Rachel Caine - [The Morganville Vampires 05] Read online

  THE MORGANVILLE VAMPIRE NOVELS

  Glass Houses

  The Dead Girls’ Dance

  Midnight Alley

  Feast of Fools

  Lord of Misrule

  Praise for the Morganville Vampires Series

  Feast of Fools

  “Rachel Caine brings her brilliant ability to blend witty dialogue, engaging characters, and an intriguing plot.”

  —Romance Reviews Today

  “A rousing horror thriller that adds a new dimension to the vampire mythos . . . a heroine the audience will admire and root for. . . . The key to this fine tale is . . . plausible reactions to living in a town run by vampires that make going to college in the Caine universe quite an experience.”

  —Midwest Book Review

  “An electrifying, enthralling coming-of-age supernatural tale.”

  —The Best Reviews

  Midnight Alley

  “A fast-paced, page-turning read packed with wonderful characters and surprising plot twists. Rachel Caine is an engaging writer; readers will be completely absorbed in this chilling story, unable to put it down until the last page. . . . For fans of vampire books, this is one that shouldn’t be missed!”

  —Flamingnet

  “Weaves a web of dangerous temptation, dark deceit, and loving friendships. The nonstop vampire action and delightfully sweet relationships will captivate readers and leave them craving more.”

  —Darque Reviews

  The Dead Girls’ Dance

  “It was hard to put this down for even the slightest break. . . . Forget what happens to the kid with the scar and glasses; I want to know what happens next in Morganville. If you love to read about characters with whom you can get deeply involved, Rachel Caine is so far a one hundred percent sure bet to satisfy that need. I love her Weather Warden stories, and her vampires are even better.”

  —The Eternal Night

  “Throw in a mix of vamps and ghosts, and it can’t get any better than Dead Girls’ Dance.”

  —Dark Angel Reviews

  To Ter Matthies, Anna Korra’ti, and Shaz Flynn— courageous fighters, each one.

  And to Pat Flynn, who never stopped.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  This book wouldn’t be here without the support of my husband, Cat, my friends Pat, Jackie, and Sharon, and a host of great online supporters and cheerers-on.

  Special thank-you recognition to Sharon Sams, Shaz Flynn, and especially to fearless beta readers Karin and Laura for their excellent input.

  Thanks always to Lucienne Diver.

  THE STORY SO FAR . . .

  Claire Danvers was going to Caltech. Or maybe MIT. She had her pick of great schools, but because she’s only sixteen, her parents sent her to a supposedly safe place for a year to mature—Texas Prairie University, a small school in Morganville, Texas.

  One problem: Morganville isn’t what it seems. It’s the last safe place for vampires, and that makes it not very safe at all for the humans who venture in for work or school. The vampires rule the town . . . and everyone who lives in it.

  Claire’s second problem is that she’s gathered both human and vampire enemies. Now she lives with housemates Michael Glass (newly made a vampire), Eve Rosser (always been Goth), and Shane Collins (whose absentee dad is a wannabe vampire killer). Claire’s the normal one . . . or she would be, except that she’s become an employee of the town Founder, Amelie, and befriended one of the most dangerous, yet most vulnerable, vampires of them all—Myrnin, the alchemist.

  Now Amelie’s vampire father, Bishop, has come to Morganville and destroyed the fragile peace, turning vampires against one another and creating dangerous new alliances and factions in a town that already had too many.

  Morganville’s turning in on itself, and Claire and her friends have chosen to stand with the Founder, but it could mean working with their enemies . . . and fighting their friends.

  1

  It was all going wrong, and Morganville was burning—parts of it, anyway.

  Claire stood at the windows of the Glass House and watched the flames paint the glass a dull, flickering orange. She could always see the stars out here in the Middle of Nowhere, Texas—but not tonight. Tonight, there was—

  “You’re thinking it’s the end of the world,” a cool, quiet voice said behind her.

  Claire blinked out of her trance and turned to look. Amelie—the Founder, and the baddest vampire in town, to hear most of the others tell it—looked fragile and pale, even for a vampire. She’d changed out of the costume she’d worn to Bishop’s masked ball—not a bad idea, since it had a stake-sized hole in the chest, and she’d bled all over it. If Claire had needed proof that Amelie was tough, she’d certainly gotten it tonight. Surviving an assassination attempt definitely gave you points.

  The vampire was wearing gray—a soft gray sweater, and pants. Claire had to stare, because Amelie just didn’t do pants. Ever. It was beneath her, or something.

  Come to think of it, Claire had never seen her in the color gray, either.

  Talk about the end of the world.

  “I remember when Chicago burned,” Amelie said. “And London. And Rome. The world doesn’t end, Claire. In the morning, the survivors start to build again. It’s the way of things. The human way.”

  Claire didn’t particularly want a pep talk. She wanted to curl up in her warm bed upstairs, pull pillows over her head, and feel Shane’s arms around her.

  None of that was going to happen. Her bed was currently occupied by Miranda, a freaked-out teenage psychic with dependency issues, and as for Shane . . .

  Shane was about to leave.

  “Why?” she blurted. “Why are you sending him out there? You know what could happen—”

  “I know a great deal about Shane Collins that you don’t,” Amelie interrupted. “He’s not a child, and he has survived much in his young life. He’ll survive this. And he wishes to make a difference.”

  She was sending Shane into the predawn darkness with a few chosen fighters, both vampire and human, to take possession of the Bloodmobile: the last reliably accessible blood storage in Morganville.

  And it was the last thing Shane wanted to do. It was the last thing Claire wanted for him.

  “Bishop isn’t going to want the Bloodmobile for himself,” Claire said. “He wants it destroyed. Morganville’s full of walking blood banks, as far as he’s concerned. But it’ll hurt you if you lose it, so he’ll come after it. Right?”

  The severe, thin line of Amelie’s mouth made it clear that she didn’t like being second-guessed. It definitely couldn’t be called a smile. “As long as Shane has the book, Bishop will not dare destroy the vehicle for fear of destroying his great treasure along with it.”

  Translation: Shane was bait. Because of the book. Claire hated that damn book. It had brought her nothing but trouble from the time she’d first heard about it. Amelie and Oliver, the two biggest vamps in town, had both been scrambling to find it, and it had dropped into Claire’s hands instead. She wished she had the courage to grab it from Shane right now, run outside, and toss it in the nearest burning house to get rid of it once and for all, because as far as she could tell, it hadn’t done anybody any good, ever—including Amelie.

  Claire said, “He’ll kill Shane to get it.”

  Amelie shrugged. “I gamble that killing Shane is far more difficult than it would appear.”

  “Yeah, you are gambling. You’re betting his life.”

  Amelie’s ice gray eyes were steady on hers. “Be clear on this: I am, in fact, betting all our lives. So be grateful, child, and also be warned. I could concede this fight at any time. M
y father would allow me to walk away—only me, alone. Defeated. I stay out of duty to you and the others in this town who are loyal to me.” Her eyes narrowed. “Don’t make me reconsider that.”

  Claire hoped she didn’t look as mutinous as she felt. She pasted on what was supposed to be an agreeable expression, and nodded. Amelie’s eyes narrowed even more.

  “Get prepared. We leave in ten minutes.”

  Shane wasn’t the only one with a dirty job to do; they were all assigned things they didn’t particularly like. Claire was going with Amelie to try to rescue another vampire—Myrnin. And while Claire liked Myrnin, and admired him in a lot of ways, she also wasn’t too excited about facing down—again—the vampire holding him prisoner, the dreadful Mr. Bishop.

  Eve was off to the coffee shop, Common Grounds, with the just-about-as-awful Oliver, her former boss. Michael was about to head out to the university with Richard Morrell, the mayor’s son. How he was supposed to protect a few thousand clueless college students, Claire had no idea; she took a moment to marvel at the fact that the vampires really could lock down the town when they wanted. She’d have thought keeping students on campus in this situation would be impossible—kids phoning home, jumping in cars, getting the hell out of Dodge.

  Except the vampires controlled the phone lines, cell phones, the Internet, the TV, and the radio, and cars either died or wrecked on the outskirts of town if the vampires didn’t want you to leave. Only a few people had ever gotten out of Morganville successfully without permission. Shane had been one. And then he’d come back.

  Claire still had no idea what kind of guts that had taken, knowing what was waiting for him.

  “Hey,” Claire’s housemate Eve said. She paused, arms full of clothes—black and red, so they’d almost certainly come out of Eve’s own Goth-heavy closet—and gave Claire a quick once-over. She’d changed to what in Eve’s world were practical fighting clothes—a pair of tight black jeans, a tight black shirt with red skull patterns all over it, and stompy, thick-soled boots. And a spiked black leather collar around her throat that almost dared the vampires, Bite that!

  “Hey,” Claire said. “Is this really a good time to start laundry?”

  Eve rolled her eyes. “Cute. So, some people didn’t want to be caught dead in their stupid ball costumes, if you know what I mean. How about you? Ready to take that thing off?”

  Claire looked down at herself. She was honestly surprised to realize that she was still wearing the tight, garish bodysuit of her Harlequin costume. “Oh, yes.” She sighed. “Got anything without, you know, skulls?”

  “What’s wrong with skulls? And that would be a no, by the way.” Eve dumped the armload of clothing on the floor and rooted through it, pulling out a plain black shirt and a pair of blue jeans. “The jeans are yours. Sorry, but I sort of raided everybody’s stash. Hope you like the underwear you have on; I didn’t go through your drawers.”

  “Afraid it might get you all turned on?” Shane asked from over her shoulder. “Please say yes.” He grabbed a pair of his own jeans from the pile. “And please stay out of my closet.”

  Eve gave him the finger. “If you’re worried about me finding your porn stash, old news, man. Also, you have really boring taste.” She grabbed a blanket from the couch and nodded toward the corner. “No privacy anywhere in this house tonight. Go on, we’ll fix up a changing room.”

  The three of them edged past the people and vampires who packed the Glass House. It had become the unofficial campaign center for their side of the war, which meant there were plenty of people tramping around, getting in their stuff, who none of them would have let cross the threshold under normal circumstances.

  Take Monica Morrell. The mayor’s daughter had shed her elaborate Marie Antoinette costume and was back to the blond, slinky, pretty, slimy girl Claire knew and hated.

  “Oh my God.” Claire gritted her teeth. “Is she wearing my blouse?” It was her only good one. Silk. She’d just bought it last week. Now she’d never be able to put it on again. “Remind me to burn that later.” Monica saw her staring, fingered the collar of the shirt, and gave her an evil smile. She mouthed, Thanks. “Remind me to burn it twice. And stomp on the ashes.”

  Eve grabbed Claire by the arm and hustled her into the empty corner of the room, where she shook out the blanket and held it at arm’s length to provide a temporary shelter.

  Claire peeled off her sweat-soaked Harlequin costume with a whimper of relief, and shivered as the cool air hit her flushed skin. She felt awkward and anxious, stripped to her underwear with just a blanket held up between her and a dozen strangers, some of whom probably wanted to eat her.

  Shane leaned over the top. “You done?”

  She squealed and threw the wadded-up costume at him. He caught it and waggled his eyebrows at her as she stepped into the jeans and quickly buttoned up the shirt.

  “Done!” she called.

  Eve dropped the blanket and smiled poison-sweet at Shane.

  “Your turn, leather boy,” she said. “Don’t worry. I won’t accidentally embarrass you.”

  No, she’d embarrass him completely on purpose, and Shane knew it, from the glare he threw her. He ducked behind the blanket. Claire wasn’t tall enough to check him out over the top—not that she wasn’t tempted—but when Eve lowered the blanket, bit by bit, Claire grabbed one corner and pulled it back up.

  “You’re no fun,” Eve said.

  “Don’t mess with him. Not now. He’s going out there alone.”

  Eve’s face went still and tight, and for the first time, Claire realized that the shine in her eyes wasn’t really humor. It was a tightly controlled kind of panic. “Yeah,” she said. “I know. It’s just—we’re all splitting up, Claire. I wish we didn’t have to do that.”

  On impulse, Claire hugged her. Eve smelled of powder and some kind of darkly floral perfume, with a light undertone of sweat.

  “Hey!” Shane’s wounded yell was enough to make them both giggle. The blanket had drooped enough to show him zipping up his pants. Fast. “Seriously, girls, not cool. A guy could do serious damage.”

  He looked more like Shane now. The leather pants had made him unsettlingly hot-model gorgeous. In jeans and his old, faded Marilyn Manson T-shirt, he was somebody down-to-earth, somebody Claire could imagine kissing.

  And she did imagine, just like that. It was, as usual, heart-racingly delicious.

  “Michael’s going out, too,” Eve said, and now the tension she’d been hiding made her voice tremble. “I have to tell him—”

  “Go on,” Claire said. “We’re right behind you.”

  Eve dropped the blanket and pushed through the crowd, heading for her boyfriend, and the unofficial head of their strange and screwed-up fraternity.

  It was easy to spot Michael in any group—he was tall and blond, with a face like an angel. As he caught sight of Eve heading toward him, he smiled, and Claire thought that was maybe the most complicated smile she’d ever seen, full of relief, welcome, love, and worry.

  Eve crashed straight into him, hard enough to rock him back on his heels, and their arms went around each other.

  Shane held Claire back with a touch on her shoulder. “Give them a minute,” he said. “They’ve got things to say.” She turned to look at him. “And so do we.”

  She swallowed hard and nodded. Shane’s hands were on her shoulders, and his eyes had gone still and intense.

  “Don’t go out there,” Shane said.

  It was what she’d been intending to say to him. She blinked, surprised.

  “You stole my paranoia,” she said. “I was going to say, Don’t go. But you’re going to, no matter what I say, aren’t you?”

  That threw him off just a little. “Well, yeah, of course I am, but—”

  “But nothing. I’ll be with Amelie; I’ll be okay. You? You’re going off with the cast of WWE Raw to fight a cage match or something. It’s not the same thing.”

  “Since when do you ever watch wrestling?”r />
  “Shut up. That’s not the point, and you know it. Shane, don’t go.” Claire put everything she had into it.

  It wasn’t enough.

  Shane smoothed her hair and bent down to kiss her. It was the sweetest, gentlest kiss he’d ever given her, and it melted all the tense muscles of her neck, her shoulders, and her back. It was a promise without words, and when he finally pulled back, he passed his thumb across her lips gently, to seal it all in.

  “There’s something I really ought to tell you,” he said. “I was kind of waiting for the right time.”

  They were in a room full of people, Morganville was in chaos outside, and they probably didn’t have a chance of surviving until sunrise, but Claire felt her heart stutter and then race faster. The whole world seemed to go silent around her. He’s going to say it.