by Faith Hunter
Reach had known or guessed Leo’s secrets and had given them up to Peregrinus. And this one secret had gotten humans killed.
Leo had done this. Gotten an old lady across the street from me killed. Gotten three construction workers killed. A cop killed. So many dead because of this secret. “Did you know he was down there?”
“No,” she said, her voice expressionless. “As far as I know, no one knew but Leo, his pet priestess, and his Mithran lovers.” She left the room and closed the door behind her.
The pet priestess and Leo’s Mithran lovers: Bethany, Katie, and Grégoire. “Well,” I said to the empty room. “That sucks. Too bad Leo didn’t stay dead one of the times I killed him recently.” Now I might have to kill him true-dead myself, and not stop at a simple staking.
This was Leo’s fault. All of it was Leo’s fault. Leo’s and Reach’s.
I stretched out my other leg and curled the pillow back around my middle as I thought about the thing on the wall in the basement, trying to remember what I had seen in the timeless moments while I was in the bubble, hanging in midair, and afterward when I was busy getting killed by Derek.
The thing had been male. Crucified to an old brick wall with silver stakes. The wall had been slashed repeatedly by his talons, which were more like the Wolverine’s blades than most vamp claws. The damaged wall had shown some kind of metal, tarnished in the candlelight—metal studs, maybe. Black-magic items—pocket watches—had been hanging on the Son’s body. Scraps of clothes. Body was mostly dried flesh, looking mummified. Eyes glittering and focused on me.
The black-magic watches contained pieces of the iron spike of Calvary, of Golgotha. The crosses of Golgotha had been used to make the thing that hung on the wall, in a black-magic ceremony.
Now Leo wanted the spike. So did the EuroVamps, who were really the earliest vamps created by the Sons of Darkness. Sooo . . . what did the iron from the spike do to the Sons? To the Son in the dungeon?
There were a lot of negatives and dangers to being turned by a vamp. Sunlight could burn them. Lack of blood could starve them. The devoveo—the years of insanity humans went through after being turned—had to be lived through, and if they didn’t come out of the devoveo sane, then they were put down like rabid dogs. Then there was the delore—the insane grief they went through when one of their loved ones died. The lack of stability that only emotionally stable blood-servants brought to a vamp. Blood-thirst. Lots more.
Though the Mithrans hadn’t yet found a cure for the long-chained—the scions stuck in the devoveo—the Sons of Darkness had parleyed with the Anzû to keep their progeny sane from the delore, by feeding them sips of Anzû blood. It had worked. What did Gee DiMercy—the only Anzû in Leo’s territory—know about the dungeon’s only prisoner? He clearly hadn’t known about the arcenciels being around.
Not so long ago, Leo had said that the Sons of Darkness had ordered the Mithrans of the Americas to make peace with the Cursed of Artemis—the werewolves and other were-creatures. That order would have been impossible to give with a Son of Darkness chained in the basement. So where did the order to parley with the were-community come from? Leo? The other Son? The European Council like the news media said? I hated vamp politics.
Even a future parley with the witches was now suspect. Was the order to reach rapprochement with the New Orleans witch coven because Leo needed the blackened prisoner and some witch magic to accomplish . . . what? Crap. I had no idea.
Anger raced under my skin, burning, hot, like acid eating away at me. So many dead. Hurt. Damn vampire secrets. Damn Leo Pellissier. But I could kill him later. For now, I had a deadly puzzle to figure out.
In the basement, we had a kidnapped Son of Darkness. Leo was playing political games with the lives of humans and of his people. Black-magic pocket watches containing parts of a magical item that Leo was looking for were resting on the Son’s body. And a werewolf who had been touched by an angel, had bitten the thing chained to the wall, and was running through the city with a mouthful of the Son of Darkness’ blood in him. I had to wonder what the bite would mean to the werewolf.
Oh—and the Devil was dead, along with Batildis, which could only tick off Peregrinus. Though he had taken their bodies with him. Could he bring them back to life, a human with no throat and a vamp cut in two?
And the arcenciel hatchling was still in Peregrinus’ possession. Soul was going to be really ticked off with me. After Bethany had said the arcenciel would be solid, I had expected to see the baby dragon, maybe held prisoner by Peregrinus via some arcane means. Or maybe with jesses and a hood, the way people trained raptors to hunt. I wasn’t sure what I had seen in the basement, about the arcenciel. It was all confused.
I also wasn’t sure what I was going to tell Soul, and she didn’t seem the patient, understanding type, not when she was in light-dragon form.
The weirdness was in overlays and none of it was going to be good. Nothing was ever good in the land of the blood-suckers. It was always FUBAR from beginning to end.
I laid my head back and studied the painting on the ceiling of Del’s bedroom. All that was missing was satyrs and images of torture to make it perfectly weird. I let my eyes trace the feathered wings of an angel as I tried to remember what else I knew about the Sons of Darkness. Something the other priestess, Sabina, had said months ago. Sabina was way more sane than Bethany, but she had lost her humanity centuries ago too. She had told me that the eldest Son of Darkness had visited, a century ago, and had failed to rise one night. Yeah. That was it. Leo and Sabina entered his lair together, and the place had stank of violence and blood—of the Son’s holy life blood, or so she had said, and the blood of someone or something else. That blood had been splattered on the walls. Had that blood been Bethany’s? Had she brought Joses to Amaury Pellissier, the previous MOC? Or to Leo? The century timeline could work either way, but there had to be way more to the story, in order for the missing Son of Darkness to end up a prisoner in Leo’s basement.
Sabina and Leo had hidden the evidence. Reach had guessed or figured it out. Now everyone knew that Joses was here. Del was right. It would mean war with the EuroVamps, unless I could figure out a way to stop it.
Overhead, the lights flickered and the room went black. Which was the first time I noticed that I was in an internal room, one with no windows, one a vamp could stay in twenty-four/seven. And Leo and Del and been getting frisky, if my memory served. I sniffed the pillow again to be sure, but I didn’t smell Leo. They hadn’t spent frisky time here, which relieved me in ways I hadn’t expected. The lights came back on and the distant sound of generators went off. Power had been restored.
I rotated to my feet and groaned my way out of the room. I found the stairs and limped down to the locker room to clean up and change clothes, coming to a few conclusions. We needed several things: a full debrief, to find Brute, and to figure out where the arcenciel was in all the hullabaloo—still with Peregrinus, or escaped? We needed to know where Bethany had gone with the missing people. It was gonna be a long night.
I was on the stairs when I realized that Bruiser hadn’t shown up. I pulled my cell. Communications were up and I had three text messages. Eli’s said, Heading back to vamp HQ. W alive in hospital. Edmund feeding healing him. Alex’s said, Gimme call. Got info. Bruiser’s said, On the way. Be safe.
That text was more than an hour old, but so far as I knew, he hadn’t shown. I texted him back. Call me. And then texted the Kid to track his cell. Bruiser’s text was the one that mattered most.
• • •
I was in the shower when I felt cool air whoosh into the room. I shut off the water with one hand and simultaneously picked up the nine-mil. There was one in the chamber, ready to fire. The Judge was on the tiled ledge beside me, next to the shampoo.
“It’s me, Legs. We need to chat.” It was Derek. Who had disappeared, chasing after Peregrinus. Or helping him escape? I had to wonder whether he was in his right mind or whether he’d been rolled by a vamp who
had managed to seize Grégoire, Leo, Katie, and all of vamp HQ in one night.
“Yeah?” I asked, not willing to throw back the shower curtain to see him. Knowing that if he wanted me dead, he could have already fired. I had no place to run anyway. But mostly not wanting to be naked in front of Derek. I took the weapon in a two-hand grip and spread my feet, balanced and ready. “Tell me something only we know. So that I’ll know it’s you talking through your mouth and not some foreign vamp who’s made you his.”
“You wore a party dress the first time I saw you take down a fanghead. You told me you had a magic charm to track down suckheads, but we both know you was lying.”
I chuckled.
“Also,” Eli said, “he’s got me, with a gun about three inches from his spine.”
Not again, I thought, but feeling relieved. “You boys have got to learn to play together.”
“Too close, Ranger boy. I’d take you—”
“And you’d sit in a chair the rest of your life. So go ahead. Make my—”
“Go away!” I yelled. I turned the water back on and set the gun aside. They could play Ranger versus SEAL on their own time. I still had things to think through. And one of those was, why was I always the only female in the ladies’ room? Was I so terrifying and creepy that all the other female security personnel who used this locker room made themselves scarce when I was here? It was kinda weird.
• • •
Once I was dressed, I read my new texts and sent several, one to tell the Kid I was headed into the security conference room. He’d know what to do. The guys were waiting outside the locker room door when I emerged, holding up opposite walls. Eli had an abrasion on his cheek that hadn’t been there the last time I saw him, and Derek was nursing a bloody lip. “Idiots.” I shook my head and asked Eli to run an errand for me, fast. He nodded and took off. I asked, “Your men?”
Derek’s face turned down, the lines beside his mouth making him look far older. “Red Dragon and Antifreeze are down for rehab. Trash Can and Acapulco are both dead.”
He didn’t want sympathy. I didn’t know what he wanted, but sympathy wasn’t it. I kept my eyes emotionless, but let my mouth turn down in acknowledgment of his loss. “I’d like to go to the services,” I said. “Anything I can do for the families, please let me know.”
He nodded once, a severe, clipped gesture, and I lifted a finger pointing to the conference room. Derek followed me down the hall into security, and I felt him behind me, more so than heard him. He moved as silently as a hunting big-cat.
If he had been rolled, then I could be a target, though I could tell by his body scent that he wasn’t fighting anything; nor was he overly, abnormally calm. He smelled like himself after exercise, and he also smelled angry, but it was normal, human “It isn’t fair” kind of angry, combined with a little “I need to hit something” angry. He stepped up beside me, our shoulders brushing. But his scent changed as we walked, a hint of adrenaline, an increase of testosterone. It smelled like a dominance thing, the scent telling me that the person he wanted to hit was me.
I could take him if he attacked. Most likely, I could. Probably. Maybe. Most days. Maybe not right now with my belly feeling like . . . “You shot me,” I said, casually.
From the corner of my eye, I saw the satisfaction flit onto his face, as he said, “Yeah. Sorry about that.” But he didn’t sound sorry. His voice went harder, colder. “Leo instructed me not to call in the cops for our DBs. He says it’s too dangerous for us to let any more humans in here.”
I suddenly understood all the mixed signals he was giving off. I moved to the side of the hallway and stopped again, turning to him. I put a hand on his arm, feeling the rigid, corded muscles there. His black eyes glittered in his dark-skinned face, but he stared into the distance. “I’m sorry about your men,” I said. “I’m so very sorry.”
“Vodka Sunrise was injured, but had enough life to be turned. He’ll be an insane suckhead for ten years, but he’ll be alive, if you call that living.” Sunrise had lost a tooth in Leo’s service not so long ago. He was good people. All Derek’s men were good people. I could smell Derek’s conflict, his anger, his grief, and I tightened my fingers on his arm, letting a bit of Beast into my grip. It had to hurt, but he didn’t meet my eyes. I understood that too. I wasn’t human. I was one of the monsters. And I hadn’t reacted with anger when one of the monsters had said no human law enforcement involvement. I was getting in deep. Too deep? How deep did I have to get to be happy that Sunrise had been turned instead of dying? “We’ll honor their sacrifice. Your men and me. And right now, I honor their sacrifice.”
I closed my mouth with a soft snap. I didn’t have time for this, but I also didn’t not have time for it. I shoved my conflict down deep inside and shook his arm until he looked at me. “In the ways of The People, the War Woman was responsible for restitution and revenge after battle. I am War Woman.” His eyes widened slightly and his scent changed, though I couldn’t tell what the pheromones meant, except more confusion. “I promise you the right to choose how our enemy will die. If you choose, then for each man true-dead, I will cause our enemy to scream until he can’t scream anymore. I will let him heal. And I’ll make him scream again for the next man. For the men turned, I’ll bring them a cup of his still-warm blood to drink. If you choose this, the death of the one we hunt will not be clean or easy.”
Derek’s head went up, his mouth hard. “You’re asking me to let you torture a man.”
“No. I’m asking what you want done.”
“Clean death,” he spat. “I’m not a monster.”
I smiled, and knew it was bitter. “No. You aren’t. And for that I’m thankful.”
He blinked several times, then said, “You don’t want to . . . do what you said.”
“I really, really don’t. But for you, to honor your men, to remember your men, I would have.” I let a small smile soften my face. “The last time I counted coup—to use a word not of The People—I was five years old and my grandmother put the knife into my hand.” Derek’s scent changed again, this time taking on a clearly identified horror in the chemical mixture. “Humans, ordinary humans, can be far worse than the monsters. To torture a man when you’re a child, when your mother and grandmother stand beside you and guide in the methodology and the mechanics, it changes you. It changed me, changed who I became; who I am now. But I’m willing to go back to that time if you need me to.”
Derek took my hand from his arm, but instead of dropping it, he curled his fingers around my wrist and pulled my hand into a soldier’s handclasp. I gripped his wrist back. “They were soldiers for the United States. We’ll honor them with a soldier’s burial.”
We stood nearly eye to eye in the hallway, arms clasped. “Okay. Good. You want me there, I’ll be there. If not, I’ll understand. I’ll contribute to the families’ funds. And I’ll get Amy Lynn to feed your man. With a little luck and her super-duper special vamp blood, he might be back in as little as two years, rather than the standard ten.”
He released my arm and I let him. He said, “Savin’ my mama is worth part of my soul. And bein’ Leo’s Enforcer sounded—”
He stopped, and I could guess what it had sounded like. Easy job, lotsa money. But it had been a devil’s bargain. It always was, with fangheads.
Derek went on. “I don’t understand how fangheads think. Why not call in the law for the dead humans?”
“Leo had a hard time getting the human LEOs to leave, the last time one of his people died in this building. Leo has control issues and danger on his turf.” Derek didn’t reply so I said, “Honestly, I don’t really care what Leo does about the law.” Oddly, it was true. Once upon a time I called in the law every time a human incident took place. But it never did any good. Leo was his own law. Always had been. Probably always would be. And I was the Enforcer who carried out his law. I had quit, but not really. I was still doing the job and wouldn’t stop even when Peregrinus was dead. I still had a contract with Leo
as his Enforcer for a cool half mil. And with the EuroVamps coming, this job might be the only way to keep my friends alive.
My forehead wrinkled as a thought occurred to me. “The last time someone died here, it was one of the new guys. Wayne something? He had what I thought was a hawk tattooed on his scalp. But maybe it was a peregrine?”
“I’ll check back. Make sure.” He pulled his cell and started thumbing around for photos of the crime scene.
“I know vamps work ahead, plan things for decades,” I said thoughtfully, uncomfortable with the direction of my thoughts.
“Centuries.”
“Yeah. For real. But it would be hard to put that incident together with the EuroVamps and Satan’s Three, and Reach.”
“No, it wouldn’t. Not for a fanghead.” He stopped thumbing on the screen. “Not a falcon. No. It was a hawk. And it was done in reds and browns, not the blue tattoos on the wrists of the fanghead and his human.” He turned the cell to me and I studied the photo of the top of Hawk Head’s scalp. The hawk tattoo looked nothing like the peregrine falcons sported by Peregrinus’ followers, and his wrists were bare. “Hawk,” Derek insisted.
“Okay. But . . . let’s keep that in back of our minds, okay? I don’t like coincidences.”
“Jane?” Derek didn’t often call me by my given name. It was Legs or Injun Princess. Not Jane. I looked my question at him. “You’re a Christian. How could you do that? When you were five? How could you do it now?”
“I don’t know.” I laughed shortly. “I probably need therapy.”
“Yeah. We all probably do.”
• • •
The team was assembled in the security conference room, including a few new faces.
I remembered Wrassler telling me he was trying to get help. Carefully, I said to Derek, “Your people?”
“Grégoire’s people from Atlanta,” he said. “They’ve been in training in the swamps for the last six weeks,” he reminded me. “Basic training. Leo fed on all of them. They’re loyal and integrated into the communications channels. Training isn’t up to my standards yet, but they’ll do in a pinch.”