Afterlight - Elle Jasper [45]
“Yes.”
My insides hurt at the thought. “How did they make him do that? And when?”
Something outside must have had Eli’s attention; he continued to stare out of the window while he explained. “At the grave, Seth and his friends disturbed a vase containing the Gullah magic that kept the Arcoses entombed, mummified. Like I said, a hundred years ago things were a hell of a lot more primitive and not as effective as our methods today. Back then, once the magic was placed, it stayed as placed . . . for as long as it lasts. There’s no changing it.” He looked at me. “I can only imagine that Valerian and Victorian fed as soon as they gained enough strength, then beckoned their rescuers.”
“The woman found dead in the park?” I stated, already knowing the answer.
“Yes.”
My insides grew icy cold as I thought of the woman found at Daffin Park, and I slowly rose. “And the guy in the alley?”
Eli nodded. “Yeah.”
I drew a deep breath. I also recalled that first morning, when I’d found Seth asleep and his window wide-open. “Why didn’t they kill Seth?”
Eli shrugged. “The Arcoses are weak. They need help subduing victims until they’re fully restored.”
I stared, speechless as that information sunk in. “You mean my little brother is luring innocent people to their deaths?” Yanking the towel from my head, I shook the tangles in my wet hair with my fingers until it hung limp, nearly to my waist. I threw the towel down. “I can’t believe that.”
“You’d better believe it,” Eli said harshly, and drew closer. “A vampire, even in its weakest form, can manipulate a mortal’s mind and make him do anything they wish.”
We stood now, face-to-face, and yeah—I thought about how easily Eli could manipulate me. But this wasn’t about me. “Why aren’t we out looking for them now? Why can’t we just bring them in, and take them somewhere safe? Why can’t we just kill the Arcoses?” Desperate panic began to seize me again, and I didn’t know how to control it. “Why do we have to wait?”
Eli’s hands grasped my shoulders hard, and I noticed for the first time that his skin was surprisingly warm. “I’m going to say this one last time, and you’d better let it sink into that thick skull. While the Arcoses’ physical beings are weak, their minds are as strong as ever. They can’t know we’re looking for them, or Seth and his friends. They could command them to do things you wouldn’t want to imagine—and with just a single, solitary thought. They wouldn’t even have to be in the same room with them.” His eyes bored into mine. “They would do some messed-up shit and do it just because the Arcoses said to do it. Probably already have.”
My mind reeled with every horrible thing a human being could do to another, and I felt sick at the images. “Then what the hell do we do?” I asked, looking into the clearest pair of light blue eyes I’d ever seen. “What?”
“We watch, and we wait. Right now, Valerian and Victorian are too weak to move stealthily through the city. That’s why they’ve got Seth and his friends.”
I stiffened, getting more pissed by the second. “We wait and do nothing?”
The look on Eli’s face reeked of irritation. “No. We wait; we watch. We try to defuse as many situations as possible. They cannot be destroyed until their physical bodies are fully restored.” He looked hard at me. “It’s just the way it is.”
“Do they know you’re here?” I asked, and pulled away as thousands of worries and questions stormed my brain. “Do they know of the contract?”
Eli crossed his arms over his chest and stood, legs braced wide. “The contract was made after they were entombed, and Gullah magic has been in our system for nearly two centuries. They may suspect we’re here, but they can’t detect it. Our scent is masked—just like yours.”
“Can they recognize you? Like, do they know what you physically look like?” I asked.
For the first time in our heated, serious conversation, Eli’s expression lightened. “They know what we looked like in 1848. Together, as a family, they’d probably recognize us as the Duprés. Maybe. My mother and father look very much the