Wings of Fire

He repressed a sigh.

“I see Fiona,” Parisa said.

So soon. Jean-Pierre was very impressed. Parisa had a soft voice, in the lower registers, very pretty, like velvet. Her cheeks bore a flush of excitement.

“Where is she?” Medichi asked. “Can you see her environment at all?”

“She’s walking outside, alone. There is a high wooden fence and beyond that, tall trees, but not the tamarind trees of Burma.”

“Try communicating with her telepathically.”

At that, Parisa opened her eyes and stared at Medichi. “Do you think I can?”

He smiled, so reassuring. He was gentle with her. Parisa did not need a heavy hand. Medichi was exactly the right man for her.

Parisa once more closed her eyes. A frown of concentration formed between her brows.

Jean-Pierre’s nostrils flared and he looked behind him. Was someone baking? He smelled croissants … again … rich buttery croissants, like the ones he had smelled in Rith’s house.

He heard footsteps and Havily appeared. Her eyes glittered and her lips looked bruised. He turned away so that she would not see his smile. She had been well kissed and perhaps more.

“What’s going on?” she asked quietly as she drew up next to him.

“Parisa can see Fiona now,” he whispered. “She is trying to communicate telepathically.” He leaned closer. “Were you in the kitchen baking?” The words seemed absurd, but he didn’t understand what he was smelling.

“No, but I brought scones home from my Starbucks run.”

He nodded. “So, I must know—are you to learn to battle with Parisa now?”

She nodded and appeared just a little pleased with herself. “Yes, I am,” she stated, keeping her voice low. “After work, Marcus will do the download and I’ll start training with you boys and Parisa tomorrow.”

“Très bien.”

“You approve?”

“Bien sûr. I think it wise.” But he frowned. If he had a breh, would he speak so easily on a subject that meant his woman might attempt to engage a powerful death vampire in combat? A shiver went through him. Mercifully, he did not have to worry about such a thing.

He did, however, feel uneasy. The aroma of the croissants made him hungry … for many things. How very strange.

***

Fiona stood very still. She glanced around her. No one else was in the garden, but she always felt as though several pairs of eyes were on her. From the moment the woman in the Burma garden, Parisa, had escaped, Rith had doubled, maybe tripled his surveillance of his blood slaves.

Right now, however, she swore she heard a voice whispering inside her head: Fiona, can you hear me?

Again, she looked around then put her feet in motion. She wore sandals and her usual pajama ensemble. The fabrics were soft but she so craved something else, anything else, to wear, like the jeans so many of the newer arrivals wore. Jeans and a blouse and underwear. How lovely that would be.

Fiona, this is Parisa, can you hear me? Don’t be afraid. This is telepathy and I’m not very good at it yet so if you hear me just say something aloud. A simple yes will do. Remember, I can see you. I’m a preternatural voyeur.

Fiona walked because she was afraid if she stopped and turned around to hunt for the source of the voice, Rith would jump out of the bushes and frighten her back into the house. But she didn’t think it would do any harm to say a single word aloud. How could that be interpreted as something dangerous?

“Yes.”

A faint girlish squealing sounded through her head and she almost covered her ears. It wasn’t loud, but it had startled her. So she said aloud, “If you really do exist, and I’m not just making up voices in my head, no more squealing, please.”

Oh. Oh, I’m so sorry, Fiona, but because I’m voyeuring you I can both see and hear what’s going on and I heard you. But just to make sure we’re communicating, say yes three times in a row.

Well, if she was going mad, this was not a hard phrase to repeat. “Yes, yes, yes.”

I heard it and I saw your lips move. Fiona, listen to me, I am doing all that I can to locate you and I’m not alone in my efforts. The Warriors of the Blood are helping me. We’re all working to locate you. After I escaped from Rith’s house, Warrior Thorne and his men returned for you but Rith had already moved you to another location. We think it was done first by van or some sort of automobile then by dematerialization. Are we right?

If this was her mind circling down the drain of insanity, she was certainly speaking to herself in remarkably lucid terms. “Yes,” she said aloud. “You have it exactly right. He put us in a vehicle, a Hummer, I think, but only for fifteen minutes or so. Then we were dematerialized here.”

Where are you? If we can pinpoint your location, I think we can come and get you, but we have to know which part of the world you’re in now.

It was at this point that Fiona’s heart began to thrum, to beat so hard in her chest that she could hardly breathe. Could it be this simple, after all these years?

Tears rushed to her eyes. She kept walking. She had almost died for good during the last blood-drain. If it hadn’t been for James, that strange elderly man who sat on a bench and fed sunflower seeds to a flock of pigeons, she wouldn’t be here right now. He’d pressed her forward, into the future. He’d put courage in her heart when she had been depleted. He had said she had reason to hope. She hadn’t exactly believed him, but now she did.

Aloud, she said, “I’ve heard people speaking French.”

Another squeal, which caused her to put her hands over her ears.

Oh, I can see that I hurt your mind again. I’m so sorry, but even a language narrows the search.

This time, Fiona smiled. “I’ll find out as quickly as I can.”

She saw movement from the corner of her eye. One of the Burmese servants had been tracking her movements and listening.

“I have to go now.”

“Who you talk to? You go crazy? Come. Rith want you back in your room. Enough walking.”

Don’t worry, Fiona. I heard her and I can find you anytime. I’ll be back for you.

“Don’t fail me.”

“What you mean, fail you? You go crazy. You been here too long. Not normal.”

“Yes,” she said. “Crazy.” She then made a face and gave a little cry, which caused the woman to draw back.

“I tell Rith what you do. He no like.”

You do that, Fiona thought. Then the next time Parisa struck up a mental conversation, the women would ignore her. It wouldn’t be the first time one of the D&R slaves had ended up babbling endlessly to herself, but it was usually the beginning of the end. It usually ended in the woman’s death at her next blood-drain.

***

Parisa leaned forward in her chair. She was thrilled at what she had just experienced, but for some reason her head ached fiercely.

Medichi touched her arm. She looked at him, at the concern in his dark brown eyes. “I’m okay. I have the worst headache, but I don’t know why.”

“This is all very new for you.”

She sat up very straight and held her head immobile. Jean-Pierre and Havily stood near the doorway. Both frowned at her.

“Are you all right?” Havily asked. “You’re very pale. Antony, look how pale she is.”

“I see it.”

Parisa heard them talking, but the throb in her head worsened. She could still see Fiona. She trailed after her in voyeur fashion, but the pain intensified so much that she finally shut down her voyeur window.

A moment later the pressure in her head eased, but tears tracked down her cheeks. “That hurt so much and I’d had such success.”

“It’s okay. It’s okay,” Antony said, his fingers stroking her forearm lightly. “This was your first try. I take it you communicated with Fiona? You squealed a couple of times.”

She glanced at Antony, who had slid from his chair and was now on his knees and leaning over her. He wiped at her cheeks. “I spoke into her head and even though she wasn’t able to answer back, telepathically I mean, she responded to my questions aloud and I could hear her. It was just as all of you said—Rith removed the slaves in a vehicle, a Hummer actually. He drove for about fifteen minutes then dematerialized the group somewhere.”

“As a group?” Jean-Pierre asked. “That would be a shitload of power.”

Parisa smiled. Shitload sounded like sheetload. She loved his accent.

“What else can you tell us?” Antony said.

Parisa tried to recall the conversation word for word and began relating it as best she could. She ended with, “One of the women who worked in the Burma house as a servant was tending to Fiona, ordering her around. She kept asking Fiona if she was going crazy, probably because Fiona was talking out loud.”

“I’m wondering,” Havily mused. “You said Fiona was walking in a garden. Was it daylight?”

“Yes. Yes it was. Oh, that’s significant, because it’s still daylight here.”

“What about the shadows? Were they long or nonexistent?”

“Very long—as in it was almost evening.”

“That’s excellent. Now, what of the gardens. What kind of plants did you see?”

“Lavender. I saw lots of lavender. Juniper, I think. The garden had rocks, herbs maybe, I’m not sure.”

Once Parisa had answered all pertinent questions, Antony called Carla at Central.

Parisa could hear her squeals, sounds that echoed her own earlier cries of excitement. By the time Antony got off the phone, he was smiling. Carla felt certain, given all the information they’d been able to provide, that they might be looking at the Mediterranean region. If her hunch was correct, she would have a fix on the location of the death and resurrection slaves within the next few hours.

Was it possible?

Antony, however, frowned.

“What’s wrong?” she asked.

“Well, now we need to get Thorne’s approval to go after them. I’ll want at least some of the Warriors of the Blood with me.”