I slid into a matching pair of heels and grabbed my overnight bag. I fingered through my hair, in too big a hurry to see him to care about doing anything more impressive with it.
Rushing to the door, I took in a deep breath and did my best to conjure up my inner Audrey Hepburn. I knew he’d be waiting for me right outside my door as he had everyday, so this was my one chance to collect my wits before his face assaulted them. I slid my hands down the dress—smoothing, pushing and adjusting—and hurled the door open.
Whatever stress I’d had over wearing the dress, was worth it the moment I saw his face. His mouth dropped and his eyes looked close to popping out of his head. I watched with satisfaction when he wavered and had to place his hands securely on the rail behind to steady himself.
“Wow,” he murmured under his breath, changing his hold on the railing so it no longer appeared to be keeping him steady, but keeping him from getting us into trouble.
I smiled from his verbal and non-verbal praise.
“Bryn.” A voice called out from the staircase. William’s head snapped to the side, just in time to see John ascend the final step before he was in the hallway with us.
It seemed strange . . . reckless, that neither one of us had sensed his approach before he was practically upon us, especially William. Perhaps I incapacitated his senses as much as he did mine.
John came to an abrupt halt when he looked at me, and a smile formed over his lips that gave me the creeps. “I see you’ve taken the dress code to heart,” he said, referring to the rule William had mentioned in passing regarding John’s stringency of “dressing the part” like the bunch of superior Immortals he considered his Alliance.
My fidgeting broke out from the unyielding eyes surveying me—my lower lip took the majority of the beating.
“Extraordinary,” John said, taking a step back and rubbing his hand over his chin; as someone would when considering an expensive purchase. My prior fondness for the dress turned to hate—you can take the girl out of the jeans . . . but you shouldn’t.
“John,” William said, sounding more like a warning than an address. His pent up fury cascaded from his tensed body. I could physically feel the heat from it.
John pried his eyes from me. Setting his jaw tight, he narrowed his eyes as he turned to William. John’s annoyed glare met William’s furious one, and the clashing of their emotions forecasted a hurricane on the horizon.
“I heard this morning of your change in schedule for today’s travels, so I wanted to grab Bryn before your early morning departure.” He raised his eyebrows in an all-knowing manner. “I’ve assembled the Council here today, and they’re quite eager to meet Miss Dawson.” He turned his head to me. “And from your radiance today, I highly doubt they’ll be disappointed.”
I could feel—more like sense—William preparing to do something very rash. The closeness shared between us transcended physicality and emotionality. I felt what he was thinking—the stronger the emotion, the easier to understand his thoughts—and right now I knew he was preparing to tackle John. As the internal broodings started to form physically when he removed his hands from the railing and balled them into fists, I panicked. I did the only thing I could think of to keep William from attacking John.
The one thing that would stop him—me.
I surged forward and took John’s arm, placing myself between William and him. I knew William would never risk me being hurt, as fool-hearty as it was since I couldn’t be injured with any kind of permanence.
I shot him an apologetic look and hoped he would forgive me. I wanted to cry when I saw forgiveness was already in his eyes. I felt the fury calming, but quick to replace it, was fear. I knew this fear was for me, and whatever awaited me with the Council. I mustered up all the reassurance I could radiate, and hoped he could feel what was flowing through me, as I could him.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
THE COUNCIL
John escorted me down the staircase, and led me down the west hall when we reached the main floor. He stopped in front of a nondescript utility door and removed a brass key from his jacket pocket. Unlocking the door, he held it open for me, but I hesitated.
A surge of cool air pulsed over me. A long staircase descended down into what must be the basement, although the forever winding stairs led down much farther than your everyday basement. It was dark, except for what looked to be the flickering of candles far below. Even with my inhuman vision, I didn’t want to step into the menacing darkness.
John tapped his foot impatiently, and the tone in his voice matched. “They’re waiting.”
I took my first step down, the cool air intensifying as I entered the darkness, and then another. The door slammed shut and John was behind me, one step higher.
“Can you see alright?” he asked.
The darkness would have been Mortally blinding, but I could see everything around us with my Immortal eyes. From the dark stone stairs winding down as if into the depths of the world, to his hand that laid uninvited on the side of my arm. I could hear faint whispers of what were most likely spoken in normal voices below us, but the most frightening thing around me was what I sensed: a heavy cloud of evil combined with a fog of destiny. I shuddered with more force than necessary, hoping to shake his hand free of my arm.
It worked.
“We haven’t got all day . . . and William and Patrick are waiting for you,” John said, when my feet wouldn’t move from the second step.
That was all I needed reminded of. William (forget the Patrick part) was waiting for me. The sooner I got this whole ordeal over with, the sooner we’d be together; putting dozens of miles between us and this place. I took the next step of many more to come, each one putting me deeper into this dark world that seemed to call me with an air of expectancy.
One hundred-and-seventy-seven steps later, I set my foot down on the stone floor of our destination. My mouth gaped as I took a good look around the cavernous room we’d entered, and it was just that—a cave. The walls were rough, and in the streams of candlelight, resembled crooked fingers tempting one towards them. The uneven ceiling must have reached nearly one hundred feet in places. This place was dark, dank, and vile . . . it looked, smelled, and felt all these things. I was aware of the trembling my body was trying to release, but my mind kept these signs of distress trapped safely within me; not daring to show my dread.
I was aware of the long, rectangular table set before us, behind which sat seven chairs containing six men, but I couldn’t focus on this image, because I was drawn to what was behind them.
In the center of the room, where the cragged ceiling was at its highest point, laid a waist-high, solid stone platform which gleamed in its onyx splendor. It was set upon a pillar of stairs leading up from all four directions.
There was one bright ray of light in this entire mass of a room, and it was the bright beam that shown down upon the platform. I had a strong feeling then that I’d seen this all before . . . I’d seen myself in this room before. I couldn’t take my eyes from the table looming like the sword of an executioner in front of me. It was calling to me with siren-like persuasion, willing it be that our fates would one day intertwine.
When the next tremor of terror tore though me, it made a very physical appearance when I trembled like a lone leaf in the dead of winter.
“Gentlemen,” John’s voice rocketed through the room. I blinked, and this small mercy allowed me the escape I needed to remove my hypnotic stare from the platform. “May I introduce, Miss Bryn Dawson.”
My eyes came to rest on the six men in front of me. John’s Alliance’s Council, minus the one who was standing before them, introducing me.
“Bryn, may I introduce—”
These men before me well-suited the room we were in. Their dark eyes were filled with supremacy, and their faces were blank; actually, more stone cold as opposed to blank. A blank face would have been friendlier than the faces that stared back at me now.
“Julius, Lourdes, Ezra, Draco, Simon, and Lucius.” Each head nodded at me when John said their names. Such old, antiquated name; names I’d heard studying ancient histories and civilizations.
“The floor is yours, Gentlemen.” John bowed, and then swept around to the right side of the long table, seating himself in the last open chair beside Lucius.
My mouth ran dry, and the pungent smell of sulfur and must dizzied me.
“You can relax, Miss Dawson,” Draco’s voice dripped with as much authority as John’s. Given his seat at the center of the table, I assumed he was the Chancellor. “I assure you, we mean you no harm.” The flicker in his eyes did little to reassure me of this, but his voice was as pleasant as the sound of my car’s engine. He looked like the kind of man that could have played the lead in a Victorian-era movie, unmistakable good looks and an aura of refinement. “We wish to ask you several questions to help us get to know you a little better.”
I nodded my head and resisted the temptation to bite my lower lip. Though it had always been a welcome comfort in times of stress, I was determined I would not let these men perceive an ounce of the dread that sweltered in my body.
A small-framed, middle-aged looking man with bright red hair, and lips so thin they were virtually non-existent, spoke next; Julius. “How are you taking to the life of Immortality so far, Miss Dawson?”
There were so many possible responses to this: it’s great, or, it’s totally freaking me out, or, thanks for leaving everyone to believe I drowned, or, I’ve been reunited with the one I will spend the rest of forever with.
I settled for, “The transformation’s gone well so far. I’m learning new things about this life everyday.” The cragged walls threw my voice at varying angles around the room, making it sound stronger than it was.
“How do you like Townsend Manor?” Julius inquired, his uneven, trilling voice reminding me of the sound my bike would make when I used to put playing cards in the spokes.
Again, a myriad of responses were possible for this, but in holding to what I knew of John, and that these men reminded me of him . . . I kept my answers as concise and impersonal as I could. “I like it.”
Julius let the echo of my answer quiet before he addressed me again. “Have you found it difficult to cut off all ties to your Mortal life—to be dead to your family and friends?”
The answer to this question should have saddened me, but it didn’t. I’d rediscovered the last good thing remaining in my Mortal life, when I’d passed over into Immortality. “No, there’s little to miss.”
Draco opened up a thick manila folder set before him and thumbed through its contents. “We’ve seen that from your file . . .”
I could guess what the contents were within the folder he was gazing over as if looking for some recipe in a cookbook, not going through the events and sorrows of one’s life.
“Bryn Michelle Dawson, age nineteen,” Draco began, reading off the top sheet in the folder that was thicker than my Calculus textbook. “Born and raised in Santa Cruz, only child, valedictorian of your high school, accepted to several Ivy Leagues, enrolled in Stanford until transferring to OSU this past year, conference champ in tennis and the 200 meter, no criminal record—”