Dark Queen

by Faith Hunter

  I unfolded the paper, seeing my long-fingered hands move. I hadn’t even noticed I was still in half-form. In Leo’s distinctive calligraphy were the words, The Master of the City requests that the Master of Clan Yellowrock join us in my office before you depart.

  Master of Clan Yellowrock, not Jane, or my Jane, or Enforcer. Names and titles meant something to vamps. This was city or clan business, and fortuitous since we needed to chat with him. I passed the note to Eli, who gave his service smile, a twitch of lips. I chuckled and the sound was half-Beast. Antifreeze flinched just the tiniest bit. Right. I was a monster and living with monsters never got easier.

  “Let’s go visit Leo in his office,” Eli said, his voice hard and emotionless. It was the voice he used when he planned to beat up someone. It made me feel all warm and fuzzy. “Thank you,” I said politely to Antifreeze. On my bare paw pads, I climbed the foyer stairs to Leo’s office, Eli on my heels. Knocked. Entered when he called out “Entrez.” I walked through the entry with its fireplace and expensive rugs and wall hangings to find Leo at his desk, me still in half-form, Eli wearing his battle face.

  Leo was sitting, leaning back in his leather chair, his legs outstretched, shoes off, and ankles crossed. Papers rested on his chest. A gold-plated pitcher dribbled condensation onto a gold platter. A cut-crystal bottle, the label reading MACALLAN 1824 SERIES NO. 6 SINGLE MALT, was at his elbow, a glass beside it, the scotch legs still draining down the side of the empty glass.

  His hair was loose on his shoulders, his clothing blood splattered. There were even a few drops on his face. The stench of old blood had to be horrible to an apex predator, but he hadn’t cleaned up. And he was drinking scotch. His hands were uncovered except for the bandage on his fingers. He’d lost some in a fight recently and they were still reattaching. It was a vamp thing.

  He didn’t look up as we entered. I stood there for a moment, watching, evaluating. Then I leaned over and took the papers off his chest. It was the werecat parley agreement that someone had retrieved from the Royal Sonesta. The pages rustled softly as I flipped through them, scanning, Eli reading at my side. The opening paragraph was like a thesis statement, saying that three parties were aligning in a triumvirate of power: the European emperor, the were-creatures (African werecats and a small pack of rogue werewolves), and two vamps. Dominique Quessaire and—Bancym M’lareil.

  “Ahhhh,” I breathed, putting things together. Cym had caused the anomaly. That was why the magic in the gym had felt so familiar. That was why the weres had attacked. I knew Bancym M’lareil. She had mind magic. She had an obfuscation spell unlike any other I had ever seen.

  Cym was both witch and vamp. She had been the heir of Jack Shoffru, the Mexican MOC, a pirate vamp, one of many fangheads in the last two years who’d tried to take over New Orleans. Bancym had kidnapped Molly. Had hurt Molly. Had nearly killed Eli. During my fight with Shoffru, when Eli nearly died, I had staked Cym. But I hadn’t taken her head and she had disappeared. Clearly, she had been dragged off the battlefield and healed.

  The rogue werewolves had always been Leo’s enemies, as had Titus, the EVs, and Cym. Dominique was the glue that held them all together, and she had sworn to Clan Des Citrons, which was not mentioned here. A clan would have their own parley agreements, not one tied in with the hoi polloi. Dominique and Bancym had their talons in a lot of pies, the least known and understood, Clan Des Citrons. I needed to find out about the clan, who they were, what they wanted, where they were, everything.

  The summary was the part that mattered. They had all signed and agreed to pacts of aggression against their enemies. When Titus defeated Leo, he would destroy the Bighorn Pack and give the huge territory to Prism, Jax, and their pack. Titus would also grant all of Leo’s territory to the two female vamps, making them, together, the two most powerful vamps in the United States. I dropped the papers on the desk.

  Leo didn’t look up. Softly he said, “The weight of years, the weight of my enemies, the weight of betrayal rests heavily on my shoulders.” It was the tone of depression, melancholy, and failure.

  Eli glanced at me and gave me a quirky half grin. He leaned over and took Leo’s glass and the decanter, holding them to the lamp. “This goes for around sixty-five hundred dollars a bottle.” He sloshed a bit in the glass and swirled it. Sniffed. Added a few drops of water from the gold pitcher. Swirled and sniffed again. Leo slowly turned his head, one of those nonhuman, snaky gestures they did, watching my partner. “I did not offer you my scotch, human.”

  Eli sipped, swirling the liquor in his mouth, swallowing in tiny bursts, breathing down the fumes. “Not bad. Not better than a thirty-five-year-old Balvenie, but not bad.” He sipped again, watching Leo.

  Leo said, “I have a forty-six-year-old Balvenie, 1968, cask seventy-two, ninety-three, in my cellar.”

  Eli nodded. Sipped again. “Nice. Since you’re all whiny and giving up, can I have the Balvenie? I’d hate for Titus to get his paws on it.” Eli glanced at me. “Begging the pardon of the pawed and pelted.”

  “Pardon granted,” I said, letting my amusement tell in my tone.

  “Whiny?” Leo asked, his eyes slowly vamping out. “You are asking to raid my estate? I am not dead.” His fangs schnicked down.

  “Not yet. And you’ve got the home advantage. And you now know all your enemies. But you sound defeated. You sound as if you’ve given up. What you believe about the outcome is three-quarters of the battle, so you’ve already lost. You’re dead, old man.” Eli sipped, sizing Leo up like a young recruit on the day of battle. “And I’m drinking your scotch without your permission.” Leo shot out of the chair, straight at Eli.

  His jaw landed on my fist. The pop of displaced air and the thump of chin to fist overlapped. Leo dropped back, sitting on the desktop, shaking his head. He started laughing and his fangs snapped up. That was three-quarters of the battle won back. I could’ve kissed my partner.

  Leo looked us over, his gaze taking in my human clothes and my cat face, hands, and feet. I could see him thinking about asking me how much of my other parts were cat shaped. “Don’t,” I said. The skin around his eyes crinkled with amusement. He slid back into his desk chair and Eli and I took chairs. Maybe it was rude to sit without being asked, but I was tired, as if the little bit of fighting I had done had taken a lot out of me. When he didn’t object, I put my paws up on the small table as if it was an ottoman. Leo let me get comfortable. “We need to chat about—”

  Leo held up a hand, stopping me.

  Quesnel, the sommelier, entered the office, carrying a tray with a dozen bottles of beer on it. All of the bottles and cans were cold and sweating with condensation, the way Americans liked beer, which meant this was not part of the taste testing that went along with being the MOC. Quesnel set the tray on the table near my arm and indicated it, as if telling me to take a pick. “Our Master of the City is pleased to toast your ascension to clan Blood Master. What would you like?”

  I pointed to a can of local NOLA Brewing Company beer. The Mecha brew had a red dragon on front that was eating part of the uptown. And then I pointed to the Irish Channel Stout by the same company. Quesnel opened both cans and poured each into a frosted beer glass, the pair of which he placed on the table at my other side. He produced a new glass for Leo and poured the scotch and water. Leo sat back in his chair, examining me in my half-form. There was no distaste or judgment in his eyes; rather, there was that hint of delight.

  Leo’s enjoyment of my form fell away, leaving him pensive again. “I have no way to properly toast you, my Jane. The appropriate toast for a new Blood Master of a clan is from the jugular of a virgin boy or girl, with the words ‘Long undeath, prosperity, scions, blood, and cattle.’”

  I looked at my beer. “Yeah. Beer is better. And how about ‘Live long and prosper.’”

  Leo gave no indication that he found me funny as he lifted his scotch in a toast. Eli followed the exa
mple, with his glass. I picked up the Mecha, holding it out and slightly up. Leo repeated my words, “Live long and prosper.” Hearing the Vulcan blessing from Leo’s lips was giggleworthy, but I managed to smother the laugh.

  Leo drank and ate a few nuts. Eli and I followed his example. In companionable silence I finished my beer. Then Leo refilled the scotch glasses and pushed my second beer to me. Leo said, “However, I prefer QaStaHvIS yIn ‘ej chep.”

  I stopped with the beer held in the air, ice water dripping from my fingers. Eli said, “Klingon? You did not just say ‘Live long and prosper’ in Klingon.”

  “Oh, but I did. And I do hope that my Jane may live many decades more and prosper greatly.” He held up his free hand in the Vulcan V salute, gave an abbreviated nod, and sipped.

  Holy crap. Leo knew about Star Trek. A lot about Star Trek. Alex would have a cow.

  Eyes gleaming, Leo sipped again and I remembered to lower my arm and drink too. Leo said, “I was informed that the white werewolf was biting Joses Santana.”

  Finally we were getting to important stuff. “Yeah. And werewolf spit seems to make the SOD less magical. Does he taste different?”

  “I have not tasted Joses in recent days,” Leo said, wryly. “I understand that the werecats who attacked us had fed from the Son of Darkness prior to them attacking us in the gym. Were you aware of this?”

  I said, “I figured it out. Dominique let them in and destroyed the cameras along the way. We don’t have video footage.”

  “Why did Dominique Quessaire betray her sworn oath to Grégoire and to me, after we forgave her trespasses and restored her to us? This has troubled me for . . .” He rotated a hand as if to say, For a long time.

  “Magic, again? Lemon-smelling magic.” Tiredly, I asked, “Does it matter?”

  Leo pondered this and then shook his head. “No.”

  “You have the parley papers between the EuroVamps and Dominique and Cym and what I hope will soon be a dead rogue werewolf pack. The Bighorn Pack is hunting for any werewolf remnants still in the city. Alex will concentrate on Bancym, Clan Des Citrons, and Dominique. When he finds their lair, I’ll take it out. That leaves only the EuroVamps. Easy peasy.”

  Leo smiled slightly and set down the remainder of his scotch as if it had lost flavor. “We will fight. Within two nights. It will be, as you Americans say, winner take all.”

  “Which will make you the emperor of Europe.” I studied him. “For all that you’re a selfish narcissist with tendencies to see everyone on earth as tools to be used or discarded, you’ll rule well.”

  Leo laughed, but it was a vamp laugh, all pathos and no human humor. “You honor me. Honor I do not deserve in the human understanding of the term, for I harmed you, my Jane, my Enforcer. My Dark Queen.”

  For once I decided not to object to the titles or the possessives. He knew how I felt about them all. I sipped. After a moment Leo sipped again too. Eli watched us like a hawk, eyes piercing and steady. “You guys decided where the fights are gonna be?” I asked. “You’ve left me out of that decision-making process.”

  “Such decisions are . . . above your pay grade.”

  Well, wasn’t that just ducky. “I need to get the venue’s security in place.”

  “I have not kept you in the dark without cause. I have used you for the purposes I need.”

  He swirled his drink again, watching the scotch legs drain down the glass. “As of two hours past, the decision has been made to situate the Sangre Duello on one or another Chitimacha tribal island not far from Port Eads,” Leo said. “There are three tribal islands with houses that have been shared with Clan Pellissier since the early 1800s, and the tribe has allowed us to maintain the homes and the grounds for a reasonable fee.”

  I thought about that, sipped the last of my beer, and said, “As tribal lands, the islands fall under non-U.S. lands use? So you can dock there and so can Titus.”

  “Correct. It can be argued that, technically, the U.S. government has no jurisdiction there.”

  “They might dispute that,” I said. “In court.”

  “They might,” he agreed. “However, as we will not be announcing the exact locale, the Duello will be long over by the time the government decides how to apply the law to us, the Chitimacha, and Titus, put the proper paperwork together, and go to a judge for legal writs to charge us or to stop us.”

  “Or they could just blow you out of the water as soon as you all arrive. Drop a bomb on the island or napalm it and be done with the biggest, baddest vamps on the planet.” Leo didn’t reply to that one, still turning his crystal glass. “You’re planning that by the time they figure out where the fights are taking place, Titus’s head will have rolled. But the military has satellite capability and radar and missiles.” Leo still said nothing. “You got a map of the places with GPS?”

  Leo pulled up a topo map of the toe of Louisiana on his computer and turned it to me. Three places were fuzzed out, the way U.S. military installations are fuzzed out on satellite maps. I frowned at him and Leo said, “Some time ago, I arranged to have them . . . pixelated?” His tone questioned the term. “Money has its privileges.”

  “Île des Eaux,” I said, reading the name of one. “Island of the Waters.” Leo looked impressed that I could translate the French, but île and eaux were pretty easy. “Spitfire Island and Contempt Isle. So when do we go?”

  “A few housekeeping and landscaping blood-servants were dispatched a week past—just in case an island proved acceptable to Titus—to each of the three islands, along with a well-paid construction crew, to determine the houses’ suitability and state of disrepair. Security went down with the construction crew to evaluate those concerns. As soon as the final venue is decided upon, you will, of course, go down and oversee preparations for security.

  “The crews involved with the immediate evaluation and cleanup don’t know they are there to begin initial preparation for a possible Mithran occupation. They have had no contact with the outside world since they arrived at the islands. Each house is primitive by modern-day standards: no cellular, no Internet. We may not have hot and cold running water or indoor toilets. Minimal electricity, all solar. We will have a small staff, most of them camping. Those of us who have been challenged will either stay on-site in light-safe rooms or be flown in by helicopter. On-site bunkroom space will be provided for Clan Yellowrock and a security team and blood-servants. Other bunkrooms may be available as needed, though the occupants may need to switch off, as you say.”

  “I’m not concerned about the sleeping arrangements. I’m concerned about the security. Why was I not involved with this?”

  “Your Alex has been an active participant, looking over all three sites. He has a preference, and I am doing all I can in negotiations to accommodate him and the security needs.”

  And Alex hadn’t told me.

  Leo let a tiny human smile cross his features. “When a leader has trained his capable and loyal people well, my Jane, it is then time to let them go and perform the tasks one has assigned to them. I needed your skills and protection here at Council Chambers, not on an island many miles away.”

  I scowled at Leo, but he had a point. Alex was growing up and doing his job without being asked.

  Leo went on. “Titus and his people will anchor offshore and arrive after dusk each evening via motorized dory to the repaired docks. They will depart before dawn in the same small boats.”

  I put my paws on the floor and stood. “You got any other news you want to share?” Leo stretched back and removed a sheet of paper from his printer, folded it once, and leaned to me, holding it out. I narrowed my eyes at him and took the sheet. I opened the fold and glanced down. It was a list of opponents and fights. My name figured prominently. “This is gonna suck.”

  “I hope so, my Jane,” Leo said, the twinkle back in his eyes. “I do hope so.”

  “Not what
I meant.”

  The partial smile slid away. “No. Not what you meant. These next few days will be difficult. But you asked me if there was other information you needed to know. Yes. There is.”

  “And?”

  “As you requested when you brought him here, I met privately with the man Ayatas FireWind. He requested to be present at the Sangre Duello. I refused. He grows persistent.”

  “We don’t need PsyLED on the island in any capacity. They would be legally bound to try and stop duels to the death.”

  Leo inclined his head as if to say he had taken that into consideration. “And yet, in the event of my true-death, the presence of officers of the law might prevent both a bloodbath onshore and any action by the United States Navy or Coast Guard.”

  “You think the military will take us all out if you lose.”

  “Accidents happen. Even a deliberate bombardment of an inhabited island in the gulf is not unheard of. Ask Eli Younger. He knows of such things. Ayatas FireWind has been kept apprised of all happenings in my city. I will think on this carefully and will discuss plans with you.”

  Softer, Leo said, “I have taken the scent of FireWind. And I was gifted with a single drop of his blood as pledge of his honor, if not his loyalty.” Gently he added, “He is your brother in truth.”

  I blinked. Felt as if the world tilted and that I might fall. I took a breath to steady myself and the air was too dry, too cold. “What?”

  “I have taken the scent of the man claiming to be your brother. You were born of the same mother, sired by the same father. He is your full-blood brother.”

  * * *

  • • •

  Both of the Youngers were relaxed in the living room, Alex at his desk and Eli lying on the couch, where he had thrown himself when we entered, now looking deceptively tranquil and sleepy.

  I was standing in the entry, still in half-form, cranky and annoyed. To Alex, I said, “You knew about the Sangre Duello being at one of three islands, and didn’t see fit to tell me?”