Blood Rules (8 page)

“You were right, though. There was some clearing that needed to happen between us if we're to travel together.”

I'd already put on my pants and was working on my boots. He'd brought in my weapons and backpack, taking good care of me, as usual.

“It's all cleared, as far as I'm concerned,” I said. “There'll be no more of it from me. You can be sure of it.”

He rested his forearms on his bent knees, slouched, but not in a defeated way. He was shielding his reactions, acting as if my every move didn't matter to him.

I knew it just as well as I knew most things about him after we'd made the imprint through sex. Reading a vampire would've been a hell of a lot tougher without our link.

“I'm done now,” I said.

He finally looked at me, the blood on his chin bright against his pale skin. The sight of the red sent the same fear and hate through me as it always did—memories of those bad guys and what they'd done to my family.

I stood, grabbing my heat suit from the floor. It was time to get into that feracat's cove before sunrise hit.

“After we rest,” I said, “we should leave shortly after dusk in our preter forms,” I said. “With enough speed, we might hit some population in Salts”—what they called old Utah—“pretty soon. Maybe we'll come across a batch of people who can point us in the proper direction if we ask the right questions.”

“Sounds good.”

“I'll follow your lead, Gabriel. You were out here traveling more recently than me.”

He got to his feet, too, graceful as all vampires probably were. “What I need more from you is trustworthiness.”

I wished I could promise him that. “And I want the same thing from me. But wanting isn't necessarily enough.” I tried to lighten both of us up. “I guess that's why a cure would be dandy, huh?”

For the first time in . . . well, it seemed like ever, Gabriel smiled. It wasn't much—just a tip of one side of his mouth, really—but it sent a fizzing high through me.

It was a smile that made me want to live up to its cautious optimism, and at that moment, I told myself that I
could
do that.

I really could.

G
abriel had a passing acquaintance with necropolises because he'd passed a few on his way to the Badlands in his search for Abby. The stench was one of a kind—a musty decay that carried over through years of hopelessness. And, here, in a nameless outpost they'd reached that was obviously about a hundred miles distant from a town of the dead, Gabriel detected the odor, even over the wood smoke that rode the main street.

But the smell wasn't as heavy as the weight he was carrying—the cost of traveling with Mariah. As planned, they'd burrowed under the diner, where he'd battled with himself until darkness had swallowed him at the sun's rise. Thank-all for that slumber, too, because he couldn't have imagined what it might've been like to lie awake next to her, obsessing over the sight of her without clothes, her flesh pale and smooth.

That wouldn't have been the only thing keeping Gabriel awake, though. He'd never seen her enjoy changing into her were-form before, and his vampire body had been pulled to her animal freedom while she'd altered.

Even after she'd changed back, the attraction remained, but forced rest had saved him, and he'd woken up with the dusk, crawling out from their cove before Mariah had even opened her eyes. She'd soon joined him, and there hadn't been much conversation as she'd willed another change upon herself so they could cover as much ground as possible—hundreds of miles. They'd run most of the night, trying to keep to some hill and tree cover until they'd come upon a small fox pack. Gabriel had taken enough blood from the animals to last for a while, but he couldn't shed the image of Mariah, half panting woman, half towering beast, tearing at her food with those long teeth.

His bewilderment had continued as they'd both scented out this way station, which squatted in the middle of the nowheres with no name, no identity. Mariah had put her clothing back on so they could blend with the humans, but, to Gabriel, there was still a huge difference between her and the stilted flows of human blood he could detect. The place also had a sour twist of unwashed skin that hung below the necropolis and smoke smells, but at least the heat was lessening slightly. The farther they got from the Badlands, the more improved the temperature would be. Relatively, at least.

At the foot of the main street, dust seemed to veil the lone eatery and the spatter of sun-shield tents opposite it. Gabriel also identified a trace of old opium that humans still used for mellowing themselves. When the sudden sound of unholy screech-howls and human yells arose, he cocked his head.

Sounded like a tournament of sorts, Gabriel thought. An entertaining contest where someone . . . or something . . . was getting hurt. He could smell the blood now, too, and he took a piece of old shirt from his bag, fixing it over the lower half of his face. He wouldn't look out of place since humans routinely wore masks in the hubs to fend off disease.

A scraggly man with a straw hat stumbled out of a tent, accompanied by a skeletal wisp of a dog that he must've found in some hole outside a hub since the government had gathered up most canines around the time they'd banned Intel Dogs. They'd cited a canine flu, claiming that they'd wanted to get it under control.

Gabriel wasn't sure why, but it reeked of bullshit, just like most things bad guys did.

As the near-distant yelling stopped, he looked into Mariah's eyes, wanting to communicate with her nonverbally. It was supposed to be a simple vampire ability, according to his introductory pamphlet, which he'd discarded long ago. However, mind-reading hadn't always come easy to him. He was getting better at it, though.

Even so, he'd be keeping the vampire tricks to a minimum when they were around people. He had to be quietlike about what he was, just like Mariah.

I say we greet that man,
Gabriel thought to her, tilting his head toward the straw-hat guy who was clearly supervising the whiz his dog was taking by the tents.

Mariah just nodded, almost as if she were surprised he'd cared to enter her mind.

Together, they ambled toward the straw-hat guy, who didn't hear them approach until they were upon him. He gasped, his hand going to his jeans pocket.

Gabriel held up his palms, speaking Text. “No hrm hre, frnd.”

Mariah didn't repeat that she also meant no harm to their new friend. She was, after all, loaded up with weapons in those holsters and the backpack she was wearing.

Nonetheless, she had her hands up, too. For the moment.

The dog growled weakly. It'd barely even had the strength to whiz; Gabriel knew as much because he'd connected with the animal and heard the feeble movement of its vital signs. He had an affinity for canines—Chaplin, this dog . . . and werewolves like Abby and Mariah.

The straw-hat man relaxed but kept his hand near his pocket. He wore a long-ass mustache that was waxed to points below his chin. “Wht u wnt?”

What did they want? Probably a sight more than this poor man could give them.

Just as Gabriel was about to begin some subtle questioning to hunt down rumors about a cure, a tinny, small, very elderly voice came from the direction of the tents.

“Which one of you asswipes took my can of beans?” Then, as if that hadn't been good enough, he repeated it in Text.

Mariah was already headed in the voice's direction, and Gabriel nodded to the straw-hat guy in the best thanks he could muster.

She whispered over her shoulder to Gabriel. “Old American's a better bet than one of those Text-hawking ignoramuses.”

He knew what she meant. There was someone speaking an upper-level language in this dump, and maybe this person would be halfway educated and tuned in to the bigger world picture.

They circled the tents, seeking the most likely spot where the Old American had come from. Meanwhile, the screeching and yelling they'd heard from the main street got louder as they approached its source.

A shade fight.

Unbelievable. These tent-dwelling cretins had two gargoylesque, hulking black carrion eaters with ropes tied around their necks and stones strapped to their wings. The hideous shades were lunging at each other, snapping their beaks, leaving tracks of blood on the dirt from their wounds while soil-caked men and women leaned forward, cheering them on.

The sight of blood deeply unsettled Gabriel, and he pressed the cloth against his face, walking away.

“Where're my
beans
!” shouted the small, elderly voice again.

Thinking that Mariah might've been affected by the blood, too, Gabriel took her wrist, handling her while navigating the maze of tents until she disengaged from him. His flesh burned where her warm skin had touched his.

“I've got a hold of myself,” she said under her breath.

“Never can be sure,” he said right back.

She didn't parry, so she must've taken his comment to heart. At any rate, there was no time for a lively discussion because they found a bent little old man standing by a campfire outside the only tepee in the copse of tents.

And
little
was certainly the best way to put it. Even with the high-crowned cowboy hat he was wearing, he couldn't have been more than five feet. He was like a mini general from the handheld screen of a history e-back, with a gray soul patch under his bottom lip and military-style pants with a multitude of pockets. A steel pipe cane kept him standing, as if he were on his last legs. Judging by the lines on his face and the deliberation of his movements, he had to be even more ancient than the oldster back in the Badlands. Maybe even over a century.

Gabriel stayed away from the fire, and Mariah remained at his side as the little old man barked out his bean question in Text again. Then he paused, finally noticing Gabriel and Mariah with a gaze that was more cloudy-white than blue.

“You're looking for beans?” Gabriel asked in greeting.

“Have you seen anyone around with a can of 'em? If you do, they're mine.”

“I suppose they are, but we haven't witnessed hide nor hair of any beans.” Gabriel put on his friendliest expression and proceeded to give the little old man a false name—a precaution he and Mariah had agreed upon. “I'm Gary and this is Michelle. We're new to this place and we couldn't help noticing that you spoke Old American. We haven't heard that in a while.”

“You wouldn't, out here.” The little guy kept peering around with his milky gaze, as if his beans were going to roll right up to his feet and all the fuss would be over. “When did you arrive at our illustrious palace?”

Mariah had clearly given the floor to Gabriel. That was another thing they'd planned—one of them would talk at a time. This way, there was a lower chance of them fumbling any cover stories.

“We got here tonight,” Gabriel said. “Lost our high-business jobs in the hubs and decided to come west. We needed a place to rest for a spell.”

Gabriel didn't know why, but the little old man's lips parted, as if he recalled something secretive and rather delightful. He seemed to forget about his beans, focusing on them instead and running his fuzzed gaze up and down their clothing.

Great. Gabriel had wanted this guy to be sharp enough to give good information, but not
too
sharp. What was he noticing about them?

“You,” the little man finally said, and Gabriel had the disconcerting feeling that . . .

No, it couldn't be. This guy couldn't have recognized them.

The old man looked smug for some reason, and Gabriel could sense the confusion in Mariah, as well.

“Son, this is a way-camp,” the little guy finally said. “You'll find other people here who also ‘recently' lost their high-business jobs, but they don't quite have the balls to cross over into the Badlands. There're more and more lately who come here, then tell themselves they'll stay for only a week or two, just to get used to the higher heat and the strange sounds of the night that you don't hear when you're sleeping in a secured hub home. Then, the next thing they know, they're speaking Text and stealing beans from an old fart.”

Mariah's imprint began to thud inside Gabriel. Was she thinking what he was? That, among these humans, there might also be preters in this camp because of an exodus? Was this man one of them?

But his blood flow was clogged, just like an ex-hub human....

As Gabriel tuned in more to the pulses around them, he at least knew that this camp held more ex-hubites than he'd sensed anywhere in the nowheres during his own trip out to the Badlands only a little over two months ago.

“There do seem to be a lot of people with the same idea we had,” Gabriel finally said.

“They're getting sick of the bad ways, just like you, I imagine. More citizens than ever are running the streets these days, stimulated out of their minds. I saw it coming, and that's why I skedaddled.”

“How long have
you
been here?”

“Pretty, pretty long.” The little guy gestured them to come closer, probably so he could see better.

Maybe this was a good thing, because the old man would realize he'd been mistaken in recognizing them. He'd find out that Mariah and Gabriel were strangers, just as everyone was to each other in the world these days.

Mariah went to the little guy first. She didn't have much to fear when it came to the campfire where the man was waiting—not like Gabriel.

In the background, a horrific screech-howl went up from the shade fight, then a raucous cheer.