The Greater Darkness

  "…so you see, Principal, although a case could be made for prosecuting the girls, we have much bigger fish to fry, and we'll forgo collecting any evidence that the DA's office could use against them. I just need to question them so that we can get a bead on who else is involved. We really need to trace this thing back to whoever is actually calling the shots."

  The principal was nodding now as she tried to consider what Geoffrey had said through the artificial haze he'd placed over her thoughts.

  "Please call me Julia, Allen."

  Geoffrey headed off her inclination to ask for a signed statement outlining what he'd just said, and then had to stop her from getting caught up with the idea of just how pissed the girls' parents were going to be if any of this ever got out.

  "That sounds entirely reasonable. I'll show you our records myself."

  The search through the student records took longer than Geoffrey had hoped, but that was probably more a result of Julia standing over his shoulder sending affectionate thoughts his way than anything else. Then again, if Geoffrey hadn't all but disconnected her higher brain functions to get what he was after, she wouldn't have been in his way.

  After searching through about half of the female students in the school, Geoffrey found one who looked familiar. If he idealized her face a little, imagined it as being even more attractive than it was, then it was a match for one of the girls from the dream. Geoffrey filed away the interesting tidbit that Melody had done the exact opposite with regards to her mental picture of herself as compared to the mental picture of this girl, and then looked up at Julia.

  "Can you please pull up the pictures of all the females who have a class with this student, as well as the total number of classes they have in common?"

  Only two other girls shared every class with the first girl, and they also bore more than a passing resemblance to the other girls from Melody's dream, so Geoffrey pointed them out to the principal.

  "Would it be possible to have these three girls pulled out of class and isolated so that I can speak with them individually?"

  Julia nodded slowly, and Geoffrey realized that she was having a hard time believing that these particular girls were guilty of anything that would require a visit from a NYPD detective.

  "Are you sure these are the ones? They are some of my best students. I was really expecting one of these to be the one you were after." Julia pressed a few keys as she spoke, and eight other pictures popped up on the screen. Geoffrey scanned through them, more out of courtesy than because he had any real curiosity, but nearly did a double take when he realized that Melody was one of the 'trouble' girls.

  "Why these?"

  "These are all of the slackers and problem kids. Most of them have a list of infractions as long as your arm."

  It seemed like she was really warming up to the idea of listing all of the things each of the girls had done wrong, but Geoffrey short-circuited the inclination and pointed at Melody's picture.

  "This one hardly looks like a hardened criminal."

  "Actually, you're right. She's only on this list because she was held back a year. It's kind of a sad story really. She'd have graduated by now except for the fact that her mom got sick and she missed a bunch of school. It was all approved, of course, but she bumped up against the state minimums and wasn't smart enough to appeal, so she's stuck here an extra year--I think she's been eighteen for most of this year."

  Julia had said it was an unfortunate story, but he got a distinct impression that she actually found it quite funny. Geoffrey resisted the urge to probe deeper into her mind to confirm just how sadistic she was.

  "That is too bad, but no, none of those girls are the ones that are involved with this particular bit of trouble. How soon can I talk to those first three?"

  It took longer than Geoffrey had expected, but eventually he found himself alone in a dingy room with the girl who had been the ringleader in the dream. Things had been touch and go for a moment, but he'd managed to convince Julia that she didn't need to be present during the questioning. It had been worth the effort just to avoid the distraction she represented. Pretending to carry on a conversation with one person while messing with their thoughts was going to be hard enough. He was pretty sure he wouldn't have been able to manage two at once.

  Cindy proved to be shallow and entirely self-centered--in short exactly what Geoffrey had been expecting from Melody's dream. As a plus, she seemed much less bright than he'd expected based on Julia's impression of her. That should make things a bit easier, but it was something Geoffrey noted only absently as he infiltrated in her mind. Mostly he was just astonished that this girl was only a year younger than Melody. She had none of the maturity he'd found in Melody's mind. She'd probably never had to worry about anything more traumatic than picking out an outfit for some school dance. It was going to be a long afternoon.

  Chapter 11

  Geoffrey crept across the clean, blue mat towards Venice. His left hand weaved slightly to screen the blunt practice knife in his right hand, thereby preventing it from being captured or trapped. Venice slowly circled, mirroring his movements--save for the fact that her right foot was forward in the 'short timer' stance commonly favored by smaller knife fighters who needed to try and negate some of the reach advantage of their opponents.

  As Geoffrey realized that his left hand had shifted out of position, Venice struck at it with her practice knife, trying to make one of the many small cuts that, in a real fight, would be used to bleed him out until he was too weak to continue.

  The reflexes that had saved him a number of times already took over and Geoffrey slapped Venice's wrist behind the knife. The blow sent the knife and the hand holding it wide. Geoffrey took advantage of the opening to step in and strike, choosing to reverse his knife and hit her in the head in the split second he had to choose his target.

  Rather than trying to counterattack as Geoffrey expected, Venice took a quick step back and swore at him. "I've told you six or seven times now. If you are going to slash someone, do it somewhere that there are major blood vessels near the surface so you can do some damage. You pull that kind of crap in a real fight, and you'll probably end up dead."

  Geoffrey recoiled slightly from the venom in Venice's voice. "I'm sorry, I was just thinking that maybe I could practice strikes that would incapacitate an opponent without killing them."

  Rather than being calmed by Geoffrey's words, as he'd expected, Venice swore again and threw her practice knife at him. The dull pot metal made it through two complete revolutions before Geoffrey's hand reached up and plucked it from the air a few inches in front of his face. He wished it were that easy to deflect Venice's words.

  "You don't fight to subdue. You've still got most of the reflexes you spent decades developing, but if you keep trying to override them you're going to end up dead. One stupid assassination where you almost got yourself killed doesn't even come close to making you qualified to start making up new tactics. If you get in a fight, one of two things happened. Either you started it or they did. If you decide to start something you bloody well better have decided that you're ready to go all the way and kill the sod. Otherwise you've got no business getting involved in the first place. If someone else starts something, you can bet that they'll be more than ready to kill you and leave your morally-superior butt dead on the curb."

  Geoffrey opened his mouth to respond that he'd been in more than just the one confrontation, but changed his mind. Venice didn't need to know about that. Besides, even if he told her about that particular fight it wouldn't help his case. He'd fought to kill that time too, rather than trying to incapacitate his opponents.

  The fact that Geoffrey didn't argue with her seemed to mollify Venice somewhat. She simply collected her stuff and headed towards the locker room instead of remaining to verbally flay him as she normally would have.

  Shrugging resignedly, Geoffrey pulled his things together and walked the other direction towards the male dressing room and its shiny new fac
ilities. At least most of the rest of the training session had gone well. Venice had been right to convince him to come here. Her gym was much nicer than his apartment. Not only that, the fact that the two of them kept such ungodly hours meant that they pretty much had the entire place to themselves.

  The vampire showered and changed as quickly as he was able, but somehow Venice was still already done and waiting for him in the lobby when he finished. It boggled the mind that she was able to get ready so quickly and still look impeccable when she was done.

  Geoffrey looked Venice over as he approached her and recognized some of the subtle clues he'd started to identify that indicated something was still bothering her. It wasn't like her to hold onto something for very long. Usually she would just ream him and then move on. He needed a way to try and defuse the situation. He cleared his throat and then said the first thing that came to his mind.

  "Decided to stay and see if you could get a good night kiss?"

  For maybe the first time that Geoffrey had ever seen, Venice looked momentarily confused, as if the sudden reversal in roles had completely thrown her. It only took a couple of heartbeats for Venice to regain her normal air of self-assurance.

  "Please, like it would have mattered if I had. For whatever reason, you've decided that I'm nearly as much an enemy as Imastious."

  Geoffrey shrugged, uncomfortable with how near Venice was to the truth. He didn't trust her, but he was actually finding it hard to preserve the kind of emotional distance he knew he should be maintaining between them. There were aspects of her character and personality that really bothered him, but he did enjoy their time together. It seemed to be one more symptom of just how broken he was. There wasn't any other explanation he could think of for why he'd ended up being friends with someone like her.

  Venice shot him a sly smile. "Did I hit a little too close there for you, love? Or is it that I just sparked one of those internal debates you seem so fond of since you came back?"

  Geoffrey did a quick scan of his thoughts, looking for something alien that might indicate Venice was using her very limited mentalist abilities to try and read his thoughts, but there wasn't anything that even hinted at a foreign presence inside his mind. He was still very inexperienced at using his own abilities, but when Imastious had tortured him he'd definitely been able to feel the older vampire pushing inside his mind.

  All indications were that Imastious was much more powerful than Venice would be for several centuries yet to come, so it wasn't that she was reading his mind without him being able to detect her efforts. She just knew him well enough to read his expression much more easily than he would have liked.

  He'd let the silence stretch out too long, but as he opened his mouth, Venice cut him off.

  "Don't try to deny it now. You've still got a ton to relearn about lying. Half of what you're thinking may as well be written on your forehead in flashing neon letters, and the other half can usually be guessed by those of us who've known you for so long."

  Geoffrey shrugged, but his mind keyed on to the last part of Venice's statement. Venice kept saying that he was a different person, but that didn't mesh with the idea that she'd known him for so long that she could predict his thoughts. It was a solitary straw in the wind, but it pointed towards the idea that maybe Geoffrey wasn't as changed as she and Imastious wanted him to believe he was.

  Then again, she could just be playing head games with him. She was more than capable of doing that, or worse, if she thought it might gain her some kind of advantage.

  Venice flashed a smile that was very nearly the picture of perfection she usually bestowed upon the world. "Don't worry about me. I've spent more years than you can imagine with people who would purposely say all kinds of things, true or otherwise, to try and throw me off my game so that they could take advantage of me in one way or another. Your current feelings about me are less than optimal, but they are also subject to change."

  Venice stood up and turned to leave. "Oh, you should probably be warned. Things are starting to get a little tense out there. Not necessarily like something is going down right away, but like events are heading that way. You should watch yourself and be prepared."

  Geoffrey's mind tried to switch gears and consider the implications of this new piece of information. "What do you mean?"

  It was Venice's turn to shrug. "I'm not sure, it doesn't happen very often but occasionally one of the masters--individuals like Imastious, or someone even more dangerous--will make a play for more power. Usually their rivals are too strong to assault directly. After decades of planning, their strategies usually are too subtle to spill out into something you or I would see. Still, there are very real conflicts out there, ones in which pawns like you and I get assassinated as a way of trimming a rival back down to manageable size. That is pretty much par for the course, but this feels like something else--like maybe a real power in the city is getting ready to try and take a rival all the way out."

  Geoffrey nodded. "Okay, I'll be careful."

  "More likely you'll passively sit by and let them kill you, but I'll just have to hope none of them figure out that you work for Imastious."

  Geoffrey stood at the door to the club, lost in thought for several minutes after Venice had left. Unsurprisingly, his thoughts once again returned to Melody.

  Implanting subliminal commands into the minds of the three girls had been extremely difficult, the more so because he wasn't really sure how to do what he'd wanted. In the end he'd worked out of instinct more than anything else. The process had taken nearly two hours and left Geoffrey shaking with exhaustion. Despite his inexperience, he thought his efforts would probably do the trick when it came to ensuring that Melody wouldn't be hassled so much at school. Not only that, he was optimistic that he'd even nudged the three girls in ways that might turn them into decent students eventually. Decent students and actual three-dimensional people.

  Getting back out of the school without running into the principal had been a little tricky, but well worth it as the vampire hadn't wanted to deliver on the promises he'd let her read in his eyes. Of course leaving like that had the potential of making Julia feel spurned enough to try and make waves for 'Detective Allen Smith,' but hopefully the fact that the girls wouldn't be talking to their parents would help. It was less likely that she'd go ahead and make herself look like a fool for having given him access to the girls in the first place if she wasn't getting any kind of static from anyone.

  It was all fine in theory, but Geoffrey couldn't quiet the tiny voice in the back of his head that kept pointing out that he didn't really know that she'd decide not to make a fuss.

  Geoffrey pushed the door open and walked out into the light drizzle, but he already knew that he wasn't going to be able to distract himself. Part of what was bothering him felt very much like his conscience, but there was something else there too.

  Melody was of legal age, but when you stacked her eighteen years up against the decades, or even centuries, that he'd probably lived, she really was little more than a child. There was plenty of reason for whatever was left of his conscience to be uneasy about his attraction for her, but what was bothering him most right now was the way he was mooning over her like a senseless animal. It was a level of obsession that he couldn't explain.

  Actually, saying he was acting like an animal was a very appropriate choice of words. He'd killed people--and not just before he'd lost his memory. He lived on blood that he took from the unwilling, and he'd invaded their thoughts for whatever reason took his fancy.

  Geoffrey pulled his trench coat tighter around his neck in an effort to keep out the rain, and adjusted his bag. It was going to be a long night full of internal arguments, but he already knew that before he went home he'd stop at Melody's. What he still didn't know was whether or not he should be happy about that.

  **

  Geoffrey crept down the fire escape from the roof and, after verifying that there wasn't any movement inside Melody's darkened window, took a
position as close to the window as he was able to get. He suspected that he was still just scratching the surface of what his abilities would allow him to do, but at least he was picking up on a few tricks. The key thing he'd learned so far was that distance mattered. The closer he was to someone, the easier it was to work with their thoughts.

  Melody's thoughts were as bright and cheery as he remembered. They washed over Geoffrey with a refreshing tingle that temporarily swept away all of his doubts about the wisdom of visiting. As pleasant as her dreams were, they didn't reveal any of the things that he needed to know.

  The vampire tried to probe deeper into Melody's psyche, but although he quickly got an overall impression of who she was, it was almost impossible to find one specific set of memories. Actually, maybe impossible wasn't the right word. It felt like it could be done, but that it would require much more time and effort than he could invest right then.

  After a few more minutes of thought, Geoffrey hit upon a novel approach and directed his consciousness towards the area of Melody's thoughts that contained her dreaming mind. It was a simple matter to subtly manipulate the fabric of the mind around him so that Melody was dreaming about what he wanted to know. He pushed an image of the three girls into her dream and waited to see what happened.

  It took several seconds, but then Melody's consciousness turned in the direction he'd prodded and he began to get a sense of her feelings towards the trio who had been persecuting her. Dislike was foremost, combined with an odd kind of guilt that she felt that way towards the three of them. Envy was there, but it was a clean envy, untainted by any kind of hate that they had so many things she didn't. There, right at the end was exactly the thing he'd been hoping for. Amazement that they'd begun treating her like a human being.

  The rush of relief and gratitude that Geoffrey felt at knowing his efforts had succeeded was so strong that some of it leaked through the link, touching Melody's thoughts and diffusing through her mind like food coloring that somehow strengthened as it spread, rather than fading. The experience was truly incredible. Geoffrey wouldn't have believed that such simple, innocent joy existed if he hadn't been there to experience it himself.