by Faith Hunter
That speculative look suddenly made me aware that I was sitting close enough to feel Eli’s body heat, close enough to feel the fine hairs on his arm graze mine when he moved. My limbs went heavy. A slow warmth settled deep inside me. I felt Beast start to purr.
I kept my eyes on the screen as Eli sat back. When I could trust myself to speak casually, I stood and said, “I’m beat. I’m heading for bed.” Beast hacked deep inside and Alex looked over his shoulder again at his brother, then at me, and he grinned. Crap. I turned and went to my room without another word. And I slept in boy shorts and a tank instead of naked. Men.
* * *
The phone rang, waking me before dawn. I knew without looking that it was Leo—I could feel him pulling on the blood-bond. I wanted to ignore the cell’s insistent ringing, but my hand went out all its own and I picked up the phone, hit the TALK button. “What?”
Bruiser said, “At sunset yesterday, Lucas Vazquez de Allyon, Blood Master of Atlanta, Sedona, Seattle, and Boston, claimed blood-feud with Leonard Eugène Zacharie Pellissier, Blood Master of the southeastern states, in direct contradiction of the Vampira Carta.” His tone was stiff and formal, and I knew that Leo was right there, listening, exerting all sorts of emotional overtones to the conversation.
For a moment, I froze, that electric stillness of remembered fear and pain, Leo’s fangs buried in my throat. Beast placed a paw on my mind, all claw and spiking demand. We are not prey.
I sucked in a breath that sounded of sorrow as much as remembered agony, and shoved down on my fear, letting Beast trap it beneath her claws as if it were her dinner. The memory of the feeding eased. Beast was right. We are not prey.
His voice even more unyielding, Bruiser said, “We believe that somehow he knows we discovered who he is, and this forced his hand.”
Somehow. Yeah. Like the leak I warned you about that you can’t find. All I had to do was send you a report on Blood-Call and Lucas, and everything changed. But I didn’t say it. I didn’t rub salt in the wound. Go, me. “Okay,” I said to Bruiser and to Beast. “Why blood-feud and not a Blood Challenge? What’s the difference between the two?” I asked, rolling up to my butt, sitting in the middle of the bed, the covers wrapped around me in the chill. I was facing the windows at the front and side of the house, seeing car lights move past one, seeing the bushes move with a slight wind in the other.
“A challenge follows the protocol of the Vampira Carta, all the rules and regulations set therein. A blood-feud is a much older contest, one from before the Carta was written, and it puts aside the Mithrans’ most important legal document. According to historical precedent, there are no established protocols for the feud. Because you killed his Enforcer, Ramondo Pitri, unprovoked, de Allyon can declare blood-feud, according to the old ways.”
It always came back to the man I had killed in Asheville. But I remembered what Aggie had said yesterday morning. “His Enforcer was in Asheville to check me out, to see why I had moved ahead of all of Leo’s people into the rank of Enforcer, cutting you out of the position too. He could have looked me over on the street, in a restaurant, anywhere. Yet he was in my room, his gun drawn, with an illegal suppressor on it. Seems to me he was going off the reservation, hoping to take me out first. Seems to me that I’m lucky to be alive.”
I heard background noises and then Leo said into the phone, “Unfortunately, my Enforcer, we have no evidence of that. When my George suggested that very scenario to de Allyon’s messenger, he asked for proof. We had none to offer, except for the human police reports, which are not sufficient in a Mithran court. Only a Mithran eyewitness would be acceptable to others of my kind.”
“Right,” I said, and though I knew he could hear the sarcasm, he went on, unperturbed.
“Therefore, the demand for blood-feud remains. I have petitioned to the Outclan Council of Mithrans for a ruling on the matter, and they have put it on the agenda for when they meet again in the new year.”
“Meantime we’re all in the crosshairs,” I said.
“Precisely. My George will send you the information we have on the methodologies of blood-feuds.”
I heard background noises again, thinking over the “my Enforcer” and “my George” phrases as the cell was passed around. Leo was staking claims—pun intended—as I had done with my use of the words “my Eli” last night.
George said, “You need to know that de Allyon offered another way out of this. Leo could turn himself and you over and de Allyon would let all the others live. Leo turned him down.”
Yeah. I bet he did. “Wait.” The winter chill of the room made goose bumps rise on my arms. “Let all the others live? Does the blood-feud mean he can kill everyone?”
Bruiser made a sound, very British, all nose and curled lip. “Historically, all of one side or the other died in a blood-feud, all the Mithrans, all the servants, all the slaves. Everyone.”
At last I understood, and lots of things fell into place, including Leo binding me—just after sunset, yesterday. “Well, crap.”
“I’ll send you all the information I have on the precedents and the histories. Most of it isn’t electronic. Most is in the form of letters and reports, so it’ll be photocopied and messengered over later today.
“My master will agree.”
I hated that “my master” crap and wanted to hurt Leo for trying to bind me to him, and for tying Bruiser to him so tightly, even if it did save his life. I felt something pull again in my mind, a compulsion to help Leo, a need to help him, and my anger at Leo flamed out. Leo needed a huge takedown or maybe some sensitivity training, delivered with the pointy end of a stake. I smiled grimly at the thought. My grandmother had been very adept with sharp pointy things. “Later,” I said, and ended the connection.
“What?”
I turned and found Eli in my bedroom, standing in the dark with his back to my wall, the door open beside him. I eyed the door. Then Eli. He was in boxers and a tee. His arms and legs were corded with muscle, his eyes dark in the shadows. He was holding a weapon in each hand, both semiautomatics. “When I lock my door, it’s to stay locked,” I said.
“Not when the house is under surveillance.”
“You mean the guy who appears to be sleeping in the alcove across the street? Small guy, dressed like he has money, but no place to crash?” It was a guess, but Leo’s Mercy Blade had used that doorway to watch my house before. So had Leo.
“You knew?”
“I’m not surprised. Next time, knock.”
“Next time, tell me when we’re being watched.”
I lifted my hand to show that I was prepared. I was holding one of the twin Walthers, the grip bloodred. Eli gave me one of his lopsided smiles. “You look good curled up in that bed, wearing a thin tank and not much else but a gun.” I didn’t reply except for a faint flush he couldn’t see in the dim room. He moved out of my room and pulled my door closed behind him. I flopped back on the bed. “Crap. Crap, crap, crap,” I whispered to the ceiling.
Seconds later the cell rang again. “What do you want, Bruiser?”
I could have kicked myself when I realized what I’d said, and there was a smile in his voice when he said, “Callan was sick, and Sabina has healed him.”
I ignored both my gaff and his tone. “Who is Callan?”
“One of the vampires in a cage at Katie’s. He says he served de Allyon only because his master kept him alive. He has asked to join Leo’s power base and it’s being considered. Leo would like you to speak to him before dawn, find out, if you can, what de Allyon’s plans are.”
“Yeah. Fine. I don’t need to sleep anyway,” I said crossly. I threw the covers away and hung up on Bruiser.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Free Dick Dot Come
I took the back way to Katie’s Ladies—over the back brick wall. Troll opened the door for me before I knocked, as if expecting me. “Little Janie,” he said, his voice like two rocks grinding together.
“Morning, Troll,” I said as I
passed him. “Your scalp needs shaving.”
He rubbed his hand over the pale dome as he closed the door on the morning’s predawn light. “When I get time. George said you wanted to talk to the new guest.”
“Yeah. It’s all my idea. Where is he?”
“Upstairs with Christie.”
I stopped and looked back. “Not . . .”
“Not. Christie came home this morning and took a liking to the newcomer. He needed to be fed and she was willing, but that’s over with now.” He grinned at me. “You won’t walk in on anything.”
I shook my head and went through the twisting hallways to the back stairs and up. Walking in on something with Christie could be detrimental to my sexual well-being. Christie was the resident S&M practitioner, with a penchant for whips, chains, and pain, able to play the part of top or bottom in BDSM games. The fact that I now understood what that meant was kinda scary. Not my thing. I knocked on her door and entered when she called out.
The inside of Christie’s room was decorated like a gym, but without the charm. Bare mattress on a plain, steel bed, the four corners and headboard adorned with flex-straps and chains and cuffs. Bare white walls, bare wood floor, plastic rolled up in the corners. I didn’t want to know what that was used for. Steel shutters and padded blinds were over the windows, blocking out the coming dawn, the latest vamp fad.
Christie was lying on the mattress with a dark blond vamp curled around her. Both were dressed, but only barely, Christie in a sheer top that exposed steel chains through her nipple rings—ouch—and the vamp in black silk pajama shorts. Seemed that Corpse had a name after all. The vamp looked vastly different from the way he had looked the last time I saw him, covered in blood and burns. Now he was clean, his hair combed, and his face stretched in a contented, well-fed smile as I looked him over. His silver cross burns were healed, and that kind of burn usually took a long time to heal. I’d burned Leo with one once and really ticked him off.
“Christie. Callan,” I said.
Callan roused enough to lift his head from Christie’s shoulder and I could see the tiny pinpricks on her throat that marked the constricted vamp bite marks. “You’re my new master’s Enforcer,” he stated, his accent Southern, maybe a mill-town accent from the piedmont of South Carolina. He climbed slowly from the bed, moving like a feral animal, all smooth muscle and grace. Callan stood in front of me and slung the hair back from his face, holding my gaze, letting me look my fill. He was pretty. Dang pretty. And he knew it. Like a lot of vamps, he’d been turned for his looks, no doubt about that. He had a boxer’s shoulders, a cyclist’s thighs, and a painter’s long, slender fingers, with an angel’s face on top. But something about him made me think he wasn’t the brightest bulb in the chandelier—maybe the fact that he was posing. He held the pose a moment longer and then dropped slowly to one knee, like an old-fashioned bow, but with a dancer’s sense of balance. He bent forward, curling his spine so his hands and his hair fell forward to the floor, exposing his back, which was a swimmer’s back, tapering to a tiny waist.
“Get up,” I said. Before he could rise, I asked, “How did your former master infect you with the disease?” I expected him to say that he had dated a sick human at Blood-Call.
Callan stood, his shoulders back, a sculptor’s model on display. I held in an exasperated sigh. “My former master fed me a woman. He feeds her to lots of us.”
“One woman?” I said, not sure I heard correctly.
“Yes, ma’am.”
My amusement vanished. A Typhoid Mary? A human with a disease that infects vamps? A prisoner, kept to be fed upon? Like a slave? I thought I had it all figured out, that sick humans were being passed around. I wasn’t sure how a single sick human connected. Not sure at all.
“Against her will?”
“She’s his prisoner. We all were.”
“Crap.” So what now? I’d have to kill de Allyon and rescue all the vamps and the blood-servants? I didn’t say it, but I could feel the need burrowing under my skin. Saving people, fighting for people, is what skinwalkers do, when we aren’t torturing them. “Is she here in Louisiana?”
“No. She is in Atlanta, in my mas—my former master’s lair.”
“So how did de Allyon infect all the vamps in Sedona, Seattle, and other places? Does he fly her around?”
“Lady, I got no idea how he did his thing. It ain’t like I was up high in the pecking order or nothing. But I will say that he never let that woman out of his compound. Like not never.”
I felt my hope deflate. “Is de Allyon in Louisiana?”
“Yes.”
“Do you know where?”
“No. Somewhere north, and maybe west. In a little town on a river. I’m not good with directions.”
The comment was so unexpected I almost laughed. Was the guy really dumber than a box of rocks, or was he dissembling, somehow hiding his true mind even from whichever old master vamp had fed him to heal him? That would have made Callan the best spy in history. Nope. He was no spy; Callan smelled of truth. And Callan was intellectually challenged—pretty, but dumb. Nearly every place in the state was north and west of New Orleans. “How did de Allyon know about me? How did he know I was Leo’s Enforcer?”
Callan shrugged. “I don’t know. Somebody tells him things.”
“Yeah. I was afraid of that.” A few more questions convinced me that I had discovered everything that Callan knew. Which was sad in all sorts of ways. Leo had a mole, a dissenter, a spy in his camp. I wanted it to be someone who recently joined the ranks, but it had to be someone who was in Asheville with the parley there, which limited the number of people involved. I had to study the Kid’s deep background search info on the Vodka Boys and the Tequila Boys. I had to unearth the mole. Unfortunately, Callan would be no help at all.
* * *
It was nine a.m. when I got back to the freebie house. I’d stayed and eaten breakfast with Deon. My meal had consisted of eggs Benedict, Caribbean-style, with spices and peppers and some really melty, gooey, fabulous Hollandaise sauce. Totally delicious and totally sinful. Eli would have turned up his nose at the fats. I scraped my plate clean.
Back at my house, I found a postal box on the front porch, filled with the CS canisters. They were plain metal canisters, like spray paint cans, but with a lever system on top to lock them on, so they could spray until empty or be stopped at will by the wielder. “Cool,” I said, and packed them away.
Sitting on the couch, I booted up my laptop and opened the file containing the English translation of the Vampira Carta. I scrolled down to the part about the Blood Challenge between masters and checked the footnotes for other info. There were four codicils to the challenge and three histories, none of which were in English. It looked like Latin, probably from a millennia ago. “Crap,” I muttered.
“Anything I can help you with?” Eli asked.
Instantly, I remembered his predawn comment about how I looked in bed. I was pretty sure I blushed and didn’t raise my head for him to see. “Not unless you speak Latin from the tenth century.”
“Free dick dot come.”
I lifted my eyes. “I beg your pardon?”
He laughed and bent over the laptop, typing “www.free dict.com” in my browser. I’m pretty sure my blush was visible even through my Cherokee coloring. He smelled good, all pheromones and self-confidence and man. “Oh. Thanks,” I muttered. Still grinning, he wandered away, leaving behind his scent and the echo of his laughter.
I went to that site and three others, subscribing to two that looked reasonable. I typed out the Latin info and started getting translations, none of which matched exactly. To be on the safe side, I sent snippets to all four sites and compared and contrasted the translations, taking the ones that seemed to match best. I quickly discovered that the VC’s Blood Challenge was instituted in direct response to a blood-feud that took out nearly two thousand humans and vamps in southern Italy in the mid-tenth century. The descriptions of the dead in that history were h
orrible, humans and vamps drained, torn apart, discarded, their bodies left to see the dawn. It was wanton destruction, leaving even the children of blood-slaves drained and dead in the streets. And a blood-feud was what we had here, what had been staring us in the face all this time, and I hadn’t really understood.
I went back to the date. If the history of Lucas Vazquez de Allyon was correct, he would have been alive back then. Just because his name was Spanish now didn’t mean he hadn’t traveled, or even been Italian—Roman—originally. As I worked, the smell of coffee filled the house, rich, dark, and wonderful. Too bad that coffee smelled so much better than it tasted to me.
Trying to block out smells and the small sounds made by men moving around in my house, I translated segments on blood-feuds, spending two hours before I realized that, basically, a blood-feud was a no-holds-barred free-for-all with winner take all. This one would be blamed on me for killing a man who had likely been intending to murder me the first chance he got.
“Jane,” Alex called from the kitchen. “I got something.”
I put the laptop to sleep and went to the kitchen, stretching on the way in. In the kitchen, I discovered where the coffee smell originated. The men taking over my life had purchased an espresso coffeemaker, a fancy stainless steel version by DeLonghi. According to the box at the back door, the thing cost nearly a thousand bucks. I hoped I hadn’t paid for that.
Before I studied the info Alex had, I put tea together. While the tea water sizzled on the stove top, I pulled up a chair near Stinky. Who definitely was not getting any fast food today. “Show me,” I said.
“Lucas Vazquez de Allyon purchased property in several states, including Louisiana last year. He has property in New Orleans, in Lafayette, and in some little towns between Lafayette and here. I put them on a map.”
It was a melded map, showing topo, streets and street names, bayous, rivers, airports, bus stations, and a lot of other stuff I would need if I had to go to each of them hunting him. “Have you found de Allyon yet?”
