The Killing Dance abvh-6

by Laurell Hamilton

  I found the dead I needed, and it didn't work. The power continued to build until I would have screamed if I could have gotten enough air. A step, an ingredient, something was missing.

  I rolled onto my back, staring up at both of them. They stared down at me. Jean-Claude's eyes had gone solid, midnight blue. They both leaned towards me at once. Richard went for my mouth, Jean-Claude went for my neck. Richard's kiss was almost a burning. I could feel the brush of fangs as Jean-Claude fought not to bite me. Temptation was everywhere. Someone's hand was under my shirt, and I wasn't sure whose it was anymore. Then I realized it was both of them.

  What was one thing I needed for raising the dead? Blood. I must have said it out loud: "Blood."

  Jean-Claude raised up, staring at me from inches away. His hand was just below my breast. I'd grabbed his wrist without thinking about it. "What, ma petite?"

  "Blood to finish it. We need blood."

  Richard raised his face up like a drowning man. "What?"

  "I can give you blood, ma petite." Jean-Claude leaned into me. I stopped him with a hand on his chest, at the same time that Richard put a hand on his shoulder. The power poured over us in a searing wash, and I was seeing white spots.

  "You won't use me to sink fangs into her for the first time," Richard growled it at him. His anger fed the magic and I screamed.

  "Give me blood, or get off me." I held up my own wrist between them. "I don't have a knife, someone do it."

  Richard leaned over me. He swept his hair back from one side of his neck. "Here's your blood."

  Jean-Claude didn't argue. He leaned into him, lips drawn back. I watched in a sort of slow motion as he bit the side of Richard's neck. Richard tensed, a hiss of breath as the fangs sank home. Jean-Claude's mouth sealed over his skin, sucking, throat working.

  The power roared through me, raising every hair on my body, creeping through my skin until I thought I'd come apart. I sent it all outward to the dead that I'd found. I filled them up and still there was too much power. I reached outward, outward, and found what I was looking for. The power left us in a cool, burning, rush.

  I lay gasping on the floor. Jean-Claude lay on my left, propped on one elbow. Blood stained his lips, trickling down his chin. Richard lay on his stomach to my right, pinning my arm underneath his cheek. His chest rose and fell in great gasps, sweat glistening along his spine.

  The world was gold-edged, almost floating. Sound returned slowly, and it was like I was listening down a long tube.

  Jean-Claude licked the blood from his lips, wiping a shaking hand across his chin, licking the hand clean. He lay down beside me, one hand across my stomach, his head cradled on my shoulder. His bare chest and stomach lay across my arm. His skin was almost hot, feverish. He'd never felt like that before. His heart pounded against my skin like a captive bird.

  His hair fell against my face. It smelled of some exotic shampoo and of him. He gave a shaky laugh and said, "It was glorious for me, was it good for you, ma petite?"

  I swallowed, and was too tired to even laugh. "Trust you to know just what to say."

  Richard raised himself up on his elbows. Blood trickled down his neck where two neat fang marks showed. I touched the bite mark, and my fingers came away stained crimson.

  "Does it hurt?" I asked.

  "Not really." He grabbed my wrist, gently, licking the blood off my fingers, sucking them clean.

  Jean-Claude's strangely warm hand caressed my stomach under my shirt. He undid the button of my pants.

  "Don't even think it," I said.

  "Too late, ma petite." He bent and kissed me. I could taste the metallic sweetness of Richard's blood on his tongue. I rose up to meet him, pushing at his mouth. I'd asked for the blood, not either of them. The truth was, we weren't done with the bloodletting today. Whatever I'd called from the grave had to be put back. That would take blood, fresh blood. The only question was who would donate it and how would it be gathered. Oh, one more question, how much blood would we need?

  26

  Jean-Claude's fingertips slid along the edge of my pants. Richard grabbed his wrist. Anger flared from both of them, and that shared power flickered to life.

  "You won't use this as an excuse to get into her pants, either," Richard said. His voice was thick and dark with more than anger. His hand tightened on Jean-Claude's wrist.

  Jean-Claude balled his hand into a fist and bent his arm at the elbow. Concentration and anger touched both their faces. I could feel the trembling effort through their chests. Their anger prickled along my skin. It was too soon to do all this shit over again. "You can arm-wrestle later, boys, we've got to go see what I raised from the dead."

  There was a fraction of hesitation, then they both looked down at me. Their arms were still straining against each other. Richard's face showed the effort. Jean-Claude's face had gone blank and curious, as if it was no effort to hold off a werewolf. But I could feel the fine trembling through his body. Illusion was all with Jean-Claude. With Richard it was all nerve endings and reality.

  "What did you say, ma petite?"

  "She said she raised the dead," Richard said.

  "Yep, so get off me. You can fight later, but right now, we need to check on what I did."

  "We did," Jean-Claude said. He eased away from Richard, and after a second, Richard released his hand.

  "What we did," I said.

  Richard stood, the muscles in his bare legs moving under the skin, and it was hard not to touch them, feel the movement of him. He offered me a hand up.

  "Give me a minute," I said.

  Jean-Claude stood as if drawn to his feet by strings. He offered me a hand, too.

  They stood glaring at each other. Their anger played through the air like invisible sparks. I shook my head. I seemed to be more worse for wear than either of them, poor human that I was. I'd have actually taken a hand up, which was rare for me. I sighed, got my feet under me, and stood without help from either of them.

  "Behave yourselves," I said. "Can't you feel what's in the air? Anger works just fine to call whatever it is, so stop it. We may have to do it again to lay to rest what we've already called from the grave."

  Jean-Claude looked instantly relaxed, at ease. He gave a low bow. "As you like, ma petite."

  Richard rotated his neck, trying to loosen his shoulders. His hands were still balled into fists, but he nodded. "I don't understand how what we did called zombies."

  "I can act as a focus for other animators. It's a way to combine powers and raise an older zombie or more than one or two zombies. I don't know how to do anything else but raise the dead, so when you shoved that much power in my face . . ." I shrugged. "I did what I know how to do."

  "Did you raise all of Nikoloas's old cemetery?" Jean-Claude asked.

  "If we're lucky," I said.

  He put his head to one side, puzzled.

  Richard looked down at himself. "Can I get some pants on?"

  I smiled. "Seems a shame," I said, "but yeah."

  "I will fetch my robe from the bathroom," Jean-Claude said.

  "Help yourself," I said.

  "No comment about how it is a shame that I am getting dressed?"

  I shook my head.

  "Cruel, ma petite, very cruel."

  I smiled and gave him a little bow.

  He returned the smile, but there was a challenge to his eyes as he walked towards the bathroom.

  Richard was sliding into his jeans. I watched him zip them up and button them into place. It was fun just to watch him dress. Love makes the smallest movements fascinating.

  I walked past him, towards the door, leaving him to put a shirt on if he was going to. The only way to ignore him was to just not look. The same theory worked with Jean-Claude most of the time.

  I walked to the door. My hand was reaching for the knob when Richard grabbed me from behind, lifting me off my feet, carrying me back from the door.

  My feet were literally dangling off the ground. "What the hell are you d
oing? Put me down."

  "My wolves are coming," he said, as if that explained everything.

  "Put me down."

  He lowered me enough for my feet to touch the floor, but his arms stayed wrapped around me, as if he was afraid I'd go for the door. His face was distant, listening. I heard nothing.

  A howl echoed up the corridor and raised the hairs on my arms. "What's going on, Richard?"

  "Danger," he almost whispered it.

  "Is it Raina and Marcus?"

  He was still listening to things I could not hear. He pushed me behind him and went to the door, still shirtless, wearing nothing but his jeans.

  I ran for the bed and the weapons. I got the Firestar out from under the pillow. "Don't go out there empty-handed, dammit." I dragged the Uzi out from under the bed.

  A chorus of howls went up. Richard flung the door open and raced down the hallway. I called his name, but he was gone.

  Jean-Claude came out of the bathroom in his black, fur-lined robe. "What is it, ma petite?"

  "Company." I slipped the Uzi's strap across my chest.

  The sounds of snarling wolves came distant. Jean-Claude ran past me, the long robe flying out behind him. He ran like a dark wind. When I got out to the corridor, he was nowhere in sight.

  I was going to be the last one there. Dammit.

  27

  Running full tilt towards a fight was not the best way to stay alive. Caution was better. I knew that, and it didn't matter. Nothing mattered but getting there in time. In time to save them. Them.I didn't dwell on that; I ran, the Firestar gripped tightly in my right hand, the Uzi in my left. I was running like an idiot, but at least I was armed.

  A roaring shout thundered off the walls ahead. Don't ask me how, but I knew it was Richard. I didn't think I could run any faster. I was wrong. I spilled into the open, breath coming in throat-closing gasps, not looking left or right. If someone had had a gun, they could have blown me away.

  Richard stood in the middle of the room, a zombie held at arm's length above his head. A wolf the size of a pony had pinned another zombie to the floor, savaging it. Stephen stood at Richard's back in human form, but crouched and ready to fight. Cassandra stood back from them. She turned to me as I skidded into the room. There was a look on her face that I couldn't quite read, and didn't have time to puzzle over.

  Jean-Claude was at the far left, away from the werewolves. He was staring at me, too. I couldn't read his face, but he was in no danger. He hadn't waded into the zombies. He knew better. Richard didn't.

  The room had been a narrow rectangle, but the far wall had blasted outward, scattering rubble across the floor. It looked like the zombies had crawled out from behind the wall. A graveyard that I, at least, hadn't known was there.

  The dead stood in front of the ruins. Their eyes shifted to me as I saw them, and I felt the weight of their gaze like a blow to my heart.

  The fear for everyone's safety was gone, washed away in a rush of anger. "Richard, put it down, please, it won't hurt you. Call Jason off the other one." It had to be Jason unless there was another werewolf down here. And if it was someone else, where was Jason?

  Richard turned his head to look at me, the zombie, once a human male, still held effortlessly above his head. "They attacked Jason."

  "They wouldn't have done anything without orders. Jason jumped the gun."

  "They didn't attack us," Cassandra said. "They started pouring out of the wall. Jason changed and attacked them."

  The giant wolf had opened the zombie's stomach and was tearing at intestines. I'd had enough. "Grab the wolf," I said. The zombie under him locked its arms around the wolf's forequarters. The wolf sank teeth into the corpse's throat and tore it out in a spurt of dark fluid and flesh.

  The rest of the zombies, somewhere between sixty and eighty, surged toward the wolf. "Let him up, Jason, or I'll show you what it's like to be attacked by zombies."

  Richard bent his elbow and tossed the zombie away from him. The body tumbled through the air and landed in the mass of waiting zombies. They fell like bowling pins, except that these bowling pins got to their feet, though one lost an arm in the process.

  Richard crouched by his wolves. "You're attacking us?" He sounded outraged.

  "Pull your wolf off my zombie and it stops here."

  "You think you can take us?" Cassandra said.

  "With this many dead, I know I can," I said.

  Stephen's face crumpled, almost like he'd cry. "You'd hurt us."

  Shit, I'd forgotten. I was their lupa now. I'd threatened to kill Raina if she hurt Stephen again, and here I was about to feed him to zombies. There was a logic gap somewhere.

  "If I'm supposed to protect you all, then you have to obey me, right? So Jason gets the fuck off my zombie or I beat the hell out of him. Isn't that pack protocol?"

  Richard turned to me. There was a look on his face I'd never seen before: anger and arrogance, or something close to it. "I don't think Jason really expected you to demand his obedience. I don't think any of us did."

  "Then you don't know me very well," I said.

  "Mes amies, if we kill each other, won't Marcus be pleased."

  We all turned to Jean-Claude. I said, "Stop." All the zombies stopped at once like a freeze frame. One tumbled to the floor, caught in midshuffle, rather than take that last partial step. Zombies were terribly literal.

  The giant wolf tore another piece out of the zombie. The dead man made a small involuntary cry. "Drag Jason off of it now, or we are going to do this dance. Fuck Marcus. I'll worry about it later."

  "Off of him, Jason, now," Richard said.

  The wolf reared back, tearing at the zombie's arm. Bone cracked. The wolf worried the arm like a terrier with a bone. Blood and thicker fluids flew in a spray.

  Richard grabbed the wolf by the scruff of the neck, jerking it off its feet. He grabbed the front of its furry throat and turned it to face him. The muscles in his arms corded with the effort. The wolf's claws scrambled in the air while it strangled. The massive claws raked Richard's bare skin. Blood flowed in thin crimson lines.

  He threw the wolf across the room into the waiting dead. "Never disobey me again, Jason, never!" His voice was lost in a growling that turned into a howl. He threw back his head and bayed. The sound rose from his human throat. Cassandra and Stephen echoed him. Their howls filled the room with a strange, ringing song.

  I realized then that Richard might avoid killing Marcus, but he'd never control the lukoi without brutality. He was already casual about it. Almost as casual as Jean-Claude. Bad sign or good sign? I wasn't sure.

  Jason scrambled out of the dead. He turned pale green wolf eyes to me, as if waiting for something. "Don't look at me," I said, "I'm pissed with you, too."

  Jason stalked towards me on paws bigger across than my hands. The fur at his neck rose in a prickling brush. His lips curled back from his teeth in a silent growl.

  I pointed the Firestar at him. "Don't do it, Jason."

  He kept coming, each step so stiff and full of tension that it looked robotic. He gathered his body, legs squirming into position for a leap. I wasn't going to let him finish the movement. If he'd been in human form, I'd have aimed to wound, but in wolf form, I wasn't taking any chances. One scratch and I'd be alpha female for real.

  I sighted down the barrel and felt that quietness fill me. I felt nothing while I stared down the gun at him. Nothing but a cool, white emptiness.

  "Stop it, both of you!" Richard growled. He walked towards us. I kept my eyes on the wolf but had a peripheral sense of Richard moving closer.

  He kept coming, easing himself between Jason and me. I had to aim the gun skyward to keep from pointing it at his chest. He stared at me, his face thoughtful. "You won't need the gun." He knocked the great wolf to the floor with his fist. The wolf lay stunned. Only the rise and fall of its chest showed it was still alive.

  When he turned back to me, his eyes were amber, and no longer human. "You are my lupa, Anita, but I
am still Ulfric. I won't let you do to me what Raina has done to Marcus. I lead this pack." There was a hardness to his voice that was new. I'd discovered his male ego at last.

  Jean-Claude laughed, a high, delighted sound that made me shiver. Richard hugged his bare arms as if he felt it, too.

  "Don't you realize by now, Richard, that ma petiteis either your equal or your master? She knows no other way to be." He came to stand by us. He looked amused as hell.

  "I want her to be my equal," Richard said.

  "But not within the pack," Jean-Claude said.

  Richard shook his head. "No, I mean . . . No, Anita is my equal."

  "Then what are you bitching about?" I said.

  He glared at me with his alien eyes. "I am Ulfric, not you."

  "Lead, and I'll follow, Richard." I stepped close to him, almost touching. "But lead, Richard, really lead, or get out of the way."

  28

  " As amusing asthis is," Jean-Claude said, "and believe me, ma petite,Richard, it is amusing. We do not have time for this particular argument, not if Richard stands any hope of not being forced to kill tonight."

  We both glared at him, and he gave that graceful shrug that meant everything and nothing. "We must call the magic again, but this time, Richard needs to try and pull some of it into himself. He needs to do something that would impress his pack. This," he motioned to the zombies, "though impressive, looks too much like Anita's work."

  "You've got a suggestion, I take it."

  "Perhaps," he said. His eyes turned very serious then, the humor dying away until his face was lovely and blank. "But first, I think I have a question or two for you, myself, ma petite. I think it is not only Richard that you are emasculating today."

  "What are you talking about?" I asked.

  He cocked his head to one side. "Perhaps you honestly do not know?" He sounded surprised. "There is a small hallway to the right. Look inside it."