Buch lesen: «Keeper of the Dawn»
His bride.
She lay upon the altar. Her face was alabaster, and her hair was gold, flowing behind her, beneath her, and falling in curls from the altar where she lay as if on a white pedestal at a wake.
Her eyes were closed, and she lay in beauty, as if she were sleeping.
But she wasn’t asleep.
A red ribbon seemed to adorn her neck, but it wasn’t a fashion accessory.
And it wasn’t a ribbon.
It was a line of blood. Blood that streamed from her throat to the floor.
He screamed, but his scream was silent, no matter how hard he tried to make it into sound. He fought the mist and shadow mire that held him down as he tried to run to her, but he couldn’t reach her…
“Mark!” The sound of his name was like an off button for the scene unfolding in his mind.
About the Author
New York Times bestselling author HEATHER GRAHAM has written more than a hundred novels, many of which have been featured by the Doubleday Book Club and the Literary Guild. An avid scuba diver, ballroom dancer and a mother of five, she still enjoys her south Florida home, but loves to travel as well, from locations such as Cairo, Egypt, to her own backyard, the Florida Keys. Reading, however, is the pastime she still loves best, and she is a member of many writing groups. She’s currently vice president of the Horror Writers’ Association, and she’s also an active member of International Thriller Writers. She is very proud to be a Killerette in the Killer Thriller Band, along with many fellow novelists she greatly admires. For more information, check out her website, theoriginalheathergraham.com.
Keeper of the Dawn
Heather Graham
MILLS & BOON
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Dedicated with deep appreciation
to Katherine Ware Wolniewicz.
Thanks for all you do!
Prologue
Illusion and Truth
Mark Valiente slowly became aware of himself, as if he were emerging from a trance where he had forgotten all movement and sense of place. He heard music, the volume slowly rising in his head. It was beautiful music—harps and violins, guitars and an organ playing while a drum kept the beat. He recognized songs, popular and classical, being performed as if for an audience.
Mist seemed to clear around him, and he realized he was in a church. It was beautiful, old, designed in the Gothic style, with elegant stained-glass windows. As he walked in, he saw that it was crowded with people. The men were dressed in suits, and the women were beautiful in dresses of what he thought of as spring colors, white and pastels, as well as hats and heels. Their heads turned, and they all smiled and looked benignly at him.
He walked down the aisle. Dead ahead, he saw that Brodie McKay was there, near the altar, grinning sheepishly and watching him as if Mark were about to do something that would change the world. The place, the people, the music, the very vibe…everything was absolutely beautiful, filled with light and promise. Colors seemed to spill through the stained-glass windows and paint the church, the red velvet runner, and everything and everyone around him, in a flow of bright and gentle tones. He glanced to his side, and he didn’t see the people in the pews. Instead he saw a rather pale reflection of himself in one of the windows—which, of course, with the light streaming through, wasn’t really possible. But there he was. Dressed in a charcoal-gray, somewhatold-fashioned tux, red vest with a white shirt beneath. His tawny hair was neatly clipped and his face shaved. He almost smiled, thankful that he had cleaned up well for the event.
The event…
It was a wedding. His wedding. He would walk through the church and greet the crowd, and take his place next to Brodie, who was certainly his best man.
And then she would walk down the aisle.
Yes, he was waiting for her. He felt as if he were trembling; he had fallen in love. She was beautiful, and he dreamed of lying beside her naked, feeling the softness of her skin and the desire she awakened in him. And the way he felt when they’d made love and when he awoke to see her eyes. He was going to marry her…and she was the dream that had filled his soul. This moment, this marriage, would be consummate magic, an affirmation of all that lay between them.
He knew that he loved her.
He just…
…didn’t know her name. Didn’t even know who she was.
Somewhere in the back of his mind he mocked himself for the daydream.
He wasn’t even dating anyone in particular.
And yet…
He could feel this; it wasn’t just a vision in his mind’s eye. It seemed to be something that was real to all his senses and in his soul.
Somehow he knew that they had chosen music from Zeffirelli’s 1968 version of Romeo and Juliet for that moment when she would walk down the aisle.
But even as he moved forward, the light from the windows began to change. What had been bright now turned to dark, swirling purple and shades of gray. What had seemed like a glow of happiness and expectation filling the church became fear and dread. He saw the people around him, saw the smiles fade and the horror creep onto their faces… .
And then those people evaporated. Brodie was gone. The music was strident and off-key, quieting to silence as the shadow colors merged to near-total darkness, leaving odd shapes and illusions to creep and crawl in the midst of a gray miasma.
He was still in the church. The only color that remained was the red runner beneath his feet. Before him, he saw something on the altar. Something in a shimmering mist of crystals and pearls and white.
His bride.
He felt his limbs grow heavy with fear and denial. He tried to run, but the fog was like sludge, and he couldn’t reach her quickly enough. She was lying upon the altar, her face alabaster and her hair gold, flowing beneath her head and shoulders and falling in curls as if on a white pedestal at a wake.
Her eyes were closed and she lay in beauty, as if sleeping.
But she wasn’t sleeping.
A red ribbon seemed to adorn her neck, but it wasn’t an accessory.
And it wasn’t a ribbon.
It was a line of blood that streamed from her throat to the floor, and then ran and created the very runner beneath his feet.
He screamed, but his scream was silent, no matter how hard he tried to make it into sound. He fought the mist And shadow mire that held him back, and he tried to run to her, but he kept slipping in the blood. Her blood. And the shadow creatures seemed to be holding on to him, throwing their heavy weight against him, keeping him from moving forward. She was dead, or dying, and he couldn’t reach her… .
“Mark!” The hushed sound of his name was like an off button for the scene unfolding in his mind.
He started as someone poked his arm.
He blinked. It had been so real, that…well, vision was the only word he could think of.
“Let’s go.” That was Brodie speaking.
Time, Mark knew, was a deceptive concept. That vision had seemed to go on forever, but, he realized now, only split seconds had passed in which he had either dozed off or been daydreaming. He wasn’t in a church; he was in an unmarked police car parked off the road cutting through Starry Night Cemetery, and he and Brodie had been in the car, drinking coffee to stay alert—there was irony for you—since four in the afternoon.
Now his partner had seen something, something he should have seen, as well.
Brodie was already out of the car. Mark quickly followed suit.
Brodie headed for the Hildegard vault. Built by Sebastian Hildegard in 1920, it now housed several dozen bodies. Bodies belonging to a long line of lords and ladies of illusion and their various offspring.
Shapeshifters. Hell, yeah, they made great magicians.
Brodie motioned to him, and Mark nodded; they’d worked together often enough over the years to develop a silent shorthand. Brodie would take the front, while Mark slipped in by the rear door. Brodie had the power of his strength, while they both knew that Mark had a different means of entry. He’d perfected the powers of his kind years ago and was almost as adept at illusion as the Hildegard family.
They parted ways. Starry Night had been a private cemetery for the first seventy-five years of its existence, until Able Hildegard had taken over the family’s holdings at his father’s demise. The cemetery had been sold, and the then-living had scrambled to buy up plots and vaults so they might rest eternally with the famous who had found their way into the glorious grounds where illusionists and stars of stage and screen—silent and otherwise—had come for the peace of the ages. The truly dead did lie here, while others merely…rested. But, most of the time, it was a place of peace.
Or had been.
Until the living had begun to go missing and then turn up dead—and the trail of clues had led them here.
As Mark neared the iron-gated rear entry to the grand mausoleum, he could hear chanting. He edged closer, at first just listening and letting his eyes adjust so he could see what was happening inside the imposing vault. Night had fallen, but there was light within, spawned from torches that burned in the hands of those who stood around the sarcophagus of Sebastian Hildegard.
The marble lid of the sarcophagus was sculpted to resemble the grand patriarch of the family; in effigy Sebastian lay with his hands folded over his chest, the long flowing robe of a magician almost real due to the energy of the artist’s creation. But as Mark watched, a caped figure, with a golden face mask, stepped forward carrying a burden—a woman. She was blonde, and she wore a white halter dress. With her hair falling around her, it was impossible to tell whether she was unconscious…or dead.
Her fingers twitched. So, she wasn’t dead, Mark thought.
Yet.
No sign of Brodie, but the chanting in the tomb was growing louder. Friends in the Otherworld of the Los Angeles area had warned them that they’d been hearing tales about the old Hildegard tomb. There was a cult growing up around the famous magician, a belief that blood sacrifices made on the altar of his sarcophagus would bring him back to life, and bring stardom, power and glory to those who worshipped at his feet.
Bull!
A dead shapeshifter was a dead shapeshifter.
But that didn’t mean there weren’t those out there who were willing to believe.
The woman was draped over the marble effigy of Sebastian Hildegard.
He feared they were out of time.
The gate was locked. No matter. It was old and easy to force. The iron hinges must have been kept well-oiled, because they didn’t even squeak until he was in, and once there, he was ready.
“LAPD! Stop where you are!” he ordered.
Someone let out a shriek of fury. A flutter of cloth and shadow erupted in the room; the woman was left behind as figures began to scramble and torches fell.
“There are silver bullets in this gun,” Mark warned. “Stop!”
That wouldn’t mean a lot to a number of those here, but to some—the Others in the group—it would be fair warning.
Something flew at him. It was a caped skeletal figure with a monstrous face, screaming as it moved. He raised his customized gun, aimed and fired just as it reached him. The thing disappeared, and his bullet crashed into the concrete slab of a tomb in the wall.
One figure tried to race past him, a human. He went down in a whining sprawl as Mark casually punched him, and then Mark cuffed him quickly before tackling another. The place was in chaos. Mist filled the room, and a horde of hooded figures and insubstantial shadows came at Mark, screeching incoherently. In the background, he could hear humans screaming and crying, followed by the sounds of Brodie intercepting those who tried to escape by the main entrance.
The fog began to clear. He met up with Brodie, and they looked around. Five humans—three men and two women—lay cuffed on the ground. The Others had gone, vanished, disappeared into thin air.
Or the mists of illusion.
“Maybe one of them will talk—tell us something we can use,” Brodie said. Even he was breathing hard.
“Maybe,” Mark agreed. But they both knew they had failed. Whoever was at the head of this mess wasn’t one of the human beings lying cuffed on the floor And waiting to be taken to the station.
But the head of this particular operation was a shapeshifter. And they had missed him.
Or her.
“The woman…She can’t be dead… . They needed her alive,” Mark said, stepping over a cuffed man to reach the tomb of Sebastian Hildegard.
He lifted her carefully. Blond hair fell around her shoulders, revealing her face.
He nearly froze.
He’d already seen her tonight.
He’d never seen her in the flesh before, but…
She had been the woman in his daydream, the bride at his blood wedding… .
“Alive?” Brodie asked him anxiously.
Her eyes opened, and she stared at Mark. They were sea-green and beautiful, and she looked disoriented.
Then she screamed and began to fight him, and she was damned good at it, belting him in the jaw and raking her nails across his face in fury. She stood on her own now; she seemed to have the strength of a thousand demons.
“Hey!”
Brodie came to his aid, catching her arms. “We’re the cops! We’re here to save you.”
As Brodie spoke, they heard sirens in the night; his call for the bus, to haul those they had caught to lockup, was being answered.
The young woman blinked. She inhaled, staring at Mark. He realized suddenly that she wasn’t human; she was Other. She was Elven.
Brodie whispered, “My God—Elven,” just as Mark thought it. But then, to Mark’s amazement, Brodie added a name. “Alessande Salisbrooke!”
Maybe it was natural that Brodie knew her; he was Elven, too.
She spun and looked at Brodie, and let out a sigh of relief. “Brodie. I didn’t realize—”
She stopped midsentence and stared at Mark, heat and anger emanating from her. “Vampire,” she said. “And you’re a cop?”
“Yeah, I’m a cop,” he said. She studied him as if he’d done something wrong, or as if his being a vampire was anathema to her. He felt his temper rising. “Yes, I am a vampire,” he said angrily. “I’m the vampire who just saved your ass.” He was shaken. He didn’t usually strike out because a panicked victim fought him.
But…
He’d seen her in his vision. Seen her with a ribbon of blood coming from her throat…
At a wedding.
Their wedding.
That was certainly never going to happen.
“Saved me?” she exclaimed. “Vampire idiot. You ruined everything.”
Chapter 1
“Seriously,” Sailor Gryffald said, “what were you thinking, Alessande?” Sailor continued to pace while Alessande sat.
After a stop at the police station, Brodie and Mark had dropped Alessande off with Sailor and had gone straight to Pandora’s Box, since Brodie had been anxious to see Rhiannon, the canyon’s vampire Keeper—and his fiancée. Alessande was glad to be alone with Sailor and free to talk.
Sailor continued, “Those monsters were about to sacrifice you. Believe me, you helped save my life, so I know how competent you are, but no one knows what kind of evil you were really up against, if I understand what you’re saying correctly.”
Alessande winced. She really shouldn’t have been so angry with that vampire cop—after all, he had been trying to save her. But, in her own opinion, she had been prepared. Ready. And she was suspicious of vampires and…
No, she shouldn’t have snapped at him.
“I had to be taken captive,” Alessande explained wearily. “It was the only way for me to get in there and find out what’s going on, who’s behind the cult and the deaths.” There was more to her logic—and her desperation to get at the truth—but at this moment she wasn’t ready to completely explain herself, not even to Sailor Ann Gryffald.
“But…you’re Elven,” Sailor said sternly. In the world of the Others, Sailor was the Keeper of the Elven community in the L.A. Valley. “You’re an ancient!”
No one liked to be reminded of her age, Alessande thought, arching a brow at Sailor.
“Sorry,” Sailor said. She and her two Gryffald cousins—Rhiannon and Barrie—were new to the Keeper job, but all three had already been tested under fire. Alessande knew that because she’d been involved with helping Sailor find her way.
They’d met when Alessande had carried Sailor into her home after Sailor had been attacked during the recent so-called Celebrity Virus plague.
“Seriously,” Sailor went on. I can’t tell you how proud I am of so many in the Elven community, but we’re not considered the…the toughest of the Others. Alessande, you create potions, you’re a healer. You live alone… . You’re practically a hermit.”
“Gee, thanks,” Alessande said.
“I’m not trying to offend you, and you know it. You brew the best tea in the country—maybe in the world. You’re like a beacon of caring and wisdom. But you’re gentle. And you could have been up against were-creatures, vampires and God knows what else—not to mention very vicious human beings. How did you intend to save yourself in that situation?” Sailor demanded.
“I was going to teleport,” Alessande said, indignantly.
“You can’t teleport when you’re unconscious,” Sailor argued.
Alessande shook her head, desperately wanting to deny the seriousness of the situation, but the truth was she knew she might have gotten herself into trouble—serious trouble—and she should be grateful to the cops who had come to her rescue. She had just gotten it into her head lately that she had to be more proactive in protecting all Others—along with the human race. And that, of course, was because of Regina, because she’d been forced to see firsthand once again what could happen to the young and innocent—especially the young and innocent among the Elven.
Like the rest of the world, L.A. was filled with all manner of creatures most of humanity knew about only because of legend—and movies. Creatures that most humans didn’t even believe in. Keepers—like the Gryffald cousins—were human beings, but…more. They had special powers aligned with those of the particular paranormal race they were tasked with protecting, and were generally born into longtime Keeper families. They bore special identifying birthmarks. It was as if their role had been predetermined by a divine power.
There were areas in the world where the Other races seldom desired to live…too hard to blend in, not enough for them to do.
L.A., however, was a haven for Others. Because it was a movie town, monsters and strange creatures abounded on-screen and, frankly, offscreen, given how many…unique individuals tended to migrate there. As a place to “hide in plain sight,” nothing filled the bill like Hollywood. That meant that the area was densely populated by Others, so there had to be a commensurately large number of Keepers.
Elven, like Alessande, were fairly recent arrivals in the New World; they were creatures of the earth. Ocean voyages—that much time away from trees, from the rich soil—would have killed them. Alessande had only left the Old World herself when transatlantic flight started to become commonplace.
She was an ancient, one hundred six years old, though she knew she appeared—in the human world—to be about thirty. She’d seen a great deal of the wickedness the world had to offer—wickedness dealt out by both human beings and Others.
Despite everything she’d encountered, everything she had lived through, she had chosen to heal, to advise.
But, damn it, she was an ancient! She should have been able to overcome whatever drug had been given to her.
She’d been aware of everything as it had been going on, and to some degree she had been able to fight the drug, though she had feigned complete passivity.
But…they had drugged her, and it had definitely affected her. Would she have been able to escape at the last second?
Now she was at the Gryffald family estate, a small collection of historic homes on a nice little hill in Laurel Canyon, collectively named the House of the Rising Sun. Sailor’s home was the main residence, and it was called Castle House, while on either side were the guesthouses: Gwydion’s Cave, where Barrie lived, and Pandora’s Box, where Rhiannon made her home. When their fathers, Keepers all, had been called away on international business, the cousins—Sailor, Rhiannon and Barrie—had been thrown into a game that was ages old, though mostly new to them, since they hadn’t expected to take their places as Keepers for years to come, yet the land had been deemed for Keepers for decades. The property had originally belonged to a magician billed as “Merlin,” real name Ivan Schwartz, who had been helped by the Gryffald cousins’ grandfather. Schwartz had added the guesthouses to his estate so that the Keepers could live on his property if they chose. Before he died, Ivan had sold the estate to the Gryffald family for such a pittance that for all intents and purposes it had actually been a gift.
Of course, it came with a catch. Merlin was still around, haunting whichever house he chose. He was a very polite ghost, often extremely helpful, and totally respectful of the inhabitants’ privacy, so in actuality he was a perfect tenant.
At the moment, though, Alessande was glad he wasn’t haunting Castle House.
Keepers had watched over various communities of Others at least since the ancient days, before accepted magic had ended and the world had become a place where the unusual was feared and anyone different, even if they were human, was considered an enemy to be burned at the stake or otherwise destroyed. Because the cousins’ fathers had been considered some of the wisest and most effective Keepers in the world, they had been called up to help form a council so that Others around the world would have guidance—and laws—to help them all live productive lives without attracting the kind of notice that would lead to a return of the bad old days.
Every Other—from the gnomes and leprechauns to the were-folk, vampires and shapeshifters—lived by the Code of Silence, keeping the very existence of the Otherworld secret from humanity. The Code was broken only occasionally and for very special human beings. Even the rashest Others, those with little respect for laws of any kind, upheld the Code, because the Code meant survival. Without it, they could all be doomed. While many in the Other community had powers that made them far stronger and far more lethal than human beings, the human population of the world was larger by perhaps 99 percent, and therefore the Others were vulnerable to persecution and death should their existence ever come to light.
Jonquil, Sailor’s big ragamuffin of a mutt, whined softly and licked Alessande’s fingers. She smiled and scratched the dog’s head. If only the world were made up of such creatures as this. Jonquil seemed to instinctively know kind people from the cruel ones.
Sailor was doing very well as an Elven Keeper now, though when Alessande had first known her, she hadn’t taken her position seriously at all. But that current knowledge gave Alessande a measure of confidence when she was speaking with her Keeper.
“I was always aware of what was going on,” she said. “I know that I appeared to be unconscious, but there was a part of me that was there. I believe I could have teleported when the right moment came.” Elven were strong, even if not as strong as vampires, and while they couldn’t give the illusion of being someone—or something—different, as shapeshifters could, they were able to teleport, moving through space, very handy in escaping dangerous situations. No one yet knew the science of it, but being an Other often meant that there just weren’t logical answers. No one really understood how shapeshifters managed to appear to be birds—and then fly away.
“Believe isn’t good enough when your life depends on it,” Sailor said sternly. She looked at Alessande. “Don’t get me wrong. I know I wouldn’t be where I am today, knowing what I know and doing my job with my mind focused on my responsibilities, if not for you. But, Alessande, I have to agree with Brodie and his vampire partner—you were risking your life, and you almost lost it.”
Alessande smiled; she loved Sailor, and knew her Keeper was being completely sincere. Alessande had been both healer and coavenger when Sailor had fallen ill to the Celebrity Virus, then had brought justice to its perpetrator—since the plague’s spread had been intentional. Alessande knew what she was doing when it came to dealing with the world’s—and the Otherworld’s—evils.
So she really didn’t understand why Brodie was so upset with her. Brodie knew her, knew she was capable of handling herself when the going got tough. As for the vampire cop—well, he was a vampire, and she didn’t expect a hell of a lot out of any vampire.
“Honestly, I knew what I was doing,” Alessande insisted.
Jonquil barked as if in agreement.
“This is the kind of situation the police need to handle,” Sailor said.
“The police? Oh, Sailor, come on. We both know that, in situations where Others are involved, the police are all but helpless.”
“That’s why Others are encouraged to join law enforcement,” Sailor said. “Whether you want to believe it or not, Brodie and Mark were anything but helpless at the cemetery.”
“I don’t care,” Alessande said. “We have to be involved when it comes to our world, Sailor. You know that. And even if they did manage to arrest a number of cult members, we still don’t know who’s behind it all. Someone is at work out there doing something far more vicious than merely creating a cult, and they have to be an Other. I believe it’s either a shapeshifter or a vampire, which is why it’s not such a great thing for a vampire to be working on this. I mean, seriously, a vampire policeman is really something of an oxymoron!”
“Oh, Alessande, honestly, that isn’t true,” Sailor said. Her eyes were wide as she stared past Alessande, who swung around quickly in her seat to find Rhiannon Gryffald had arrived, standing with her hands on her hips, watching Alessande.
She winced.
No, of course it wasn’t true, and she knew it. She didn’t understand her own behavior right now—she was usually cool, collected and serene.
It was the situation.
And maybe even the fact that she had almost died, but she had to remain in denial or give up on her ultimate goal.
And now, just as she had spoken carelessly, Rhiannon had walked in.
Rhiannon Gryffald was the oldest of the three cousins, and though she had not particularly wanted to come to L.A. when her father had headed off to form the international council, she had been the first to embrace her life as a Keeper—the vampire Keeper for the Valley. And she was very much in love with Brodie.
Thankfully, Brodie was an Other—Alessande’s kind, Elven—so there was no awkwardness in trying to explain the Otherworld and Rhiannon’s role in it to him. He was a great guy and a good cop, and Alessande was fond of him—just as she was fond of the entire Gryffald family. But Rhiannon was quick, maybe too quick, to defend the basic decency of the Valley’s vampire population—and quick to take offense if they were accused of misdeeds with no proof.
“I’m sorry,” Alessande murmured.
“Vampires get a bad rap,” Rhiannon said. She tossed back a length of auburn hair. “I knocked,” she told her cousin. “I guess you didn’t hear me—over the rant.”
“Rhiannon,” Alessande said, “really, I’m sorry. It’s just that Brodie’s partner behaved as if I was some kind of idiot with no idea what I was doing.”
Rhiannon arched a brow. “You were about to be a sacrifice—if I heard correctly.”
“I would have teleported at the right time,” Alessande insisted stubbornly. “But first I would have figured out who’s behind the cult and the killings. Never mind. I’m not trying to be argumentative or cast aspersions on anyone. But this is ridiculous. When we left the police station, I agreed to come here to talk with Sailor, as my Keeper, but if no one’s going to take me seriously, then forgive me, but I really should be leaving.”
She’d come straight here—from seemingly endless hours of police paperwork. From questions that she answered as best she could when there was no true answer to some of them, or no answer she could give in the world of men. She’d been very careful, trying to be forthright without giving away any information that would make the human employees of the police department suspicious.
And worse, her car was at the impound lot. She’d had to ride with Brodie and Mark, and she was stuck here until she could ease her way out of the conversation and get someone to drive her home.
She spoke in an even tone to Rhiannon. “Forgive me. This—It’s senseless,” she said quietly. “The fact that you’re Keepers makes you responsible for dangerous situations, but it doesn’t preclude the rest of us from acting when those we care about are threatened. I really would like to just go home now, if you don’t mind.”
“Alessande,” Sailor protested gently. “We’re not attacking you—really.”
“No, I don’t mean to attack,” Rhiannon said softly. “If it seems like we are, it’s because we’re frightened—frightened for you.”
