"No," he said. "She's sick, too. We all are. Myrnin's been searching for the cause — and the cure — for seventy years now, but it's too late now. He's too far gone, and the chance that anyone else could help him through it is too small. I can't let her sacrifice you like this, Claire. I told you that he's had five assistants. I don't want you to become another statistic."
"What if he doesn't find the cure?" Claire asked. "How long —?"
"Claire, you need to forget you ever heard any of this. I mean it. There are a lot of secrets in Morganville, but this one could kill you. Say nothing, understand? Not to your friends, and not to Amelie. Do you understand?"
His intensity was even more terrifying than Myrnin's, because it was so controlled. She nodded.
It didn't stop the questions from swirling in her brain.
Sam let her out at the curb and watched her until she was inside the house — it was full dark, and there were plenty of hunting vampires out on a clear, cool night like this. Nobody would hurt her —probably — but Sam wasn't in the mood to take chances.
Claire shut the door and locked it, leaned against the wood for a long few seconds, and tried to get her head together. She knew her friends would bombard her with questions — where had she been, was she crazy being out alone in the dark — but she couldn't answer them, not without violating some order from either Amelie or Sam.
They're dying. It seemed impossible; the vampires seemed so strong, so frightening. But she'd seen it. She'd seen the way Myrnin was decaying, and how afraid Sam was. Even Amelie, perfect icy Amelie, was doomed.
Wasn't that a good thing? And if it was, why did she feel so sick?
Claire took a few more deep breaths, willed her mind to shut up for a while, and pushed off to walk down the hall.
She didn't get far. There was stuff piled everywhere. It took her a second, but she recognized it with a shock of horror. "Oh no," she whispered. "Shane's stuff." It was blocking the hallway. Claire shoved a path through the boxes and suitcases piled there. Oh, crap. There was the Playstation, unplugged and looking mournful, in a heap with its game controllers.
"Hey? Hey guys? What's going on?" Claire called, edged around the barricades. "Anybody here?"
"Claire?" Michael's shadow appeared at the end of the hall. "Where the hell have you been?"
"I — got held up late at the lab," she said. Which wasn't a lie. "What's happening?"
"Shane says he's moving out," Michael said. He looked deeply angry, but it was covering up hurt, too. "Glad you're here. Maybe you can talk some sense into him. Eve's not having much luck."
Claire heard the indistinct buzz of voices upstairs. Eve's voice, high and strident. Shane's rumbling low. There was about a sixty second delay, and then Shane came down the stairs carrying a box. His face was pale but determined, and although he hesitated for a second when he saw Claire was back, he kept coming down.
"Seriously, dumbass, what the hell are you doing?" Eve demanded from the top of the stairs. She darted around and got into his path, forcing him to back up and try to get around her. "Yo, village idiot! Talking to you!"
"You want to live here with him, fine," Shane said tightly. "I'm going. I've had enough."
"You're moving at night? Do you have a head wound?"
He faked Eve to the right and moved past her to the left.
And ran into Claire, who didn't move. She didn't say anything, and after a few seconds of silence he said, "I'm sorry. Got to do it. I told you."
"Is this about your dad?" she asked. "About this prejudice you've got against Michael now?"
"Prejudice? Jesus, Claire, you act like he's still really Michael. Well, he's not. He's one of them. I'm done with this crap. If I need to I'll go break some laws and get my ass thrown in jail. Better that than living here, looking at him — " Shane stopped dead and shut his eyes for a second. "You don't understand. You just don't understand, Claire. You didn't grow up here."
"But I did," Eve said, stepping up closer. "And I don't get your paranoid bullshit either. Michael hasn't hurt anybody! Especially you, you prick. So lay off."
"I am," Shane said. "I'm leaving."
Claire didn't move out of his way. "What about us?"
"You want to go with me?"
She slowly shook her head, and saw the pain in his face for a split-second before it turned hard again.
"Then we've got nothing to talk about. And sorry to break it to you but there's no 'us.' Get it straight, Claire, it's been fun, but you're not really my type — "
Michael moved. He smacked the box out of Shane's hands, and it flew halfway across the room, skidded across the wood floor the rest of the way, and slammed into the baseboard, where it tipped over and spilled things all over the place.
"Don't," he said, and grabbed Shane by the shoulders and flattened him against the nearest convenient wall. "Don't you disrespect her. Be an asshole to me, fine. Be an asshole to Eve if you want to, she can give it right back. But don't you take it out on Claire. I've had enough of your crap, Shane." He stopped and took a breath, but the anger wasn't burning out of him, not yet. "You want to go, get the hell out, but you'd better take a good hard look at yourself, my man. Yeah, your sister died. Your mom died. Your dad's a violent, prejudiced asshole. Your life has sucked. But you don't get to be the victim anymore. We keep cutting you breaks, and you keep screwing up, and it's enough. I'm not letting you whine anymore about how your life sucks worse than ours."
Shane's face went dead white, then red.
And he socked Michael in the face. It was a solid, painful punch, and Claire winced and covered her mouth in sympathy, moving back.
Michael didn't move. Didn't even react. He just stared into Shane's eyes.
"You're just like your dad," he said. "You want to stake me now? Cut my head off? Bury me out back? That work for you, friend?"
"Yes!" Shane screamed, right in his face, and there was something so frightening in his eyes that Claire couldn't move. Couldn't breathe.
Michael let him go, walked over, and picked up a couple of things from the pile that had spilled out of the box Shane had been carrying out.
A pointed stake.
A wicked sharp hunting knife.
"You came prepared," he said, and tossed them to Shane, who caught them out of the air. "Go for it."
Eve screamed and threw herself in front of Michael, who gently but firmly moved her out of the way.
"Go on," he said. "We do this now, or we end up doing it later. You want to move out so you can kill me with a clear conscience. Why wait? Come on, man, do it. I won't fight."
Shane turned the knife in his hand, the edge slashing the light with every agitated move. Claire felt frozen, winter-cold, unable to think of anything to say or do. What had happened? How did things get this bad? What —
Shane took a step toward Michael, a sudden long lunge, and Michael didn't move. His eyes — they weren't cold at all, and they weren't vampire-scary, either. They were human, and they were scared.
For a long breath, nobody moved, and then Michael said, "I know you feel like I betrayed you, but I didn't. This wasn't about you. It was for me, it was so I didn't have to be trapped here anymore. I was dying here. I was buried alive."
Shane's face twisted, as if that hunting knife had slid into his own guts. "Maybe you should have stayed dead." He raised the stake in his right hand.
"Shane, no!" Eve was screaming, trying to get to them, but Michael was holding her off. She turned on him in a fury. "Dammit, stop it! You don't really want to die!"
"No," Michael said. "I don't. He knows I don't."
Shane paused, trembling. Claire watched his face, his eyes, but she couldn't tell what he was thinking. What he was feeling. It was just a face, and she didn't know him at all.
"You were my friend," Shane said. He sounded lost. "You were my best friend. How screwed up is this?"