Again the stars disappeared and angry gray clouds pa.s.sed over the moon.
The Chairman sighed and let Eve go. "They play hardball with no sense of humor," he muttered. He studied Eve for a moment; the complete darkness temporarily fracturing anything rational left within him. "Only Neteru who has my heart, let me propose a tender offer." He waited as she stared at him, more ravishing in the complete darkness. "If I deliver Lilith"s head and dethrone this pretender prince to my throne by summarily exterminating his young, arrogant a.s.s... would you be inclined to wager another visit on a moonless night and remove the will barrier to me... just for one night?" He waited, knowing that he should allow her to answer before speaking again, but couldn"t help himself. "That"s my final offer."
"Let me take the request up with authorities," she said, smiling at him in the completely blackened night.
"That you would even propose it to your council inspires me."
She chuckled deeply and began walking toward the water. "Oh, Dante, don"t be silly. This has to be discussed way higher than in council."
Stunned, he held her with a magnetic bolt of dark energy to keep her from leaving. "You would do that for me?" he whispered in awe. "Take such a request that high up?" He closed his eyes.
"I have to go," she said, looking at the dark energy current.
"Wait," he said in a rush, wanting to keep her talking and interacting with him for the rest of the night. "I hear the young female Neteru no longer has her blade."
Eve smiled. "That was a very sloppy attempt to make me jealous, Dante. Really. That was beneath you." She shook her head as his gaze slid away with embarra.s.sment. "If she gets into trouble, you know we"ll make sure it"s restored when necessary." Eve remained serene. "But if you"d rather take your chances with her..."
He laughed, contrite. "She tried to strangle me, Eve. Have you ever? In my own chambers!"
Eve laughed with him and covered her mouth with her hand. "Dante, you are from the Old World with a different set of sensibilities. However, if you insist on running after a younger woman..."
"You know you"re irreplaceable. She was just a fantasy, a diversion because I missed you so." His smile faded as his face became serious. "With you, I could withstand the night for several more millennia." He stepped closer. "With you, no daywalker would be necessary for me to find contentment."
"Ah," Eve breathed. "Then I stand corrected."
"I am dead serious, no longer negotiating."
Her smile faded and her voice became gentler. "Then I really must go."
"Did I tell you that you"re beautiful?" He looked up at the now pitch-black sky. "They can eclipse every star and every moon in the galaxy, but I would still be able to see your radiance in the dark. Stay with me tonight."
She shook her head no, and for the first time since he"d spotted her on the beach, fear reflected in her eyes.
"We have a son together, we made life-you and I. We have history and laughter... we made history, and-" "Dante, don"t," she said, honest tears shimmering. "This conversation is over."
"Why?" he argued, coming closer as a long blade materialized in her hand. "Because you don"t trust me or yourself?"
"Both."
He nodded, satisfied in part. He looked at the Isis blade in her hand and then sought her eyes. "It always looked better on you, anyway."
She lowered the blade, closed her eyes, and raised her chin as though consulting Heaven. It did something to him to see her that way, so near to the breaking point that the joints in her knees were about to bend. He replayed the incident in the Garden for her in vivid color, texture, and tone, and she redoubled her grip on the sword. But the fact that she was strong enough now at her age to resist every psychic bombardment he was leveling at her impaled him where he stood.
"Have that conversation, please, and see what they"ll allow if I deliver," he whispered in Dananu.
She didn"t commit, just began moving forward toward the violet pyramid opening at the crest of the next wave, leaving him to remember everything all alone.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Hours of searching and the result was still the same: no Carlos. The mission had been in vain, and part of her knew that before she"d even jumped into her Hummer. Daylight might shed light on his whereabouts, but he"d obviously vanished into the night.
The team had pulled together, everyone"s senses keen and sweeping for injury, demons-nothing. Therefore, his disappearance had to be willful. The one thing she was sure of was, if Carlos didn"t want to be found, he wouldn"t be.
There was no SOS beacon prying its way into her senses. There was no blood trail for her and her trackers to pick up. Memory of the Chairman, and that demon"s AWOL status made one dread with every breath. If Lilith resurfaced, G.o.d only knew what Carlos had been up against alone. Still, there should have been a trail.
She reentered the living room of the family house and went up to Marlene. Rider and the others could fill in everybody else. She and Mar needed to have a closed-door, one-on-one. She didn"t care how it looked, how people might take it; she was so upset right now that all of that was secondary.
Marlene looked up the moment Damali came through the door and stood. No words needed to be exchanged. Marlene nodded and went toward her bedroom. Damali followed, not even greeting the worried housebound team members. Her man was missing, injured, and had possibly relapsed.
"I know," Marlene said in a quiet voice as she shut the door.
Damali walked in a circle, tugging at her locks. "Mar, there"s a huge problem out there beyond the one we already know about. I can feel it, but can"t put my finger on it. Call me double paranoid, but my gut ain"t been right about Carlos since we left Philly."
Marlene stared at her. "This relapse may be a Net-flux, kiddo. Let"s not become overly alarmed. We know he had an att.i.tude when he left, and may have just gone somewhere to chill out till daybreak. None of us with second sight are picking up that he"s out there injured, or abducted. In fact, who are we to talk? We"re all shaky."
"That"s just the thing, Mar," Damali said. "Shaky or not, I can"t pick up anything on him. No vibration whatsoever. It"s like a total absence of light, nothing to track, and even when he was a vamp, I could home in on the brother. Something even deeper than the infection is wrong with him-I know it."
"It may be us," Marlene said slowly, again raking her hair in frustration. "We"re all infected. Like the fact that Shabazz and I didn"t want to come home, and didn"t right away, when there was a serious emergency going on... and Marjorie and Richard said they were tired of being parents and stayed away from the house as long as Shabazz and I did. Can you imagine?" Marlene shook her head and glanced out the window. "It took everything in us to fight the urge just to leave the family." She closed her eyes. "The pull just to worrying about ourselves for a change, being together without responsibilities... our judgment is impaired, baby. Maybe yours is, too."
She didn"t want to hurt Marlene"s feelings by telling her straight up that she was no longer banking solely on her mother-seer"s second sight, but the fact remained that Marlene"s judgment had been shattered and stretched thin since Kamal had hit North American soil and the portals had been opened. Damali chose her words carefully, avoiding the too-hot topic that was currently not her main focus, then stopped pacing and leaned against the dresser to look at Marlene squarely.
Marlene opened her eyes and folded her arms over her chest, allowing her gaze to slip away from Damali"s toward the window again. "His energy has been different. Angry. Unsettled. Kicking up a lot of dust in the house, creating an undercurrent. But Shabazz and I have talked about that at length. We"d been through the same drama with you, so we weren"t particularly concerned. Plus, with the strained living conditions, the loss of his mother and grandmother, all you two kids have been through, and him being a rogue male that had to come in out of the streets to this new Joe-citizen life..." Marlene let her breath out hard.
"Showing a little teeth every now and then didn"t really worry me, even with what we know now... until tonight."
"I hear you," Damali said, pushing away from the furniture. "But, Mar, he came by my house this afternoon in a cold-blooded vamp purge. Shivering, daylight sensitive, and when I doused his clothes and vomit in the yard, the ground swallowed it all whole."
"What?" Marlene whispered. "He"s supposed to be immune."
The tone of Marlene"s voice and the look in her eyes made Damali hesitate. She could feel her blood pressure spiking within her as she again chose her words with care.
"Mar, listen," Damali said slowly. "He upchucked green bile, which, given how much he"d probably thrown up already, and what he drank last night, made sense. But the smell..." Damali wrinkled her nose and shook her head, almost tasting the putrid stench on the back of her tongue as she remembered it. "I took everything, even the bathroom sponge, out into the yard, and doused it.
Holy water, oil, salt, you name it. If it was in my cabinets, I beat it back with what you"d given me to protect the house. The s.h.i.t smoked, the ground opened up, and sucked it down, and then the earth closed over like nothing had ever been there."
"Have you been with him since all this happened?" Marlene began to pace. "Not that I"m in your business, girlfriend, but-"
"No," Damali said quickly. "I hear you, and no."
"Good. Maybe you"d better hold up on that until I can divine something more on the situation."
Both women stared at each other for a moment.
"That"s not gonna be a problem," Damali said, her tone distant and sad.
"We"ll find him," Marlene rea.s.sured her.
"That"s not what I"m talking about," Damali said, her eyes seeking Marlene"s for understanding.
"Oh," Marlene said in a quiet voice. "Since when have things cooled?"
"Since we got back from Philly. A couple of times, yeah... but, it wasn"t the same." Marlene held Damali"s gaze, but kept her voice tender. "Why, baby?"
"I don"t know," Damali said with a sad smile. "I was hoping you could tell me?"
Marlene chuckled softly. "I can tell you a lot of things, and see a lot, too, but that I can"t divine for you. Your heart knows the answer, so talk to me."
Damali let her breath out in a rush of frustration, blowing a stray lock up from her forehead. "Marlene. ... I don"t know. I"ve been stressed, with all this stuff that"s going on, worrying about how to keep the uninitiated members of the team safe, the moves, everything. I"m battle-weary."
Marlene shook her head to signal she wasn"t buying the explanation. "No, girlfriend. I hear you about the stress thing, but-"
"I know, I know," Damali said, holding up both hands. "All right, here"s the deal as honestly as I can tell you." She looked away, finding a benign spot on the wall. "I go to hug him, and I tense up. He goes to kiss my neck, and I freeze. There"s this deep- down revulsion that I have to get past; then I have to hide that away in my head, black box it, and then talk to myself while he"s holding me to remember, this is my friend, my man, we"ve been through thick and thin, he loves me, I love him. I"ve got so much chatter going on in my head that by the time everything is over, I just feel relieved, then want him up off of me and out of me as soon as possible. It"s all I can do not to dash for the shower. Now, I know I"m wrong, crazy, it makes no kinda sense... and Lord knows, I"m-"
"Stop beating yourself up, right this minute," Marlene said in a firm but gentle tone. She walked away from Damali and went to the closet, found her big satchel, and extracted her huge, black book. "When are you gonna learn that you can come to me with anything, chile? I"m female. I"ve been there. And every time I have been, my gut instinct was never wrong."
Again, there was a long pause as their gazes and minds connected.
"I just figured..." Damali"s voice trailed off as Marlene shook her head. "Maybe I"m reacting to the contagion, or it"s affected me in some weird way?"
"I know how you feel about Jose," Marlene said bluntly. "Know how he feels about you, too. No matter. But he"s a carrier, and you respond to him. Your body is functioning normally. It"s your head or your heart, maybe your spirit link with Carlos. I don"t know."
Shame made Damali"s face feel warm. "I don"t wanna talk about... let"s just focus on Car-"
"Girl, please," Marlene said in an exasperated tone, dropping her satchel and the Temt Tchaas book on the bed. "The man is fine. Jose is crazy about you, always has been. Y"all are tight, thick as thieves. You guys practically grew up in the compound together and share so much in common. You have a pulse, so, chile, an attraction is normal. Been there, too. Recently." Marlene looked away for a moment, but returned her gaze to Damali"s. "But, the thing is, you have a line, he has one, too, and you"ve both elected to honor it. Cool. My lips on that are sealed; ain"t my bizness. So, Jose hooked up with Juanita, even though she"s a piece of work... but has a good heart down deep; and you"ve hooked up with Carlos, who also has a good heart-down deep."
Marlene stared at Daman intently. "Now, pound for pound, round for round, given the real special connection you and Carlos have, I"m not understanding what"s ringing your alarm bells. The man ain"t been nowhere, ain"t been with n.o.body but you."
"I know," Damali said quietly.
"He hasn"t flagrantly relapsed, yet. Hasn"t said or done anything any more or less annoying than the average male, has he?"
Damali shook her head.
"So, I can get with fatigue, general purpose not feeling romantic due to lack of privacy and chaos-oh, yeah, been there. But revulsion-your word not mine, seems a little extreme. And all of us who have been infected have heightened libido to the point of the ridiculous, not lowered. I could understand if you two couldn"t get out of bed to make decisions or address this new threat. That would make sense, given how this mess is manifesting in the household. But you"re telling me you"re revolted by the love of your life? Uh-uh. Something ain"t right."
"I know," Damali whispered, tears beginning to form in her eyes. "What"s wrong with me, Marlene?"
Marlene flipped open the book and began furiously turning pages. After a while, she sat down and sighed. "There"s a lot in the book, honey. You"re a huntress, with vampires as your primary target. You"ve mastered dealing with that ent.i.ty. Know werewolves and incubi pretty good, too. I"m looking at your living history, and it stops dead here," she said, placing a finger on the page and turning the book for Damali to inspect.
"The Himalayas? C"mon, Mar, what"s that got to do with what we"re talking about?" Damali leaned in and sniffed. "New information burns."
Marlene peered more closely. "Just came in tonight." She gingerly touched the still-warm print and jerked her attention up to stare at Damali. "Has Eve"s signature vibration in it."
Damali flattened her hand on the page and closed her eyes. A mountain came into her mental view and she recognized it from an earlier vision, but this time landmarks surrounded it to add additional guidance. "The Chairman"s lair... oh, my G.o.d... she actually met with him on my behalf. My destiny begins there."
Marlene"s brow furrowed as she ran her palm over the ancient text, the slight brush of her hand making the secret alphabet sway and ripple as though riding on an invisible wave. "Part of it ends there, too." Marlene looked up. "Have you had any visions?"
Damali sat down slowly on the edge of the bed next to Marlene. "Yeah." Slowly and carefully she related how the cactus in her yard had transformed.
"I wonder..." Marlene said after Damali had finished, causing the young Neteru to hang on her every word. "Two things. You could be really angry at having lost the Isis long blade in large part because of Carlos, and that could be driving a wedge between you. I"m no psychologist, baby, but being with him did significantly alter your career path. You wouldn"t be the first woman to harbor deep-seated resentment, even while loving a man, for something like that."
"I don"t know," Damali said, studying her clasped hands. "Maybe. I"ve thought about it. But if I had to do it all over again for the same outcome, him being alive, I would."
"That"s just the thing," Marlene said, her voice warm, and her palms covered Damali"s. "It had to be done, you made the ultimate sacrifice on his behalf-gambled everything, gave up something that defined you, and he got to be redeemed, stepped into your s.p.a.ce, your family, your team, and has the gall and audacity to have an att.i.tude about things not going exactly his way."
Damali nodded fervently. "Ungrateful b.a.s.t.a.r.d."
"Ahh... now we"re getting somewhere."
Damali smiled for the first time since she"d entered Marlene"s room. "Okay, I got beef about a lot of things."
"You"re glad he"s alive, thank G.o.d that he is, but..."
"Yeah," Damali said, looking at Marlene without blinking. "But."
"Then, because he ain"t feelin" no luv, and doesn"t like the step down from the fabulous, he has the nerve to go out with his boy, Yonnie, and possibly get himself back into trouble again while the world is literally falling apart. All you can think of is all the changes you went through to save his sorry a.s.s in the first place, and all he can think of is how much he hates that a woman had to be the one to pull his b.u.t.t out of the flames. Which leads me to the second thing I was gonna say. Your energies got disconnected and you"re no longer in sync, once the big crisis was over and it was back to everyday life. So neither of you was ready and in lockstep when this new serious challenge came down."
"That is it, Marlene!" Damali shouted. "That"s it. In a nutsh.e.l.l."
"Whew," Marlene said, blowing out a hard breath. "If every world crisis could be so easily solved."
"But what about the clothes in the yard and this Himalayas stuff?"
"Were you angry when you doused his clothes?"
"Mad as h.e.l.l."
Marlene laughed. "Then, that"s where you sent them, girl."
Damali"s eyes opened wide. "For real?"
"You"re full-blown Neteru, kiddo. You sent something back into the pit, put a fury topspin on it, and it"s gone."
"Dang."
"Yep." Marlene grunted as she stood. "The Himalayas... hey. We go to the Chairman"s lair and dust him, once and for all.
Carlos doesn"t have time to go through another month of training before he spikes, even though Tibet is where some real serious martial and spiritual arts masters reside. If he has to learn Zen principles and integrate his longings for his old life with this new one in the Light, what better place for him to learn in a hurry; he dang sure ain"t absorbing what he should out here in Arizona. I knew that the moment we set foot on this land and stared at the house. Brotherman"s jaw locked so hard I thought he"d chip teeth."
Damali laughed softly in relief, remembering the day well.