“Gretchen will give you a tour of the grounds,” Blaine announced when the crowd had left us. “Your council members and I must discuss the plans for tomorrow’s test.” He zeroed in on Sheridan. “Shall we?”
“Of course,” Sheridan said on a sharp smile.
Blaine nodded to us with that same holier-than-thou look he had given to his vampires. I forced a polite smile. I could see Carter trying not to laugh at me out of the corner of my eye. I elbowed him, and he smoothed his face. The corner of his mouth still twitched.
My dad, Blaine, and Sheridan went inside the house, and Gretchen took the path on the right that apparently wound around into the gardens. I followed slowly, content to keep a healthy distance between me and anything without a pulse.
I was surprised to see Prince Owen fall into step beside his mother. I would have figured him for bolting as soon as he was able. They moved gracefully, like they didn’t walk so much as float—or slither. I stared at a spot in the center of the prince’s back and imagined how satisfying it would be to plunge a stake between his ribs.
“Wow,” Carter said, drawing my attention back to reality and away from my bloody fantasies. I found him and Charlie on either side of me, and both of them were staring in awe as we rounded the house and the yard came into view.
“It’s beautiful,” Charlie admitted. And I couldn’t disagree.
The vampires seemed to have a thing for non-native plant life. Palm and papaya trees shot up in groves interspersed between brightly colored flowers with wide stalks and fan-shaped leaves. Directly ahead, a shallow pond surrounded by dense, leafy ferns that looked more like a jungle than a forest stretched before us. The perfume of plump orange blossoms wafted through the humid air. Tiny lights glimmered among the plants and threw everything beyond the water into soft shadows. If I didn’t know this place was infested with vamps, I’d be enchanted by it all.
The only downside was the bugs. Mosquitoes buzzed around us in thick clouds. I swatted a couple off my arm but not before one of them took a bite. I shot a glance at Gretchen and Owen but the vampires didn’t look bothered. Guess mosquitos didn’t like to eat the undead.
When they reached the pond, they stopped and waited for us to catch up.
“This is my husband’s garden,” Gretchen explained, casting her eyes over the exotic flowers with a tilt to her mouth, a constant frown I’d come to recognize as her hallmark. “He favors the exotic, as you can see. This way.”
She led us past the jungle pond to a small labyrinth made out of paving stones and a low wall that looked like white granite in the twilight. “And this is mine,” she went on with no small amount of pride. White roses grew up and around the low stone. It made me think of something from Alice in Wonderland.
“It’s lovely,” Charlie said, admiration clear in her voice.
A hint of a smile touched Gretchen’s frigid face before vanishing as quickly as it had come. “Thank you. Now, proceeding past the guest houses…”
She led us past a few little cottages. I glimpsed people in the windows, and I realized with a jolt of surprise that they were human. They sat on couches, watched TV, and generally looked like normal people. Except that they were living in the vampires’ backyard.
Charlie hesitated, staring into the window of the guest house we were passing.
I couldn’t blame her for gaping. Sure, the front rooms looked nice, but I could just imagine what it would be like farther back—did vampires keep their victims in cages? I wanted to know, but I couldn’t guarantee my reaction to the truth would be peaceable.
“How do vampires eat?” Charlie whispered.
“They drink human blood,” I said, not bothering to lower my voice.
Prince Owen gave me a sharp look, hanging back as Carter and Gretchen drifted onward. “As part of our pact, we don’t harm humans. We can sip blood from them without causing permanent damage. In fact, our saliva has healing properties for humans, and we can instantly heal the bite wound when we finish drinking.”
I couldn’t resist. “You can, but that doesn’t mean you do.”
His voice took on a hard edge. “Having a permanent settlement here means a lot to us. We don’t want to jeopardize our home, but we won’t starve for it either.”
“So you drink from them and then heal them again,” Charlie said, looking at Owen with open curiosity. After the hard time she’d had with the deer, it surprised me she sounded so accepting of his diet. “And they don’t mind it?”
Owen shrugged. “The bite of a vampire can be very … stimulating,” he said with a wink.
Charlie flushed.
Taunting my sister? Seriously? I glared. “We better catch up with the others,” I interrupted before he could say anything else.
The rest of the tour was the same. Beautiful gardens. Grand living quarters. No expense spared inside and out. I felt as if we’d stepped into another dimension. One where money grew on trees and over-indulging meant the height of social status. As we rounded the house, back again where we started, I saw the crowd of vamps from earlier had returned. They stood in a group near the front door, waiting to scream at us and snap more pictures. Charlie hung back at the sight of them and bit her lip.
“Is there another way in?” she asked.
Gretchen had already gone ahead, completely ignoring the masses. For some reason, Owen had hung back. In fact, since our conversation in front of the rental cabins, he hadn’t left us alone. Owen cocked his head. “This way,” he said.
He led us to a back entrance that opened into the kitchen. The blinding whiteness of the counters and polished steel of the pots and pans made me wonder if they’d ever been used before tonight. But as proof, the space bustled with activity. Pale-faced chefs and apron-clad assistants rushed here and there, slicing and stirring whatever it was they intended to serve later.
Owen led us past all of it and straight up a back stairwell. It was narrower and less opulent than the one in the entryway, but it was still plusher than anything at home. The adults were waiting for us on the second floor in a room Owen referred to as the parlor. The snobby way he said it made me snort.
We had drinks—the adults had snifters of brandy while the teens had club soda—until it was time for dinner. It all felt so organized, so political, so fake.
“See?” Charlie whispered over the rim of her glass. “I’m glad I changed.”
“I thought you looked fine,” I grumbled and suddenly wished I’d worn sweatpants just to prove my point.
After an hour to “dress,” dinner was held in a dining room the size of a football field. Okay, so that was probably not true—but it sure felt like it as I stepped through the grand double doors. The table was long—I counted seating for twenty easily. The walls had old paintings on them that depicted familiar faces, and I wondered how many of them were authentic. Had Gretchen Rossi really been alive in the time of ruffled collars? Had Blaine Rossi really worn plate metal armor and jousted? It was hard to tell how much was myth, and how much of it was PR meant to scare us.
As intimidating as the room, paintings, and even the marble sculptures were, it was not nearly as surprising as the fact that the vampires had dedicated so much space and money to having a dining room at all. I imagined that they ate their victims in places more like dungeons. But there was nothing dungeon-like about the tall, airy windows and red velvet drapes, and even though they did illuminate the room with candelabras, they had a few electric lights near the kitchen to keep things from being too dark. The three-piece orchestra I’d heard earlier had found its way to the balcony outside the dining room. They were playing something I recognized as Mozart with skill. I guess you can get pretty good at violin if you have a century or two to practice.
Blaine and my dad took seats at the opposing heads of the table. Gretchen drifted to her husband’s side and rested a hand on his shoulder. “How fare negotiations?” she asked in an empty voice.
“Well enough, my dear,” he said without so much as looking at her.
She continued standing as we each took our positions at the table. I was seated between Carter and Charlie near the middle of things—and too far away from either set of elders to hear anything important. I scowled into my water glass. I would have much preferred to sit close enough to hear what the Rossi queen and her dinner partner whispered about as they cast dark glances in my direction. But each seat was marked with a name card, so I didn’t have much of a choice.
I scanned the dining room, keeping an eye on all the shadowy crevices that weren’t illuminated by candlelight and the long corridors that led into darkness.
I didn’t like the gloom in the hallways. Not one bit. It would be way too easy to mount a sneak attack. I had promised Charlie there was no way the vampires would make a move on us on their home territory, but the words weren’t quite so comforting now that we were actually here. I actually found myself hoping I’d spot my vampire visitor—and maybe even find a minute alone to ask him what the hell was going on and who was after my family.
Charlie paused at the head of the table to greet the Rossis with her usual grace, giving a dimpled smile and a light laugh at something they said to her. If she was afraid, she didn’t show it. She’d changed into a red dress with a high neckline and low back that made her look elegant, and a lot more grown-up than usual. Her hair was twisted into a complicated knot.
“Your eyeballs are going to fall out,” Carter whispered as he took his seat. “Stop glaring at the vampires.”
“Sorry,” I said, but I didn’t mean it. If I didn’t watch Charlie, who would make sure she didn’t get eaten? After a moment, she joined us. I felt a lot better having her at my side, within arm’s reach. She eyed the crystal goblets set in front of the fashionable square plates. “How, exactly, do vampires drink blood?” she asked me in a low voice without ever losing that charming smile.
“From the tap,” I responded with confidence, as if I knew what I was talking about. To be honest, I had never seen vampires in a social setting before. I’d only seen them feed in battles. And “from the tap” was too cutesy for the reality of those feedings—I had watched them rip out the throats of pack members and drink the gushing blood like it was a water fountain. They weren’t neat about it. They were monsters.
Charlie toyed with her fork as a server filled our water glasses from an icy pitcher. “Do they eat real food?” she asked when the server moved on.
I didn’t know the answer to that, so I just shrugged. “Guess we’ll find out.”