by Faith Hunter
“Clan Mearkanis no longer exists,” he said, his words clipped. “Ask for something else.”
Derek and I’d had issues from time to time. Tonight, he was gonna be difficult and I didn’t have the emotional fortitude to deal with it like a grown-up. Like Alex. Which was amusing. So I went for my go-to snark and looked Derek over, as insolently as I could. He was wearing a hand-stitched dress shirt, Italian lace-up dress shoes, and cuffed pants with a perfect half break. I know that kind of stuff now because I live in New Orleans and I hang with people who spend gazillions on clothes. His mouth went tight at the way I was looking him over, and I grinned at him, showing teeth as I stepped up to him, into his personal space, so my height would work for me. I tilted my head down, to his ear, and whispered, “I can handle this one of several ways. Eli and I can walk away and go to the scion room alone. I can go to Leo and tell him you’re being a butt-head. Or I can kick your ass. Right here. Right now. In front of your people.”
He stepped closer and whispered back, “You can try, little girl.”
“Stop it,” Eli said, shoving us apart. “What’s wrong with you two?” He twisted his body so we were the width of his shoulders apart. I put another few feet between us, and Derek stepped back too. Formally, stiffly, as if passing along an order to a higher-ranked soldier, Eli said, “Lee. We need to see Ming Zoya, who was once Blood Master of Clan Mearkanis. Do you wish to lead the way?”
Derek frowned and blinked. “Yeah. . . . What just happened?”
“Were you at the Elms tonight?” I asked.
“Why?”
“Crap,” I said, checking out my hands and his. They looked okay, but they might not be. “We got bigger problems than I thought.” Not that I knew what do to about any of it. And then it hit me. “Hair,” I said. “From the locker room shower drain. I always use the one on the end. They got my DNA here.” That was where the witches who attacked me got the stuff that tied the spell to me. And they might have gotten other people’s DNA the same way. Vamps. Blood-servants. Anyone. Everyone.
Eli’s lips went tight as he processed that. “We got an inside man. In HQ. Someone with access to the women’s locker, which means security and housekeeping.”
“Which means,” I said, “that they could have all our samples. Crap. We need to change the protocols and create a more stringent burn policy for everyone. Though it’s clearly too late. Even the EVs could have our samples by now.”
“We’ve been stupid,” Derek said.
I pulled my cell and texted Molly the problem. To the others, I said, “Here’s hoping Molly can come up with something to counteract DNA spells. And fast.”
Derek shook his head as if thinking of the numbers of people in security and housekeeping who might have gone into the locker room. Or maybe thinking of the work that went into creating a new protocol. Silent, he led the way to the scion lair, which was reached by a circuitous route, up- and downstairs, through recently discovered hallways, and, as best I had ever figured, the lair might actually be located between two floors, half in one and half in the other. I nodded to the security guy, who nodded back, one of the many new ones I hadn’t gotten to know yet. He opened the door and we three went inside, into the smell of mixed vamp—almond, lily, and a tiny hint of rot.
Derek stayed with his back against the door and I sent him a quick, assessing look. He was staring down, frowning, thinking. He raised his hands and ran them over his buzzed scalp, his frown deepening. Eli and I went to the cages.
Ming-the-not-sane, not-Mearkanis, now technically just Ming Zoya, though she might not know that, was awake. She had been showered, cleaned up, fed a lot of blood, if her state of healing was any indication, and had been dressed in black silk, the kind of clothing her sister wore. She was curled up on a beanbag-type lounger, and, unlike her fellow caged vamp, Adrianna the nutso, Ming Zoya looked relatively coherent. Her black hair wasn’t yet silken and long, and her scalp showed through in some places, but her face had regrown flesh and she looked mostly human, if a lot older yet than her twin.
Adrianna was dressed in skinny jeans and a halter top, with ballet slippers and a gold chain necklace, and was snuggled down with a furry-looking blanket that reminded me of a bearskin but was synthetic. Her blue eyes crinkled with humor and she laughed when she saw us. It was perfect laughter for a horror movie where the bad guy was a basement-dwelling, serial-killer clown.
Ming said calmly, “She laughs because of the scents you carry. One of you is both cat and dog and human. She finds that amusing.”
Okay. That was interesting and unexpected. I asked, “You know what she’s thinking or has she been talking?”
“She has spoken to me, but the English words are confused and make little sense, except for the punishments she will mete out to one she calls Jane Yellow Rock. It is an odd name, and I thought it was confusion too, until you arrived to visit with me. You are she?”
I belatedly realized that I had been rude by vamp standards and dipped deep for some formal phrases that would fix things. “Forgive me.” That was always a good one to start out with. “I hadn’t expected to see Ming Zoya of Mearkanis Clan so healed and well. I’m Jane Yellowrock, Enforcer, along with Derek Lee”—I indicated the man at the door—“for Leo Pellissier, Blood Master of New Orleans and the greater Southeast, with the exception of Florida. And this is my business partner in Yellowrock Securities, Eli Younger.”
“Two humans in such positions of power?”
“We have our uses, ma’am,” Eli said, snark subdued but strong on his scent.
“There was no offense intended.”
Eli gave her a light nod. “No offense taken, ma’am.” A bald-faced lie.
Ming gifted him with a slight smile. “With the exception of Florida,” she quoted. “Leo has spread his borders.”
I thought about the current events Ming had missed out on. I wanted answers, so maybe a little chatty quid pro quo would grease the wheels of an info exchange. “The Master of the City of Atlanta, Lucas de Allyon, created a vampire plague and infected several small holdings across the United States, then took them over without proper Blood Challenge. He was securing and expanding his power base against the protocols of the Vampira Carta. He came to New Orleans and challenged Leo. His Enforcer and I fought and the challenger died. Then I killed Lucas de Allyon in combat when he attacked outside the protocols of the Vampira Carta. Leo freed the masters de Allyon had infected, and his lab found a cure, which he offered freely.”
Ming had watched me raptly as I spoke, her black eyes seeming calm and at rest, the way a kung fu master seems at rest just before he lops your head off with his bare hands. “Leo has never done anything for free,” she said. “Much has transpired since I was taken.”
“About that,” I said before she could come up with questions about her clan. “Do you know who took you? Who held you? And what they were doing with you? What happened?”
Ming’s lips turned up, but the expression never touched her eyes. “What do you know of my blood-servants, Benjamin and Riccard?”
So much for me steering the conversation.
Eli said, “My brother ran a search on them. They disappeared when you did.”
Ming’s face didn’t change, but her scent did. Sorrow. Grief. And what might be stoicism. “And my heir?”
And here we go with the clan stuff I was trying to avoid. “Your heir, Rafael Torrez, took over, aligned with a female vampire from Clan St. Martin.” I pointed at my archenemy. “He started practicing black magic with the Damours, and was taking part in a blood-magic ceremony with witch children to sacrifice. He died at the hands of two of his men.” I indicated Derek.
Ming inclined her head to show she had heard, her gaze on Adrianna. Her black eyes slowly, very, very slowly, vamped out. But her fangs were still up in her head, which meant she was in total control, far from what I had expected. Adrianna, however,
vamped out fast and threw herself at the mesh that held her. Twisted steel mesh was a poor substitute for silver-plated steel, but it held her.
“I see,” Ming said. “Rafael betrayed our clan and turned against the Master of the City. With that one?”
“Yes,” I said.
“And you did not take her head?”
“I’ve killed her any number of times, including the time Rafe died, but Leo keeps bringing her back. Something about the European Vamps making a trip here soon. Or soon in vamp time. This century maybe.”
Ming went silent, letting that settle inside while she watched Adrianna, who might have been listening. With my peripheral vision, I saw the other vamp throw herself onto the beanbag and stretch like a cat, her eyes on my partner, trying to attract Eli’s attention, her fangs out and her boobs nearly so. Eli ignored her antics. Realizing that only Ming was actively watching her, Adrianna stuck out her tongue.
Ming said, “Rafael deserved his true-death. Leo and I will discuss the woman. If she bonded with my heir, who was then Blood Master of Clan Mearkanis, then she is mine to claim.” Which was news to me, but was probably covered in the Carta or one of its codicils.
“Rafael’s betrayal and death. How badly did they affect my clan?” Ming asked.
This was the sticky part, but I had a feeling that Ming Zoya had already guessed, just from my greeting to her, and was likely to prefer truth over anything else. Still, I spoke softly and with a grieving tone in my voice when I said, “A vampire war followed. Clan Mearkanis was disbanded following the conflict, as were three other clans who rebelled against Leo. Because it was believed that you were true-dead, your clan home was given to the witches in recompense for the Damour blood-family killing their children.”
Ming drew in a breath, things taking place in the darkness of her eyes—calculations and games and machinations and politics. She said, “This is of interest. I thank you for the candid responses, no matter how distressing the reception. My sister is overly concerned about my state of mind, and underconcerned about my need for information. Your words will be useful during my discussions with the Master of the City.”
Leo might be ticked off that I gave information to her, info that she might turn against him soon. Which made me smile. It was always a pleasure to frustrate the MOC.
Still watching Adrianna, Ming said, “The man who took me from my lair was known to me. His name was Antoine.”
I drew in a breath, slowly, between my teeth. Antoine. Antoine Busho, or other spellings. The magic user who had read me the first time I came to New Orleans. He was dead. But . . . Antoine . . . Pieces began to fall into place in my brain. Rick had said that Marlene was Antoine’s wife, way back when I met the magic user. And Antoine was part of Ming’s being taken, kidnapped, tortured. Part of the spell that erupted in my palm, the spell that started all this crazy crap. And Marlene was his wife. And Tau . . . Tau was his daughter. The daughter of a magic user who had trained in a form that made him smell like something other than a witch. A shaman of some kind, maybe.
Ming said, “He had once been a chef of some repute, but his use of opiates had brought him low. He owned a diner where Benjamin and Riccard, my favorite blood-servants, often dined. Antoine was a magic user, of island and African descent, though his scent did not speak of witch. Because Benjamin and Riccard trusted him”—the scent of grief from rose from her—“I trusted him. He broke that trust, entered my lair, and pierced me with the point of a brooch. He had the assistance of Rafael and two Mithrans I did not see, whose scent I did not know.”
The number of Mithrans, even in an over-vamp-populated city like NOLA, was fairly limited. But then, the helpful, betraying vamps might have been from Atlanta, paving the way for the attempted takeover. Or unaligned vamps from a backwater clan. Heck, it could be anyone, even Euro Vamps . . . Could they have started plotting and scheming so early on a visit? Easy answer: Yes. They lived for centuries. They connived with the long view in mind.
“The pin and the brooch were spelled,” Ming continued, her voice strong but her grief unabated, “and when he threaded the pin through my flesh, I became compliant like a human who tastes Mithran blood and is addicted from the first moment. He cut my flesh and sprayed my blood throughout my lair, and overturned the furniture that it might appear I was taken by force, though I was agreeable to anything from the first moment I wore it. Even being put in a pit in a swamp, I was docile.”
She looked up at me, her eyes still vamped out, empty of emotion, dark, cold, harsh. Scary as heck. “I do not know why I was taken or why I was kept alive, but I remember much, and more returns to me. Antoine drank from me and I was unable to cloud his mind while the pin of the spelled brooch was upon me. He asked me questions about the Pellissier clan and about Leo and about his son and I answered. I had no gift for beguilement while pierced by the brooch.”
She transferred her gaze to Eli and it was as if a fifty-pound weight had been taken off my shoulders. She might not have been able to mesmerize humans while she was pinned, but she did now. And she was using that gift. “Eli. Derek. Don’t look at her.”
Both men flinched, hesitated, and turned away. No argument. How cool was that?
Ming said, “You spoil my entertainment, woman who smells of cat and dog. You are a shape-shifter?”
It was my turn to flinch and hesitate. But my secret wasn’t exactly a secret anymore. And if she knew what I was by my scent, then she might have met another skinwalker before. “Yes. You know of my kind.” I made it a statement instead of a question, hoping she would elucidate.
Ming simply shrugged, which baited and hooked me. And she knew it. She was good at this. Without answering she went on. “The water had not risen in the pit at that time, and it was dry. Antoine gave me humans to drink upon, a different one each time. They were the homeless, the addicted, the outcast members of society. I drank and they were taken away. But—” Her dark eyes filled with tears, bloody and thin, and they ran in slow trails down her perfect skin. “Then he brought a stray animal. I did not wish to drink, but he commanded me. Every time he came he brought another one. I became sick. My blood dried up in my vessels. It was horrible, horrible, horrible.” She didn’t blink, didn’t move, and yet the tears ran in steady streams to drip off her cheeks and onto the black silk she wore.
“He fed me dogs. He made me drink from dogs . . . I had forgotten. The brooch let me forget. The brooch kept me mesmerized and drugged and . . . But I now remember. I remember.” Her tone said she was ready for vengeance, and she clenched her hands. She breathed, and it was a quaking breath, as if her lungs and throat wanted to collapse, and she breathed again, calming. “And then he vanished. Much . . . much . . . later, the girl came. She and another woman brought me two humans and chained them in the pit with me.
“I tried to be gentle with them, but it had been so long . . . I was so hungry . . . And the witch girl did not return for such a long time, long after I had drained the humans and killed them, after I ate their rotted flesh and sucked dry their bones.” Ming blinked and took a breath, exhaled. I smelled blood on her breath this time, the scent of Katie, the most powerful vampire in New Orleans, and the only other one I knew of who had eaten dead flesh and survived. Katie hadn’t been sane, even by vamp standards, in a long time, but she had kept her promise to feed Ming after she got here. Point to Katie.
“The girl drank from me then. But my mind was not true. I do not know why she drank or what she gained from my words or my blood, except that something in her changed with each taste of me.
“She left the dead in the pit with me. And I ate.” Ming closed her eyes. “Eventually she brought me more humans. One a month, on the full moon, when I was so starved that I had no control. These she threw in with me, into the water, where they thrashed and the stink of their fear was an aphrodisiac to me.
“I was mad. I drank as the Naturaleza drink, to the death. Of all of
them. I killed.”
I said nothing. What could I say?
Ming’s unblinking eyes tracked to me. “I am free from Antoine. I drank from the girl, his daughter. Her magic was strong. Stronger than any I remember in all my life.”
Of course it was. Because Tau was the daughter of two witches, so she had a fifty percent chance of being a double-gened witch like Angie Baby. Crap. Crap, crap, crap. This explained why the spells she threw were so complex and powerful. Like Angie, she could likely craft with her mind, with a single thought, without the work and mathematics that other witches needed to craft a successful working.
Ming asked, “The witches. They are dead?”
“Antoine is. Tau, not yet, but soon. She no longer has the brooches and can’t trap another vampire. And I plan to . . .” Kill her? No. “To bring her to justice.”
Ming thought about that for a while, her eyes transferring again to Adrianna, who was lying back on the beanbag, her long legs up, feet propped on the mesh above her. Ming said, “You killed Antoine?”
“No. Leo’s son, Immanuel, killed him. And then I killed Immanuel.” Enough with the history lesson, I thought. “Would you recognize Tau and the other woman if I showed you photographs?”
Ming gave a single downward nod, and Eli held out his cell, with photos of the witches in question. On the screen were photos of Tau and Marlene Nicaud from social media. Ming turned away from Adrianna, and Ming’s blackened gaze fell on the cell screen. “Yes,” she said. Eli’s eyes flicked to me and back and he paged through the last ones. “Tau. And this one. Mother and daughter,” she said, her tone bitter. “They are the two who put humans in the pit with me. And to save myself, I killed the humans. Until then, I had never killed a human. Never.”
“Would you recognize her magics if you saw them again?”
