Kelly Mendig - Three Days to Dead

It was the source of the smell, of the dread, and of the sense of death. My death. My blood.

“Oh my God.”

Shit. “Alex, don’t come in here.”

Too late. He bolted back into the hall before he threw up. I ignored the retching. I couldn’t lose it, too. This was what I’d come to see. It’s what I had to remember. How had I gotten there? What had I learned that was so goddamn important?

I tried breathing through my mouth, but could still taste the stench. It permeated the room, the air, my senses, my skin—everything. I thought about Max and going to see him the night I left Wyatt’s bed, so certain that Max could help me, give me something on an alliance that was—at that time—only a rumor. Tell me if it was fact or fiction.

I took another step inside, less than a foot from the torn and defiled mattress. I studied the bloodstains. Most were centered, and imagination, not memory, told me its source. My stomach tightened, forcing bile into my throat. More blood dotted the head, near the dirty handcuffs. Footprints smeared it in unremarkable patterns on the concrete floor, but left no discernible shapes or sizes, just shadows of many feet. Had Wyatt knelt there? Held my hand? Watched me gasp for air and finally die?

The handcuffs had bound my wrists, the shackles my ankles, and had held me prisoner for almost three days. Most of the blood spilled was mine, but I felt some semblance of satisfaction in knowing—because I knew how hard I would have fought—that some tiny amount belonged to my captors. I knew I had been tortured here, because Rufus said so. I knew I had died here, because Wyatt said so.

But I knew nothing about that room from my own memory. Nothing.

The room tilted. I was on my knees, arms around my waist, hugging myself tightly. My entire body trembled. Slowly, I was beginning to lose it. If seeing this hadn’t shocked my memory into returning, would the next forty-eight hours really make a difference?

“Evy?” Alex was in front of me, crouched to eye level. He held my upper arms and shook me gently until I met his eyes. Twin blue puddles of concern shocked me out of my downward spiral. “Evy, are you here?”

I licked my lips, tasting death. “I’m here.”

“Do you remember?”

Tears, hot and bitter, seared my eyes. I didn’t blink, only stared. Sought answers in his eyes and found none. I was stronger than this. I inhaled and held it, imagined the oxygen was cleansing me, energizing me. Centering me so I could get on with the task ahead. In Alex’s concern, I saw Wyatt—waiting for me, counting on me to rescue him and make it right. To do what he’d brought me here to do.

“No,” I said on the exhale. “I tried and it didn’t work.”

“I do not know what memories you have lost,” Isleen said, “but perhaps memory is not what drew you to this place. Perhaps it was fated that we meet.”

“I don’t believe in fate.”

“No? Truman places great value in fate and fortune.”

I thought of Tovin and the vision that had brought us to this point—Wyatt’s blind adherence to that bright, happy future. It set all of these events into motion, and with only two days left, that future loomed on the edge of darkness. One gentle push and it would fall into the abyss, along with my life and his free will. So much suffering for nothing.

Using Alex for leverage, I stood up. He hovered, and I let him. Isleen stood casually in the doorway, outwardly unaffected by the sight or odor of the room. It surprised me, with wood surrounding her in all directions. Polished or not, it had to be discomfiting. Never mind her keen sense of smell.

No, her nostrils flared every few seconds, timed with the rise and fall of her chest. She sensed it; she was just good at hiding it.

I stood toe-to-toe with her, unintimidated by the eight inches she had on me. “Truman’s blind devotion to the idea of fate is why his own people are trying to kill him.”

She arched a slender eyebrow. “I thought his people were trying to kill him because he possesses information they do not wish to see made public.”

“That’s insane. They think he’s a traitor. No human would benefit from a vampire/goblin takeover. All of us would suffer.”

“Except for the humans rewarded for seeing such a takeover to fruition.”

The room suddenly seemed twenty degrees too cold, the walls too close. What she suggested was impossible. Goblins couldn’t be trusted. No one with any sense made a deal with one and expected them to uphold their end. Not without a vampire to ensure it.

“This is insane,” I snapped. “They took Wyatt because he kidnapped one of them and tortured him for information. They think he’s turned rogue, that’s all. You’re making me see conspiracies where there aren’t any. You don’t have any proof.”

“You are correct in this, Evangeline. I have only my suspicions and experience.”

“Well, I’ve got my suspicions and experience, too, lady.”

“Then I apologize for voicing my assumption, but my previous observation still stands. We were meant to meet, you and I. We are battling a common enemy, and we are running out of time.”

“You think we should help each other out?”

“I do.”

“Because you’re happy with the status quo and don’t want to see your people become a dominant species?”

“I do not wish to see the goblins become a dominant species. Vampires may not be dominant over humans, but we are still a superior race. Nothing changes that.”

I snorted. “So how can you help me?”

“Have you ever heard of Mo’n Rath ?”

“Punk band?”

“It is an ancient vampire ritual,” she said, unflustered by my sarcasm. “We live long lives and, at times, we forget. The Mo’n Rath helps us recover forgotten memories. I have never attempted it with a human, but as I said before, you are not completely human. It may work.”

Alex had suggested hypnosis. Isleen was suggesting a vampiric memory ritual. As much as I preferred waiting for what was behind Door Number Three, I had to do something. The memories weren’t coming back on their own, so I had to go in and dig. Or let someone else do the digging.

And what was with her insistence that I was not completely human? Was it another side effect of the damned resurrection spell? If so, Wyatt was going to get an earful.

“Say we do this,” I said. “What do you want out of the deal?”

“Simply to stop the alliance. And, of course, I get to slay the vampire traitors involved.”

I looked at Alex. His expression was slightly glazed. It was familiar—the one he got when things started getting excessively weird. Sooner or later, he’d get used to it, but for now his innocence was refreshing. It reminded me what the Triads fought for—confidentiality. We kept the Dregs a controlled secret, and the rest of the world went about its merry way. Failure meant a lot more people walking around the city wearing expressions identical to his.

“You don’t have to keep helping me, Alex,” I said.

“Yeah, I do,” he said.

“You could get out of the city, far away from all of this.”

“I don’t have anywhere else to go. Chalice was my family.”

I brushed his cheek with the back of my hand, my heart swelling with gratitude.

“Touching,” Isleen said, “but we should be going.”

Leave it to a vampire to ruin a tender moment. I turned back to face Isleen. “Do you know someone who can perform this ritual? Someone trustworthy?”

“I do,” she said. “Myself.”

51:50

We left Alex’s car by the train tracks. I had no intention of returning to the abandoned station, and by now the make and plate had been given out to every cop in the city with a working radio. Isleen led us to her stashed vehicle—late-model sports car with tinted windows. It looked like something a rich lawyer would drive.