“You will determine his fate,” Charity promised. “Only you.”

“Balthazar always said vampires could never change, that it was the tragedy of what—of what we are.” It was bitter to again include myself with Charity, to admit that soon there would be no difference between us. “That’s the only reason he still cared about you, Charity. He thought you hadn’t changed, but you have. You’ve become a monster.”

Charity shook her head. “My poor brother never did understand. I haven’t changed. This is what I always was, even in life.” Her gaze was distant, focused on the past, on people no longer here. “But now I have the courage to act.”

“This one is strong,” Shepherd called as he continued struggling with Lucas. “Too strong.”

Charity’s face lit up in a giddy smile. “He has vampire strength? You’ve drunk his blood, Bianca. Was he sweet? He looks sweet. I wouldn’t mind a taste.”

“Don’t you bite him,” I said, and my voice shook now.

“Don’t.”

“If I bit him, and drank all his blood, and he died,” she singsonged, “Lucas would become a vampire. Would you drink willingly then? To join your lover?”

I slapped her. Her head jerked sharply to the side, and most of the vampires froze in their tracks, like they couldn’t believe anyone had dared strike Charity. She pressed her own delicate hand to her cheek, which was flushed red from my blow. Otherwise, she acted as though it had never happened. “You will ask me to join my tribe,” she said. “You will beg me.”

“Why would you think I would ever—” The words choked in my mouth as I realized why she thought that, what she was planning to do.

She whispered, “You’ll beg me for it, and you’ll open your throat to me. If you don’t, I’ll kill your boy.”

Lucas tried harder to free himself, but they had him fast, and another of the vampires was duct taping his wrists and then his ankles together. Then Shepherd threw Lucas over his shoulders, like he wasn’t even a person, just a bag or a thing.

“Climb the ladder,” Charity called, and Shepherd began ascending to the diving board, Lucas still in his grasp. She walked to the edge of the empty pool, and I followed, unable to understand what was going on. But when I looked in the pool, my stomach turned over. The pale-blue surface was horribly stained with blood, splash after splash of it, dark brown with age. Glimpsing the terror on my face, Charity whispered, “Sometimes, the ones that bore us, we give them a chance to get away. If they can survive the fall, we tell them, we’ll let them go. It’s so much fun to watch them on the diving board. They cry and they scream and they beg, but eventually they all decide to jump. They all fool themselves that they have a chance. Then they fall. So messy. All that wasted blood.”

“You’re disgusting,” I said.

“Sometimes it takes them hours to die. Days. One poor fool kept whining down there for nearly a week. How long do you think Lucas would suffer?” Charity’s dark eyes glinted with pleasure at the memory of others’ pain. “Beg.”

“It wouldn’t work anyway. I can’t become a vampire unless I take a life.”

“If I drink your blood—if I drain you far enough—you’ll become so desperate for blood that you’ll attack the first human you see. I promise to keep you away from your darling boy, though it wouldn’t make any difference to you, not in that state.”

I thought about how crazed I’d been for blood at times, especially during my captivity with Black Cross. Even then there had been times I’d been in danger of losing control with Lucas. I didn’t doubt that Charity was telling the truth.

“Don’t do it,” Lucas said. “She’ll kill me anyway.”

“I won’t. Cross my heart. You did me a favor once—I do remember, you know.” The small hesitant smile on her face was as girlish and trusting as ever. “You really can choose. You can walk out of here right now, safe and sound, and live out your life as a—well, as whatever you are. We’ll let you get far away before we drop him, so you don’t have to hear.”

I closed my eyes tightly, willing myself to be somewhere else. Anywhere else.

Charity continued, “Or you can be a good girl and beg me nicely, and we’ll let your boy go. He’ll have to watch you die, of course. Otherwise he wouldn’t believe us. But we’ll let him live. On my word.”

The crazy thing was, I believed her. Charity believed in bargains and debts. Also, she was a sadist. If she were simply going to turn me into a vampire and then kill Lucas anyway, or have me kill Lucas anyway, she’d say so and take pleasure in watching me scream. No, I had a real chance to save Lucas’s life. That meant I had to take it.

Slowly, I forced myself to say, “Please.”

“Bianca, no!” Lucas thrashed in Shepherd’s grip, but there was nothing he could do.

Charity gave me the most tender smile, like I was a prodigal child who had come home. “Please?”

“Please—make me part of your tribe.” Was that enough? No. I hated every word. Every single heartbeat felt precious, because I knew I wouldn’t feel that much longer. Brokenly, I thought that I would die on my birthday—just like Shakespeare, I remembered. My life was being stolen from me, and I had to beg. For Lucas, I would beg. “Please turn me into a vampire.”

“Do you want to stay with me forever?” Charity’s hands framed my face. “Will we be sisters? Then Balthazar will see that you’re mine instead of his. We’ll show him. Please say yes. Oh, please say that’s what you want.”

That was why she wanted me to beg; so she could convince herself it was true and that she was building a family again. She didn’t want me to get back at Balthazar; she wanted me to replace him.

I’d begun shaking so hard I felt like I couldn’t stand up, but I managed to say, “Yes. That’s what I want. Please.”

She stuck out her bottom lip, a spoiled little girl. “If you really wanted, you would plead. You would go down on your knees.”

It was impossible for me to hate anyone more than I hated her at that second. I thought of Lucas and sank to my knees. The broken tile floor scraped my skin, and I put one hand over my coral bracelet, the last token of love Lucas had given me. “Please, Charity. Please take my life.”

“There,” Charity said. “That wasn’t so hard, was it?” She smiled at me sweetly, and her fangs were out. It wouldn’t be long now.

“No!” Lucas shouted. “Don’t! Bianca, you can fight, forget about me!”

I tilted my head backward, looking up at the metal rafters. Cobwebs drifted lazily, like wicked clouds. My throat was bared to Charity, and I knew this was the end of my life.

I’ll be a vampire now, I thought. Please let my parents be right. Please let it not be so bad.

As Charity cupped her hand around the side of my throat, I saw a strange flickering in the rafters. Like light reflecting on water in a pool—though there was no water in the pool—

My eyes opened wide.

“It won’t hurt much,” Charity promised. “Really it won’t.”

The blue-green light brightened and spread, covering the entire ceiling as it coalesced into something that looked like clouds. A cool breeze flowed around us, making a summer night into winter, and I shivered.

“Charity!” Shepherd cried. “What is this?” All the vampires were staring upward now, and even Lucas had stilled his struggling.

Charity gasped. “Oh, they wouldn’t dare. They wouldn’t dare.”

Sleet began to fall. Sharp pinpricks of ice rained down, jabbing my skin and crackling against the floor. Charity skittered back from me, and I got to my feet, wishing I could run. Maybe I could escape, but I couldn’t leave Lucas behind, not even now—not even during an attack by the wraith.

The sleet thickened, silvery curtains that blurred our vision and made Charity cry out in pain. Ice fell so hard that it hurt. I winced, and then gaped in astonishment as one of the silvery curtains grew more solid, more distinct, and a face formed in the sleet. Though the ice kept falling, the face and form remained.

Even more shocking: I recognized him. He was the first wraith who had ever spoken to me. His long, dark hair flowed loose, and he had a beard. Although his clothing was indistinct, it looked old-fashioned to me—like something from a couple of centuries back, with a long cloak and high boots. The frost man, I thought. It was the only name I’d ever had for him.

In a voice made of the sound of breaking ice, he said, “This one is not yours.”

“She is mine! She is!” Charity stamped her foot. “You heard her! She said she wanted to join us!”

He tilted his head, curious and disdainful, then punched forward. His fist went through Charity’s gut.

She opened her mouth as if to scream, but no sound came out. Her entire body shifted color, turning the same pale blue as the wraith. I realized he was freezing her—and apparently, even vampires could be frozen to death.

Charity jerked her head upright and shrieked, “No!” She pulled back, which seemed to take all her strength, but she staggered away from the frost man’s fist. There wasn’t any blood. Stumbling, she cried, “Get out of here! Everyone, out!”

With that, Shepherd threw Lucas from the board.

I screamed, reaching out for him in vain as he tumbled downward. But then the blue-green light appeared in the pool—more like water than ever—and it slowed his fall. Lucas still hit the bottom, but not that hard, and I could see him struggling to get free of his bonds. Obviously he was okay.

The wraith saved him, I realized. The wraith saved me.

There was no time to wonder about it now. I had to get Lucas.

I hurried to the ladder and descended, through the blue-green light. It was cold—even colder than ice—and yet somehow it didn’t hurt. Instead it felt like waves of energy, or maybe electricity, dangerous to be near. I ran through it, or tried to run; it slowed my steps. My long hair trailed behind me, almost as though I were swimming instead of running. “Lucas!” I cried.

Lucas tore his hands free of the tape just as I got to him. Together we pulled at the bonds on his ankles. “Is this what I think it is?” he asked.

“Yes.” The tape came off at last. “We have to go!”

We pushed through the blue-green energy toward the ladder. Lucas shoved me upward so that I could get out first. As I clambered out, I saw the frost man staring at me.

Not knowing what else to do, I said, “Thank you.”

“You are not hers,” he said. “You are ours.”

So, they could kill me but nobody else could? That wasn’t so comforting.

Lucas climbed out of the pool. “Bianca, run! Come on!”

We ran through the silvery-gray sleet, now pounding down so hard I knew I’d have bruises tomorrow. The wraiths didn’t try to stop us, or if they tried, they failed. Lucas hit the nearest door and pulled me through into a long hallway that connected the pool area to the rest of the building. Although it was cold here, there was no sleet and no unearthly light.

“You!” Shepherd appeared at the far end of the corridor, and we both skidded to a halt. “You brought this down on us!”

Lucas dragged me to the left. “Side door. Move.”

I didn’t see any side door. “Where is it?”

“I was more hoping one would be here,” Lucas admitted.

“Oh, crap.” I could hear Shepherd’s boots pounding as he ran after us. He appeared to be separated from the other vampires, but that didn’t mean I wanted to be cornered by the guy.

Lucas shoved a chair underneath the doorknob, and then glanced around the room. Mostly it looked like the pool area had—heaped high with trash, rags, bits of old paper, half-empty bottles of booze, cigarettes, and lighters. That didn’t look promising to me. However, Lucas grabbed a bottle of vodka and a stained bandanna. “Find me a lighter,” he said.