by Karen Chance
“I can,” Mircea said. “If that is what you want—”
“No, you can erase the memory of it. But then who would I be? From a screw-up to . . . a blank?”
Mircea made a frustrated sound, which was another measure of how not-himself he was today. “It is difficult to help you when you don’t seem to know what you want—”
“Yes!” Jules nodded. “Yes, exactly. Before I became a master, back when I was a baby vamp, I was told who I was supposed to be. I was given the right clothes to wear, the words to say, the jobs to do. And after, I was still expected to be that person, just . . . better at it somehow. It was like being in a play—put on the costume, say the words, try to stay in character . . . and I did. I did that. But I’ve been a character for so long now, I don’t know who I am when I’m out of it.” He looked at me and spread those expressive hands. “Cassie, you didn’t mean to, but you stripped off the costume, took it clean away. And now you want to know what I want? How the hell should I know?”
I looked at him, and I thought maybe I did finally get it. I got something else, too. “We may not know what you want, but we know what you don’t want.” I looked at Mircea. “He doesn’t want to make this choice today.”
“And I did not wish to lose eleven masters tonight!”
“What?”
“The raid. The one you saw us preparing for?”
I nodded.
“Twelve operatives went out; only one returned. And they had power, every single one. And skill. And centuries of experience you don’t have. And they died nonetheless.”
“But . . . what can kill twelve masters?” I asked in disbelief. Because the answer should have been nothing. Sending a senior master—a first – or second-level vampire—after a problem was to suddenly have no more problem. It was like sending a whole battalion. Losing eleven . . .
Nobody lost eleven.
“We don’t know,” he told me, running a hand through his hair. “As of right now, we have no idea. But it was a carefully coordinated attack that required intimate knowledge of us. There are very few people with that sort of information, very few who could have stage-managed a series of ambushes dangerous enough to kill first-level masters.”
“You think Tony and his group were behind it.”
“That is the current assumption. They certainly have the most cause. But whether it turns out to be accurate or not, until we root them out, they will keep coming. They’ve proven that much, at least. And Antonio—”
“Is a threat,” I agreed. “And you know I want him more than anyone. But I’m a little more worried about Ares right now—”
“Ares may never return if his supporters are taken out!”
“But Rhea didn’t see Tony returning to kill us all, did she?” I asked. “She saw Ares—”
“And you believe her? A girl you barely know?”
“—and so did my mother, and so did Jonas’ prophecies—”
“Prophecies, visions—give me tangible enemies to fight. I can’t fight air!”
And that was it, wasn’t it? Mircea really didn’t like feeling helpless, didn’t like being on the sidelines, didn’t like leaving his fate in someone else’s hands. But a god at full strength was too much, just too much for any of us, and he knew he couldn’t fight him.
So he was trying to take on those he could.
I understood that. But I also understood something else. That if I gave in to him on this, I’d be giving in on everything. Because how do you step back after giving someone an army? How do you turn him down when he knows you’ll cave, even on the big things, even on the huge things, because you already did?
If I gave Mircea what he wanted, it might help now, but it would hurt later. And it would hurt a lot. Not just because of all the extra master vampires suddenly running around, but because I would have just confirmed that I was nothing more than a weapon for him to fire, whenever he chose, at whatever he chose, and I couldn’t be that. I couldn’t do that.
Not and have any legitimacy left.
“I understand—” I began.
“Do you? Then give me an army.”
And, okay, I was getting pissed again, probably because that had sounded a lot like an order.
“I am not your servant, Mircea.”
“I am not treating you as one. I am pointing out the best course of action under the current—”
“You are treating me exactly like one. You aren’t asking me; you’re telling me—”
“I am telling you what we need to do to survive!”
“And I’m telling you that taking out Tony won’t solve the problem! Ares has other supporters—Agnes’ old acolytes, for example. I think they may be after the Tears of Apollo to shift him across the barrier—”
“The barrier that has stood for thousands of years? Your acolytes are likely after the Tears to avoid capture by you.”
I shook my head. “One of the Corpsmen overheard them talking. He said they are planning to bring back a god—”
“And what did Mage Marsden have to say to this, when you told him?”
“I didn’t tell him. Rhea did—”
“Then what was his response to her?”
“He didn’t appear too concerned.”
“And did this tell you anything?”
“Yes! It told me he doesn’t take me seriously. I had hoped for better from you!”
“I do take you seriously—”
“No, you take my power seriously. It’s not the same thing! If you respect me at all, give me—”
I stopped, because Mircea had just crossed his arms over his chest, an implacable piece of body language that he never used. His normal style was approachable, open, relaxed. There was a reason that, despite his being a powerful first-level master and a senator, people talked to Mircea, in ways they just didn’t to others of the same rank.
Only it didn’t look like he was too interested in talking right now.
“So that you can get killed with them?” he demanded.
“So I can do my job!”
“Your job is here, finding your acolytes and helping your allies. How exactly is the war effort to be served by running about time after a single war mage?”
“This isn’t just about him—”
“On the contrary, this is wholly about him. Don’t you see what they are doing? What Marsden is doing? He was the last Pythia’s lover—oh yes, we knew—and is now trying to exert the same measure of power over you. But he is too old to use his own charm these days; therefore he uses another—”
“Pritkin?” I stared at Mircea incredulously.
“Ironic that it should be the man who began his association with you by trying to kill you,” Mircea said grimly. “But you have come to rely on him—too much. And this has not gone unremarked, by us or by the Circle.”
“Pritkin has never tried to influence me—”
“Has not tried to influence you yet. But it will come, if you keep him in your service. Perhaps whatever calamity he finds himself in is for the best, before he becomes even more of a problem than he already—”
“Pritkin is not a problem! And this is not about him. This is me making a formal request of an ally—”
“As I just did?” A dark eyebrow raised. “You know how our world works, Cassie; you have always known—”
“I knew how it worked for others. I thought we were different.”
“We are different. But we have two relationships—”
“Until you decide otherwise!”
“Cassie—”
“Give me the Tears, Mircea!”
And I knew it, saw it in his eyes before he even got the words out. “Give me an army.”
“Goddamnit!” I said, and shifted.
Chapter Thirty-five
“You’re calling him?” Tami followe
d me from the lounge, where she’d been putting a puzzle together with some of the kids, into the kitchen.
“Yep.”
“But I thought you were gonna give him more time.”
“He’s had time,” I said, and grabbed the house phone.
She grinned and slid some cornflakes in front of me while we waited for the connection to go through. It didn’t take long, which wasn’t surprising considering that it was a little after eight a.m. here, meaning it was afternoon in Britain. And considering that it didn’t go through to the right guy, even though this was his direct line.
“Lord Protector’s office,” a brisk-sounding functionary told me. “How may I help?”
“By putting me through to Jonas.”
“And whom shall I say is calling?”
“Cassandra Palmer.”
There was a small silence on the other end. “I . . . shall inquire.”
“What’s he doing?” Tami asked, leaning on the counter, eyes bright, while I listened to Elton John sing about tiny dancers.
“Inquiring.”
“What is there to inquire about? You’re the Pythia. They put you through.”
“No, they put Agnes through.”
Tami scowled.
“He . . . the Lord Protector . . . is in a meeting,” the secretary informed me after a minute. “I was instructed to arrange . . . an appointment?”
Jonas needed to get some new help, I decided.
Even his secretary sounded like he knew that was bullshit.
“Okay,” I said. “I just wanted to check with him before anything was finalized.”
“Finalized?”
“Yes, you know. About my court?”
“I . . . The Pythian Court?”
“Do I have another one I don’t know about?”
“I . . . no. That is to say—”
“Please don’t. Just tell him I called, so he doesn’t say I didn’t consult him—”
“Consult—”
“—before deciding to make the court’s permanent residence Las Vegas—”
Tami laughed.
“—instead of whatever other possibilities we might have dis—”
“Be right back,” the man said, and the Muzak cut back in abruptly.
“What’s happening now?” Tami asked eagerly.
“I’m on hold again.”
“At least it’s Queen this time,” Roy said, not even trying to pretend that he wasn’t listening in.
I didn’t care. If I cared, I’d have done this in the bedroom, under a silence spell. But I was getting tired of having to creep around my own suite, of having to keep secrets from the people who were supposed to be my allies, of trying to do my job with no support and with active opposition half the time.
And it wasn’t like it mattered.
Mircea wasn’t going to give me that damned potion anyway.
Of course, Jonas probably wasn’t, either. I’d told Tami the truth last night: I didn’t have a lot of cards to play with him. In fact, I’d had exactly one, which I’d just used to try to get him on the phone.
It was the same problem I had with Mircea. I am Pythia, hear me roar might sound good in theory, but in practice it was a lot more problematic. Because what were my options? Fight Ares on my own? Run the Pythian Court like some kind of island in the supernatural stream? Never talk to them again? I was pretty sure that wasn’t in the job description. I was pretty sure that was the exact opposite of the job description, that the Pythia was supposed to be a bridge between the various groups, bringing them closer together.
Although it kind of sounded like Agnes hadn’t been doing that.
It almost felt like sacrilege to question her, but I was beginning to think that maybe her relationship with Jonas had given the Circle delusions of grandeur. Like they didn’t need anybody else, because they had the Pythia. And as for the vamps—
Well, they hadn’t trusted the office at all.
Until I came along.
And now I was Agnes 2.0, only with a vamp lover instead of a mage one. Who obviously expected the same privileges he thought Jonas had been getting. And maybe that would have worked in peacetime; maybe I could have done the same thing Agnes apparently had, and let the powers that be believe what they wanted while I did whatever I damned well liked. Hell, I’d mostly been doing that anyway, because I hadn’t had a choice. But it wasn’t going to work forever.
Because I wasn’t a peacetime Pythia. I was a wartime Pythia, and I needed them. I needed both of them to work with me instead of dictating to me, but they weren’t. And I didn’t know how to make them and I was running out of time and Jonas wasn’t going to give me shit, I knew it, assuming he even deigned to speak with me at all, and—
And then he was on the line. “Cassandra.”
“Lady Cassandra,” Rian snapped, because she had come into the kitchen in time to overhear.
If he heard her back, he didn’t react. Or probably care. I cleared my throat and grabbed an apple out of the bowl, because I needed something to concentrate on.
“I’m not calling about my court,” I told him.
“I gathered that.” It was dry.
“Or about the money.”
And, okay, that got a slight pause. And a frown from Tami, who is more practical than me, and probably had a list of all the stuff the girls needed. But they weren’t going to die if they didn’t get it.
Someone else was.
“I’m calling about the Tears of Apollo,” I told him evenly. “Rhea said she asked you for them.”
“She did.”
“She also said she told you why. My acolytes—”
“Will not obtain any from us.”
I concentrated on the apple, which might have darkened a shade, although that could have been my imagination. And told myself to keep my voice steady. Because that had sounded a lot like “and neither will you.”
“You can’t know that,” I pointed out. “They can shift in anywhere. Agnes trained them herself, and they seem to have paid attention.”
“A fact of which you would be unaware had you not sought them out.”
“They’re my responsibility—”
“A great many things are your responsibility, and those girls are the least of it!”
“Not if they obtain the Tears,” I said, staying calm, because I had to. I had to do this right. “At best, it will leave me dealing with multiple Myras, and at worst—”
“There will be no worst, as they shan’t obtain any.”
And, okay, that staying calm thing was getting a little harder. The apple definitely blushed darker, which probably matched my face as I struggled to keep the irritation out of my voice. “Jonas, they were looking for the Tears when I met up with them. They killed Elias for them—”
“For which they will be brought to account, I assure you.” He sounded grim. “But that can be left to us. You need to concentrate on other things—”
“I can’t concentrate on other things until I’m sure about the Tears! Send them to me, whatever stock you have, and then we can—”
“I can’t do that.”
“Damn it, Jonas! We’re supposed to be allies!” I said, and belatedly noticed that the apple was now slimy apple mush, and seriously gross.
Tami handed me a paper towel.
“A fact you seem to be forgetting of late.” It was acid. “But at any rate, I couldn’t send them to you if I wished to.”
“And why not?”
“For the same reason I know the acolytes will not obtain any from us. The last batch was sent to court a week before Agnes passed—”
“A week?”
“—and in her absence, naturally no more have been—”
Jonas was still talking, but I was having trouble hearing him over the sud
den roaring in my ears.
How much is a batch? I mouthed to Rhea.
Three.
Three?
“—and in any case, it requires six months to—Cassie? Cassie?”
• • •
“Whoa,” Tami said, grabbing my arm, and looking a little woozy. “You do this all the time?”
“Feels like it,” I told her, glancing around Agnes’ living room.
It was dark and quiet and empty, just like last time. Which wasn’t surprising since this was last time, or at least the same night Rhea and I had visited before. I’d just brought us back to several hours earlier. The acolytes were probably still off at my inauguration, and with Rhea along, the wards were ignoring us.
Or maybe there was another reason for that.
Because Tami wasn’t just awesome with kids and a great cook. She was also a magical null. One of the rare witches who couldn’t do magic herself, but who could make sure nobody else did any, either. Or anything.
At least, I really hoped so, because safecracking was not in my skill set.
“It’s behind the painting,” I told Tami, who had gotten over the disorientation of a time shift and was staring around in apparent fascination.
“This is where the Pythias lived?” she asked, taking it in.
“Until it was blown up.”
“Damn,” she told me. “Your place needs an upgrade.”
“I wouldn’t feel comfortable somewhere like this,” I said, pulling the painting open.
“You sure? ’Cause I could get used to it. I could get used to it real fast,” she said, checking out the crystal on the bar.
“You don’t like the suite?”
She rolled her eyes at me. “Honey, that’s not a suite. That’s a halfway house. You know you can’t keep that up, right?”
“It’s only been a couple days—”
“A couple days too long. You got to think of your image.”
I glanced at Rhea, who hadn’t said anything, but whose silence was kind of telling. “It’s a penthouse suite,” I pointed out.
Tami laughed. “It’s a penthouse suite with bullet holes in the walls, cots all over the floor, and no privacy for those girls or for you. I don’t know why you’ve put up with it this long!”
