Blood Trade

by Faith Hunter

  Crap. Bruiser had taken the room next to mine.

  Bruiser, who had betrayed me.

  Icy heat flushed through me from the soles of my feet to the top of my scalp. I had to stop and swallow down the acidic fury. The memory of being held down as Leo and his heir— My breath stopped in my throat as the remembered pain flashed through me again, the feel of fangs tearing through my throat, ripping, cutting; none of the painkilling, laving tenderness of a true feeding, but the torment of a forced feeding. Tears filled my eyes and one hand lifted to my throat to rest there, my pulse pumping hard beneath my fingers. “You let him force a feeding from me.”

  Bruiser’s eyes were hard and hot with some emotion I couldn’t name, some strange combination of anger and self-loathing and unknown purpose. But he didn’t say anything; he just stood there, leaning against the counter, his gaze penetrating.

  “I know we’ve talked about this,” I said. “I know I should just be able to forgive and forget. But I still remember. Every time I see you, I remember.”

  He didn’t move. He scarcely breathed. Waiting for something I didn’t understand.

  “I know,” I said, my throat growing tight and painful with unshed tears, “that you were blood-drunk. I realize that you were dead and the priestess brought you back to life and that assuming command of your own mind after something like that must be nearly impossible. I truly understand that you had no control. But still . . . you let it happen. You were there. Letting them . . .” I took a breath that ached all the way into my lungs, “letting them hurt me.”

  Stupid tears rolled out of my eyes and slid down my cheeks. Burning. I caught them on the back of my hand and wiped them on the towel. My fingers were shaking and colder than they should have been on my hot face. I opened my mouth, taking in a breath, scenting the man before me, a tangy scent, prickly and warm, the color of sunlight on sand in Beast’s mind. My big-cat was staring at Bruiser through my eyes, watching him like prey. Silent, she nudged me, and I said, “You have to say something now. I’m done.”

  His jaw bunched and relaxed, bunched and relaxed. A soft plop of water hit the drain from the showerhead. Bruiser opened his mouth. “I would—” He stopped and took a slow breath. His hands tightened on the marble, fingers whitening before he relaxed. “I would give,” he said, his voice rough, “everything I am to keep you from being hurt. And that includes my freedom.” I didn’t reply, and another drop fell, measuring the silences between us.

  “Freedom?” I asked. How does a blood-servant get freedom? Bruiser shrugged, his steam-damp shoulder moving stiffly. He went on more softly, “I remember, in my nightmares, the feel of your body.” I took a sharp breath, loud in the silence. “My hands holding you still. I remember the fear and the shock of being unable to move. Being frozen. I couldn’t stop them.” He shifted on the counter, putting one hand back flat against the marble. “I couldn’t stop myself. I was totally, completely under compulsion. For that I deserve for you to hate me. But I—”

  He stopped again and raked his fingers through his hair, making it stand up straight and spiked, damp from the steam. “But it seems no matter what I do, I’m treading on your pain. As now. I am here because Leo sent me.”

  I didn’t gasp or drop my towel, but whatever crossed my face made his mouth wrench to the side. He looked at the floor, his hair curling in the steam. Speaking to the tiles, he said, “I’ll never keep anything from you, Jane. Even when it may be uncomfortable. Painful.” Seconds went by. The shower dripped, loud in the silence.

  I shuddered out a breath, feeling my throat relax just a hair, just a hint. A tear fell across my cheek, but this one felt different. No longer hot and burning. “Why did Leo send you?”

  “He hired you in New Orleans for a job none of us could do. And you did that job, even when it meant killing his son. In his own way, he respects that. Before he sent me here, Leo said, ‘Jane Yellowrock has a propensity for luck.’” The words were stilted, a perfect mimic of Leo. He went on, imitating the MOC. “‘She looks for the truth, no matter how unappetizing, and uncovers it, much like a muckraker or a gravedigger, but one who carries a stake and knows how to use it.’” Bruiser chuckled, but there was no humor in the sound.

  “When he heard that Mithrans were changing shape in Natchez, Leo arranged to get you involved. Some of his people told Hieronymus about you.”

  Silently, everything began to click into place. Some of his people . . . Like Reach. Son of a gun. “He couldn’t just up and send me himself. That would imply that he forgave Hieronymus, which isn’t the fanghead way, not without a lot of bowing and scraping and pleading on Big H’s part, but he could make sure things were okay in his territory.”

  Bruiser nodded. “Politics.”

  “I hate politics. And vamp politics more than most.” I stared at the primo until his eyes lifted from the floor to me. “Can I ask questions?” I asked.

  “I presume that you mean something more along the line of an interrogation.”

  “Pretty much. But I need to get dressed.”

  “I like you the way you are.”

  The last of the pain seemed to ease away at his amused tone, and I said, “Tough. Give a girl some privacy. “

  Bruiser shrugged and left the bathroom, letting in colder air before he shut the door. I shivered hard and clutched the damp towel. I went to my own room and was dressed in thirty seconds, my T-shirt sticking to my damp skin. I was braiding my hair when the primo entered my room from the bath. He was wearing a dress shirt with a subtle pattern in the weave and the dress pants, wrinkled from the steam. He stopped in the doorway and stood there, watching, as my fingers twisted and tugged my wet hair, saying nothing, his face as impassive as a vamp’s. For reasons I didn’t understand and didn’t want to explore, I didn’t ask what he was thinking.

  “Twenty questions,” he reminded me.

  “Tell me what you mean about having freedom.”

  “What else do you want to know?” he murmured. He shoved the covers out of the way and sat on my bed. The action was odd, as if it was summertime and the comforter was hot.

  “Months ago, we were fighting vamps here in Natchez. I finished off mine, and you finished off yours, and I said something. I don’t remember what. But you whirled on me, swords out. And you didn’t recognize me. At all.”

  “What else?” he asked, his face taking on an intrigued attentiveness. “What else do you want to know?”

  “Why has your scent changed?” I swallowed at the shift in his eyes as something feral stared back at me. “What are you?” I finished, whispering. Knowing that was the question he had been waiting for.

  CHAPTER 15

  You’re a Gun Whore

  He did that brow-tilt thing, only one brow going up, quizzically. It was something I had tried in the mirror, but it seemed the ability to lift a single brow was innate, not learned. “All of your questions have a single answer. Have you heard the term Onorio?” he asked.

  I shook my head and slid into the chair by the bed. We were close enough that our knees brushed before I drew my legs into the chair and pulled the discarded comforter over me. He said, “It means ‘honored one’ or ‘honored freeman.’” When I still said nothing, Bruiser said, “An Onorio is a revered and honored status among blood-servants, but few who attempt the position survive. Most end up dead or turned and chained. I was one of the lucky few, and only because I was mostly dead through it all.”

  I remembered when he had died, his skin so pale and gray. And when the priestess lay across his body, naked and drinking. “The priestess drank. And then she fed you.”

  “Yes. To keep me alive. That amount of ancient blood fed to a blood-servant begins a transformation, but doesn’t necessarily finish it. In my case, it stopped just before I was turned. Onorio status means I have many of the skills and gifts of the Mithran, but few of the drawbacks. I’ll be younger for much longer. I’ll be faster. I can see in the dark nearly as well as a vampire.”

  Understandin
g beat its way into me. “Onorio. You mean like a Renfield?”

  He laughed, the sound not particularly lighthearted. “Sometimes fiction writers get it right. Sometimes not. And sometimes only nearly so. Yes, we’ve been called Renfields, the special servants of the undead. And I will live a long, long time. Perhaps as much as three more centuries.”

  “You’re hot, in an old, cold house. Even with my skinwalker metabolism, I’m chilled.” I knew two other blood-servants who had higher-than-human body temperatures. “Grégoire’s B twins, his primos, are they Renfields? Because they’re the longest-lived servants I know of.”

  Bruiser tilted his head to me, the gesture oddly and uncomfortably like Leo’s. “Yes. Brandon and Brian went through the process over a hundred years ago and both survived. They are the only other Onorios whom I know. If I tell you that Renfield is a derogatory word, will that only make you use it more often?”

  “Probably. Once, a long time ago, you said something about there being a way for you not to drink. For you not to be bound.” He had also said it was a way for us to be together, but I didn’t repeat that part. “Was it this Renfield thing?”

  “Yes. I had thought many times about trying for Onorio status.” He shifted on the bed, leaning forward and taking my hand. His skin was feverishly hot. “I can share my thoughts and will and power with someone I bond with, much like a master vampire does with a primo blood-servant, but without the actual servitude. And, best, I have to drink only once or twice a year to maintain my status, and then from any Mithran. I am free of Leo. If I wish to be.”

  “Sooo, why didn’t you do it sooner?”

  “All blood-servants think about it at some time or another. It is a powerful position among the Mithrans. And we think about requesting that we be turned. But there is danger in either process.”

  “Yeah. Ten years of insanity, chained in the basement,” I teased.

  “The devoveo is a rite of passage,” he said, amused.

  “The devoveo is a time when the vamp disease makes humans go insane, reworks a human’s body and brain into something new—” I stopped, remembering the insectoid movement of the Naturaleza that Eli and I had tried to kill.

  “Son of a gun,” I said, thinking, trying to put it together. “The Naturaleza here have been twice transformed. They got turned the first time; then they started drinking their fill, which made them stronger and faster and harder to kill, better at healing. Then they got the vamp plague.” I narrowed my eyes, trying to bring it all into focus. It was here. The answer of what had happened to the supervamps was here. “And then someone started including magic powered by a full witch circle, and that did something more, probably something unexpected, and now they’re transforming into something else. It’s all connected somehow.” It felt right. But there were still puzzle pieces missing, important stuff I needed to know, stuff that might help me kill supervamps and find Misha. Flying by the seat of my pants usually endangered only me. This time other people were in danger and I didn’t like the feeling of responsibility.

  A knock sounded at the door, two soft taps. “Up and at ’em, Legs,” Eli said. “We got vamps to behead.”

  “I’m up,” I called out. “I’ll be ready shortly.”

  “Yeah, well, don’t get all gussied up. It’ll be a bloody night.” He moved on down the hall.

  “Jane?” Bruiser rolled off the mattress and to his feet, once again watching me with that intensity, unexpected and unnerving. “I can’t join you hunting.” He placed a chaste kiss on the back of my hand. “I have other duties. Be safe.”

  With no other words, he disappeared back through the bath into his room. Leo-type duties, I assumed. He might not be bound to the MOC, but he was still employed by the chief fanghead.

  Alone in my room, I pulled my braided hair into a fighting queue and dressed in vamp-fighting gear. I’ve worn lots of different things when fighting vamps, from nightclothes and flip-flops—total accident—to full-on, high-impact, plastic motorcycle armor secured into my leathers. With the new vamps, I’d need all the good stuff.

  I started from the skin out with the silver-over-titanium chain-mail collar Leo Pellissier had given me to replace the one lost in his service. It clasped in place over the gold nugget and mountain lion tooth on the doubled gold chain. I’d bought the chain before the price of gold soared so high. I couldn’t have afforded it at today’s prices. I unrolled and donned the silk-knit long johns that were perfect for hot, sweat-generating sports in cold weather, and laid out the now-tight leathers.

  I inserted the flexible plastic into the specially made slits at elbows, knees, and my own customized areas: inner elbow, back of knee, and groin—places vamps wanted to drink from. The plastic on the inside joints had to be very pliable, and so, while it wasn’t very thick, it was filled with silver foil set into the plastic when it was poured. I pulled on the skintight leather pants and a fleece top before lacing on my combat boots. I zipped up my pants and stomped the boots hard before starting the arduous procedure of weaponing up.

  I carried thirteen crosses, all silver, all tucked away into pouches or under my jacket so the silver glow that alerted me that a vamp was near didn’t alert them that I was near. Crosses worked on vamps when other forms of religious icons didn’t, because vamps had been created with the wood of the three crosses of Calvary. It had been an act of black magic that went wrong. And didn’t it always?

  Three throwing knives were in sheaths specially made into the jacket front. Thirteen ash stakes and thirteen silver ones, each about fourteen inches long went into various loops and sheathes, ready at hand no matter how my body might be positioned, the sharpened tips either pointing away from my body or into the plastic protection of the body armor. Five fighting blades came next: the newest vamp-killer I strapped to my left hip for a cross-draw that resembled a sword draw in many ways; a blade into each boot sheath, one into my holster harness, and one in a spine sheath in the back seam of my jacket—a last resort draw that meant I was in major trouble.

  The weapons harness was custom, and not the easiest thing in the world to put on, so I laid the harness out on the bed beside the jacket with the weapons: four semiautomatics—two nine millimeters, two .380s with red polymer grips—each with its holster, in the proper spot on the straps. Each weapon got a thorough look-see; I pulled back on the slide and removed the round from the chamber, ejected the magazine, and inspected the weapon for any visible problems. I saw none, at which point I reinserted the magazine and chambered a round. To make sure I had maximum firepower, I ejected the magazine again, reloaded the ejected round, snapped the mag home, and put the safety on. It was just dumb to run around with a chambered round and the safety off. I’d done it before, of course. But it was dumb. Each weapon got the same treatment. All four weapons were perfect, though all of them would be due for disassembly and cleaning soon. Like in the morning, after a night spent firing them. I holstered the semiautomatic pistols with regular ammo on the right, and the weapons with silver-based ammo on the left.

  The Benelli M4 Super 90 slid into the spine sheath for an overhand draw. The M4 wasn’t beautiful to anyone but a gun lover. Its steel components had a matte black, phosphate-treated, corrosion-resistant finish that reduced the weapon’s visibility during night operations, like tonight. I didn’t know how well the new vamps saw in the dark, but it had been impressive last time. I’d have to think of a new term for them—not supervamps, which made them sound like a good thing, but more like vamp squared, or snake vamps, or maybe spidey vamps. “Yeah,” I muttered. “Spidey vamps tweak my spidey senses.”

  The shotgun was nearly idiot-proof, requiring little or no maintenance, and operated in all climates and weather conditions. It can fire twenty-five thousand rounds of 2.75- and 3-inch shells of differing power levels without any operator adjustments and in any combination, using standard ammunition or well-made, hand-packed rounds, without replacing any major parts. The smoothbore, magazine-fed, semiauto shotgun had been a big
investment, and I had studied long and hard before putting my money down. It was a modern weapon, utilizing the autoregulating gas-operated—ARGO—firing system, with dual gas cylinders, gas pistons, and action rods for increased reliability. It can fire and can be adjusted or fieldstripped totally without tools. It’s perfect for close-in fighting in low-light operations. Even after all these months, I thought it was a totally cool weapon. Mostly, though, I just liked the fact that it was idiot-proof.

  The M4 was loaded for vamp with hand-packed silver fléchette rounds made by a pal in the mountains. Fléchettes were like tiny knives that when fired spread out in a widening, circular pattern, entering the target with macerating, deadly force. The fact that each fléchette was composed of sterling silver decreased their penetrating power but made them poisonous to vamps, even without a direct hit. There was no way a vamp could cut all of them out of his body before he bled out or the silver spread through his system. Well, until now, when they seemed to heal despite the silver in them. I opened the cock, inspected each round with eye and nose. Closed it and murmured, “Lock and load.”

  I slid it into the sheath and opened my door. Eli was leaning against the far wall, spine and one foot on the wall, arms hanging loose and ready. He was dressed for vamp fighting in gear that resembled mine, no matter that he’d refused not that long ago to wear leather. It looked good stretched across his shoulders, his scar rising from the high collar and snaking up his jaw. “Took you long enough,” he said. “Painting your toenails?”

  “You waited three minutes, give or take, while I did a weapons check,” I said.