headmaster, a man who had come to Archangel Academy with no other purpose than to steer the students toward a more promising future. He wouldn’t accept the truth, not just yet. David had made sure of that by using his immense power to dazzle his audience. No, he needed advice on how to handle the situation, and there was only one person Ronan could think of, only one person Ronan knew who would understand the situation. He gave Michael a soft kiss on his forehead and then left to see his mother.
Edwige was one of the few people Ronan couldn’t hide anything from. He didn’t understand her control over him, but he assumed it was simply the maternal connection between a mother and child, heightened because they were both vampires. She didn’t transform Ronan, but in a very similar sense her blood ran through his veins, and that somehow bestowed with Edwige power over her son, it somehow allowed her to know what he was thinking when he was in her presence or even sometimes when they were separated. She didn’t always care what her son thought—the thoughts of most people, in fact, typically bored her—but it was a wonderful tool to possess because Edwige always preferred to be in control.
“Do you think this painting would look better in a smaller room, my bedroom perhaps?” Edwige asked. “Then I could feel as if I were in the ocean as I drifted off to sleep; that would be comforting.” Ignoring her son’s presence, Edwige gazed at her prized painting and imagined how the cool salt water, a blend of deep, rich blues, must feel as it wrapped itself around the naked bodies of the two men. Actually, she didn’t have to imagine. She knew exactly how the ocean water felt against a naked body; she had made the glorious journey to The Well of Atlantis each month for over a decade. And although for the most part she had made the journey alone, there was a time when she had a male companion. It’s been far too long since I’ve swum with someone by my side, Edwige noted. I think the time has come for a change.
“Everything’s changed, Mother,” Ronan proclaimed.
Did he say something? “What? No, I think I’ll keep the painting right here,” Edwige announced. “It needs room to breathe.” And Edwige didn’t need to be reminded of loneliness each night as she drifted off to sleep. She did, however, need to be reminded that she wasn’t alone.
“Are you even listening to me?”
“I have heard every word you’ve said,” Edwige replied, without taking her eyes off the two male figures, the couple whose skin touched barely but permanently, in her painting. “There’s a new teacher at your school, hardly earth-shattering, and hardly a reason to leave that beautiful boyfriend of yours alone in your bed.” If Ronan could read his mother’s mind he would have heard her final remark, that beds were meant to be shared, but since Ronan was having a hard enough time maintaining a verbal conversation with Edwige, it really was better that her private thoughts remained unshared.
“Not just a teacher,” Ronan corrected. “The new headmaster.”
Pressing her fingers to her temples, Edwige felt the onset of a headache. She dug underneath her close- cropped bangs, careful not to scratch herself with her newly manicured fingernails, and massaged her skin. The pressure felt good. It didn’t alleviate the pain, not at all, but did add a layer of pleasure. And lately that’s all she had been craving, pleasure, enjoyment, escape, but her craving went unfulfilled and instead she was presented with a child who, although the reasons were still foreign to her, had a problem. “Well, someone had to replace that other one who left.”
“Hawksbry didn’t leave, Mum, he was killed and you know it!” Ronan charged. “You’ve always known it!”
“Will you stop yelling?!” Edwige demanded more than requested, clutching her forehead. When she spoke again, her voice was softer, but unmistakably filled with disgust and impatience. “Turned into one of Them or killed by Their hand, what does it matter? Either way it’s eternal damnation.” Finally she turned to her son, hoping her action coupled with her words would be perceived as a dismissal. “Now, if that’s all the news you have to dispatch, I think it’s time you left. It is, as you children say, a school night.”
Sometimes you really do have to talk to her like she’s the child, Ronan thought. “Brania’s father is the new headmaster,” he announced.
Imperceptibly, Edwige’s expression changed. “Why didn’t you say so?” Turning her back on Ronan, she walked across the room to the small glass and steel minibar. She lifted a stout pitcher, clear except for delicate etchings of fish that randomly adorned the circumference, and poured herself a glass of water. It was the one liquid her kind could drink, and even though she wasn’t thirsty, she did need time to think. The water tasted clean, fresh, not nearly as intoxicating as blood of course, but it served its purpose, it gave her a moment to make her son think his news hadn’t startled her. “You must learn to present the most important piece of information first instead of, pardon the pun, vamping.”
Ignoring his mother’s jeer, Ronan pressed on. “So you agree that this is important, we’re in danger?”
“I would hardly say we’re in danger,” Edwige replied, the glass making a louder clank than expected when she placed it back onto the surface of the bar. “It means just as you said, Brania’s father is your new headmaster.”
Why does every conversation with her have to be so frustrating? “And why in the world would he take on that role if he didn’t want to hurt us, if he weren’t trying to make some sort of statement?” Ronan asked.
Why does every conversation with him have to be a challenge? “David has always acted like a little boy,” Edwige said, sitting on the acrylic Ghost chair next to the bar, her fingers absentmindedly stroking the smooth, clear armrest. “So it’s quite fitting that he would want to be the leader of an allboys school.”
Ronan started to pace the room. How could he make her understand that this situation wasn’t funny; it was potentially lethal. “He’s already a leader,” Ronan cried. “Of our enemy!”
Edwige pointed a finger at her son, the red lacquered nail aiming at him like a blood-tinged arrow. “They are not our enemy. Are you forgetting the truce?”
“They broke the bloody truce when they killed Penry!”
“That human was not one of ours!” Edwige hated to lose her temper with her son, but she also hated to hear her son talk like an idiot, she had raised him to be so much better than that. He has such potential, she thought. His destiny could be limitless, if only, if only he would end this asinine fascination with the lower classes. Rising from her chair, looking as statuesque as her petite frame would allow, she softened her voice and approached her son. “I know you are fond of these people; you consort with them and you find them to be useful, entertaining, which I will admit they can be, at times, but you must remember that we are not like them.”
“But we used to be,” Ronan said, sounding more like a child than he cared to admit.
“Past tense,” Edwige stressed, then added with unequivocal authority, “We are unto ourselves.”
The space between Ronan and his mother was suddenly drenched in shadows and silence. Could their differences ever be bridged? Ronan thought. Yes, of course, we’re different, better in so many ways, but the reason we’re better is because we’re connected to our past, to our humanity. Has she really lost sight of that? Does she really think we exist, that we could exist, without that link, without being bound to humans? Staring out the window of Edwige’s flat to the world below, Ronan saw some people walking in the darkness, scrambling to get somewhere, to someone, and he thought of Michael sleeping alone in his bed, and he suddenly ached to be alongside him, breathing in his smell, drifting off to sleep, secure, loved. He thought of his friends and his teachers, the people he spent his days with and learned from, and it was so clear to him that a contract was broken when two of those people were murdered. Why couldn’t she see that?
“They killed both Penry and Alistair without cause and there was no retribution from either side,” Ronan said quietly. “They hate water vamps, and now their leader is in control of Double A. This cannot be good for us.”
One minute stupid, the next perceptive. Edwige didn’t know if her son was contradictory because he was a child or a man. “David’s kind has always hated us; that is nothing new,” she allowed. “But the murders of your friend and your former headmaster, while unfortunate and unnecessary, were not declarations of war.”
“Just the first steps toward the acceptance of one.”
She was not going to win this argument. She was not going to convince her son that there was nothing to worry about, that David was just playing an innocuous game because he woke up one morning and decided that he wanted to do something different. So she chose a new tactic. “You have a point.”
“I do?”
“A muted, not entirely substantiated point, but a point nonetheless.”
Oddly, Ronan felt ambivalent at hearing Edwige agree with him. That is what he wanted, confirmation that his instincts were correct, but if they were, if he did understand what was going on, what David was trying to
