“No,” he said, and picked up a stray piece of metal from the floor, which he flicked at Myrnin’s back, where it landed, electricity arcing, and sizzling. “I can smell the ozone. She’s got him wired. If you touch him, it’ll kill you.”
9
“Is he dead?” Claire’s heart was racing, and not just because she’d nearly gotten herself barbecued. . . . Myrnin was just getting better, just becoming himself again. For Ada to do this to him, now . . .
But Michael was shaking his head. “More like he’s unconscious. I don’t think he’s hurt too badly. We just have to break the circuit.”
Claire hunkered down, trying to get a look at Myrnin’s face; his head was turned to the side, but his black hair had fallen over his eyes, so she couldn’t see if they were open or closed. He wasn’t moving. “We need something wood or rubber to push him off the metal,” she said. “See if you can find something.”
And with a snap, the lights went off. Claire’s breath went out of her, and she felt her heart accelerate to about two hundred beats a minute when she heard Ada’s cell-phone-speaker voice whisper, “I don’t think you should do that.”
“Michael?”
“Right here. The circuit’s still on to the keyboard; I can feel it.” His hand touched her shoulder, and even though she flinched, she felt reassured. “Here. Take this.”
He handed her something. It took her a second to figure out what it was—a hunk of wood? It felt odd. . . . “Oh God,” Claire blurted, “is that a bone?”
“Don’t ask,” Michael said. “It’s sharp on one end. Organic, like wood, so it makes a good weapon against vampires. Just don’t stab me, okay?”
She wasn’t making any promises, really. “Help me with Myrnin.” She carefully reversed the bone in her hands to the non-sharp end, and used the flashlight to check that Michael had something nonconductive, as well. He did, and it was more bone. It might have been a rib. She tried not to think about that too much. “You push from that side; I’ll push from here. Push hard. We need to knock him completely away from the panel.”
Claire’s cell phone screamed so loudly that it seemed like the speaker was melting from the force of it; the sound dissolved into high-pitched static, and Claire took a deep breath and put the end of the bone against Myrnin’s shoulder. He was wearing a black velvet jacket, and the bone looked very white against it, almost blue in the Maglite beam.
She saw Michael as a shadow in the backwash of the light. “Ready,” Michael said.
“Go!”
They pushed. Michael, of course, had vampire strength, so it was over in a flash—Myrnin’s body flying backward from the console, crashing on its back in the darkness. A glittering, frustrated arc of blue sparks from the keyboard snapped toward Claire and fell short.
Claire almost dropped the bone as she turned it in her hand so the sharp end was ready to use, then got on one knee next to Myrnin’s motionless body. She carefully brushed hair away from his marble-pale face. His eyes were open, and fixed. They looked dry, but as she watched, moisture flooded over them, and he blinked, blinked again, gasped, and came bolt upright. His gaze fixed on Claire’s face, and he grabbed her arm in a tight, grinding grip.
“Let go,” she said. He didn’t. “Myrnin!”
“Hush,” he whispered. “I’m thinking.”
“Yeah, great—can you do it without breaking my arm?”
“No.” He didn’t even try to explain that, but just got to his feet while still clamped on to her wrist like a person-sized handcuff. “That hurt.”
“You need to shut her down; she just tried to kill you!”
Myrnin’s eyes flashed a bloody red.
“You will not tell me what to do!”
He shoved her abruptly at Michael, and the glare was even angrier for him. “What are you doing here?”
“Talk later. Go now,” Michael said, and grabbed Claire up in his arms before she could protest. “Those things are coming for us.”
Myrnin looked around into darkness that hid whatever it was that scared Michael so much. Claire didn’t think she wanted to know; she put her arms around his neck and hung on for dear life as she felt his muscles tense. Things moved past, and she noticed a sense of air pressing against her.
The tunnel, she thought, because things felt closed in, sounds seemed muffled and strange. “Myrnin?” she called behind them, but got no reply. Then she felt Michael jump, and for a breathless second she was weightless, suspended in midair as the light seemed to rush over her.
Michael landed perfectly just beyond the trapdoor set into the lab’s concrete and stone, and quickly spun around, backing away at the same time.
Myrnin seemed to almost levitate up out of the hole in the floor, graceful as a cat. As his coat swirled like black fog, he turned in midair, reached out, and slammed the trapdoor shut.
Then he landed on it, light and perfectly balanced, and leaned over to slam his palm down on a red panel on top. It lit up, and a metallic clunk echoed through the lab. Myrnin stepped off the door, stared at it for a second, and then carefully unrolled the carpet and smoothed it back over the entrance to Ada’s cave.
Claire let go of Michael and slid to her feet. She was still gripping her sharp-pointed bone weapon, and she didn’t really feel inclined to put it down. Not yet. “What just happened?”
“I set the lock,” Myrnin said, and tapped a toe on the carpet, in case she’d missed the point. “It’s quite clever, you know. Electromagnetic. Keyed to my own handprint.”
“Yeah, that’s great. Why were you down there in the first place? You know she’s not—well.”
Myrnin fussily adjusted the lapels of his velvet coat, frowned at his bright blue vest as if he didn’t remember wearing it, and shrugged. “Something to do with adjusting her emotional responses. Unfortunately, she was ready for me, it seems. She’s quite clever, you know.” He seemed almost proud. “Now—was there something you wanted, Claire?”
“A thank-you might be nice.”
He blinked. “Whatever for? Oh, that. The electricity was only to keep me immobilized. She’d have had to let me go, eventually.”
“Not really. She could have just kept you like that until you starved, right?”
“I can’t die. Not like that. I can be made very uncomfortable, and very hungry, and quite a bit mad, but not dead. She’d have to have one of her creatures—cut my head—off. . . .” Myrnin’s voice trailed away, and he seemed very distant for a few seconds; then he said, “I see. Yes, you’re quite correct. She would have options. But she wouldn’t kill me.”
“Why not?”
“I think we both know why, Claire.”
“You mean, because she loves you? I’m not really seeing it right now.”
“Ada needs me as much as I need her,” Myrnin snapped, suddenly—and very un-Myrnin-like—offended. “You know nothing about her, or me, and I am ordering you to stay out of my affairs where they concern Ada.” He suddenly staggered, and had to put out a hand to steady himself against the nearest lab table. “And fetch me some blood, Claire.”
“Get it yourself.” She couldn’t believe she’d said it, but he’d really stung her. “Also, your precious Ada killed Bob by supersizing him and trying to get him to bite me. So maybe you don’t know anything about Ada.”
“Get me blood, or I’ll have to take what’s available,” Myrnin said softly. He didn’t seem dramatic about it, and it wasn’t a threat. He raised his head and looked at her, and she saw that shine there—lunatic and focused and very, very scary. “I’m very hungry.”
“Claire, go,” Michael said, and moved to stand between her and Myrnin. “He’s not faking it.”
He really wasn’t, because Myrnin lunged for her. He was faster than she or Michael could have expected, and Michael was off balance and nowhere near the right place as Myrnin shoved him out of the way and sent him crashing into the nearest stone wall. . . .
Then he grabbed Claire by her shoulder and a fistful of hair. He wrenched her head painfully to the side, exposing her neck, and she felt the cool puff of his breath against her skin, and she knew she had only one move left.