The elevator opened onto a very plush lobby, but no amount of decoration could disguise from my practiced eyes that it was the antechamber to a secure bunker. Beyond the normal-world anti-intrusion measures, the room was wrapped and tied in layer upon layer of gleaming magic that burned with the deep red glow of things born of blood and darkness. There was no indication how long the wards had been in place, so I didn’t know if it was a routine paranoia on Edward’s part or something new. Either way, anyone stupid enough to make threatening moves in this place would die screaming. That was not going to be me.
Goodall crossed the room to a pair of double doors made of some dull gray metal inlaid with bronze panels pressed deep with complex geometric patterns. They were almost Art Moderne but not quite, and they, too, emitted the hungry red glow of blood magic.
Goodall waved me forward. “The inner doors won’t open while the elevator doors are also open.”
Drawing a deep breath against the stink of vampires, I complied. I stopped next to Goodall on the assumption that Edward wouldn’t kill me after so much trouble to get me there, and especially not if it would take out his security chief at the same time. Edward had done some thoughtless things in the past, but he didn’t generally waste useful people without reason.
Goodall pressed a button next to the door frame and I was glad it was him touching the black thing. I thought I saw an eye blink above it and the impression of tiny teeth gnashed at the air beneath Goodall’s wrist. I knew these weren’t spells laid by Edward—he didn’t have any such power of his own—and his uneasy truce with Carlos wouldn’t have persuaded the necromancer to lay them for his benefit. It worried me that such spells existed in Seattle; someone had to have set them and I had no idea who, but such power was dangerous and its source wouldn’t be pleasant. I put that thought aside for later consideration and braced for whatever was next.
The big doors swung open with the hiss of hydraulics and we stepped through to Edward’s private lair. The doors sighed closed behind us and I heard a faint click and a rattle in the Grey like the sound of insect wings. The bloody glow of the wards seeped though the walls into the room beyond and brushed over us like the touch of carnivorous vines. Then came the smell, the stomach-twisting psychic odor of vampires.
Edward entered the room through a door on the far side, bringing the heat and roil of his particular aura closer. Most of the bloodsucking fraternity seemed to exude a glamour of sexual attraction—prey attractor, I supposed, since if anyone could really see and smell them as I could, they’d never get close enough to get a bite in—and Edward’s was thick enough to gag on. I eased half a step back without thinking. It had been a while since I’d had to deal face-to-face with the Prince of the City. I’d forgotten how hard it was to be in his presence.
He strolled up to me, his eyes, hooded from recent sleep—or feeding—were directed straight to mine as if Goodall didn’t exist. Even freshly risen, he looked like a film star from Hollywood’s golden age: dark haired, sloe eyed, and far too handsome for anyone’s good. The spoiler was that he was short for a modern man—about five foot seven or so. He reached for my hand and caught it, stroking the palm with his fingertips. I wanted to shudder but didn’t.
“My dear Harper. Good of you to come.”
“As if I had a lot of choice.”
He raised his eyebrows in question. “You are under no compulsion.” He glanced at Goodall. “Is she? You’ve not got a gun to her back, have you, Bryce?”
“No, sir. Not that I think it would make a difference with this lady.”
“Indeed. She’d tear your arm off and feed it to you if you offended her. Wouldn’t you, my dear?”
I narrowed my eyes. “What do you want, Edward? Your secretary said it was urgent, not just an excuse to mess with me.”
He sighed. “Blunt as always. Yes, all right. It is urgent. Bryson, you may go.”
“I’d rather he didn’t,” I said.
“This one time, I’m afraid you have no choice,” Edward replied, dropping my hand and lowering the temperature in the room with his scowl. “Much as I trust Mr. Goodall’s discretion, this is not a discussion for his ears. Only yours. Stay or go as you choose, but choose now. I’m very busy.”
I glanced at Bryson Goodall, who didn’t move a muscle, not even to shift his eyes, which he kept fixed on his boss. The energy of his aura had expanded when Edward came near, and now it rippled in a dark blue corona shot with yellow lines and coils. There was something very odd going on between him and Edward, whose own red-and-black energy haze reached out toward Goodall’s like the tongue of a snake.
“Why should I assume I’m safe with you, Edward?” I asked.
He closed his eyes as if he were too exhausted to bear it. When he opened them, they were darker than ever and infinitely tired. “If I wanted you dead, Ms. Blaine, you’d never have exited my plane alive.”
“That’s not a comfort with you.”
He laughed. “True.” Then he turned to Goodall. “Bryson, I believe Ms. Blaine will be staying, after all. Please retire until I call for you again.”
Goodall gave a curt nod and left us alone, the door opening before him automatically.
“Neat trick,” I said, watching the doors.
“Rather. It wasn’t easy having them installed. The panels are ancient and powerful. I’m afraid I lost a few people getting it done.”
So they were dark artifacts—objects that had been imbued with or accrued magical residue and, with it, power. That might explain the darkness of the spells around them. The wrong kind of magician would lust after them more than he would all the virgins of heaven.
I let Edward take my hand again and lead me deeper into his sanctum, resisting the urge to recoil from the hot/cold sensation that rushed up my arm at his touch. We went through a door and into a chamber—you couldn’t call it a room—decorated in dark green. All the better to conceal the blood, I thought, for this looked like a small board room and I imagined that any business done here carried the direst consequences for someone. A large black table dominated the center of the room with hard chairs ranged around it and audiovisual equipment hanging from the ceiling. Off to the side were several groupings of more comfortable chairs—no doubt for private conferences.
Edward led me to one of these and slid with his usual elegant bonelessness into one of the seats. There was already a drinks tray on the table between the chairs. I sat more carefully. He poured amber liquid into glasses and I didn’t pick mine up.
“It’s quite safe,” he said, sipping at his own drink. “It’s a rather rare whiskey and very nearly eighty years old. I wouldn’t insult such a distillation with anything that would harm you.”
“I’d rather know why you were in such a rush to see me.”
“You really can be stubborn.”
“It’s one of my best traits, I think.”
“Do me and my whiskey the honor of taking a sip, and we’ll get down to business. Please.”
Well. he wasn’t going to kill me, and we’d long ago established that I’d be no use to him undead, either, so I took the risk and drank. It was, without doubt, the smoothest, mellowest whiskey I’d ever tasted in my life—not that I’m an expert. Once in my mouth, it went places and did things whiskey ought not to be allowed to get up to, and my fingertips tingled from the warmth of it. I could feel a flush on my face. Barrel strength. I narrowed my eyes at Edward.
“Don’t,” he said. “Appreciate it as it is. I’m not trying to get you drunk and take advantage of you.”
“You won’t.” I put my glass down. “It is very good, but before the whiskey steals my sense, tell me what you want from me.”
“I need you to go to London on my behalf.”
“You could send Goodall. He’s obviously in your good graces, competent, and aware of what you are as well as who.”
“Mr. Goodall is only recently installed in his position, and anyway, he can’t be allowed too far from my side yet—even if he wasn
’t known to be my employee. He won’t do. I need someone horribly clever and not openly my friend. Which certainly fits you.”
“I’m hardly thought to be your enemy, either.”
He stood up, agitated. “You are a neutral party. They may think they can sway you, suborn you. I know they won’t succeed.” He started pacing on a short track across the space in front of the two chairs we occupied.
“Who? Who is this ‘they’?”
“The London cabal. Possibly with the help of other factions and agitators, certainly with the help of my enemies there and here. You have seen us fractured and fighting here, but I assure you, Seattle is a tranquil sea of unity compared to the Old World.”
I snorted, but Edward shook his head.
“It’s the truth. I handled Seattle poorly—as you demonstrated—because I had grown used to the habits of England and its divisions and factionalism. They were an irritation but a constant in England that one simply accepted because the population is old and the territories and hatreds well-established. They could not be changed, only worked around. I have been trying to change that here. But it has not made my enemies into friends. I suspect my troubles on both sides of the pond are orchestrated by a single source, but among my unfortunately numerous enemies and evil-wishers, I don’t know who it is. It’s the sort of trouble old enemies stir up—people who’ve known you long enough to think they know your weaknesses.”
“If these problems are connected, then why are you ignoring the destruction of vampires in the underground?”
His eyes narrowed. “Your friend is not in my best graces over that. ”
“He says he didn’t do it.”
“I’m aware of that. And of who did. There is much going on of which you are not aware, and I cannot simply do as I like. Still, I’m not best pleased to have lost one of my own. But I can address that myself. And I will, but that will require my attention here. I cannot go to London on this other matter. You can.”
“What matter? You haven’t said yet what’s wrong.”
“You haven’t agreed to go.”
“And I won’t until you tell me what I’d be getting into.”
He stopped over me, looming, his gaze trying to bore into mine. “You must agree first.” His voice resonated, and ripples moved through the Grey. I felt the pressure of his insistence against me, weighing on my body like a physical thing.
I unfolded myself from the chair and stood, trying to shake it off. I towered over him, but that didn’t help as much as I’d have liked. I felt weaker than I had in a long time, and Edward wasn’t playing with me this time. He was deadly serious. He’d never put out so much effort to control me before. I felt hot and unwell. The combination of his blood-soaked presence and the blaze of his sexual glamour was sickening. I drew my breath with care and clenched my teeth.
He clutched my right wrist, pulling me down so my eyes were level with his. “You must agree.”
“Go screw yourself,” I growled. It wasn’t the cleverest thing I’d ever said, but I was fighting, his will against mine. I squeezed my eyes shut to break the contact while I still could.
Edward, though shorter, was much stronger than I, and he yanked me into the nearest corner. I could feel something unearthly wash over us, but I kept my eyes closed, resisting his pulling and pushing with everything I had. His other hand came up to my throat. I felt it hovering, just brushing the fine hairs on my skin, waiting to wring the breath out of me.
“Say you will do it,” he hissed, a note of desperation in his voice. “Say it, under the seal.”
A seal, yes, now I could almost see it like an afterimage on my retinas. Some cold-fire sigil embedded in the ceiling and sending its icy power down over us both. I knew that promises made under the power of certain magics were binding even beyond death. The thought burst into my head that there could have been something similar acting on the ghosts of my father and Christelle, too. I’d bound and been bound myself by such magic. I wouldn’t do it. I wouldn’t let Edward bind me to whatever he pleased, no matter how distraught he was. I would not be a pawn, a living ghost with no will of my own.
His hand closed on my neck with just the slightest pressure. For an instant, panic surged in my system and I felt the knot of Grey embedded in my chest by another vampire twang and thrum, vibrating across the spectrum of the Grey in rainbow colors that danced on the inside of my eyelids. Wygan had tied me inexorably to the grid two years ago with that tangled strand. Now I forced every ounce of power, of thought, toward that singing in my chest and, bringing my free hand between us, I shoved.
The world seemed to stretch and twist.
Thunder shook the room and lightning coursed over my bones and out toward Edward.
“No!” I shouted, opening my eyes and giving one more desperate mental push.
The seal cracked, its power vanishing, and we both pitched away.
I landed hard on my back, rolling fast to my feet, drawing my pistol in one fluid movement and a sharp clack from the cocking lever. Unless I blew his head off, shooting him wouldn’t stop Edward, but it might slow him down.
Edward was on the other side of the room, looking at me with narrowed eyes. “You’re more formidable than I recalled.”
I didn’t know how I’d done it—I’d never pushed with that sort of energy before—but I didn’t let on. “Don’t flatter me. What do you want?”
“Would you please put the gun away?”
“I think I like it better in my hand and you on the other end of it.”
He strolled across the room toward me. “It’s really not that useful.”
I kept the sights on him. “Call it a security blanket. You want me to go to London, and you’re scared white of what might be going on or you wouldn’t be trying to coerce me.”
“I don’t wish to coerce you. I want to hire you.”
“Your negotiation skills suck. Give me a reason.”
He was startled. “You would still go now?”
“I never said I wouldn’t. You’re the one who started the hardball tactics. Tell me why you need to send someone like me to look into your business—I assume it is your business—and I might consider it. If the money is good enough.”
“I thought you weren’t motivated by money, my dear.” He was on more comfortable ground now that we were talking—especially talking money. He’d always preferred to solve problems with leverage and charm rather than getting his hands dirty. “It’s not a matter of sending someone like you. There is only one Harper Blaine. I assure you that is no empty compliment but the truth of the matter—I need your skills and your ability to walk both the day and the night. This is a matter of my kind, and Mr. Goodall will not do.”
“Tell me the situation and I’ll tell you if I’ll go.”
“I. cannot risk telling you if you then don’t choose to go. You would have the upper hand of me.”
“Edward, I’ve got enough on you to wreck your unlife a dozen times over. But I don’t have any reason to. I’m far better off with you, the devil I know, running this particular show. I’ve never rolled on you. What makes you think I would now?”
He turned away and slid down into his chair again. “Fear. My dear Ms. Blaine, I should trust you, but things that should not have happened have happened. Such things. don’t just occur. They come to fruition through enemy action over time. I don’t know whom I can trust.”
“If you didn’t think you could trust me in the first place, why call me at all?”
He drew down his brows in thought and picked up his whiskey glass again. “That is a good question. So you would rather have me in control than, say. Carlos?”
“Carlos isn’t likely to want your domain, only your head.”
He raised an eyebrow and went back to his drink, waving at my gun with one lazy hand. “Do put that away and sit down. I swear by blood I won’t attack you.”
“So are we going to discuss your situation now or keep on fencing? Because I’m starting to lose intere
st in that.”
“I shall tell you, but I prefer not to be literally under the gun. If you don’t mind.”
I let up on the cocking lever and the pistol clicked back into safe mode. I wasn’t quite certain this was a good idea, but I reholstered it and sat back down.
“All right, spill it.”
“Before I came to Seattle, I spent some years in London, where I discovered the importance of an economic base in the daylight world. Leverage to maintain control in the night half. When I left, considerable holdings remained, which also gave me considerable weight with certain people who worked for my interests both among the daylighters and the nightsiders. I was persona non grata, but my money and power were welcome to stay. I turned them over to the administration of a trust headed by a. friend.”
“A flunky. You don’t have friends, Edward. Only slaves and sycophants.”
“On the contrary. I have cultivated a few relationships of trust. Maybe not friends but not enemies, either. You. perhaps.”
Seeing Edward uncertain was disconcerting. As top dog in the vampire pack, such a sign of weakness would be an invitation to destruction, which was something I didn’t want to be caught up in and surely would be if worse came to worst. If this was typical of his recent behavior, no wonder he was hiding in his bunker. I wanted to know more of what had spooked him, so for now I let it go and waved his comment off. “Whatever. Go on.”
He nodded. “This friend, John Purcell, has vanished. As if he never existed—which is not entirely surprising for one of us. Silence has fallen all around what was John’s. And around what was mine. Queries go unanswered, calls unreturned. I’ve tried to make contact with others in London, but they, too, return only silence. I don’t know what’s befallen Purcell or my assets. Or the others of my kind who controlled the darkness of London. I know they are still there, for the void left by their total destruction would be filled with notoriety and noise. But there is only silence. I must know what’s happened! Have things fallen to another faction, been driven deeper under the ground, perhaps taken by the asetem—another species of my kind—or perhaps some other thing has risen.? I must recover what I can or cover my tracks if nothing can be salvaged. And I want to know what’s become of John Purcell. Is he the victim of some plot or is he the perpetrator? And of this, no one here must know. For each of my enemies in London, there are opposite numbers here. Do you see?”
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