by Sierra Dean
“Brigit, why are you here?” I closed my eyes against a new wave of pain.
“Oh. Oh! Yeah, I guess last time you saw me it was that whole awkward trying-to-kill-you thing.” Brigit rolled her eyes, as if to say what can you do. “Calliope set me right. She introduced me to the council and they said I’m okay, but I need a liaison until I’ve proven myself in the real world, you know?”
“Liaison?” My heart sank.
“And that blond guy, Stick?”
“Sig.”
“Sure, him. He said you were my liaison. And I had to stay with you until you got better.”
This bolted me up, which I regretted when a wave of nausea threatened to pull me back down. I moaned and sank deep into the thick down duvet, shutting my eyes tight enough to block out the light, hoping Brigit and my pain would be gone when I looked again. Instead, when I reemerged from the blankets, Brigit had been joined by Calliope.
The immortal looked downright casual, dressed in jeans and a rose-pink cashmere sweater, with her dark hair in a high ponytail. She was smiling at me in the manner of a concerned mother. A real mother, not the one who had tried to rip my face off. Reminded of what Mercy had done, my hand flew to my cheek, grazing the skin for any trace of open wounds.
Calliope shook her head. “All healed. Everything on the outside is healed.”
“Still hurts.”
“It will for awhile. You almost died.”
“Twice.”
“Yes. And getting shot certainly didn’t help you deal with the open neck wound. You’re very lucky the wolf king was willing to feed you.”
“He’s a king?” Brigit interjected. “Cool!”
Calliope gave Brigit a frustrated but patient look. The young vampire sat back in her chair and stayed quiet. The Oracle was on the end of the bed, her hand gently resting on my foot.
“I’m sorry he couldn’t be here with you. He wanted to be. He and his lieutenant both. They’ve been waiting all day in the coffeehouse for you, ever since you arrived. I send Brigit there every so often to tell them you’re okay, but I don’t think they’ll believe it until you’re with them again.” She lowered her eyes. “You know the rules, though. It could be very—”
“I know. It’s dangerous.”
“But someone is here to see you.”
I pressed my unharmed cheek into the pillow and smiled in spite of myself. “Holden.”
Calliope frowned, patting my leg with maternal comfort. “No. Someone else.”
If it couldn’t be my wolves and it wasn’t Holden, I was out of guesses for who could be waiting to see me. I didn’t think Keaty could come to Calliope, seeing as he wasn’t afflicted by any sort of supernatural ailment.
“Send them in?”
She reached out for my hand, giving it a firm squeeze. “You have to go to him. I won’t invite him in.”
It was night in the courtyard. Time could exist in parallel ways in this realm. The sun and the moon could share one sky, and it could be daytime in one room and night in another. The sound of cicadas filled the air and stars sparkled overhead in constellations that had never been seen from the New York skyline.
Calliope led me to an overstuffed loveseat and eased me back into a more comfortable position, me wincing every inch of the way. Calliope claimed I was healed, but I’d never felt less whole in my life. I felt like I was one sneeze away from breaking into pieces.
“Where is Holden anyway, if he’s not here?”
“He brought you here and left shortly after that. He didn’t tell me where he was going or if he’d be back.” She stood close to me, hand resting on the top of my head.
“Then who came?”
“I did.”
The voice was soft and even, coming from the darkened edge of the courtyard. Calliope and I both looked in that direction, and she took a few steps away from me. A figure emerged from the shadows, and Sig walked with long paces towards where I sat.
It was rare for me to see Sig outside of the Tribunal, and to find him in Calliope’s realm was an extra shock. Overdressed in comparison to how I’d last seen him, he now wore black dress pants and a black T-shirt tailored so perfectly it looked like it was painted on. He was still barefoot, though, and I wondered how he managed it living in a city like New York.
He stopped in front of Calliope, ignoring my presence for the time being.
“Oracle.”
The corner of his mouth twitched with a smirk that vanished so fast I might have imagined it. Calliope’s face was stony.
“Good evening, Sigvard,” she replied with cold detachment, crossing her arms over her chest.
It was my turn to suppress a grin. Sigvard?
“Thank you for bringing her to me. Are you sure we cannot have this discussion inside?” This time the laughter in his tone was unmistakable.
Calliope rolled her eyes. “Don’t make me regret this, Sigvard. She is important. Too important to play these games with. You need to protect her better. Especially considering…” She cast a glance towards me and then back to the Tribunal leader.
I didn’t like being talked about when I was sitting right here. I may have been hurt, but my ears worked just fine.
“Don’t keep her long,” the Oracle threatened, and turned back towards the house.
Sig watched the immortal go, not bothering to hide his smile now, looking quite pleased with himself for how irritated he’d made her. “She hasn’t changed.”
“Why won’t she invite you in?”
“She’s a little mad at me still.”
“Still?”
“I said something to her during the Italian Renaissance, and I gather she’s still annoyed about it.”
“What could you possibly have said to make her mad for more than four hundred years?”
He sat next to me, leaning back in the chair and looking up at the sky. “Who knows? To an immortal four hundred years isn’t that long. Calliope is much older than I am, but she’s still a woman, and even immortal women are capable of holding irrational grudges.”
“What did you say?”
He smiled at me. “I told her I didn’t love her.”
I stared at him, trying to process the meaning, but I couldn’t grasp the enormity of the two oldest, most powerful beings I’d ever met having once been a couple. “Oh,” was all I said. “Why did you tell Brigit I was going to be her liaison with the council? You have to be a warden to be a liaison to baby vamps.”
“You were promoted.”
“I’m not a vampire.”
“You are many things, Secret.”
We stared at each other. He’d combed his blond hair back so I could see nothing but his glacier-blue eyes.
“You know.”
“Yes,” he replied. “I know everything.”
“And the others?”
“Daria and Juan Carlos cannot know the truth. Not ever.”
I let out a breath I hadn’t realized I was holding. “Thank you.”
“I’ve given you this position because the rest of the council cares very little about the daily lives of wardens. When you just worked for us, you were constantly drawing attention to yourself.” He sighed. “If you are one of us, you will stop being considered an outsider, and it will be less likely for you to fall under serious scrutiny.”
“And that starts with me babysitting Miss Vampire USA?”
“She is a vampire because of you.”
“I didn’t make her.”
“Did you not? Really.” Sig arched a loaded eyebrow at me. “If you hadn’t taken Peyton’s fang, or killed his rogue spawn without permission, would Miss Stewart be a vampire today? It may be ripples in a pond, Secret, but your actions have their consequences.”
I looked at the stars so I didn’t have to admit he was right. “Brigit isn’t why you’re here. And I doubt you came to check on my health.”
“This is true.”
“So, what? Why come across dimensions just to get me out of bed?”
/> “Would you rather I came across dimensions to get you into bed?”
I frowned at him.
“No, then?” He chuckled, then rose from the seat so I was staring up the full six-and-a-half-foot length of him. It was a daunting view. “I came to give you your next job.”
His announcement reminded me of the last job he’d assigned me, and phantom pains stabbed through me at various key places.
“Peyton. What happened to him?”
“We are taking care of that.”
“He’s alive?”
“As alive as a vampire can be. Though I’m certain he wishes he were not. He will say nothing about what he learned of you from Mercy, I’ve seen to that. You did excellent work. Ingrid was very complimentary, which is rare for her.”
Apart from telling him how well I was able to bleed out, I couldn’t imagine what kind of compliments Ingrid had paid me.
“And my mother?”
Sig’s calm veneer flickered. “She escaped. Your wolf king sent someone back so she could be dealt with under the covenants of the pack, but she was gone. I’m sorry.”
I took a moment to think about that. Mercy McQueen, the mother who hated me enough to sell me out to her mate and his vampire associate, was still out there somewhere.
“What do you want?” I was exhausted, weak and so sore the slightest shift made me feel like I was being compressed by the Death Star trash compactor. What I wanted more than anything was to be in a bed with Lucas or Desmond beside me, and to feel whole again. I did not want a vampire protégée or more responsibility from the council. I certainly didn’t want whatever job Sig had felt the need to hand-deliver to me before I’d been given a chance to heal.
He withdrew a small black envelope from his pocket and placed it on the seat next to me. It looked different from the white linen envelopes I usually got from him. “I am so very sorry.” He bowed down and placed a hand on my cheek, staring at me for a long time with such intensity I was unable to turn away.
“She was never really my mother.”
“That’s not why I’m sorry.”
He dropped his hand and walked away. Before I could think of a proper response he had disappeared into the shadows and was gone.
I picked up the black envelope and flipped it over in my hands several times, tracing the outline of the wax seal with my fingertips. The seal was an engraving of a peacock feather.
Never in the six years I’d worked for the council had Sig met with me alone to give me the name of a target. I almost always received them from Holden. It felt too intimate to receive my orders straight from the hands of the Tribunal’s leader, and I was instantly suspicious of the envelope.
My heart was pounding inside my rib cage like a frightened bird trying to use its body to invent freedom where there was none. I took a deep, rattling breath and broke the seal on the envelope, but paused before opening it.
This was big. It was important. Sig wouldn’t have brought it to me this way if it weren’t. Something in me understood that when I opened the envelope the whole game changed. When I opened it nothing would ever be the same.
I released the breath and slid out the stiff white card inside. On it, in Sig’s sharp, looping scrawl, a name was written in mottled black ink.
That name was Holden Chancery.
About the Author
Sierra Dean is a reformed historian. She was born and raised in the Canadian prairies and is allowed annual exit visas in order to continue her quest of steadily conquering the world one city at a time. Making the best of the cold Canadian winters, Sierra indulges in her less global interests: drinking too much tea and writing urban fantasy.
Ever since she was a young girl she has loved the idea of the supernatural coexisting with the mundane. As an adult, however, the idea evolved from the notion of fairies in flowerbeds, to imagining that the rugged-looking guy at the garage might secretly be a werewolf. She has used her overactive imagination to create her own version of the world, where vampire, werewolves, fairies, gods and monsters all walk among us, and she’ll continue to travel as much as possible until she finds it for real.
Sierra can be reached all over the place, as she’s a little addicted to social networking. Find her on:
Facebook: www.facebook.com/sierradeanbooks
Website: www.sierradean.com
E-mail: [email protected]
Twitter: @sierradean
Look for these titles by Sierra Dean
Coming Soon:
Secret McQueen
The Secret Guide to Dating Monsters
A Bloody Good Secret
The first bullet is always free. After that, you gotta pay.
The Zero Dog War
© 2011 Keith Melton
Zero Dog Missions, Book 1
After accidentally blowing up both a client facility and a cushy city contract in the same day, pyromancer and mercenary captain Andrea Walker is scrambling to save her Zero Dogs. A team including (but not limited to) a sexually repressed succubus, a werewolf with a thing for health food, a sarcastic tank driver/aspiring romance novelist, a three-hundred-pound calico cat, and a massive demon who really loves to blow stuff up.
With the bankruptcy vultures circling, Homeland Security throws her a high-paying, short-term contract even the Zero Dogs can’t screw up: destroy a capitalist necromancer bent on dominating the gelatin industry with an all-zombie workforce. The catch? She has to take on Special Forces Captain Jake Sanders, a man who threatens both the existence of the team and Andrea’s deliberate avoidance of romantic entanglements.
As Andrea strains to hold her dysfunctional team together long enough to derail the corporate zombie apocalypse, the prospect of getting her heart run over by a tank tread is the least of her worries. The government never does anything without an ulterior motive. Jake could be the key to success…or just another bad day at the office for the Zeroes.
Warning: Contains explicit language, intense action and violence, rampaging zombie hordes, a heroine with an attitude and flamethrower, Special Forces commandos, ninjas, apocalyptic necromancer capitalist machinations, absurd parody and mayhem, self-deluded humor, irreverence, geek humor, mutant cats, low-brow comedy, and banana-kiwi-flavored gelatin.
Enjoy the following excerpt for The Zero Dog War:
I double-timed it up the stairs off the foyer, thumping my way toward Gavin’s rooms. I wanted nothing more than to get this over with ASAP, and I’d just raced up to the second-floor landing when I rounded the banister and crashed right into Captain Sanders. For one moment all I could think about was muscles and the smell of gun oil…until I realized he held me steady, his large hands on my upper arms. I shoved back from him, and he let me go. I could feel my skin grow blazing hot.
“Excuse me.” I stepped farther away. He’d come early. I hadn’t expected him until tonight. Something else to deal with, and my list already floweth over.
He smiled, but he had a way of looking at me that made me feel as if I were the focal point of the universe, as if he waited for every word I might chose to speak. I didn’t like it. The word disconcerting sprang to mind.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I should’ve been more careful. I was looking for you.”
“I’ll let you know when I find me.”
He cocked an eyebrow, but his smile didn’t falter. I took a deep breath and willed my heart to airbrake back to a normal speed. A muscle in my cheek might’ve twitched with my effort to suppress my stupid schoolgirl-crush reactions. I clamped down even tighter. I had a job to do and a team to run. I sure as hell wouldn’t allow this distraction to endanger either.
“I wondered if we could sit down together and go over a few tactical scenarios before the briefing,” he said. “Make sure we’re on the same page.”
“I’m still tracking down my people.” I glanced at my watch. “And I’m scheduled out until about…eight twenty-five. And hey, that’s when your briefing starts. How unfortunate.”
His smile s
lipped a notch. “Maybe afterwards—”
“Look, Captain Sanders—”
“Call me Jake. Save syllables.”
“Fine. Jake. I’m busy running a team, Jake. Not a lot of time to attend your little tête-à-tête.” Hail, and all witness Captain Andrea Walker behaving like an ass—yet, I couldn’t stop now. Inertia was a horrible thing.
He didn’t seem daunted as the wattage on his smile dialed back up to blazing. “May I call you Andrea? In private, of course.”
God. Damn. It. Men, you let them pick up the ball and they ran off the field with it, yelling how they’d won. “I’m more comfortable with Captain Walker, Jake, thank you.”
“All right, Captain Walker.”
We stood so close, with no one else around. My skin felt afire, flushed, and sweat dampened my armpits. The urge to drop my gaze from his eyes pulled at me like an iron chain, but I refused to look away. Dominance games? I could play them all week, and he’d soon find out if he didn’t stand down. I stepped back from him again, putting even more distance between us. Any farther and I’d fall down the stairs—but I still didn’t blink, so point to me.
He didn’t pursue. “I’m confident we can map out some strategies to maximize our team assets.”
“Our team assets? Look, Jake, those are my people. Mine. I’m responsible for them, for keeping them safe and getting them back here every night after we go out and bust our asses, blowing shit up. I call the shots. I’m the only Captain Ahab around here. You can dispense advice when I damn well decide I need the input of a magical Green Beret.”
Something flared in his eyes—either anger or respect—before the professional detachment slammed back down. Anger I could understand, but respect would only vex me more. I didn’t need his damn respect.
“I didn’t mean to violate protocols,” he said in a smooth, calm voice. “I just want to make certain we mesh together well. That our leadership styles are fully integrated to avoid any splintering of command.”
Mesh together well. That conjured up some distracting images. Oh, he did vex me something awful, the bastard. “We can fully integrate if you listen to my orders. When we’re hot, I’m calling the shots.”