"Impediment! I’m amazed you didn’t need a flashcard to use the word."
"Hey, hey! Assaulting me is one thing, but watch the nasty comments."
She stalked toward me, stake in hand. I became morbidly aware that we had an audience. Besides the vampires hanging onto me with grim determination, there were about twenty more on the dance floor who were staring at us. No help, I figured. They belonged to Monique. Or they didn’t think I was a real queen. Either way, it amounted to the same thing. Well, at least she was still talking, even if she was waving that stake around like a band leader’s baton. Classic James Bond villain mistake. I hoped.
"Waste of resources."
"What? I wasn’t listening."
She gritted her teeth. "I said, I am appalled at the waste of vampires and resources. I should have taken you myself, the moment I came to town. I had no idea you’d be so easy."
"Hey! What’d I say about the nasty stuff?"
"To think I was paying the Blade Warriors to practice, to hone their skills, to work their way up to you. What nonsense! You didn’t really kill Nostro, did you?"
"What?" The abrupt subject change took me by surprise. "Is that why you thought I’d be such a toughie?"
She gave me a withering "of course" look.
"As a matter of fact, I did kill him, so there." Alas, like little George Washington, I could not tell a lie. "Well, sort of. I set the Fiends on him, and they ate him." The Fiends! What I wouldn’t give to see their snarling faces right now. "But listen, Monique. You don’t have to stake me to get Sinclair. You can have him."
"I disagree."
"No, really!" I couldn’t believe this. First he tricked me into boinking him. Then I found out I was his undead little woman for a thousand years. Then he tricked me into boinking him again. Well, sort of. Now this nutty bitch was going to kill me to have him for herself! Oooh, if I lived through this, he was getting a piece of my mind.
A pox on you, Eric Sinclair!
"Seriously. I don’t want him, I never wanted him." Okay, that last one was a small lie. I mean, I wanted wanted him, you know, like you want a juicy steak, but I didn’t want to be married to him, not without him at least asking. Which he never did. Not once. Was that so much to ask? A marriage proposal? I didn’t think so. Not that anybody asked my opinion. Oh, God forbid, anybody should ask my opinion!
"… is devoted to you."
"What?"
"Will you pay attention? In case you haven’t noticed, you’re in dire straits."
"Yeah, yeah. I’ve been there before. Look, we can work this out. Sure, you’re a crazy cow bent on my destruction, but can’t we get along? I mean, if my parents could work things out, anybody can. You can have Sinclair on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, and I—"
She lunged forward with a scream of frustration—I’ll admit I have that effect on people—and buried the stake in my chest. It hurt like a son of a bitch. And then I died. Again.
Chapter 26
FROM the private papers of Father Markus, Parish Priest, St. Pious Church, 129 E. 7th Street, Minneapolis, Minnesota.
Moments too late! I suspect that’s why we were all so slow to react. It didn’t seem real that we hadn’t arrived in time to save the day. The children, especially, had no real experience in failure. The cavalry always arrives in time, at least in the movies.
Jon had followed Betsy all over town, of course—foolish boy, we had all warned him it was hopeless—and something about the club put him on alert. Possibly the way all the vampires waiting outside ran off for no apparent reason. They must have sensed something in the air—shifting allegiences, perhaps. It didn’t matter now.
The important thing was, Jon called us when he got to Scratch. It didn’t take long for us to arrive, in terms of mileage. In terms of time, of course, it took just a few moments too long.
When the woman who had been pulling our strings killed Betsy, it was like all the light went out of the room. Exactly like that. We were so shocked, nobody moved.
And Betsy was still, so still. It seemed ridiculous that those green eyes would never again flash fire, that her red lips would never form the words idiot or moron or asshole ever again.
Then Eric Sinclair, as formidable and frightening a creature as I have met in my long days, just went to pieces. It would have been touching if it hadn’t been so terribly, terribly sad.
He cradled her in his arms and sank to the floor. His coat billowed around them as they fell. He whispered her name, over and over, and caressed her face with trembling fingers, and blocked all of us out.
Our former employer, Monique, tried to explain herself. She could smell death in the air—her own, as well as the Queen’s. We were all standing in silent judgement, but she must have known it wouldn’t last. That we would soon be moved to action. She had been caught out, her true colors revealed at the worst possible moment, and she knew it as well as we did.
It was the usual, tedious motive: she explained that she had coveted Eric, who by vampire law belonged to Betsy. So Monique. had formed the Blade Warriors to get Betsy out of the way.
Was she crazy, I wondered disapassionately, or just driven? Had years of feasting on humans warped her conscience until hiring children to kill her own kind actually seemed like a fine plan? I didn’t know. And at the moment, frankly, I didn’t care.
But she might as well have been speaking to a boulder. Despite her pleadings for his attention, Eric Sinclair simply rocked Betsy in his arms and wouldn’t look up or speak.
Tina, however, had no such compunctions. She was as angered and shocked as any of us, but she was not frozen to inaction. I have long been fascinated by how different vampires are on the outside from their true selves. Tina had always looked like a charming sorority girl to me.
Not tonight.
She led the charge, and in minutes, a vicious fight was raging all around us. I pulled Marc and Jessica behind me—they were too stunned to fight—and held out my cross, but I needn’t have bothered. I could see several of Monique’s minions were slipping out the back, avoiding the fight entirely. Wise of them. Because when Mr. Sinclair recovered his wits, this would not be a good day to be on Monique’s side.
Being human, I of course could not track much of the, fight. It was a physical impossibility. There would be a flash of silver or a blurred fist, and then a vampire’s head would be rolling on the floor, or a body would sail through the air. And the children, as always, acquitted themselves well.
Finally, only Monique was left, and Jon, who had tears in his eyes, pulled his knife and marched toward her. He ignored us, he ignored everything. He swung it back, and I heard him say, "This is for Betsy, you bitch," only to be stopped in mid-swing by Tina’s sharp, "Hold!"
For she had moved with that eerie, inhuman quickness, and was now holding our common enemy at swordpoint—Ani’s sword, in fact—and had an arm out to prevent Jon from getting closer.
Monique had been backed into a corner, and Tina, despite her fragile looks, was formidable. Ani was backing her up, but it appeared to be entirely unnecessary.
"We’ll let the king decide her fate," Tina said, and that was that. Even Jon, heartbroken, could not argue with that command.
I noted much of the heart had gone out of Monique’s group when Eric Sinclair arrived. It made sense, though it was unfair and unkind to dear Betsy. Because if she hadn’t seemed especially royal or noble—although she was, if one cared to take the trouble to really see her—there was never any question of Eric’s right to the throne. And nobody wanted to mess with the most powerful vampire on the planet. Especially when he had just lost his consort to treachery and betrayal.
The last of Monique’s vamps slipped out, and we let them go. We had been woefully outnumbered, and weren’t unaware of the depths of our luck.
While Tina held Monique at bay, the rest of us crouched around Betsy. There was no blood and, as I wrote earlier, the whole thing didn’t seem quite real. She did not look like a dead woman. The
stories were wrong. The movies were wrong. She wasn’t a pile of dust, she wasn’t a wizened mummy. Her eyes were closed, though she had that vertical wrinkle in the middle of her forehead which usually meant she was annoyed. She looked as though her eyes would pop open at any moment and she would demand tea with extra sugar and cream.
After a long moment, Marc, ever the practical physician, asked what we should do. Jon did not answer him, and Tina just shook her head. Monique tried to speak, and stopped when the swordpoint pressed into her throat.
As for the rest of us, we knew it was hopeless. Vampires did not come back after being staked with wood. It was impossible—even those formidable night creatures had to follow their own rules. But none of us had the heart to let Marc and Jessica in on this fact. We were just using this time to begin to recover from the shock.
It had been, as the deaths of all charismatic individuals are, too sudden, too quick. We wanted time to grieve.
Jessica was straightening out Betsy’s bangs, which were quite disheveled, and I could see her tears dripping down on Betsy’s still face.
"Oh, Bets, Bets … it’s not fair. We figured it out. If we’d just been here a minute sooner … we could have saved you! We should have!"
She was young.
"I just can’t do this again," Jessica wept. "I wasn’t supposed to have to go through this anymore with you. You’ve got to stop dying on me!"
"Well, forget it," Marc said abruptly. He put his hand on the stake protruding between Betsy’s breasts. Jon put out a hand to stop him, but Marc shook his head so hard, his own tears flew. "I can’t stand to see her like this, you guys. Like a bug tacked to a fucking board. It’s not right, and I’m not havin’ it."
And, with a wrench and a grunt, he yanked the stake out of her chest.
Betsy’s eyes flew open, which of course, startled everybody.
Chapter 27
I felt a sharp burning in my chest, heard my shirt tear, and opened my eyes to give whoever-it-was a piece of my mind.
"Owwww!" I complained. "Dammit, this is a new shirt!"
There was a thump as Sinclair dropped me. Why he’d been holding me I had no idea—his sneakiness and hidden agendas were boundless. "Elizabeth," he said, and I was startled to see his lips were dead white.
"Owwww again! What’d you do that for?" I rubbed the back of my head. "What are you guys all staring at? You’re freaking me out." And they were! I was looking up at a moon of faces, and every one of them had their mouths hanging open. I was afraid if I stayed where I was, I’d get drooled on.
"Buh," Jon said.
"Yeah, okay. What happened? Where’s that sneaky cow, Monique? Oooh, she’s toast! Did you guys know she was the bad guy? She totally is! She tricked me into coming and partying with her. Except some party—she staked me in the chest. I mean, who does that? And it hurt like hell! And what took you guys so long? Why am I lying on this disgusting floor? Sinclair, help me off this floor right now."
"Buh," Jon said again. Not sure what the boy’s problem was, but right now I had bigger fish to fry.
"You’re alive!" Jessica blurted. "Again."
"Look at this hole in my shirt," I complained. "Does she think cotton grows on trees? Wait a minute. It does, doesn’t it? Or does it grow on bushes? Either way, I … mmph!" I beat at Sinclair’s shoulder until he stopped kissing me. "Dude! Time and place, okay? Now let me up."
He hauled me to my feet and Jon threw his arms around me, which made me stagger. Then Sinclair peeled him off me and started making that peculiar growling noise again, and Jon sort of bristled back, and Jessica snapped at them both to cut the shit, but I didn’t care because I spotted Monique, who was backed up in a corner and had a sword at her throat, courtesy of my new best friend, Tina.
"Ha!" I said, yanking the stake away from Marc, who let out a yelp and then pulled a splinter out of his palm. "Stake me in the chest, willya? And you ruined my shirt."
I marched over to Monique, who managed to look amazed, scared, and pissed, all at the same time. "False queen," she said defiantly as Tina stepped away. Made me sort of nervous. I kind of wished that the sword was still pointing at my nemesis du jour. "You’ll never rule."
"Tsk, tsk. Someone skipped her Book of the Dead bible lessons. Apparently I am ruling. It’s just, losers like you didn’t get the memo."
"You’re talking too much," she said. "You always do."
"Awww, that hurts, Monique! It gets me right here." I touched the gaping hole in my shirt. "Where’s the love? Say, while I’m thinking about it, you dropped something over there." I hefted the stake. "I think I’ll give it back. If you don’t mind."
"You don’t have the—urk!"
"Oh, gross!" Jessica cried, turning away.
"Sorry," I said, stepping back and surveying the staked Monique with—I admit it—not a little bit of satisfaction. "What can I say? Death is messy. And she had it coming." I tried not to sound as whiney and defensive as I felt.
Because she did have it coming. For what she made the Blade Warriors do to all those other poor vamps, never mind what she did to me. Let her explain herself to the devil, if she could. I didn’t care.
"Nicely done," Sinclair commented. He was looking a little better—not so deathly pale (for him)—which was a relief. And he wasn’t growling at Jon like a rabid bear anymore.
"I wanted to do it," Jon pouted.
"It was sort of my job," I explained. "You can kill the next evil vampire serial killer."
"Oh." He visibly perked up. "Okay. I’m glad you’re not dead for real."
"Me, too," Marc and Jessica said in fervent unison.
"Yeah, um, what’s up with that? Monique’s not going to come back like I did if I take that stake out, is she?"
"Of course not," Tina said, sounding shocked. "No one ever does. I mean … besides you. No one has ever …" She trailed off and shook her head, looking mystified, which for someone that smart, was a pretty rare thing.
"And that’s interesting, isn’t it?" Sinclair asked.
"Interesting," Jessica said, still looking a little green around the gills, "is so not the adjective I’m thinking right now." She shook a finger under my nose. "You … you …" She didn’t have to say any more. I could tell she had been through hell again.
He ignored her. "I don’t believe the Book of the Dead mentioned just how … unkillable … Elizabeth seems to be."
"Well." I shrugged. "You know. Hard to keep a good woman down, and all that."
"Particularly now," he said dryly, "with all your new possessions."
"What?"
"By our law, when you kill one of us, their possessions become yours."
"No way. Really? What about their families?"
"Vampires don’t have families," Tina explained patiently. "Except for you, apparently. Didn’t you wonder why Nostro’s house never sold? It’s yours."
"Sweet! First Sarah’s Armanis, now this! Did you see Monique’s Porche? Mine, all mine!" I stopped, because Marc and Jessica were giving me funny looks. "I mean, not that I killed her just to get the car, or anything." That was just a sweet, sweet bonus.
"No," Tina said, giving me a funny look of her own, "but I think that’s the story we’ll spread."
"How come?"
"We’ll have to," Sinclair said, "until you work up some ruthlessness. Otherwise, this problem will keep coming up. Others will assume you’re an easy kill, and will try for your crown."
"Who cares? She’s obviously unkillable."
"Nobody is," Father Markus objected. "Not even Christ."
"Besides, I’m plenty ruthless," I protested. "I killed two vampires this week! And I put the milk back last night when there was just a tiny bit left."
"That was you?" Marc asked.
"Although …" I nibbled my lower lip, thinking. "I didn’t kill Mr. Mason, and I sure should have."
"Mason? Your supervisor at Macy’s?"
"Yeah, he’s Monique’s evil minion! He totally set me up. Fired my ass,
then tipped her off so she could scoop me up like a minnow in a bait shop. Jerk."
"Really." Sinclair’s eyes went flat. "Elaborate." He made me tell him the whole story, and then he took me over it one more time. Everyone was appropriately outraged on my behalf. It was great!
"I can’t believe your boss tried to kill you, too," Jessica said. "I mean, I know they’re trying to keep the unemployment rate down, but that’s ridiculous."
"Most people think their bosses are out to get them. But mine really was! Eh, never mind him … now what? I mean, besides changing my shirt. This is just"—I looked down at myself—"yech."
"We have much to discuss," Sinclair announced.
"You’re right about that," Tina said, looking disturbingly fervid. "What does this mean? For all of us, and for our queen?"
"It will make for some fascinating additions to my papers," Father Markus admitted. He looked like he could hardly wait to sit down at a desk and write. Bo-ring.
"Majesty, you’re with us again! Unprecedented! And—"
"Look, you two … I realize you can’t help being total buzz kills, but we’re not having any big panel discussion tonight. It’s Friday, I’ve shrugged off death’s clammy embrace—"
"Again," Ani said.
"—and I want to dance!"
"I could use a drink," Jessica admitted, "or five."
"Me, too," Marc chimed in. He wiped sweat off his forehead. He and Jessica still looked really rattled. "It’s really stressful, watching you come back from the dead."
"I’m sorry," I said humbly. "It’s been a bad week for everybody, I guess."
"No more of this getting killed crap," Jessica ordered.
"Hey, it’s not exactly fun for me, either! It’s not like I’m doing it for the attention." There was an annoying, pointed silence. "I’m not!"
"Where are you going dancing?" Ani asked.
"Nowhere you can get in," Jessica said shortly. "This is strictly a roommates-of-Betsy unwinding thing."
"I’m a roommate of Betsy," Sinclair said mildly.
"I guess we could go to Gator’s," I said. Then the horrible words sunk in. "What ?"
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