Suzanne McLeod - The Sweet Scent of Blood

Ignoring her, I looked round at the stone ceiling, stone floor, steel door, thick navy rug and massive oak furniture. It all appeared horribly familiar. I was still in the same underground place, just in a different cave room. I strode to the door and waved at it. Nothing happened. A combination of anger, frustration and fear expanded like a whirlwind inside my head. I wanted to scream and cry, punch something, anything—

I concentrated on calming my thoughts. The blood had banished the hunger and the deep slice on my arm had almost healed, the skin knitting together in a raised red scar. Now I had to get out of here.

I wiped a hand over my mouth and walked back to where Hannah was sitting on the bed. ‘Let’s skip the after-dinner pleasantries, shall we? Instead, why don’t you tell me what I’m doing here?’

‘You need help, and I like to help people.’

‘ Right . Hijacking me is being so helpful.’ I stuck my hands on my hips, ‘I have to tell you, it’s not working for me.’

‘Oh, I didn’t hijack you.’ She tapped her chest. ‘I felt the blood door open and offered.’

‘Come off it, Hannah,’ I snorted, ‘until now I haven’t had your blood.’

Her smile turned sly. ‘But you did, a tiny taste, maybe, but enough to still count.’ Reaching out, she stroked her fingers across the tattoo on my hip. ‘You may not be wearing the same body, but that’s a minor technicality. It appears that the two of you are becoming so entwined that there is almost no separation.’

I gritted my teeth. Had the need for blood pulled her—Rosa, my Alter Vamp—from—well, wherever she was, and given Hannah an opening? Maybe the tattoo hadn’t worked in the gardens because Rosa hadn’t been hungry? I pushed all the questions into a dark corner in my mind; I didn’t have time for them.

No use crying over spilled—well, blood, I guessed. ‘Again. What do you want?’ I demanded.

‘I like helping people, Genevieve. I find it very rewarding.’ She stood and gestured behind her at the bed. The vamp sprawled across it, one leg hanging over the edge of the mattress as if he’d been so exhausted he’d just fallen onto it without conscious thought. ‘For instance, I rescued this poor lamb. His Master gave him the Gift and then left him to starve. He was going quite mad with hunger.’

‘We should all be so charitable.’

‘Exactly. Rio thought you’d make a nice first meal for him, only I appropriated him before that happened.’ She took hold of my left arm, stroked her fingers over the almost healed skin. Her touch was gentle, hypnotic. ‘And I’m sure that the four vampires Rio did finally give you to enjoyed you immensely—and they were much more effective at removing the iron poisoning from your body than just Darius would have been.’ She leaned in and licked the swollen bite on my neck.

A shudder of need rippled through me.

‘Without the loss of blood, you really might not have survived, even with your strange heritage.’ She kissed my mouth, the faintest touch of her lips. ‘My help is always free, I never ask for anything, but I always find it returns to me in such interesting ways.’ She sat back down on the bed, circled her hand round Darius’ ankle and smiled. ‘He really was very satisfying.’

I shook my head to clear the slight wooziness brought on by her touch. Had she just told me she’d saved my life? Not that it mattered; she was after something and no doubt I’d find out what sooner or later. Until then I had other more important things to do.

‘If you want to help so much, take me to Malik al-Khan,’ I said flatly.

‘Malik can’t help you, Genevieve.’ Her low, warm laugh echoed round the cave room. ‘I am afraid he still dances to his Master’s tune.’

So much for Plan A.

‘Fine. Get me a phone then.’ I waved an arm at the room. ‘Or get me out of here.’

‘We’re underground.’ She smoothed a hand over the silk sheets. ‘When the goblins excavated into the rock down here mobile phones hadn’t been invented, and the vamps are so archaic that as yet they haven’t made provision for communications. And as for getting you out’—she sighed, standing up—‘sadly, not everything is in my power. I am, after all, just a human. We’re in the middle of Sucker Town, and the vamps are gathering for the Challenge.’ She moved to stand in front of the huge wooden wardrobe. ‘The likelihood of you escaping and being able to get help to rescue all of your friends in time is an impossibility.’

Friends, plural? The word snagged my attention. ‘You said “friends”?’

She smiled at me like I was a child. ‘Well, you’ve more than one, haven’t you?’

Katie . An anxious knot tightened in my stomach.

Hannah opened the wardrobe and placed some clothes on the bed.

I stared at them. What was I going to do if they had both Katie and Finn?

‘Don’t just stand there,’ she chided me, and I realised what I was looking at: her Corset Girl outfit.

‘Hurry up and put it on, unless you want to go out there naked.’ She pulled a long blue evening dress out and held it up in front of her, her eyes sparkling. ‘Beautiful, isn’t it?’ She stroked a hand over the shimmering silk. ‘John Galliano made it especially for me.’ She glanced up, a mistrustful glint in her eye. ‘But don’t get any ideas about it. I know I said like to help, but I draw the line at lending you an original Dior.’

Her dress was the last thing I wanted.

The skyborn goblin curled her long cats’ whiskers, regarding me with her blue marble-like eyes as she slid her finger down her nose. I returned the greeting. A deck of cards appeared on the blue baize card-table in front of her. She picked up the cards and shuffled the pack, the cards whizzing through her triple-jointed fingers almost too fast to see, then she carefully placed them face-down on the table.

‘Hurry up, Genevieve. You need to pick a card,’ Hannah shouted in my ear, trying to make herself heard over the whoops and whistles and jeering.

I pressed my lips tight together. Now she wanted to hurry. The cave room had opened onto a stone-hewn corridor with a small underground stream running down the middle. Hannah had sniffed, then lifted the long silk skirt of her Dior and picked her way carefully up the slight slope, trying not to scuff her Jimmy Choos. I’d stomped along behind her in the Corset Girl outfit. Her boots were too big for me, so I’d stuffed them with tissue. The puffball skirt was itchy and scratched against my thighs, and she’d had to lace the corset so tight to stop it falling down that even my small breasts were bursting out over the top. By the time we’d reached the circular metal staircase that led upwards, my patience was running thin enough that I was ready to heave her over my shoulder and carry her. The staircase had taken us up into the empty—but noisy—interior of the Leech & Lettuce, the Blue Heart blood-pub.

There was another loud burst of sound, and Hannah nudged me. ‘They’ve started.’

I glared at her in disbelief, snatched up the cards, and started to turn them over.

‘No look, Lady,’ the goblin ordered, waving her bony fingers at me.

‘What the hell am I supposed to do then?’ I asked.

‘Just pick up half the pack, and give it to her,’ Hannah said. ‘Or she won’t let you in.’

‘Fine.’ I put the cards back and cut the pack.

The goblin took them and handed me back the bottom card. ‘Participant.’

‘I’m not here to participate,’ I snapped.

Hannah put her arm round my waist and gave me a quick hug. ‘You want to save your friends, don’t you? You can’t do that by watching.’