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"Out," she said. "No connection. They've cut us off."
"They?" Shane asked blankly. "They, who?"
Michael took out his own cell and tried it, then shook his head. "It's not just you - it's me as well, and mine's on the vampire system. Cell phones, landlines, and Internet - it's all down."
"Why would they do that?"
"At a guess, they're getting ready to leave Morganville, and they don't want anyone to be making plans for trouble," Michael said. He dropped his useless cell phone on the table. "It's probably wrong that I feel relieved right now."
They all froze as a knock came at the front door. After a silent exchange of looks, Michael went to answer it, and Claire went with him, just because it was something to do.
Outside the door was a vampire policeman, dressed in a big raincoat, and his police cap protected by a rain bonnet. It was still pouring, Claire saw. The yard outside was a sea of muddy water. "You need to bring your charges to the meeting tomorrow night, Mr. Glass," he said. "We're going house to house to remind everyone, and we'll be checking all buildings tomorrow to ensure full compliance. Everyone at Founder's Square at dusk tomorrow."
"What if we don't want to go?" Michael asked. "Our friend died today."
The cop gave him a long look, and said, "Nobody stays away. I'm sorry for your loss, but if you don't show, we'll come and get you. Orders of the Founder."
He tapped the front of his hat with a finger in an abbreviated salute, and walked away, heading for the next house.
"This is not good," Michael murmured. "Not good at all."
Claire had to agree with him, for all the use it was; she didn't want them to leave the house. Especially, she didn't want them to leave her alone. What if they never came back? What if she was trapped here all alone with just Hiram Glass for company, forever? That seemed selfish, but she was terrified at the very thought.
Michael shut the door and locked it, and stayed there a moment, head down. Then he whispered, very quietly, "Claire, if you are here, please tell us. Please. God, I hope you are, because I'm scared. I'm scared for all of us."
Michael was scared. God.
That made her even more panicked.
Think, she ordered herself. Clearly, she couldn't expect any help from the head ghost of the Glass House, who was actually kind of an ass; she was going to have to find a way out of this herself. As she thought about it, she drifted back down the hall, into the living room, past the couch where Shane and Eve sat together, silently holding hands . . . and then to the spot where her body had fallen. Come on, she told herself. Think.
She felt a warm surge of power condense around her, like an insubstantial hug. The house. Hiram had said the house liked her; clearly, the house and Hiram had different opinions. It was trying to tell her something.
It shoved her a little, pushing her toward the wall.
The portal.
No, I can't do it. It's impossible.
But if it was, what did it hurt to try?
Claire focused on the blank wall - on the textured paint, on the gray color, on every flaw and imperfection.
Come on. Come on....
She sensed a flicker of power, almost a sense of surprise, and then the portal responded.
And when it gradually misted open, she smiled, just a little, even though nobody could really see it.
She looked around. Eve was facing away, and Michael was still in the other room. Shane sat slumped on the couch, facing the silent TV. Nobody was looking at the portal, which was too bad, because at least they'd know something was odd.
This may not work, she told herself. You may not come out of this.
But really . . . would it matter? She was already gone, as far as those she loved were concerned.
If the physics of the portals had been complicated before, she'd be years working out how the potential energy of a dead soul could possibly travel through wormholes. Well, if nothing else, it'll keep me occupied with calculations for as long as I live.
And then Claire, ghost of a dead girl, stepped through the portal and was lost in the dark.
She opened her eyes, and she was in Myrnin's lab. It was deserted, and it was trashed.... Someone had scattered books everywhere, ripped some up, and an entire lab table had been thrown all the way across the room, smashing the marble top into pieces.
So, pretty normal, then.
"Frank!" she said. She felt thinner here, almost fading, and realized that she was still connected to the house, through the portal. If the portal failed . . .
. . . She'd be gone along with it.
"Frank Collins! Can you hear me?"
She felt a sudden buzz of power, and Frank's image formed in front of her, one grayscale pixel at a time. He blinked. "Anybody there?"
Oh. He couldn't see her. Great. "Frank, can you hear me?" She yelled it, loud as she could, and Frank's image flickered, as if interference had ripped it apart for a moment.
"Jesus, Claire, turn it down," he said. "Where are you?"
"Right here!" She was so happy to be communicating she felt like kissing him - only that wouldn't work, on so many levels. "I'm right here, in front of you. I'm sort of - "
"Dead?" he asked. "I heard the chatter. Guess saying I'm sorry seems a little redundant, since you're actually talking to me."
"I need your help."
"Nothing I can do for you, cupcake. Dead is dead, although I have to admit, pretty big achievement since you're audible."
"Not for me," Claire said. "There's a gathering at Founder's Square tomorrow night. Why?"
"Can't say," Frank Collins said. His image flickered again. "Move back; you're screwing up my projection."
She floated back, just a little. "Can't say, or won't say?"
"What did I just tell you?"
"So you've been told not to talk about it." He didn't answer, which she supposed was answer enough. "Frank . . . Amelie once told me that if she ever decided that the Morganville experiment was over, she would take it all down. Is that what we're talking about?" More silence. She felt thinner and more faded, as if pieces of her were slowly streaming away into the dark. "Frank! Is she going to destroy the town?"
"She's setting the humans free, and the vampires are leaving town," he said. "Upside: Myrnin's going to turn me off, and I can get on with dying the right way, finally. Downside - well, there's always a downside."
Talking to Frank was like talking in circles. "Where's Myrnin?"
He shrugged. "He tore ass out of here to see you. Hasn't come back."
"Don't pretend you don't know. I know you've got surveillance everywhere."
Frank raised his eyebrows, and smiled crookedly. "All right. He's at Founder's Square, with the Big Cheese. I don't have eyes inside her offices, but they frog-marched him straight there and he hasn't come out."
That . . . wasn't good. Myrnin was the only real hope she had. "Frank, when you see him, I need you to tell him that I'm still here. Hanging on. That he wasn't wrong. Do you understand? He said he might be able to help me. Tell him I really, really need him now." She swallowed. "Can you call Shane? Tell him . . . tell him I'm still in the house?"
He shook his head. "Can't, sweetheart. I would if I could, but the comm system is screwed right now. They pulled fuses at the source, cut connections. I can't activate the speaker on his phone unless he comes here. I'm limited, too."
She was getting stretched too thin; she could feel the pull from the Glass House getting more tenuous. If it broke, she'd vanish like a puff of smoke on the wind.
"Frank! Please, you have to help me!"
He slowly shook his head. "You haven't thought this through," he said. "I guess that's understandable, all things considered; it's been a big day for you. Suppose Myrnin gets the message that you're still around. Suppose he comes and works some kind of crazy magic and makes contact with you. You're still trapped. Only way Michael got free of that place was to turn vampire." His rippling image stared through the air, not quite focused on her. "You ready to be a vamp, Claire? Full-on bloodsucking freak? Because I can tell you, it was the worst damn thing that ever happened to me, in a lifetime of bad things. And I don't want that for you. Or for my son. Better he lose you now. Better he not get false hope."
"But - " She really, really couldn't stay. Claire began drifting back to the portal, already worried that the cord connecting her to the Glass House was so thin. Or that Frank just might decide to cut it by slamming the door himself. "It doesn't have to be that way. . . ."
