A vampire that drinks from an ability user may inherit aspects of that ability.

I read it twice.

Celestine had drunk from me. Not much, the bell had interrupted her, but enough.

And afterward she had pulled back and asked what are you with the specific confusion of someone who had found something in the blood they hadn’t expected. Then she had told me not to cross her path again.

She tasted the charge. And it confused her enough to make her cautious.

That was interesting information. I kept reading.

"Did you know," Sherry said, pulling me out of the page, "that the most dangerous vampire isn’t one that walks in the sun?"

"Imm."

"It’s one that can control its blood lust." She looked at me over the top of her book. "That’s the real danger."

"Exactly what I was just reading," I said. "Greatest strength and greatest weakness in the same place. If they can control it, they’re almost untouchable. If they can’t, you have a window."

"Can’t believe we’re sitting here researching vampires," she laughed. The genuine kind, finding it absurd in the specific way that absurd things become funny when you’re already too deep in them to do anything else. "By the way. I connected with Max."

I looked up. "How did you get his number?"

"He called me. I think Bala’s watches are connected to the whole team." She had a specific quality of happiness when she said it, the kind that had been sitting in her chest waiting for an outlet.

I set my book face down on the desk. Not because I wanted to stop reading. Because there was a page ahead of me titled Easiest Way to Kill a Vampire that I intended to get to, and I needed Sherry to finish before I did.

"How’s he doing?" I asked. Performing interest, which was the right thing to do.

"Really well. He’s a C-class CGI agent now." She started explaining what that meant the way Max had clearly explained it to her, with the detail of someone who had listened carefully and stored every word.

I didn’t know the CGI class system yet. I filed it as something to learn.

"They’re on a mission right now," she said. "Tracking someone." She paused, trying to remember. "Mary... Mary Stam."

The name landed like a stone in still water.

"So they won’t be joining the Bala mission because of—" she started.

"Wait," I said. "Mary Stam?"

"Yes. Something like that. Do you know her?"

"Familiar name," I said. "Had someone by that name outside the walls."

"Not this one. This one is a criminal. Max said they nearly had her in the capital, her and some unknown person she was with. She escaped. Big bounty. That’s why the team can’t come."

I sat with that.

The capital. That night. The hotel. Room 34. The blonde masked leader who had stood in the doorway and told us this didn’t have to get worse. The voice I had recognized and not been able to place.

Max Donman. With Rebecca and presumably Danny Stam.

They had been the CGI agents in that room. I had discharged Max and Becky simultaneously and gone through the window. Mary Stam had walked out of it.

And now she had recovered. Which meant the charge had worked the way it was supposed to. Which meant somewhere in the city, a level seven shadow walker was alive and operational and very much wanted by the government.

Good, I thought. Good for her.

"Mary Stam is wanted badly," Sherry was saying.

I picked up my book. The bell rang.

"Lunch," I said, pulling the page out carefully and folding it into my pocket. I was going to need that. "Call Ivy. Lunch is on me."

"You said your gold card was at Hogsby."

"Did a job this morning. Got a silver."

She pressed her watch and dialed.

****

The dining hall was loud and full and exactly the kind of environment I normally found exhausting.

But Sherry and Ivy were easy company, the chicken pizza was significantly better than anything Hogsby had produced, and the silver card from the Vale job was covering it without a problem.

We had just settled when I saw them coming.

Annabelle first, reading the room the way she always did, finding me before she had consciously looked.

Mable behind her, then Isabelle. Three girls with trays, making straight for our table with the natural confidence of people who had decided where they were sitting before they entered the room.

Ivy watched them coming with a smile that understood exactly what it was watching. "Seems we’ve sat with the fresh boy of Central," she said.

"You haven’t seen anything," Sherry said, dryly, with the tone of someone who had been keeping count.

Annabelle set her tray down and put her hands on my shoulders from behind. "Bram." A greeting and a claim simultaneously.

Mable noticed the watch. She came around the table, nearly nudging Annabelle aside, and pressed her watch to mine before the scan had time to feel like a decision.

"We’ll be in touch," she said.

Annabelle did the same. Then Isabelle, who caught my eye when she did it and held it for a moment longer than the scan required.

They took their trays to another table. The moment they were out of earshot, Sherry and Ivy looked at each other and laughed. The unrestrained kind.

"What is special about you?" Ivy asked, still laughing.

"Nothing," I said.

"I’m sleeping over at your hostel tonight," Ivy said, in the tone of someone announcing a plan they had already made. "I’m serious, Bram."

[LEWD LEVELING SYSTEM]

[Ivy: Stage is set. Every opportunity counts.]

Sherry picked up a slice of pizza and looked past my shoulder. "You see that girl coming in?"

I turned. May. Carrying a tray. Moving through the dining hall with the unhurried ease of someone who always arrived exactly when she was supposed to.

Then two notifications hit simultaneously.

[The user who marked you has found you.]

[Vince Vale has ended his relationship with Harmione.]

[Harmione is now a compatible user.]

[Vince Vale has made a decision to eliminate you.]

[Countdown: 09:59:33]

[Be alert.]

The mark, I thought. Not Celestine. The one from the Capital. The night I fought Max and Rebecca. It’s been dormant until now.

I looked at the countdown running in the corner of my vision. Ten hours.

He’s not coming for me in the daylight. He’s waiting for tonight. He’s planning to use the dark.

I looked at the dining hall around me. Ivy reaching for her juice. Sherry watching May cross the room. The ordinary afternoon energy of students who had no idea that a countdown had just started.

Ten hours, I thought again. Then he comes.

I reached into my pocket and felt the folded page from the library.

Easiest Way to Kill a Vampire.

I was going to need to read it before the clock ran out.