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"I know. He's sick or something. But he won't hurt me. Amelie -- "
"Amelie isn't in the business of worrying about individuals." That, for Sam, was surprisingly bitter, especially when it came to Amelie. "She's using you the way she uses all humans. It's not personal, but it's not in your best interest, either."
"Why? What is it you're not telling me?"
Sam looked at her for a long time, clearly trying to decide, and finally said, "Myrnin's had five apprentices in the past few years. Two of them were vampires."
Claire blinked, surprised, as Sam got to his feet. "Five? What happened to them?"
"You're asking the right questions. Now ask the right people."
He walked away. Claire gasped, grabbed her bag, and followed.
Over at the coffee bar, the two detectives were breaking the news to Eve. As Claire looked back, she saw the precise second that Eve realized her friend was dead. Even from across the room, it hurt to see the pain in her face, quickly masked and locked away. In Morganville, losing someone was something you got used to, Claire supposed.
God, this town sucked sometimes.
Sam had a car, a sleek dark-red sedan with dark-tinted windows. It was parked in the underground garage beneath the U.C., in a reserved spot marked SPONSORS ONLY, with a graphic of a sticker that had to appear in the corner of the windshield for the parking to be legal.
A sticker which Sam, of course, had. "So that means what, you donate money or something?"
Sam opened the passenger door for her, a bit of chivalry she wasn't really used to, and Claire climbed inside. "Not exactly," he said. "Amelie gives them to vampires who have campus business."
Once he was in the car, turning the key, Claire said, "You have campus business?"
"I teach night classes," Sam said, and grinned. He looked about twelve, when he did that. She had the feeling it wasn't something vampires were into, looking that endearingly goofy. Maybe if they were, they'd be more popular with the local breathing population. "Sort of an outreach program."
"Cool." The tinting was so dark it was like midnight outside. "You can see through this?"
"Like daylight," Sam said, and she gave up, buckled her seatbelt, and let him drive. It wasn't a long drive -- nothing in Morganville was -- but she had time to notice some things about Sam's car. It was clean, really clean. No trash at all. (Well, he wouldn't be chowing down on burgers in the car, now, would he? Wait. He could ...) It also didn't smell like most cars. It smelled new and kind of sterile. "How are classes going?"
Oh, Sam was going to do the interested-adult thing now. "Fine," Claire said. Nobody ever wanted to really hear the truth, to a question like that, but fine wasn't a lie, either. "They're not very hard." Also not a lie.
Sam shot her a glance, or so she thought, in the dim lights from the dashboard. "Maybe you're not getting all you can out of them," he said. "Ever thought of that?"
She shrugged. "I've always been ahead. It's better than high school, but I was hoping for something harder."
"Like working for Myrnin?" Sam's voice had gone dry. "That's a challenge, all right. Claire -- "
"Amelie didn't exactly give me a choice."
"But you still want to do it, don't you?"
She did. She had to admit that. Myrnin had been scary, but there had been something so bright in him, too. She knew that spark. She felt it herself, and she was always looking for someone, something to feed it. "Maybe he just needs someone to talk to," she said.
Sam made a noncommittal noise that somehow sounded amused, too, and pulled the car to a stop. "I have to move fast," he said. "It's the door at the end of the alley, I'll meet you there in the shade."
He opened his door and just ... vanished. The door slammed shut, but it did it on its own. Claire gaped, unbuckled her seatbelt, and got out, but there was no sign of Sam at all on the street, in the brilliant sunlight. The car was parked at the curb of a cul-de-sac, and it took her a second, but then she recognized the house in front of her. A big gothic ramble of a house, nearly a mirror image of the Glass House where she lived, but this one belonged to a lady named Katherine Day and her granddaughter.
Gramma Day was on her porch, rocking peacefully and stirring the warm air with a paper fan. Claire raised her hand and waved, and Gramma waved back. "You come to see me, girl?" Gramma called. "Come on up, I'll get some lemonade!"
"Maybe later!" Claire called back. "I have to go -- "
She realized, with a jolt of horror, where Sam had told her to go.
Into the alley. The alley into which everybody, Gramma Day included, had told her not to go. The alley with the trap-door spider vampire who'd tried before to lure her inside.
Gramma pulled herself to her feet. She was a tiny, wrinkled woman who looked as dry and tough as old leather. Had to be tough, to be old in Morganville, Claire thought. "You all right, girl?" she asked.
"Yeah," Claire said. "Thanks. I'll -- I'll be back."
She headed off down the alley. Behind her, Gramma Day called out, "Girl, what you playin' at? Ain't you got good sense?"
Probably not.
The alley was narrow, with fences on both sides, and it seemed to get even more narrow the farther she went, like a funnel. She didn't feel any strange attraction, though, or hear voices.
She also didn't see Sam.
"Here," a voice said, as she turned a slight corner. And there he was, leaning back in a patch of black shade next to an overhanging doorway, which was attached to what looked like a shack. Not a really well-made shack, either. Claire wondered if it was supposed to lean like that.
"It's Myrnin," she said. "He's the trap door spider."
Sam looked thoughtful at that, and then nodded. "Most people know not to come down this way," he said. "He only takes Unprotecteds. He can tell the difference, so he wouldn't try it with you. Not now."
Cheery. Sam opened the door, which didn't look sturdy enough to keep out a cool breeze, and stepped inside. A smell washed out into the still air, something old and bitter. Chemicals. Ancient paper. Unwashed clothes.
Well?
Claire sucked in a breath that tasted of all those things, and stepped into Myrnin's lair.
Chapter Five
Myrnin was in a mood. A good mood.
"Claire!" As she came down the steps -- the only thing in the shack itself were the steps leading down -- into his main chamber, he flashed across the room in a blur and stopped just an inch away from her, close enough that she flinched back into Sam's broad chest and he steadied her. Myrnin's eyes were wide, blazing with enthusiasm. "I've been waiting! Late, late, late, you're very late, you know. Come on, come on, we haven't got time for nonsense. Did you bring the books? Good. What about Last Will and Testament? Are you familiar with the symbols? Here, take this." Chalk, pressed into her hand. Myrnin moved again, fast as a grasshopper, and rolled an ancient stained chalkboard closer. He had to shove over some stacks of books to do it, which he did with cheerful disregard for how much of a mess he was making.
