Page 29 of Rock Bottom
He nodded. “I will speak with our Queen to arrange something.”
A short time later, maybe twenty minutes, Kirsten came in the door with a different band than the one in the courtyard. They all followed her in with their instruments, and Kirsten told us, “A few things you need to know. This realm auto-translates. Or, I guess the magic does. The band members don’t speak English, and you don’t speak their language, but the translator does a decent job of figuring out what everyone is saying. It isn’t perfect, so if you think they aren’t understanding something, word it differently. Simple words and sentences, and no dangling modifiers or bad grammar, because those things trip it up. Also, puns aren’t going to translate.”
She smiled at the group and looked back to us. “The name of their band, they are the Karakanagos, and this is a case of a made-up word that’s also a pun not translating. Loosely speaking, the band name implies they all have huge dicks.” She formed her hands as if to demonstrate the size of a big dick, grinned at the female band member, and looked back to us. “I trust these guys. They’re good people. Ya’ll can do your own little meet and greet, they know your musicians on Midgard but nothing else. Ring the bell if you need something. I’ll have more beer brought up, and some snack foods. Do ya’ll need anything else?”
They had a pear-shaped guitar-like instrument, and one of them taught me to play it. The drummer had brought two drums instead of a full kit, and he and Mikey fell into a deep conversation while I got acquainted with the instrument that translated as lute, rather than guitar.
It was feather-light in my hands, almost unsettlingly so, and the first time I brushed my thumb across the courses, the resonance bloomed out so richly it seemed to fill the room. The sound was deeper and more luminous than any guitar I’d held. Even the softest touch made the air hum. Every note had a kind of crystalline edge, sparkling against the warm body resonance.
I experimented with moving my hand closer to the bridge, marveling at how the tone brightened to something almost chiming, then shifted near the neck and felt it turn warm and rounded. One of the players showed me a technique they called ‘thumb-under,’ where my thumb slipped beneath my fingers so I could pluck the courses in a rolling pattern. It felt alien at first, but by the third pass, I loved the fluidity. The tension on the strings didn’t seem enough to do anything, vibrationally speaking, but man, did it play music.
It didn’t take long to learn the tuning or the basic chords. One of the band members rang the bell and asked the staff to bring us some music. When they were delivered, the sheets weren’t staff notation — more like an elegant diagram of symbols and lines — but it didn’t take long to follow along after it was explained.
To my surprise, they’d brought arrangements of a few classical pieces, plus some eighties songs I’d grown up hearing. My fingers picked out familiar melodies, transformed and strange on this alien lute, but still distinctively familiar. Music from home played on an otherworldly instrument.
“You know about our music here?” Mikey asked, looking almost as enchanted as I felt.
“We’ve known about your classics for ages,” one of the players said, a little shy. “And we’ve learned some of the songs our Queen likes best since she came to us and passed the tests.”
I couldn’t help grinning. Playing those old melodies in another world, on an instrument that felt half magic, I felt lighter. Like maybe for a few hours, none of the down-the-rabbit-hole revelations mattered.
The band stayed with us most of the night, filling the room with music and laughter until nearly dawn, when they left and we finally went to bed. When Kirsten returned hours later, while we were eating breakfast, she told us it’d been deemed safe for us to stay at Homewood. “We can keep you safe there, and I believe you both have some questions that can only be answered back in your own realm.”
Chapter 10
Julian
Silver knew about vampires. She knew about Lugat and Strigorii.
The thought kept ringing in my head, celebratory bells first, but they soon turned to funeral bells. What if she wanted no part of me, ever again? A blade of dread pressed to my throat, so it was good I don’t have to breathe.
What if this knowledge severed the fragile bond we’d formed? She’d looked at me with love before. Trust. What would I see when I looked into her beautiful blue eyes again?
Fear? Loathing?
When would I get to see her? I both wanted it to speed up, so I’d know, and yet terror kept me hoping it never happened, so I’d never have to see horror in her gaze when she looked upon my face.
The sun rose, and I died all over again. No breath, no life. Nothing but a fierce burning in every cell of my body as I once again died, the magic that animates me abandoning me, chased away by the sun.
And then I was awake again. Reborn. Just like that.
I now wake an hour or two before the sun sets, rather than rising as it dips below the horizon. Marco’s power has done that for me, because I rarely rose before the sun’s daily death while in Europe.
Stay put, Marco’s voice came into my head, dripping with authority, and then he replayed a conversation with Silver. Kirsten stood with my Silver, her arm wrapped protectively around Silver’s waist while Marco talked to her.
“Julian isn’t available just yet. I am old and powerful, so I rise long before the sun dips below the horizon. Julian will wake an hour or two before because he’s young and…” He motioned towards a seating area. “Please, sit. You are safe in my presence, and in Julian’s. I have some things to explain to you.”
I braced for dread, but the feeling didn’t come. Instead, relief soothed my vampire heart like moonlight sliding past storm clouds and illuminating our world. She was here. She hadn’t run. She was listening.
He told her a lot about how vampire society works, survival of the fittest, the rules that had shaped every day of my existence. He explained how new vampires need decades to learn control, and they must pass some harsh tests to prove they’re safe around humans before they can be allowed out on their own.
“Aaron told us Micca hadn’t been able to pass tests to show she’d be safe around humans,” Silver told him, her voice steady, “and she’d been sent somewhere harsh to learn.”
“Julian never had a chance,” Marco told her. “I’ll let him explain his human life to you, but suffice it to say, by the time he was turned, he was used to following orders and basically being owned by others. His first Master, the vampire who turned him, should’ve taught him control, but she did not. It worked to her benefit because she had a long-term slave, since he couldn’t even begin to pass the tests. Eventually, when she tired of him, she sold him to another vampire. Julian was a slave, and he still is, legally speaking, but I’ve given him a path towards freedom. It’s why Adelaide or another vampire must be near anytime he’s alone with you — he can’t legally be alone with a human until he passes those tests. I’m bending the rules and allowing them to stay in another room, but they’re still monitoring him.”
He looked at Kirsten and back to my Silver. “He’s never come even close to losing control around you, and I feel certain he’d be fine without a minder, but I’m following the rules for a variety of reasons, and that means someone’s always close.”
Silver’s voice came soft but clear. “So, you can fuck with my memories? He can fuck with my memories?”
