Sloane Briallen

I couldn’t get service in my room.  This was bullshit.  I had gotten enough service to get texts.

The search for cell service ended with me climbing to the top of the highest tower I could get to.  I couldn’t figure out how to get inside of it, so I leapt up from the perimeter wall and scrabbled up the stones.  It wasn’t the most elegant thing, but it got me where I needed to go. 

Dawn had fully crested over the mountains, and we were well into morning.  The sun was bright in the sky and all I saw above me was blue.  It was a new, clear day.  And if that wasn’t a fucking sign, then I didn’t know what was. 

The top of the tower was flat with a parapet, covered in a two-inch-thick layer of undisturbed snow.  I couldn’t see any way to get up here, but there had to be, right?  Maybe there was a trap door beneath the snow.

I pulled out my phone and checked it again.  Two bars.  Good.  I scrolled to the number I wanted and hit dial.

I only had to listen to a ring and a half before, “Sloane?”  Mickey sounded both relieved and hesitant.  Like he was afraid of what the other end of the line held.  Which was fair.

“If we hadn’t had that dream, the one with my mom where she gave us the soulsilver, the one that you said prompted you to come find me, would you have come looking for me, still?”

“What?”

“Were you ever going to look for me?”

There was a pause.  I was afraid of the answer, but I also needed to hear it.  I needed to know what their thoughts had been.

“I don’t think either of us really had a plan.  There wasn’t like a deadline of, we train for four years, and go look for Sloane.  But . . . yeah.  I think, for both of us, there was an endpoint.  We never talked about it, but we both knew.”

“Bell, too?”

“I think so, yeah.  After that dream, when we woke up, he just looked at me.  We were sleeping at Mingan’s next to each other.  And without really talking, we got up and left.  I think we even both knew we had to go to Phoenix.  It was like we finally had permission to go looking for you.”

I let out a shaky breath I hadn’t realized I was holding.  With it tears rolled down my cheeks.  “I’m sorry,” I said.

There was a silence that, even though I couldn’t see Mickey, I knew was stunned.  I heard it in his voice when he said, “Sorry?”

“I blamed you for everything.  You and Bell and your moms.  A-and, while I don’t agree with it, I finally get it.”  I wiped my eyes with the back of my free hand.  “You did the best you could with what you had.  No one could have known what was going to happen.  It was cruel of me to put all that blame on you guys.  It wasn’t your fault.”  I hiccupped.  “I’m sorry, Mickey.  I’m so sorry.”

More stunned silence met my apology.  I could practically hear the gears in his head working.  Finally, he said, “Me, too.  I’m sorry.”

We stayed on the phone like that for minutes.  I cried quietly, small sobs escaping here and there.  I could hear the way Mickey’s breath hitched and when he sniffled.

“I love you,” I said when I had finally gotten my breathing under control.

“I love you.”  Mickey’s voice was raw.  “I-I miss you.”

It had only been a week since we saw each other.  But I knew that’s not what he meant.  He missed how we’d been.  He missed our friendship.  And fuck, so did I.  “I miss y-you, too,” I whispered, barely keeping another sob from breaking through.  “Wh-where are you?”

“I went back home when I found out you w-weren’t in the Cities.”

“Would you hate me if I asked you to go back?”

“To the Cities?”

“Yeah.”

“Aren’t you in Montana?”

“Yeah.  But I should be home tomorrow night or the morning after.  I want to see you.”  I bit my lip to keep it from trembling.

“Okay,” he said.  The word was wet and nasally.

“I’m going to call Bell.”

“He lost his phone.”

Of course he had.

“I can get a hold of him.  Get him to meet us there,” Mickey said.

“Okay.”

“Okay.”

We stayed on the phone for I don’t know how long.  We listened to each other breathe, catching hiccups and sobs in our throats.

Finally, I said, “I love you.”

“I love you, too.”

“I’ll see you soon?”

“Of course.”

“Okay.”

“Okay.”

We hung up.

I stared at my phone screen until it went dark.  I could see my reflection.  My cheeks were wet, and I looked terrible.

I felt lighter than I had in years.  I knew there would be hiccups and stumbles, both from me and from Mickey and Bell, but we were moving forward.  We were going to find a new normal.  We weren’t in high school anymore.  That dynamic would never come back.  But we would find something new. 

I couldn’t fucking wait.

The snow next to me suddenly lifted and then a wooden trap door swung open, landing on the floor with a thunk.  I looked down to see Alice’s head poking out through the floor.  She stared up at me with wide, surprised eyes.

“Uh, hi,” I said.

She took in my appearance.  Red eyes, wet cheeks, probably disheveled hair since I usually run my fingers through it when I’m upset.  “Hi.  If you need to be alone—”

I shook my head.  “No, no.  I’m okay.”

She studied me for a moment before she continued up and shut the door.  It left a perfect, clear square of dark wood with only a light dusting of snow on it.  There was an iron ring to pull it back up.

Alice wore a thick, puffy grey jacket and black corduroy pants with red woolen mittens and a matching woolen beanie with a pompom.  Her snow boots had a thick fringe around the top.  She looked cozy.

“You sure you’re okay?” she asked. 

I finally put my phone in my pocket.  “I had to reconcile with my brothers.  It was a tough conversation.”  I smiled.  “But we’re finally okay.”

Alice broke out into that dazzling smile of hers.  She had killer dimples and her canines were crooked.  It was charming.  “That sounds wonderful.”

“Yeah.”  I inhaled and exhaled.  I felt so much lighter.  “It really is.”

Alice went over to the parapet.  It was notched, with breaks in the wall (the deepest parts of my brain dredged up knowledge from my art history class in high school that these were for archers to shoot from).  She sat in a notch after pushing the snow off.

“What are you doing up here?” I asked.

“Needed a break from the wedding planning.  I’ve found that no one ever looks for me up here.  The entrance is hard to find.”  Her brow furrowed.  “How did you wind up here?  You found the entrance?”

I snorted, shaking my head.  I sat down in a notch a couple yards from her, swinging one leg over to dangle in the open air, the other staying on the floor of the tower.  “I needed cell phone service, and I figured the highest tower would help.  I couldn’t find the entrance so I climbed up.”

She laughed, throwing her head back.  “Vampires.  Can’t find the right way in, so you parkour up.”

I shrugged one shoulder.  “If I got the ability, I’ma do it.”

“No judgment here.  It’s cool.  That’s one of the things I’m looking forward to.  The strength and speed.  Also, the non-responsiveness to temperature.”

I frowned.  “I kind of wish I could respond to temperature.”

“Yeah, I do I think I’ll miss that to an extent.  But winter makes vitiligo worse.  Skin dries out more and the lack of sun makes it tough.  And my vitiligo is starting to get close enough that there’s a danger to my eyesight and my hearing.”

I hadn’t known vitiligo could do that.

“Also, I haven’t yet been diagnosed with any sort of autoimmune disorder, but they’re common for vitiligo.  So being turned means I don’t have to worry about that eventuality.”

I myself had been dying when I’d been turned.  But I still had never really thought of vampirism as a way to escape health problems.  It was interesting.

“I’m sorry about yesterday,” I said.

“I’ve heard you’ve had a shit time with dead man’s blood.  I think having a trauma response was warranted.  Besides, Cyly made sure I got out safely.  Are you okay, though?  I heard Faren was with you for hours.”

“Yeah,” I said.  I rubbed my face.  “I’m better.  I talked with Mira about it.  You know, letting out our frustrations and venting and whatnot.”

“I do.”

She huffed out a laugh.  “I knew it.”

“Knew what?”

“Devlin suddenly came to me yesterday, after everything died down with you.  He finally told me how he became a vampire.  Told me about his parents and his sister.”  She was pushing around the snow with her boots, playing with it.  “Is that because of you?”

I leaned back against the parapet, letting my head rest against it.  “I’m so glad he finally talked to someone.”  But I probably owed him an apology, too.

“It answered a lot of questions.  Thanks for talking to him.”

I shrugged one shoulder.  “Just glad he finally talked to his friends.”

Alice made a noise of agreement.

I changed the subject.  “What are you doing hanging out with twenty-year-olds?”

She snorted a laugh.  “What?”

“You’re almost forty.  I would think you’d be bored by kids half your age.”

“Ah.  Well, I’m friends with Fiachra’s cousin, Azure, who’s close to my age.  Wound up hanging out a lot with Fiachra, and then Dev when he came to live here.  I have a lot more in common with those two than Azure.  We read a lot of the same books and go for the same movies and TV shows.  Similar hobbies.  Eventually, we just started hanging out a lot.

“You can’t really go by age in a place filled with vampires.  I’m friends with Faolan and Cailean, who are hundreds of years old.  Obviously my fiancé is hundreds of years old.  If you find some common ground, and can get along, then age is really just a number.”  She paused.  “To clarify, I’m not saying any vampire should be fucking a fifteen-year-old.”

I held up a hand to stop her from continuing.  “I get it.  Trust me.”  My second serious girlfriend had been old, so I definitely got it.  “Can you answer another question for me?”

“Maybe.”

“What is up with the Irish names?  Like, your husband and his siblings are all black.  Faolan is Hispanic?  Indigenous?  And Fiachra is Asian.  Might have heard Irish last names for them, too.  Not sure.”

“Faolan Niamh and Fiachra Laisrén, yeah,” she chuckled.  “So, you know how the living vampires are pretty stuck up and clique-ish?”

“I hadn’t noticed,” I said drily.

She rolled her eyes in agreement.  “So, Faolan was born like . . . three hundred years ago, or something.  There was, like, a fad at the time because the Ruaidhrís are the Irish vampires.  Hazel is Irish.  And so every kid just got a super Irish name, regardless of if one or both parents was a person of color.  Faolan’s mom is from the same place as Matadi.”

“The Congo?”

Alice’s eyebrows went up.  “Oh you know his background?  I guess I should be more specific.  Faolan’s mom is from Palenke.”

“His mom was a slave?”

She nodded.  “His mom was born into slavery in Columbia—a lot of the indigenous people were slaves, just like the kidnapped Africans.  The Spanish and Portuguese weren’t super picky.

“She was part of a slave rebellion that succeeded, and she escaped to Palenke.  She was actually turned around the same time as the king because she was part of the same failed guerrilla attack as Matadi.  I think Aoife turned her?”

When I got home, I needed to do more research on this shit.  It was crazy.  I had only ever heard of failed slave rebellions in the US.  It had never occurred to me that other places had had successful slave rebellions.

“And Fiachra?”

“His father is the lieutenant to one of the nine generals.  He’s very traditional sometimes.  Kind of a hardass but not a bad person.  He was born into the house around the time that the Irish name craze was happening.  He was committed to having a traditionally Irish-named boy when he finally had a partner to do that with.”

“Is his dad even Irish?”

“Irish-Korean.  And Fiachra’s mom is fully Korean, and she was turned about forty years ago.

“So, Fiachra’s mom is just as hard-headed as his dad.  And she would only agree to taking his surname and allowing him to name their kid, if she got to give Fiachra a Korean middle name.”

“What did she name him?”

“Fiachra Jae-sang Laisrén.  His mom will only call him Jae-sang.  His little sister is Chun-ja.  His dad didn’t win on naming a second time.”  She smirked.  “I’m 95% certain it’s because they had a fight about the name and the argument forced her into early labor with Fiachra and his dad freaked because she almost died from blood loss.  So she got to name her.”

“I didn’t know vampires could die of blood loss like that . . .”

“Living vampire pregnancies are super high risk.  Pregnant vampires have to take so much medicine, and there’s still a high risk of losing the baby, and a risk to the pregnant person.  It’s bad.”

“Huh . . . that’s crazy.”  I shook my head.  But I was back on the Irish-names-for-non-Irish-people.  “It honestly wasn’t until I got here that I had ever seen non-white vampires besides Carry and Zeren.  But everyone here is still racist as shit.  It’s like being in Georgia, surrounded by people of color, and still hearing white people using the n-word.”

Alice grimaced.  “Yeah, it’s not great.”

“Were Cyly and the other two born during the Irish name craze?”

“Yeah.  Hazel didn’t care, but Matadi made the argument that it would be better if they got Irish names because people already looked down on their union.

“He gave them their middle names.  Decidedly not Irish.”

“I’ve never heard the name Cyly before.”

She chuckled.  “It’s a nickname.  His name is Suileabhain Anu Ruaidhrí.  He couldn’t pronounce his first name when he was younger, and it morphed into Cyly.  He kept it as his official name, primarily because it pissed off the Irish purists who wanted the princes and princess to use their given names.”

“Every time I learn something new about Cyly, I like him that much more.”

She grinned.  “Right?  He’s amazing.”

“He’s so even-keel, too.  I wouldn’t have expected a lot of this.”

“Youngest child syndrome.  He had to mediate between Saeran and Cailean a lot.  It was either learn to manage them or get steam-rolled.”

I made a face.  “Lovely.”  I started to say something else, but I stopped. 

Something felt off.  My brow furrowed, and I looked around.  There was nothing off the edge of the castle and nothing in towards the courtyard.  Still, I couldn’t shake the sudden awareness that we were being watched.

“Do you feel that, too?” Alice asked.

I was about to reply when we both looked up.

High above us, I saw four floating specks, banking and swerving. 

“Are those birds?” Alice asked.

“Yeah.”  I stood up.

“Vultures?”

The movements were like vultures hovering over a kill, but they were too far up.  I squinted at them.  They resolved after a moment.  Definitely birds of prey, but they weren’t buzzards.  They were all hawks.

They dove down suddenly.  “Uh, I don’t think they should be doing that.”

“No,” Alice agreed.  “They shouldn’t.  But whatever it is, they’ll hit the barrier around the castle.”

That was when I saw sparks above us.  The birds were aiming straight for the sparks.  That couldn’t be good.

And then—Oh fuck.

“That definitely shouldn’t be happening,” she said, standing up.

The hawks transformed into humans midair and breached the sparks.

I grabbed Alice and rolled just before the shifters landed where she had stood.

I let go of her to face the four shifters.  My fangs ran out beneath my lips and claws tipped my fingers.

I lunged at the closest shifter, a man with dark hair.

The shifter let out an eerie bird-like screech, and he met me with the blade of his arm into my throat.  I slammed into the parapet, pain exploding in my airway. 

I scrambled toward Alice, gasping for breath as I did.  I had to remember.  I couldn’t just go full on into a fight.  I had to play the defensive.  I needed to get the trapdoor up and us gone.

Two shifters were already at Alice.  She shrieked, trying to kick them off.  I saw one, with hands that were partially formed into four-fingered scaly talons, tearing into her side.

I jumped on his back and raked my claws across the front of his neck as hard as I could.  He bucked me off, and I heard a wet gasp for air. 

I fell on my side, but I had enough control to turn and end on my belly.  I launched myself back at him to get him off Alice.

Sharp claws ripped into my side, and I screamed, turning to swipe across the face of the shifter who had me. 

She screeched and her other hand went straight into my stomach.  I coughed, blood filling my mouth, and knocked my head against hers.  She cried out in pain, and I flattened my hand and jabbed with an uppercut beneath her sternum.  My claws cut clean through her skin, and I hit through something big and firm—a lung. 

She choked, falling to the ground, and I spun to Alice.

Alice lay on the ground, covered in her own blood.  Her breathing was dangerously fast.  I saw the other shifter standing over her.

“No.”  I ran at him and slammed my left leg into him, sending him into the edge of the roof.

I spun around but I saw the other shifter already taking off, going for the still-sparking shield.

I heard shouts, but I ignored them, running to Alice.

There was a gaping hole in her stomach.  I could see things I shouldn’t have been able to see.

She gasped for air, gurgling.

I crouched over her and tore my shirt off, putting it up against her stomach to put pressure on the wound.

She moaned in pain, and I saw her eyes flutter.

I got in her face.  “Alice, stay with me.” 

“C-cold,” she spurted, blood spattering her lips.

Fuck.  Cold didn’t affect me at all because I was dead, but we were in the middle of winter in Montana.  She was going to die if I didn’t get her out of here.

I grabbed her in a bridal carry and jumped.  I wasn’t going to try to figure out how to get down the tower.  Not when I could jump from the rooftops to find someone who could help.

I went straight for the Royal Wing.  I would find someone there.