by Leanne Leeds
Rex waited, expectantly, for my mother to move out of his way. I was sure his highly evolved senses had zeroed in on Emma already. Because of that, he knew (without my mother having to say a word) she was blocking him from entering the living room. When she didn’t move, Rex’s eyes traveled over her and Archie. “Do I have reason to be concerned here, priestess?”
“If you’re asking whether I am going to stake you where you stand, no, vampire. You have nothing to worry about. For the moment.” The tone of her voice didn’t make it sound like he had nothing to worry about.
“Mom, he’s just here to check on his sister. Let’s let him do that.”
My mother turned toward me sharply. “You’ve done enough for one evening, Astra,” she warned me. “Stay out of this.”
I knew her well enough to know she was furious at me for letting Rex in the door, and it seemed a ridiculous overreaction. For a split second, my anger flared.
This was ridiculous—and speciesist. There were hundreds of paranormals across the world far more dangerous than a vampire. And vampires were previously human—and very similar to witches in vestiges of humanity. Just because they drink blood…I mean, I didn’t blame Rex for his diet any more than I blamed Archie. This man—vampire, whatever—was first and foremost Emma’s brother.
This whole thing? My mother’s reaction? It was ridiculous.
And, by the way, it also showed a complete lack of confidence in my ability to kick his butt. Which was disappointing, since I was sure I could take him.
Rex stared at my mother with an unnerving intensity. “I gave your daughter certain assurances. I oathed to Astra that I would harm no one on this property while I was here. I intend to keep my word, priestess.”
I nodded to confirm.
“I assume you extracted similar oaths from her?” my mother asked. “It would make no sense for you to walk into a temple without them.”
“No.”
Her eyebrow raised. “No? You just walked into a house with multiple witches and didn’t bother to ensure your own safety by oath?” Althea and Ami silently watched the exchange between our mother and the vampire. “Why would you do that?”
A brief half-smile flashed across his handsome face. “With respect, I don’t need to extract oaths to ensure my own safety,” Rex said, his gaze passing over everyone gathered. My mother tensed at his low-key brag, but he raised his hand. “But I am aware of who you are and that you owe me guest-friendship. Your own goddess demonstrated what this entailed when she visited Ithaca. If I asked for more than that, it would be disrespectful to your own professed beliefs.”
“And you care about respecting our beliefs?”
“I have no desire to cause offense.”
I looked back and forth between them, trying to figure out what they were talking about. What was guest-friendship? And why hadn’t anyone issued me a house handbook when I came home so I wouldn’t be caught unaware of the multitude of rules? I swear, my mother had more rules than the military.
Althea caught my look of confusion and edged toward me. “The Odyssey,” she whispered. “Didn’t you ever read it?”
“Why on earth would I read that dusty old tome? Isn’t it, like, a bazillion words?” My sister’s brow wrinkled. “Yes, yes, I know you all have to read it. I know I was supposed to. I didn’t. What is Rex talking about?”
“Athena visited Ithaca disguised as Mentes, a hero,” Althea explained. Though she was still whispering, my sister had the attention of everyone in the room. “In the story, they make it clear that only one guy treated her with proper respect as a guest. From there, we got the rules of guest-friendship. Once Rex crossed the threshold, we became obligated to feed him, give him a drink, and offer him a place to sleep equal to or better than our own sleeping quarters. Treat him like royalty. Basically.”
“And this is a religious obligation?” I asked. “Is he right about that?”
“Alcinous considered hospitality part of his sacred duty to the gods, and so hospitality became our sacred duty, as well,” she finished. “It has been so ever since.”
“So the vampire is right.” I pushed again.
“Yes.”
“Any other questions, Astra?” my mother asked tartly.
“Actually, I think I do,” I said, suddenly realizing the full impact of the obligation and obstacles my mother had deliberately erected to make sure she wouldn’t have to. “So, you guys have some religious obligation of hospitality to anyone that shows up here, but you created wards to keep out all paranormals so none of them could ever show up here?” I paused, but no one answered me. “Do I have that right?”
Rex shot me a brief look of amusement.
My sister met my eyes. “Well, it’s not, like, exactly that way,” Ami said slowly. Then she frowned. “At least I don’t think it is. The way you said it sounds bad.” Ami looked at my mother. “Mom?”
My mother’s face was impassive, but Althea’s expression told me she’d figured out long before that they complied with the “rules” of hospitality without the burden of being hospitable. I shook my head. “Wow. That’s some serious technicality twisting there, Mom. Practically military-like in its—”
A sound of impatience, soft as a summer’s breeze, slipped from the lips of the vampire. “While all this discussion of priestess-witch customs is truly fascinating, now that we’ve established your obligations and mine?” Rex flexed his hands. “I’d like to see my sister.”
The frustration twisted my mother’s face, but she took a deep breath.
Then she nodded.
Then she stepped aside.
“How did he wind up here?” Archie asked.
“He’s a vampire?” Turning, I watched Emma and Rex. She was still asleep on the couch snoring peacefully. He crouched down in front of her, his hands resting lightly on her knees. “He probably gave Emma some of his blood so he could keep tabs on her. He knew there was something off, and he used his supersonic travel power to get here quick.” Turning back, I raised my eyebrow. “I don’t want to talk about him right now. I want to talk about you.”
“Oh?” Archie asked distractedly.
“How am I supposed to trust you if you can’t tell me what’s going on?” I asked him. “I never would’ve brought you…Actually, I didn’t bring you into the pixie area, now that I think about it. You just decided to invade their home turf all on your own.” I crossed my arms. “I was just starting to trust you, Archie, and then you pull a stunt like this.”
He shrugged. “If I’d eaten him, your case would have been solved.”
“You’re telling me Pistachio Waterflash is going to try and kill Alice?”
“Well, it makes sense, doesn’t it?” the owl asked with arrogant confidence. “Ami told me that she told you what I told your mother. Doesn’t that solve the case?” He swung his head with an exaggerated flare of feathers. “Some guy that would drug women would obviously kill them. I mean, it’s the first step on a—”
“That’s a little black-and-white. And assumptive.”
“Of course it’s not,” he responded with another shake of feathers. “It’s obvious to me.”
“Is it now? Do you know anything else that Ami didn’t tell me?” I asked him.
His big owl eyes blinked. “What do you mean?”
“What I mean is you’ve given me absolutely no evidence that Pistachio Waterflash wants Alice dead. All you’ve brought to the table is that he’s a narcissistic jerk trying to start a cult of women that worship him. Good information to have, but I wound up getting it anyway—from the rebel pixies.” I raised my eyebrow. “I also hate to tell you this, Archie, but what he’s doing doesn’t exactly make him super unique. I mean, the sun dust he’s using and the fact that he’s a pixie make him unique. But his motivations?” I held my hands up. “Not really. He’s just a narcissistic man with entitlement issues. It doesn’t mean he’s a murderer.”
Another exaggerated blink. “You don’t like men very much, do you?
”
Where on earth did that come from? “I like decent men just fine. He’s not a decent man. But Althea and I just spent an evening with six female pixies out to stop their chieftain from starting the Casanova Cult with their magic. There’s more going on here than ‘Pistachio Waterflash is a big dumb jerk,’” I told the owl. “Althea and I spotted a pixie stealing fuel injectors from all the construction equipment at a site Alice ultimately owns.”
“What does that have to do with anything?”
I pointed and nodded. “See, that’s the type of question you should be asking. I don’t know yet, but I’m pretty sure eating Pistachio Waterflash wouldn’t get us any closer to knowing the answer.” For a small fraction of a second, the fiery arrogance in the owl’s eye was clouded by uncertainty. “You see what I mean now?”
“Maybe,” he murmured.
“And I have more news for you. The pixies said there are four women under sun dust control. Well, I should clarify—that’s what the rebel pixies think, anyway. Alice was the first. Emma, obviously.” I gestured toward the couch. “One woman they were not aware of and hadn’t been able to identify.”
“The rebel pixies? Sounds like a grunge band.” The owl frowned. “You said four. That’s three.”
“The fourth is Meryl Hawkins. She’s a reporter for the Forkbridge Gazette. The one that interviewed Emma and me this morning.”
Archie turned suddenly back toward me. An exaggerated blink. “Well, that doesn’t seem random. That doesn’t seem random at all. Those three people all being drugged and under one person’s control?”
Now it was my turn to blink. He was right. “An heiress, a reporter, a detective?” I crossed my arms. “No, now that you mention it…that doesn’t seem random at all, does it?”
“So which pixies sabotaged the construction equipment? The rebel pixies, or the sun-dust narcissist pixie?”
I looked back at Archie with embarrassment.
Archie raised what passed for an eyebrow on an owl. “Didn’t you go into pixie territory specifically to investigate what pixie sabotaged the equipment?”
“We did, but somehow, we never quite…covered that. With them.”
“So you don’t even know which side wanted the construction equipment disabled?” Archie looked vaguely surprised. “Maybe you should make sure you have all your ducks in a row before you start giving divine creatures guff for trying to solve the case in a way that wasn’t perfectly to your liking.” I watched the raptor as he pulled his arrogance back together without effort. “So what now, genius?”
“Besides you working on your people skills?”
“Haha.”
“I’m going to talk to Althea about an antidote for the sun dust. I don’t know what her capabilities are, but she seems to be pretty adept at this potion stuff. Maybe she can come up with a way to break whatever spell Emma and Alice are under.”
Archie nodded. “You think that will save Alice?”
“I think we have a better shot of saving Alice if she’s not drooling and giggling over Pistachio Waterflash. But no, I have a feeling the threat to Alice is more tangible than that.” I looked back at the sleeping heiress. I didn’t know why the two were sleeping or what control—if any—Pistachio had her under. And I didn’t like how much I didn’t know.
“There’s just too much swirling around her—a pixie war, the CEO of her company under investigation, being targeted by Pistachio. Add in the sabotage at the construction site, the sun-dusted reporter…it feels like something’s going on here that we’re all missing.”
“There’s always something going on we’re all missing.”
Rex stepped away from Emma and made his way to where Archie and I were talking. “She is deeply asleep and dreaming of some man. A pixie, I believe.”
“Green hair?” I asked Rex. He nodded. “Pistachio Waterflash.”
“The other one on the couch is dreaming of him as well.” Rex gestured to a chair next to Archie and me, and I nodded. He moved so quietly the chair didn’t even creak when he sat down. “They are not in any specific danger that I can sense, but they are not under their own control completely. There is something or someone else within their minds.” His downcast eyes moved from me to Archie. “I would like to help you uncover the truth of the situation you’ve been discussing.”
“What situation?” Archie asked with casual dismissal. “We haven’t been discussing a situation.”
I smiled at the bird. “Vampires have exceptional hearing. It’s quite likely Rex could tell us what the people three houses away are discussing over the dinner table without exerting much effort.” I glanced at the clock and sighed. “Or maybe while they’re brushing their teeth getting ready for bed? Wow, it’s late.”
“For you, perhaps,” Rex said with one of his brief smiles. He turned toward Archie. “Astra is right. I heard every word that the two of you said. I also heard every word they said,” Rex shared as he glanced at my mother and two sisters across the room. They were about as far from the vampire as they could be and still be in the room. “I’m sure that Astra is quite capable, but I know that there is a clock ticking on that woman’s life, and you may be at a disadvantage because of my sister’s condition. You have little police backup without Emma.”
“How are you going to give me police backup?” I asked him.
“I won’t. But I’m not bound by legal rules.” He paused. “That might be useful.”
“Pardon me for saying so, but you’re talking like you know everything going on here.” Rex looked up at me quickly and then dropped his eyes again. His mouth twitched. “Nothing to say?”
“I have certain abilities. Some because I’m a vampire, and some because I am the type of vampire I am. I am aware of what you are, what the owl is. Once I sensed my sister was in trouble, I focused heavily on hearing what was going on around her.” When he spoke, his voice had a toneless quality. He seemed tired.
“Are you telling me that you can use Emma like a spy bug?” I asked him, shocked. Even Archie looked surprised. “You can hear what she hears? See what she sees?”
He nodded. “It’s quite similar to your power. Emma is the only ‘object’ I can see and hear through, and I don’t need to be touching her to do so.” He stopped talking and looked up at me to see how I was taking what he said. “Once there were more, but since I left the organization that turned me, it’s only Emma. And it’s only to ensure her safety.”
In the silence that followed, I asked with a slightly accusing tone: “Does she know this?”
“She knows that we are bonded. Emma is aware of many of my powers.” His mouth snapped open, and his fangs glinted at me in the dim light of the living room. Just as quickly, it closed, and his face melted into impassivity. “She knows what I am.”
“Look, as much as I would like to help, I don’t know you—”
“And as much as I would like to tell you I would stay out of your way? I won’t. My offer was politeness, but that is my sister, and she is in trouble,” he told me, his voice strong and determined. “It would probably be more useful if we work together, but mark my words, Astra Arden, Archimedes—I am going to find who did this to my sister. With or without your assistance.”
I paused and thought of all the reasons working with the vampire was a horrible idea. They couldn’t always be trusted. At times, they would tell the truth in a way that left you with more questions than answers. They could, obviously, be dangerous.
And this wasn’t just a vampire. This was an ex-mafia vampire.
But it was for all those reasons he could be helpful. Hell, just his super hearing might quickly uncover what was going on with Meryl Hawkins.
“Deal,” I told him. He nodded.
I glanced across the room and saw my mother’s eyes blazing with panic.
“By the way,” Archie asked the vampire casually. “How are you able to hear me talk?”
I felt the shock zip through my body like a lightning bolt.
I com
bed my memory for the past several minutes of interaction. I realized the vampire and the owl had been conversing. I saw, heard, observed, and participated in that conversation without ever realizing none of it should be happening.
“No idea,” Rex responded. “Can’t everyone?”
“No. Just the women of this family,” I responded.
“Curious,” the vampire said and shrugged.
“Huh,” Archie added, also shrugging.
The two were masters of understatement.
Chapter Fourteen
I pretended to be oblivious to the sour look on my mother’s face. She pretended to be oblivious to the fact that I would do exactly what I wanted, with or without her input.
Rex was right. We were on a clock, and that clock was ticking down. I took my job seriously—the whole “save someone when a card with a star glowed” thing—but my nerves ratcheted up to a slightly higher level now that Emma was affected by whatever this was.
I glanced over at her. Why the heck was she sleeping?
“She’s peaceful, for now,” Rex assured me.
I glanced at Emma’s brother. He was another reason I was raring to go.
I’d never gotten to use a vampire in an investigation. There were very few employed by the military—vampires aren’t exactly joiners. The ones that signed up were always being deployed on some weird black ops mission the rest of us never heard about. I’d heard rumors that a vampire assistant on a case was a quick solve guarantee. So quick you might even get time off afterward.
“Do you have some plan, Astra?” my mother asked me (in a way that made me think she already knew I did, and she was hoping I would think better of it).
Mom’s expression was easy to read.
She wanted the vampire out of her house and away from her daughters.
Unfortunately for my mother, Rex represented a tantalizing possibility for surveillance, and there was precisely zero chance I’d pass up the opportunity his involvement presented.
I took a deep breath. “I think Althea needs to focus on finding some sort of cure for whatever this is,” I said, waving at Alice and Emma. Althea nodded in response. “Rex and I can make it to the Punktex offices on the outskirts of town within twenty minutes, and then we’ll head back into the swamp. If we stop yammering, he and I should be able to accomplish quite a bit before dawn—”