Shadow Rites

by Faith Hunter

  Edmund chuckled, a human sound, and said, “I promise to get my master all gussied up for the Rock N Bowl.”

  The Rock N Bowl was my date with Bruiser.

  The my master form of address really had to go. Unless I agreed to allow Edmund to become my primo, the first vampire primo to a non-Mithran in . . . maybe forever. I shook my head at the faint thread of sarcasm in his tone and his insistence on that master crap, and slung my satchel over my shoulder. As we left the room, I called Eli on my cell. He answered, “Jane. You up?”

  “Kinda sorta. Where are you?”

  “In the conference room. We have an update from George.”

  George was my Bruiser, George Dumas. “On the way.” I closed the cell and walked to the elevator, my would-be primo on my heels. The hallways were empty, smelling predominantly of humans: sweat, blood, sex pheromones, alcohol breath, and vitality. Most vamps were having breakfast.

  CHAPTER 5

  How Many Suckheads Got Shot

  The conference room was more than a big table centered with Krispy Kreme boxes, surrounded by swiveling leather desk chairs, and a new Krups coffee machine in the corner, it was also part of the security arrangements. A vamp had killed one of the team while he was monitoring the original console, and we had updated the arrangements. Now there were two consoles in HQ itself, one off the front entrance in an armored cubby, and one down here. There was also off-site supervision at Yellowrock Securities, where the Kid could monitor and call in the Marines (or YS) if things went sour at HQ.

  Soon we would also have access to the security systems at all the clan homes. Leo, the sneaky suckhead, had once maintained unauthorized, backdoor access to the other clan home systems, but when Pellissier Clan Home burned to the ground, he lost it. With the EVs coming, and the possibility of a real vamp war, we needed to access to everything at multiple sites so if one was hit, we stood a chance of maintaining an overview. Eli had made it clear that in a battle, knowing what was going on and maintaining coms was paramount. The Youngers and I were making that a possibility.

  I stepped inside the conference room and looked it over. It was night, though early, so the room held only humans: Derek Lee and his security team were crowded into the large space, most of them staring up at the main, monster-sized video screen over the table. On the screen overhead, was me.

  Gee and me. Fighting. In slow motion, which was the only way to see every sword stroke, with Gee moving as fast as any vamp, and me having pulled on at least a tiny bit of Beast-speed.

  Gee looked like a dancer, surefooted and lithe, a small, slender man wearing black Lycra beneath black knickers and croissard, both padded with blade-resistant Dyneema. His eyes were glowing a bright blue. Mine were not glowing at all and looked totally human, if a strange shade of amber. Beast had been right when she said she could hide her presence inside me.

  As we moved in slo-mo, I looked like a skinny chicken trying to dance and failing. And then dropping to my knees. Gee raising his weapon for a death cut. Eli adjusting the aim of his weapon. The glimpse of humans beyond Gee, in danger of Eli’s friendly fire. If he missed. Eli firing. Gee falling in front of me. I saw me pick up the blue feather and place it in Gee’s croissard. Then I fell across him and into a pool of my blood. Leo vamping out, shouting something.

  The sequence replayed again, even slower, and when I dropped to my knees, the person working the console touched the screen over Gee’s face and expanded that small area, to focus on his expression, just after he was shot. It was blurry at this magnification, but his eyes were no longer glowing. He looked horrified. Stunned, perplexed, and, an instant later, grief-stricken. And then he fell.

  I turned away from the screen to see Derek staring at me, his dark-skinned face unreadable. Like Eli, he had a battle face, and this was it, giving away nothing. I looked from him around the room and noted that Eli was standing on the far side from Derek, his own battle face on. The two men were warriors, an Army Ranger and a Marine by training and experience, both dark-skinned, though Eli was paler, with a hint of golden in his skin, when he stood in the daylight. And right now I had a feeling that they were working together, covering the room, watching all the people standing and sitting. But watching for what, I didn’t know.

  Leo’s voice came over the speaker system. “Girrard DiMercy. The Enforcer is now present. She has seen the proof of your treachery. All have seen the evidence of your deception and disregard for my rule.” The screen blanked and a new scene appeared, of Leo’s office. Gee was on his knees with his arms behind his back. I couldn’t tell from this angle, but he looked bound. Hog-tied. Gee’s head was down and his pretty black hair was hanging forward, against his cheeks. His clothes were bloodstained with red blood, but I knew that, without glamour, his blood was a different color entirely and evaporated instantly upon contact with the air. Ergo, the blood wasn’t his. Some vamp had fed him, ensuring his healing, and left traces on his clothing. It had been a messy feeding, suggesting that Gee DiMercy had been in trouble of dying from the feeding as much as from the shooting.

  Leo said, “As Master of the City, I have seen all the evidence and heard all statements except for the victim of your betrayal. I myself was at the scene and was a witness to the altercation and the grievous injury suffered by my Enforcer, Jane Yellowrock. Jane, do you choose to speak to the attack or to the assailant before a ruling is made against him, before I pronounce judgment on this accusation of crime against my Enforcer?”

  I looked around for a microphone, and the man at the mass of security camera screens waved me over. I didn’t know him. There were so many here whom I didn’t know now. It disturbed me on various levels. Mostly because it was dangerous. The man at the security console handed me a tiny mic, the size and shape of a bendable straw with a foam pad on the end. “Yes, I have something to say,” I said into the foam piece. “This is Jane Yellowrock, Enforcer to the Master of the City.” Full titles, because this was a trial, and with suckheads, trials usually ended in death. “I don’t know what’s been said or deduced while I was healing, but Girrard DiMercy, the Mercy Blade of New Orleans, was spelled. Look at his eyes in this screen.” I pointed, and the man at the console put that one up on the main screen. “Then back up to the footage before Eli Younger, of Yellowrock Securities and my partner and my second in battle, shot Gee DiMercy. His eyes are glowing blue before. They aren’t after.”

  The footage backed up and appeared on the screen. The still shot was cut out and placed side by side with the other one. “He was spelled. We need to talk about how he was spelled, but I have a feeling that the attack on me wasn’t his fault, but was the result of something else.” Like his blue eye of seeing on my palm, which turned green later. I didn’t really know what had caused the attack, but I didn’t want Gee punished if he had been under the influence of a spell. “That’s all I have to say.” I handed the guy the mic and stepped back.

  Leo shoved his fingers through Gee’s hair, lifted his head, and leaned in. I heard him sniffing the bound captive. “I smell . . . nothing. No magic. Were you spelled, Mercy Blade? If so, by whom?”

  Gee shook his head side to side as best he was able, with Leo’s fingers gripping his hair. “I have said. I do not remember what was shown on the footage. I remember only a training session. I am not innocent of the attack. I have seen that I tried to kill your Enforcer. But I am . . . not certain of anything else. Except that I am consumed by guilt and self-loathing, my master. Something took my goddess magics and”—he shuddered—“something happened that I do not understand.”

  Leo dropped the captive’s head and said, “Girrard DiMercy, we have all now spoken. Following the attack, you did scent of error and fear. Following the attack you did appear shocked, fearful, and anguished with sorrow. When you were fed by my secondo, he did read pain and disbelief in your heart and mind. The security images—the footage,” Leo corrected himself, “upholds my initial impression. I rul
e this, as my new security team calls it, accidental ‘friendly fire,’ the result of magical interference.”

  Leo himself stepped in front of the camera, his eyes on Gee. He was holding a curved knife, small, easy to conceal. He bent over Gee and cut downward through the bonds. Gee’s body slumped forward. Leo stood, the steel knife resting on his palm, like an offering.

  I had an instant of memory, a single vision, of a hand holding a knife of similar shape, but of different construction—knapped flint set into a curved deer antler hilt and tied with a hide thong. Unlike the one in Leo’s hand, the one in my memory was bloodied.

  My father’s knife. Too large for my small hand. As I cut into a man’s arm.

  My heart tripped and raced. The image vanished.

  Leo set the knife on the desktop and lifted Gee to his feet. Someone had beaten the small man. I narrowed my eyes and looked at Eli, but his attention was on the screen. “You are free,” Leo said. “No one will harm you for fear of my judgment. Go. Find sustenance.”

  Gee asked, “Is Jane Yellowrock . . . ?”

  “She is in the conference room. She is well.”

  “Tell her I am deeply regretful.”

  “You may tell her yourself, when next you see her.” Leo turned to the camera eye and said, “That will be all.”

  The scene vanished, to reveal a static view of Gee and me on the floor. I said, “Let’s see the rest of it.” I let an Eli-worthy smile touch my lips. “I want to see how many suckheads got shot.”

  For a moment the silence in the room was absolute. Then Derek started chuckling. Then the whole room was laughing, including Eli, who was wearing a wry face.

  “Four,” Derek said. “There are few things I appreciate more, as Leo’s other part-time Enforcer, than walking into the gym to see blood everywhere, suckheads down and out, and a Ranger walking away with a smoking gun.” Derek crossed the room and held out his hand to Eli. “That was fine shootin’, my brother.”

  Eli stared at the proffered palm half a second too long before slapping his hand into it. “Booyah,” Eli said, Ranger-style.

  “Hooyah,” Derek said back, Marine-style. Then they both turned to the screen and Derek said, “Play it forward.”

  Over our heads the action resumed, and I watched as Leo dropped into place beside me, rolled me over, ripping my shirt. It was so fast it all looked like one move. Considering that Leo had been a warrior on battlefields where death was frequent, up close, and personal, for more years than his security team all combined, it likely was.

  The wound up under my arm pumped blood into the air and Eli dropped to his knees next to Leo, medical supplies already in his hands. But Leo didn’t waste time applying pressure. He drew the little knife he had later used to free Gee and sliced the blade through the fingertips of his other hand. Vamp blood didn’t often pump like human blood, except from the stump of a neck or a wound to a major artery, but Leo had been under stress and his blood spurted three feet to land in a stream of droplets on the floor. It glowed crimson in the gym lights. Leo plunged his fingers into my wound. Eli froze for a moment before shoving the supplies back into his leathers.

  Edmund ripped his wrist with his fangs and pressed it to my mouth. My lips didn’t close over it, and the blood of a master vamp filled my mouth and dribbled to the floor. Neither vamp seemed to notice the waste, but a young vamp on the sidelines did. She was vamped out, her eyes like black pits opening into a fiery hell, her talons an inch long and sharp as steel. She edged closer. Her mouth moved on words that I couldn’t make out. Derek quoted her, “I’m hungry.”

  On-screen, Edmund snarled at her. Eli shot her. That must have been Pauline Easter, the new security scion. Frankly she had shown remarkable control not to fall and feast, with all the blood scents and pheromones that must have filled the air. Biologists had postulated that the scent and taste of blood released something like endorphins into a vamp’s bloodstream. Shot, Pauline fell and the remaining humans ducked, covered their ears, or raced from the room. Dying vamps are noisy. Vamps who might be dying or who think they might be dying are noisy too.

  Vamps themselves began racing away. A woman from housekeeping was standing in back of the shot, her mouth open, frozen with fear. Her arms wrapped around her chest as if hugging herself.

  On the floor was Gee, a small human-shaped body, a faint bluish haze covering him, unremarked by the others, who probably thought it was simply the video. Gee’s magic was bluish and his blood evaporated like alcohol, smelling like flowers in the sunlight. But in the gym, no one noted anything about Gee. All eyes were on me as, together, Leo and Edmund lifted my body.

  Eli stood to the side, a nine-mil in each hand, watching the dwindling crowd, his eyes everywhere except on me. With his fighting leathers and stone-cold expression, he looked like death’s henchman. But I could see the screaming rage beneath the surface. The impotent fury. My partner had been pissed.

  The two vamps carried me toward the camera, followed by my partner. Off-scene, something happened, and Eli lifted his right arm, his hand steady as he slowed and pulled off three shots. He was close to the camera now, this one with a mic in it, and I could hear the blasts as more than muffled cracks. The small group passed beneath the camera and out of sight. Eli had been armed with standard ammo. I knew because I saw the young vamp nearest twitch, even with three rounds in her.

  The video began again from a different angle, from inside an elevator as they crowded in. No sound on this one. The elevator doors closed. The vamps laid my body on the floor and Edmund lifted my head and pinched my nose, his other wrist still at my mouth. I struggled weakly and swallowed. Again. A third time. At my side, Leo removed his hand from my side. The wounds on his fingertips were healed. Vamps heal fast. Leo resliced his fingers, deeper this time, and he sliced his palm as well before sticking all bleeding parts inside me. On the floor, I gagged and my body spasmed. My flesh was white, tinged with gray. It looked as if I was dying.

  The elevator doors opened again to reveal two vamps, both young scions, who vamped out at the sight of me. Eli, without thinking, acting on instinct, raised his weapon and fired. When the mag was empty, he raised the other weapon and fired three more times. The air was filled with the smoke of gunfire, a gray haze. The elevator camera showed the two vamps dropping down into a small heap together. The master vamps lifted me up over the downed vampires and carried me out and down the hall. Eli followed, implacable, changing out the mags for fresh as he paced.

  The three disappeared behind a door. Edmund’s door. There was a trail of blood and bloody footprints on the carpet.

  The video stopped and the screen went blank except for a single camera, showing the empty gym, a single woman in it, wearing the gray of housekeeping, a bucket on rollers at her side and a mop in her hand as she scrubbed my blood off the wooden floor.

  Then the largest screen lightened and a huge version of Bruiser’s face filled it. He was looking straight at me. I realized we were looking at real time now and that Bruiser had a combat face nearly as implacable as Eli’s. “Move closer to the camera,” he said tonelessly.

  I stepped closer, knowing he was looking for wounds. I smiled brightly at him, and his expression went from worry to frank disbelief. “Big smile too much?” I asked.

  “Yes. That was a patently fake smile.”

  “True. But I’m alive. A little wobbly, but alive.”

  Bruiser’s eyes narrowed, little creases at the corners. “We’ll talk when I get back.”

  And that sounded worrisome, more of the “Why didn’t you shift?” questions. Stuff I didn’t know the answers to. I said, “Yeah. Good,” and nodded, my hair moving on my shoulders, drawing Bruiser’s eyes.

  I could see he wanted to say something about the funky braids, but he said instead, “Update.”

  Eli stepped beside me and told Bruiser everything that had happened. Then he quoted Bruiser
back. “Your turn. Update.”

  The cell phone he was holding turned to the world around him. The last of the daylight cast long shadows in a swamp scene. Stagnant water coated with green slime was everywhere. Huge trees pushed out of the water, cypress knees poking through the scum, the strange upward-turned root knobs stabilizing the trees. In the small clearing, the ground rose out of the water, muddy and pitted deeply with footsteps. In the center of the ground were two wooden doors, flush with the earth. Around the doors were arcane symbols drawn inside a witch circle. In the distance gators roared, the primal sound of reptile combat.

  Bruiser held out a hand. In it was a length of crumpled, oft-folded foil and the brooch that he had found in the alley, the scarab and the peacocks, pixelated with digital failure. “This is where the brooch led. We can walk across the witch circle and nothing happens, but the feel of hidden magics is quite strong, and there must be a trap inside the doors cued to their opening.

  “By the scent there is a vampire inside the door, in the ground. We will open the doors tonight and discover what we may. I’ll have more to say after sunset.” The communications went dark. From beside me, Eli said, “So much for date night, babe.”

  * * *

  “The Truebloods will be here tomorrow morning,” Eli said as he parked down the street from the house.

  Technically and legally it was my house, as I had won it from a vamp in service to her, but we all lived and worked there, so it in reality it was our house. I’d come to New Orleans with a motorbike and the clothes on my back. Now I had a house, full-time work, a business with partners, and a man in my life. I had roots. I belonged. Everything was new and strange.

  And because of the new things and people and lifestyle, my bestest pal in the world, and my godchildren, and Mol’s husband, were coming to stay with me. I could offer shelter to her and hers. Also very, very strange.

  “I’ll be ready,” I said. “For now, I’ll be out back.”