Masquerade (Blue Bloods 2)

The dark underground of the Repository. Mimi and Kingsley laughing over the book. Standing inside the pentagram, the candle flickering and casting their shadows against the stone walls.

Mimi slicing her wrist, sending the blood over the flame and calling the words.

But then...nothing happened.

Mimi had fainted, but the spell had not worked.

She had been unable to summon the hatred needed to bring out the Silver Blood.

But Mimi had not been rendered unconscious, just dis- oriented. She had witnessed the events that unfolded next, but the memory of it remained in her subconscious, which is why she had not been able to recall it to prove her innocence. Now, through the blood trial, Schuyler was able to see what had really happened.

Kingsley cursed and picked up the knife. He sliced his wrist and called out the summons in a strong, deep voice.

There was a rip in the ground: the earthquake, the flame that shot out. Smoke filled the air, and suddenly there was a hulking dark mass going straight for Bliss Llewellyn and then killing Priscilla DuPont.

In the resulting confusion, Kingsley helped Mimi stand, and put a hand on her shoulder.

Schuyler felt a cold pressing on the back of her neck just as Mimi had experienced.

Then Kingsley pushed Mimi out of the alcove and ran to the Repository, pretending to be pinned by a bookcase.

It was Kingsley all along.

Schuyler gurgled, feeding on Mimi's blood. She knew she should stop, but she couldn't. She wanted to see, wanted to devour all of Mimi's memories. She saw something else:the night of the Four Hundred Ball. The after-party at the Angel Orensanz Foundation. Jack Force, putting on the black mask worn by the boy who had kissed her that evening.

So it had been Jack who kissed her after all.

The realization made her lose her hold on Mimi, and she stepped away, disengaging her fangs. The call of the blood had been strong she had been tempted to take Mimi to full consumption, to become Mimi, to absorb all her memories and her being. But the shock of seeing Jack in the mask had saved her from becoming Abomination.

Schuyler staggered against the wall, feeling faint and delirious, while Mimi swooned and fell onto the nearest chair.

When she found her bearings, Schuyler returned to address the Conclave.

"Mimi is innocent," she said, and just as Lawrence had shown her, she held their minds in her own and showed them what she had seen in the blood memory, projecting the vision of Kingsley Martin calling up the Silver Blood to everyone in the room.

Mimi was released to her family, and Schuyler waited with her grandfather at the entrance of the Ducal Palace for their speedboat to arrive.

"Are they going to arrest the Martins?" Schuyler asked.

Lawrence looked up to the sky. "Yes, a team of Venators was already sent to their town house. But they won't find them there."

"Why not?"

"Because they will already have disappeared," Lawrence said. "It will not be easy to catch them."

"Did you know?"

"Not until you read the truth in the blood memory. I suspected, but I did not know. It is not the same thing."

"So why did you do nothing?"

"Nothing?" Lawrence asked with a smile. "I saved an innocent girl from death. I wouldn't call that nothing."

"But you should have sent someone to Kingsley's..."

"Not without proof."

"But you waited--and they are gone."