Free Entwined With the Dark by Nicola Claire

no concern of yours." I was momentarily stunned by the forcefulness of her words. I mean Amisi and I talk about everything and anything together. How could she not have known I knew?
    "I... I didn't mean anything by it, Amisi. Come on! It's just a bit of fun." Goddess what was wrong with me, I even alienate Amisi.
    There was a pause, I heard her sharp intake of breath and then softly, "Oh Luce, I am sorry. It's not you, it's me. I," she hesitated, let a breath of air out and I pictured her running her hand through her long black hair in frustration as she spoke the next words, "I feel guilty. I feel a little naughty. Nero would not approve."
    Oh, and there she said it. She said his name. Tears began to course down my cheeks and I heard my best friend's almost silent sob as my emotions reached her down the line. Amisi is an Empath, a powerful one. She is in tune with my emotions, the strong ones. She would have felt my heart break at seeing Nero in Amun's face. That's why she was calling. It had woken her from her sleep and she had to reach out.
    "I met the Master of London City tonight," I said in a quiet voice.
    "That's good," she answered in encouragement. "Gregor was concerned you had taken so long. It obviously went OK, you're at least alive." The last was said rather dryly. Amisi knew only too well that surviving a meeting with a master did not necessarily mean all was OK.
    I took a deep breath in and prepared myself. There was no way of avoiding this now. "Amun Nadeem looks just like Nero." I heard her gasp at the other end of the line. "His eyes, his facial features, hell, Amisi, even his voice. He could be related to him." I stopped there. Was Amun related to Nero? I had no idea how old the Master of London City was. Nero had been close to five hundred years old when he died. If Amun was about the same age, perhaps they were brothers.
    "I have never heard of this vampire," Amisi said, making me frown in response. Amisi knew Nero well, she was raised in the same Nosferatin community as him. He trained her, took her under his wing. Surely she would have known if he had a relation that was a vampire somewhere out there in the world. She interrupted my train of thought. "I'll ask some of the others at home if they know of him. Maybe Awan Hamadi does." Awan was the new Master of Cairo City, the vampire who took over from Nero's kindred Nafrini, when they both died.
    "OK, that would be good. I didn't exactly make a good impression. A lasting one, but not good."
    I heard her delicate chuckle on the other end of the line. "You always make a lasting one, Luce. Gregor says you'd rock on up to the Queen of England and flash silver if you felt in the mood for some fun." I wasn't sure how to take that, I decided not to comment. "Has he given you permission to stay and hunt?"
    "Yes," I replied, still a little distracted by her last words. Did Gregor think I was suicidal?
    "Good, well, don't take it all too much to heart. Remember what your father said."
    Oh Amisi, how I missed your casual remarks, which always seemed to be steeped in subtle guidance and laced with an ancient knowledge I could never hope to possess. My birth father had left me a note, in it he had encouraged me to do what I needed to survive and learn to forgive myself afterwards.
    Maybe that was the key to my current state of mind. Just keep doing what I needed to do to get to the other side and try not to think too much about it. It would be hard to accomplish, I am not one normally to blithely sail through life. I constantly fret about my actions, about my reactions, about life. But, I did need to breathe more, to just learn to accept what is.
    I took a deep breath in now and imagined my problems floating away on the air when I exhaled. It felt a little silly, but I did feel a bit better for it afterwards.
    "I miss you, Nosferatin," I said a little more brightly.
    "And I you, Nosferatin," she answered and I could hear her smile.
    I rang off feeling a little more