The Force of Wind

  Through it all, Giovanni kept an eye on Beatrice, watching her as she took in the grandeur of the palace and the wealth on display. She was subdued and looked around with curiosity, but no great outward reaction. She was handling herself perfectly, he thought as he reached back and gave her hand a quick squeeze.

  They climbed the steps and waited for an even more elaborate set of carved doors, overlaid in pure gold, to be pulled open by saffron-robed monks. Finally, they entered the Hall of the Elders and Giovanni paused, taking a deep breath to sense the air.

  The few times he had come to this place in his five hundred years, the sheer spectacle of it was enough to start his heart. The hall was lined by enormous malachite pillars, and the walls were coated in silver. The oil lamps were gold, and the floor was a pure, white marble. Deep red rosewood benches lined the walls, but his eye was drawn to the end of the hall, where eight ancient thrones were placed, each from the era and province of the immortal who sat upon it.

  His eyes moved from left to right as he faced them.

  Elder Zhang Guo, the oldest of the eight, was Tenzin’s sire and a warlord of some kind from the ancient steppes of the North.

  Royal Uncle Cao, the youngest of the eight, was still over twelve hundred years old. An earth vampire of unknown origin, he usually wore a pleasant smile.

  The Immortal Woman, He Xiangu, sat next to Cao. Giovanni met the eyes of his fellow fire vampire, who nodded at him with respect.

  Lu Dongbin, the ancient water-master, scholar, and reluctant leader of the eight, sat near the center next to Zhongli Quan, a wind vampire who met him in an uneasy truce. The two had been embroiled in a somewhat-polite tug-of-war for power for almost two millennia.

  The earth-master and legendary healer, Iron Crutch Li sat next to Zhongli, and next to him was possibly the most enigmatic immortal Giovanni had ever met.

  Lan Caihe was a fire vampire who had been turned at a very young age, but that was all anyone knew about him… or her. No one even knew that much, and Lan wasn’t sharing.

  The last of the eight was the philosopher and water vampire, Han Xiang, a watchful immortal with a smile that never reached his eyes.

  Giovanni estimated that at least sixty other vampires and numerous humans milled around the room, positioned in relation to their allies and associates. All of them paused and turned when Giovanni, Beatrice, and Baojia entered the room.

  As one, the Eight Immortals, wearing identical white robes, rose to greet them, and the rush of energy that rolled through the room was enough to make Beatrice stumble back.

  “Welcome, Giovanni Vecchio,” Zhang greeted him in Mandarin. “And welcome, Baojia. Your presence is unexpected, but not unwelcome.”

  Baojia nodded, but refrained from bowing toward Zhang.

  He Xiangu, the Immortal Woman, smiled as she surveyed the group. “It is pleasant to have such respected vampires in our midst, particularly a famed one of my own element.” She nodded toward Giovanni. “But who is this young human you have with you? Who is this girl who warrants protection from both the lion and the dragon?”

  Giovanni stepped forward. “Elder He, may I introduce the granddaughter of Don Ernesto Alvarez of Los Angeles, a friend of Tenzin, and my companion, Beatrice De Novo.” He motioned Beatrice forward, and she nodded respectfully toward the Eight, as Giovanni had instructed her. When she spoke, it was in English, which Giovanni knew all the Elders spoke.

  “I am honored to be introduced to the hall. Thank you for your invitation, Elder Zhang Guo.”

  “You are welcome here, Miss De Novo,” Zhang answered with a smile. “It is my pleasure to meet my daughter’s dear friend.” He looked to Giovanni as if searching for a reaction when he continued. “I believe there is another present in the hall who is even more pleased to see you than the Elders.”

  Zhang looked at Lu, who lifted an open hand and motioned to the side of the enormous room. The crowd parted to reveal a slim vampire dressed in the blue-grey robes common among scholars of the court. Giovanni recognized him immediately and turned to Beatrice to hold her hand as she gasped in recognition.

  “Dad?”

  Chapter Two

  Mount Penglai, China

  August 2010

  He looked exactly the same.

  Beatrice’s mind flashed to the last time she had seen her father the summer she was twelve. She’d been angry with him because he was leaving for Italy and worried because he wouldn’t be there for her first day of junior high school.

  “You’re always leaving. You love books more than me.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous. I’ll be back on Friday afternoon. You and Grandma can pick me up at the airport and we’ll meet Grandpa for dinner to celebrate your first week of school.”

  “I can’t believe you’re leaving again! You just got back from Boston.”

  “And I was only there for the weekend. I can’t turn down this invitation, Beatrice. Try to understand.”

  She hadn’t understood. Beatrice hadn’t understood anything except the last words she had ever spoken to her father had been in anger. Five weeks later, her grandparents sat down with tears in their eyes and told her she would never see him again.

  And fifteen years later, Stephen De Novo looked exactly as he had when he’d stepped out the door that summer morning.

  “Daddy?”

  Beatrice could feel Giovanni’s hand on her arm, and she knew he wanted her to stay still. He worried so much. He shouldn’t have. Her feet were as frozen as her gaze while she stood, staring at the man she thought she would never see again.

  His thick, black hair was shorter, and he was paler, but no wrinkles touched the corners of his eyes. No grey sprinkled his hair. His dark brown eyes, the exact color of her own, stared at her as he stood in utter, immortal stillness. Her father was thirty-five years old for eternity.

  Her hand slid down to Giovanni’s, gripping it in her own as she heard him start to speak.

  “Elder Zhang, you can imagine that you have… surprised us, though I am pleased to see Mister De Novo in good health. I’m sure his daughter is eager to meet with him, and—”

  He broke off when the doors to the hall swung open and an irritated stream of Mandarin rung out. Beatrice tore her eyes from her father and turned to see the disturbance. For some reason, the sight of Tenzin’s tiny figure stalking into the hall brought tears to her eyes and an overwhelming wave of relief.

  Giovanni pulled her closer, slipping an arm around her waist and sighing. “Grazie a Dio,” he whispered.

  Beatrice leaned into him, her eyes darting between Tenzin and Stephen, who had stepped forward with a smile.

  “Why are they doing the bowing thing again?” Tenzin barked in English. “Did you get new humans? Don’t you tell them I hate the bowing thing?”

  Elder Zhang stepped forward. Beatrice could have sworn he rolled his eyes when he saw his daughter. He issued a very polite-sounding stream of Mandarin that Beatrice didn’t understand a word of until Tenzin interrupted him.

  “Don’t be rude in front of B. You know she doesn’t speak Chinese, and your English is perfect. And why is Stephen in the hall? I told you I wanted to be here when he was introduced.”

  She could feel Giovanni start next to her, and she looked up at him in confusion. Tenzin had known her father was here? How long? She could tell the same questions were running through Giovanni’s mind at lightning speed. The minute she saw his face, she realized he was furious, and she could feel his skin heating as she held his hand.

  “I knew you were coming tonight,” Zhang said with a shrug. “Why would I delay their reunion for your whims, my daughter?”

  “Because I asked you to.” Tenzin let loose a string of incomprehensible words that Beatrice couldn’t even begin to translate. It didn’t sound like Mandarin. It didn’t sound like any language she’d ever heard before. She looked around, but no one looked as if they understood a word.

  Zhang was arguing with his daughter in the same guttural tongue
. Beatrice looked up at Giovanni, whose eyes were darting between Tenzin, Zhang, and Stephen with steadily mounting anger.

  She slipped her hand along the small of his back, trying to soothe him. Beatrice was starting to feel overwhelmed. The last thing she needed was to worry about Giovanni bursting into flames while she was in a completely foreign environment, her father had suddenly appeared, and her friend seemed way more familiar with him that she ever would have expected.

  “What, um… what language is that?” she whispered, trying to distract Giovanni, as Tenzin and Zhang continued their argument, seemingly oblivious to the audience in the hall.

  “What?”

  “What language are they speaking? No one looks like they understand what they’re saying.”

  “They don’t.” Beatrice saw him take a deep breath and a calm mask fell over his face. “It’s their own language. I suspect anyone who speaks it died long ago… or Tenzin and her father killed them so they could converse without eavesdroppers.”

  Somehow, that didn’t seem implausible.

  Most of the vampires were riveted by the loud argument. The humans skittered to the edges of the room, but the vampires were still and utterly silent. The Elders in the front of the room looked bored, except for Elder Lan. The childlike immortal’s mouth was covered by his or her hands as the vampire looked on with laughing eyes.

  “Enough. I’m taking them to my rooms,” Tenzin cut her father off. “You can meet with them there if you want. Tomorrow night.”

  “Of course, dearest daughter,” Zhang said with an indulgent smile. “There has been enough excitement for tonight. We have disrupted the business of the court long enough.” He looked over to Beatrice and Giovanni with a smile. “Giovanni Vecchio, Beatrice De Novo, Baojia, you are welcome here. My daughter will see to your needs.”

  She felt her arm being pulled toward the back door, but she was still frozen in confusion. “What? Where are we going now?” She looked back toward where her father had just been standing, but he was gone. Beatrice started to panic. “Gio, where’s—”

  “Shh, Tesoro, he’ll meet us there. Follow Tenzin. Follow her now.”

  “But—”

  “Beatrice, do not linger. We have been dismissed.”

  His arm was like iron around her waist, but she craned her neck, trying to see where her father had gone. Over her shoulder, she spotted Baojia, who shook his head slightly before catching her eye and giving her a nod toward the door and a quick wink.

  Beatrice swallowed the feeling of panic and leaned into Giovanni as he led her from the room, following behind Tenzin, who swept the doors open with a flick of her wrist and a gust of wind. She strode into the dark night, growling at the humans who bowed before her.

  He still looked exactly the same.

  They were sitting in one of the windowless rooms in Tenzin’s wing of the palace. Beatrice and Stephen sat on low couches across from each other in awkward silence as Giovanni and Tenzin carried on a vicious argument in yet another unknown language. Baojia lounged on another couch across the room, glancing up from his book occasionally with a smile.

  Beatrice stared at her father for a few more minutes until the silence became overwhelming. “What language are they speaking?”

  Stephen blinked, apparently shocked that she’d spoken to him.

  “I—I think it’s Mongolian. Or some variation of it. There are several dialects that Tenzin speaks.”

  His voice sounded different. Deeper, somehow, but then she wondered if she had only forgotten what he sounded like in the fifteen years they’d been apart. He stared at her and a pink sheen came to his eyes. He smiled.

  “You’re so beautiful.”

  Blinking back her own tears, she crossed her arms and took a deep breath, wishing that Giovanni would finish his argument and take her away so she could collapse. “Thanks.”

  “You look like Mom… but different, too.”

  She stared at him, completely confused by the churning emotions in her gut.

  “You look exactly the same.”

  He gave her a wry smile. “Part of the package, you know?”

  “Yeah, I know.”

  He had no response, only nodding as he continued to stare at her.

  “Grandma’s doing okay?”

  “Yeah. You know about Grandpa, right?”

  “Yes. I… uh.” Stephen cleared his throat the same way he always had when he was nervous. “I heard a few months after he passed away. But Tenzin said Mom got remarried earlier this year?”

  “Yeah.” She gestured toward Giovanni. “Gio’s friend… well, kind of his son. But not a vampire son. But he raised Caspar, so he’s like his son. But he’s not a vampire. I mean, that would be weird, because he’s old. Like Grandma. Well, a little younger. They’re good. Great, really. Really in love and… happy. They’re really happy.” Beatrice couldn’t seem to stop rambling, and her father was looking at her the same way he had when she would tell him a story as a child.

  “I’m happy for her.” Stephen nodded. “Tenzin has nice things to say about Caspar. And Giovanni, too.”

  She wanted to hug him. She wanted to hit him. Beatrice wanted to break down in tears and beg his forgiveness for her childish anger when he left. Then, she wanted to scream at him for putting her life in danger so many times.

  “I don’t know what to say to you,” she choked out.

  His eyebrows furrowed, and she saw a pink tear slip out of the corner of his eye as he shrugged his shoulders.

  “That’s okay. You don’t have to say anything. I’m kind of enjoying just sitting across from you right now.”

  She fought back tears and twisted her hands together. “There’s just… so much. There’s so much that’s happened. I’m really different than I was when I was little. And you’re…”

  “What?”

  “You’re just the same! But you’re not. I just—I don’t know who you are anymore.”

  Stephen nodded and took a deep breath before he spoke in a hoarse voice. “I know it’s confusing, Beatrice. And I know we have a lot—a lot to talk about, but… I’m still me, Mariposa. I’m still me. And I love you so much. That has never changed.”

  Tears rolled down her face, and her father held out a tentative hand.

  “Dad—” she cried before she stood up and met his arms as he embraced her.

  His hands were cool when they brushed the hair out of her eyes and tucked her head under his chin as he had when she’d had nightmares as a child. She felt the rush of energy as Giovanni sped toward her side. He didn’t pull her away, but Beatrice felt his quiet presence at her back as her father rocked her silently.

  “I missed you so much,” she whispered.

  “I missed you, too. More than I could ever say.”

  Beatrice let him hold her as she soaked the front of his grey robes with her tears. After a few minutes, she heard him softly singing a lullaby she remembered from childhood.

  “A los ninos que duermen, Dios los bendice…” His low voice took her back to the small bedroom where she’d grown up. The children who sleep, God bless them…

  “A los padres que velan, Dios los asiste,” she whispered along, remembering the old words as if he’d sung them to her the night before. The fathers who watch them, God helps them…

  “I missed you every day, Beatrice. Forgive me for putting you in danger. Forgive me—”

  “Don’t,” she said, pulling back and wiping her eyes. “Don’t start apologizing for that. This has all been…” She shook her head. “I know it’s not your fault, Dad.”

  She saw her father glancing over her shoulder and knew he was looking at Giovanni. She could feel his heat radiating on her back and knew her lover was showing enormous self-control to be standing still instead of whisking her away. Giovanni hated to see her cry. It seemed to disturb him on a very deep level, and he often reacted in anger toward the perceived cause. Feeling for his hand, she grasped it and pulled him closer.

  “I think
Beatrice needs some answers, Tenzin.” She heard Giovanni speak in a low voice as he pulled her away from her father and into his arms. She kept hold of Stephen’s hand for a moment, squeezing it before she retreated into Giovanni’s embrace.

  “What were you two arguing about?” She sniffed. “It better not have been about me.”

  “Of course it was.” Tenzin snorted. “You know how he is.”

  Tenzin walked over and motioned toward a grouping of plush cushions on the far side of the room. A small fountain trickled in the corner, and Giovanni sat next to it, pulling Beatrice into his lap as Tenzin and Stephen sat across from them.

  “Tell her how long.”

  Beatrice’s eyes narrowed at her friend. Tenzin sat, perfectly relaxed and looking like the queen of her own personal castle. Which, in a way, she was. The palace complex was two-tiered, and Tenzin’s rooms took up a full half of her father’s buildings. Giovanni had explained it as they walked out of the Great Hall, trying to distract her from her whirling emotions.

  The two earth Elders and their clans stayed below ground in a complex series of caverns that had been dug thousands of years before. The four wind and water Elders each took a wing of the outer palace walls with their retinues; and Mistress He and Elder Lan, the two fire vampires, lived in smaller homes within the palace walls, since they preferred to keep less company.

  “Tell her how long you’ve known where her father was.”

  “Don’t be rude. I don’t have to explain myself to you. You’re in my home.”

  “Tenzin,” Giovanni growled.

  “And, I’m here in this crazy house as a favor to you. You know how much I dislike being around my father and all the bowing people.”

  A bevy of servants scurried about, most of them overseen by a quiet, sweet-faced woman named Nima, who was a personal assistant of some sort. She was older than Caspar, easily in her eighties or nineties, and issued quiet orders as each human servant hung on her words.

  “Tenzin,” Beatrice finally said after a silent woman brought a tray of tea. It was hot and sweet-smelling, suffusing the air with the scents of honey and cardamom. “Please tell me how long you’ve known my father was here. You know we’ve been looking for him.”