Dark Journey. Susan KrinardЧитать онлайн книгу.

       Chapter 1

      It was time.

      Daniel moved through the woods to the edge of the field, making one last check to be certain that his clothes were appropriately dusty. Cattle grazed in the waning light, and in the distance Daniel could make out the small white forms of sheep. Farther on stood more fields, green with crops, and beyond that...

      Tanis. The former Citadel of Tartaros, rising beside the river, its odd but impressive silhouette revealing its nature as a place where—if the stories were true—humans and Nightsiders, or Opiri as they called themselves, lived side by side in peace and equality.

      They lived the same way in Avalon, the colony to which Daniel had escaped when he’d fled the Nightsider citadel Erebus, and in Delos, the compound he had governed in the far north of Oregon, where Opiri, humans and half-bloods worked together to fend off common enemies.

      He’d given up his command of Delos and returned to the place where he had first been free. But his reunion with old friends and comrades had been incomplete.

      His father had disappeared. Ares, former Bloodmaster of Erebus, had gone east in search of the mysterious half-domed Citadel at the foot of the mountains. He’d wanted to find out if it was truly possible for an entire city to maintain the equality that only smaller settlements and colonies had managed since the end of the War.

      Daniel had serious doubts that such a thing was possible. Nevertheless, since Ares had not returned, he had volunteered to complete his mission. And if Ares’s disappearance had something to do with his going to Tanis, Daniel would find that out, too. No matter what role he had to play.

      For now, that role meant blending in among the human field workers as they ended their workday. The path between the fields widened to a dusty dirt road, bounded on both sides by pastures. By the time Daniel reached the crops, the last light of day was reflecting off the several towers of the former Citadel and glinting on the surface of the river behind it. Workers—humans—gathered along the road to return to the city, while other figures, white-haired Nightsiders, arrived to take their places.

      It was just dark enough for Daniel to slip in among the retiring workers, just another man in a plain shirt and pants and work boots. He didn’t let on that he could see everything as if it were full daylight; as far as the people of Tanis would know, he was fully human.

      He lingered at the back of the group as the workers started toward the city gates, talking in low voices. One of the women shot a curious glance Daniel’s way, but said nothing.

      The human workers stopped as a flood of artificial light fell over them from the parapet walk above the gate made of immense logs bound together with steel, which would require the efforts of more than a few inhumanly strong Nightsiders to open. Opiri looked down on them from the walk, and they appeared to be armed.

      Clearly the people of this city feared attack. But from whom?

      Daniel braced himself for some kind of screening or check on the workers, but no one seemed to pay any particular notice as they passed through a smaller door just to the right of the gate. They entered a large, canopied courtyard, where other humans and a few Nightsiders spoke to the workers, tallied the day’s harvest or engaged in activities Daniel couldn’t identify. Daniel noted that there seemed to be little mixing between the Opiri and the humans.

      Not a good sign, Daniel thought, in a place supposedly devoted to peaceful coexistence between humans and the beings they used to call vampires. But he didn’t have much time to think about it; the humans were passing through one of the doorways at the other end of the courtyard, moving more quickly as if they were eager for food and rest. Again, nobody stopped them, and they entered an open area like an immense, railed balcony that was part of a raised causeway circling the inter wall of the city. Two wide ramps on either side of the landing descended to the lower part of the city. The humans hurried down the ramps, paying no attention when Daniel fell behind.

      Waiting until all the humans had left the landing, Daniel moved to the railing. His gaze followed the causeway, exactly like the one in Erebus where Bloodlords, of lesser rank but far more common than Bloodmasters, displayed their Households in grand promenades, showing off their wealth and power, accompanied by a train of their favorite serfs.

      Daniel forced himself to look away to the city below. A single main avenue ran through the center of the city, terminating at the base of the largest tower. Unlike Erebus, the former Tartaros’s towers were clustered at the far end of the Citadel, piercing the half dome that protected the area from the sun. Once, such towers would have been occupied by the wealthiest and most powerful Bloodlords and Bloodladies, Bloodmasters and Bloodmistresses, shrouding blocks of lesser buildings in their shadows.

      Closer in lay the low town, where Opiri of lesser rank would have made their homes, a maze of structures interspersed with plazas and small parks. The town glittered with lights like distant stars.

      Tanis.

      Daniel ground his teeth together, resisting the overwhelming emotions that took hold of him in that moment. He hadn’t set foot in any Citadel since Ares and his allies had helped Daniel and dozens of human serfs get out of Erebus, but he had not forgotten one moment of pain or humiliation, not one day of being chained like a dog or forced to give blood to a ruthless master and other Opiri of his master’s acquaintance.

      This Citadel had changed, yes. Half of it was now open to the sky. Human workers left and entered the city without being subjected to checks or examinations.

      But that didn’t mean Tanis was like Delos or Avalon or the other mixed colonies. It would be a miracle if it were.

      “A lovely sight, is it not?”

      Daniel stiffened and then forced himself to relax. The woman who had come to stand beside him at the railing spoke softly, without concern or threat. But the hairs at the back of his neck prickled with recognition even before he turned to look at her.

      The first thing he noticed was her hair. Glossy and black as a raven’s feathers, it fell past her shoulders and almost seemed to move of its own accord as she spoke, tempting any man within reach to run his fingers through it.

      But the hair framed something even more remarkable: a face of astonishing beauty by the judgment of human or Nightsider. Her chin was firm, her brows finely shaped, her eyes nearly black with the slightest tinge of deepest purple, her lips full. The skin of her face and bare arms was golden bronze. Hints of her figure appeared beneath the layers of her flowing, semitransparent robes—a hip here, a breast or shoulder there. Daniel had no doubt that this woman’s body was as sleek and perfect as her face, hair and voice.

      And there was something more about her that Daniel felt all the way down to his bones: a profound charisma, a pull that Daniel had experienced before, and not only in Erebus.

      Surely she couldn’t be what his senses told him. Not with hair like that or eyes so dark or teeth as blunt as any human’s.

      But Ares’s hair was just as black, an anomaly among pale-haired, pale-skinned Opiri. And he knew of other anomalies. Daniel, for instance, lacked the sharp Nightsider cuspids of his kind, the half-breed offspring of