I took one step, and then another, until the clearing disappeared behind me and I was ensconced in a forest alive with noise. Al manner of animals not yet bedded down for the coming winter shuffled through the underbrush, and the canopy of trees above the path created a fretwork of moonlight on the ground.
Recal ing I was a vampire - and a sharp-sensed predator myself - I let my senses off th [sendiv>e leash. My night vision sharpened. I could smel damp soil and the faint musk of animals in the trees. Acrid smoke and the greenish smel of fresh resin drifted down the path from what I assumed was Lorelei's house. Someone had been chopping wood, maybe.
The night was alive with things most humans would rarely see or consider, an entire world that turned while they were unconscious. Would it frighten them, I wondered, to imagine how much went on while they were oblivious?
I walked for a little less than ten minutes. The path moved gently uphil , and I emerged onto a plateau that, during the day, probably would have afforded a beautiful view of the lake. I considered it a good thing my father didn't know the property existed; he'd have razed Lorelei's house to make way for a luxury lodge.
The house glowed in the middle of the clearing. It was low, with wal s that alternated between curvy glass and long swaths of wood. The house spread low across the earth like it might simply have grown there, like it might melt back into the ground if you turned your back long enough. A tamped dirt path led across the grass to a giant wooden door I assumed was the main entrance.
I stood at the edge of the woods for a moment and savored the irony. A few minutes ago, I'd been afraid to enter them. Now, I was dreading the exit. Sure, I was supposedly immune to Lorelei's siren cal , but that didn't exactly calm my nerves. I'd seen the boats at the shoreline.
What had happened to their captains?
In the silence while I waited, I heard the singing for the first time. It sounded like a low dirge of mourning, sung by a woman with perfect pitch and a sensual tone.
The siren.
I closed my eyes and waited for a moment . . . but nothing happened. I didn't feel compel ed to stalk her, or live out the rest of my immortal nights on her island. Other than feeling a little lightheaded from relative lack of blood - horrible timing on Frank's part - al was wel .
I blew out a breath, walked toward the door, and knocked on it.
No more than a second later, a heavyset woman in her fifties or sixties opened the door, her eyes narrowed.
"What?"
Surely this woman, who wore a T-shirt and cut-off stretch pants and held a feather duster in one hand, wasn't the siren of the lake. But the singing continued from somewhere in the house, so this couldn't have been her.
"I'm Merit. I'm here to see Lorelei."
She seemed unmoved by my interest and stared blankly back at me.
"I'm a vampire from Chicago," I told her. "I need to talk to Lorelei about the lake."
Without a word, she shut the door in my face. I blinked back shock, then gnawed my lip for a second, considering my choices.
I could barge into the house, but it was a rule of etiquette that vamps had to wait for an invitation before entering someone's home. It wasn't going to do much good if I pissed off the lake spirit by breaching protocol.
Alternatively, I could pout my way back to the helicopter and advise the pilot she'd have plenty of time to get to her next appointment.
Since neither of those options would solve my current problem, I decided to go for option three - stal ing while gathering a little intel. Quietly, I tiptoed across the smal portico and peeked into a window.
I got only a smal peek at wood and stone before I heard a voice behind me.
"Ahem."
I jumped and turned to find the woman who'd opened the door standing behind me with a suspicious expression and a menacingly wielded feather duster.
"Lovely home," I told her, standing up straight again. "I was just curious about the interior design. With the wood.
And furnishings." I cleared my throat guiltily. "And such."
The woman rol ed her eyes, then flipped her feather duster out like a composer directing an orchestra. "I have been authorized to invite you into the abode of Lorelei, the lake siren. Welcome to her home."
Her delivery was desert dry, but it got the point across. I fol owed her inside.
The interior of the house was as organical y designed as the outside. The window looked onto a two-story living room. One wal was made of rounded river stone, and a trickle of water spil ed down the rocks and into a narrow channel that ran through the middle of the room, where it disappeared into an infinity-edged trough on the other side.
A curvy woman sat on the floor beside the channel of water, trickling her fingers into it. Her hair was dark and pul ed into a topknot, and she was dressed simply in a shimmery gray T-shirt and jeans, her toes bare. Her eyes were closed, and she sang out low and clear.
I looked back toward the woman with the feather duster, but having done her duty, she was gone.
"Are you Lorelei?" I quietly asked.
She stopped singing, opened her eyes, and looked up at me with eyes the color of chocolate. "Honey, if you're on my island, you know there's only one person I could be. Of course I'm Lorelei." Her voice carried a hint of a Spanish accent, and a lot of sarcasm.
I bit back a smile. "Hi, Lorelei. I'm Merit."
"Hi, yourself. What brings you here?"
"I need to ask you some questions."
"About?"
"The lake."
Her eyes narrowed. "You think I had something to do with the water?"
"I don't know whether you did or not," I admitted, kneeling beside the channel so we could speak at eye level. "I'm trying to figure out what happened, and you seemed like a good place to start. It's not just the lake, you know. It's the river, as wel ."
Her head shot up. "The river? It's dead, too?"
Neither the question nor the look of defeat in her eyes comforted me.
"It is," I said. "And the river and the lake are bleeding al the power out of Chicago. The nymphs are growing weaker."
Wincing as if in pain, Lorelei pressed her fingers to her temples. "They aren't the only ones. I feel like I finished up a four-day shift and a two-day bender. Weak. Exhausted.
Dizzy." She looked up at me. "I didn't cause this. I'd hoped the nymphs might have the answer, that they'd become too involved in some kind of unfamiliar magic, but that the magic could be reversed."
"They thought the same thing about you."
"That's no surprise," she dryly said.
"You don't get along?"