Chapter 466
The flight was short, as airplane trips went. Just over three hours later, Katelina stepped out onto a brightly lit airfield. Huge planes lurked in the distance, and a sprawling complex twinkled against the night. It wasn't the small airstrip she'd expected.
Three vampire guards wearing heavy black coats and stereotypical furry hats marched forward to meet them. They saluted, and Wolfe replied in broken Russian. Katelina didn't bother to ask Jorick what they were saying.
"They want to know why there are so many of us," Jamie said.
Katelina looked to the Executioner in surprise. "You speak Russian?"
"No. But thoughts are often more visual than verbal, and I can guess from the images flashing through their minds."
Verchiel had once told her something similar, though she hadn't been sure whether to believe it or not.
Wolfe turned to Jorick. "The sun will rise soon. They have transportation to take us to the Konfederatsiya, where we will be staying."
Katelina didn't ask what the foreign word meant. She filed it under "Russian Guild" and stuffed her hands in her pockets. It was only then that she realized she had no winter coat. Despite the frosty wind, she didn't feel cold.
They followed the vampires through a guarded gate and down a narrow walkway where a human stood guard.
"The security seems unusually heavy," Jamie commented.
One of the guards replied, "Security has tightened at airports since the Tokyo incident. The Japanese can say it was an accident all they like, but many suspect otherwise." He gave Jamie a hard look that said he wouldn't be fooled.
Tokyo. Katelina clutched Jorick tighter and suppressed a shiver. Malick and his goons had attacked the airport thinking they were inside. In an effort to clean up what they feared were vampire corpses, the Japanese Guild had crashed a plane full of passengers into the building to create an inferno. All those innocent people had died because Malick had been hunting her and Jorick. The weight of the guilt still made her sick.
"And then Syria," the guard added. "Have you heard? All the employees at an airstrip were slain. All humans."
Though she didn't say anything, Jorick's comment popped into her head, "So much death for so little gain."
The vampires led them through the building. Katelina could smell the concentration of humansand human bloodand her stomach rumbled. At last they turned down a long set of stairs. The deeper they went, the fainter the smell became, and Katelina relaxed.
"You're a glutton," Jorick teased. Her eyes flamed with offence and he laughed. "I'm only joking, little one. Fledglings are usually hungrier."
"Just as children are always crying to be fed," Jamie said.
"Etsuko isn't," Katelina muttered.
"Of course she is. She just does a better job of hiding it."
The stairs ended in a series of basement-like rooms full of tools, boxes, and odd bits of machinery. If they were taking transportation to the Russian Guild, why were they in a basement? It felt like a trap to her; something Malick had cooked up. She imagined phantoms in every shadow. With Braydon stalking behind them, it seemed even more likely. Maybe he'd been left behind so they'd take him prisoner, try him, and send him here, another perfectly orchestrated scheme.
The door they stopped in front of was metal and looked like it belonged to a bank vault, or an old cold war bunker. It took two of the fuzzy hatted vampires to turn the giant wheel-like handle. The seal released with a hiss, and the thick door groaned as it opened.
"This way, please."
The tunnel was dark, or should have been, but Katelina's new eyes could see without the light. The walls were cinder block and damp with moisture. A far off drip echoed. Something scurried, unseen; tiny feet whispering on the cement floor. It was the scene of a horror movie, but she didn't know what part she was playing anymore. Was she still the damsel in distress, or had she become the monster?
The vampires opened another bunker door at the end of the tunnel to let golden light in. The rooms beyond had vaulted ceilings, with ornate stained glass insets, ornamental brick walls, and polished wooden benches. Everything gleamed. Even the light fixtures were gilded.
A vampire stood behind a ticket booth. The train schedule behind him explained everything.
"A vampire subway?"
"They call it the Metro-2, I believe," Jamie said. "Moscow is famous for it."
Braydon cleared his throat and murmured, "It was built in the 30s."
Jorick glared, as if he'd just remembered the vampire's existence, and Wolfe commented dryly, "They do teach you something in America."
"I'm not American," Braydon said.
One of the furry hatted vampires interrupted to motion them on. "The train will arrive soon."
Katelina had never been on a subway before, though the platform reminded her of the train stations on the other side of Russia, when they'd been hunting the Heart. There was something similar about the architecture and the carved wood.
"Probably from the same era," Jorick said. "And likely to be as uncomfortable."
Jamie smirked. "You don't like trains?"
"No."
The one word was packed with enough venom for a novel. Katelina gave him a curious look, and Jamie chuckled. "We've all had our share of the cattle car."
"Cattle car?"
Jorick made an unhappy noise in his throat and Jamie explained, "Passenger cars have many windows, but not cattle cars. Though some of us objected to traveling with the animals, there was a certain logic to the arrangement. It meant fresh blood was available. However, I suppose the smell was-off-putting." Jorick growled and Jamie went on. "They weren't completely sun proof, so one had to wrap up and there was the risk of getting trampled. The Guild eventually had special passenger cars made for us. I can't recall if Jorick was still there."
"No. I'd left by then. And I wish I'd stayed gone."
Neither Jamie or Katelina reminded him why he was stuck being an Executioner again. One of Malick's last official acts, before he rebelled and left The Guild, was to reinstate Jorick as punishment for killing Executioners in Oren's war. Katelina had hoped that the new regime would release him from service, but she was still waiting.
"You may wait an eternity," Jorick muttered.
A low rumble started in the distance, growing louder and louder, until a sleek silver train came into view. Brakes squealed and it slid to a stop. Just like in the movies, doors opened, but instead of pink cheeked city-goers towing children or looking irrepressibly cool, a group of pale vampires hurried out, lugging suitcases.
The guards motioned Katelina and the others inside. On one corner of the vinyl benches sat a pair of vampires, their hands intertwined. Katelina met the woman's eyes and a strange, warm feeling spread through her, as if she was looking at Jorick for the first time.
Jorick tugged her to a seat. The feeling disappeared when she broke eye contact with the vampiress, but she looked at her from the corner of her eye. Was the woman a whisperer? Usually, they made a person think or feel something for a reason that benefited them. What reason could the vampiress have had for that?
She felt the woman looking at her, but stopped from alerting Jorick. She didn't want to give her the satisfaction of knowing that her whisper abilities had bothered her.
The train stopped. The doors opened and a vampire in a suit got on. He glanced at them, then headed into the next car, his cellphone pressed to his ear. Katelina jerked her head toward him questioningly, and Wolfe gave a puff of impatience. "It's an underground. There are multiple stops."
When the train stopped again, the guards stood. Katelina and the others followed to a brightly lit platform. They waited as the couple from the train had their tickets stamped at the window. When it was their turn, the guards flashed IDs to the ticket man. He nodded and motioned them through a turnstile.
A long room stretched out, complete with giant chandeliers and a brightly colored mural. The guards led them on to a check-in window. Katelina spotted the couple from the train just ahead of them. They were still in the middle of paperwork when one of the guards pushed his way past them. He rattled something off in Russian, flashed his ID, then motioned the rest of them to follow.
They hurried through what looked like an office lobby with silver elevators. The guards practically herded them into one and, as the doors swished closed, explained, "We have orders to take you to the command center immediately."
