As Jeremiah resolutely carried out his task, Brania took the opportunity to cast an even stronger spell over Nakano. “Thank you, Kano,” she said sweetly.
He was startled. His mind was just beginning to calm after the frenzy that always followed a feeding and he had no idea why she was thanking him. “Uh, of course,” he muttered, trying to sound convincing, but was then compelled to ask, “For what?”
Her moist, ample lips formed a smile, no teeth exposed, no fangs revealed, just her lips meeting and curving upward, making her cheeks plump and her eyes twinkle. She knew that while Nakano preferred the intimacy of boys, he wouldn’t be able to resist the intimacy that she now offered him, because his looks were also deceiving. He presented an outward persona of fire and arrogance, but his hidden truth was that he was simply a lonely kid. “For obeying and trusting me,” she replied. “You can always count on me, Kano.”
She really is so compassionate, Nakano thought, so maternal. Hell of a lot more than my own mother ever was. “I know that, Brania,” Nakano said. “And that means the world to me.”
Hiding her arrogance with yet another smile, this time less full and more wistful, Brania embraced Nakano and told him to go home and rest. “You may be a child of immortality, but you’re still a student at Archangel Academy.” And then she threw her head back and roared, “And I am quite the poet!” She was still laughing sitting alone in the backseat of the car as Jeremiah drove away, but if she wasn’t so preoccupied she would have been able to read Nakano’s mind, and then her laughter surely would have stopped. The instant she was out of sight, he forgot about her empathy, her motherly thoughtfulness, and saw her simply as yet another person to whom he had to answer, yet another person who wanted to control him. “Someday, Brania, I’ll be the one giving the orders,” Nakano told himself. “And you, and Jeremiah, and even your father, will do as I say.” And then because he didn’t have decades upon decades of practice like Brania did, he was unable to hide his own arrogance, so he yelled after the car as it sped out of the forest, “I swear to it on my blackened soul!”
At that moment, another gust of wind ripped through Ronan. This one was sudden and much stronger; maybe a storm was brewing, maybe just a warning. Either way, Ronan didn’t hear a word Michael was saying as they walked toward his dorm, not because he wasn’t interested; he just couldn’t concentrate. In the back of his mind he knew that Brania and Nakano were up to something and it was as if the wind were trying to tell him he was right, even trying to offer him a clue. He was grateful, but he didn’t really need the wind’s help; he knew the moment they met Nakano that somehow he and Brania were working together. Brania was sly, but Ronan was savvy, and he noticed her expression change ever so slightly and felt her temperature rise by a degree or two when they bumped into Nakano and Penry. He knew Penry meant nothing to her, but Nakano—they were linked and for some reason that thought frightened him. So even though he didn’t want to leave them together to roam the campus freely at night, his first priority was to get Michael away from them and back here, to the safety of St. Peter’s.
The building itself didn’t offer foolproof protection—although the golden frieze over the front door depicting a series of crucifixes and chalices would definitely deter a vampire who was out to kill from entering—there was an inhabitant of the building who would never give Nakano or Brania permission to enter their dorm after dark. Ciaran knew better. Ronan didn’t have to ask him to refuse them entry; Ciaran just knew it was not a wise thing to do.
“I’m sorry,” Ronan said, “I didn’t hear what you said.” Ronan hoped that Michael would think he didn’t hear him because Ciaran was listening to the radio while taking a shower and the mixture of music and the loud hum of water pumping through the pipes drowned out his words.
“You see, I’m right,” Michael said.
“About what?” Ronan asked.
“Ever since Brania showed up, you’ve been preoccupied.” Michael sat on his bed and unlaced his sneakers. He doesn’t just kick them off and toss them into a corner like I do, Ronan thought. “It’s almost like you’re afraid of her.”
He’s too perceptive, Ronan thought as he tried to come up with a diversion to steer the topic of conversation away from Brania and toward another, less complicated subject. “Are you seriously putting your sneakers back into their shoe box?”
Michael looked perplexed. “Don’t you go avoiding my question by pointing out my quirks.”
“That’s no quirk, Michael, that’s downright queer.” The word hadn’t even made contact with the air before Ronan’s cheeks turned red; by the time it hit the ground, Michael’s jaw dropped in delightful surprise.
“Well,” Michael said, “if the sneaker fits.” He shrugged his shoulders and tossed the shoe box into his closet. Correction, he placed the box on top of a stack of other boxes and then closed the closet door. Both boys couldn’t help but laugh, and Ronan was glad he was able to change the subject. But Michael wasn’t finished talking about Ronan’s sort-of half sibling. “So is there a specific reason you don’t like her or just her general nature?”
He’s not going to let this go, so think of something, Ronan, give him an answer. “We’ve just never gotten along.”
By Michael’s expression, Ronan knew that wasn’t a good enough answer. “Really? She seems to genuinely like you,” Michael said. “Though it is hard to know when she’s being genuine. She was acting like a completely different person tonight than when I first met her. I’m not sure which one is the real Brania.”
I hope to God you never meet the real Brania. “It’s complicated,” Ronan started. “We were like family for a while and then our parents separated.”
“Because your mother didn’t want to get married?”
Ronan didn’t like talking about his mother, but he had to put an end to this topic, so he felt he had little choice. “My mother … she never loved Brania’s father and, trust me, he wasn’t heartbroken when she left him. He never loved her, either.” Ronan stopped himself to make sure he wasn’t revealing too much.
Sounds like Ronan’s mother might be as complicated as mine. “So why did you guys live with them in the first place?”
Ronan noticed another photo he hadn’t seen earlier. It was of a handsome man holding a young boy, no more than a year old, in his arms. The photo captured the boy in mid-swing. They were in the country somewhere, in the middle of a wheat field maybe, or just a field of sunburnt grass. It could have been Nebraska, it could have been the English countryside. Ronan couldn’t tell. He could tell, however, that the man looked very much like Michael and had straight, very blond hair and the same high cheekbones. Ronan assumed it was his father. This is what Michael will look like if he grows older, if he ages. If I let him. Did he just say something? “What?”
Michael repeated his question and this time Ronan fixed his gaze onto Michael himself and not onto the image of what he could look like if he had a normal future. “Contrary to what Mr. Wilde wrote, women are geniuses and much more than just the decorative sex,” Ronan said, and then explained further. “My mother was skint broke, she had no money, we had no place to live, so she convinced Brania’s father that she loved him and that we should live together as one big happy family. Worked fine for a while until my mother received an inheritance and we no longer needed assistance to survive. So we moved on.”
Just like we did, Michael thought. Grace got tired of the man she was living with just like Edwige got tired of hers. “Sounds like our mothers really do have a lot in common.”
By this time, they were both sitting on Michael’s bed facing each other, the way they were before being interrupted. “Don’t get me wrong, Michael. What my mother did wasn’t right, but she’s my mother, she’s all I have. I can’t really condemn her, can I?”
Michael thought about all the things his mother did, especially her last successful act, and although he was angry with her often and he didn’t approve of her actions, he realized he didn’t condemn her; he couldn’t find it within himself to judge her that harshly. “No, you can’t.”
“So I know that when Brania starts in on my mother, what she’s really doing is protecting her … father, but it still doesn’t make it any easier to hear. And you know something?” Ronan said, exhaling a long breath. “I just think she’s a right balmy lass.”
“Does that mean you think she’s crazy?”
“Certifiable.”
They shared another laugh and instinctively they each reached out to grab the other’s hand. Michael stopped laughing, but the smile never left his face as he examined Ronan’s hands with his own. His fingers were blunt, some of the nails chewed off, just like his, and underneath he had some rough patches, calluses that felt deliciously manly. He couldn’t wait to know what it would feel like to have those hands touch his face, his arms, the
