HAPTER 9

Bliss

The Visitor was annoyed. Bliss felt his irritation like a blister. It was afternoon, as far as she could tell. The days slipped by one after the other so easily that it was hard to figure out what time it was, but Bliss tried to keep track as best she could. When he was quiet, it was night, and when she could sense his awareness, it was day.

Usually she would get a glimpse of the outside world when he woke up. Like yesterday morning, with the white shutters. Then the blinds would shut again. Only when he let his guard down was Bliss able to get a quick image of the outside world.

Like now, for the Visitor had been taken by surprise.

One minute they were striding through the house, and the next they were smack in the middle of a bunch of animals: grotesque and pitiful. Ugly.

What was this? What was she looking at? Then she realized she was seeing the world through his eyes. Only when she pushed herself a little harder did she see that they were just among an ordinary group of people. A lady wearing a beige suit and sunglasses was ushering a family through the foyer. They looked like the typical Hamptons crowd, Dad in a pastel alligator shirt with a white tennis sweater over his shoulders, Mom in lavender seersucker, the kids, two boys, in miniature versions of Dad's outfit.

"Oh, hello... I'm sorry. We were told the owners wouldn't be here for the showing," the lady in the business suit said with a fake smile. "But since you're here, do you know if your father's contractor is still available to complete the renovation?"

Then it all went black and the image disappeared again, even though Bliss had been able to hear the question. Bobi Anne had been in the midst of renovating before she died. The Hamptons house was supposed to be completed by now, but when they returned from South America, Forsyth had ordered the construction ceased. The entire back half of the house was missing. In its place was a big hole in the ground covered in plaster dust, sawdust, and plastic.

The senator had returned to New York only to discover that he had been cleaned out in the latest financial upheaval. Some kind of Ponzi scheme, Bliss understood; a total scam. She wasn't sure, except that whatever it was, it had been enough to get Forsyth out of Conclave duties for a while. She couldn't quite tell what had happened, since it was around this time that the Visitor began to take over completely; but she had a feeling they were bankrupt.

Forsyth was trying to get a loan from the Committee to tide them over, but it would not be enough. His salary as a U.S. senator was trifling. The Llewellyns, like many Blue Blood families, lived on investment returns.

And apparently those investments were gone.

Which was probably the reason why there was a real estate agent at the house with her clients. Forsyth was selling the house. The thought didn't make Bliss very sad. They didn't spend so much time in the Hamptons that she would miss it. She had been much more despondent when they had left their home in Texas. She still missed that house sometimes: the way her two-level attic bedroom rested under the leaves of an old willow tree, afternoons spent reading on the porch swing, the old antique mirrors in the bathrooms that made everyone look a little bit mysterious and faerie.

The Visitor's been gone awhile, she thought, alone in the darkness. How long, she wasn't certain. It was hard to judge time when you weren't in the physical world anymore.

Bliss wasn't sure, but she thought that there was something different about the solitude. That she might be truly alone this time, and not just cast out of her body while the Visitor did god knows what. Usually she sensed his presence, but there had been times in the past when she was quite convinced she was completely alone. That it was only her inside her body, and the other had gone.

Could it be? Was she truly alone? Bliss felt an excitement rising in her chest.

There was nothing. The Visitor was gone, she could feel it. She was sure. She knew what she had to do. But she didn't know if she still could. Open the blinds. Open your eyes. Open them! Open! But where were they?

Disembodied. She truly understood the meaning of the word. It was like floating without an anchor. She had to get grounded again, to feel her way around until, yes'there it is, a crack of light, maybe she just imagined it?, but if she could just force it open �C there!, just a little more...

Bliss opened her eyes slowly. She'd done it! She looked around. It was amazing to be able to see the world on her terms, and not how the Visitor saw it, through his hate-colored glasses. She was in the library.

A small cozy nook surrounded by walls of books. Her stepmother's decorator had insisted that all the "good homes" had one. Bobi Anne read magazines. Forsyth liked to stay in his den with his large-screen television. The library had become the sisters' territory.

Bliss remembered how she and Jordan would sit at the window seat, looking out at the pool and the ocean while they read. Bliss saw an old summer reading stack on a shelf next to the Victorian rolltop desk. The Brothers Karamazov. The Grapes of Wrath. Persuasion.

She thought she heard a noise. Whether it was from inside or out, she did not know. Close the blinds. Close your eyes, she thought frantically. Close them before he comes back.

She closed them.

Nothing. She was still alone.

She waited for a long time. Then she opened her eyes again. Nothing. She really was alone. She had to take advantage of this. Bliss had had a plan ever since she'd noticed his prolonged absences. She had to do something more than just look around. Dare she?

Her body felt sluggish and heavy. So heavy. This was going to be impossible. What if he came back?

What then? She had to try, she told herself. She had to do something. She couldn't just live like an invalid, in limbo, in paralysis. If I can open my eyes, I can do something else. I'm still Bliss Llewellyn, aren't I?

I've won tennis tournaments and run marathons. I can do this.

Move your hand. Move your hand.

Can't. Too heavy. Where is my hand? I have a hand? What is a hand? There. I can feel my five fingers, but they feel so far away, as if behind glass, or submerged underwater. She remembered seeing a magician on the Today show who had attempted to live underwater for several days. How immobilized and swollen he had looked.

She was no magician, but there was no reason to remain trapped underneath her own fear either. Move it. Move. Your. Hand. Oh God. It weighs three thousand pounds. I can't do it. I can't, I can't. But I have to.

Do it!

She remembered how hard it had been to learn the four-base pyramid scorpion, one of the most difficult moves in cheerleading. It required acute coordination and the skill of a trapeze artist. Bliss was the only cheerleader on the team who could do it. She remembered how scared she had been the first time. If she didn't connect with the base's hands on the way up, she would fall; if she missed the back spotter on the extension, she would fall; if she didn't balance correctly on her left foot, she would fall.

But she would connect with the base, hit her mark, stand with her right leg bent back above her head, and hold the pose until she was thrown upward in a triple-somersault pop-flick to land on her feet.

Too bad Duchesne didn't have a squad. Bliss had tried to start one, but no one was interested. Snobs! They didn't know what they were missing. The feeling of the night of a big game. The anticipation of the crowd. The thrill of running out on the field, pom-poms bouncing, the roar from the stands, the jealousy and the admiration. On Fridays, cheerleaders were allowed to wear their uniforms to class. It was akin to wearing a crown. The scorpion.

She'd nailed it.

If I could do that, I can do this, she told herself.

Move. Your. Hand! She could feel her bangs in her face. The Visitor had not bothered with haircuts, or manicures either. Bliss was annoyed. All that work to look cute gone down the drain. Her hair was wild and untamed, rough to the touch. She had to do something about it.

There. Urrrgh! Her hand jerked away, moving like a marionette, like a puppet on strings. But she'd done it. Her hand awkwardly brushed her hair, moved it away from her eyes.

So.

I can do it.

I can take control of my body. It's going to be difficult and painful and slow, but I can do it. I'm not out of the game yet.

Now all she had to do was learn how to walk again.

The Conduit

For almost seventy years, Christopher Anderson had served as faithful human Conduit to Lawrence Van Alen. He was the one who had brought Schuyler to the hospital to have her arm properly looked at after they'd returned from Corcovado with the news of his master's passing. The spry, gracious gentleman had never struck Schuyler as being particularly elderly, but since Lawrence's death it looked as if age had finally caught up with him. He was frail now and walked with a cane.

Anderson visited her that last night at Oliver's, where she had been staying since returning from South America. She hadn't the courage to go back to the brownstone on 101st Street. It hurt too much to know that there would be no Lawrence puffing on his cigar in his study. Her grandfather's Conduit advised her to leave the country as soon as possible. He had read the transcript of the investigation. "You cannot take chances. No one knows what will happen tomorrow. It is better that you go now and disappear before they can renounce you as a traitor."

"I told you," Oliver said, looking meaningfully at Schuyler.

"But where would we go?" she asked.

"Everywhere. Do not stay anywhere for longer than seventy-two hours. The Venators are fast, but they will be using the glom to find you, and it will slow them down a little. Wherever you go, make sure you end up in Paris next August."

"Why Paris?" Schuyler asked.

"The full European Coven converges every other year for a grand party and a congress," Anderson said. "Lawrence had been planning to attend the biannual meeting. You shall take his place instead. The countess will see you. The Conclaves have been estranged ever since the Blue Bloods left the Old Country. She never had any faith in Michael and the New York Coven. She will have even less faith now, when she hears of Lawrence's demise. She was one of his oldest friends."

The countess had been a friend to Cordelia as well, Schuyler realized later. She vaguely remembered the royal couple: their stately home had made more of an impression. She hadn't thought anything in particular of them except that they had seemed gracious and extremely wealthy, just like everyone in Cordelia's circle. Now Schuyler understood they were special. The countess had been married to the late Prince Henri, who would have been the King of France save the Revolution. Henri had been Regis of the European Conclave. Upon the end of his cycle, his queen had assumed the title.

Anderson was leaving the city too. Upon a vampire's death, human Conduits were released from service and allowed a choice: the Repository or freedom. They could work for the Coven at large, or they could have a normal life.

Anderson told them he had no desire to live out the rest of his life in a basement. He was going back to Venice, back to the University. Of course, his memory would be erased by the Conclave. That was a prerequisite to his leaving them. The Blue Bloods kept their secrets.

Schuyler understood Anderson's choice, but it saddened her all the same. Anderson was the last remaining link to her grandfather. Once he left the Coven, he would be a stranger to her. But she would not deny him his desire for an ordinary existence. He had spent a lifetime in service to the Van Alens.

"Go and find the countess," Anderson continued. 'tell her everything that has happened. There has been distrust between the covens, so she might not know the truth about the massacre in Rio. And, Schuyler?"

"Yes?"

"I know what they've planned for me tomorrow at my exit interview. The forced amnesia. But don't worry, I will never forget you." He shook her hand, and she clasped his in hers.

"Nor shall I forget your great kindness," Schuyler replied. Oliver was right as usual. They had to leave immediately. The Venators would come for her that evening. They would come to take her away.

"The countess will help you."

Schuyler hoped her grandfather's old friend was right.

CHAPTER 10

Schuyler

"Look at you," Oliver murmured, coming up from behind to rest a warm hand on Schuyler's exposed hip.

She turned to him with a soft smile and placed her hand firmly on top of his so that they were practically embracing. Whatever happened tonight, at least they had each other. It was a source of great consolation to both of them.

"You don't look too bad yourself," she said.

He was dressed as a Mogul prince, in a fine gold brocade riding jacket and a white turban atop his caramel-colored hair.

In answer, Oliver took her bejeweled hand and pressed it to his lips, sending a delicious shiver up her spine. Her friend and her familiar. They were a team. Like the Los Angeles Lakers, unbeatable, Schuyler couldn't help thinking. She always made corny jokes when she was nervous.

"What's this?" she asked, as Oliver pressed something into her palm.

"I found it in the garden earlier," he said, showing her the crushed fourleaf clover. "For luck."

I don't need luck, I have you, she wanted to say, but she knew Oliver would think it was cheesy. Instead, she accepted the flower and tucked it into her sari with a smile.

"Shall we?" he asked, when the bhangra pop ended and the orchestra switched to a waltzy version of the Beatles' "Norwegian Wood." He led her out to the middle of the dance floor located in the grand ballroom just off the courtyard. The room was festooned with floating Chinese lanterns, delicate orbs of light that looked incongruous against the French classical architecture. There were only a few people dancing, and Schuyler worried they would look conspicuous as the youngest people on the dance floor by several decades.

But she had always loved this song, which wasn't so much a love song as the opposite of one. "I once had a girl, or should I say, she once had me." And she loved that Oliver wanted to dance. He held out his arms and she stepped into them, resting her head on his shoulder as he circled her waist. She wished dancing was all they had to do. It was so nice just to live in the moment, to enjoy holding him so closely, to pretend for a little while that they were merely two young people in love and nothing else.

Oliver led her smoothly through every dance, a product of mandatory ballroom lessons from his etiquette-obsessed mother. Schuyler felt as graceful as a ballerina in his confident direction.

"I never knew you could dance," she teased.

"You never asked," he said, twirling her around so that her silk pants floated prettily around her ankles.

They danced through two more songs, a catchy polonaise and a popular rap song, the music a schizophrenic mix of high and low, Mozart to M.I.A., Bach to Beyonce. Schuyler found she was actually enjoying herself. Then the music stopped abruptly, and they turned to see what had caused the sudden silence.

"The Countess of Paris, Isabelle of Orleans," the orchestra conductor announced, as an imposing woman, very beautiful for her age, with coal black hair and a regal bearing entered the room. She was dressed as the Queen of Sheba, in a headdress made of gold and blue lapis. Her right hand held an immense gold chain, and standing at the end of it was a black panther wearing a diamond collar.

Schuyler held her breath. So that was the countess. The prospect of asking that woman for shelter suddenly seemed more daunting than ever. She had expected the countess to be plump and elderly, frumpy even, a little old lady in a pastel suit with a bunch of corgis. But this woman was sophisticated and chic; she came across as remote and distant as a deity. Why would she care what happened to Schuyler?

Still, maybe the countess only looked imperious and inaccessible. After all, this party could not have been easy for her. Schuyler wondered if the countess was sad to have lost her home. The H'tel Lambert had been in her family for generations upon generations. Schuyler knew the recent global financial crisis had humbled even the grandest houses and the richest families.

The Hazard-Perrys had invested well: Oliver told her they had gotten out of the market years before it crashed. But all over the Upper East Side, Schuyler heard, jewelry was being auctioned, art appraised, portfolios liquidated. It was the same in Europe. None of the other Blue Blood families could even afford to buy the Lambert. It had to go to a corporation, and it did.

The countess waved to her guests as the ballroom exploded in applause, Schuyler and Oliver clapping as heartily as the rest. Then Isabelle took her exit, the music started up again, and the tension in the room abated. A collective exhale.

"So what did the baron say?" Schuyler asked, as Oliver twirled her away from the center of the room.

The Baron de Coubertin was in the countess's employ and served his lady as human Conduit, as Oliver was to Schuyler. Anderson had told them a meeting with the countess could only be facilitated by the baron. He was the key to an appeal. Without his permission, they would never be able to even get within a hairsbreadth of the countess. The plan was for Oliver to introduce himself the minute the baron arrived at the party, waylaying him as he stepped off the boat.

"We'll find out soon enough," Oliver said, looking apprehensive. 'don't look up. He's coming our way.