by Debra Dunbar
“Yes. Yes. And yes. Mostly sword and shield, though. That’s what we Templars tend to use the most.”
He chuckled. “No seriously. Outside of the Templar persona act, who trained you?”
He thought I was joking. Not that many people took me seriously when I told them I was a Templar. Most people thought we’d died out after the Crusades. We weren’t exactly a secret society or anything, but it’s not like we did much to bring ourselves into the public eye. Templars tended to hang with other Templar families. Outside of a few religious organizations, no one called on us for assistance anymore, and the Elders were fine with that. Playing polo, drinking martinis for lunch, attending posh soirees and guarding the Temple were pretty much all modern-day Templars did. Besides me. I was the Templar of Baltimore, the self-appointed guardian of the city. And I was trying to be as open as I could be about who I was, even if no one believed me, or believed in the monsters I protected the city from.
“My mother. She’s the best fighter I know. At sixty-five she would probably take you down with one blow.”
He didn’t look like he believed me. Wolfram eyed his plate, obviously trying to decide whether to keep rubbing my leg or cut up his pie. The pie won out.
I took one bite of mine and decided to be insulted that this weird combination of organ meat and dried fruit somehow trumped my sexy leg. I’d even shaven this morning, which wasn’t something I did regularly now that October weather had set in and my shorts were put away for the season. Starving as I was, I did have some culinary standards, so I pushed the pie to the side and instead feasted on pickled mushrooms and fried apples. They were soon replaced with a plate of meringue cookies, which were really good, and a cheesy fondue. The last course was fruit tarts artfully decorated with marzipan animals. It totally made up for the fact I’d missed out on the chicken. Wolfram was pressed against my leg, but further conversation or fondling had taken a back seat to his food.
It’s not like Zac was any better. All the rah-rah encouragement of today was gone now that I’d actually won the tourney. I fumed, irritated that I’d just been used so he could sit here and have people bow and scrape before him. We weren’t dating anymore. We were just friends. It’s not like he really owed me anything as far as actual attention, but I’d expected at least some conversation from him.
“I think I’m going to be sick.”
Okay, maybe that’s why he’d been silent the whole dinner. Come to think of it, Zac wasn’t the only one looking rather pale and clammy. I eyed my neglected organ-meat pie with alarm.
“Like now sick? Or later when you get home sick?” I asked. A few people from the tables had gotten up and were rushing from the dining area. I was pretty sure I could hear retching noises coming from off in the adjoining corn field.
“Like now sick.” Zac pushed his chair back and stuffed a hand over his mouth.
Oh, God. What had he eaten? Had I eaten it too? “You need me to drive home?”
He shook his head and ran, not quite making it to the edge of our little raised stage-area before bending over to vomit on the grass.
It was then that I noticed the gagging sounds coming from the crowned gentleman that was sitting next to Zac. The king stood, his eyes panicked as he struggled to free his voluminous robes from the chair.
He finally tore free, but it was too late. Bending at the waist, he vomited, the chunky mess hitting the ground and splashing up onto the hem of my dress. Wolfram jumped off the stage. I scrambled away, my legs catching in my long skirts and sending me to my rear on the ground. I tried to scoot backward, but wasn’t quick enough to avoid the king’s projectile vomit spraying across the lower half of my gown.
I looked up to see Wolfram safely at the edge of the stage, laughing.
Jerk. There would be a next time, and I planned to hit him even harder with my shield in that tourney.
Chapter 4
I was barefoot, my shoes in a plastic grocery store bag, as I made my way up my apartment steps. Thankfully I’d had clean clothing to change into, and both my legs and my shoes were reasonably clean after a quick dunk in some wash-water meant for the dinner dishes. I felt bad for whoever had to get the king’s regurgitated stomach contents out of my loaner velvet dress. And I did feel bad for the attendees. The charity event had gone horribly wrong when over two thirds of the participants were barfing in the field.
Zac had let me drive home. He’d sat moaning in the passenger seat, clutching his stomach the whole way. I’d reluctantly offered to let him crash on my couch, but he assured me he only wanted his own bed to ride out the effects of food poisoning. He’d be okay. I’d gone down that road a few years back after some bad shellfish and knew he was almost through the worst of it. Besides I had an evening of community service ahead of me, and I also needed to continue to prep for my ritual in six days.
The ritual to get rid of my demon mark, that is. My heart skipped a beat just thinking about it. This better work. It was the only hope I had of breaking free from Balsur’s grasp. Dark Iron had used the ritual to clear his own demon mark, and I was banking that he’d given Raven the real thing before he’d killed her, otherwise I’d be right back where I started. Worse, actually, since a banishing ritual gone wrong might just piss Balsur off enough to make my life truly miserable.
It worried me. The bruise on my hip was killing me, plus all the other aches and pains that were starting to creep up on me now that the adrenaline was gone and my muscles had cooled down. Sore. Demon-marked. With soaking wet shoes. I’d been walloped with a rattan sword and puked on. The one good thing about today beyond the money raised for charity was that I must not have eaten enough whatever to suffer the same food poisoning as nearly everyone else.
And that was looking to be the only good thing out of my day today. I rounded the steps to the landing and stood staring at my apartment door—at the note stapled to my apartment door.
It was an eviction notice.
I pulled it down and read it with a sense of dread. It’s not like this was unexpected. I’d broken a window, even though I’d paid to replace it. I’d defaced the subfloor with magical symbols. I’d been summoning demons as well as banishing demons, which my neighbors complained about mightily. And I occasionally entertained vampires, a necromancer, and mages. Oh, and there were the dead guys that kept turning up in my parking space last month.
Loud parties. Destructive use of apartment. Consistently late rent payments. Inconsiderate use of other tenants’ parking areas. Hey, the last one wasn’t really my fault. I had to park somewhere, and there had been dead bodies and crime scene tape all over my parking spot.
I was supposed to get thirty days, but the landlord was claiming he’d already given me notice, so this was a formal court document giving me two weeks. Two weeks, or all my stuff would be out on the curb.
I crammed the paper into my pocket and unlocked my door, tears blurring my eyes. Yes, it was a crappy apartment, but it was my apartment. I’d gotten it myself, paid the security deposit, signed the lease, paid the rent—albeit occasionally late. Okay, most every month was late, but I eventually paid it. And I’d done it all with my part-time coffee shop earnings. Baltimore’s Templar was an unpaid gig, and I’d been reluctant to touch the money my parents kept depositing in that other checking account.
Maybe I should take it. I could consider it a loan. I needed to do something because there was no way I could find an affordable place that wasn’t a rat-infested hovel in the city.
“What do you think?” I asked Raven, tossing the eviction notice onto the table. The little fox figurine was on my coffee table watching American Ninja. The television had been off when I’d left the house this morning. And when I’d turned it off last night, it had been on a different channel.
Words appeared on the whiteboard next to the bookshelf. Take your parents’ money. Sublet one of those sweet waterfront condos. Sign up for premium cable television.
Ha ha. The words vanished to be replaced with a senten
ce that wasn’t as funny. Move in with Dario.
Vampires were very cagey about revealing where they lived, usually only entrusting that information to blood-slaves and their Renfields. I was neither. And as close as Dario and I had become, I hadn’t the foggiest idea where he lived.
Still, I was sure his place was nice—nicer than this crappy apartment of mine.
“Not happening,” I told Raven, moving her off the coffee table so I could put up my feet and grab my laptop. By the time I needed to get ready for my community service I’d realized my dilemma was far more serious than I’d imagined. There wasn’t anything one bedroom available for immediate occupancy that wasn’t ninety percent of my net monthly income. I checked Craigslist and noted a few ads for roommates in my price range that weren’t way outside the city limits, but living with a roommate would bring problems. I had vampires, mages, and necromancers visiting me along with my LARP and Anderon friends. Add to that Raven’s spirit living in a resin fox figurine and the fact that I summoned and banished demons along with my other magical practices and I’d most likely be kicked out in the first month.
And then there was the whole sword-and-armor Templar thing. I wondered how a roommate would feel if a demon impersonating an angel started dumping dead bodies in our driveway?
The other alternative was squatting in one of the hundreds of vacant houses throughout the city, stealing electricity via a hundred-foot extension cord and sleeping on an old mattress. That or live out of my car.
I looked down at the roommate-wanted names and added a few more to my list. I’d call Reynard and Russell. Maybe members of the magical community would know someone who was looking to rent out a spare room, or their basement, for a few hundred a month. I’d also check with my co-workers at the coffee shop. Worst case scenario maybe someone could put me up for a few months until I managed to find something. I wasn’t sure what I’d do with my furniture, though. Guess I’d have to abandon it here. I could hardly show up at a friend’s house with a moving van, squeezing all my stuff into their house.
Crap. Moving van. How was I going to afford to move my stuff? Did I know anyone with a pickup truck, because there was no way I could get a sofa and my mattress into my Toyota.
I glanced out my window at the streetlights, checking my watch. I had to head to the cold weather shelter in less than an hour and I was looking more like one of the homeless they served than a volunteer.
I wished I was meeting Dario instead. He could meet me here while I showered, maybe bring take-out so we could watch movies. I’d tell him about the tourney, complain about my bruises. Maybe he’d rub my sore back. Maybe he’d rub more than that. My breath caught at the thought. He’d only kissed me once, and that had been when he was lost in bloodlust. As far as I knew he had a blood-slave and what was between us was just a combination of professional relationship and friendship. But something made me think otherwise. It was the way he looked at me, how he dropped everything to help when I needed him, the way he always stood so close to me, taking any excuse to touch me.
Could I share him with Giselle? Because I couldn’t go down the path of addiction that the role of a blood-slave led to. I didn’t begrudge Dario taking blood from others, but from the times I’d seen him and Giselle together, I knew that her blood had come with sex.
And that I couldn’t deal with. Call me old-fashioned, but just as I couldn’t be intimate with more than one man at a time, I needed the same commitment in return.
I’d stripped off my clothing and was heading to the bathroom when I heard my phone beep. I hesitated, but the hot steamy water was calling my name. It was probably Zac letting me know he was feeling better, or the community service coordinator checking in. I’d look when I was done cleaning up.
The shower was amazing. It even made up for the pain trying to wrestle out of my clothing caused me. I took longer than usual, letting the heat loosen up all the muscles that had tightened after the tourney. Unable to delay any further, I shut off the water and stepped out of the tub. My bathroom was a sauna of steam. Even the open doorway hadn’t done much to dissipate the heat and dampness. I guess I’d taken a longer shower than I’d thought. Wincing as I reached for a towel, I wiped a hand across the mirror and stared at my blurry reflection. I wasn’t the prettiest woman in the world, but I’d do, even covered with bruises and scars from a lifetime of sword-fighting and jousting.
I glanced at the bra and underwear hanging on the hook of my bathroom door. Given the huge black mark on my hip It might be a good night to go commando and wear a dress so I didn’t have to deal with the waistband of my jeans rubbing against my swollen, bruised skin. It would be kind of weird going to assist at a cold weather shelter in a dress, but it was better than being in pain. I threw on the bra, then dropped a navy-blue sheath dress over my head. Ready to head out the door, I hesitated undecided whether to take my sword or not.
Take it. You never know.
A shelter for homeless people wasn’t exactly the right place to be sporting a big sword, but I hated not having it at hand. Raven was right, I never did know when I’d need it.
“I’ll be back around two-thirty,” I told her. That’s when another group came on board to man the shelter until morning. I was almost finished prepping for the ritual. After tonight I only had one more round of community service. And as for the eviction notice, well I’d deal with the apartment search tomorrow.
Chapter 5
Winter in Baltimore meant the shelters frequently became overwhelmed. Local churches stepped up to help, each taking a week and opening their doors to give the homeless a warm cot complete with blankets for the night. It was only late October, but in spite of the warm day, nights were dropping down to freezing. Originally the cold weather shelters opened only in temperatures below zero, but the need was so great that they started earlier, now opening their doors beginning in mid-October.
This week, the shelter was hosted by Calvary Methodist Church on Greenwich. It was a beautiful church, gray stone with sharp gothic spires and leaded windowpanes. Spotlights out front lit the building up with a golden glow, and signs directed homeless around to the rear of the building.
It was just before nine at night. The shelter would start admitting people at ten, and lock down for the night at midnight. Once the clock struck that hour, no one aside from the volunteers was allowed either in or out. I was here early to help set up beds and dividers, then hand out toiletries and blankets as people began to file in.
A stout young man named Duane met me at the door with a clipboard in hand. With a welcoming smile he checked off my name and ushered me in.
The shelter was being set up in an area that looked like it was commonly used for spaghetti pot-luck and Christmas craft festivals. There was a sign-in sheet on a desk by the entrance. Beside it were Ziploc bags of personal-sized toiletries, and a box that held dozens of pairs of white socks.
“Some don’t use their real names, and that’s okay,” Duane told me. “Read them the rules from this sheet. Most of them are regulars, but we still remind them. Each one gets a care-bag, and socks if they want. Bathrooms are over there. Coffee is over there. Blankets and pillows will be on the cots. We’ve got donated clothes—mostly coats, hats, and mittens—in boxes by the door. Keep an eye on the clothes and make sure Pinky doesn’t stuff them all in a bag to sell on the street.”
“Gotcha.” I looked around at the other two volunteers setting up. There were only three of us not including Duane, and there was clearly a lot to do before we took in guests.
“How handy are you at assembling stuff?” Duane asked. “Most of the cots are the fold-up type, but a few need to be screwed together. We also need sheets stretched across those temporary panels to separate the women’s area from the men’s.”
“I can do that.”
Might as well get to work. We only had an hour to get this all set up before people started arriving. Duane handed me a screw gun and a hammer and pointed to the pile of metal poles, sheets, a
nd lumber in a corner. I went over and surveyed the job. Screws were in plastic bags duct-taped to the metal poles which had thankfully been numbered with a Sharpie. Next to them sat a series of wooden frames and a neatly folded pile of sheets with a box of nails on top.
Beds first. I separated the poles, then plopped down on the floor to start assembling. The first cot was screwed together when I realized that the side poles needed to be pushed through sleeves in the canvas ‘mattress’ before I screwed them together. After I’d figured it out, the process went smoothly with me sprawled on the floor, screw gun in hand.
“You’re wearing a dress to volunteer at a homeless shelter? I think I’ve only seen you in a dress twice before this, and one of those times was at your parents’ house.”
My heart skipped a beat at the warm, deep, teasing voice and I looked up to see Dario standing over me.
“I know where I stand, now. You get all dolled up for these men, where I’m lucky if you change out of your pajamas to meet me.”
The one time I’d worn a dress to go out with him, he’d acted like he didn’t care. And I wasn’t “dolled up,” I was wearing a casual cotton dress with no makeup and flats.
“I’m just trying to make a good first impression. Don’t worry, the moment I hook them with my charms, it’ll be pajama pants and T-shirts for them too.”
He eyed my bare legs. “You should wear that more often. You look good in a dress. I’m betting you look even better out of it.”
Whoa. Dario’s sexy intense approach had dialed back considerably after I’d made it clear what was between us could only be business, but this light-hearted flirty Dario was new.
If I was completely honest with myself, he’d never been “only business” as far as I was concerned, and his friendship had only deepened what I felt, adding a solid foundation of trust, respect, and affection to the sparks. But the sparks never left, even when the only contact between us had been the brush of a shoulder, or a light kiss on the forehead.
