Page 44 of Xantera
He was the first person to die on my watch, and the last. Ever since the Guardians approved my request to become a healer, I’ve ensured nothing like that has ever happened in front of me again.
None of my training or hard work has helped save my mother, though.
I thought maybe the Guardians had taken pity on her,I continue in a whisper.I thought they knew she was sick and needed a reprieve from her assigned job after watching my father die. I thought they’d Chosen her to help her heal. But whenever I saw her waving from those balconies, she looked like she was slowly getting worse—her movements slower, her face paler. And then she stopped appearing at all about three months ago.
Before three months ago, I never missed a Sanctuary Sunday. I always made sure to make the trek to the Blood Moon Palace so that I could catch a glimpse of her face. In return, she never missed a Sunday, either. She always made sure to shuffle out to the balconies and raise a trembling hand.
Then, right before the last Choosing, I looked up and she was gone. I spent that entire Sunday pacing back and forth beneath thebalconies, searching the Chosen Ones for a sign of her face, but she never came out. And she didn’t come out the next Sunday, either.
I was so worried she was on her deathbed somewhere in one of those palace rooms,I murmur.I thought if I was Chosen, too, I could heal her and slowly nurse her back to health.
Now, I keep seeing Belinda’s expression flit across my mind, that split-second of determination in which I could have sworn she was going to try to barge through the palace doors by force. That same determination has grown in me. I don’t have to be Chosen to get in, especially if I have the right key. But I can’t shake the feeling that I’m too late, anyway.
That my mother is already dead.
She might still be alive,Lucan says, and a scoff catches in my throat.I’m serious, Saskia. My ancestors didn’t get to study the vampires much during the chaos of their short battle—his tone leaks bitterness—but they did observe that a vampire’s bite didn’t kill their victims right away. They didn’t know if death came slowly or if… something else happened to them, but she might just be incapable of coming to the balconies for some reason. But still breathing. Still alive.
The clinical side of me tucks that information away, where I can observe it later. Every other part of me snags on the new word he just let loose, one I’ve never heard before.
Vampires?
What my kind call the parasites.Our legends claim they’re our greatest enemies—and the greatest threat to humankind. Lucan seems to bristle at the very mention of them, each of his words tight, on edge.It’s why my kind was designated as kings in the past. Not to dictate humans, but to protect them. Only, my grandfather hadn’t seen any real vampires in living memory, so he forgot what a threat they were.I can practically feel Lucan’s teeth grinding.He wasn’t prepared when the original thirteen vampires invaded his kingdom.
Wasn’t prepared.Just like I’m not prepared now.
Turning around, I gather my knees up into my arms and rest my head back against the doorway. Any minute now, the loudspeakers will announce curfew and Malcolm will return. Lucan has successfully delayed me, but how could I possibly prepare for this? I’m just one woman in a city of twelve thousand people and twelve vampires who have us trapped.
How close can you get to the Blood Moon Palace without being detected?Lucan asks.
I think about the dark alleyways between complexes, how the maze of them winds throughout all of Xantera with no cameras to monitor what happens in between. The giant courtyard in front of the palace is the only thing that stands between the edge of the complexes and the palace front doors.
Close, I say.
Okay.Lucan’s tone takes on a note of authority that makes me sit up straighter.Wait until tonight when it’s dark. Get as close as you can and observe the sentries who stand guard. How many arethere? When does their shift change? Once we know, we can make a plan for you to try out the key when they’re at their most vulnerable. Maybe I can distract them long enough for you to slip inside.
Distract them? How can you distract them when you’re on the other side of the—
A howl fractures the air outside my window, so loud and keening that I’m willing to bet the whole of Xantera just froze mid-step. So rarely does the Monster howl before the moon comes up. So rarely does my body flutter with goosebumps before sunset—like it is now.
Lucan stops howling abruptly, the aftermath making the silence vibrate in my ears.
I have others that can do that with me, if I ask them to, Lucan growls.I’m sure the sentries will be plenty distracted when they realize there’s more than one Monster outside the Wall.
More than one?I breathe, still tingling all over.
You’ll get to meet them one day, but only if you live, Saskia.The male in my head seems to burrow into my heart when he adds,You don’t die on my watch. You understand?
Tears thicken in my throat and well in my eyes as I think about all the people I’ve ever healed. All the people whose hearts have continued beating a little longer because once upon a time, I was a fifteen-year-old girl who couldn’t save the people she loved most.
Now, someone I’ve never even laid eyes on is trying to saveme.
And I want to let him.
I want to be saved.
Got it, I say.I’ll wait until tonight to observe the sentries.
Then the Monster and I will form a plan.
