Only it didn’t feel like nothing.
It felt like whatever was out there, whatever was stalking me through the mist, was malevolent. Hateful. Fearful. Like it didn’t like me any more than I liked it. Like it would like to remove me, kill me even.
Like it wasn’t any more comfortable with me inside its skin than the reverse.
And that wasn’t so surprising, was it? How many times had I thought, If only it would just die? If only it wasn’t there anymore, maybe I would be okay. Maybe in time I could learn to be normal, or could learn to fake it well enough for a regular life. My life, instead of the bastardized time-share we had going on.
Would it be so strange if it had thought the same?
“Dory!”
I jumped, and looked back around at Louis-Cesare, who was now a few yards off to the left. He’d either moved or I had, unconsciously following currents in the fog. And wasn’t that just a great thought to have right now?
“What?”
“I called your name several times; you did not answer.”
“I was…distracted.” And then I got a good look at his face. “What’s wrong now?”
“I don’t know why, but…I am having difficulty communicating with your father.”
I glanced around. “No shit.”
“What?”
I licked my lips and looked back at him. “Remember what Mircea said. I inherited his mental abilities, but they’re carried on her…on her side of the brain, so to speak. They’re under her control, not mine.”
“But what does that have to do—”
“Just that if she wanted to block him…”
“You believe she is more powerful than your father?”
“Not…necessarily,” I said, not feeling real sure about that. “But they’re almost the same age, and he’s had to divide his time between a lot of different things over the years. Had to wear a lot of hats. She hasn’t. She could specialize—”
“But even so—”
“—and it’s her brain. She knows it better t
han he does. She has to.”
“She—” Louis-Cesare stopped. “Why are we speaking of her as a separate person? There is no she. There is only you.”
“Sure about that?” I said, glancing around again.
“Yes! She is…you are…the same. In either form. You are—” He broke off, as if trying to put the impossible into words. And seemed to be having some trouble with it.
Join the club, I thought grimly. It was my head and I didn’t know what the hell was going on. And why did I think I wasn’t going to like it when I figured it out?
“Dorina…she is you as you would have been, had you been born fully vampire,” he finally said. “Therefore there are…variations…in approach, in the way you think, react, fight—”
“So, virtually identical, then.”
He frowned at me. “In essence, yes. In your sense of honor, your humor, your innate goodness—”
I laughed.
He frowned more. “It is true. In all the ways that matter, you are the same.”