trevor gently brushed the hair back from her cheeks. “They allowed P.G. and Veneta to bring you a thermos of coffee and some sandwiches.” He pulled one of her hands from her face and curved her fingers around a hot paper cup.
Kay looked at the coffee and the plate of sandwiches on the bedside table. “Actually, I planned to order a sausage pizza for my last meal. With triple cheese.”
Trevor smiled grimly and nodded at the pile of wadded papers he had collected from the floor. “Some are yours, some are mine. I haven’t had any better luck than you did.”
Nothing ever tasted as fine as that first sip of coffee. But the caffeine needed a minute or two to kick in. She still felt sluggish and disoriented. Blinking, she looked around her.
“The lights are on, P.G. and Veneta came and went, you were pacing and wadding paper... and I thought you slept soundly! I must have been dead.”
The smile instantly faded from Trevor’s lips and they stared at each other. Then he took the coffee from her hands, wrapped her in his arms and held her as she burst into tears and wept on his chest.
“I’m sorry,” Kay apologized, angry at herself. “I can’t stop crying.”
“It’s all right,” he murmured in a gruff voice. He stroked her, smoothed her hair, held her tenderly until the storm of weeping wore itself out.
Then he pressed her back on the bed, rubbing his cheek against her cheek and throat, his hands roaming, doing wonderful things to her body, tender things, exciting things.
Between gasps of pleasure, Kay managed to blurt, “But shouldn’t we—” She bit off the words. She had tried everything she could think of to decipher the hidden message—if there was a hidden message—in the crystals’ legend. Trevor had given it a valiant try while she slept. They had both failed.
It was a waste of the precious hours remaining to them to spend the time frustrating themselves in a futile pursuit.
Kay kicked out of her jeans and blouse then opened her arms. Her voice was husky with desire. “Come to me....”
He did. Again and again.
* * *
They sat together on the side of the bed, studying the words on Kay’s notepad. Tension gripped them both. A glance at the bedside clock informed them that they had only minutes left.
“I love you, Trevor, but I hate your vampire world,” Kay said softly. She squeezed his hand. “I hate it that they’ll make me a vampire first. And I hate it that they’ll use the sun to kill me.” The thought was so hard to bear. Her beloved sunshine would be the instrument of her destruction.
Trevor turned her hand in his lap, traced the lines on her palm with his fingertip. “You brought joy into my life,” he said quietly. “Remember your first motorcycle ride? And the night we went shopping?” He shook his head. “I’ll enter the cage willingly. I’d rather die than live knowing I caused your death.”
Kay frowned and tapped her pencil against the Vlad legend. “The answer is here somewhere. I just know it! If only...”
“Darling Kay, it occurs to me that you are not a romantic.” A smile curved his mouth. “Shouldn’t we be exchanging final words? Pledging to meet in heaven or something like that?”
“I think you were right. The code has to be so simple that if the council were wiped off the earth the average vampire could figure out how to use the crystals!”
Trevor examined the concentration drawing her brow, then brushed his lips across her forehead. “I see why you’re so good with computers. You have an analytical mind. But we’ve tried everything. Right now, my heart, I’d rather hear how much you love me.”
“You know I love you,” Kay said impatiently, glaring at her notepad.
“Thank you. I’m glad to hear it,” Trevor said dryly. He pressed his leg against hers, needing to touch her. “There has to be a key,” he said after a moment.
“Every code has a key,” Kay agreed. She frowned into his eyes. “Maybe the words correlate to the words in a different reference. Is there a vampire book? Maybe a set of rules or, I don’t know, philosophy or something?”
“The only rules are those imposed on IV members. And I helped set them up. They aren’t old enough to correlate to the crystals.”
“There’s something obvious that I’m not seeing,” Kay said, grinding her teeth with frustration. “Damn it, there’s a key.”
“We aren’t going to find it. Give it up, Kay.” Gently he took her shoulders and turned her to face him. “I’m trying to say goodbye to you, my love.” His voice was husky with emotion. “I’m trying to find the right words to tell you what you’ve meant to me and how much I love you.”
“Oh Trevor, I...”
They both froze and looked toward the door at the sound of a key turning in the lock. When the door opened, Claus Bettinger scowled at them, and his fangs began to extend. Kay gripped the notepad so hard that her knuckles turned white, and she felt her heart lurch. Bettinger’s narrow gaze fixed on her pale throat. “Your time is up. Come with me,” he snarled.
Trevor stood, placing his body between Bettinger and Kay. He extended a hand to her. “Forgive me,” he said in a low voice, agony bleaching the color from his eyes.
“It’s not your fault.” Standing, Kay tried to loosen her muscles, but the tension was too great. She touched her fingertips to his pale cheek. “I love you, Trevor. Whatever happens, I’ll always love you, and I’ll always be grateful for the time we had together.”
“I can’t stand it that I finally find you, and—”
“You will come now,” Bettinger growled from the doorway.
They followed him into a stone-faced corridor, Kay stumbling as she feverishly tried to study her notepad in the dim light. She’d read the Vlad legend so many times that she knew the two paragraphs by heart. If she could only find the damned key!
Torches illuminated the stone walls of the council chamber. The air was damp and cold. After Bettinger led them to a table placed below the podium, he rejoined the Council of Six.
In a show of loyalty, Veneta and P.G. waited at the table. Anxiously, they examined Trevor and Kay’s faces as they approached, looking for a hopeful sign.
“Did you find the solution?” Veneta asked, speaking rapidly so only Trevor could hear.
“Please tell us you found the answer,” P.G. implored.
Trevor shook his head, his face grim. He glanced at Kay, his heart in his eyes, but she didn’t see. Her head was lowered over her notepad, her hair had swung forward on her cheeks. Stepping up behind her, he circled her waist and pulled her against his body, feeling her vibrant warmth. Like everyone else in the chamber, he heard the rising beat of her heart, smelled the sweetness of her blood.
Although Trevor had fed from the freezer in the suite’s empty closet, a surge of love caused a sudden, almost violent hunger to taste her, to meld with her and know her spirit in a way denied to mortals. His upper lip twitched and the tips of his canines pressed his lip. His arms tightened compulsively around her waist and he felt dizzy with wanting her in the dark way no mortal could know or understand.
“Your time has expired,” Otto Von Lichten announced from the podium. Torch light gleamed on his yellowing fangs. “Tell us how the crystals are used.”
Trevor examined the parchment faces staring down at him and wondered which of them had been chosen to make Kay a vampire. Which of them would know her in the intimate way he craved? Had they drawn lots? Narrowing his eyes in hatred, he studied their stoic expressions, searching for a hint of eagerness or anticipation. Only their fixed stares betrayed their expectation. They all leered at her with blood thirst glowing in their ancient eyes.
“When the Council of Six speaks, you will answer!” Eleander Mondrake stared at Kay’s pale throat and salivated with anticipation. A drop of spittle leaked from the corner of his lips. “Can you or can you not tell us how the crystals are used?”
Trevor clenched his fist against Kay’s waist. From the corner of his eyes, he could glimpse the cages. Steel monstrosities just tall enough to permit a victim to stand, narrow enough that the bars would almost touch the body. His imagination showed him Kay standing inside, cringing in fear of the sun she loved so much. If he had believed he had even a minuscule chance of victory, he would have leapt onto the podium and torn the elders limb from limb.
He stepped in front of her, instinctively protective. He heard Veneta and P.G. suck in a deep breath and hold it. Every eye steadied on him. Waiting. Certain of his answer.
Trevor opened his palm and looked at the crystal. Then he lifted his head and stared at the council with frustration and hate. “I don’t know how to use the crystal.”
“Wait!” Kay gripped his arm and narrowed her eyes on the faces of the council. “Of course,” she breathed. A long sigh dropped her shoulders and she murmured a quick prayer of gratitude. Then a radiant smile lit her face. Excitement deepened the color of her eyes to a sparkling purple.
“I know the answer,” she announced in a ringing tone. “I know how to use the crystals to restore mortality!”