Читаем The Night Eternal полностью

Eph did not want the hunter to detect his potential deceit. Eph was walking a fine line here, playing the same game with both sides. Telling each he was working to subvert the other. In the end, Eph’s only loyalty was to Zack. He suffered equally at the thought of potentially turning on his friends—or spending eternity in a world of horror.

I had a family once.

The Born’s voice shook a nervous Eph, but he recovered quickly.

The Master turned them all, leaving it to me to destroy them. Something else we share in common.

Eph nodded. “But there was a reason it was after you. A link. The Master and I have no past. No commonality. I fell into its path purely by accident of my profession as an epidemiologist.”

There is a reason. We just don’t know what it is.

Eph had devoted hours to this very thought. “My fear is that it has something to do with my son, Zack.”

The Born was quiet for a moment.

You must be aware of a similarity between myself and your son. I was turned in the womb of my mother. And through that, the Master became my surrogate father, supplanting my own human forebear. By corrupting the mind of your son in his formative years, the Master is seeking to supplant you, your influence upon your son’s maturation.

“You mean, this is a pattern with the Master.” Eph should have been discouraged, but instead he found reason to cheer. “Then there’s hope,” he said. “You turned against the Master. You rejected it. And it had much greater influence over you.” Eph stood off the counter, lifted by this theory. “Maybe Zack will too. If I can get to him in time, the way the Ancients got to you. Maybe it’s not too late. He is a good kid—I know it…”

So long as he remains unturned biologically, there is a chance.

“I have to get him away from the Master. Or, more accurately, get the Master away from him. Can we really destroy it? I mean, if God failed to do it so long ago.”

God succeeded. Ozryel was destroyed. It was the blood that rose.

“So, in a sense, we have to fix God’s mistake.”

God makes no mistakes. In the end, all the rivers go to the sea…

“No mistakes. You think that fiery mark in the sky appeared on purpose. Sent for me?”

For me, as well. So that I might know to protect you. To safeguard you from corruption. The elements are falling into place. The ashes are gathered. Fet has the weapon. Fire rained from the sky. Signs and portents—the very language of God. They all will rise and fall with the strength of our alliance.

Again, a pause that Eph could not decipher. Was the Born already inside his head? Had he softened Eph’s mind with conversation so that he could read Eph’s true intentions?

Mr. Fet and Ms. Martinez have cleared the sixth floor. Mr. Elizalde and Mr. Soto are still engaged on floor five.

Eph said, “I want to go to six.”

They went down the stairwell, passing one conspicuous puddle of white vampire blood. Passing the door to the fifth floor, Eph could hear Gus cursing loudly, almost joyously.

The sixth floor began with a map room. Through a heavy glass door, Eph passed into a long room that had once been carefully climate controlled. Panels featuring thermostats and humidity barometers dotted the walls, and the ceiling was spaced with vents, their ribbons hanging limp.

The stacks were long here. Mr. Quinlan fell back, and Eph knew he was somewhere deep beneath Bryant Park now. He proceeded quietly, listening for Fet and Nora, not wanting to surprise them or be surprised by them. He heard voices a few stacks over and moved through a break in the shelves.

They were using a flashlight. That allowed Eph to switch off his night-vision scope. He got close enough to see them through one stack of books. They were standing at a glass table with their backs to him. Above the table, inside a cabinet, were what looked to be the library’s most precious acquisitions.