The Old Races Read online

  "You always leave me before the sun," she said the next evening. Not angry, but thoughtful, which was more than he might expect of any woman newly breached and then abandoned. "Do you not like it on your face?"

  "I rest in daylight. I always have." True enough, if misleading. Softer confession, though: "I would stay if I could, Isabel."

  "Will you ever?"

  "No." There was no question, no chance. Not so long as the laws of the Old Races held. Tell no humans of our existence. It was a matter of survival.

  Isabel, to his surprise, laughed. "I think a man should lie to a woman when she asks that question, Biali. I think he is meant to say yes, sí, of course I will stay."

  "I'll never lie to you." Gargoyles don't, he wanted to say, but there were so many things that would go unsaid. A promise of truth would have to be enough.

  Isabel pursed her lips, put them against his shoulder, then nodded. "Some women would not like that answer. I think perhaps I do. Truth can be terrible, more terrible than lies, but I am glad to trust what you tell me is always true. Tell me this, then. Do you lose the fights on purpose?"

  Biali blinked. "Yes."

  "The one the night we met?"

  Rare humor rose. "I was supposed to lose, but not that badly. I didn't know there would be a beautiful woman there."

  "Then tonight," she said firmly, "you will win a fight for me. And then we will come back to here, and be together, for if we have only the nights, my Biali, then we must have them with all that we are."

  He won that night, and every night after that she asked. His bad-breathed manager was torn between delight and fury. Mostly fury, as Biali won fights his manager had bet against him on, but sometimes delight for the sheer brutality of the fights. And Isabel watched them, every one, and after the first night or two she went unmolested by greedy hands or greedier looks. Everyone knew, now, that Biali threw the fights he lost, and none of them wanted to meet him outside the ring for harassing his woman. Weeks passed, winter nights growing shorter but no less sweet for it. This, Biali thought: this was happiness. Isabel and the fights. He could ask for nothing more.

  It had to happen, then, that Alban Korund would interfere.

  Biali caught his scent after a fight, the big gargoyle in human form one of dozens of men pressing to see the match. Like Isabel, Alban dressed too well to frequent the dock fights: well-cut suits of good cloth, shoes that had seen less offal than most, and his long wheat-pale hair tied in a knot at his nape. Men were egging him on regardless, hoping to get him in the ring. They were fools: anyone fighting Alban would be undone by the gargoyle's long reach, nevermind his inhuman strength. He stood the better part of a foot taller than Biali, with arms of according length, and Biali was already their master.

  He bulled his way out of the wooden corral, other fighters and plenty of dockworkers making way for him. Isabel came to his side, joining him as he approached Alban, and for the first time in weeks he wished she might be somewhere else. Not because Alban was prettier than Biali--most things were--but because Biali wanted Isabel kept well away from the Old Races. They were dangerous to humans, whether humans knew it or not.

  "You're doing well," Alban said softly. Most of the time, he was soft of voice. Compensating for his human height and breadth, which were still nothing in comparison to his true form. "Some reporters are starting to notice."

  Isabel's face shone at the news. "You will become famous, yes, my Biali? You will be a prizefighter across the nation!"

  "No." He and Alban spoke together, in agreement for the first time in centuries. Isabel faltered, looking between them, and Biali shook his head. "Fame's no good. Neither's too much money. I don't need it."

  "Mi abuelito would like it," Isabel teased, uncertainly. "A famous fighter, better than a Buffalo soldier."

  "He'll have to like me as I am." Not that Biali would ever meet the Spanish lord on the beach of gold, but it was too soon to think of that. It would always be too soon. "Why are you here, Korund? Why are you telling me this?"

  "Because it's always too soon to lose something precious." The big gargoyle's phrase so closely echoed Biali's thoughts that Biali scowled. Alban had not joined the overmind, had not made any effort to abandon his self-imposed exile; he had not, therefore, heard a whisper of what went on in Biali's mind.

  It was more offensive, somehow, that they shared a perception of the world. Biali turned away, his arm protective and possessive around Isabel, and when he looked back, Alban was gone.

  "He is the one, no?" Isabel asked as they left the fight. "The one who took your woman from you."

  A breath escaped Biali, startlment so broad it touched amusement. "How do you do that? How do you know these things?"

  "They are not so hard to read in your face, my Biali. You hide behind your scars, but I can see through them to the man below."

  "Then I am lucky," he said roughly, and left her ever-more reluctantly come the dawn.

  He awoke to a shocking connection across the mental void: Biali!

  An image with his name, a place in the park, wooded, secluded, near the northern end. Sunset still colored the western sky, though grey, not gold, crept through trees and lent no warmth to the scene.

  One word. One image. Alban Korund had not risked so much in the gestalt in three centuries. Biali should claw his way into that connection, force it open, learn what he had been sent to this city to discover. Expose Alban's secrets, touch Hajnal's last thoughts, and return, finally return, to the clan he had left behind.

  He ran instead, launching himself from the window of his small apartment, still in human form. Transforming, wings snapping open, beating, straining, pushing him through the air as quickly as he could. Alban's presence in the gestalt was gone, his sojourn there so brief it left barely a sketch of memory, much less pathways into the secrets he kept. And after three centuries, there was no good reason for him to break silence. Which meant his reasons would be very bad.

  Biali flew.

  Alban crouched beside her, his wheat-colored hair falling around his shoulders and his huge hands reluctant to touch her. She was broken everywhere, beautiful lines of her face as smashed as Biali's. Her corset gave structure to ribs that no longer had enough, and her wrists were shattered. Biali knocked Alban aside, fury roaring from him, but the other man made no fight, only rolled and came to his feet several yards away.

  "Isabel. Did he--who did this to you?" There was no blood on Alban's hands, though that was scarce comfort. Biali took his place, crouched beside the dying woman, his own expression glazed with shock. "Isabel..."

  "A wo...man." Her brown eyes were huge with pain and bewilderment. "So strong. She hated..."

  "Hush," Biali whispered helplessly, "Shh, shh. Save your strength. You'll be all right."

  "Me," Isabel finished. "Hated...me. Hated...herself. We were...alike. Except...."

  Except for strength. Hatred offered plenty of that. Biali should know. "Hush," he said again, but she smiled.

  "I came for you, Biali. I did not mean...to leave like this."

  "You won't. You can't. Not again." That made no sense, and all three of them understood. Isabel smiled again and let her eyes close, tears leaking from their corners. Biali made useless fists above her, as afraid as Alban had been to touch her and cause more pain. So fragile. Humans were so fragile, and he couldn't even lay the blame for this at Alban's feet. A woman, Isabel had said. What woman would have the fury to do this to another?

  The same one who had murdered at least one other of Alban's acquaintances. He was the commonality between these women who looked like Hajnal. There was blame to lay at his feet after all. Biali's vision rushed red with rage. He balled himself, ready to pitch himself at Alban, to beat answers out of him and provide some sort of catharsis for himself.

  "Daisani is here."

  Biali lifted his head, staring without comprehension at the other gargoyle. Then understanding lurched through him, obliterating wrath. He bent his head over Isabel's, wh
ispers fierce with determination. "Don't die. Wait for me. Wait until morning, Isabel. Live until morning. Promise me that."

  "I'll stay with her." Alban's voice, so remote that sympathy barely touched it. That was as well: the last thing Biali wanted was his sympathy. "Go," Alban said. "Tell him I've asked for this."

  Biali stood, lip curled. "You? Why you? What will that gain me?"

  "Just do it, Biali."

  He would, too. Without knowing why, he would. "Don't let her die. On Hajnal's memory, Korund. Don't let her die."

  "Hurry."

  He hurried, and it hardly seemed fast enough. Daisani was wealthy and men like Biali, rough and scarred and ugly, were not welcomed in the fine restaurants and clubs that Daisani frequented.

  He was almost certain he'd killed only two or three of the fools who tried to stop him from entering the club he found Daisani at. Someone hit him with an iron bar. Biali took it, wrapped it around his own fist, and hit anyone who came near in the face as he stormed through the club. After a few of them fell, no one else got in his way.

  Dapper, slight, black-haired and not particularly handsome, Daisani still commanded the attention of everyone at his table. Or he did until Biali found him, and then without a blink the mogul snapped his fingers and sent the others away. Then his eyebrows arched, mockery in their questions.

  "A woman." Fumbling excuse, suddenly absurd in the face of the violence he'd used to approach Daisani. Words were not Biali's strength. "Alban sent me to you."

  The questioning eyebrows shot higher, becoming exclamations. Daisani patted his lips dry with a napkin, then stood, turning to the only other person who hadn't left the table: a woman, narrow and reserved, with a hint of suspicion in her eyes at Biali's explanation. "Vanessa, forgive me. I seem to have pressing business with intimate acquaintances."

  Sudden understanding eliminated the suspicion--the envy, perhaps--from Vanessa's eyes. She knew, then. That was clear. She knew about the Old Races, and that was an edict none of them were supposed to break. Tell humans nothing. An exiling offense, if discovered.

  Biali didn't care what laws Daisani had broken, not now. Not tonight. Daisani marked that, a hint of satisfaction creasing lines around his mouth. "Shall we go, then? Or will I go on my own, which will be faster?"

  "No," Biali grated. He wanted to--had to--be there, and though Daisani could be there inside a moment, Biali would take minutes. Minutes Isabel would be able to spare, because she had to. Because he would not be absent this time, not even if his absence might save her life. This Vanessa woman already knew what Daisani was. That was enough to let Biali say, "We'll take the skies," and within a minute to do just that, Eliseo Daisani's inconsequential weight carried in his arms.

  The park was no distance, not when flight carried them there. Not as quick as Daisani, maybe, but quick enough. Alban was kneeling at Isabel's side when they arrived, his soft murmur of reassurance doing nothing--or perhaps everything--to keep her alive.

  Daisani's pupils enlarged as he glanced Isabel over. "She's all but dead already. This is a meal, Biali, not a rescue. You've wasted my time."

  A snarl erupted in Biali's throat, but Daisani walked away unconcerned. No reason for concern, not when his speed was such that Biali would never lay a hand on him. "Then why did you come at all!"

  Daisani tossed the answer over his shoulder carelessly: "Because you said Korund had sent you. I thought it was for some plausible task."

  "Eliseo." Alban spoke unexpectedly.

  Daisani paused. Turned his head, not quite looking back, but listening. Waiting for a move in the game, Biali thought, though he had no idea what the game was. Alban, though, did, and spoke again. "If you do this, we will owe each other nothing."

  Daisani's jaw came up, tension spreading through his shoulders, then fading. "It is not so simple as that."

  "It can be."

  An ache came into Biali's hands. Not from Isabel's weight; he could hold that forever. From rage at the game these two played, at the exchange that meant both nothing and everything to him. He wanted to bellow, to demand understanding, to command a stop to their wordplay, and yet he held his tongue. Barely breathed around the hurt in his chest, knowing a wrong word would mean the woman's death. Hurry! roared inside his head, so loud Alban should have winced with it, had he touched the overmind as all gargoyles always should. So loud Daisani, who was nothing of the gargoyles at all, should have heard it, and made haste to do as he was told.

  "It can't be," Daisani said ever so softly, but he turned. Came back to Biali and to the woman held in his arms, a woman whose breath came in short, desperate gasps now. A rattle had begun in her lungs. "It's almost too late," the vampire murmured. "I will not have her in this city, Biali. One sip for health alone, but I will not have her here, glowing with fitness and beauty. I will not have her here to wonder at what happened tonight, or at what other gifts another sip might bring."

  Biali nodded, curt, furious, desperate, and Eliseo Daisani smiled. He was not a handsome man, though he could be mistaken for one. Not, though, with that smile. Not with the brief flash of savage black teeth that opened his wrist's veins. Not with the fastidious way he wiped blood over Isabel's mouth. There was nothing handsome, nothing compelling, about him at all, as he did those things.

  But she wheezed again and licked her lips, half-conscious response to wetness there, and with the convulsive swallow that followed, her color improved. From blue ashen to a touch of pink beneath the skin, and with each wetting of her lips, each swallow, strength and health returned.

  "You will owe me," Daisani said, and Korund, strongly, said, "He owes you nothing."

  Biali felt, didn't see, tension sluice through the vampire again. His gaze was only for Isabel, for the slow improvement in her breathing, for the crackling and straightening of bone. But he heard the challenge in the vampire's voice as he faced Alban: "And I?"

  "Owe me nothing."

  Daisani made a sound. Distrust, disbelief, perhaps relief. Then he was gone, a whisk of wind where he'd been. Biali, still clutching Isabel, looked up. There were so many answers there, lingering in the air. Alban's silence in the gestalt had to do with the vampire. With all the vampires, perhaps; perhaps an answer to their dwindling numbers this past decade. It was something, at least. Something he could bring to the others, something he could add to the memories. It might be enough to excuse him from his own exile, from his own long watch over the outcast. It would certainly bring others to the city, others who would question Alban and even Daisani, working to worm their shared secrets into the open.

  And there were the women, the ones Alban knew who had died or, like Isabel, had survived through fortune alone. But they were human, and had Isabel not run afoul of their attacker Biali would have thought no more of them at all. He could let them go, in exchange for Isabel's survival. In exchange for the sure knowledge that it hadn't been Alban who had harmed her, because what reason would she have to lie, even if her attack hadn't been just before sunset, at a time no gargoyle could be awake.

  Biali's voice scraped as low as it went, raw words offering a compromise he would never voice aloud. A gargoyle could lock individual memories away from the gestalt, only offering them upon his death. And gargoyles were difficult to kill. For her life, he would not say aloud, for her life, this night had never happened. "This doesn't mean you're forgiven."

  A smile touched Alban's mouth. "No." His yellow gaze softened on Isabel. "Take care of her."

  Then, like Daisani, he was gone, though less dramatically. Just a big man walking away, leaving a scarred gargoyle and a woman slowly coming back to life.

  He looked human again by the time she awakened. It had never been a matter of debate before, never a matter of consideration. He had never shown his gargoyle face to a human who didn't already know about the Old Races, and they were far and few between. But for hours as Isabel's breathing had steadied, as her color had improved and her wounds had healed, he had held her in his natural from, and h
ad thought often of maintaining it even when health was hers again. In the end, though, it was easier to send her away if she knew nothing, and he had to send her away.

  Her waking breath was sharp, as if it searched for pain and found none. Moments passed before her eyes opened. Before she whispered, "Biali?" and smiled, the same small expression he'd grown so fond of. Then confusion etched it away and she pressed her eyes shut again. "I was hurt."

  "Yes. But you're well now."

  "I should be dead, yes?"

  "...yes."

  Silence, and a slow exhalation. "And you will not tell me how this has happened."

  "No."

  Isabel opened her eyes again. "Why not?"

  "Because I love you," he said simply, foolishly, honestly, "and the thing that healed you would surely kill you if you knew how."

  Astonishment and a smile filled Isabel's eyes. "I thought you did not know those words, mi corazón. Will we be happy now," she whispered, "together and happy, as we should be?"

  "No." Biali closed his eyes in turn, then forced them open again to watch slow dismay wash the joy from Isabel's eyes. "You have to leave, Isabel. This morning, on the first train."

  "Because of the thing that healed me." Her voice had dulled, but hope still lingered. "You will come with me?"

  "I can't." Implacable as stone, that answer.

  Isabel heard it, too, and the remaining light drained from her face. "Why?"

  There was no explaining. No possible way to hide what he was. No days to be spent locked away in solitude while his body turned to stone. No way to travel apart from her, hidden in a train compartment. It couldn't be done. He'd thought about it all night. The only way was to tell her what he was, and that would lead to questions about how she had been healed. And that would cross Daisani's will, and whether there were debts owed or not, if Eliseo Daisani imagined for a moment that Biali had betrayed the Old Races' secrets--his secret in particular--to a human woman, he would be ruthless in his vengeance. Nevermind that Daisani had clearly broken laws himself with the woman Vanessa. Unless Biali was willing to involve her in warfare, to level the field between himself and the vampire, he could not risk Isabel's awareness of the Old Races. "Because I'm not what you think I am."