His words hit like a punch to the gut, and, for several seconds, all I could do was stare at him. Then I licked my lips and said, voice a little hoarse, “I can perhaps understand the drive to develop light immunity for wraiths given what has happened to you, but why in hell would you want it for the vampires? Are you insane?”
He half shrugged. “It’s not me who seeks such a thing.”
“Meaning it comes from one of your partners? Why?”
“Because he is a rare survivor of a vampire attack. He’s one of them, at least in part.”
I’d heard tales of vampire survivors over the years—or dhampirs, as they were more commonly known—but I’d never actually believed them. It was said while they were unable to walk in light, they were not afflicted with the need of blood. It went some way to explaining not only why they were making the serum for vamps, but also why the vampires seemed to be taking orders from his female counterpart. The rift had muddled their DNA, so they were all now part vampire—although Sal and at least one of his partners was still able to walk in sunlight.
“Surely even your vampire partner cannot want the total and utter destruction that will be wrought on our world if either—”
“Why do you even care?” he cut in harshly. “What have humans ever done for the likes of you and me?”
“They gave us life—”
“And then made no move to help us when we had outlived our usefulness.” He snorted softly. “The vampires, at least, I can understand. They live to eat and breed and destroy, and is that not what you and I were also designed for?”
His breathing was becoming harsher—more of a struggle—and for the first time ever, fear flickered across his beautiful face. The muscles of his strong arms became taut, as if he were trying to force movement. I had no doubt he was attempting the same with his legs, but there was little evidence of response. The drug moved insidiously fast through the body, freezing muscle response from the outer extremities in. It was a swift and horrible way to die, and had there been any other drugs on hand, I would not have used it.
But even as remorse surged, I remembered that this wasn’t my friend. That rift had forever changed him, and within his cool gray skin there now lurked monsters.
Monsters who’d kidnapped young children and were even now torturing and experimenting on them.
It was all that mattered, all I had to concentrate on.
“What did you use?” His voice was harsh—furious—as the realization of an inglorious death hovered in his bright eyes.
And it was that, more than death itself, that angered him, I realized. “Sueño. Where are the children, Sal? Where are you keeping them?”
He hissed. It was an ugly, desperate sound. “Why the fuck did you use such a dirty drug on me? What we had deserved more consideration than that.”
I smiled, but there was little in the way of warmth or humor in it. “What we had died right along with the man I cared about the minute he was caught in that rift and became wraith and vampire and Rhea only knows what else. Where are the children, Sal?”
“I cannot tell you where they all are, because I do not know.”
“Then where are the five you escorted from Carleen?”
He swore again, but he could no more refuse to answer me than he could move or call for help. “Under Chaos. In the very heart of the vampire nest there.”
I blinked. That was one location I certainly hadn’t been expecting. “Why the hell would you leave five children in such a place?”
“Because it would take a hundred déchet in peak fighting form to enter such a nest and survive. There is no such force alive these days—and the shifters lost the capacity for true fighting long ago.”
I seriously doubted that. “But why waste the lives of five children when one or two would have achieved the result?”
He shrugged. Or at least attempted to. Again that wave of fury hit me. I took another sip of coffee, but my hands were trembling, and the liquid splashed over the rim of the cup, splattering across my bare thighs. I placed it on the floor, then met his gaze again.
“Because those five had already outlasted their usefulness.”
I could only stare at him. He had basically given those children to the vampires, knowing what they would do to them, knowing how horrible that death would be.
Suddenly, I was very glad his death would be slow and agonizing. “Are they dead?”
He smiled, though only one part of his mouth responded. Sueño’s creeping death was almost upon him. “No. The vampires are under orders not to touch them until after a rescue attempt.”
“Who made the order? Who is the woman who controls the vampires?”
Again, that fleeting half smile. “We all can, because the minute the rift melded our DNA we became a part of the greater nest.”