Two
The Asylum
The plane touched down about an hour before sunrise. Planning trips like this in the summer was a nightmare. The private flight to Budapest was almost seventeen hours. Hungary is nine hours ahead of California. We left at two a.m. our time and flew all through the day and night, only to arrive just before sunrise. We’d planned to leave at midnight so the timing wouldn’t be so tight but had run into a fog delay.
Clive was asleep-ish during the day, of course, and I had hoped to nod off as well, but it hadn’t happened. Even though I was exhausted, I was restless about the trip, more so the closer we got to Budapest. If this offer was on the up and up, I wanted to make a good impression.
I doubted Clive would ever have made the decision to step down as Master of San Francisco if the nocturne hadn’t hated me. Leticia, Garyn’s spy in the nocturne, had been able to turn way too many of Clive’s vampires against him because of his love for me. I knew none of that was my fault, but I couldn’t help feeling responsible.
I needed this visit to go well.
And if this was all an elaborate ruse to separate us from our support system, I needed to keep my guard up and be ready to fight.
When we came down the metal steps off the plane, a black car was waiting for us, a driver standing beside it. He opened the rear door and then took our luggage, placing it in the trunk. We slid into the back seat, and I did my best to stifle a yawn.
The driver got in and said something in Hungarian. Clive responded in kind before speaking to me mind-to-mind, a gift we had.
He says we’ll beat the dawn, though it will be close. The Guild is about thirty minutes away.
The driver took off, driving much faster than what would normally be considered safe, but vampires had excellent eyesight and reflexes. I doubted he wanted to be burned up in the sun, so we were racing.
I found his blip in my head and dipped into his thoughts. He was annoyed he’d been chosen to go out so close to sunrise and was battling back a stupor that was beginning to take hold. We might get into a car wreck, but at least he wasn’t trying to kill us. I withdrew from the driver’s mind, still looking out the window, hoping Clive didn’t pick up on my paranoia about this trip.
I couldn’t see much of Budapest, but what I could was a strange mélange of Baroque masterpieces and blocky, utilitarian buildings. A few people were walking quickly to work, I’d assume, though the streets were still dark and empty at this hour.
We traveled through a downtown area, crossed a bridge over the Danube River, and then drove up green hills, past ancient monuments. The driver turned off a street with shops and cafés, onto a dirt road beside tall cyclone fencing bearing signs shouting messages in Hungarian. Mist hovered over the ground beyond the fence, hiding what lay beneath.
The driver slowed and a gate slid open. He floored it, moving toward a huge, menacing institution that looked condemned. It stood three stories high and had two long wings jutting forward, seeming to punch through the murk. Jagged glass hung in window frames, ready to bite trespassers. With stone walls blackened by time, it crouched, waiting for prey, ready to pounce.
The main entrance was recessed, the building an inverted U. Two incongruous turrets stood sentry on either side of the oversized double doors. The fanciful architecture, rather than softening the foreboding building, added an element of I have candy in my van, little girl. This, I assumed, was the asylum, the headquarters of the Guild.
A chill ran down my spine, looking at it. I did not want to go in there. As the car came to a stop at the base of the stairs, I blew out a breath and did my best to tamp down the fear.
“The interior has been remodeled,” Clive said, holding the door open for me.
The building had already shown me what it was. Adding makeup didn’t conceal the predator.
Darling, are you all right?
Nodding once, I took my bag from the driver and followed Clive up the stairs. He was right, of course. Once inside the door, the entry was white marble and dark wood, with lofty ceilings and huge chandeliers. Of course.
A vampire stood in the center of the entry, giving Clive a cordial nod. Two men—human—both dressed in black suits, stood behind a long, polished counter and inclined their heads to Clive in respectful greeting. Another vampire stood off to the side, all but disappearing in the shadow of a high archway leading into a dark hall.
The main vamp, in a black suit of a far superior quality than the humans’, moved forward. “Clive, it’s good to see you again. I’m glad you were both able to make it.” He didn’t shake Clive’s hand. In general, vamps didn’t do that unless they were dealing with outsiders.
“Sebastian, it’s been a very long time. Thank you for your patience. Please allow me to introduce my mate Samantha. Sam, this is Sebastian, the Guild Master and one of the European Counselors.”
Sebastian held out his hand and I shook it. He was pale with light brown hair and blue eyes. Both men were angled toward me, so they didn’t see the looks of disgust the humans behind the counter wore. And so it began.
Sebastian glanced over his shoulder. “József, come take our guests’ bags to their room.”
The shorter of the two came out from behind the carved wooden desk and bowed to an oblivious Sebastian before picking up the bags. He silently sniffed, pulling a face while the men discussed a gathering at ten that evening.
It hit me why the entry felt so odd. There were rows of broken windows outside, but inside there were no windows at all. I spun to study the walls. Smooth plaster. “What happened to the windows?” I hadn’t meant to interrupt them, but it was strangely claustrophobic for such a huge, airy entry.
“We want the outside to look as derelict as possible,” Sebastian explained.
“Mission accomplished,” I muttered.
