The Forever Song (40 page)

I crumpled to the deck once more, listening to the chain rattle over the side as the container sank beneath the surface, hopefully filling with water. It was done. I didn’t know if I’d gotten to it in time, if it would be enough to turn the barge, but there was nothing more I could do. As I lay there, I thought I could feel the barge turning…turning…agonizingly slow. But I couldn’t be certain.

And then there was a deafening, grinding crunch that shook the deck, as the huge ship finally ran aground. The barge shuddered violently, metal screeching, wood snapping, sounding like it was tearing itself apart, before it finally stopped moving. I thought I heard shouts and cries from the shore, gunfire booming into the night, and knew I should get up, try to help. I ached, badly, but I was healing, and in no danger of hibernation. At least not yet.

But, Zeke…

Suddenly frantic, I pushed myself upright and half crawled, half staggered over to where Zeke lay, collapsing beside him. His face was slack, but at my touch, he stirred, and his eyes opened. Bright with Hunger, glazed over with pain, but alive.

“Allie?” His gaze sought mine, worried and anxious even through the Hunger. “Did it work?” he whispered. “Did you turn the ship in time?”

“I don’t know,” I whispered back. Raising my head, I stared past the deck, but couldn’t see anything beyond the railing but trees. “I did everything I could.”

“Well, you did cut it a bit close, there, runts,” said a clear, familiar voice, as a shadow fell over me. “Another couple hundred feet, and it would’ve been a massacre. Which, don’t get me wrong, I’m usually all for, but not when I’m on the losing side.”

I looked up. Jackal stood over us, wearing his usual smirk, an assault rifle held casually to one shoulder. Raw, open wounds glimmered on his cheeks, and the sickly black veins had spread from his jaw to the side of his face, but he stood tall and proud there on the deck, shaking his head at me. His duster billowed out behind him, and his gold eyes shone in the darkness.

“Jackal,” I whispered, as he raised a sardonic eyebrow. “You’re…still here? I thought you took off….”

He snorted. “With Requiem on the loose? Where would I go, exactly? We had to stop it here, but I figured if Sarren killed us all, the damn plague would begin the second the barge hit land and the rabids got loose. I knew I wouldn’t be any help in taking on the psychopath. So, I implemented a backup plan. That way, if he managed to kill you all, at least I could warn the meatsacks what was coming.”

“That was your plan?” I glared at him, remembering what he’d said on the boat, right before he pulled away and vanished over the waves. “I thought you were abandoning us! Why didn’t you just tell me that earlier?”

Jackal gave me a smug grin. “And miss out on those lovely rants you do so well? What fun would that be?”

“Wait a minute.” Zeke struggled to sit up, his expression incredulous and skeptical. “You…you’re telling me you left to warn the town. To save the humans?”

“Don’t read too much into it, puppy,” Jackal sneered. “I don’t want Requiem to spread any more than you. It would put a rather large damper on my plans if everyone up and died. So, yes, I left to warn the bloodbags, who all agreed that we should try to stop this thing. Maybe pick off as many rabids as we could before they hit shore.” He raised his assault rifle. “That’s when I saw you and your girlfriend on deck with Sarren, getting your asses kicked, and thought I’d intervene. You’re welcome, by the way. I’m just a little sad I didn’t get to see Sarren’s face when it finally left his scrawny neck.” He snorted and looked at the pale, crumpled corpse lying several yards away. The head was nowhere in sight, having rolled off the deck when the ship ran aground. One corner of Jackal’s lip curled in a satisfied grin, before he sobered. “Too bad the old man never got to see it.”

A lump caught in my throat, even as I blinked at him. “You know.”

“I have a blood tie, too, sister.” Jackal smirked at me, though it lacked the bite of before. “I felt when the old bastard finally kicked it. It seemed to be what he wanted, so I’m guessing Sarren wasn’t the one who did him in. How’d it happen, anyway?”

I swallowed hard. “Kanin,” I began, trying to keep my voice steady, “discovered the cure…was inside him.” Jackal’s eyebrows arched, and an incredulous look crossed his face as I continued. “That he carried the cure for Requiem in his blood. He gave his life to make sure the virus wouldn’t spread to the rest of the world, that it would end right here.” My eyes went blurry, and I blinked hard to clear them, my voice coming out a little choked. “He saved us. He saved everything.”

“Huh.” Jackal blinked at me, his expression unreadable. Turning, he gazed back toward the platform, where the rabids had been minutes before. “Well, old man.” He sighed, and his voice wasn’t smug, or sarcastic, or mocking. “You’ve been waiting for this day since the rabids were first created. I hope you found your peace.”

Suddenly, he winced, sinking down on the deck, the assault rifle clattering beside him. Alarmed, I straightened, reaching out to steady him, but Jackal slumped to his back on the deck, putting an arm over his face. I could see the ugly bite wound on his neck, glimmering and black, turning the skin around it dark.

“Well, isn’t this fucking hilarious.” He sighed as the wind blew over the railing, swirling around three vampires slumped together on deck. “We saved a bunch of bleating meatsacks, killed a psychopath who is older than dirt, stopped another world-destroying plague…and we still don’t have the cure. God really does hate us, after all.” He sighed again, letting his other arm rest on his stomach, like he was just getting ready to take a nap. “Seeing as this is probably my last hurrah, I don’t suppose I could get you two bleeding hearts to massacre a village with me? For old time’s sake.”

“No,” I said, as Zeke frowned beside me. Though I
was
starving, and I would have to feed soon, as would Zeke. Hopefully, Dr. Thomas could spare a real blood bag or two. “You’re not going to slaughter the humans we worked so hard to save,” I told Jackal, who snorted without looking at me. “Besides, you’re not going to die.”

“Oh?” He lowered his arm, eyeing me with resignation. “Got the cure up your sleeve, then, sister?”

“Actually, I think I do.”

They both stared at me. I looked at Zeke, and Jackal, and felt that tiny flicker of hope grow steadily into a rising flame. Kanin had been injected with Zeke’s blood in New Covington, but he wasn’t the only one. Just to be certain, I felt along my neck where the infected rabid had bitten me, finding smooth, unbroken skin, and smiled.

“I’m a Master vampire,” I said, to their stunned expressions. “The cure is inside me, as well.”

Chapter 20

I woke up on a table.

Opening my eyes, I winced as an overhead light blazed down on me, making me hiss and turn away, shielding my face. The surface under my back felt hard and smooth, metallic. Confused, I struggled upright, squinting against the brightness, wondering where I was.

“Ah, Miss Allison. You’re awake.”

A man came forward, dressed in a long white coat, the light reflecting off his glasses. His arm hung in a sling, and a bandage covered one side of his head, but I blinked in recognition. “Dr. Richardson?”

He nodded, and the rest of the room came into focus, small and white, with tile floors and shelves full of sharp instruments. The surface I lay on was a metal table, shiny and smelling faintly of chemicals and blood. My stomach gave a jolt as I realized where I was. Somehow, I was back in the lab.

I groped back for my sword and found it missing, as well. Glaring at the scientist, I growled and bared my fangs. “You should’ve tied me down if you thought you were going to keep me here,” I said as the human’s eyes widened.

“Easy.” Richardson held up his uninjured hand. “Calm down, girl. It’s not what you think.”

“Where are Jackal and Zeke?”

“They’re fine! They’re both fine. Please, calm down.”

“Both of them?”

“Yes.” The scientist gave a firm nod. “Both of them.” He sighed as I relaxed a bit, retracting my fangs. They were okay. Even Jackal was all right. “And we’re not going to keep you here,” Richardson went on, gesturing to the door, which lay open and unguarded. “You can leave whenever you want. Just hear me out.”

“Where are we?” I asked, trying to remember the final few minutes of the night before. After the ship had run aground, most of the rabids had fled into the woods or joined the swarm still lingering around the checkpoint gates. Jackal, I discovered later, had taken a small boat out to the crippled barge rather than fight his way through the horde. We’d returned to the checkpoint the same way and found a platoon of soldiers waiting for us, thankfully with an ample supply of blood bags and no citizens around to tempt us. Jackal, apparently, had told them what to prepare for when we returned.

After downing two—just enough to heal and keep the Hunger at bay—I had returned to the hospital with Jackal and Zeke. Hendricks had been waiting for us, but with Jackal in such a bad way, I’d sent Zeke to deal with the mayor while I hunted down Dr. Thomas and forced him to help the sickening vampire. The little human hadn’t said anything when I’d ordered him to draw my blood and inject it into Jackal, clearly terrified now that there were
three
vampires to contend with instead of only one.

After that, with dawn less than an hour away, the rest of the conversation had become somewhat of a blur. I remembered meeting with Mayor Hendricks and Zeke, remembered telling them about the cure, and the mayor had asked if I was willing to offer a bit of my blood for research. After making him swear that they would not be using me for a lab experiment, I’d agreed.

And then I’d woken up here.

“Is this Eden?” I asked in amazement, but Dr. Richardson shook his head.

“No, this is still the checkpoint,” he answered, and offered a wry smile. “Trust me, I was just as confused when I woke up in the hospital and not on the island. After you four vampires left me at the lab, I thought I was going to die. I holed up near the power plant until I passed out from blood loss.” He shook his head. “But, as it turns out, it wasn’t quite my time. A squad came for me early this morning, said that one of the vampires had told them where to find me, and that Mayor Hendricks had personally ordered my retrieval.”

“Why?”

“Because of you, vampire.” The scientist’s voice was grave. “Because of what you told them, about Requiem. About the cure. They needed someone who understood the research, who worked firsthand with the virus. I came here with a slight concussion and a broken arm, and they still had me begin work as soon as the painkillers kicked in, and I was lucid enough to stand.” His eyes gleamed behind his glasses as he stared at me. “Of course, if I’d realized what they had, what they wanted me to do, I would’ve started as soon as I woke up, broken arm or no. To think…” He stared at me, appraising. “After all this time, the answer was right in front of us. If we’d only understood vampires a little more.”

“You mean the research,” I guessed. “The failed vampire experiments.”

“Yes.” Richardson nodded. “The key was vampire blood. That’s what we always thought, but we were only half correct. Normal vampire blood wouldn’t do it. Type 2 and 3 vampires still create rabids when they try to produce offspring. We needed something stronger, something more powerful, to overcome the Rabidism virus. But you know that now, don’t you? You realized the missing link.”

Before I could reply, he turned and stepped to the counter behind him, picking up something with a clink. When he turned back, a vial glinted from his fingers as he held it up, full of something that shone a dark red under the lights.

“Your blood,” he murmured. “The blood of a Master vampire, combined with the experimental vaccinations we gave to Zeke Crosse before he left, all those months ago. It hasn’t been tested yet, not on a human, anyway. But you already injected that Jackal fellow, and he’s on his way to a full recovery now. So, based on that, and the research I was able to perform…” He paused, staring at the vial, his voice going faint with awe, with hope. “This…is our cure. We finally have a cure.”

Eden celebrated that night. Somehow, though the mayor and the doctor had wished to keep it quiet for now, word of the cure had leaked out of the hospital and spread like wildfire through the masses. Despite near-starvation circumstances, cases of alcohol were mysteriously unearthed from somewhere, and hunting parties had managed to return with several deer that afternoon, so the mood of the camp was jubilant. Bonfires were lit throughout the camp, and humans milled around and laughed and talked, uncaring of the few vampires who walked among them now.

I hung back from the crowds, leery of the huge fires but also not wanting to be around that many humans drunk on alcohol and giddiness. Their excited voices trickled to me as I moved through shadows, hearing snippets of conversation, about the cure, and Eden, and going home.

I couldn’t join their celebration. We had a cure. The one thing both humans and vampires had searched for, sought after, desperately needed, for six decades. Dr. Richardson had told me that, if the cure worked as he expected, any human injected with the vaccine should be rendered immune to Rabidism. It wouldn’t “cure” the rabids and turn them human again; the rabids were already dead, and death was the one thing you couldn’t cure. But it would nullify the disease and make it so the rabid couldn’t pass Rabidism on to living creatures. If you could get close enough to inject it with the cure, anyway. And a vampire who was given the vaccine would no longer be a carrier of Rabidism and would, in theory, be able to create offspring again. It wasn’t perfect, but it was a start. I should’ve been happy.

But the cost was high. For me, anyway. The humans didn’t know. They would never understand the sacrifice that had been made so that they could live—so that we all could live.

I wished he could be here now, to see it.

Wandering the perimeter of the camp, I spotted the person I was looking for near the edge of the light and made my way toward him. Zeke also hung back from the crowds, talking to a pair of humans in the shadows. As I got closer, I recognized them, or one of them, anyway. Silent Jake, tall, dark and leaning on a crutch, shook Zeke’s hand before hobbling away with a dark-haired woman, her arm wrapped protectively around his waist. Zeke smiled faintly as I approached, his gaze distant as he watched them limp away.