“What is it?” he asks, hastening to her side.
“Y-you’re here!” She circles her arms around him. “What happened?”
“Fabiana is patrolling. I only came to make sure you were safe, then I will rejoin her. What is wrong?”
“S-Salma,” she says, dabbing at her eyes with her sleeve. “She’s very sick.” Her voice fades on the word. “Sh-she wants you to turn her.”
William nods in assent. “I know. I am sorry I did not tell you. I wanted to give you both the space to discuss it on your own.”
“What—what do you think?”
“You know my feelings on the matter,” he says. “I think to be eighteen forever and forced to hide in the shadows is a dreadful future.”
She nods, looking reassured by his answer. Only he is not finished.
“Yet when I inhaled her blood… it was not a healthy scent. I am sorry to say this,” he says, and he feels a tightening in his own chest in anticipation of the pain he is about to cause in hers. “Salma does not seem long for this life.”
“What if,” says Lorena after many sharp breaths, “she gets some kind of treatment? If she… if it’s not a successful outcome, could you just wait and do it then?” She looks at him in hopes of an answer. “So we can buy her more time?”
Buy more time.
The phrase strikes William as supremely innocent. If there is one thing that has become amply clear to him, it is thattimetruly rules all: It is the ultimate power behind the universe. No one can ever own time, not even immortals. At most, they can lease it.
The only contract time makes with all beings, whether mortal or vampire, is this moment.
The present.
“I will do as you wish,” he says, keenly aware that every second with Lorena is precious.
“Thank you,” she says, and he pulls her into an embrace.
“I am sorry,” he says, lifting her off her feet. “I have brought you only problems.”
He carries her away, and she blinks a few times when he sets her down in his room.
She does not pull away from him. “You’ve also brought me love and adventure and a chance to discover myself. Doesn’t that count?”
“I need you to know that I will never let any harm come to you,” he murmurs. “That means I may have to do some things neither of us would approve of.”
“I don’t accept that. You’re their fuckingStoker.” She says his name as if it were equivalent toking,and it fills him with something like actual pride.
“These vampires have been waiting for you for what probably feels like forever even to them, because there was no guarantee you existed. They’ll listen to what you have to say.”
“I have met some of these vampires,” he says, “and they are far worldlier than I, and savvier, more sophisticated.” He is thinking of Anne as he says this, how she moves through this world and knows exactly what she wants, and how he felt like a child in her presence. “Why would they trust me to lead them when they have Leonardo the Bloody?”
“The answer is right there, in his name,” says Lorena, who always seems to have an answer for everything. “There is one thing vampires value above all—blood. And you have the blood of a leader.Their leader.Without you, nothing changes.”
“Lenny knows he has all the leverage he needs over me. I will do anything as long as nothing happens to you.”
She reaches up and cups his cheek. “Then you have to show them that simply making more vampires won’t change anything. Let them see what they are lacking isvision—something your grandsire had that you’ve inherited. Don’t just be their Stoker. Be theirhope.”
He takes her face in his hands and kisses her deeply becausesheishishope. Only now that he sees himself reflected in Lorena does William feel like he is beginning to process what he must do. It is as if everything has only become real in this moment, because he is sharing it with her.
She makes him real.
HOURS LATER,William and Fabiana take a break for some blood. They sit on Huntington’s rooftop, and she has two thermoses. He can smell the warm liquid inside.
“I did what you asked,” she reports.
