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Savannah

Great, noas on trial "A to be back hooes well, yes I a to convince them that we have much to learn fro your case to theued with the councilfor me? Shocked, I blurted out, "Why would you do that?"

"Because you are hter Why would I not try to protect you?" He said it simply, as if the ansas obvious

"Ididn&039;t realize you cared" I stared down at aamesI asked you to coht" I lifted one shoulder in a half shrug

"I was trying toI see, they see If you had begun to show vaical abilities early in life, I did not want theMom and Nanna on the council&039;s behalf Unless "At the restaurant today, you said elder vaer ones Can the council coainst your will?"

"Yes"

"So when you passed on their threat to hurt Nanna and Mo?"

"That was at their coo with you today?"

"I a you to them one way or another If you had refused, I would have been forced to drug you It would have hurt reatly to do so You are and alill be my child But a conored"

I had to look away and blink fast as ht he caredhe did for theain But if they had forced him to do it instead

He was as ht aboutDid I know him at all?

I had to take a few seconds to clear ain "So why don&039;t they just command every vampire to follow the rules? Then they wouldn&039;t have to worry about settling va with rule breakers"

"They like us to feel as if we have free will"

And yet the council could order vampires around like puppets if they chose, even as tools to be used against their own children

I re I had accused hi hiainst my knees to hold them still and forced myself to look at his harder for you with the council And for giving you soto protectforward, he rested a hand over one of mine "I may be old, but there are still huht otherwise of rown used to slowly began to lift, loosening the pressure on ht the council forto help me now

After a ain

I sat back, too, trying to shts and e It was definitely reassuring to knoasn&039;t alone here, that I had someone on est problem How could I-we-convince the council that I wasn&039;t a threat to them? And ould happen if we failed?

"Dad, are you still allowed to tell me the truth?"

"If I cannot, I aood enough "How much trouble am I in?"

"I convinced them before your birth that it was better to let you live and learn froically trained, you stayed away from the Clann and you did not have the bloodlust You did not pose an immediate threat to them"

And now I did

They&039;d allowed e their mind about that

Myelse to think about "So, um, you never told me where yourourtype of vahed "There are ins We are not a race that has traditionally valued our own history However, I have done my own research and found that we actually predate Adam and Eve&039;s descendants"

Huh?

He told me then about Lillith, Adaainst God and beco a demoness, as well as the one around killing babies and seducing ht of all the tily draining hiy and life I winced "This Lillith sounds like a real role model for women Did she eventually die?"

"No She is still alive, sleeping deep beneath the Su the day she can seek final revenge on God"

Talk about not being able to choose the family we&039;re born into "Wow Sorry I asked" I leaned back in ain, my stomachay too much infor about Dad actually cared about me, after all

He chuckled and reopened his paper "You look tired We have a few hours before our arrival You should try to get so, I reclined my chair and tried to relax

When I caht above Dad, he closed and folded his newspaper then turned up the general lights "Good, you are awake We will be landing shortly"

Ian to race Soon I would ed to reach out across an entire ocean and screw up my life I wished they were on another planet instead of just another continent

I wished Tristan could be here with me somehow Or at least that I could knoas safe soar of the airport A car with dark-tinted aited for us a few yards away Once ere in the backseat, Dad held up a long, black satin scarf A blindfold "I apologize, but the council insists that this is necessary for their safety"

"Uh, okay" I held my head still while he tied the blindfold over es to be sure I couldn&039;t see out

"Your handsas you do not touch the blindfold"

The car eased forward, and ere on our way Great My first ti Not even the Eiffel Tower

It seemed we turned a lot, surely more than was actually necessary for the half-hour drive Maybe they were trying to confuse ot lost even with a map and a compass

Then the car stopped

Dad exited first then held on to uidesense of a breeze ruffling the tiny hairs on roaned open We walked forward, and the breeze died away, replaced by chilly,tiht have been only a couplehard floor and too h a series of clanking uards we passed, the loss of sight uards projected boredo Theythat va his mouth close to my ear, he breathed out in a rapid whisper, "I , the bloodlust is ive yourself to the vampire side, only then will you find co vao of their eain control Some never do But you must learn how to do this Today The council will have a surprise waiting for you to test your control I aot on the plane, and then I could not safely warn you So whatever you do, stay calm"

A surprise? What kind of surprise would make me want to just surrender to the vamp within? And wasn&039;t that backward anyways? Wasn&039;t it the va the bloodlust? How could giving in to that side actually help ain control over the bloodlust?

It didn&039;t make any sense And a tiny part of me had to wonder if this was soe into beco a full vampire

But if I couldn&039;t trust my dad, I would have no one on my side here I had to trust hiain in silence for a few more minutes, then paused one last time Dad must have had to wait for permission to continue With every second that passed, my nervousness cranked up another notch

Finally, a loud,of yet another door We walked forward three steps, the sound of our footsteps becoed on my forearm to stopor heartbeats to signal ith others now But I could feel their ery, a little worried, but ed shut behind us, and Dad re to keepa bit at the bright light in the room

The council seemed to like the color red The cement-block walls were bathed in it, and nine council , half-round table draped in a criold cloth

"Honorable council, hter, Savannah Colbert"

The members stared at me with faces like stone But their easped fro flood of fear and curiosity

"You have tested her, Michael?" the vampire in the center asked His skin was as sht they appeared solid white except for their ebony pupils, never left me

"I have"

Silence filled the room while they apparently read his

"May I respectfully request that the council consider further discussing these deliberations out loud?" Dad said "This would allow Savannah to follow the proceedings and elaborate on her abilities in her oords"

Yep, just as I&039;d guessed They had been talking about ht in front of me The exact opposite of what the Brat Twins did topause, then the center councilically trained?"

"No Even when it would have been helpful, randmother and mother refused They prooodness for it, too

"Michael, you were not aware before that she has the bloodlust?" the council leader said

"No, Caravass I became aware of it when you did"

A ripple of alarm projected from the council

"However, my memories today should have shown that Savannah was tested and is in firular human blood," Caravass corrected "The watchers&039; report showed that she has no such control with regard to Clann blood This is cause for great alarm She cannot be allowed to violate our peace treaty with the Clann nor expose us to the world at large If she cannot be controlled, she is a danger to our entire society"

"No, I&039;m not" I couldn&039;t believe I&039;d had the nerve to speak up No doubt any one of them could snap my neck before I even saw them leave their seats

Caravass stared into my eyes "How can you be sure of this?"

"Because I&039;ve been alone with a Clann descendant a lot over the last six months I&039;ve had plenty opportunity to" Feed? Drink froht term? "to bite him But I haven&039;t"

"Admirable control," Caravass said "And yet you lost a little of that control when you actually saw and sulped Just talking about it made the memory of that taste flood my mouth "Yes But that was my first time to ever feel the bloodlust Now that I knohat it feels like, I know I can control my reaction to it And it&039;s not like I actually bit hi"

"We desire proof If you really believe you have coree to our test" Caravass waved a hand, and a guard at the right wall pressed a button A smooth section of the wall slid away into a recessed pocket, revealing ainto what looked like a police interrogation room

Handcuffed to a ray rooainst h my nose Tristan What had they done to hiht have warned o crazy over this I&039;d probably get blaiven in to the temptation to date hiuessed it was my fault, after all

"It is clear already that you do not have complete control around this witch boy," Caravass said

"I&039;m half huaze away fron of a lack of control," a pinch-faced councilwoman hissed "We cannot afford to risk our entire society on a girl who cannot control her emotions"

"Especially when the cause for that loss of control is a Clann reed

Their collective fear rose, nearly suffocatingto give"Why don&039;t you try est that the test be kept within reason so as not to start another ith the Clann Kidnapping their future leader could possibly already be construed as a violation of the treaty Itthe Tristan?

The council hesitated, and I couldn&039;t breathe

"Agreed," Caravass said "We will keep him alive for this test"

And afterward?

One step at a tiuard outside the council chamber opened the vaultlike uard stepped away from theto lead me out In silence, he turned to the left down a dim corridor that seeet Tristan free, which ould we need to go? The place had seeure that out when the time came If it did First, I&039;d try to do what I should have been doing for months noould follow the rules

After a few steps, the guard turned to the left again at a rectangularof keys on a chain and unlocked it Then he stepped inside

I followed hiaze immediately snapped to Tristan, as still knocked out Part of me wanted to run over to him immediately The other half offrom the room we&039;d just left On this side, thelooked like a es Yet I could alh their anger, fear, worry and curiosity

They were on the ain by the , gathering in a tight half circle only a few feet away Probably so they could see uard&039;s face looked bored, as if to say this was nothing personal Which was a lie This was totally personal And all my fault

He reached inside his inner jacket pocket and took out two itee and a scalpel The clear plastic protectors on the blade and needle ht overhead glinted off the needle and ulped, the air rushing in and out of usts I couldn&039;t hide within the silence of the cold ceh h rew cautious He kneas desperate But that didn&039;t , built like a linebacker beneath his badly fitted suit And even if I could soes would step in to stop led to breathe Tiic, not emotion

Okay So ere in deep this time But eren&039;t totally doomed Yet The council had promised that I had only to pass one test, and then Tristan could go free

An innocent boy ouldn&039;t even be here if I hadn&039;t fallen in love with hier If I&039;d only broken up with hiht now I had to focus on passing this test, and then we could go hoenetically destined to fail

"What are those for?" Iuard&039;s hands

"They are your test" His French accent was so thick I could barely understand him Then he pressed the scalpel to Tristan&039;s neck