Chosen

Aphrodite shrugged. 'Yeah. Whatever.'

Stevie Rae cleared her throat and Aphrodite and I jumped. The sight of her made my heart squeeze hard. Her short blond hair was wet, and it hung around her face in familiar curls. Her eyes were still tinted red and her face was thin and pale, but it was clean. Her cloths were baggy, but she looked like Stevie Rae again.

'Hi,' I said softly. 'Feel Better?'

She looked uncomfortable, but nodded.

'You smell better,' Aphrodite said.

I glared at her.

'What? That was nice.'

I sighed and shot her an obvious you're not helping look. 'Okay, how about we talk about coming up with a plan?' I meant it to be a rhetorical question, but Aphrodite spoke up right away.

'What exactly are we planning about? I mean, I know Stevie Rae has, uh, unique issues, but I'm not sure what you think can be done about them. She's dead. Or undead dead.' She glanced a Stevie Rae. 'Okay, I'm not actually trying to be mean, but—'

'It's not mean. It's just the truth.' Stevie Rae interrupted her. 'But don't pretend that you care about my feelings now any more than you did before I died.'

'I was trying to be nice,' Aphrodite snapped, sounding the opposite of nice.

'Try harder,' I said. Then, 'Sit down Stevie Rae.' She sat in the puffy leather chair beside the couch. I ignored my headache and sat on the couch. 'Okay, here's what I know.' I ticked the points off on my fingers. 'First, Stevie Rae doesn't have to live around adult vamps anymore, so that means that she has completed a Change.' Aphrodite started to open her mouth and I hurried on. 'Second, she has to have blood, even more often than normal adult vamps.' I looked from Stevie Rae to Aphrodite. 'Do either of the two of you know if adult vamps go crazy if they don't drink blood regularly?'

'In Advanced Vampyre Soc we've learned that adults need to drink blood regularly to stay healthy. That's mind and body.' Aphrodite shrugged. 'Neferet is the prof for the class, and she's never said anything about vamps going crazy if they don't drink. But that might be one of the things they tell us only after we've made the Change.'

'I didn't know anything about it till I died,' Stevie Rae said.

'Can it be blood from any mammal, or does it have to be human blood?'

'Human.'

I'd asked Stevie Rae, but she and Aphrodite answered at the same time.

'Okay, well, besides having to drink blood and not having to be around adult vamps, Stevie Rae can't come in someone's house unless she's invited.'

'By someone who lives there,' Stevie Rae added. 'But that's not such a big deal.'

'What do you mean?' I asked.

Stevie Rae turned her red-tinged gaze one me. 'I can get humans to do things they don't want to do.'

With an effort, I didn't shiver.

'That's not a shocker,' Aphrodite said. 'Lots of adult vamps have such strong personalities that they can be very persuasive to humans. That's one of the reasons they're so damn scared of us. You should know about that, Zoey.'

'Huh?'

Aphrodite raised an eyebrow. 'You've Imprinted with your human boyfriend. How tough was it for you to persuade him to let you have a little suck.' She paused, smiling wickedly. 'Of his blood, I mean.'

I ignored her stankness. 'Okay, Stevie Rae has that in common with Changed vamps, too. But vamps don't have to be invited in to someone's house, do they?'

'Never heard of anything like that,' Aphrodite said.

'It's because I'm soulless,' Stevie Rae said in a voice totally washed of all emotion.

'You are not soulless,' I said automatically.

'You're wrong. I died and Neferet figured out a way to bring my body back, but she didn't bring my humanity back, too. My soul's still dead.'

I couldn't even stand to think that what she was saying might be possible, and I opened my mouth to argue with her, but Aphrodite was quicker.

'That makes sense. It's why you can't come inside a living person's home without being invited. It's also probably why you'll burn up if the sun hits you. No soul—no standing against the light.'

'How did you know about that?' Stevie Rae asked.

'I'm vision girl, remember?'

'Thought Nyx abandoned you and took the visions away, too,' Stevie Rae said cruelly.

'That's what Neferet wants people to believe because Aphrodite had visions about her—and about you,' I said pointedly. 'But Nyx has no more abandoned her than she's abandoned you.'

'So why are you helping Zoey?' Stevie Rae shot the question at Aphrodite. 'And don't give me that crap about Nyx having a sense of humor. What's the real reason?'

Aphrodite sneered. 'Why I'm helping is my own damn business.'

Stevie Rae sprang to her feet and moved across the room so fast that her movements were one big blur. Before I could blink she had her hands around Aphrodite's throat and her face pressed close to hers. 'You're wrong. It's my business, too, because I'm here. Remember, you invited me in?'

'Stevie Rae, let her go.' I kept my voice calm, but my pulse was pounding like crazy. Stevie Rae looked and sounded dangerous and more than a little crazy.

'I've never liked her, Zoey. You know that. I told you a zillion times she was no damn good and you should stay far away from her. I don't know why I shouldn't snap her neck.'

I was beginning to worry about how bugged Aphrodite's eyes looked and how bright red her face was turning. She struggled against Stevie Rae, but it was like a little kid trying to break the hold of a big, mean adult. Help me to get through to Stevie Rae. I sent up a silent prayer to the Goddess as I began to center myself so I could call the power of the elements to me. Then words whispered into my mind and I quickly repeated them.

'You shouldn't snap her neck because you're not a monster.'

She didn't let go of Aphrodite, but Stevie Rae turned her head so she could look at me. 'How do you know that?'

I didn't hesitate, 'Because I believe in our Goddess, and because I believe in the part of you that is still my best friend.'

Stevie Rae released Aphrodite, who started coughing and rubbing her neck.

'Say you're sorry,' I told Stevie Rae. Her red eyes pierced me, but I lifted my chin and stared right back at her. 'Say you're sorry to Aphrodite,' I repeated.

'I'm not sorry,' Stevie Rae said as she walked (at a normal speed) back to the chair.

'Nyx has give Aphrodite an affinity for earth,' I said abruptly. Stevie Rae's body jerked like I'd slapped her. 'So by attacking her you're really attacking Nyx.'

'Nyx is letting her take my place!'

'No. Nyx is letting her help you. I cannot figure this out on my own, Stevie Rae. I can't tell any of our friends about you because if I do it's only a matter of time before Neferet knows everything they know, and even though I'm not sure about much, I do absolutely believe Neferet has gone bad. So basically it's us against a powerful High Priestess. Aphrodite is the only fledgling besides me who Neferet can't read. We need her help.'

Stevie Rae narrowed her eyes at Aphrodite, who was still rubbing her neck and sucking air. 'I still want to know why she'd bother to help us. She's never liked any of us. She's a liar and a user and a total bitch.'

'Atonement,' Aphrodite managed to gasp.

'What?' Stevie Rae said.

Aphrodite glared at her. Her voice was raspy, but she was definitely regaining her breath and had gone from being scared to being pissed. 'What's wrong? Is the word too big for you? A-T-O-N-E-M-E-N-T.' She spelled it. 'It means I have to make up for something I've done. A lot of somethings, actually. So I have to do what I didn't do before—which is to follow Nyx's will.' She paused and cleared her throat, grimacing in pain. 'No, I don't like it any