Don't Rhine on My Parade

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  My senses came back in pieces. I could smell first. A tangy copper smell, sweat, fear, a musky smell I couldn’t identify. Next was my hearing. Two voices were speaking low near my head. A man’s and a woman’s. I felt like I should know them. They both sounded familiar. I struggled to place them while the words bounced harmlessly off my comprehension.

  “-nk you,” said the woman.

  “It is not often that I am called an egg sucking, cold-blooded, worm,” the man replied.

  “My apologies. I was,” she paused for a moment, “upset.”

  The man laughed. A deep rumbling laugh. It made me want to laugh as well. “You have a talent for understatement, my dear. It is obvious that diplomacy is not your path.”

  I began to regain feeling. I was lying on a hard surface. Legs stretched out straight, arms at my sides. Warmth was radiating from my stomach. There was pressure there as well. It felt like two hands pouring heat into my body. My eyes snapped open.

  I was lying on the Synod table. The chairs were empty, as was the room. Empty of everyone except Deerhurst who was standing over me, hands placed on my stomach, speaking to Cecily. She was standing a step back from the table, body language that of someone combining submission with reckless defiance.

  “Cecily?” I croaked.

  “Hush,” Deerhurst spoke first. “I am not finished. Be patient a moment more.”

  The warmth continued to spread. It reached the top of my head and trickled down my arms into my fingertips. I wiggled them experimentally. No pain.

  “How—?” I asked.

  He chuckled, “Hush, I said. This is the least I could do for you.”

  He lifted his hands and stepped back as I swung my legs over the edge of the table and sat up. I flexed my shoulders. Still no pain. Did I imagine it all? I looked behind me and saw two large pools of blood staining the carpet. The liquid had left the outline of a leg and a— I looked away.

  I felt uncomfortable sitting on the table. I hopped off to the ground and looked at Deerhurst.

  “Any pain?” he asked like a family doctor.

  “No.”

  “Good. It has been a while since I have practiced on a human. For your sake I am glad that I have not lost my touch.”

  I rubbed my arm in remembered pain. “What happened?”

  “Before or after Dusana tried to kill you?” Cecily spat.

  Deerhurst raised his hand to quiet her. “Peace. It was a fair test and within the law. As is also my healing.” He turned back to me, “I regret to inform you that your request to join the USB has been denied.”

  My eyes prickled with tears but I kept a steady voice, I remembered enough of what had happened to know where this was going. “Why?”

  “The Code states that one being cannot be admitted as a species. You, my dear, are perhaps a fluke. An aberration. If you could bring us another human with like magical ability, it would be enough to re-open your case.”

  I took a breath, “What will happen to humans?”

  He frowned, “That is still a tricky subject. Had you succeeded in your application it would have swayed the issue greatly. As it is,” he sighed. “I don’t know. There is much fear among the USB. We will see if common sense or panic will prevail.”

  “So, what now?” I asked angrily. “What do I do now? Just go home and wait to be eaten by someone?”

  “There is that choice.”

  “What if I tell people about all of this? There are billions of us! You think we couldn’t wipe you out?”

  His eyes swirled with red and black and yellow. I stood staring into them, mesmerized in fear. “That would be a mistake.” He blinked and they were back to normal. “Think of your family, and do nothing that would require us to act against you.”

  Cecily was poised, ready for action at my back. She quivered with suppressed motion, whether of attack or flight, I didn’t know.

  “Piper,” she pleaded.

  I sighed. “Don’t worry. I won’t do anything stupid.” I looked around the empty room. “I’d like to go home now.”

  She nodded. “Thank you, Chairman,” she said politely.

  I turned back to him. “Yes. Thank you. I guess I wasn’t in too great a shape and you fixed me. Thank you for that.”

  He nodded and I stepped back and then paused. “Okay,” I couldn’t help it, I was curious, “I really would like to know one thing. What is a Naga?”

  He smiled at me and walked around the table into the center of the room. I blinked and a huge, green and blue scaled dragon stood before me. Its eyes were swirling pinwheels of red, black, and yellow. Its teeth were the length of my arm. Gigantic, leathery wings stretched back from its shoulders. It was big, and scary and reptilian, and yet the most beautiful and graceful thing I had ever seen. I took an involuntary step towards it and in another blink it was gone and Deerhurst was standing there again, the musky smell from earlier slowly fading from my senses.

  “Oh,” I said.

  He lifted his hand in silent farewell and walked out the door. My ears popped again as if a change in pressure had occurred. I looked at Cecily.

  “The Bast has renewed the magic damper. She held it off after the meeting was over so that Deerhurst could heal you.”

  “Oh,” I said again. I looked around the room, feeling lost.

  “Piper?”

  “Yeah?”

  “I’m, um, I’m glad you’re okay.”

  I remembered her voice yelling, pleading, for my life. I tried not to get angry at her. She wasn’t one of the bad guys. At least, not totally one of the bad guys.

  “What was the point?” I asked flatly.

  “What?”

  “The point. What was it all for?” She still looked puzzled. “I was shot at, locked in a closet, that poor man died, I was almost sacrificed in a Satanic ritual, and just about died myself in a vampire attack. I killed someone, Cecily. Not to defend myself, not because I had to, but just to prove a point. I murdered him.”

  “Umm. Not really,” she answered.

  “What?”

  “Not really. You see, you didn’t kill him, because even if you did, you couldn’t, because he was already dead, and you can’t kill something that’s already dead, you can just more, umm, dead, it. But anyway, you didn’t, because he isn’t.”

  I sat down heavily in one of the chairs and stared at her. “That made no sense whatsoever.”

  She rolled her eyes. “I know. Sorry. It’s hard to explain. You didn’t kill Matthew.”

  “Why not?”

  “You started the killing process. But you didn’t finish it.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “To kill one of us you have to remove our head, and then burn us. Otherwise …” she trailed off.

  “Otherwise, what?”

  “Otherwise, we, umm, come back.”

  “You come back?”

  “Yeah. It’s not fun. And it will take him a while. But, he’s not dead. I mean, he is, but not the way you think.”

  I thought about that for a moment. “You mean there is a homicidal vampire out there who has good reason to hate my guts and who is going to heal one day and come looking for me?”

  “Umm, no.”

  “No, he’s not out there, or no he’s not coming looking for me?”

  “The looking part. It was a fair contest. Had he killed you there would have been no repercussions against him either. You won. It’s over with. He moves on.”

  I stared at her. “Either vampires are nothing like humans or you are really naive.”

  She shrugged, “If he comes after you he would be breaking the Code and his maker would reprimand him. Severely.”

  “Ooh. A severe reprimand. How horrible. That makes me feel tons safer.” I felt my anger rising.

  “It is horrible. And it takes a lot longer than a simple staking to come back from.”

  “Swell. Whatever. Back to my first point. What was the point?”
br />   “I—”

  I cut her off. “You what? You nothing! I risked my life yesterday for those werewolves and Fairies. My life! And that homeless guy lost his life! And what did we get out of it? You told me that they would vote for me! You, who by the way, are a vampire, and whose people just tried to whack me!” I was yelling at this point. “So I’m not so sure why I should be trusting you at this point!”

  She mumbled something.

  “What?” I yelled. “I can’t hear you.”

  Cecily looked up and met my gaze. “I’m sorry. I didn’t think it would turn out like this. I’m sorry.”

  Just like that the wind was taken out of my sails. I felt empty, drained, and defeated. I shrugged and slowly stood. “I know. It’s not your fault. Thanks.”

  “For what?”

  “For saving my life.”

  “Deerhurst saved your life.”

  “Yeah, but I heard you yelling at him. He wouldn’t have done it if you hadn’t made him.”

  Her mouth twitched. “I yelled at him,” she said in awe.

  “Yeah,” I agreed. “And now I know why that isn’t such a good idea. Thanks.”

  She shrugged, embarrassed. “Hey, it was the least I could do.”

  I looked around the room one more time. I had a feeling I would be revisiting this place in my nightmares. “I’d like to go home now.”

  I looked down at my sticky, bloodstained shirt. From the direction of the stains I probably had blood on my face as well. I didn’t want to think about the amount of internal bleeding that would produce those stains and the puddle on the floor. I felt fine. Tired, freaked out, but fine.

  “Now what?” I asked helplessly.

  “You don’t happen to know another human with mental powers do you?”

  “Let me think,” I said sarcastically. “Nope.”

  “Well then,” she answered, “now I take you home and you try to pretend none of this happened.”

  “That would be nice,” I sighed. “Fine. Let’s go home. But first, I need another shirt.”