by Debra Dunbar
“Nope. So don’t try to hit me up for any. I shared a joint with an angel after killing off most of the management of a local drug empire. There was a bit of a scene downstairs with that Kelly girl, so I strongly suspect they’ll move up my meeting with the master guy and kick us out before daybreak.”
Wyatt looked regretfully around at our clothing. “Ah. Just the essentials in a bag as we planned?”
“Yeah, except I’m going to try and walk out the door as the tall blond. There’s no way Haagenti’s people are going to let me leave this casino, so I’m going to see if I can sneak out.”
Wyatt looked concerned. “Won’t they sense your energy? I thought you guys all recognized each other?”
“I don’t leak,” I told him. “And my physical form is damned near perfect. It’s probably a fifty-fifty chance that they won’t recognize me, but it’s the best I’ve got.”
I grabbed a pair of jeans and a bright red oxford shirt, throwing another pair of jeans and a plain white t-shirt in Wyatt’s small duffle with my license, cash, cell phone, and the box of elf blood. Then I raced for the shower. I wanted to be clean for my meeting. I was towel drying my hair when I heard Wyatt answer the door.
“Ten minutes, Sam,” he hollered, throwing a bag of Doritos in the bathroom door at me. Nacho Cheese.
I ignored the Doritos and put on my clothes, piling the wet hair in a pony tail and forgoing make-up. It’s not like I needed to impress this guy. The whole meeting was just a formality. He says ”Hi,” I hand over elf blood, we make small talk for two minutes, and then off I go, empty handed.
I grabbed my duffle and tossed Wyatt the car keys.
“You need to take good care of my Corvette. No scratches, I don’t even want to see drool on the steering wheel. If I’m not there in one hour, go ahead like we planned.”
He met me at the door and kissed me. It was one of those kisses like someone’s afraid they won’t see you again.
“Stop it,” I told him. “I’m a cockroach and we must have a dozen lives or something. Don’t get all soppy on me, I’ll be there.”
“You better be,” he said, his voice husky. “Otherwise I’m going to drop your car into the Chesapeake Bay. On purpose.”
That was proper motivation. I gave him a quick kiss and followed Mario into the elevator.
Chapter 25
Mario led me into what appeared to be a long, narrow study. The door where we entered was at one end. At the other was a large, ornate, dark wood desk with an equally ornate chair behind it. The wall behind the desk was bare, no doubt so there was nothing to distract your attention from the man in the chair. A couple of guest seats were angled in front of the desk. To the left, a couch sat with a coffee table in front of it. To the right, a series of built-in bookshelves, filled with books, pictures, and knickknacks. Mario and I were the only ones in the room.
“So what do I call this guy?” I asked Mario. “I’m assuming he has a name. Bob? Phil?”
“You can call him Master,” Mario said definitively.
Yeah, like that was going to happen. I looked around, and was rather surprised when Mario left. He actually left me alone here to wait for this guy? Shouldn’t he be worried that I’d take off with the silver, or go through the desk drawers or something?
It was absolutely silent in the room. I was starting to get bored, so I went and looked over the items on the bookshelf. There was an eclectic mix of books. Some beautiful leather-bound classics. Philosophy, a very old Bible, and an equally old copy of Pilgrim’s Progress. A handful of modern paperbacks and some worn children’s picture books. These books had been read, and I assumed they meant something to their owner.
The pictures were equally intriguing. A beautiful black-and-white of cliffs overlooking the ocean, and one of fields of wheat, bent in the breeze. One of a little boy with dark hair and grey eyes, his mouth turned slightly up at the edges like he found life infinitely amusing. It had to have been Kyle as a child; the resemblance was too striking to have been otherwise. There was only one reason I could think of for a man to have a picture of a little boy in his personal study. Yes, Kyle is a bad, bad boy, I thought with amusement.
My host had still not arrived, so I turned my attention to the knickknacks on the shelves. Beautiful woven rush baskets, so tiny they fit on my fingertips like little thimbles, were next to the old Bible. Beside the picture of Kyle was an old wooden top, its string frayed and its paint chipped. I handled a piece of hemp rope with wonder. What significance could it hold for the owner? These were clearly all very personal objects with great meaning. What an intriguing man to have so much of himself out on display like this, even if it was his personal study. Did he needed reminders of his past? Something to anchor him to lost humanity in a very long vampire life? But then, this man was born a vampire. There were no roots of humanity to remember. Perhaps they were to remind him of what he’d never had.
I was just about to turn away when I saw the egg. I’ve seen a lot of eggs in my years. Intricate jeweled ones, sugar ones with little edible scenes inside their hollowed-out shells, and actual bird eggs, warm and colorful. This was the most beautiful egg ever. I caught my breath and picked it up, running my fingers across its surface. It was a kind of metal. I couldn’t tell what, and I probed it with all my might. The surface was covered with little symbols and letters, none of which combined to form any language I was aware of. A metal egg with raised symbols shouldn’t hold this much fascination for me, but it was hard to put it down. I desperately wanted to stick it in my pocket and steal it. It would be kind of obvious walking out of here with a huge bulge in my jeans pocket so I reluctantly put it back on the shelf and sat down on the couch. There was a glass candy dish with what appeared to be bits of beef jerky in it, so I helped myself.
As usual, I had my mouth stuffed full of jerky when my host walked in. I could feel him the moment he opened the door, his power rolling before him like a wave. I jumped up and vaulted the coffee table to shake his hand, swallowing the poorly chewed stuff and choking slightly.
“I’m so glad to finally meet you Mr. Master. I’m Samantha Martin. You can call me Sam.”
My host looked at me with the same placid, bored look as the rest of his crew. Unlike his crew, though, there wasn’t much beyond the surface that appeared human. Kyle was Born, but he still looked like all the other vampires. This one didn’t, and I wasn’t sure if it was his age or his power or a combination of them both that set him apart. He wasn’t good looking in the conventional sense of the word. Thin, almost gaunt, with sharp angles everywhere, and eyes that seemed glassy and feverish. His skin was a grayish color. If he’d been human, I would have thought he was in the late stages of cancer or some wasting sort of disease. He even smelled like something that hadn’t been exposed to fresh air for centuries. In spite of that, he had a sort of aristocratic air about him that made me feel like I was a poorly educated, naughty child. This was going to be a long five minutes. I wiped the drool from the corner of my mouth with the back of my hand.
“Excellent jerky you’ve got there,” I said, by way of conversation.
A ghost of a smile crossed his face. “Yes, we made it ourselves.”
Clearly this was an inside joke. I wondered if the jerky was some poor sap that’d lost big at blackjack. I’d eaten human before, so it didn’t exactly faze me.
“Please sit.” My host motioned toward the guest chairs as he moved to sit behind the desk. I plopped myself down on the couch and he frowned, changing direction and turning around one of the guest chairs to face me. Clearly this was a lot more informal than he’d planned. Too bad.
“I’d like to start by apologizing for the incident in the lobby with my former casino manager,” he said smoothly. “We don’t tolerate that kind of behavior, and I’m hoping you don’t hold her disrespect against our family.”
“I’m terribly affronted that she didn’t actually show up to shove Doritos up my ass. That would have been epic.” I shrugged. “I totally
understand if you needed to kill her. Shame, though. You’re missing some spunk like that in your ranks. Of course, if you’re worried that her power might rival yours, then you should definitely off her. Taking out strong rivals under the guise of keeping behavioral standards is a good way to prop up a tottering empire.”
His dull skin glowed somewhat, a silvery gray. He knew what I was doing, but the implication that he was old, weak, and outdated still stung.
“You do realize that we cannot just hand this artifact over to you? That it chooses who it goes to and isn’t likely to go to a courier?” He ignored my comments.
“Oh yeah, your son told me that already.” I was amused to see him start as I referred to Kyle as his son. “I just thought we’d chat a bit before I go home and get my ass soundly beat.”
He looked at me with some curiosity. “Why go to all this trouble to get a meeting if you know you won’t be able to retrieve the artifact?”
“And miss out on a few days of gambling and killing at some other demon’s expense? I never pass up a freebie.”
His eyes brightened slightly. “Surely that isn’t your only reason?”
I was hardly going to tell him I was hoping to mitigate my smack-down from Haagenti a bit by putting in an effort.
“No. My boyfriend had a computer game tournament up here and I wanted to come along to make sure you vampires didn’t end up making jerky out of him.”
That was a horribly insulting thing to say, but my host wasn’t paying attention to me. He wasn’t even looking at me. Instead he was frowning at something on the coffee table. I looked down and saw the egg sitting there, right next to my hand. Fuck. I thought I had put it back on the bookshelf. It wouldn’t be the first time I’d stolen something and not really been conscious of it, though.
“I’m sorry.” I picked up the egg and replaced it on the bookshelf. “I was admiring some of your decorations, and didn’t realize that I’d not put that one back.”
This really didn’t look good. I didn’t want the head of the entire northeast region of vampires thinking I was stealing his personal items. Hastily, I dug in the little duffle bag and pulled out the box that held my gift. Well, Dar’s gift, actually.
“Here.” I tossed the box at him. He caught it in a quick, smooth motion, and raised his eyebrows at me. “A gift. I was told I was to present a gift to you.”
He looked at the box suspiciously then opened it. A soft gasp escaped him as he looked at the tiny vials, and he ran a finger lovingly over them. Dar clearly did something right here.
“I cannot accept this, Baal. This gift is precious beyond words, and I cannot reciprocate by giving you the artifact.”
I waved my hand at him. “Keep it. Otherwise I’ll sell it on ebay and it will end up collecting dust on the shelf of a forty year old fat man living in his parent’s basement. There are only so many people interested in buying elf blood, you know.”
He nodded, and giving the vials one last caress, closed the box and placed it on his desk.
“So, what else should we discuss? The weather, perhaps? Or your favorite sports team?”
“Nope. I should probably head out,” I said, making to rise.
He halted me with an upraised hand and frowned at my bag. “Is there something else in your satchel, Baal?”
“Just a change of clothes,” I replied, checking quickly. My face reddened and I pulled out a metal egg. I was so fucked. No amount of elf blood was going to make this one right. And he’d caught me stealing it, too; otherwise how would he have known it was in my bag?
I got up to put the egg back once again. Suddenly, it flashed and morphed, and instinctively I threw it across the room. In a panic, I jumped up on the couch as if it were a mouse and shielded myself with a couch cushion.
“Get down, it’s gonna blow,” I shouted.
After a few seconds of silence, I peeked around the couch cushion to see the egg lying on the coffee table once again. A chunk of the bookcase had broken into splinters on the floor where the egg had impacted.
“Perhaps if you held onto it, rather than hurling it across the room, you’d figure out what it is,” my host said sarcastically.
I reached out tentatively and picked up the egg, still holding onto the cushion with my other hand, just in case. In a flash, it became a sword. It was rather plain, with a braided hilt and round knob pommel.
“So this is what all the fuss is about?” I asked. The master guy nodded.
“Well, it’s very nice,” I lied. “Should I stick it back on your bookcase, or is there somewhere else you keep it?”
“It appears to want to go with you,” my host said.
Wow, this was a lucky turn of events. I could give the sword to Haagenti after all and maybe be back here before Wyatt died of old age.
“You cannot give it away. It will remain with you until it decides otherwise.”
“I have no use for a sword,” I said in frustration. “I don’t know how to use it. I don’t fight with a sword. What the fuck am I supposed to do with this thing?”
He shrugged, looking like he might start to laugh at any moment. “It can change shape to whatever you want. A knife? A staff perhaps? Or an egg? At this juncture, it’s mainly ceremonial, although if you need, it can be a powerful weapon for you.”
“What sort of ceremonies?” I asked. I couldn’t recall any demon ceremonies off the top of my head, let alone one that included using a sword.
“At Council meetings, or if someone questions your authority. Or you could always just chop off an angel’s wings with it,” he added, his eyes glittering in amusement.
I looked at the sword with a growing sense of doom. Now I really didn’t want the damned thing. Not if it was what I thought it was. As if Gregory didn’t hate me enough right now. He’d destroy me if he saw me with it.
“It’s the Sword of the Iblis, Ha-satan.” He sounded rather sympathetic. “Surely you didn’t think you were coming to retrieve Excalibur, did you?”
Of course. But why would Haagenti have wanted such a thing? Yeah, I could see him drooling at the prospect of chopping angel wings off, but I didn’t envision him wanting to be the Iblis. Nobody wanted to be the Iblis. I certainly didn’t want to be the Iblis.
“Can I give it back? Maybe you vampires can hold onto it until some other sucker, I mean demon, comes along?”
He shook his head. “It’s a sentient object, Ha-satan. I have no control over it.”
What the fuck was I supposed to do with this thing? Maybe I could hide it and no one would know. Stick it under my bed or something.
Well, there was nothing to be done about this right now. I needed to leave pronto and sneak out of this hotel or I wouldn’t make my rendezvous with Wyatt. Of course, it was going to be hard sneaking out of a casino with a big sword in tow. I concentrated on the sword, begging it silently to turn into something useful, like a Gucci bag or a pair of Ferragamos. There was a flash, and a gold barrette in the shape of a feather lay in my palm. Oh, the irony.
“Well, thank you very much for your hospitality.” I clipped my hair back with my newest accessory. “I wish you the best of luck in quelling the upcoming rebellion.”
He shot me a shrewd look as he rose to shake my hand.
“I’m hoping I can count on your continued support and friendship, Ha-satan.”
“Oh absolutely,” I lied, grabbing my duffle and heading out the door. “I’m totally in your corner on this one.”
Time was running out. I raced for the elevator, and jumped in, smacking the button for the lobby. The hotel was not tall, and I only had a few floors to go, so I dropped the duffle bag and quickly popped my form into the tall blond, blowing apart every stitch of clothing I had on. In a moment of panic, I grabbed at my hair thinking I’d blown apart the Barrette of the Iblis along with my clothing, but I was relieved to find it there undamaged. I’d never live it down if I managed to destroy a priceless demon artifact within five minutes of taking possession of it. Scrambling,
I threw on the jeans and white t-shirt from the duffle bag, going commando for speed in dressing, and shoving my ID, money, and my cell phone into a pocket. Just as I was pulling on a pair of wedge pumps, the elevator dinged and I stepped out, leaving the duffle behind.
I meandered around the casino for a bit, searching for either Sobronoy or Labisi. They both knew my meeting was this morning, but I’m sure they assumed later. Maybe they weren’t going to bother staking the place out until lunchtime? I headed toward the hotel lobby area and stopped dead as I caught sight of Mario. He’d most likely seen the footage from before and might recognize me as this tall blond woman. It was too late to backtrack without bringing notice to myself, so I casually kept walking, hoping he’d not see me. Nope. He glanced up and froze, staring intently at me. Fuck. I slowed down and looked at him, wondering what to do. He was clearly wondering what to do, too. How tight was he with the late Kelly that I’d screwed over? He knew both Sobronoy and Labisi were going to grab me. Would he rat me out to them?
Our eyes met for a brief second, and I saw him smile. Walking with an inhuman speed toward the door, he touched the sleeve of a man there. Sobronoy, I thought as I saw him turn. Fuck, Mario was going to hand me over. I did not want to have a knockdown, drag out fight with Sobronoy in this hotel lobby, but there was no way I was going down easy. I took a breath, ready to pull my energy up, but something made me hold back. Sobronoy walked away, with Mario following him. I sighed with relief and saw Mario give me the peace sign behind his back. That vampire was on my good list. I owned him one. Anytime Mario, I thought. Anytime.
Feeling like escape was within my reach, I walked out the revolving doors and grabbed a cab. Within ten minutes, I was outside the city limits and happily walking into an IHOP and Wyatt’s arms. Home free. Almost.
Chapter 26
“I was followed,” Wyatt whispered into my neck as he hugged me. I was actually taller than him in this form.
“Is she here?” It had to be Labisi.
He shook his head. “In the parking lot. Sam, I’m not sure how we’re going to get out of here. Maybe if you stay like this, she’ll think I’m cheating on you. Then we can go to a rent by the hour motel, and hopefully she’ll give up and head back to the casino.”
