“Exactly,” Rowan said, sitting back in his chair, his fingers tapping ever so lightly on the table.
“What sort of a comment is that?” I asked a bit testily.
“He means that they all believe you wished to become a Zorya, and you simply took the most expedient method to do so,” Kristoff explained, his thumb still stroking my hand.
“They’re nuts, then,” I said, giving them all an astounded look. “I’m doing everything I can to stop being a Zorya.”
“Indeed.” Christian pursed his lips slightly. “And what, if you do not mind me asking, would that entail?”
I opened my mouth to answer, but thought better of it, taking my time before I finally said, “We’ll come to that, but after we’ve taken care of your stuff first.”
“I have a foreboding suspicion that your issue is very much connected with ours,” he answered dryly.
“You bet your-” I glanced over to where Esme watched with bright, interested eyes, and an air of being about to impart some of her homey advice. “Er . . . you bet.”
“Very well. As for the situation with the Zorya, she was found in your bathroom, a dagger stabbed into her heart. Locating and charging her killer is obviously beyond the mortal police; therefore, the crime falls under our jurisdiction. We have reviewed the facts, and can come to only one conclusion.”
“An erroneous conclusion,” Kristoff scoffed. “Pia said she didn’t kill the Zorya. I was hesitant to believe her at first, but I know now that she would not be capable of such an act.”
“Thank you,” I told him with a little smile that had his eyes darkening.
“Then who did kill her?” Sebastian asked. “You’ve stated that you didn’t. If it’s not you or the Zorya, who did?”
I hated to dwell on this, but now was not the time to worry about niceties. “I wasn’t alone that night.”
“Mercy!” Esme gasped.
Kristoff’s fingers tightened around mine.
I’m sorry. I’m not trying to rub it in.
He said nothing.
“We are aware that Alec was with you.” Christian inclined his head in an acknowledgment of what I was hesitant to say right out. “But he left shortly after two a.m., and the Zorya did not arrive until approximately three hours after that, whereupon she asked the desk clerk for your room number. He refused to give it to her, and she apparently left but, in reality, entered the hotel by a secluded side entrance, after which she was seen entering your room.”
I blinked at him a couple of times. “How on earth do you know all that? Even the police didn’t know what she’d been doing before she died.”
Kristoff’s fingers tightened again. “I was watching your room,” he admitted.
“You were watching me?” I asked, turning an incredulous look on him. “Why?”
“You are a Zorya. We had to know where you were at all times.”
My astonishment fizzled into irritation. “You mean you and Alec both spied on me?”
“It is our job . . .” He glanced toward the other vampires. “It was my job to be aware of all movements of the reapers, you included. It was not until I realized that you were different that I ceased surveillance.”
“You surveyed me,” I asked, outraged. “Like I was a criminal? Before or after we slept together?”
He had the grace to look embarrassed. “Mostly before.”
I punched him in the arm. “ Mostly before? Do you have the balls to sit there and tell me that you followed me around after we spent the night together?”
“Dear, a gentleman’s personal accoutrements are never mentioned in polite-”
“I had no choice. Alec was busy trying to find another reaper, and I had no idea if you were just using me or-”
“If we might continue,” Christian said in a mild tone.
“Using you!” I was surprised to find myself on my feet. I was even more surprised at the fact that I was yelling at Kristoff. He sat before me, still gaunt, but with color in his face now, and his eyes burning with a cool blue heat. “If our marriage had been legal, I would divorce you right now!”
“Please-” Christian said, but he didn’t stand a chance.
Kristoff jumped to his feet. “Our marriage is legal, and you can hardly blame me for suspecting that you might be manipulating me, since you had made it clear you preferred Alec to me, and yet there you were in my bed.”
“It wasn’t a bed. It was a bunch of moldy straw, and don’t you dare try to make yourself out to be the victim! I’m the one whose trust was abused!”
“I never abused your trust,” Kristoff said with a grim note to his normally sensual voice. “I didn’t believe you were actively working against us, but I knew that the reapers could use you without you being aware of it. I was simply trying to protect you and us at the same time.”
“You were?” I asked, surprised. You really believed me?
Yes.
Oh. I . . . oh. Thank you.
“Enough!” bellowed Christian.
We both turned to look at him.
“Still think they’re putting on an act?” Allie asked him.
A flicker of irritation was momentarily visible in his face before his mouth relaxed. “I am beginning to see your point.”
“It takes them a while sometimes,” Allie said with a fond smile at her husband before turning to me. “But they usually get there in the end.”
“The fact remains that the Zorya was killed in your bathroom.”
“That means nothing,” Kristoff answered abruptly, warming me with his quick defense. “Anyone could have gotten into her room. The door to her balcony was open, and the bathroom connected to the room next door.”
“The room containing the same woman who accompanied you here,” Christian said, looking thoughtful.
“Magda had nothing more to do with Anniki’s death than I did,” I said.
He continued looking thoughtful. “No one else was seen entering your room.”
“Exactly. No one was seen entering. But much as the idea gives me the willies, it doesn’t mean someone didn’t enter.” I turned to Kristoff. “Where were you watching?”
“Outside, in the garden beneath your window.”
“That means you couldn’t see who was coming or going.”
He shook his head. “I could see both hotel entrances that were still unlocked, and your door through the window. No one entered after Alec left.”
I thought for a moment. It was true my room had been at the end of the building, but there was more than one way into it. “Then someone must have come through Magda’s room. She had a balcony, too.”
“It’s possible, of course,” Christian said. “But likely? Why would anyone but you wish to kill the Zorya?”
“Why don’t you ask some of the other vampires you seem to have granted the right to kill Brotherhood members?” I asked somewhat snappishly.
“Ooh, she has you there, love muffin,” Allie said.
His mouth tightened. “Despite what you may think, we do not encourage our people to murder reapers without a reason. We imprison, yes, but that is only for the safety of our people, and as you see, our captives are treated humanely.”
“I will grant you that, but I’d just like to know how we’re supposed to prove we didn’t do something.”
“In mystery books, that would be motivation for finding the killer yourself,” Kristoff said.
That astounded me. “You know how to find a killer?”
“Yes. But not in this situation. There were only so many people who had access to your room. One of them must have done it.”
I thought over the list. Magda and Ray had been asleep in the room next to mine, the one that shared the bathroom. But neither of them would have a reason to kill a woman they didn’t know. That left Alec and Kristoff, but I couldn’t believe they had done it.
Thank you for the vote of confidence in my moral base.
Oh, I don’t mean you wouldn’t have done it-I think under th
e right circumstance, you’d be perfectly capable of killing a woman like Anniki. I just don’t think you did.
“I really think you’re going to have to go with a verdict of death by a person or persons unknown,” Esme suddenly piped up. “Like they say in those fascinating police shows you like to watch when no one is around.”
“I do not watch television,” Christian said sternly. “That is a mortal pursuit.”
“Uh-huh. Think I didn’t discover your secret stash of those British homicide DVDs that are so conveniently hidden in your study?” Allie asked.
“Very well,” Christian said, obviously ignoring the teasing tone in his wife’s voice. “I am willing to withdraw the charge of unauthorized murder against the Zorya pending further evidence. But the last charge will not be so easily dismissed.”
“I don’t see how you can think Alec going to ground has something to do with us,” I said, wishing Kristoff would hold my hand again, but lacking the nerve to just take his.
His fingers curled around mine, warm and strong and bringing me untold comfort. I slid a quick glance at him, but his face was impassive, his attention on Christian as the latter reiterated the charges.
“I have not seen Alec since he left Iceland. Neither has Pia,” Kristoff said firmly.
“We have evidence to the contrary,” Sebastian said with a smug little smile.
“Evidence? What evidence?” I asked, suddenly worried. What if someone had gone to the trouble of manufacturing evidence against us the way they had against Kristoff?
Christian nodded to Rowan, who rose and left the room. “We will bring in our proof.”
I gnawed my lip a moment as I considered Kristoff. “Alec hasn’t been in contact with you at all?”
He shook his head. “I haven’t seen him since that night in Iceland. He said he was returning to his home in California.”
“Where do you live?” I asked, somewhat surprised to hear that the very urbane Alec made his home in California.
“Outside of Firenze.”
“That’s Florence, isn’t it? In Italy?”
He nodded as the door opened and Rowan reappeared with Mattias.
“First you put me in the cell. Then you take me out and taunt me with the sight of my wife. Then you put me back in, and now you bring me here again. Your methods to break me are most cruel, but I will never give in to you. Never!” Mattias said in a dramatic fashion. “Wife! Have you convinced them yet to set me free?”
“She’s my wife, not yours,” Kristoff grumbled as Rowan shoved Mattias into a chair. “I married her first.”
“She’s a Zorya, and I am the sacristan. A Zorya must be wed to a sacristan in order to have full access to her powers, and since we’ve all seen proof that she has those, it is the marriage to me that is valid,” Mattias retorted.
“I’m afraid he has a point,” I murmured.
Kristoff’s glower turned even darker.
“The discussion of your release hinges, as you have repeatedly been told, on your cooperation,” Christian told Mattias in mild chastisement.
My ears perked up. Christian was considering releasing Mattias? Perhaps it wouldn’t be as hard as I thought to get him to see reason.
“You will repeat what you told us earlier.”
Mattias’s pale blue eyes rested with consideration on me. “I will speak only to my wife.”
Sebastian made an impatient gesture. “We can force you to speak.”
“You may torture me all you like-I will speak only to Pia!” Mattias yelled.
I began to see a way to present my case. “Am I to understand that Mattias has said something that connects us with the disappearance of Alec?” I asked the council members.
“He stated . . .” Christian shuffled a few papers until he found one he liked. “He stated that he knew how you and Kristoff were involved in engineering the disappearance of Alec, and where he was now. He refused to say any more when pressed.”
“Tortured!” Mattias shouted. “I was tortured.”
“You look just fine to me,” I told him. And he did; he was practically radiating health, whereas poor Kristoff had nearly wasted away. “I’m afraid you’ve been had. Mattias is either confused or lying.”
“Wife!” Mattias sputtered.
Kristoff glared at him.
“That eventuality crossed my mind, which is why we asked you here,” Christian answered smoothly.
Allie snorted but said nothing.
“You know . . .” I looked at Mattias with what I hoped appeared as innocent speculation. “If you were to release him to my custody, I’m sure I’d be able to get from him everything he knows.”
Both of Christian’s eyebrows went up at such a bold suggestion. Sebastian scowled and said in a voice rife with scorn, “Although we have not done so, despite what the reaper says, we are not above using force to extract the information we need. I doubt if you could bring yourself to do so.”
“Ah, but I have two points in my favor,” I said, smiling my most winning smile.
“And those are?” Sebastian asked.
I held up two fingers and ticked them off. “First, you guys may talk the talk, but I don’t seriously think you’re going to torture Mattias and Kristjana, although I don’t think I’d blame you where the latter is concerned. She definitely has more than one bat loose in her belfry. But cold-blooded torture?” I considered the vampires before me for a moment, shaking my head. “No. You guys aren’t that way, not really.”
“Brava,” Allie said, nodding.
Sebastian looked disgruntled for a moment before asking, “And the second point?”
I tossed a little more charm into my smile. “I am the Zorya. Mattias has to do exactly what I tell him. So if I tell him to spill everything, by the laws of the Brotherhood, he has to spill. But I’m not going to do that unless he’s in my custody.”
“Impossible,” Sebastian pronounced.
Christian, to my surprise, said nothing. He looked thoughtful, though, which gave me hope.
“To have you and the sacristan running free . . . it is impossible,” Sebastian repeated.
“What exactly are you holding Mattias for?” I asked, curious.
“Exactly what I have asked them myself, wife!” Mattias said, shooting an outraged look at Rowan. “I have done nothing wrong.”
“You are a sacristan,” Rowan answered.
“Yes, but he hasn’t actually committed any crime against you guys,” I pointed out. “He wasn’t even present at the ceremony where Frederic and the others tried to use me to hurt Kristoff and Alec. You guys had nabbed both him and Kristjana before that. So I really don’t see that you have any grounds to continue to hold them. And as I am willing to guarantee their good conduct, I don’t see a reason you shouldn’t turn them over to me.”
Sebastian sputtered and grumbled at the idea. Christian continued to look thoughtful, finally saying, “You seek to have them released. That is why you agreed to meet with the council.”
I slid a look at Kristoff. He was watching me with an impassive expression. “Well . . . yes. But not because I didn’t want to help Kristoff. I had no idea he was in this state, or I would have come weeks ago. But yes, I have been asked to facilitate the release of Mattias and Kristjana.”
“I knew it!” Mattias said gloatingly. He smiled at Kristoff. “I knew you truly wanted me and not that one there, the one you had carnal relations with right in front of me. I knew it must be a mistake.”
Allie’s eyebrows went up as she gave me a long look.
“It wasn’t at all like that,” I told her, my blasted genes kicking in with a blush that was hot enough to fry bacon. “Mattias wasn’t actually right there with Kristoff and me. We were locked in a cell. By ourselves. In the dark, actually. And Kristoff was handcuffed-”
“Pia,” Kristoff interrupted me, his lips twisting a little. “I don’t think anyone wishes to know about our time imprisoned in the Brotherhood house.”
“Sorry,” I s
aid hastily, the blush cranking up another notch. “I just want to say right here and now that I’ve never had sex in front of an audience.”
“Well, then, there you go,” Allie said cheerfully.
“Er . . .” Christian looked a bit dazed. “Where were we? Ah, yes. I assume there is a reason other than altruism that you wish us to release the two reapers into your custody?”
“Yes. It’s a means to an end-mine. Or, rather, my career as a Zorya. If I can convince you to release Mattias and Kristjana, the Brotherhood will revoke my permit to be Zorya, or something along those lines. The end result would be that I would no longer have any special powers against vampires.”
“No!” Mattias gasped. “An execration? You cannot mean that! You cannot give up!”
Everyone ignored him.
“Sounds like a smart plan to me,” Allie said, nodding at me. “I approve.”
“Well, I do not!” Sebastian snapped. “Nor will any other member of the council tolerate such an idiotic idea. Is that not right, Rowan?”
Kristoff’s cousin shook his head slowly. “I do not think it would be wise for the Zorya and the sacristan to be together. We have no guarantee that the reapers will do as they have promised her.”
“Agreed. Andreas?” Sebastian looked to the man who’d been standing so silent, it was easy to overlook his presence.
Andreas roused himself from what appeared to be a deep meditation. His face gave none of his thoughts away. “I object to the release of reapers on general principles. There is no reason to believe they will not later harm our own people.”
Mattias sneered.
“You are not helping,” I told him. His sneer faded away to a pout.
“Christian?” Sebastian asked.
Christian was even slower to reply than Andreas. “We have held reapers before who have not been directly responsible for harm. Since Kristjana and the sacristan are both members of an active chapter, a chapter that we know has made several attacks against both Kristoff and Alec, we are within our right to continue to hold the two of them, regardless of whether or not they themselves participated in the attempts to harm Dark Ones.”
My heart sank. So much for doing this the easy way.
Crouching Vampire, Hidden Fang do-7 Page 8
