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His gaze followed the line of vamps, skipping over each one, and I watched his brow furrowing before he found me at the back of the line. Our gazes locked again, the act no less powerful than it had been when we'd met for the first time a week ago. And then, with a motion so slight I'd wonder later if I'd imagined it, he inclined his head.
I nodded back.
My gaze still on Ethan, I nearly stumbled into the woman in front of me when we stopped moving, the first of our line even with the columns of vamps beside us.
The music stopped and the room stilled. Ethan unfolded his arms and took a step forward.
"Brothers. Sisters. Vampires of Cadogan House."
The room burst into raucous applause, the vampires around us whistling and screaming until Ethan quieted them with a slight motion of his hand.
"Tonight we initiate twelve new Cadogan vampires. Twelve vampires who will become your brothers, your sisters, your room-mates, your friends." He paused. "Your allies." There was nodding in the crowd.
"Tonight, twelve vampires will swear their allegiance to Cadogan House, to me, and to you. They will join us, work for us, laugh with us, love with us, and, if necessary, fight with us."
Ethan paused, then took a step forward. "My friends, my vassals, do you consent?"
They answered with action. To a one, the vampires at our sides swiveled to face us. Then, nearly simultaneously, their expressions solemn, they sank to the floor, kneeling before us. But for the group at the podium, we were the only men and women still on our feet, the rest genuflecting around us. They offered us fellowship; they offered Ethan consent, faith.
I got goose bumps all over again.
It was humbling, astounding, jolting to watch the display, to see a hundred vampires prostrate before me, to know that I was part of this, one of them. The nervousness disappeared, supplanted by a weighty kind of knowledge, a bone-deep understanding that I had become something different, something historic.
Something more.
I let my gaze flow across the crowd of vampires, still on their knees before us, and became aware of something else - the slow hum of power, like a subtle electric current, that moved across them, like water over a tumble of rocks.
Magic.
I let my hand lift, let my fingers feel the subtle shape of it, the curves and bows in the air. It wasn't unlike putting a hand out a car window and feeling the wind rush by; it had that same weird sense of solidity. And, like Catcher said, it wasn't that they were doing magic, performing it. It was more like they were extruding it, leaking it into the air around us. Whatever Ethan had said, being a vampire wasn't just about genetics.
Realizing that I was standing in the midst of nearly a hundred vampires, my hand floating in the air like an idiot, I snatched it back, rubbing the inside of my palm with a thumb to wipe away the residual tingles. I surveyed the vamps around me, realizing that no one else seemed to have noticed the magic. The Initiates stared a little blankly at the Housed vampires, mouths parted in surprise, their eyes flicking nervously across the men and women at our feet.
I risked a glance and looked up at Ethan, still on the platform. His gaze was on me, his expression unreadable, but his attention fixed. I wondered if he'd seen me raise my hand, feel out the current, and I wondered if I'd done something wrong by touching it.
After a moment, he turned back to his troops. "Rise, friends, as we welcome your comrades, as they swear their oaths to protect this House."
The vampires rose in concert, as if they'd choreographed and practiced the moves. They moved with such synchronicity that it was akin to watching a flock of birds in flight - and a little disconcerting in a group of men and women.
They swiveled again to face Ethan, and the tension in the room seemed to heighten incrementally, the new vamps in front of me shifting nervously. Something was about to happen.
Lindsey leaned toward me. "When he calls your name - when he calls you forward - go to him. It might scare you, but it's perfectly natural. He calls all of us."
Without warning, the Initiate vampire at the front of the line - a young man of maybe twenty-five - stumbled forward. The vampire at his side took his elbow to catch him, then escorted him the dozen-odd steps to the podium, where he kneeled before Ethan. The escort then stepped to the side. The room was silent, all eyes on the Master and Initiate before him. Ethan leaned down, said something to the boy, who nodded, then responded.
The exchange continued for a few moments, before Malik stepped forward and handed something to Ethan. It glinted in the light - a medal on a thin gold chain - and the vampire lowered his head. Ethan reached his hands around the man's neck and fastened the medal. When it was clasped, he whispered again, and the man rose.
"Joseph, Cadogan Initiate, I anoint you a full member of Cadogan House, with all the rights and duties afforded a Novitiate vampire."
The crowd applauded raucously as Joseph and Ethan embraced. Amber then stepped from the podium and led Joseph to one side, where he stood facing us, like a beauty pageant finalist.
The same sequence followed with the other ten vampires before me - kneeling, speaking, embracing, applause. Warner, Adrian, Michael, Thomas, and Connor followed Joseph into the ranks of Cadogan Novitiates, as did five women - Penny, Jennifer, Dakota, Melanie and Christine. Before I knew it, I stood at the front of the line, Lindsey at my side, Ethan before me, the host of Novitiates, new and old, watching as I waited to be called. Adrenaline began to surge.
The ballroom fell silent again. I forced myself to raise my gaze, to meet Ethan's. There was a moment of eye contact before he dropped his head.
That was when I heard it - the soft echo of his voice in my head, like a whisper from the end of a tunnel. And then I was hurtling through the tunnel, toward the sound, and I squeezed closed my eyes and tried to staunch the sudden burst of nausea. His voice called clear, my name. My full name - first, middle, last. And from his lips, it didn't sound so bad.
But I wasn't that girl anymore. Hadn't been, maybe ever, certainly not since I was old enough to claim my own identity. To be Merit, rather than the ghost of someone else.
Eyes closed, contemplating my identity, I hadn't heard him approach. I didn't know he stood before me until I felt his fingers in a viselike grip around my arms.
My lids lifted. Ethan stared down at me, nostrils flaring, silver tempering the edges of his irises. I swallowed and looked around, realized that the ballroom was graveyard silent, and that all eyes were on me. I looked to Lindsey, whose expression bore some mix of horror, shock, and awe, and I had no idea what I'd done.
I blinked and returned my gaze to Ethan. A muscle twitched in his jaw, and he leaned incrementally forward.
