The Coldest Girl in Coldtown

And what the dead had no speech for, when living, they can tell you, being dead: The communication of the dead is tongued with fire beyond the language of the living.



-T. S. Eliot



Tana could barely keep her eyes open. Gavriel was at the wheel, having taken the keys from Aidan's pockets after depositing him in the backseat. Tana should have protested, but she'd let him get in on the driver's side, let him turn the key in the ignition. She'd gathered up the bottle of water and the two sandwiches, still wrapped in plastic, brushed off the grit and eaten them while they sped along the road, headlights picking out the dark shapes of trees and houses. The windows were down, and Gavriel's hair blew around his face like frayed black ribbons.



She didn't know where they were going, only that they were driving away from her former life and into a distorted fun house mirror version of it.



After the food, she felt as sleepy as if she'd been drugged. It was the adrenaline draining away, she was pretty sure, the terror receding. She tried to convince herself that she wasn't safe, that she was in a car with a vampire who, in addition to being a vampire, was talking like a crazy person, but her body didn't seem to have any more fight in it.



She blinked a few times, trying to stay awake. "What was going on back at the house? Those chains-why didn't you get out of them before, if you always could?"



"I killed someone-a vampire-and I was exhausted and-" He stopped and looked at the road for a long moment. She studied his features, the androgynous, exaggerated beauty of his wide mouth and lashes so heavy they made him seem like he was wearing eyeliner. "My mind is-not as it was. There is a madness that comes over us when we're starved and carved, a madness that can be cured only by feeding-but such things they have done to me that it would take a river of blood to wash away all my wounds. I struggle for my most rational moments. I could have gotten out of the chains, yes, but it would have cost me."



Which meant it had cost him, later, in the trunk of the car, when he was already burned.



"You don't seem crazy," she said. "Well, you don't seem that crazy."



The side of his mouth lifted in a half smile. "Some of the time, I'm not. But the rest of the time is most of the time. And when I am, unfortunately I am all appetite.



"They left me there with the tied-up boy, saved for the following night, like a sweet on the pillow. I was still waiting for it to get closer to dark when you came in."



Tana watched the shadows shift across his face along with the lights from the road. She wondered if he could smell her blood, drifting from her pores along with her sweat.



She guessed that he'd planned on draining Aidan before he escaped, even if he didn't say so out of some sense that it was bad manners.



She wondered if Gavriel thought about biting her-his face, turned to the road still, was as calm as a statue of a saint in a cathedral, but she had seen him with Aidan. She had seen the way his fingers dug into Aidan's skin and how the muscles in his neck strained and when he'd looked at her, mouth painted with blood, his gaze hadn't tracked. She wondered what it would be like to be infected and to give in, to let herself be turned, to be ageless and frozen and magic and monstrous.



There were so many girls and boys running away to Coldtown, who would do anything to have the infection burning through their veins the way it burned through Aidan's. The vampires inside were incredibly circumspect about biting people-that's why all the pictures of them feeding inside Coldtown showed them feeding from tubing and shunts. More vampires were a drain on the food supply. What Aidan had-what she (maybe) had, too-was rare and desirable. There was a girl Tana had met, a friend of Pauline's, who cut thin lines on her thighs with razor blades before she went out to clubs, so that a vampire might be drawn to her.



When she looked at Gavriel's mouth then, it was still stained carmine along the swell of his lower lip. Maybe because he'd saved her at the gas station and she was feeling grateful or because she was so tired, she found herself fascinated with his mouth, with the way it curved into a sinner's smile. She knew she was looking at him like a boy, like a gorgeous boy whose smile could be admired, and that was dangerous and stupid. She didn't even know if he thought of her as a girl at all.



She needed to stop thinking about him like that. Ideally, she should stop thinking about him entirely, except as something dangerous. "Why were they after you-those men and the Thorn? Was it bad, what you did?"



"Very bad," he agreed. "An act of mercy that I regret-endlessly, I regret it. I had a tutor who wanted me to believe that mercy is a kind of sorrow and that since evil is the motive of sorrow, evil is also the motive of mercy. I thought that my tutor was old and cruel, and maybe he was-but now I think he was also right."



"But that doesn't make sense," Tana said, leaning against the cushioned headrest. "Mercy can't be evil. It's a virtue-like kindness or courage or..." Her voice trailed off.



He turned to look at her. "This is the world I remade with my terrible mercy."



She shook her head. "That doesn't make sense, either." Then, helplessly, she yawned.



He laughed, sounding like any boy from her school. She wondered what color his eyes had been long ago. "Go to sleep, Tana. Lean back your seat. If you let me borrow your car for tonight, I promise I will repay you."



"Oh yeah?" she asked, looking at him, with his bare feet and plain, dark clothes. "With what?"



The smile stayed on his lips. "Jewels, lies, slips of paper, dried flowers, memories of things long past, useless quotations, idle hands, beads, buttons, and mischief."



She was almost sure he was joking. "Okay. So where are we going?" she asked, her head nodding against the window.



His voice was soft. "Coldtown."



"Oh," she said, blinking herself awake again.



"I must. But if Aidan comes through the gates with me, he'll be safer, and you'll be safer without him. They'll hunt for him out in the world. And he's likely to start hunting, too."



"But what if he doesn't want to be a vampire?" Tana asked. As soon as the words left her mouth, she realized that he would want it-of course he would want it. Didn't he say as much before he attacked her? Being a vampire would get him all the glory he could ever imagine-he wouldn't just be known as the guy at a party most likely to seduce someone else's girlfriend or the small-town boy yearning for a big city. In Coldtown, he would be drowned in attention-and the massacre at the farmhouse would make his story only more tragic. More romantic.



Plus, Aidan was hungry.



She was the one who didn't want to be a vampire. And she was afraid that as time went on, she'd become less and less sure of that.



"The fever is in his blood," Gavriel said. "He looks for no cure but one. I think he is decided in his heart, but who can confess to such a decision?"



"It's hard to fight the infection," Tana said, her voice coming out harsher and more despairing than she'd intended. She didn't want to talk about her mom. She didn't want to tell him that the fever might be in her blood, too. In a few hours, she could be as bad as Aidan. "They can't. You don't understand. It takes them over and they can't think straight."



He said nothing in return. In that silence, she realized how stupid she was being. He must have been infected once, must have given in to it, must know better than she did how it felt.



"If you go to Coldtown," she said, hoping to change the subject, "you won't be able to get out. Are you sure whatever you're going there for is worth it?"



"What's that?" he asked suddenly, one hand leaving the wheel to touch her arm.



"What?" she said, looking down.



His long fingers traced the outline of the scar just beneath the crook of her elbow, his expression unreadable. Her skin felt too warm against the coolness of his touch, as though she were feverish. "These are old marks," he said finally. "You were just a child."



"Should it matter?" Tana asked. She was usually careful, but she must have pushed up the sleeves of her dress.



"Why should death discriminate between age and youth, you mean?" he asked calmly. "Death has his favorites, like anyone. Those who are beloved of Death will not die."



She was relieved he hadn't asked her any of the awful, stupid questions she'd grown used to: Who bit you? I heard that it doesn't hurt when you're bitten-does it hurt? Did you like it? Come on, you're lying, you did like it, didn't you? But then, he must know most of the answers. "Seems like Death came back for me."



He grinned, a subtly odd grin that somehow made her smile back. "You drove him off again. Sleep, Tana. I will guard you from Death, for I have no fear of him. We have been adversaries for so long that we are closer than friends."



"I'll just close my eyes for a minute," she said. "It's not even really that late."



There was something else that she wanted to say, something that she was sure she was on the verge of saying, but the words were swallowed up by the night.



Tana awoke to the sound of voices. She was alone in the car, spread out across the front seat, head pillowed on her arm, one of her booted feet kicked up against the glass of the driver-side window. The pleasant scent of coffee in the air mixed with car exhaust. And she felt chilled through, as though she'd kicked off a blanket in the middle of a winter night.



For a moment, waking up seemed like a nice thing to do. She remembered a party and being worried about going alone, where she was sure she was going to run into Aidan. She heard his voice outside the car, though, so it must all have worked out. Except for memories that seemed to be part of a nightmare-stuff that couldn't be real. Blood and empty eyes and a shimmering rain of shattered glass.



Then everything came back to her in a rush and all her muscles clenched with instinctive alertness. Her heart sped and she scrambled in her seat, kicking the wheel in her eagerness to be upright.



Her Crown Vic was parked in a lot, far from the central cluster of cars and trucks. In the distance she saw a large, sprawling building, blinking bulbs and glowing floodlights announcing it as DEAD LAST REST STOP OPEN 24 HOURS. The sheer gaudy brilliance of it made the outer edges of the lot seem even darker by comparison.



She'd never been there before, but she knew the place, the same way she knew South of the Border. Kids at school wore T-shirts emblazoned with the logo or plastered its bumper stickers on their cars. The Dead Last Rest Stop was as flashy and famous as it was because of its proximity to the first Coldtown.



They'd come a lot of miles while she'd slept.



Gavriel was sitting on the hood of her car, a paper bag and a steaming cup resting beside him. His head was down and, shadowed as his face was, he looked like a pale human boy and not a monster at all. Aidan stood with his hands in his pockets, talking to two people she didn't know. He must be reeling with infection, but he seemed to be hiding it well, his voice only a little unsteady. The pair were a girl and boy, their hair dyed the vibrant azure blue of butterfly wings and gum balls. They looked so alike that Tana thought they must be siblings.



"You sure you can give us a ride? I mean, thanks, of course, but I just want to make sure you're serious," the boy was saying. His hair was razor-cut in the back and sprayed into a shaggy, teased mop, with longer pieces framing spiky bangs. His eyes were lined with kohl, and a single silver stud shone just above the right side of his lip, like a beauty mark. "Out here in the dull world, we're just a couple of kids without any cash, but inside it's all about barters and favors and who you know. Midnight is tight with lots of people through her blog, so we're going to be set up when we get to the city. We brought plenty of stuff to trade and we've got a plan. So we could help you if you help us."



Aidan smiled. "Definitely." He looked back at the car, toward Tana. She wasn't sure if she should get out. It was bad enough that he was promising people rides.



"Heading to Coldtown was kind of an impulse for us," he said. "So we could use a guide."



The girl-Midnight-touched Aidan's shoulder. "Reckless," she said, as if there were no higher compliment. Her hair was much longer than her brother's, parted on one side to hang in her face, falling completely over one eye. She wore skinny jeans with a blue velvet top and grubby, home-dyed ombre blue ballet slippers. Two rings threaded through her lower lip and the one in her tongue clacked against her teeth as she spoke. "We're part of this online network for people who are planning on going to Coldtown. We used to post all the time about meeting our destiny. Claiming all the stuff that normal people don't want. We'd talk and talk and talk, but how many of us actually did anything? We say that you've got to be willing to die to be different. I bet you believe that, too."



Winter pointed a painted fingernail at Aidan. "You don't even know him, Midnight. He could be doing this on a total whim. He might not be serious. He could be high. He could balk. Look at him. There's something wrong with his eyes and he's sweating."



Midnight rolled her eyes, sarcasm in her voice. "That's a nice thing to say about someone who's offering us a ride." She looked at Aidan. "Don't mind Winter. He's overprotective."



"So are you willing to die to be different?" Aidan asked them, and Tana heard the hunger in his voice.



"For sure," she said. "I wanted to go last year, but Winter didn't want to be sixteen forever and I had to admit it was kind of lame. So we compromised. We're going to be eighteen in a month and that seemed old enough to go."



Midnight and Winter, Tana thought. She knew that the names had to be fake and that the way they looked was an elaborate artifice, but they wore their strange beauty like war paint. They made an intimidating pair.



Winter looked down at his calf-high boots, buckles running back and forth over the length of them, frowning as though he wanted Midnight to give Aidan a different answer. A long metal chain ran from his belt loop to his back pocket; he twisted it around one finger idly, in the same fidgety way that his sister bit her lip rings.



"I'm going to blog the whole thing," Midnight said. "That's how we're going to pay for stuff after our trade goods run out. I've got a tip jar on the site, and there are ads and stuff-my readership was already pretty good, but it's gone through the roof since we ran away. A hundred thousand unique visitors are watching Winter's and my adventure. We made a promise to each other-and to them."



"No more birthdays," they recited more or less at the same time, then flushed and laughed a little. It was a vow, a piece of a chant, their scripture, something they took so seriously that saying it aloud embarrassed them.



"Because you're planning on dying and rising again?" Gavriel said from atop the car hood. They glanced at him in surprise, as if they'd forgotten he was there. His face was shadowed enough to hide his eyes, but his unnatural stillness should have unnerved them.



"I just posted about our Last Supper," Midnight said, taking her phone and holding it out to Aidan, leaning closer than she had to. "It's kind of a tradition. Before you go through the gates, you eat one last meal. All your favorites. See, Winter had pizza with olives, ketchup chips, and bubble tea? And here's the picture of mine-steak and eggs with a slice of apple pie. I was so excited that I only took a bite of each. You know, like how you get one last special meal of your choosing before you go to the electric chair."



Because they were hoping to die, Tana realized.



She saw how Aidan's gaze drifted over Midnight's skin. She really was beautiful, with large black eyes and all that blue hair, with earrings in the shape of daggers swinging from her earlobes. He grinned as if what she'd just said was very funny.



He was going to bite her.



Tana got out of the car, slamming the door behind her. They all looked over, Midnight frowning at having her conversation interrupted.



"Aidan," Tana said warningly. "Everything okay?"



He turned toward her, a strained smile relaxing into a real one as she got closer. He shrugged and threw an easy arm over her shoulder. "Midnight, Winter, this is my girlfriend, Tana."



Midnight took a step back from Aidan. Winter looked at Tana in a way that told her just how bad she must appear in her ripped and filthy dress, hair sticking up all over the place.



"I'm not-" Tana started, pulling away from him.



But Aidan was still smiling. "And she's worried because I'm sick. I'm Cold. She's worried I'm going to bite you, and she should worry, because I want to bite you. I want to real bad."



At that, Gavriel looked up again, his gaze catching Tana's. She couldn't read his expression, but she could tell he wasn't pleased. One of Midnight's hands flew up to cover her mouth, chipped silver nail polish and onyx rings on her fingers.



Winter studied Aidan's face. "You really are, aren't you?"



"He was bitten last night," said Gavriel, leaning forward, black hair hanging in his face. "He can control the hunger now, for short periods, more or less, but it will become worse. He has maybe another day or two before he ought to be restrained."



Tana expected Aidan to give some response, but he was quiet. Maybe he hadn't realized it would get worse. Tana thought of her mother screaming up from the basement and shuddered.



She thought of the way her skin had felt chilled when she'd woken. She wasn't sure why Aidan hadn't said anything about the possibility of her being Cold-whether he was being nice or whether he figured they would be less impressed if it wasn't him alone who was dangerous-but either way she was grateful.



"Can I interview you?" Midnight asked Aidan, pulling out her phone and fiddling with it, opening some app. "For the blog? Can you describe what it feels like-the hunger?"



"Careful," Winter said, putting his hand on his sister's arm.



Tana could see that Midnight wasn't listening. Her mouth was slightly open, fascinated, a mouse in love with a snake.



"Come on," Midnight said to Aidan, losing her cool affect entirely. She bounced on her dirty ballet flats. "Please. I've never talked to anyone experiencing what you are. I am so curious-and my readers would be supercurious, too. It must be amazing to have all that power running through your veins."



"It's like you're hollow," Aidan said, looking into the camera as if he was ready to devour all the viewers, looking as if he were an understudy for one of those online vampire celebrities. "Hollow and empty, and there's only one thing that matters."



"I can't believe this is happening," Tana said, walking over to Gavriel.



He held out a cup to her, the one she'd seen beside him on the hood when she woke. His black shirt was stretched tight against his chest, and he had a crumpled paper bag resting beside him. "They say a long sleep is the best cure for all sickness."



She took a long swallow of the coffee. It was too sweet and choked with cream, as though it had been mixed by someone who had no idea what it was supposed to taste like-someone who hadn't tasted food in a long while. She reached for the bag. "What's in here? Doughnuts?"



He turned away, as though he didn't want to watch her open it. "Take it. That's for you as well."



The bag turned out to hold a necklace of Bohemian garnets clustered together like pomegranate seeds, with a huge garnet-studded locket the size of a fig hanging from the center point. The gold clasp on the back was broken, as though it had been ripped from someone's throat, and the locket itself was empty. It rested on a bed of loose bills, some ink-stained, some smeared brownish-red, some single dollars and some twenties mixed in with a few euros, all jammed together in a messy pile.



"Where did you get all this?" she asked.



At that moment, Midnight screamed. Tana whirled toward them and felt Gavriel's cold hands closed around her. Frozen fingers dug into her skin just below her rib cage. His grip was so firm it was like being held by a bronze figure.



Midnight was on the ground, her phone tossed to one side, her hands scrabbling to push Aidan away. He crouched on top of her, pushing her velvet shirt off her shoulder. Winter had hold of one of Aidan's arms and was trying to pull him backward.



Tana's feet kicked out ineffectually against the car bumper as she was dragged up into the air. She felt Gavriel's chest against her back, smooth and chilled as stone. She felt the icy curve of his jaw where it rested against the top of her head.



"Hush, Tana," Gavriel said, sliding his cheek downward over her hair, so that he could murmur against her throat. Terror overwhelmed her, vast and animal. Her body took over, twisting and writhing and clawing. It was like being in that dark basement again, her mother's cold lips giving her one final kiss.



"Hush," he said. "It's almost over."



"No!" Tana shouted, struggling uselessly. "No, no, no. I have to help him. Get off of me."



Then, suddenly, he did, hands sliding free of her. She staggered away, nearly falling to her knees.



Winter had let go of Aidan's arm in preference for pulling him away from Midnight by his hair. His head lashed back and forth, Midnight's hand up under Aidan's jaw, pushing him away from her. But he was close, close enough for his teeth to snap just above the bare skin of her arm. His fingernails raked at her shoulder, making bloody runnels.



Her screams spiraled up into the night air.



For a moment, Tana's mind was blank. Then she rushed over, crouching down, so she could dig her hands into Midnight's armpits and haul her.



Aidan looked at Tana, and for a moment, it was clear he thought she would help him. Then she scuttled away, pulling Midnight as hard as she could, and he snarled in comprehension.



Aidan went for Midnight's legs, but she was fast enough to kick him in the chest, hard. Even though she was wearing only slippers, he stumbled to one knee, gasping, one hand held out as if to ward off more violence.



Winter locked his arm around Aidan's neck and held him like that. For a moment, Aidan's body went slack, then he brought up his shaking fingers, stained red. He was about to lick them clean. Tana leaped forward, grabbing his wrists and pulling them to her, wiping his hands against her dress. She wasn't sure how much human blood would turn him, but she didn't want to take any chances.



Aidan started to laugh, a choked sound with Winter's arm against his throat.



Midnight sobbed softly, red soaking her torn shirt, turning the blue velvet to black.



Tana looked at Gavriel. He was watching her with half-lidded eyes of glittering scarlet, an intent and covetous stare.



"You didn't do anything," she accused, pointing a trembling finger. He swayed slightly toward the scene of carnage, like a tree bending in the wind, as if she had beckoned him. "You could have stopped him and you just let it happen."



"It's dangerous to go to Coldtown infected but not yet turned." His voice was distant, but something in the way he moved his mouth, some languorousness, showed that the blood in the air and feel of her struggle against him had ignited his desire to feed. "It would have been safer if you'd just let it happen. Every new vampire born in Coldtown is a drain on the blood supply and there are only so many donors."



"It's dangerous to be infected anywhere," Tana said. "I just don't want him to die."



"One way or another we all wind up dead," Gavriel said, his eyes on Aidan.



But then he bent and picked up the coffee cup from the ground, bringing over the remaining liquid to wash off Aidan's fingers. Tana knelt on the cool asphalt of the parking lot, carefully scraping Midnight's skin from underneath Aidan's nails with her own.



"Buzzkill," Aidan said, low. Cold sweat dampened the bangs of his forehead. He grinned up at Gavriel, his head lolling against Winter's arm now, as though there was no more fight in him.



"You owe me," Tana told Aidan. "I hope you know just how much you owe me."



Leaning over them, Gavriel's face was no longer shaded, his eyes catching the blinking lights of the rest stop sign, his skin too pale to belong to a living human.



Winter stood abruptly, freeing Aidan and backing away from the vampire.



"Something the matter?" Gavriel asked him.



Aidan stretched out, looking up at the stars.



Midnight pushed herself to her feet a little unsteadily, wiping tears off her face and smearing her black mascara. She saw Gavriel and froze as her brother had.



"Red as roses-yes, those are my real eyes. Am I not what you've been looking for?" Gavriel's smile was all teeth. "I have been here all along waiting for you to notice. I can give you what you want. I can give you endless oblivion."



"Stop it," Tana said, hitting him on the shoulder, continuing to pretend he was a regular person who wasn't scary in the hopes he'd forget, too, continuing to pretend she had any power at all in this situation. "Stop it right now. I've had enough of everyone attacking everyone."



Her words seemed to break the spell he'd had over Winter, who put his hand on his sister's unhurt shoulder. "We should get you to an emergency room."



"No hospital," Midnight said groggily. "I just need bandages-we can get them inside."



"Jenny," said Winter. "Please. Let's go home."



She looked at him with wide, black, furious eyes. "We have everything we need right here. And don't ever call me that name again. Ever."



Tana looked toward Aidan, still staring dazedly up at the stars. He was breathing faster, as though he couldn't quite inhale fully. One of his hands was pressed to his heart. He barely seemed to notice when she called his name softly.



"Go with them," Gavriel told Tana, sitting down beside Aidan and pushing up the sleeve of his own T-shirt. "Since you wish it, I won't let him feed on the living, but there's no reason he can't drink from the dead. It will curb his hunger. Go, Tana. We'll be here when you return."



She went.