Chosen

“I was born in South Africa in 1925. On my family’s estate. You know the business they were in. From the time I was old enough to understand what diamond mining was all about, I hated it. Progress has been made in the last century, sure. But slave labor is still slave labor even if those slaves are now given nicer places to live and better food to eat.”

Lance twists the cup in his hand. “My brothers and sister never seemed to mind. Their lives revolved around the next shopping trip to the continent, the next glamorous soiree. They paid more attention to their pampered pets than the people who broke their backs to provide that lifestyle. I couldn’t wait to get away.”

He sets the cup down on the nightstand. “I shouldn’t have been so anxious. I ran away from home when I was seventeen. Went to Cape Town. It was December 1942. A British ship en route to South Africa, the HMS Ceramic, was torpedoed by a German submarine west of the Azores. Took the ship three hours to sink and the Germans let it. Saved one man for interrogation, but let the other six hundred fifty-six die. Most aboard were South Africans returning home.”

His eyes take on a faraway look. “Like most South Africans, I was outraged. And like most idealistic seventeen-year-olds struggling with private demons I couldn’t fight, I wasted no time in joining the battle against demons I could. I enlisted in the South African Third Infantry Division. If I couldn’t fight my parent’s system, I could sure as hell fight the Germans.”

I touch his arm. “What did your parents do when they found out?”

A bitter smile twists the corners of his mouth. “Nothing. My father decided the discipline would be good for me. Even took credit for my enlisting. Ironic. Since I was the only one in the family who exercised any kind of discipline at all. But it didn’t matter. Not really. For the first time in my life, I wasn’t Broderick DeFontaine. I was Aircraftman Rick DeFontaine, and I had work to do that would benefit all people, not just the self-indulgent rich.”

He picks up his cup and crosses the room to the coffeepot. “The Third Division never took part in any battles while I served. We mostly organized and trained the South African home defense services.”

He raises the pot in my direction. I nod and hold out my cup to him. He fills it, returns the pot to the warmer and rejoins me on the bed. “I don’t know how much you know about Germany’s war plans. Early on, Hitler devised what he called the ‘Madagascar Plan.’ All of Europe’s Jews were to be forcibly deported to Madagascar.” He shakes his head. “Maybe if it had been allowed to happen, lives would have been saved. But Madagascar was a strategic island and British troops invaded it in mid-1942. The Battle of Madagascar took place before I joined, but following the end of the campaign, I was assigned to a reco

The tone of his voice suggests he might be thinking the pilot had been the lucky one. His thoughts are black with despair.

I’m glad you didn’t die, Lance. My life would be empty if you’d died. You have to know that.

He smiles at me, sadly, then looks away. “I was found by a peasant family. I didn’t speak Malagasy and they didn’t speak English. They tended to me the best they could, but I’d suffered a compound leg fracture in the crash and a couple of nasty cuts, one of which nearly took my right ear. Infection set in pretty quickly. I’ll never know why they did what they did next. Maybe they were afraid of what would happen if I was found with them. Maybe they thought they would be blamed for my death. But once it became clear that I wasn’t getting better, they took me to an area known as Tsingy. It’s a park now, but in 1942 it was nothing more than an isolated forest of limestone, mangrove swamps and lakes. They left me there. With water and a few scraps of food.”

Lance is rubbing at his left leg, at a ghostly ache from a long-healed wound. I put my hand on top of his to stop it. “What happened then?”

He shuts his eyes. “I was crazy with fever and delirium. I half crawled, half stumbled for days until I could go no farther. Finally, I just lay down on the ground and waited to die. I had no idea how far I’d gone or how long I’d been alone. The last thing I remembered was staring at a night sky. It was a sliver of a moon and a sky awash with stars. Suddenly, one of those stars became a fireball that moved across the sky. It flew in a rainbow arc with a glittering tail from east to west. A shooting star. Then it stopped. Seemed to hover right over me. I reached out my hand to touch it and a shadow passed between us. A shadow that became a figure, then a face. A shadow that became a man.”

Lance rubs his eyes, draws a sharp breath. “He leaned over me and asked one question. ‘Do you seek death or immortality? ’ Simple question. I had no way of knowing how complicated my answer would prove to be.”

Lance gives me a rueful smile. “I never told anyone the story before. Not even Stephen or the others. We were brothers but we each kept the secret of how we became. Julian never told us that we had to. Somehow, though, we knew it would make him unhappy if we did.”

“What was Underwood doing in a forest in Madagascar?”

He shrugs. “At the time, I was too sick to ask. Later, it didn’t seem important. He saved me. Or so I thought.”

Lance’s mood shifts suddenly. He’s anxious, as if realizing that sharing his story with me might make Julian unhappy, too.

I rub his arm, reassure him with a warm smile. “He won’t know that you told me. What happened after he found you in Madagascar?”

But he’s not reassured by my touch or smile. He frowns, begins once again to twist the cup in his hand, his thoughts turbulent and disjointed. He’s frantic with worry that he’s done something wrong, that Underwood will know, that he’s put me in danger.

“Lance.” I take him by the shoulders. “Julian won’t hurt you anymore. He won’t hurt me.”

His eyes are wild. “He’s too strong. He knows things. He knows about you. What you are. He thought I was bringing you to him last night. Delivering you to him. It’s why he got so angry. He realized what I felt for you. It’s why—”

His voice breaks off. A sob catches in his throat. He is shaking and afraid, and I don’t know what to do. I’ve never been exposed to anything like this before. Even Avery, the vampire who made my life a living hell in the weeks after I was turned, wasn’t able to exert this much control. He used the subtle power of seduction and then it only worked when we were together. Underwood is wielding his control like a sledgehammer and seems to be able to reach across time and space.

I realize I have only one way to fight it. Get Lance out of here. Sort through what I’ve learned and come up with a plan to break Underwood’s hold. My first impulse to kill him may be a good start. But Lance is in bad emotional shape. The most important thing now is taking care of him.

“Let’s go back to San Diego.”

Lance shakes his head. “It won’t do any good. He wants you. He won’t stop and he won’t give up. He needs you. It’s so close now. The prophecy will be fulfilled and you’re the one who will make it happen.”

Lance’s words come at me like stones launched from a slingshot. “I don’t understand. What are you talking about? When I make what happen? You’re not making sense.”

This time, when Lance looks at me, the cloud has lifted from his face, his eyes are clear. “You are the one.”

Oh god. I shut my eyes. Not Lance, too. I’ve lived the last year being regaled by those in the vampire community who think of me as some sort of uber-vamp. It’s why Avery focused his attention on me and Williams won’t leave me alone. I hate it. Until now, Lance was the one vampire who never pressured me to pursue the ridiculous claim.