rising. Pandora abandoned Lucy’s stroking hand, for the one she’d been seeking. Lucy turned all the way around as she followed the big cat’s progress.
Rhiannon stood there in a less than modest floor-length black nightgown with bloodred lace trim, petting her cat, her long red nails scratching Pandora’s head gently. “A first-degree adept could mask an island with mist,” she said slowly. “It’s little more than a twist on a simple glamoury. The question is, why is it necessary? And what are we doing on this pathetic excuse for a yacht?”
“According to Will, it’s a forty-six-meter Mystic, Rhiannon,” James informed her. “One of the most luxurious yachts there is. Not that I couldn’t tell just by looking around.”
“Pssht. It’s a rowboat with a motor. Now tell me what’s happened. And…” She wrinkled her nose. “What is that pungent aroma? Is that coming from my peignoir?”
Behind her, through the open doorway that led into what looked like a suite at a five-star hotel—king-size bed, gleaming hardwood everywhere, brass fixtures— Roland was rising, too. He gave a brief look around him and then came into the hallway to stand protectively beside the vampire queen, though she needed no protection.
Directly across the hall from them another door opened, revealing a nearly identical room, where Damien and a beautiful, willowy blonde stood arm in arm.
Lucy saw that there were two more cabins, one on each side, and at the end, a wide living-type room, its door standing open.
Willem came down the steps then, taking them all in with a sweeping glance. Lucy shivered, realizing that the Gypsy vampiress, his beloved Sarafina, hadn’t yet risen. Did that mean she was…?
Then a third door opened, and Sarafina stood there, looking puzzled in her satin robe. “Will?”
She caught the scent of smoke that clung to them all, wrinkling her nose, and widening her eyes. “Will, what’s happened? Why are we on the Nightshade?”
Will opened his arms, and she moved into his embrace. “The house is gone,” he said softly.
Rhiannon gasped.
Sarafina seemed to wobble in Will’s embrace. “How?”
“They burned it, didn’t they?” Rhiannon demanded, lifting a long lock of her own hair and bringing it to her nose to sniff. “With us inside. Those putrid mortal weaklings tried to murder us in our sleep.”
“Not just us,” James said softly. As he spoke, he moved, sliding an arm around Lucy’s shoulders to bring her to his side. Then he led her past the four cabins, one with its door still closed, and into the room at the end, which turned out to be a sitting room carpeted in pure white, with elegant brown and butterscotch furnishings that included a three-piece modular sofa and a two-piece love seat that sat at a right angle to each other, glass-topped tables, a wet bar and a huge flat-screen TV.
James picked up the remote from a holder mounted to the wall and flicked on the TV. Its satellite system took a moment to come online, and then he scanned through the channels, finally stopping on one of the twenty-four-hour news networks.
“There were fires all over the nation today,” he said, and the images on the screen backed up his words, as did the ticker running beneath it.
They all read the words scrolling there. The so-called Human League, a group of anti-vampire vigilantes who describe themselves as humanity’s only hope, have organized themselves in a stunningly short time. Their website has already logged more than 2 million hits. They’re claiming 300,000 members, and say they’re attracting more all the time. This group advocates the use of violence, and claims that only by wiping the vampire race from existence do humans stand a chance of surviving.
“The Human League?” Rhiannon looked from one face to the next. “And I suppose they think that’s clever? Sick, murderous animals is what they are. I’ve always said their kind ought to be wiped from existence. Maybe now the rest of you will finally believe me.”
“Shit, Rhiannon, you think just like they do,” James said.
She glared at him. Lucy put a hand on his forearm. “James is one of their kind,” she said softly. “So is Brigit, and so is Will. And I’m one of their kind, too.”
“And so were you once, Rhiannon,” James reminded her.
“I was never one of them. My father was a god.”
“A Pharaoh, love,” Roland said gently. “And I think all the young ones are saying is that there is good and evil in all of us. In humans, as well as in our kind. You