Chapter Fifteen

"Did you hear?"

"Hear what?" Anne asked warily.

It was between classes, and she was exchanging her books at her locker. It wasn't usual for Amaranth to stop by, as Amaranth's locker was halfway across the school. Something was clearly up.

"Ivy Greer has disappeared."

"What?"

Amaranth nodded. "She hasn't been in any of her classes for two days."

Anne pushed her hair back from her face and tried to think. It was hard. It was probably just the worry and stress over her mother's shooting, but she had felt mildly sick for a couple of days now. It was difficult to concentrate on what Amaranth was saying.

"Maybe she's just home with the flu," she suggested.

"No, her mother called me to ask if I'd seen her. She's disappeared."

Anne took another deep breath and forced herself to focus. "Maybe she's. . . ."

She stopped. She'd forgotten what she was about to say. A slight cramp pulled at her leg, and she bent to massage it. When she straightened, she felt dizzy, just for a second, as if she'd stood up too fast.

"I did a scrying spell during homeroom," Amaranth was saying. "Just a small one, so no one would notice. I got a Coke from a vending machine and spilled a little on my desk to make a dark pool to see in. And I couldn't see anything, but I had a really bad feeling. I think something bad has happened to her."

Another cramp tugged at Anne's leg. She shifted her weight and tried to stretch the muscle out. It was really hard to concentrate on what Amaranth was saying.

"Maybe Samuel killed her," she suggested.

"I . . . I think maybe you're right. That was the sense I got, anyway."

Anne stopped shifting from one leg to the other and blinked. She hadn't really meant what she'd said.

"I thought Ivy was one of the bad guys," she said slowly. "Why would Samuel kill her?"

"Who knows why he does anything? Why did he shoot your mother? That doesn't make sense, either."

Hearing Amaranth mention her mother, Anne felt the familiar wave of anger. Yes, Samuel Gregory did whatever the council told him, no matter who was hurt, or how, or why. If they'd told him to kill Ivy Greer, he'd have done it. Nothing would have mattered to him other than that he'd received an order.

Ivy probably wouldn't have been expecting a Night World assassin to turn on her. She wouldn't have known to defend herself from Samuel.

Even though Ivy had set the bomb that had almost killed Anne and everyone else in her English class, Anne found herself feeling a little sorry for the other girl. Samuel had probably lured her somewhere isolated and then betrayed her and killed her. Maybe he'd even tortured her as well. No one deserved to be tortured, not even Circle Midnight witches who set bombs.

Another reason for her to kill Samuel. As if she needed any more.

The bell rang just then. Amaranth grimaced.

"I'll see you at lunch!" she called, already walking hastily away.

"Bye," Anne said, mechanically. Amaranth was already too far away to hear.

Anne gathered her books and headed toward her own class. In a way, Ivy's death answered a question she'd had. Why hadn't Samuel Gregory returned, as he'd promised, to kill her? He'd given her two days, but three days had passed since then. She'd had an extra day. Why?

She'd been thinking that it was because she'd wounded him when he had attacked her in her bedroom. Maybe he'd needed some time to recover fully. But now she thought she understood the real reason. He'd been out killing Ivy Greer.

Somehow, she had to stop him. Before he killed anyone else. Before he tried to kill her mother again, or her friends. Before he could kill her.

The plan they formed to ambush and kill Samuel Gregory was very simple.

Anne would reply to the email Samuel had sent her before. She'd offer to meet him at a coffee shop after dark, to negotiate. Samuel would probably come. At least, they hoped he would. Anne would sit at the plate-glass window so that he could see she was alone.

Amaranth's idea was that Samuel would be more confident, maybe careless, if he saw Anne sitting alone in the coffee shop. He wouldn't notice Amaranth and Mary and Neil lurking outside in the shadows. Using Amaranth's spells, Mary's shifter abilities, and Neil's general talents, they'd attack him as he approached. Anne would then rush outside and help with the attack. They'd try to get Samuel in such a way that no one noticed what was happening, but Amaranth would be able to cast a forgetting spell on anyone who got too close.

"What if you get knocked unconscious?" Neil asked Amaranth.

"I don't know. Maybe it won't matter. Everyone thinks something weird is going on at this school, anyway. Bombs, Ms. Jamison's shooting, Ivy's disappearance . . . this will just be one more thing."

She didn't sound very certain, and Anne didn't feel very certain, either. They needed Amaranth's ability to cast forgetting spells to get away with this. Without Amaranth, they might all be picked up by the police and put in jail.

But it was better being in jail than being killed by Samuel Gregory. She had to do something. They all had to do something. Circle Daybreak couldn't just sit back and wait to be picked off by Night World assassins.

She sent the email while everyone watched. Then they all waited for an answer.

None came.

"We'd better go ahead with the plan anyway," Amaranth decided, when it was half an hour before the time Anne had promised to be at the coffee shop. "Maybe he's gotten the email and just isn't going to answer it."

"I guess we can add 'rude' to the list of his other bad qualities," Neil said. No one laughed.

They set out through the twilight to the coffee shop. Mary and Neil each carried a wooden sword. Amaranth had a bag of charms and potions with her. Anne, in keeping with her role as bait, carried nothing, not even her purse. She had to look unarmed, or Samuel might get suspicious.

At the coffee shop, she ordered a latte, paid for it, and sat a table in front of the window and near the door. She felt sick and tense, and she wished that someone would turn off the music that was being piped through the store's stereo system.

One bullet and a rifle with a laser sight. That was all that Samuel Gregory had said he'd need to kill someone. And she was sitting right here, in plain sight, a perfect target. He'd already shot her mother, so she knew he had a gun.

Sitting still and staring into the froth of her latte was the hardest thing she'd ever had to do in her entire life. She didn't dare raise it to sip. If he was watching, he'd see how badly her hand was shaking. If he was going to kill her, she didn't want him to see her terrified as well.

The new small wild part of her rose up and told her that she wasn't going to die. That she would attack and kill Samuel Gregory before she'd let him murder her. She ought to be out there, lurking with her Daybreak friends and waiting for her prey to show up.

But that wasn't the plan. So she sat, stared into her latte, and imagined all the vicious, bloody things she'd do to Samuel Gregory after he arrived and the others had ambushed him.

It was strangely exciting.

The vampire who kept his true name secret but called himself "Samuel Gregory" approached the coffee shop.

He did not trust this sudden request from his target to meet and talk. She didn't have anything more to say to him; she'd made that abundantly clear when she'd shot him repeatedly a couple of nights ago. She probably was intending some other attack now.

On the other hand, she'd chosen a place where there would be witnesses. Surely she didn't intend to try shooting him in a brightly-lit coffee shop with a dozen other customers watching?

And he knew that she'd tasted his blood not once, but twice. He thought she'd probably be feeling some effects by now. She'd be dizzy if she stood too quickly. She'd be less interested in sleeping at night and more lethargic during the day. She might be suffering from occasional mild cramps as his vampire blood overcame her own oxygen-carrying cells.

Almost certainly, she'd be feeling sick and weak. The transformation from human vermin to vampire was a deadly one. He remembered it more clearly than he remembered most things from his pre-vampire life. It had not been pleasant. He didn't think any made vampire had ever enjoyed a truly pleasant transformation.

She might simply be wanting to speak to him about the changes she felt in herself. If that was what she wanted, he owed an explanation to her. To a true vermin, he would never owe anything, but to a budding Nightworlder, he owed as much courtesy as his duties to the council would allow him.

They'd told him to kill her, but they hadn't told him not to talk to her. In fact, he was supposed to talk to her, to get as much information from her as he could about her Daybreak friends.

So he approached the coffee shop casually, alert but not really expecting an attack. He saw her sitting at a small table in front of the store window, head bent over a tall paper cup, and he slowed slightly to observe her more closely as he drew near.

Thus, he completely failed to spot and avoid the ball of orange fire that struck him and knocked him sprawling.

Out of the corner of her eye, Anne saw a bright flash. She jerked toward the window and, at the same time, heard a light thud. The noise might not have caught her attention at any other time, but she was certain that it meant the fight had begun.

Abandoning her latte, she raced for the door.

She checked her dash on the doorstep. In that second-long pause, she saw Samuel Gregory sprawled in the parking lot with orange sparks dissolving eerily over him. Amaranth was running forward from where she'd hidden herself behind a tree. Anne couldn't see Mary.

Neil was even closer to Samuel. He'd been walking through the parking lot, certain that Samuel wouldn't be able to detect any Night World energies coming from him. Now, he'd withdrawn the wooden sword he'd kept hidden beneath his coat and was lifting it to bring it down on Samuel.

Anne started to run toward the two. She didn't have any weapon, but it didn't matter. She was ready to attack Samuel with her bare hands, if she had to.

But Samuel was already rolling away from Neil's blow. In a single incredibly graceful move that Anne wouldn't have believed if she hadn't seen it with her own eyes, he was on his feet even as Neil stabbed empty air.

Neil snarled and took a swipe that was clearly designed to cut Samuel's stomach open. But Samuel stepped forward, grabbed Neil's wrist, and twisted before the blow could land. Neil screamed, and then somehow Samuel had the sword and Neil was stumbling backward.

Anne was still several car lengths away.

Another ball of orange fire spun past her, and she ducked and swerved instinctively. Samuel ducked, too, but Neil was in his path, and the ball struck his leg glancingly before it sped past and struck a car. For an instant, Anne's eyes were pulled to the car as it sparked and coruscated with energy. She was afraid it would catch fire, but the orange fire began to die to sparks almost instantly.

She looked back to Samuel Gregory and Neil.

Neil was getting to his feet, gasping and obviously in pain. Samuel, however, was no longer there. Anne turned.

In that brief time, Samuel had closed the distance between himself and Amaranth. Amaranth had lifted her hands, probably for a third attempt at orange fire, but Samuel seized them and jerked them apart roughly. Amaranth cried out, and the spark that had been sizzling in her cupped palms flared and disappeared.

Anne changed direction and started to run toward them. But just then, she heard a roar.

It was the sound of a very large animal, and it made Anne jerk back, just for a second, as she tried to guess where it was coming from. And then she saw it, a huge animal that looked like a gigantic dog but moved like a cat. It bounded through the puddles of orange-yellow light at the foot of the lamposts, and Anne could see that it had tawny fur, like a lion.

Mary, she thought, stunned. Her name is Mary Lyon.

Everything was happening unbelievably quickly. Neil was staggering forward, but he was clutching his arm and clearly not going to be of any use. Mary was almost close enough to Samuel and Amaranth to spring, but Samuel was holding Amaranth and dragging her in front of him, swinging her off her feet as if she weighed nothing at all. . . .

Then Samuel simply picked Amaranth up, as Mary did spring, and he threw the stunned witch directly at the lion.

Shifter and witch collided in midair and fell to the ground as Samuel darted aside.

"No!" cried Anne, before she could stop herself.

The two tangled figures lay motionless on the asphalt. Neither one was getting up.

Anne ran. When she reached them, Mary was scrabbling to get her feet under her. She looked dazed but unhurt. Amaranth, however, wasn't moving. Her eyes were shut. Anne knelt and leaned to touch Amaranth's hand. Amaranth didn't respond.

"Don't move her." That was Neil, bending over them.

"Are you all right?"

"I think my arm is broken."

"Oh, God." Anne wanted to cry, and shake, and scream.

She looked around. Samuel Gregory was nowhere to be seen. A stream of people had come out of the coffee shop after her, and several of them were already frantically punching buttons on their cell phones. Calling the police, calling an ambulance.

She looked around for Mary and saw the lion's yellow body moving stealthily away through the parked cars. Good. Mary was probably all right, and they didn't need for anyone to find a lion in a coffee shop's parking lot.

Anne looked at Amaranth again. She didn't seem to be bleeding anywhere, but she was still lying perfectly still, and her eyes were still closed.

"She probably got a concussion when she hit Mary," Neil said. "He threw her head-first."

"Did he?" Anne hadn't caught that detail. She just remembered the horrible sight of Samuel lifting Amaranth as if she weighed no more than the average backpack and throwing her into the path of the springing lion.

"Yeah." Neil's face was very pale. "Do you know something?" he went on, almost conversationally. "A broken arm hurts. A lot."

"I'm so sorry," Anne said helplessly. "You all got hurt because of me. I'm so sorry."

"I've never had a broken arm before," Neil went on, as if he hadn't heard her. Maybe he hadn't. "It really does hurt."

"I'm so sorry."

"I wonder if it's a simple break, or a compound one? I think you have to put steel clips in, sometimes, if it's a compound break."

"Stop it!" Anne cried, before she could stop herself. "I said I was sorry!"

A shadow fell across them, and she flinched back. But it was some of the customers from the coffee shop, coming to help. And then the police arrived, and the paramedics, and they took Neil and the unconscious Amaranth away. Mary didn't return, and Anne had no opportunity to say anything privately to Neil.

She told the police that she'd seen something outside of the window and had run out to see what was happening. Since everyone else in the coffee shop told the same story—with variations about large yellow dogs and orange balls of lightning—the police let her go.

Anne went straight to the hospital. She couldn't find anyone who would tell her about Amaranth or Neil. She wasn't a relative, and she could tell that the nurses just thought she was a troublesome teenager. Eventually, she gave up and went to her mother's room.

"Hi, darling," her mother said. She was watching television, but she pushed the "off" button on the remote when Anne walked in. "I didn't expect to see you tonight. Homework all done?"

"Yes."

"I've got some good news. The doctors say they'll probably release me the day after tomorrow."

"That's great."

Ms. Jamison probably heard the lack of enthusiasm in her daughter's voice. "Is everything all right? You look upset."

Anne looked at her mother's still-pale face. She didn't know what to say. The whole story was unbelievable, and it had grown too far for her to know where to begin. Even if she had been free to tell her mother about the Night World, she wouldn't have known how.

"I'm okay." She sat down on the chair next to the bed, though, and took the hand that her mother held out to her.

"Sure?"

"Yes. Mom?"

"Yes?"

"Is it okay if I spend the night on the chair here again?"

Ms. Jamison looked at her daughter's drawn face. This shooting has been hard on her, she thought. Anne's had to face some unpleasant facts about how we don't live forever. It's hard on a teenager to see her mother in the hospital.

"All right," she said gently, and squeezed Anne's hand gently. She saw a little of the dull despair leave her daughter's face, and was relieved.