Billy the Kid & the Vampyres of Vegas (The Secrets of the Immortal Nicholas Flamel #5.5) Read Free Page B

along the Embarcadero was at a standstill.
    He shrugged. “Once we get out of the city, it should be fairly easy. At this time of night, with me driving, I’d say eight, maybe nine hours.”
    “Do you sleep?” she asked.
    “Not much anymore. Naps every few days.”
    Scathach turned back to the phone. “If he drops me on the Strip and turns around, he should be back in San Francisco by midmorning tomorrow. I’ll make my own way home,” she continued in English, before slipping back into the language of Danu Talis. “I hope this is not too much of an inconvenience for you, but I am sure you have many other servants.”
    “None like Billy the Kid,” Quetzalcoatl said. “Try not to damage him.”
    Scathach hung up and passed the phone back to Billy. “He likes you,” she said.
    Billy laughed delightedly. “That old monster. He doesn’t like anyone. I’m not even sure he likes himself.”
    Scathach shifted in the seat to get a better look at her driver. “So you’re the famous Billy the Kid. I thought you’d be taller.”
    “I’m five eight,” he answered, then paused. “You know, people used to say that all the time. But I haven’t heard it in a while.”
    “Why not?”
    “They’re all dead.” Billy smiled. “The curse of immortality, eh?”
    Scathach nodded and turned away, looking out across San Francisco Bay as Billy swung right, then circled left onto the Bay Bridge.
    “I know you’re not human, so I’m guessing you’re an Elder, like Quetzalcoatl?”
    “Next Generation,” Scathach said shortly.
    “What’s the difference?” Billy asked.
    “I was born after the Fall of Danu Talis. Quetzalcoatl was born on the island.”
    “So you’ve lived a long time. You know what it’s like to be immortal, to see everyone around you age and die. How do you deal with that?”
    “You need to ask your master,” Scathach snapped.
    “He doesn’t tell me anything.”
    Scathach remained silent for a few moments. “I’ve seen many humans face immortality, and they never get used to it. You’ll learn to accept it. You’ll learn never to make a close association with a mortal human.” She turned to look at Billy. “You’ll never take a mortal wife, or have a mortal girlfriend. You’ll learn to artificially age yourself. You’ll dress differently, add gray to your hair, grow a beard and then move on. You’ll never live too long in any one place. You’ll spend the rest of your life on the run, looking over your shoulders.”
    “I did that when I was human,” Billy said. “I’m well used to it.”
    “You’re young. Enjoy it while you can. In another hundred years, two hundred, five hundred, a thousand, you will see things differently.”
    “You’re just a bundle of laughs,” Billy muttered. “I was enjoying being immortal.”
    “Billy, I have lived on this world—and others—for ten thousand years. I have watched the very Earth reshape itself. I have seen empires rise and fall.” Her voice turned lost and lonely, and Billy caught the hint of what he recognized as an Irish accent, not unlike his mother’s. “I have watched the death of nations; I have seen entire tribes vanish into myth and great civilizations fade to dust. I have seen so many friends die … and do you know the true curse of immortality?”
    Billy the Kid shook his head. “Not sure I want to know now.…”
    “The curse is that you remember every single face.” Her expression became hard, lips disappearing into a thin line. “Ultimately, that’s what will drive you mad.”
    “You remember all the faces?”
    “All of them,” she breathed.
    “But you’re not mad,” he said lightly.
    Scathach peered at him over the top of her aviator glasses. “How do you know?”

7.
    Quetzalcoatl sat in a room surrounded by the remnants of a lost empire, holding a cell phone in his hand. It was a slender rectangle of glass, metal and liquid crystal, the very latest in high-tech gadgets, and yet incredibly crude when