More than Magic: Semester Aboard (54 page)

"I'm going to stay with Dani," Mariana said.
She looked down at her blood-coated clothes and looked almost like
she wanted to throw up. "And get clean."

"Here." Charlie fumbled in a suitcase by the
bed and pulled out a little jar. He shook out a little cube of
potion. "Give him that, will you?"

"Of course." Mariana took it and then dove
off of the balcony.

Charlie held another out. "Thomas?
Painkillers?"

"Please," Thomas groaned.

I moved over to sit by him. "Do you want
blood now?" I asked before he could take the potion.

He nodded reluctantly and I held out my
wrist. I didn't feel a thing when he bit into me and I wondered how
painful it would be without being numbed first. When he was
finished he gently pulled back and started licking the punctures
shut.

"How do I taste? Honestly." He'd lied before,
but this time I could actually see the blood that had welled up
before he licked it.

Thomas hesitated. His answer was so quiet I
almost didn't hear it. "Really good." Then he popped the potion
into his mouth and closed his eyes. "Get cleaned up and get some
rest. You deserve it."

It wasn't until I was literally washing blood
off my hands that I realized I had killed somebody. I had actually
killed
somebody. Then the floodgates opened. The adrenalin
had really kept my emotions, mostly, at bay during the fighting.
Now that it was finally over everything hit me. I had been so
scared. We had all come so close to dying, it had been beyond
terrifying. I scrubbed until my skin was nearly raw. I probably
would have stayed in the shower for hours. I had been crying and
shaking for a good twenty minutes and was having trouble stopping.
But I was so very tired, emotionally, physically, and magically too
if that was possible. The slight blood loss didn't help either. I
threw on some clean clothes and collapsed onto the couch in the
spare room. And somehow, I fell asleep.

Chapter 30

Something woke me up. I sat up with a frown,
trying to figure it out. The engines! I sighed in relief; the
engines were running again. I went out into the main room. TS was
still sprawled on the bed. He was still pale, but not nearly as
pale as he had been. Thomas was sitting next to him looking
significantly better. His arm was red and scarred, but didn't look
broken. The other bed was empty. I looked around for Charlie in
concern. I spotted Mariana out on the balcony, by herself.

"Where's Charlie?"

"In the bathroom," Thomas said. "With
Dani."

"Is Dani ok?"

"Yeah, he's a lot better. He decided he'd
rather soak in the tub and be near Charlie. Not as efficient as the
ocean, but it'll work."

I sat down on the empty bed. "Is TS ok?"

Thomas nodded. "He woke up long enough for a
drink. He'll be fine once the sun is down."

"Do you need more blood?"

"Not at the moment."

"Are you sure?" I pressed.

He inclined his head toward the balcony. "Had
some."

Mariana looked a bit paler than usual. I felt
a silly stab of jealousy and pushed it away. I noticed that the sky
was streaked with red.

"When is sunset?" I asked.

"Half hour or so." He leaned back against the
headboard and stretched.

I studied him and Nathaniel's words came back
to me. "Thomas?"

"Yeah?"

"Are you..." I hesitated, but had to know.
"Are you starving to death?"

He looked surprised and then frowned. "Not
exactly."

It wasn't a very good answer. "You either are
or you aren't."

Thomas sighed. "I guess...technically, yes."
He continued before I could say anything. "But it's slow. At the
rate I'm going I probably have a good four, maybe even six, months
before it becomes life-threatening."

"You aren't going to...let it get that bad
are you? I mean you won't...you're not..."

His eyes widened when he figured out what I
was getting at. He got up, sat down next to me, and put his good
arm around me.

"No, no," he said firmly. "That's
all...that's all way behind me. The
only
reason I'm doing
this is because I'm too stubborn to feed from anyone on the ship.
As soon I get home I'll start feeding regularly. Believe it or not
I'm sort of looking forward to it. This isn't exactly pleasant. Not
that I thought it would be. I knew what I was getting in to; at
least I thought I did..." He sighed and I saw guilt flash across
his face. "If we'd been dealing with anything other than another
vampire I would've been able to take care of it. Then, none of this
would have happened." He heaved another sigh. "None of this should
have happened."

"It's not your fault."

He smiled at me. "You're sweet."

I glanced down and prayed I wouldn't blush.
"It's true. It's not your fault."

Thomas gave my shoulder a grateful squeeze
and then returned to his bed.
It isn't exactly pleasant
.
Thomas just plain didn't look healthy. I still couldn't believe I
had never noticed before. He wasn't just a skinny guy, he actually
looked pretty sick. I wondered if it was always this pronounced and
I was just blind, or if he looked worse because he was still
healing.

"Does it hurt?" I asked.

He shook his head. "Not a bit. That potion
was so strong I can hardly feel anything, let alone pain. And I
should be better by the time it wears off."

"I meant...you said starving isn't very
pleasant..."

"Oh. It doesn't hurt, but it's not...I just
don't feel...right." He shrugged. "I'm tired. Achy. It sort of
feels like I've had the flu for a month."

I was glad it didn't hurt, but felt awful
that Thomas was that uncomfortable. "Can vampires get the flu?" I
asked, hoping that he was exaggerating about how he felt.

He chuckled. "Yeah, but I've never had it."
He patted TS on the back. "He's caught it couple of times though,
so I have a good idea of what it's like." He smiled at me. "Don't
worry, I'll be fine."

We sat in a comfortable silence for a while,
and then Thomas decided to go get some food before TS woke back up.
Charlie offered to join him, but I wasn't invited. I knew that they
were just being cautious, so I wasn't bothered. I hadn't felt
hungry until I got a whiff of the food they returned with. Then I
was absolutely starving. Neither one of them ate and I was relieved
when Mariana came back in and had some food too. TS woke up a few
minutes after sunset and was ravenous. He turned into a wolf and
gulped down food without even chewing. Thomas ended up making a
second trip to the dining hall and TS ate his second round just as
fast. He stayed awake long enough to make sure everyone was alive
and well, then curled up into a big ball and went right back to
sleep. Mariana decided to go to sleep too and snuggled into
bed.

I was still sort of overwhelmed by the past
twenty-four hours, so I decided to sit out on the balcony for a
while. I cast my night vision spell and looked out over the dark
water with everything we had just endured running through my mind.
There wasn't a cloud in the sky and the water was so calm it was
hard to believe that our fight with Nathaniel was so recent. I was
totally lost in thought and I never even noticed that Dani had
joined me until he spoke.

"How you doing, kid?" After I nearly jumped
out my skin, he sat down with a heavy sigh. "Sorry." I expected his
apology to be accompanied by his usual chuckle, but it wasn't. Dani
leaned back and propped his feet up on the rails with a soft groan.
He still looked abnormally pale and his eyes were gray and eerily
still.

"I'm ok," I said. "How are you feeling?"

Dani shrugged. "Better." He shifted his
weight with another groan.

"Do you want me to get you another
painkiller?"

"Thank you, but no. It's not that bad."

"Are you sure?"

He nodded. "I don't like to take more than I
need to. I'll be ok."

I studied him for a moment, concerned about
his recovery. "Charlie said..." I hesitated, wondering if I was
getting too personal. "Charlie said you have an injury that didn't
heal?"

"Yeah."

"Will it be worse now? Because of last
night?"

I was relieved when he shook his head. "That
punch messed me up a hell of a lot more than it should have. And it
will take longer to heal, but it won't be any worse once it
does."

"How long have you had it?"

"Few decades."

Charlie had called it an old injury, but I
had assumed he was exaggerating a little. With how fast I had seen
them heal before, a few decades sounded like a very long time. I
thought of the scars on Thomas' neck. "Will it...ever heal
completely?"

"No." Dani didn't sound very upset about it.
Resigned, maybe.

"How did it happen?" I wasn't sure if he'd
want to answer, but I was too curious to not ask.

"A mix of bad luck and dehydration," he said
simply. I considered trying to learn more, but he continued before
I could. "I hear you're the reason we're all still alive."

I wasn't sure what to say to that.

"You ok?" he asked. When I didn't answer he
gently added, "You don't have to be, you know."

I sighed and admitted, "I'm not sure how I
feel."

"Sounds like a good start."

"What?"

"You were just forced to kill somebody.
That's...that's rough no matter how prepared you are. And it's a
hard thing to wrap your head around." Dani looked at me for a
moment and then looked out over the water. "It might seem easier to
try not to think about it, but you need to. Mull it over and let it
bother you. Let it upset you. It should."

"Or else I'm just like Nathaniel, right?" I
asked, remembering what he had said to Mariana. It hadn't been that
long ago, but it seemed like ages.

"Exactly. Then get over it." He reached over
and rested a comforting hand on my knee. "Not today. Not tomorrow.
But soon. Sit around and feel confused, be upset. Then accept it,
forgive yourself, and get over it. You need to let it sink in, but
you can't let it eat you up too much. You'll make yourself sick if
you can't move on."

I flashed him a small, grateful smile and he
patted my knee. Then he heaved a sigh.

"I am sorry, Jen. This shouldn't be your
anchor. Nathaniel was a complete psycho and somebody had to stake
him. But
you
should never have been the one to do it. I'm
sorry you had to be."

"It's ok. You're right. Someone had to." I
hesitated. "Right? I didn't have any other choice, did I?"

Dani shook his head. "No, you didn't. That
was your only option. And death was the only thing that would have
stopped him. You saw how callously he staked one of his own. Sandra
was far from the first person he's killed and I doubt many of them
died quickly. He would have killed all of us. And a lot of other
people." He studied me for a moment. "But, that's confusing, isn't
it? You didn't just save yourself, you stopped a murderous lunatic
from slaughtering countless innocent people...but you still feel
bad about it."

His words rang remarkably true. That was
exactly part of what was bothering me and I hadn't been able to put
my finger on it until Dani said it out loud. "Yeah..."

He nodded. "You can still feel bad that you
took a life, but don't feel guilty about that particular one. I
don't like to say whether or not a person deserves to die, but the
world is a safer place without Nathaniel around. And that should
help you feel a bit better. There are worse things you could have
done..."

I couldn't believe it, but that did sort of
make me feel better. "Like?" I asked. Maybe it would help to hear
some of those 'things' because I couldn't imagine what would be
worse than killing someone.

"You could have killed him for revenge
instead of self-defense. Or worse, you could have killed someone
who was in the way of your real target. You could have had other
options, like just taking him prisoner. But you killed him because
it was easier. Instead of a murderer he could have just been an
idiot who..." Dani's voice grew even softer than it had been, "who
provoked you when you were having a bad day." He turned to me, eyes
churning slowly. "There are worse things you could have done, Jen.
Things that are harder to forgive yourself for...if you ever can.
This isn't one of them."

For a few minutes the only sounds were the
hum of the engines and the waves lapping against the ship. It took
a while to gather the courage to ask my next question. I wasn't
entirely sure I wanted to know.

"Dani?"

"Hm?"

"How many vampires have you had to kill?"

"I guess...fourteen if you count Sandra."

That was higher, a lot higher, than I had
expected. "You didn't kill Sandra."

Dani shrugged. "I drove a stake through two
of her hearts. She was dead whether or not Nathaniel stepped
in."

I shivered. Fourteen. "Does that...include
dhampirs?" I asked.

"No."

I looked at him incredulously. No wonder he
had such good sounding advice. He had a lot of experience, more
than I'd realized. He'd killed fourteen people, not including
dhampirs. That seemed like a pretty high number of vampires to run
into. It seemed like it was common. I felt another chill. "So, you
lied to me."

Dani snapped his head around to look at me.
He looked shocked. Maybe even hurt. "What? I've
never
lied
to you."

"I asked you if this..." I gestured at the
world in general, "Vampires and stuff. I asked if it's always this
dangerous and you said no."

"It isn't."

"You've killed fourteen vampires!" I cried.
"You can't tell me they aren't common!"

Dani sighed. "They aren't." He held up a
hand, stopping my protest. "We're immortal. Sooner or later
everyone runs into something. But, you don't end up trapped on a
ship with a vampire. This entire voyage has been insane. If you
ever encounter a vampire, or anything, you get somewhere safe and
you call MES."