by Kayleigh Sky
Cool fingers touched the skin of his waist, and Moss’s voice came out on a sigh. “It’s not bad. Just a cut.”
“Why is he so weak?” Justin asked.
“It’s a spell.”
Zev rolled onto his side as Moss advanced on the door where Camiel stood staring in at them. Moss hissed, and Camiel’s eyes narrowed to slits, but he backed up a step.
“I want to help,” Camiel said.
Moss sneered. “We don’t need your help, Nezzarram.”
“I might.”
At the sound of Otto’s voice, Zev struggled into a sitting position. His wooziness disappeared as though blown away.
Justin looked down at him with a worried frown. “You should lie down, sire.”
He took the cloth Justin held out but waved him away. “Coffee, please.”
“Of course.”
Otto stood nose to nose with Camiel and stared into his eyes. “I told you to wait in your room.”
A smile flashed on Camiel’s face before he retreated another step. “And I told you… This is a spell.”
“The king was cut,” said Moss.
“To deliver the poison,” said Camiel.
“Poison? Spell? Which is it?” Otto asked him.
“Both.”
“Start talking.”
Camiel’s lips parted, but Zev said, “Go sit down, Camiel. We’ll talk in the study.”
Zev shivered under Moss’s glare but pushed to his feet and patted Moss’s arm. “I’m okay.”
“Fucking Nezzarram,” Moss uttered under his breath.
The walls stayed in place, the floor steady under Zev’s feet. Otto stood by the fireplace, and Camiel sat on the settee. Zev took a chair, and Moss stood behind him.
“Wait for coffee,” Zev murmured.
“This isn’t a social visit,” Otto snapped. “Somebody tried to murder you.”
“No, they didn’t,” said Camiel.
“Camiel is my guest,” said Zev.
Otto wiped a hand down his face while Camiel settled back and rested his hands on his long legs. Nobody spoke again until Justin arrived with a trolley, poured their coffee, and departed. Zev took a big swallow, ignoring the scalding heat, and sighed.
“Now,” he said.
Oddly, Camiel looked at Otto, and Otto nodded. “Talk.”
Camiel turned to Zev. “You were doing everything Moss told you to do.”
Zev frowned. “I was—confused.”
“Poisoned. With a potion.”
“Oh, for God’s sake,” said Otto.
Camiel looked back at him. “Ask your swain. We’ve all heard stories of these spells being used.”
Zev frowned and turned to Otto, who met his gaze with a look of recognition surfacing in his eyes. Is he thinking about the cup too?
“What kind of potion?” Otto asked.
“A wish potion,” said Camiel.
“So what? It grants a wish? Why the knife wound?”
“It’s more that it makes the other grant the wish. The potion would be on the blade. It’s conveyed by blood or by consuming it. We can presume that making the king consume it was more difficult than cutting him. The victim becomes susceptible to whatever the spellholder wants. That’s why I said it’s not murder. The wound is superficial for a reason. The spell holder wouldn’t have felt confident of getting the king to eat or drink the potion, or of getting only him to do it.”
“How do you know all this?”
“I would’ve thought he’d’ve been injured more if somebody had wanted him dead. Plus, as I said, he followed every one of Moss’s orders like a zombie.”
“A zombie,” Otto laughed and scrubbed his face again. “Vampires and zombies.”
“So… one of the families wants you to grant them something? That puts everyone under suspicion,” Moss said. “Even the humans.”
“We all know about things like this,” said Camiel. “But for a lot of vampires, spells and potions are fairytales and don’t happen in real life anymore. This would never be the way they’d try to get at the king. This is somebody who is closer to the old ways.”
“Like you?” said Moss.
Camiel inclined his chin. “Like me.”
“What’s the point of something that wears off?” asked Otto.
“That I don’t know,” said Camiel.
“Do you know how to create it?”
Camiel smiled at Otto. “Yes.”
“Are you under the impression that helping us out will deflect our interest in you?”
Camiel’s smile thinned as it widened. “Of course not. I was…” His gaze turned to Zev. “Helping.”
“You can go,” said Otto. “Stay in your room.”
Camiel rose, and now the smile only tipped up on one side. “This has been my pleasure.”
“Camiel,” said Zev before the vampire reached the door. He forced his own smile. “There is no love lost between us.”
“On the contrary,” said Camiel. “I am loyal to you. We haven’t had our meeting yet, but I will tell you that my family tires of exile.”
“And you would like to convince me?”
Camiel sighed. “As was already asked, what would be the point of a spell that wears off?”
Zev’s smile widened. “My signature on a proclamation.”
Camiel’s stillness was palpable. “It was not I.”
“As you say.”
Otto reached out, opened the door, and Camiel stepped through. Zev deflated in his chair, relaxing under Moss’s hands on his shoulders.
“At least, it wasn’t a murder attempt,” said Moss.
Otto gave them a grim smile. “Not so fast. They wanted something. Doesn’t mean they’d need you once they got it,” he said to Zev.
Zev let out a feeble laugh. “That can be anybody.”
“Call this off,” said Otto.
Zev shook his head. “And run home? I rule to the extent they fear me.”
“You can’t rule dead.”
He let his eyes close for a moment. The coffee wasn’t helping at all. The lure of sleep dragged at him until he jerked himself upright, and Moss’s hands fell away. He turned to look into his cousin’s eyes. “I have an idea.”
“Maybe you could share it,” said Otto.
Zev grinned at him, and Otto’s eyes narrowed with a glint of interest.
“I don’t plan to go through with it, detective, which means you have three days at the most to find my attacker.”
“And if I can’t?”
Zev’s smile grew grim. “I will die.”
36
Check
The words on the page swam in front of Asa’s eyes. He’d already forgotten the name of the book. He flipped it over and stared at the battered cover and a frantic-eyed girl, who stood with her hand in the air as though to ward off the on-coming car. Headlights drenched her in yellow. Isaac had given him the book. Probably noticing how Asa was about to jump out of his skin, and he’d taken it because he didn’t want to let on that he’d sensed something wrong. The same sick rush of vertigo he’d felt when he was a kid. But he’d told himself he couldn’t possibly sense something like that. He wasn’t a fortune-teller like Camiel. He had to be cracking up. Too much worry about Zev catching onto him or Solomon swooping out of the dark to break his neck.
Maybe it was just the pressure getting to him.
A half hour earlier, he’d gotten his chess set out, but the pieces had blurred, and he’d broken out in a prickly sweat. Concentration shot, he’d put the set away and glanced at Isaac. The kid had been lying with his leg over his bent knee, bobbing a foot as he’d turned a page of his book. Why couldn’t Asa be like Isaac?
But maybe he was. Maybe Isaac sensed when something was wrong with his fated too.
Asa had licked his lips. He’d wondered if he should ask? But why. What could he do? And his feeling had been that Zev was hurt, but… not exactly hurt. No matter what, though, it wasn’t Asa’s business. He had to make up his mind. C
alling Zev “my sweet” just dug him in deeper. He had to keep his distance, but…
Something had happened. Something was wrong.
After those thoughts had spun in his head for a while, he’d finally jumped off his bed at the same time an enforcer opened the door and looked in. “Everyone stays in their room, please.”
Then he’d left, and Asa had stared at the empty space in shock. That’s when Isaac had stretched out the book to him. “It’s pretty good,” he’d said.
So Asa had tried to read it. But now he dropped it on his bed, got up again, and headed for the door.
Before he got more than a few feet, Isaac yanked him back, and he spun with a glare. “What are you doing?”
“What are you doing? We’re supposed to stay in our rooms.”
“I need to check on Zev.”
He might have swayed, because Isaac reached for him.
“The king? You have to check on him?”
Why not him? You’re just a servant for one thing. A nobody.
He took a deep breath and shrugged Isaac’s hand away. “Well, something’s going on. I need to know.”
Which wasn’t what he’d just said he needed to do, and Isaac pulled at the neck of his sweater with a frown. “Nobody’s after us.”
“You don’t know that. Maybe they’ll want to take out the whole place. No witnesses.”
He clung to that because it made sense, and it was a real possibility. There was a reason he’d never get rid of the images of bodies lying in the bloody corridors of his father’s office building. It was a message that helped him survive. No witnesses.
But Isaac wasn’t buying it from him, and his face hardened. “I like him.”
“Zev? You’ve never even seen him. What is it you like?”
“Everything he’s done for us.” A flicker of something else, something tough but bright as gold flashed through Isaac’s eyes. “I know you sleep with him.”
“Y-y-you… You’re imagining things. I wait on him. I’m a servant. Nobody’s looking out for us, so I’m going to.”
He turned and headed out the door. It slammed behind him a moment later.
Good. Stupid kid. Asa had a job to do and worrying about Isaac worrying about him wasn’t it. He liked the company, but damn, he’d had better luck with Lady. Always at his side, no complaints, no questions. He’d trusted her, though maybe that hadn’t been the best idea, considering she’d let a vampire crawl into his room without a single bark or growl. Much better to whine and wriggle her way to its feet. “Loyal creatures,” the vampire had whispered.
As opposed to vampires.
But Asa was going to him anyway.
Keeping close to the walls, he made his way toward Zev’s room, scooting against the rough surface and listening for voices.
The hallway split up ahead, leading to the game room in one direction and the stairs to the foyer in the other. He crept to the end of the hall, not even his breath making a sound, and peered around the corner.
Light seeped out of the game room. He padded to the door and peeked inside. A lamp beside a single chair was on, a book upside down on the seat. Across the room, embers flickered on the fireplace grate, stirred by the icy cold coming through an open door. He crossed the room. The door opened on a small round well that contained a glass table and chairs. Niches for potted plants encircled the wall, but the pots had nothing growing in them. Steps led to another patio. From there, a soft voice floated down.
“The king was attacked. You’ll know the truth of that tomorrow. I gain nothing from a lie.”
“I gain nothing from your truth, witch. I am no one’s enemy, and the old ways ought die.”
“It’s not the old ways that will die.”
“They are dead.”
“Only secret,” the other whispered.
Asa crept up the steps, ducking to keep his head below the level of the patio. The shadows of upper bodies and heads appeared first. No light reached them, but they stood in the middle of the patio. Asa rested a knee on a step and stretched to look over the top of the stairwell.
“Don’t be stubborn. You have nothing to lose.”
“Why do you care? You and your family reek of deceit.”
“This has nothing to do with the families. This is about you.”
“You are a fake and—”
One of the shadows separated from the other and a dark mass flew at him. Asa reared back and staggered down the steps.
“Stop!”
But instead of stopping, he bolted through the game room and down the hall. Still no light and no sound, except the hiss of “Spy,” from behind him. He reached the end of the hall and glanced back. The vampire stood outside the game room door but didn’t approach. It only stared.
Asa shivered, then spun around, and darted up the steps.
Now on the first floor, he looked in both directions. No one lurked here either, all locked in their rooms, except for the two on the patio.
Were they in on it?
In on what though? Was Zev—hurt?
His heart spasmed as though somebody had grabbed it and twisted it in their fists to wring it out. He gasped at the pain, dizzy as his heart stuttered back to life.
Attacking Zev didn’t make sense to him. Unless somebody had found the necklaces and they didn’t need Zev anymore. But why attack him? And why leave Asa here? If they had the necklaces, they’d get rid of him. They wouldn’t need him anymore. But he was still here. So maybe the attacker wasn’t Solomon. It didn’t have to have anything to do with the necklaces. Zev joked about vampires and their intrigue all the time. Moves and countermoves.
So if the attack was about something else, that meant the necklaces might still be here, and Asa still had to find them.
But if the attack had been Solomon’s, if he had somebody else working on the inside, who was it?
Telling Asa to get the necklaces didn’t mean he was the only one looking for them. Half the employees might belong to Solomon. Jere did. Maybe Asa was one of many.
But his job was to seduce the king. That was his only advantage over anyone else in Solomon’s pay. Getting close to the king.
But not too close.
Not close enough to feel him.
Asa had to stay on his own side, and that meant finding out what was going on.
He hurried toward Zev’s rooms. A gruff voice, the cop’s, came down another hall. “Bitch at me tomorrow. I don’t have time for you right now.”
Asa sped past and snuck through the foyer. Ghostly white light, the moon on snow, filled the windows. He ran past the stairs into another hallway. The stillness surrounded him like a weight. His ears rang with it. Not a single sound came from under the doors, though a light was on in Zev’s study. Asa stared down the dark expanse of hall to Zev’s bedroom and froze.
A shape disentangled itself from the shadow. Asa backed up a step, and a radio crackled.
Shit.
He ran, sliding across the slick foyer floor into the hall he’d just emerged from, and hurried for the stairs at the end. Maybe Jere could get a message to Solomon about what was happening here, but Asa couldn’t. He had no other contact. No way to show Solomon he was doing his job.
He rushed down the stairs, turned the corner, and ran face first into Otto. He bounced back a step.
“Well, well,” Otto murmured.
“What are you doing? You could’ve killed me.”
Otto laughed. “You can take a little bump in the night.”
“What do you want?”
“What are you doing out of your room?”
“I wanted to see to the king.”
Otto gave a slow nod. “Isn’t that Justin’s job?”
Asa gritted his teeth. “Mine, sometimes.”
“Do you pick the times?”
Asa blew out a breath. “I was going for a walk and decided to check on him.”
“Even though you were ordered to stay in your room?”
“I haven’t done anythin
g wrong, and besides, I wasn’t the only one.”
“Oh?”
Asa shrugged. “There were some people talking on the patio.”
“Who?”
“I don’t know. I didn’t want to interrupt them.”
“You heard the conversation?” Otto asked.
“No words. Just voices. I think Camiel was one, but I only saw him at dinner, so I can’t be sure. But like I said, I didn’t want to interrupt them, so I came back inside.”
Otto smirked. “Considerate.”
“Can I go?”
“By all means. But this time, stay.”
Otto made a solid lump in the center of the hallway. Glaring at the amusement in Otto’s eyes, Asa slid around him. The bastard had all the power, just like a vampire.
Asa clenched his teeth, hands in fists, as he stalked to his room. He threw open the door, slammed it shut, and stared at Isaac, who sat on his bed with his hands in his lap, and his face stark.
“What’s wrong? Did that cop bother you?” His outrage perplexed him. He didn’t know where it came from.
Isaac shook his head. “He didn’t bother me.”
“Did you tell him anything?”
Isaac picked at a hangnail on his thumb. “No.”
Liar.
Why would Isaac lie? Because people lied. Vampires lied. Everybody was in it for themselves.
I’ll come get you… I promise.
Right.
Maybe Isaac stole and cheated and tricked people all the time. Maybe he didn’t mean anything by it. He had to survive somehow. But it meant he wasn’t Asa’s friend. It meant Asa was as alone as always.
37
Middle Game
Uriah opened the door to the dining hall, and Zev said, “Make sure no one enters.”
“Yes, sire.”
He stood still after the door closed behind him, eyeing the silverware and dishes on the table. Emek sat at the far end of the room, shooting narrowed-eyed glances at him, but keeping quiet. He rubbed the glass in his hand with a cloth, then set it aside, and picked up another. Zev’s throne was empty, but he took the closest chair, rested his head against the back, and said nothing.
