by A. J. Aalto
We were barely out of the cold wind and inside Skulesdottir when, somewhere deep within, an orchestra sprang to life, welcoming the immortal nobility in time honored tradition that I found both thrilling and bizarre. Drums rattled my bones. Violins trilled a salutation, and horns trumpeted at our approach. I snuck a peek at Batten in his jeans, black t-shirt, and beat up leather jacket. He caught me looking and smiled uncertainly; he found this as weird as I did. He looked me up and down for the third time, giving my starched lace and silk court dress another dubious inspection. I felt the defensive need to declare, “I do so wear dresses, shut up,” but he hadn’t said a word. He didn’t need to. The disbelieving shake of his head said it all.
Behind us, Harry was a silent draft, a cool wall of hope. While I was laced tightly into corset and old lace, Harry had chosen to go modern, to play his house’s “young immortal from the New World” role in his finest tux, tall topper hat crowning his perfectly groomed sandy brown hair, his Oxfords polished to a high shine under immaculate white spats. He supplemented his outfit with a carved, ebony walking stick that ticked alongside the sweep of his wool trench coat and afforded him the perfect excuse to extend his right hand, showing off thick French cuffs and brand new Asprey black diamond cufflinks, and a thick insignia ring I’d never seen before. I couldn’t be sure, but I thought he might have even polished his three platinum eyebrow piercings. As he passed dowdy old revenants in their centuries-old apparel, Harry knew exactly how much attention he was drawing, and his haughty pleasure thrummed through our Bond.
“I still think I should be rockin’ a leather catsuit,” I muttered to anyone who might care. Nobody did, but that was okay; I would comfort myself later by laying claim to Harry’s new ring, and by “claim,” I meant “blatantly steal.”
Harry had drilled the house banners into me long ago so that I would recognize them if ever the need arose, and though I couldn’t say I had memorized many of them, my lessons were coming in handy. I thought he’d be pleased at how quickly I recalled the banner at the door, though it was an admittedly easy one: echoing the hands of the Overlord Himself, this banner had a dragon claw and a bear claw flanking a pile of ash. That ancient and unfriendly sigil told me that House Buryshkin was in charge of greeting us; the DaySitter standing guard at the door was a slim black woman, haunting the entryway in a ghostly white chiffon gown. Through softly painted lips, she spoke some sort of European language that had her tongue rolling in ways that would probably sprain mine. When she greeted Malas Nazaire and Declan ahead of us, I heard her switch effortlessly to French. When that pair moved into the courtroom, she switched back to the mystery language to speak to another group, and I tried to peg it down; Czech, perhaps? I checked Batten’s reaction, but he had his cop face on: blank, but cautiously and keenly observing, marking every detail in his mental notes, calculating risk, seeing escapes and possible weapons should he need them, or find one used against him.
I felt the need to remind Batten that the weapon he needed most was walking behind us; House Dreppenstedt was an ample swath of immortal power coming in the front doorway now, knocking snow off their boots and dusting their shoulders, a populous house, noisy with laughter and whispers, murmurs of pleasure and anticipation. He doesn’t get it yet. Maybe Kill-Notch would never get it. Maybe he didn’t want to get it. We were with House Dreppenstedt now. Batten was mine. I would do everything in my power to protect him, and here, so close to Wilhelm and the congregation of his offspring, that power was not insignificant. As long as Batten behaved, he was perfectly safe at my side.
Wilhelm’s mind brushed mine like satin over naked skin, pleased with what he sensed in my thoughts. The wings were wide behind me, and every time trepidation jittered into me, the master of my Cold Company offered a rushing riptide reminder that I was not alone, his mind a strong undertow vowing to roll through my own sooner or later. This would cascade through Harry as well, tying us tighter together, swelling our powers, threatening to pull us off our feet. I wondered if I was hiding Wilhelm’s effect on me from Batten’s notice at all, or if I was kidding myself about that.
The group in front of us stopped abruptly, and I had to wheel back so as not to body slam into the whip-thin revenant before me. He turned the side of his face, sensing our closeness and not entirely comfortable with it; I caught sight of a small, greying tattoo above the guy’s left eyebrow, and that was enough to make Batten stiffen unhappily beside me.
I nudged him and gave him the questioning know-that-guy? eyebrow lift. In answer, Batten dipped his chin ever so slightly in confirmation. At first, I figured that narrowed it down a lot, but then I remembered this was Kill-Notch I was talking to, Mr. Hundred-and-Eight slayings, and he probably recognized a lot of revenants on sight. It hurt me to think that he'd staked more revenants than I'd even met. Maybe he had a warrant for this guy’s demise. In any case, it ramped Batten’s discomfort further. I glanced over my shoulder uncertainly at Harry, looking for words of comfort, and found his cold, flat gaze focused on the vampire hunter he’d reluctantly brought to Skulesdottir. I didn’t need the Bond or my Talents to read distrust tempered with determination; if Kill-Notch stepped out of line here, I wouldn’t have to react. Harry would beat me to from eight feet away.
The DaySitter of House Buryshkin greeted me first in German, making an assumption based on my prince’s declared ancestry. I hadn’t explained yet to Batten the difference between “declared ancestry” and actual ancestry. Some revenants had existed long before human beings were widespread on the planet; in order to blend in to their surroundings, some of the eldest had claimed a heritage that was closest to their area of origin. Wilhelm Dreppenstedt had chosen his name. What he had been called at birth was anyone’s guess. I understood only that he had been taken down by the First Turned somewhere in the Swabian Alps at the same time as Malas Nazaire, and that they had fled north in the wake of their maker, draining mortal bodies as they did.
When I smiled at the DaySitter but did not appear to understand her greeting, she bit her glossy bottom lip, gave me a quick head-to-toe, checked out Batten, and switched to English. “There is always a safe corner in the Den of the Ice Bear for the Raven of Night,” she said formally, tucking her hair behind one ear. “And Death Rejoices with me as I welcome my sister.”
Um, okay. “Hiya,” I said, picking up from the Blue Sense that she found me interesting to look at. Must have been the punk-Rapunzel ghost hair; the turquoise strand, disobedient as ever, had wriggled out of my up-do to curl down against the soft marks left by Harry’s last feed. I stuck my gloved hand out. She took it gently and shook. “I’m Marnie. You might not want to call yourself my sister. My real sisters don’t.”
She gave me another sweeping look. “Thank you for the warning,” she said, “but my loyalty to my house decides who is family and who is not. I’m Netta.” She paused, apparently for me to add something, but since I didn’t know what she wanted, I squirmed in my Keds. She lowered her voice to barely a whisper. “May I know your Second?”
“Know, like… in the biblical sense?” I grinned wickedly at her, ignoring Batten’s long-suffering sigh. “Sure. I rent him out by the minute. He’s super-cheap. Not because the sex is bad, but because he’s a total dickhead before and after. Sometimes during.”
Her mouth made a little O that matched the perfectly wide eyes my words had inspired. For a moment, she didn’t know quite how to respond, and while her mouth worked soundlessly, her eyes slid sideways to see who exactly might be listening. “How much?” she said with a widening smirk.
I laughed then, delighted. “For my sister? First one’s on the house. Get it?”
Batten took my elbow with a little growl.
“Until we meet again, sister,” Netta said, already cautiously shifting gears to speak to Harry behind us, using whatever cues she had in her social arsenal to decide between French and English. I was sort of curious as to where she’d peg Harry; it could go either way, depending on his mood. In the end,
I overheard her greet him with purring respect in rapid French and then switch to English when she heard how his French had a subtle London inflection to it. Netta was a marvel. I wondered what she’d done for a living before becoming a DaySitter, and if she still worked at it.
We waltzed through a small gallery filled with niches containing giant urns. I refused to think about the possibility that they contained the dust of immortals, like much classier versions of the Kermit the Frog cookie jar atop my fridge back in Shaw's Fist, choosing instead to focus on the room opening ahead of us.
I said, “I like Netta.”
“I noticed.” Batten tugged absently on his right earlobe. “Mind not pimping me out to your new friends?”
“How come?”
“I don’t fuck every woman who spreads for me, Snickerdoodle.”
“Is that supposed to make me feel special?”
“Does it?”
It did, kinda. “Lots of guys like being treated like a sex object or a spank buddy. Slap it up, flip it, rub it down, oh noooooo. You know the drill. Are you saying it offends you?”
“That a surprise?”
“A little.” I grinned up at him and fluttered my lashes, making exaggerated googly-eyes. “You kinda like me, huh?”
That earned me the hint of a smile and the shake of a head. “What was your first clue?”
I had no answer for that. I had very few clues as to Mark Batten’s actual feelings. Not only was he a total null for my Talents, but he kept his emotions almost completely walled up. It sort of baffled me to think he expected me to know how he felt. “If you’d enjoy being more than my horizontal dance buddy, you should probably say so. I’m a little clueless when it comes to you.”
He barked a laugh. “Understatement of the day.”
“Which part? The clueless bit, or the liking me bit?”
“There’s a familiar face,” he said, pointing. I suspected he was trying to change the subject, but as we stepped into the main hall, I looked anyway.
The throne room was not what I’d expected. I had anticipated a grim, gothic scene with plenty of black velvet barely visible in near-darkness. I was met instead with a vivid, hectic blend of lively colors — flags, gowns, robes, cloaks — at once dreamlike and slap-your-face real. Gas lanterns glittered, turning crystal to stars, glossing the marble floor to a lake of black glass, adding flickering dimension to the flutter of banner and cape. At the end of the room, center stage, was a massive, empty throne made of what appeared to be carved from a solid piece of greenish-blue vesuvianite, called cyprine. The Unhallowed Throne was surrounded by stone-faced revenant guards, each wearing a robe bearing their colors, one representative from every house except Rask. There seemed to be revenants and DaySitters from every race and culture the world had on offer, so the chamber looked like a meeting of all hundred ninety-somethin’ UN member states, if the UN was made primarily out of dead guys. Flitting here and there, human servants dressed in white and marked with their house sigil at the right shoulder delivered greetings between the houses, while DaySitter voices in various languages made a bubbling chorus under the orchestra’s welcome. The effect was wholly immersive and lushly beautiful.
My eyes followed the direction of Batten’s gaze and fell on the banner of House Nazaire, where Malas immediately caught my eye; I went still, captured in the hypnotic lure of his cornflower blue eyes as they shot through with gold. Oh, crap. You dumbass, I told myself, swimming in the draw of his casual mindfuck. For a moment, the creepy, withered rotten creature faded away into a vision of Malas in his cavalry days, dangerously handsome, black hair a curly riot as he lifted his helmet and shook out his damp locks, laughing in the face of yet another screaming lecture from Napoleon.
I broke eye contact, but only because Malas got bored and released me.
“Clever vamp,” I cursed, barely above a breath, and then froze at my accidental use of the V-word. Batten actually nudged me, cutting shocked eyes at me. “Sorry. Sorry! It’s just…” I didn’t so much gesture at Malas as indicate him with a subtle tilt of my head. “Reminding me of the man he once was. I’m guessing he recognizes you and is trying to lull me to make sure I keep you in line.”
“Well, control yourself.”
I screwed up my face. “Hi, I’m Marnie. Have we met?”
“Can’t Harry do something about you?” Batten asked.
“You want Harry to cock-block other dudes?” I smirked. “That’s a riot, coming from you. If he could, do you think I’d be groping you at every opportunity?”
“You haven’t been,” he reminded me, sounding a tad rejected. I didn’t know what to say to that. He was right. We’d had plenty of opportunities, at least when we weren't cockblocking ourselves with awkward discussions of our feelings. Harry had even created opportunities for me to be alone with Batten. By removing the naughty secret nature of my lusting after Batten, Harry had, accidentally or on purpose, made some of the illicit pleasure go poof! The broad-shouldered hunk that stood beside me was still a yummy treat, but he was no longer off limits. Was that all it took to cool my loins? Or were the circumstances here just too weird and uncertain for me to relax enough to become aroused? I hadn’t exactly been chasing Harry’s taut ass, and I had left Mr. Buzz, my trusty purple vibrator, at home. The realization struck me as stunning.
“Maybe I’ve got reasons,” I said, exploring the other house banners without making eye contact with any revenants. “It’s unhealthy to be happy all the time. It burns itself out. I don’t wanna burn my happiness out.”
“Isn’t it unhealthy to be miserable all the time?”
You’d know, Kill-Notch. “It’s an excellent fallback position from which to regroup. Misery never burns itself out. Misery is quiet and muddy. There's depth, so you can wallow in it. At your lowest, you have no risk of crashing to the ground. There’s no doom to worry about, you’re already there! Happiness is floating up high on wisps. Happiness is dangerous and fleeting. Misery is solid and unlimited; it’s self-sustaining, piling up on itself. It’s the best value for your money, when you think about it.”
“You’re a bright spark today.”
“I am. But you think I’m gloomy. That’s where you’re wrong.”
“Does this have anything to do with a rumor I might have overheard?”
I flicked my gaze at him. His face revealed nothing, and that worried me more than usual. “Rumor?”
“Harry’s other DaySitter?”
“She’s not. Anymore. It’s fine. Think I’m jealous?” I’m so goddamn jealous. I did a very good job of not glancing at the woman who sat at Wilhelm’s right hand, but my eyes did stray to Harry. He was trying not to look in Carole Jeanne’s direction either, but his control wasn’t nearly as good as mine. “It doesn’t matter. We’re cool, you know? I mean, I can…” I flapped a hand at him, trying to be all casual about it, indicating his zipper. “You know. With you. And he’s okay with it.” Mostly. Maybe. If this how Harry feels about my wanting Batten, it’s awful. It’s terrible. Why did he say it was okay? “So why should I care that one of his ex-DaySitters is serving Wilhelm, and is still alive and kickin’, and smart and powerful and everything? Who cares if she’s a fancy fifth and I’m a shitty seventh? Does it look like I care?” I snort-laughed. “Cuz I so don’t.”
“I can see that,” he said, not falling for it in the least. His eyes softened around the edges as if to invite further declarations. Pass. He allowed, “Maybe you’re worried about something else.”
Duh. House Dreppenstedt had been abuzz with whispers all evening about who might be put on the throne. The stress was starting to rankle some. I sought out the reassuring sight of Declan’s curly back hair…
And a light bulb went on in my grey cells.
It was a bad light bulb, one that flickered and threatened to snuff out almost immediately; the idea stuck, though, stubbornly, and as much as I hated it, I clung to it. The king. Nine Talents.
“Noooooooo,” I whispered.
“No?” Batten’s tone shifted to worried.
“Oh, no,” I answered. “Fifty-eleventeen times no.”
“What?”
“I can’t,” I argued with myself aloud. “Can I? Should I? I should not.”
“Probably not,” Batten agreed.
“Harry would kill me, wouldn’t he? They’d all kill me. It would be a mass murder. Just an out-and-out Marnie-kablooie, right?”
“Dunno what the fuck you’re talking about, but ‘yes’ is a safe guess.”
“I can’t say it out loud,” I said. The king. Nine Talents. “If anyone even suspected…” I shook my head but my belly told me I was onto something, something big; it churned madly with excitement. “I think I have the solution. They’re not going to like it. Nobody. Not one bit.”
“Then it’s a bad idea, Snickerdoodle.” He gently bumped me with his elbow to make contact. “Better let it go.”
“On a completely unrelated note: I am reveling in my misery,” I said. “No one can take it from me. It’s mine.”
Batten’s lips almost gratefully curled into a slippery smile, happy to be on familiar ground. “Fairly sure I could steal your misery away.”
I narrowed my eyes. “Never.”
Batten said, “Instant glee button.”
I tried not to smile. “How can you think of sex at a time like this?”
“What are you thinking about?”
