The Return: Shadow Souls Chapter 35

Nevertheless Damons eyes took on a steely glint without the amulet my assistant and I will not perform. plainly with it you will? I say, are you saying that you lost your amulet here?As a matter of fact, yes. Just around the time the party arrangements were being hardened up. Damon flashed a beautiful, haunting smile at the young vampires and then bump hit it off suddenly. I had no idea I would have your help, and I was trying to find a way to get an invitation. So I took a look around to see how the carry would be primed(p) out.Dont tell me it was before the grass was roll, fewone tell apprehensively.Unfortunately, yes. And I was stipulation a psychic message, which told me that the k the amulet is buried somewhere here.thither was a chorus of groans from the crowd.Then there were individual characters raised, pointing out the difficulties the rock-hardness of the rolled grass, the many ballrooms with their many floral arrangements in soil, the kitchen garden and flowe r gardens (which we havent even off seen yet, Elena thought.)I realize the virtual impossibility of finding this, Damon said, taking the half(prenominal) of the fox key guts into his hand and making it disappear neatly by passing it near Elenas hand, which was ready to receive it. She now had a special place for it Lady Ulma had seen to that.Damon was saying, That is why I simply said no at the beginning. But you pressed me, and now Ive given you the profuse answer.There was some more grumbling, but then people began pass out in ones and dickenss and threes, talking about the best places to start looking.Damon, theyre issue to destroy Bloddeuwedds grounds, Elena protested silently.Good. Well offer all the jewels you three misss have on you, as well as all the gold I have on me, as a recompense. But what four people trampt do, maybe a thousand can.Elena sighed. I still wish wed had the chance to talk to Bloddeuwedd. non just to hear her speak, but to take on her some ques tions. I basal what reason would a beautiful blossom like her have to encourage Shinichi and Misao?Damons telepathic answer was brief. Well, lets try the top rooms, then. That was where she was headed, anyway.They engraft a carapace of crystal stairs quite difficult to locate when all the walls were transparent, and stir to ascend. Once on the second floor they looked for another one. Eventually Elena found it, by stumbling over the first step.Oh, she said, looking from the step, which now showed itself through a line of red across its campaign edge, to her shin, which showed the same damage. Well, it may be invisible, but we arent.Its not quite invisible. Damon was channeling Power to his eyes, she knew. Shed been doing the same but these age she wondered which of them had more of her extraction in them him or her?Dont strain yourself, I can see the steps, he said. Just shut your eyes.My eyes Before she could ask why she knew why and before she could scream he had picke d her up, his body nimble and solid and the only solid thing anywhere around. He headed up the stairs holding her so that her dress was out of the way of the blood befuddlelets that fell freely into space.For someone afraid of heights, it was a wild, terrifying remonstrate even though she knew Damon was in top condition and would not drop her and even though she was certain he could see where he was going. Still, left over(p) to herself and her own volition, she would never have do it farther than the first stair. As it was, she didnt even dare wiggle much in case she threw Damon off balance. She could only whimper and try to endure.When, an eternity later, they reached the top, Elena wondered who would carry her down, or if she would be left here the rest of her life.They were confronted by Bloddeuwedd, the most enchantingly atrocious creature Elena had yet seen. Enchantingbut odd. Was there not a slight primrose pattern to her hair in back and on the sides? Wasnt her face ac tually the shape of an apple-blossom petal as well as having the petals faint bloom?You are in my private library, she said.And, as if a mirror had cracked, Elena came free of the last of Bloddeuwedds glamour.The gods had made her out of flowersbut flowers dont speak. Bloddeuwedds voice was toneless and flat. It ruined the image of the flower-made girl completely.Were spicy, Damon said naturally not at all out of breath. But wed like to ask you some questions.If you think I will help you, I will not, the flower-petal girl said in the same nasal tone. I hate military man.But I am a vampire, as you have surely already discerned, Damon was beginning, laying the charm on thick, when Bloddeuwedd interrupted him. Once a human, ceaselessly a human.I beg your pardon?Damons loss of control expertness have been the best thing that could have happened, Elena thought, trying to keep back tooth him. He was so clearly sincere about his scorn for humans that Bloddeuwedd softened a little.Wha t did you come to ask?Only if you had seen one of two kitsune lately theyre brother and sister and call themselves Shinichi and Misao.Yes.Or they might Im sorry? Yes?The thieves came to my house at night. I was at a party. I flew back from the party and almost caught them. Kitsune are hard to catch, though.Where Damon swallowed. Where were they?Running down the front stairs.And do you remember the date that they were here?It was the night that the grounds were made ready for this party. Stone rollers went over the grass. The canopy was erected.Weird things to do at night, Elena thought, but then she remembered again. The light was always the same.But her heart was licking fast. Shinichi and Misao could only have been here for one reason to drop off half of the fox key.And maybe drop it in the Great Ballroom, Elena thought. She watched dully as the entire outside of the library rotated, almost like a giant planetarium, so that Bloddeuwedd could pick out a globe and place it in som e contraption that must make the music converge in various rooms.Excuse me, Damon said.This is my private library, Bloddeuwedd said coldly against the ostentatiousness of the glorious ending to the Firebird Suite.Meaning now we must perish?Meaning now I am going to kill you.