Chapter Fifteen

Faith sat with the cupand saucer balanced on her knees, the tea cold, the spoonful of honey she'd added two hours ago congealed at the bottom like a modern art blob. She'd barely been able to swallow, much less drink anything, during Dr. Parthen's lengthy explanation of everything that had…happened…in that garage.

All three of them, Faith, Kacie, and Dr. Toni Parthen, were currently gathered in the sitting area of a well-appointed bedroom located on the third floor of some glorious mansion. The door to the room was decorated with an opulently painted mural of a Flamenco dancer in traditional Spanish dress, her skirts flared out in swirl of color against the backdrop of a soaring cathedral.

Inside, the décor was equally dramatic. The walls were covered with dark red velvet wallpaper inlaid with golden whorls, a huge four-poster bed had swags of gold cloth draping the canopy, and over in the sitting area, where they were now, a three-foot-tall earthenware urn was filled with bright silk flowers of the type a Flamenco dancer might wear in her hair. The three of them were seated in iron-framed, black-cloth-upholstered furniture, Dr. Parthen in an armchair,

Faith and Kacie on a couch.

When the doctor had first arrived, a man in a white serving coat had trailed her inside, pushing a tea cart. As if Darjeeling, scones, triangle-cut cucumber sandwiches, and salmon canapés—none of which a ballet dancer would eat, by the way—could soften the blow of what was about to come next. Not quite.

"I realize everything I've just told you sounds far-fetched." Dr. Parthen's slim hands were folded in her lap, her legs elegantly crossed.

Far-fetched? Faith smiled wanly. According to the last two hours' worth of explanations, they were currently in a town built inside a subterranean cave, complete with its own plumbing, electricity, Internet, houses, a water park, football field, movie theatre, several restaurants, and myriad shops. It was a refuge for a human species called Varcolac. This species' blood makeup was different from "regular" humans, requiring them to frequently ingest blood by biting a host using a set of…No, she couldn't even think that word.

Oh, and also demons, referred to as Om R?u, lived in a neighboring town and caused all kinds of trouble. Up in the city of San Diego, which was "topside," there was another group of these nasty characters under the leadership of the now-infamous Raymond Parthen. This Raymond had wanted to capture Faith and her sister for some kind of special DNA they possessed—looked like Wolverine had been telling the truth at the airport—called "Dragon." This was the same gene which most of the other humans living in this town carried…except Faith and Kacie owned a supercalifragilisticexpialidocious version of it, making them Royal Dragons. Faith sighed. Like most little girls, she had once dreamed of waking up one day to find out she was actually a princess, but this wasn't exactly what she'd had in mind by being dubbed royalty.

Honestly, she didn't know what she'd had in mind after seeing all she had in that garage. She and Kacie had been left alone in this bedroom for only about fifteen minutes before Dr. Parthen had arrived with the tea. In that short time, "ketamine-induced hysteria" and "cruel prank" were about all they'd come up with. Unfortunately, everything they'd seen had looked very real.

Drawing a shallow breath, Faith scrunched her toes together inside her shoes, rubbing her calluses together. Too much excitement with Adonis, Wolverine, and their aberrant gang, plus being drugged, were making her punchy. Not to mention that everything had happened after a cross-continental flight which had landed her in California with three hours of jet lag; her body said it was 1:00 o'clock in the early morning, her watch read 10:00 at night local San Diego time, but down here, it was actually 10:00 in the morning. She was really starting to feel like vomiting should be her next course of action.

Dr. Parthen smiled reassuringly. "Luckily, you two are way ahead of where most people begin when they come to ??ran?. You've already seen for yourselves the truth of everything I've described."

They had, at that. Faith swallowed tautly, the tea cup clinking softly beneath her trembling fingers.

"Do you have any more questions?" Dr. Parthen asked.

Faith pushed to her feet and crossed to the tea cart, setting her cup and saucer down on it. "I just think…we need some time to let everything percolate for a bit, doctor."

"Of course. Take all the time you need." Dr. Parthen rose from her chair. "The Lucerne room two doors down has been prepared for your use, as well." Apparently every bedroom door in his mansion was painted with a different European theme to distinguish one from the other. "Rest a bit, and I'll be back at dinnertime to give you two a tour of the town. Hopefully when you see what a great community we have here, it'll help you decide to stay."

Faith offered up another pallid smile, the best she could manage at the moment. She'd lived her entire life in big cities, her days and evenings filled with dancing, rehearsals, fittings, dinners, the theatre, and premieres. She didn't need more than a peek outside her bedroom window at the dinky town of ??ran? to know she absolutely did not want to stay.

Dr. Parthen extracted what looked like a small cosmetic pot from her pocket. "You'll need to wear this special mud before either of you can go into town. A double hit of Royal scent will knock the single men over like bowling pins."

Faith moved her brows together.

Dr. Parthen chuckled. "That'll make sense once you've read the community manual, which I left for you on the desk." She crossed to the nightstand and set the cosmetic pot there. "A dollop behind each ear will do. It's been cleaned and treated to remove allergens. Okay, then. You have my cell number if any questions or problems arise." She paused at the door. "I would like to apologize once again that you two were drugged. I can relate to how disconcerting and frightening it feels. I also want to reiterate that you were brought here for your own safety. You're free to go at any time. I only ask that you carefully consider the danger that Raymond now poses to you before you make such a decision." With a nod, Dr. Parthen opened the door. "See you soon."

As the door closed, a ripple of incredulous laughter escaped Kacie. "Wow."

A little too simple of an exclamation for all this, but Faith supposed there weren't any other words descriptive enough. "Do you believe everything Dr. Parthen said? I mean…" Vampires, demons, and Dragons.

"I wouldn't have if I hadn't seen it, but…" Kacie waved airily. We both saw some very unnatural stuff: that one man stopped a moving vehicle with his bare hands, and the other extremely large…creature just yanked the car door off. We saw that woman bleed white acid and her broken jaw heal in minutes. And we saw that hunky blond guy suck on the woman's neck using a definite pair of fangs. "They didn't know we were watching them in the garage," Kacie added. "So I think we can trust they were being their true selves."

"Yes," Faith uttered the single syllable on an exhaled breath. Was she actually agreeing or just uttering? Her brain was numb from the effort of trying to digest everything she'd heard about this outlandish community while simultaneously processing the news that she'd flown to San Diego for nothing. Certainly not to rejuvenate her career.

Kacie pushed up from the sofa. "Dr. Parthen also came across to me like a perfectly reasonable and rational human being." She moved over to the tea cart, standing across from Faith. "So what do you want to do?"

"What do you want to do?"

Kacie caught her lower lip between her teeth. "Find out more of this place, for sure. I… I'm curious about what it'd be like to live here."

Faith gaped. "You're seriously considering staying?"

"I know it sounds crazy, but…" Kacie shrugged. "They really need us here. You heard that sad story Dr. Parthen told."

Sad? Mostly, bizarre. The Varcolac were apparently a dying breed, the result of a one-hundred-year-old betrayal leading to the deaths of a majority of them. With so few left, the Varcolac family tree had become somewhat of a straight line over the years. No surprise that hadn't worked out. Varcolac had ceased producing live offspring nearly thirty years ago, landing them on the endangered species list. Their future had looked extraordinarily bleak for a while…until it was discovered that Varcolac could procreate successfully with Dragon humans, women like Faith and Kacie, along with others like them. There were twelve currently living in this community, four singles, the rest already married.

"From the sound of it," Kacie went on, "they treat their women like queens around here. I think it would be nice to be special."

"Are you kidding me?" Faith set her hands on her hips. "We've always been treated as special. Too much so."

"We've been treated as a circus act," Kacie countered. "Not for what we can do. Well, you maybe, but not me."

"They want us to have babies." The pitch of Faith's voice was rising. "That's what they want us to do."

"So?" Kacie threw out a hand. "You've always wanted to have a family, Faith, but you've kept it on hold because of ballet. Now that your career is over, maybe we both can finally—"

"My career isn't over!" Faith shouted.

Kacie lowered her head with a long sigh and pinched the bridge of her nose.

Faith mashed her eyes closed, so tight she felt her lashes fluttering against her cheekbones. "I'm sorry," she pushed out of her mouth. "I didn't mean to yell at you."

"And I don't mean to hurt or upset you. But…." Kacie hesitated, the but hovering over them along with a heavy cloud of tension. "Your knee isn't ever going to go back to normal," she said quietly. "I'm sorry, but it's just not. It's been a year now, and… I really think you need to accept that so we can get on with our lives."

Defeat closed in on Faith, like every door in the world had suddenly and simultaneously slammed shut.

Kacie's brow pleated. "Here in this town we could also have some close friends for once. Our whole lives we've sat on the fringes, always assuming we didn't fit in because of the quirk of being identical or because we were raised by Aunt Idyll after Mom and Dad died."

Faith glanced down. She'd always thought the same thing, especially about Idyll. The kooky aunt who'd taken them in when they were orphaned had never lacked in love to give to her two nieces. But the hippie-guru-shaman priestess-Tarot Card reader-sprightly woman hadn't exactly excelled at providing a normal, stable living environment. Faith had always needed to be the responsible one. It made perfect sense that she'd been drawn to the structure and discipline of ballet.

"But now we know we've been outcasts because of this Dragon-thingy we carry." Kacie's gaze was earnest. "There's nothing wrong with us, Faith, and I want to feel that, experience it, believe it every day."

"And you think you can accomplish that here?" Faith pointed a rigid finger at the sliding glass door which led out to a small wrought iron balcony. "Have you seen that town?"

Kacie's lips pressed together. "Would you not be so closed-minded? Just because there's no dance company here doesn't mean you have to automatically turn up your nose at it. You're going to miss out on a great opportunity to—"

"What opportunity, Kacie?! We're in a cave!"

"Tell me, then," Kacie snapped back. "What you think we'd do if we returned topside? More not dancing, same as the last year? Not only that, but we'll also have to spend the rest of our lives looking over our shoulders, trying not to get kidnapped again. You heard what Dr. Parthen said: now that we've been identified as Royal Dragons by this Raymond, he'll never stop hunting us."

"M-maybe," Faith stammered. "Maybe not. We could at least—"

"No, Faith," Kacie flared. "It's my turn, okay? I've followed you everywhere besides Joffrey: into a ballet career, apartments, our lifestyle. I haven't regretted it, because…well, there wasn't anything else I wanted to do. But now I might want to stay in ??ran?. And if I do, you need to support me in that."

Faith's hands trembled as darkness swallowed her up. What could she possibly say? She loved her twin more than words could describe; she couldn't live without her. Yet…she didn't see any way she could survive in this Podunk town, either.

"No response?" Kacie marched over to her suitcase and grabbed the upright handle. "Fine." She rolled it toward the door. "I'll be in Lucerne if you care to offer comment."

As her twin disappeared through the door, Faith stared down at her teacup, little pink roses on white porcelain. So delicate. So breakable. Her legs shook, threatening to bend her into a plié deep enough to dump her onto the floor. Her right knee attacked her with pins and needles. The teacup blurred, and she swayed. There were two things she required to live: her twin sister and ballet. And now for the first time in her life, it looked like she might not be able to have both.