The Forever Song
Page 40

Jackal shifted against the seat, making it groan loudly.
“Guess you got lucky there, bloodbag,” he muttered, and I wondered if even Jackal found the thought of being tied to Sarren disturbing. “Any hints as to what he’s doing, then?
Plans? Ideas? Creepy riddles?” He turned and peered back at us, raising a pointed eyebrow. “A message scrawled on a bathroom door in the blood of the innocent?”
“He didn’t tell me anything,” Zeke said, with a dangerous undertone that warned not to keep pushing him down this path. Jackal, of course, didn’t get the hint or, most likely, didn’t care.
“Well, you’re just all kinds of useless, aren’t you?” He shifted back, settling against the seat with his arms behind his head again. But he wasn’t done, yet. “Come on, Ezekiel, you’re the progeny of the Insane One himself. Sure you can’t scrape something out of that screwed-up head to give us the jump on Sarren? I’m sure if you dig hard enough, you’ll find his special brand of crazy right where you need it.”
I slid forward and kicked the back of his seat, making him turn to glare at me. “Will you shut up? Leave him alone. How is this helping anything?”
“Hey, pardon me for wanting to be prepared,” Jackal drawled. “We can’t all be like you, sister, charging in blind and hoping your sword hits something as you flail about. You got lucky this time. That’s not going to work with Sarren.”
“Why don’t you tell us what he’s up to?” I challenged. “You worked with him back in New Covington. I’m sure the pair of you had plenty of chances to bond.”
“You’d think so, but not really.” Jackal didn’t miss a beat.
“Turns out, crazy psychotic vampires are really difficult to pal around with. They tend to be irrationally paranoid, and his poetry was about to drive me up a wall. So I’m afraid I didn’t get any useful information out of Sarren because I was busy…oh, what was it again? I forgot why I was there.” Jackal mock frowned, then snapped his fingers. “Oh, yeah! I was saving your skin.”
“Funny, I was going to say setting us up.”
“You’re never going to let that go, are you?”
“If the two of you would like to walk to Eden,” Kanin said at last, not taking his eyes from the road, “I can stop anytime.” I fell silent, and Jackal gave a disgusted snort and turned to face the windshield again. Kanin sighed. “James, we will come up with a plan for dealing with Sarren when we have more information,” he said, glancing at Jackal. “But antagonizing Ezekiel will not help, so I suggest you cease before your sister runs a sword through the back of your chair.”
I smirked triumphantly, though it didn’t last. “Allison, your brother is right. You cannot go charging into Sarren’s lair blind this time around. He will be expecting you.” Kanin’s voice turned grave. “And he will be ready for us all.”
The van died an hour later.
Kanin had slowed again, driving carefully beneath an overpass that had partially collapsed, leaving huge chunks of concrete leaning against each other at treacherous angles. As we cleared the bridge’s ominous shadow, the van shuddered, gave one final wheeze, and stopped moving. Kanin tried coaxing it to life, but no amount of prodding could revive it this time.
It was well and truly dead.
“Great.” I glared at Jackal as we piled out onto a lonely highway that stretched for miles in either direction. The trek to Eden had just become that much longer, and we didn’t have time to spare. “I know it’s irrational,” I told him, “but I blame you for this.”
“Whatever floats your boat, sister.” Jackal ignored my glare and walked to the front of the van, then lifted up the hood with a creak. Gazing over the complicated jumble of metal and wires, he shook his head. “Could be the fuel hose, could be the alternator. Or the engine might be shot to hell. I won’t know unless I fiddle with it.” He eyed Kanin, who stood calmly at the front of the vehicle. “Unless that screws with your time schedule, oh, impatient one. This might take a couple hours, and I don’t know if I’ll be able to get it started again. But by all means—” he waved a hand down the empty, moonlit highway “—feel free to take the runts and start walking, and I’ll meet you down the road. If you hear me coming, just stick out a thumb.” Jackal grinned, his eyes glowing yellow in the shadow of the hood. “I’ll slow down. Probably.”
Kanin gave him a level stare. “No,” the Master vampire said, as if that was the end of it. “We go to Eden together, or not at all. Unless someone truly wants to leave for good, we face Sarren as a unit. There is too much at stake to take chances.” Jackal shrugged and stuck his head beneath the hood again as Kanin went on. “We can make up for a few hours if we have a working vehicle. What do you need to repair it?”
“Besides a bloody miracle?” There was a grunt, and Jackal swore. “Parts. Tools. And a new engine would be f**king fantastic. But since we’re sort of screwed on any of those, peace and quiet, without a certain obnoxious sibling bitching at me every two minutes.”
“Funny, I think that exact same thing every day.”
“There were a few vehicles a couple miles back,” Zeke said, startling me. His voice hadn’t changed; it still was empty as ever, as if none of this interested him. “They looked abandoned. Want me to go see if any of them start? Since this is going to take a while.”
“The puppy speaks,” Jackal mocked, peering up from the hood. “And he actually said something useful. Yeah, why don’t you do that, bloodbag? And while you’re at it, see if any of them have fuel. Fixing this thing won’t matter for shit if we don’t have gas.”
“I’ll go, too,” I said, quickly pushing myself off the van.
Jackal snickered and muttered, “Big surprise,” as he ducked back under the hood, but I ignored him. No way was I letting Zeke out of my sight now. I didn’t think he would head off down the road alone to meet the rising sun, but I honestly wasn’t sure. This cold, emotionally detached Zeke worried me more than if he’d acted angry and bitter.
I wanted to talk to him without Jackal’s snide comments or Kanin’s silent but unmistakable presence. If I could just get him alone, talking freely, maybe I could break through the icy shell he’d built around himself. Or at least get him to tell me what was going on.
“Allison.” Kanin’s voice reached me over the van. I glanced at my sire, saw sympathy and understanding in his dark eyes.
“Be careful,” he warned. “You will likely not meet with rabids or humans, but still, remain on your guard. Return immediately if there is trouble.”
“We will,” I promised, and glanced at the vampire beside me. “Ready, Zeke?”
Zeke returned my gaze and nodded, but his eyes remained distant. Reaching into the van, he emerged with a faded red container and turned down the long stretch of highway behind us. “Let’s go.”
We followed the road for several minutes in silence. Zeke walked next to me, gaze fixed on the distant horizon. Around us, nothing moved. The highway stretched on, empty and still, the only sounds the crunch of our boots on the snowy pavement. I was trying to think of a way to talk to Zeke, to breach the silence, when his voice echoed quietly into the stillness.