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“No,” Fiona cried. “Is that possible in this dimension?”
Parisa glanced at her. “I had wings on Mortal Earth. That was supposed to be impossible as well.”
Fiona turned to Havily. “What of you? What is your power that makes you a target?”
“Well, I have two actually. My blood has special properties and tends to act like dying blood in some respects. It made Crace maniacal. He was a High-Administrator-turned-death-vampire who wanted my blood more than anything. He was the one who orchestrated my abduction.
“In addition, I work with Endelle in the darkening. Yeah, I know … well, it’s a nether-space thing, a place that exists between dimensions. When she and I do darkening work, we hunt for Greaves all night because he uses that time to travel around the world to ship death vampires to this area, to Phoenix Two. You know how the Warriors of the Blood battle all night? Greaves has been building an army of death vampires throughout the world by turning High Administrators and in addition making one of their tasks the creation of more death vampires through the taking of dying blood.”
Fiona leaned her head against the mattress. She covered her face with her hand. “And he supplies the High Administrators with our blood, with the blood we died for every month.”
“Yes,” Havily said. “But yours no more.”
Fiona’s hand shot out and grabbed Havily’s arm. “But Rith will acquire more women to meet the demand. And if not, the death vampires must feed. I’ve heard that to go without dying blood creates unbearable abdominal cramps.”
Parisa turned and settled a hip on the bed. She took Fiona’s free hand and held it tightly in hers. “That is not your responsibility,” she said. “Your job is to get well quickly and to serve on our committee to free the rest of the slaves.”
Fiona shook her head. “They will feed on mortals because they’re weak. There has to be a better way. Something more permanent. The blood is packaged and distributed all around the world. What if we followed that trail and eliminated the source that needed the blood.”
“You mean the death vampires.”
“Exactly.”
“Are you aware that Greaves has an antidote and that more ascenders partake of dying blood than we know of? It’s rumored that a third of COPASS uses dying blood and the antidote.”
“COPASS?” Fiona asked.
“The Committee to Oversee the Process of Ascension to Second Earth. No one checked the acronym, which is probably also an indication of the intelligence level involved. It’s all political.”
“What does COPASS have to do with anything if they just oversee the ascension process?”
“Over the decades, the governing body gained more and more power. It now has the ability to establish all kinds of laws. The one that hinders Endelle the most is that she is not allowed access to her own Seers Fortress at the Superstition Mountains without the permission of that Fortress’s High Administrator.”
Fiona frowned. “But I know for a fact that Commander Greaves uses Seer information to plot his course.”
“How do you know that?” Havily asked.
A blush suffused Fiona’s cheeks. “I can hear telepathic conversations.” She whispered the words.
Parisa glanced at Havily. Havily returned her stare and into her mind, sent, Is she lying?
“I wouldn’t lie about something like this,” Fiona said. “And I only mentioned it because I trust you both.”
Parisa laughed, then Havily. “Can you communicate telepathically? I’m just learning to do it myself.”
Fiona shook her head. “I don’t know.”
“How did you discover you could do this?”
“Generally I can hear everyone’s thoughts, though I’ve learned to block the noise really well. The first time I met Greaves and Rith all those decades ago, it was like hearing a symphony in full orchestral mode. I thought I would go mad.” She shuddered at the memory.
“You must know way too much about everyone.”
“More than I’d like to.”
“What about Jean-Pierre?” Havily asked.
Fiona smiled. “I don’t know French. He blends his French and English together in his thoughts. Besides, the minute I know I’m hearing thoughts instead of spoken words, I close my mind down.”
Parisa blew air from her cheeks. “That’s probably a good thing where Jean-Pierre is concerned.”
Havily laughed.
“What am I missing?”
Havily said, “Well, he’s a man and he’s a warrior.”
Fiona laughed, first a little then a lot. “You’re so right. I forgot what it used to be like when I would listen in accidentally. Men do think about sex a lot.” After the shared amusement subsided, she said, “I wasn’t that way before I was abducted, on Mortal Earth, I mean. I couldn’t hear everyone’s thoughts until I arrived on Second.”
“But how did you survive?” Havily asked. “ Mortals can’t, you know.” She jerked her thumb at Parisa. “Except this one, but she’s the only exception … ever.”
Fiona shrugged. “The first thing Greaves did to me was ascend me. I know that’s not the right phrase but he has the power to bestow immortality though he withholds the fangs, thank God. Vampire fangs would have been too much to deal with.”
“As if the D and R process wasn’t enough all by itself. You know, Fiona, what we don’t understand is how you lived as long as you did.”
She stared down once more at clasped hands. “I really don’t know, but the worst of it was that I got really good at reading the women. I knew how long each one would last to the year, often to the month.”
“Jesus,” Havily whispered. She put her hand on Fiona’s shoulder. “We’ve all been through it one way or another, because we’re ascended and this is a world at war. My fiancé was killed by death vampires and he was a powerful Militia Warrior. Later Crace, who used to be High Administrator of Chicago Two, turned and got a taste of my blood and abducted me. He drained me, not to death like you, but he kept me drugged and chained to a wall. Sometimes I have nightmares, but Marcus is there for me now and it helps.”
Fiona grabbed her hand, the one on her shoulder. “We’re sisters then, in this kind of suffering.”
“And power,” Parisa said.
Another feminine voice flowed from the doorway. “And compassion.” Alison moved forward, her gaze fixed on Fiona. “You have compassion for the other women. I’ve been talking to them this morning. You were the hub, the counselor, the comforter. You got most of them through longer than they would have survived otherwise.”
