"How do you like your new phone?" she asked.
I knew she meant the protrepticus, but in the photo line where I wouldn't know coven members from the public at large, such things should not be discussed. I replied cryptically, "I think I have a few bugs to work out."
"Connectivity problems?" she asked.
"It connects to the network all right, just I'm not certain I got the right calling features."
"I hear you."
The frustration in her tone made me feel better about my situation. "That new compact of yours…"
She thought about it and cocked her head as she answered, "I can't begin to tell you how much such a little thing has come to mean to me."
"It's special to you, then?" I wasn't quite getting her meaning.
"Yes. Like an heirloom already. I feel a weighty responsibility about tending it, not physical, mind you. Just mentally."
"I know exactly what you mean."
After we took pictures, Hunter was off to meet and greet others. I found Lydia sitting with a couple dressed as Bo Peep and a sheep at one of the tables. They were an older couple, and it made their matching theme costumes cute. But it made me glad I didn't have to match my costume with anyone. Lydia was dressed in a flannel nightgown and robe, complete with sleeping bonnet. She even had the small wire-rimmed glasses to suit her character. "Is Grandma still looking for Red Riding Hood?" I asked.
"Who's asking?"
"Persephone."
"With your tummy bared! Lord and Lady, I'd never have guessed!" She introduced me to the couple and then made polite excuses that we had business to attend to. As we strolled away she said, "I'm more comfortable tonight in this costume than I have been all week." She even had house slippers on. "And I can go home and go straight to bed."
"There is that," I replied.
"You, on the other hand…" She gestured at me.
"Oh, that reminds me—I want you to loosen this bodice in the back a little. I had to put it on alone and got it too tight."
"Can you breathe?"
"Yeah."
"Then it's not too tight. Besides, you're young enough to enjoy the interest."
"But—"
"What superhero are you, anyway?"
"I thought it was pirate-y."
She gave me the once-over again as we walked. "You were right. About that and about Hunter. I am so pleased I could burst."
"I wouldn't have done this well, Lydia."
She gripped my arm, stopping our strolling. "You have other commitments. If you wanted this like she did, you'd have done better."
I was about to reply, when I felt something. The fine resonance was occurring again, rising up my spine.
Menessos was here.
Chapter 31
Turning to face the entryway, I waited only a moment before he entered the Covenstead and stepped down the foggy walkway. He was dressed as a king, in a copper velvet shirt with a black velvet cape and pants. The crown upon his head was adorned with topaz and onyx, and Goddess help me, it was like Arthur strode into the hall.
I couldn't breathe. My eyes felt dry and refused to blink. My body wouldn't move, not even to flee. The vibrant sensation had wended all through me and was now beginning to converge into the heat of desire. I began to crave his touch.
And then I realized our costumes matched.
I should have known he'd planned it this way.
Lydia followed my gaze and put it together. "He sent you this costume?"
"Most of it, yes." Denying it would have been childish.
She squeezed my arm. "I am so sorry! If I hadn't insisted you participate in the Eximium, he'd never have met you and you wouldn't have to bear his notice now."
"Lydia, it's all right. I just thought—"
"He's a vampire. A dangerous one!"
"I know. Trust me, it's under control." I moved away.
She didn't release my arm. "He'll let you think it is until it's too late."
"Thank you for caring about me, Lydia." I let her see the truth of that statement in my heartfelt smile. It made her grip weaken, disappear. She was surely putting it together, knowing that I had a protrepticus, a connection to Xerxadrea, and that Xerxadrea had a former connection to Menessos. It was the wrong assumption, but based on what she knew, it was a good one that should satisfy her. "I have some work to do while I'm here. I'm sure you understand…"
"Yes. I do now." She didn't seem to like it. "Take care with your work, Persephone."
"I will. Thank you."
When I left her and approached Menessos, Goliath, dressed as a knight in armor that I'd have bet was real and heavy, had joined him. Menessos offered his hand to me as I neared. "No skirt?" He sounded disappointed.
"I don't much care for them." I accepted his warm hand. It surprised me; I expected it to be cool or cold. "Thank you for the bodice and jewelry."
His eyes were locked on my cleavage. "You lend credibility to the theory of euhemerism."
It meant something about the belief that ancient heroes were deified mortals. "Bombastic as ever, Menessos. No mask for yourself?" I asked, reaching to take the mask from my own face. Few others were wearing them.
"Leave it," he said abruptly.
"Why?"
"Because I like it very much." He slipped my hand onto his arm and walked slowly away with me. "Grant me this one indulgence, please?"
"You're not wearing one. Goliath's not."
"True." He didn't elaborate.
"That's a small response. Monosyllabic, even."
"Concupiscence distracts me."
His fancy way of saying he lusted for me reminded me that he was the one with the stain, now. It was his libido that should be amped. Mine was more than libido, though. I felt… powerful in his presence. Like my ego was sexually aroused.
No wonder vampires were so egotistical. In a room full of their stained underlings, they'd feel a rush of invulnerability and confidence. I would have to keep this in mind and not let it rule me.
Time to see who knew what was actually going on. I halted the promenade and pulled away. "Goliath, would you get me a drink, please?"
He glared at me and made no move to do as I asked.
"Bottled water." I did not resign, but waited expectantly.
Menessos whispered, "Goliath."
The knight turned with a sneer. Goliath probably thought I was testing my favor with his master, and for him to have to fetch me a drink would gall him. He didn't realizeI was the master. But Menessos did. And now Menessos knew that I knew.
We spent a long moment, the vampire and I, standing in the Covenstead staring at each other, gauging each other. I kept my shoulders square and my head high as if to say that I would not be manipulated by him.
The protrepticus rang. Thankfully, it was the ringing sound of an old telephone again.
I was not about to answer it here, in front of Menessos—Samson D. Kline's murderer—and certainly not with the chance of Goliath returning.
"Aren't you going to answer?" Menessos asked.
"No."
Just then, I caught movement on the stage. Johnny was removing guitars from cases and putting them in stands. He hadn't passed us, so the band must have access through the south doors.
Hunter stood before the stage, chatting with him. When he finished placing his instruments, he sat on the stage left steps. I watched them talk and trade polite smiles. Hunter moved closer. She put her hand on his knee for an instant as she spoke, then removed it. Flirtatious prep-move.
"Interesting," Menessos said. "Someone's flirting with your wolf, and your pulse hasn't changed at all."
Still watching the stage, Hunter did it again, but this time her hand lingered.
Johnny reached toward her hand and her smile broadened. That is, until he carefully removed her hand and placed it on the stage beside him.
"Excuse me," I said to Menessos.
Hunter had taken the rejection well but found a reason to be on her way as I started cro
ssing the Covenstead. Johnny walked to the front of the stage and turned to check the backdrop and the scene from an audience viewpoint. His arms were crossed over his chest.
Pausing beside him I said, "You patch things with Erik?"
"Theo checked on the contract. You were right."
"If it's what you guys want…"
"He's not sure now that he knows the vampire connection. Feral's not sure either."
"What do you want?"
He turned and took a good look at me as if he hadn't realized I was in costume until then. "Wow." His awareness lingered in my chest area too. "More of what I already had."
My cheeks flushed. "Would you settle for a dozen or so of your remaining kisses?"
"Wanna see my tour bus, little girl?"
After glancing at the front of his pants, I said, "Didn't I already take a ride on your bus?"
He laughed, low and hungrily. "Well, the one parked out back is almost as big."
"Almost?" I laughed.
He grabbed my hand and led me around the stage to the south doors and out. "I stopped at the Rock Hall and retrieved your blazer."
"You did?"
It wasn't a bus, but a box truck that sat with the back open like a black, gaping mouth. "That's what a good boyfriend would do, isn't it?"
"B-boyfriend?"
The Covenstead door clanged shut behind us, and he grabbed me into an embrace. "Yeah," he whispered. His hand was hot on the back of my neck as he held me and kissed me with an intense passion. I felt as if I were melting. When he finally broke away he said casually, "You know, ma'am, I'm eager for the position and I think I'm very qualified to do a satisfactory job."
"Yeah," I said. My semi-molten brain wasn't up to witty rejoinder.
The night was bright with the just-past-full moon to light it and the air was cool as it swirled around us, lifting the cedar and sage smell of him to my nostrils. My ears gave a little pop like a bubble bursting. It reminded me of Aquula's bubble in the grove—
The protrepticus rang again.
Johnny broke off. "You got a cell?" he asked, incredulous.
The ringtone wasn't antique phone this time; it was something else.
"And your ringtone is an old Black Sabbath tune?"
I heard lyrics about fairies wearing boots.
Fairies. Oh Goddess.
Chapter 32
Hearing a muffled scream, I pulled away from Johnny and moved around the box truck. I heard Johnny right behind me.
Beyond the parking lot, in the grass of the Covenstead grounds stood three short, costumed teenagers, and one of them was restraining Beverley, still in her mermaid costume.
They weren't teens. They were fairies.
The brunette male growled as Beverley struggled against him. She almost slipped away, but his slightly elongated fingers stayed fastened over her mouth and he jerked her roughly against him. I saw that his dark vest glinted with gold embroidery as did his breeches. A large jeweled brooch gleamed against a lacey cravat.
The female stepped forward. "We've lost our mermaid. So we took yours." Even in the distorting illumination I could tell her skin was red and her hair a shade of the same. She wore a wreath of tiny flowers in her hair and a gossamer tunic dress that matched her coloring.
"Release her!" I demanded. Johnny, standing just behind my shoulder, gave a low growl.
"Come and make us," the red fairy said.
I didn't exactly know how to stop fairies. My mind blanked.
She answered my hesitation by saying, "Cerebrosus, the honor is thine."
The third fairy, a light-haired male with yellowish eyes that afforded him an air of uncontrollability, stepped up beside the female. He wore breeches with a shirt under a brocade surcoat. He leered at me as she offered him a sheath.
Suddenly, many things happened at once. My mind registered the weapon and Beverley's danger. I started forward. Though running, time seemed to slow, and all sounds became muffled. The yellow-eyed fairy pulled the dagger from the sheath. The southern doors opened behind me… I felt the air current of their movement. I felt Johnny at my heels. I heard Menessos's voice, chanting, loud through the fog that had filled my ears. The yellow-eyed fairy turned and raised the gleaming dagger, ready to strike Beverley.
I was too slow. I could not speed myself up. I would not make it to Beverley in time.
The fairies suddenly blurred toward me, like ink smearing in water. Lines of color slid over the cars separating us.
Beverley fell to the soft grass.
I was there, picking her up. "Beverley, honey, are you okay?" A second later, Johnny was beside us.
"Yes." She hugged me so tightly. "I was so scared. I'm sorry. I'm sorry."
"You have nothing to be sorry for."
"I took it off. The necklace Demeter gave me. I didn't wear it because of my costume. And the fairies took me, just like in the story."
Johnny put his hand on my back and we both sighed with relief.
But it was too soon.
The sounds of fighting came from behind us.
Menessos, Goliath, and Aquula were fighting the three fairies.
Aquula?
And then I understood. Menessos had used his bond with them; he'd called them all to him as if to guard a circle. He'd done it to remove the threat to Beverley.
Aquula's blue tail flipped and caught the red fairy in the jaw, sent her up in the air twenty feet. Wings shot from her back and she laughed, producing another dagger.
"Stay with Beverley," I said to Johnny and was up, running across the lot. Putting the toe of my boot on the fender of a sedan, I charged up and across a car, launching myself into a flip even as the red fairy dove down. From the side, I collided with her. The dagger tumbled from her grip and she crashed into the fairy with the vest and cravat.
"Persephone," Menessos said, giving me a hand up. His crown was missing and his tunic was ripped.
Beyond him, though, I saw the fairy named Cerebrosus bolt away from Goliath to the south doors, and into the Covenstead.
I was moving again, running after him.
Inside, screams and shrieks erupted. I charged around the stage at a run, but pulled up short. This fairy had sprouted wings as well and, fluttering, they held him perhaps fifteen feet above the floor.
Xerxadrea was just arriving and being guided through the entrance aisle. He swooped down to hover in front of her. "Where is it?" he demanded, his hands—yellow, I could now see, as was all his skin—pawing at her robes.
He backhanded her raven, knocked her staff from her hands, and lifted the ancient Eldrenne into the air. She screamed. Her raven fluttered about, pecking and clawing at the fairy, but the fairy twisted Xerxadrea this way and that to block the bird. "Where is it?" he demanded again.
Flying backward toward the stage, Xerxadrea in his clutches, he snarled, "It will be the end of all witches!"
I eased up the stage-left steps.
"Ha!" he said, dropping her even as the stage came under her feet. Lucky for her too. Instead of falling six feet down, it was as if she merely stumbled and fell to her hands and knees.
"Ha, ha! I have it!" he shouted to everyone, shrinking as he spoke. "The end of the witches is at hand! Or is that at handkerchief?" he asked, laughing and waving a black cloth at the throng staring at him.
I darted forward, grabbed the handkerchief, and ran for stage right.
Behind me, the fairy growled angrily, wings flapping to pursue me. Nearing the edge of the stage, though, I remembered here there were no steps like there were on stage left. I went down and slid like a baseball star aiming for home plate. The fairy shot past over my head. I jumped up and ran back across the stage to the steps.
Halfway across, the fairy dropped into my line of sight, flipping head over heels to kick at my face. I ducked to the side, narrowly avoiding his boot; I felt the ankle brush over my earlobe. Fairies wear boots, I thought, even as he grabbed my foot from behind and tripped me.
Rolling with the
momentum, I came up with my shoulder against the tip of one of Johnny's guitars in its stand. It was the wicked-cool axe-shaped one.
Then the fairy was on me. "Give me that cloth!" he demanded. We grappled for it. He was small but superhumanly strong, agile and fast. He yanked on the cloth but I held tight. With my other hand, I punched him in the chest, knocking him back. I used the instant to shove the cloth down into the bodice firmly between my breasts.
He was on me again in a flash. I crossed my arms to block him. Amid a flurry of pinching and grabbing strokes of his hands, I rolled to my stomach and pulled my knees under me. He kicked at my stomach, but wasn't big enough to make it count. He moved to kick at my head but was too late. Having gotten one foot flat on the stage, I pushed up, took a boot to the shoulder, and swung my fist.
He retreated to avoid the strike, then lunged at me. I threw another punch, added a kick. He lunged again, and we repeated our measures. With each lunge he grew a little bigger.
His boot heel hit the corner of my mouth. I tasted blood, but snatched him by the ankle. With a savage jerk, I slammed his back against the stage, wings fanned flat under him. "Stay down!" I commanded, standing over him.
He lay still for a heartbeat or two, then his mouth moved once and an ornate dagger appeared in his grip.
"Don't," I said, kicking at the weapon.
He shrank again, changing the distance needed for my kick to succeed. As my follow-through brought my leg past him, he rolled clear and leapt to the air. The blade glinted in the light. He came after me.
Slicing X shapes in the air, the fairy had me backpedaling across the stage. Hands reaching back, searching for something, I thought if I came up against the amplifiers I'd duck and roll. Instead of amps, my hand found the neck of the axe-like guitar in its stand. My fingers wrapped around it.
The fairy's X-move ended to my left; I ducked to the right, rushing forward and dragging the guitar with me. I righted myself and ran. Again, everything slowed.
I heard the flap of his wings behind me. I heard my breath in my ears.
I ran for the drum riser. In my mind's eye, I could almost see myself one step ahead, see what I was planning an instant before I did it. My foot lifted, one big, slow step directing my motion upward. The fairy gained on me. The next step was slow as well, but it started me across the riser. Two steps and I pulled up short, twisting around, while the guitar in my hand came up.
Hallowed Circle c-2 Page 26