Chapter 2: Chapter 2

On the other side of the gate, she began to understand his reason for doubting the level of difficulty. Dozens of armed guards took up positions on either side of the Jeep, escorting it toward the large house at the end of the lane. Their eyes glowed amber, an indicator that all of these people were Souled Vampires. She hadn’t gotten the impression from Cassidy and her parties visit that they’d been quite so amassed, but then, perhaps Jo hadn’t been paying quite enough attention.

Slowly, Jo eased the Jeep along, awaiting instructions from these greeters, should they bark them. It wasn’t until she was near the house that one of the men signaled for her to stop and shouted something she didn’t understand. This time, it wasn’t in Russian, but his broken English was uninterpretable to her.

“He said turn it off,” Zane said. He always was more attuned than she was.

She did as she had been told, her eyes taking in the mansion now situated to her right. It was huge, probably ten thousand square feet, in a modern style, though not with the sort of wide windows one might expect from twenty-first century architecture. Instead, massive white walls encapsulated much of the living space with a broad, gray porch, probably slate, she thought. Lights illuminated the shrubs along the outside and poured out from the few windows that were visible from the front. It looked like the home of an affluent family, maybe in Seattle or Aspen, before the Revelation. Now, the idea that Eliza, Lucas, and their clan of Souled Vampires lived here, perhaps pretending the world around them wasn’t crumbling like fisted sand seemed as wrong as the idea that these Vampires might have a tiny chunk of rare metal shaped into a bullet that could kill the Guardian sitting beside her.

Jo didn’t open her door; one of the guards did. He took hold of her arm, forcing her out, though he didn’t yank her as she thought he might. Thank goodness I wasn’t wearing my seatbelt, she thought. On the other side of the vehicle, Zane was also removed.

“Who this person?” one of them asked, gesturing at Zane. “You were to come alone.”

“He’s… nobody,” Jo said, watching him tip his head to the side in consideration of her remark. “I mean, just company for the long journey. He can stay here.”

The guards discussed the situation in Russian but didn’t come to a conclusion before the door to the house opened and a shadowed form emerged. “He can come inside.” An airy, male voice with only a slight Slovak accent called. Jo couldn’t see him, but she felt his eyes on her, and then, he disappeared back inside. Lucas, she thought. It had to be.

The guards checked them both for weapons, roughly enough that Jo thought she was back in jail--or maybe at the airport--and then they were allowed to walk inside. Not having any weapons made her feel as exposed as standing on stage with no clothes on would have, if she had ever had that experience, but she had to remind herself these people were supposed to be their friends, sort of. Besides, she could kill Eliza, a Guardian, with her bare hands if she needed to. The Vamps as well, assuming none of them shot her before she got the chance. The odds of her taking them all out were against her, but she’d never played to the odds.

Most of the guards stayed behind, either looking over the Jeep or heading back to the road. She wondered if that was their job, to just stand outside all damn day and night and make sure that nothing and no one infiltrated the fortress. She wondered what they ate. Most of the Souled Vampires preferred animal blood to human because they did have a conscience, but she knew there was such a thing as evil Souled.

Inside, the house was as much a palace as Jo had expected. They followed a few of the guards through a foyer lined with expensive works of art, their shoes echoing on immaculate wooden floors, down a long hall to a living area where Lucas and Eliza stood in front of modern white sofas that looked so soft Jo imagined one might sit and stroke the couch all day, like it was a pet.

“Welcome to our home,” Lucas said, the voice matching the one that had hit Jo’s ear earlier. So he had come outside to check on them. He crossed the space quickly and offered his hand to Jo first, and then to Zane. “How was your journey?”

“Long,” Jo admitted. “But not bad.”

“Good. We are glad you’re here.” He wasn’t as tall as Zane, but he was strikingly handsome, his amber eyes glowing softly in the light from a few lamps that dotted the expansive room here and there and a roaring fire that had to be more for show than anything else since neither of the creatures that lived here would be any more capable of catching a chill than Jo was.

Eliza finally stepped forward and offered her hand. She looked nearly the same as she had in the images Jo had seen of her from when she was younger, except her hair was a dark black, not purple as it had been, and it reached past her shoulders now, tied back in a simple ponytail. She wore a black pantsuit made of elegant fabric, heels, and more jewelry than Jo owned. “Thanks for coming,” Eliza said as she released Zane’s hand and took Jo’s. “It’s nice to see you again, Josephina.”

“Please, call me Jo.” She managed a friendly smile. While she couldn’t remember ever having met the woman, she knew she had a few times, when she was a small child. Back then, before Eliza married Lucas, she’d still been a LIGHTS team member. Not a very good one, at least to Jo’s knowledge, but a member nonetheless.

“Won’t you have a seat?” Lucas motioned toward the larger of the sofas, which was now situated behind Jo and Zane since they’d entered the room to greet their hosts. They looked at each other and then sat down, leaving a good space between them. Eliza and Lucas sat with their backs to the fireplace in equally impressive white chairs. Jo was right about the couch. It was soft. She put her hands in her lap to prevent herself from further running her fingers along the fabric.

“What is it that we can help you with?” Lucas asked, folding his hands in front of him.

Jo studied the Souled Vampire for a few moments. It was difficult to imagine someone of his resolve tearing a person’s throat out or sucking their blood. He was so polished, so… civilized. Jo knew he wasn’t that much older than her as their kind went, but she imagined, if he had been alive in the eighteen hundreds, he would’ve blended right in with the English gentlemen the Irish farmers, such as her dad, detested. Not that it made her feel any ill will toward him now. If he and Eliza would help them track down Holland or otherwise weaken the Vampires’ position, she would love him until the day he died--which might be never.

Stalling while she collected her thoughts, Jo took a deep breath and cleared her throat.

“Where are our manners? Would you like a drink?” Lucas asked, scooting to the edge of his seat.

“No, thank you.” Jo put up a hand to stop him. “We don’t want to take up too much of your time. We’re here just to see if… if there’s any way you’d reconsider helping us. We understand that your conversation with Cass didn’t go so well--for us anyway, and I guess… I just wanted to try again. We know you could help us--if you have time.” She couldn’t imagine how they wouldn’t have time to help. It really wasn’t a matter of time, was it? Who had anything better to do right now? Saying they didn’t have time, rather than they just didn’t care to help, was an easy path for them to take out of the mess. She wasn’t sure why she was handing them an excuse, but she waited to see what they had to say, hoping she could keep her mouth shut and give them an opportunity to talk.

Eliza and Lucas exchanged glances. They both looked like adults, like a well-off married couple with jobs and responsibilities. In comparison, Jo felt like a child, like a vagabond, wandering around in the woods looking for things to kill…. She knew it was all a mirage, but it didn’t help her feel any more settled.

Once the exchange of glances and a few silent statements were made between the couple, it was Lucas who turned back to address her. “Well, Jo, we did have a conversation with your Aunt Cassidy. I’m not exactly sure I understood the reason for her request. Perhaps you can shed a little more light on the situation for us. Specifically… are you certain it is, in fact, Holland that was seen? If so, how do you know that? And then… what precisely would you have us do?” He spoke with a Slovakian accent that had faded over the years to a mixture of British English and Eliza’s Mid-Western American, but it was clear, concise, and made perfect sense.

Jo had to wonder why Cassidy wouldn’t have explained all of that before. Maybe they just wanted to hear her version of the answers. Or maybe Cassidy hadn’t done her best to convince them because she didn’t want them to come. She wasn’t sure if Cassidy’s husband, Brandon, would’ve been able to use his mind tricks to convince them or if that didn’t work on Souled Vampires and/or Guardians who had been exposed to his father, Elliott, for so long they were immune to that type of persuasion, but had Brandon even tried? She knew there was no love lost between Eliza and Elliott. Eliza had been involved in the ambush that had gotten Elliott temporarily killed, after all.

Jo found herself clearing her throat again but stopped just before Lucas moved in a way that made her think he was off to get her some water despite her protests. “My father saw her. He was back a few weeks ago for a week or two, and while he was in Moscow, he saw Holland. So… that’s one way we know it’s her. Since Cassidy’s visit, I also confirmed with a Vampire we had in our custody for a short amount of time that she has many names, one of which was Asteria.”

If they had been looking at her skeptically before--which they had--those expressions shifted. “He said that?” Eliza questioned, tipping her head forward as he eyebrows raised. “The Vampire voluntarily told you that one of her names was Asteria? Without prompting?”

“Yes,” Jo confirmed. “Believe me, no one could possibly be more skeptical than I was. I didn’t think it was her. I thought she was dead, or at the very least so lost in the portals she’d never find her way out. Even if she were alive somewhere, I didn’t think there was a chance my dad would’ve actually had the opportunity to see her with his own eyes. In my experience, fortune doesn’t quite work that way.”

“Preach!” Eliza said in agreement.

It seemed the two of them had more in common than Jo had thought.