Bride(7)

I study him calmly. I’m positive that he really does believe this bullshit. That he thinks he’s a good guy. “Nine minutes and twenty-two seconds.”

He looks briefly, genuinely sad. Then he says, “There is to be a wedding.”

I jerk my head back. “A wedding? As in . . . like the Humans do?”

“A marriage ceremony. Like the Vampyres used to have.”

“Whose? Yours? Are you going to . . .” I don’t bother finishing the sentence—the sheer thought is ludicrous. It’s not just weddings that have gone out of fashion hundreds of years ago, but the entire idea of long-term relationships. As it turns out, when your species sucks at producing children, encouraging sexual walkabouts and the search for reproductively compatible partners takes precedence over romance. I doubt Vampyres were ever particularly romantic, anyway. “Whose?”

Father sighs. “Yet to be decided.”

I don’t like this, not any of it, but I’m not sure why yet. Something prickles in my ear, a whisper that I should get the hell out now, but as I’m about to stand, Father says, “Since you chose to live among the Humans, you must have been following their news.”

“Some of it,” I lie. We could be at war with Eurasia and on the verge of cloning unicorns, and I’d have no clue. I’ve been busy. Searching. Scouring. “Why?”

“The Humans recently had an election.”

I had no idea, but I nod. “Wonder what that’s like.” A leadership structure that’s not an unattainable council whose membership is restricted to a handful of families, passed down from generation to generation like a chipped china set.

“Not ideal. As Arthur Davenport was not reelected.”

“Governor Davenport?” The City is divided between the local Were pack and the Vampyres, but the rest of the Southwest region is almost exclusively Human. And for the last few decades, they’ve chosen Arthur Davenport to represent them—as far as I can recall, with little hesitation. That jerk. “Who’s the new guy?”

“A woman. Maddie Garcia is the governor-elect, and her term will start in a few months.”

“And your take on her . . . ?” He must have one. Father’s collaboration with Governor Davenport is the driving force behind the amicable relationship between our two people.

Well. Amicable might be too strong of a word. The average Human still thinks that we’re gagging to suck their cattle dry and mind-scramble their loved ones; the average Vampyre still thinks that Humans are cunning but feckless, and that their main talent is for procreating and filling the universe with more Humans. It’s not like our species hang out, aside from very limited, highly artificial diplomatic events. But we haven’t been overtly murdering each other in cold blood for a while, and we’re allies against the Weres. A win is a win, right?

“I have no opinion,” he tells me, impassible. “Nor will I have the opportunity to form one soon, as Ms. Garcia has refused all my requests for meetings.”

“Ah.” Ms. Garcia must be wiser than I am.

“However, I am still tasked with guaranteeing the safety of my people. And once Governor Davenport is gone, in addition to the Were threat that we constantly face at the southern border, there might be one at the north. From the Humans.”

“I doubt she wants trouble, Father.” I pick at my nail polish. “She’ll probably just leave the current alliance as it is and cut down on the ceremonial bullshit—”

“Her team has informed us that as soon as she takes office, the Collateral program will be no more.”

I freeze. And then slowly look up. “What?”

“We have been formally asked to return the Human Collateral. And they will send back the girl who’s currently serving as the Vampyre Collateral—”

“Boy,” I correct him automatically. My fingertips feel numb. “The current Vampyre Collateral is a boy.” I met him once. He had dark hair and a constant frown and said “No, thank you” when I asked if he needed help carrying a stack of books. By now he might very well be as tall as me.

“Whatever it might be, the return will happen next week. The Humans have decided not to wait for Maddie Garcia to take office.”

“I don’t see . . .” I swallow. Gather myself. “It’s for the best. It’s a stupid practice.”

“It has been ensuring peace between the Vampyres and the Humans for over one hundred years.”

“Seems a little cruel to me,” I counter calmly. “Asking an eight-year-old to relocate alone inside enemy territory to play hostage.”

“？‘Hostage’ is such a crude, simplistic word.”

“You hold a Human child as a deterrent for ten years, with the mutual understanding that if the Humans violate the terms of our alliance, the Vampyres will instantly murder the child. That seems crude and simplistic, too.”

Father’s eyes narrow. “It’s not unilateral.” His voice grows harder. “The Humans hold a Vampyre child for the same reason—”

“I know, Father.” I lean forward. “I was the previous Vampyre Collateral, in case you have forgotten.”

I wouldn’t put it past him—but no. He might not recall the way I tried to hold his hand as the armored sedan drove us north, or me trying to hide behind Vania’s thigh when I first got a glimpse of the Humans’ oddly colored eyes. He might not know how it felt, growing up with the knowledge that if the ceasefire between us and the Humans broke down, the same caregivers who’d taught me how to ride a bike would come into my room and drive a knife through my heart. He might not dwell on the fact that he sent his daughter to be the eleventh Collateral, ten years a prisoner among people who hated her kind.