by Karen Chance
“Shut up!” everyone told her.
She shut up.
“Well, how about it?” Carla said, breathing a little hard. “You can’t avoid us forever. And, frankly, I know some of my colleagues. If you don’t tell your story, they’ll tell it for you. And after the merry chase you’ve led us, believe me, it won’t be a version you’ll like!”
“That sounds a lot like blackmail,” I pointed out.
“It isn’t,” the Oracle said. “It is—I am loath to admit—merely a cogent commentary on the state of our once great profession. Where will you find a Thomas Bowlby these days? Or a Sir Henry Stanley? ‘Dr. Livingstone, I presume’ has been replaced by celebrity gossip and sycophantic fawning, and I shudder to think what the future may hold for—”
“A ‘she’s right’ would have sufficed,” Carla said dryly.
“My dear woman, I was merely attempting to—”
“Prove that it’s impossible for you Brits to say anything in a single sentence? I’ve often wondered if it actually pains you.”
“Not nearly as much as working with the likes of—”
“Trust me, you would never be working with—”
“Who are all these people?” Witch’s Companion suddenly asked.
“What?” the Oracle said huffily. “What people? My girl, we are trying to discuss important—”
“These people on the concourse. They’re everywhere, and it’s not even ten o’clock yet.”
“The concourse? Where are— My God, she is!” he told someone, sounding outraged. “The little strumpet snuck down while we were distracted and is trying to steal a march on us!”
“I’m not a strumpet!” Witch’s Companion said, her voice coming through clearly, but also hiccupy, as if the owner was being battered around outside. “At least, I don’t think so; I don’t know what that is. And I’m not trying to steal anything. I just want to show the Pythia our latest issue, but these men won’t let me—”
“It’s the damn paparazzi,” Carla snarled, staring at the shop door. “We sit here for weeks and then someone tips them off—”
“Oh, that’s rich, coming from you,” the Oracle said. “Everyone knows you obtain half your stories through bribery, chicanery, and deceit—”
“At least we get stories that aren’t a month old! When was the last time you had a scoop?”
“Hey!” Witch’s Companion said. “Hey! Let me go! I don’t want to—”
“We are not concerned with ‘scoops,’” the Oracle said proudly. “We are concerned with the proper reporting of factual, well-researched, well-supported—”
“Can I yawn now?” Carla asked.
“Oh. Oh no,” Witch’s Companion said softly. “You’re not paparazzi at all, are you? You’re—”
The voice abruptly cut off, and her little black fluttery thing suddenly stopped moving and floated gently to the floor, like it was made out of tissue paper.
I bent down and picked it up.
And my bracelet started slamming into my pulse point hard enough to bruise.
“CASSIE PALMER.”
“CASSIE PALMER.”
“CASSIE PALMER IS IN AUGUST—”
My head jerked up, but I didn’t see anything. The shop was designed to keep people’s attention on the expensive wares inside, not on whatever was happening on the concourse, and it worked pretty well. All I could see were glimpses of the usual morning crowd, passing along the drag in colorful tees and unfortunate spandex.
I stood up and started walking cautiously toward the front.
“This is so typical,” Augustine said bitterly, from behind me. “She’s been the official Pythia for weeks now, but has she held a press conference? Given an interview? Made a single statement to anyone? I spend all my time trying to get press, and she spends hers avoiding it! It’s no wonder we’re inundated on a daily basis with nosy types, prowling around, hoping for a—”
“Cassie?” Françoise said, coming up behind me.
“—story, which wouldn’t be so bad if they were planning to mention the shop or the brand—”
“Cassie?” Françoise said again, and then froze, her hand on my arm, as I pulled back a couple of the hanging floral strands in the window.
And no, I thought blankly, those weren’t paparazzi.
“—but no. Couturier to the Pythia and do I rate so much as a mention?” Augustine asked, while on the concourse across from the shop, an army was assembling. They looked like tourists, but they weren’t. And I didn’t need the bracelet almost vibrating off my wrist to tell me that.
“Mon Dieu,” Françoise whispered as a wave of power washed over us like a hot breeze, causing the hair on my arms to stand on end. And the tacky T-shirts, too-tight shorts, and beer bellies of the crowd to ripple and change. And melt into what would have looked like black commando gear, if not for the long coats that commandos don’t bother with, because they don’t carry weapons that they mind everyone seeing.
War mages do.
Only I didn’t think these were ours.
It looked like nobody else did, either, because Françoise suddenly turned and bolted for the counter, and the Graeae released Augustine, who hit the floor along with half his merchandise. Something slammed into place in front of the shop a second later, an almost transparent field wavering just beyond the pretty bow windows, which would have looked more at home on a Rue de Something in Paris than in the Wild, Wild West, because Augustine gave a crap about Dante’s theming.
He obviously felt the same way about its wards, because that was a shield flickering out there, not that it mattered.
It wouldn’t hold against that kind of firepower.
There wasn’t a lot that would.
“CASSIE PALMER.”
“CASSIE PALMER.”
“CASSIE PALMER IS IN—”
I grabbed for my phone, before remembering that I didn’t have it on me. And Françoise was already on the house one behind the counter, presumably calling security. But the casino’s guys were used to dealing with drunks and shoplifters and people who won a little too regularly for chance. They couldn’t handle this.
My guys could.
“Here.” I looked up to find Carla holding out a phone. I took it and punched in the number I knew best while kiddo did a twirl on the tile, her pink tutu swirling out around her. I stared at it and tried to get my thoughts in order.
It didn’t seem to be going so well.
My brain kept insisting that this wasn’t supposed to happen. This happened other places, and then I came back here to eat and sleep and banter with my bodyguards in safety. Unless I tripped over one of the cots that were currently strewn around my suite, that is, because the court I’d recently ended up with needed a place to sleep.
And oh God.
My court.
“CASSIE PALMER.”
“CASSIE PALMER.”
“CAS—”
Pick up, pick up, pick up, I thought as the phone rang and rang. It was midmorning, not a vampire’s favorite time of day, but normally my bodyguards worked around the clock. But yesterday hadn’t exactly been normal.
Not that I was sure what that was anymore. But I was fairly certain it didn’t include an almost-dead master vampire, who happened to be the font of energy for the extended family that ran this hotel. Including the group of senior-level masters who formed my bodyguard, and who were normally miniature armies all to themselves. But who had been left limp as rag dolls after he was forced to almost drain them to keep himself alive.
Which might explain why this attack was happening now.
And why nobody was answering the goddamn phone.
“CASSIE PALMER.”
“CASSIE PALMER.”
“CA—”
“Get back! Get ba—” I yelled at the reporter, who didn’t need
it because she’d felt the same massive energy surge that I had. She grabbed her kid and threw herself to the side, just as the burst hit.
And all but destroyed the front of the shop, ward and all, splintering the windows and slinging a wash of glittering glass and burning wood through the air.
Straight at me.
And at Augustine, who I hadn’t noticed come up behind me until we were both blown backward off our feet. And through several racks of what had been expensive clothes and were now burning tatters. And into a decorative column.
Which we bounced off and hit the floor, face-first, about the time that the shield he’d thrown around us failed.
I looked up through a haze of blood and saw him raising a similarly messy face with a snarl. The half-fey designer had always looked a little girlie to me. The perfect hair, the too-pale skin, the flamboyant clothes had just never registered as dangerous.
I was revising my opinion.
Until he suddenly turned tail and ran for the back, disappearing through a curtain.
And, okay, I thought. Maybe I’d been right the first time. But I didn’t have time to worry about it.
Because someone else was calling my name.
And this time it wasn’t a spell.
Chapter Six
“Cassie Palmer?” The new voice wasn’t the harsh, almost metallic tones of the locator spell. Instead, it was quiet, calm, amused. “Is that really you?”
I got back to my feet, pushing shattered glass away from my bare soles. And picked my way across a minefield to the burning hole that had once been the front of the shop. And looked out.
And saw a man in war mage gear standing on the other side of the concourse, holding a knife to the throat of the terrified girl he’d positioned in front of him.
She wasn’t the unfortunate reporter from Witch’s Companion.
I knew that because I knew her.
She was my acolyte, Rhea.
She stared at me and I stared back. Her long white gown was pristine and freshly pressed, and her waist-length dark hair was just a little mussed. She looked like she should have been attending a Victorian-era lawn party, not standing stiff and careful and slightly off balance because she was having to pull back from the knife to keep it from eating into her throat.
I’d been in that position myself recently. Only, unlike Rhea, I’d been pretty sure the guy in question wasn’t going to kill me. Yet it had still been terrifying.
Rhea looked like she was about to throw up.
The war mage smiled.
The smile should have been attractive. He was, with blue eyes bright enough that I could see them from here, and dark brown hair worn stylishly long, just enough to touch the collar of a modern dress shirt. It looked a little odd under all the hardware.
Like the smile, which would have looked creepy on a corpse.
“Can I say,” he said, looking me over as well, “you’re not exactly what I expected?”
“I get that a lot.”
“I apologize for the rudeness of our introduction, but some of my associates are a little . . . keyed up. We thought we’d have a fight to reach you, but instead—” He waved his free hand in the air, to indicate the now missing announcement.
“Must be your lucky day.”
He smiled some more.
I turned my gaze back to Rhea, who was looking green, but also like she was starting to get it together. And she might, because she frequently surprised me. A member of Agnes’ old court, Rhea had been the only one, other than the kids, not to take the bait the gods were offering and go power-mad.
In fact, she’d risked her life to come here and warn me about the imminent return of Ares, and the pleasure that seemed to give five of her colleagues. Then, in quick succession, she’d gotten scared by a coffee machine, yelled at a senior-level vamp, intimidated another into taking her shopping for the young girls who formed the rest of my court, and fed, comforted, and defended them fiercely until I got back. And then panicked and teared up when she thought I was going to kick her out for being useless.
And all that had been in the first couple days. Since then, she’d continued to show flashes of both timidity and excessive bravery, and I never knew which I was going to get. I thought the former might be the false front, acquired over a lifetime of being ignored and discounted at the court her mother had presided over, because a Pythian love child doesn’t exactly have it easy in the world.
But frankly, a little timidity would stand her in good stead right now. Despite being a pretty formidable witch, she wasn’t going to beat these odds. Excess bravery right now was going to get her killed.
“Don’t look so concerned,” the dark mage said, watching me. “I assure you, I don’t mean any harm to Ms. Silvanus here. In fact, I fully intend to return her to you.”
“In exchange for?”
“You have a piece of our property,” he said gently. “We would like her back.”
“Lizzie.”
He inclined his head.
We were talking about Elizabeth Warrender, one of Agnes’ old acolytes and my current rogues. Out of the original five, three were now dead, one—Jo Zirimis—was missing, and then there was Lizzie. Who had turned dark and started playing for the other team apparently without realizing that her team considered her expendable.
The other rogues had sent her here yesterday to take me out of commission while they raided a vamp stronghold in New York. One that contained a potion capable of boosting an acolyte’s power enough to rival mine. And possibly enough to shift Ares past the barrier of my mother’s spell.
Lizzie had succeeded—sort of. I still didn’t understand how she’d known when I’d be back, stepping out of thin air at almost the second I returned, beat up and bleeding, from Wales. But she had, and, like Gertie today, she’d jammed a needle in my leg before I could stop her.
If it had contained poison, I wouldn’t be here now. But it hadn’t, because Lizzie was a little slow, and a lot fixated on becoming Pythia, while her savvier rivals had known the truth: once Ares returned, there wouldn’t be a Pythia. There wouldn’t be any magic workers, since he planned to kill us all.
I supposed that was one way to make sure no one ever challenged him again.
But they hadn’t let Lizzie in on their insight, and she hadn’t figured it out herself. Which meant she’d been under the impression that she couldn’t kill me, since no one who kills a Pythia can ever be one herself. So she’d drugged me instead, and been captured in the process. And I had woken up in time to prevent the acolytes’ plan in New York, mainly because they’d turned on each other while I was out, each wanting to end up as Ares’ champion.
And to become the goddess he’d promised to make the victor.
I almost felt sorry for Lizzie. Everyone else had been going after godhood, and she’d just wanted to be Pythia. And still did, I assumed, since I’d left her alive and drugged upstairs, intending to deal with her later.
Only it looked like somebody else had decided to do the same thing.
“And if I refuse?” I asked.
The dark mage made a small moue of disappointment.
“Killing Rhea won’t do you any good. You’ll still have to battle your way through the wards on the upper floors to get to Lizzie, and they were created by some of the best wardsmiths the Silver Circle has,” I told him, talking about the world’s leading magical organization and the parent body of the War Mage Corps. “I doubt you’ll find them as easy to fool as these.”
“Oh no,” he mused. “I shouldn’t think so.”
“And even if you survive—all two or three of you—you’ll have my bodyguards to deal with—”
“Who I hear are not feeling well today.”
“—and who are still master vampires of Mircea’s family line! They’ll drain you before you get in the door.”
; “Hmm.” The mage nodded slowly. “You may have a point.”
“And the Circle’s men will be here soon, in force, and this whole thing is about to explode in your face. But if you give me Rhea now—”
“Oh, I couldn’t do that.”
“Why not?” I asked, trying to keep my voice steady. “If I won’t trade for her, she’s of no use to you. But if you give her to me now, unharmed, I promise—”
“No use?” the mage broke in, those blue eyes opening wide. “A Pythian acolyte is no use?”
Annnnnd the record scratched.
Time seemed to slow down as I stared at Rhea, who stared back, tearful, apologetic, terrified. Because she must have said something that let them know or guess her new status. I had elevated her rank as a reward for her warning, and because there never seemed to be enough of me to go around. I could really use an acolyte.
I just hadn’t thought—so could somebody else.
“If you do not give us Elizabeth, we will have to see if this one can be . . . persuaded . . . to assist us,” the mage said, running his free hand through her long, dark hair. “It may take some time, but there are ways. And she is so young. In the end, I think she’ll do as we ask.”
Looking at her face, I thought Rhea did, too.
Because she’d just gone white as a sheet.
My fingers wanted to curl, to clench, to eat into my thigh. It took a concentrated effort of will to leave them limp, to make my expression disinterested. To keep myself from using the last of my power to age his smile into powder.
I used to have better control than this.
Of course, I used to have fewer people I cared about, too.
“She was lying,” I said flatly. “I barely know her. Why would I give her that kind of power?”
“Someone is lying,” he agreed, with that same small smile.
I shrugged. “You don’t have to believe me. You have the evidence already. If she was an acolyte, she could shift away from you.” My gaze slid over to Rhea’s. “Do you really think you could hold someone with the Pythian power if she didn’t want to be held?”
