Bitten in Two

I’m tel ing you, this action figure is going to earn me my way into—” Cole stopped when he realized Sterling wasn’t listening anymore. He was staring at the woman who’d fol owed Bergman into the courtyard. Wel , actual y two had come out. Monique had brought a pitcher to refil the orange juice. And Kyphas had strol ed in.

What a contrast. The human, her hair pul ed back in an elegant French twist, looked cool and sweet in a light blue sundress covered with embroidered daisies. Bergman didn’t even growl at her when she patted his shoulder and asked if he’d hand her the half-empty carafe. How could he? That smile had been made for him.

The demon, on the other hand, had let her hair fly free, and it seemed like no layer was quite the same shade as the next, giving it the flow and glow of a lion’s mane. Her bright red capris hugged her curves like they’d only just met, and her black tank had the word “angel” written across the chest in shiny red rhinestones. She skipped the buffet completely and strode toward the gazebo, her eyes glued to Cole, who seemed determined to pretend she didn’t exist.

Sterling hadn’t hidden the fact that he was wel aware of her presence. His eyes hadn’t left her since she entered the courtyard. Both his hands rested easily in his lap, but his fingers were touching the bracelets, his equivalent of cocking a gun.

Shit! Knowing what it would cost me, I put my hand on the warlock’s arm. Hard not to gasp at the sudden drop in energy, like I’d just been dumped into the aftermath of a 10K run. His fingers hadn’t moved, so I kept my hand in place.

Sweating now, I said, “Kyphas is with us. She signed a no-harm contract. You’re included under that umbrel a now.” When his hands dropped to his thighs I pul ed away. So tired that I knew it would be a major undertaking to drag my sorry ass up the stairs, I turned to Kyphas. She’d final y gotten Cole’s message, backed off whatever open display she’d intended, and decided to be social instead. Which was when she realized we had a visitor. If I hadn’t been exhausted I’d have gotten big hairy kicks out of the bug-eyed terror on her face. She yanked off her scarf.

“Stow it!” I snapped. “He’s with us!”

She shook her head. “No. No, this is too much. I wil not hold to my vow to protect the likes of him!”

“Jaz.” Bergman nodded at Monique, who was looking at Kyphas curiously. I jerked my head, motioning for him to get her out before al hel literal y broke loose. He shoved his plate in her hands, picked up his coffee, and slipped his arm around her waist so he could guide her to the door.

“You were tel ing me before about the ramparts that were built around the medina. I looked some of it up online.

Real y fascinating stuff. Could you explain what you were saying about some of the old legends relating to the gates?”

“Of course!”

The rest of us remained frozen in place until Bergman had escorted Monique from the courtyard. And then Sterling rose to his feet. Slowly, like a monk beginning evening prayers, he said, “I thought I threw you back into the pit once already.” His pupils had dilated so drastical y I couldn’t tel where they stopped and his irises began. Bolts of black lightning flew within the amulet he wore, and I could feel the power building kind of like Vayl’s did, only this was a sense of bottomless wel s of fire preparing to explode.

Kyphas snapped her tahruyt in the air, transforming it into the ruby-hilted flyssa she’d threatened me with before.

“Stop!” I stepped between them, holding out my arms, too aware of how my hands were shaking. I dropped them before it showed, pissed that Sterling’s shining power was partial y fueled by me.

I said, “Kyphas, you know exactly what wil happen to you if you break your contract. So go stuff your face with some damn eggs until you’ve calmed down enough to pretend you’re normal. And you—” I turned to Sterling. “Get it through your thick skul that I need her, at least for now.”

“Why?” Such a reasonable question. But my eyes were drooping so badly now that even if I wanted to tel him I thought she would be the one to find the Rocenz for us, I’d probably be asleep before I could make any sense of it for him. So I said, “Cole, tel him everything you think he needs to know. I’m going back to bed. You’re in charge of Vayl’s safety until I wake up again.”

“Okay,” Cole said. “Just remember, he’s going to want a reply to that letter.”

“Fine. I’l do one before my nap.”

Which turned out to be a good thing. Because the person who woke me up, with a tooth-clicking shoulder shake that made me feel somewhat queasy, was Vayl.

CHAPTER TEN

Madame Berggia, how can you be sleeping at a time like this!” I opened my eyes. Vayl’s face, hovering inches above my own, had locked down so tight I could see the muscles jumping in his jaws.

I shot up in bed, pul ing Grief out from under my pil ow as I did so. “What’s wrong?”

“Your husband says you have a note for me from the Lady Jasmine. Why did you not bring it to me the instant I rose?”

I loosened my grip on the gun. “What time is it?”

“Eight in the evening. Why are you abed? Are you il ? It matters not. Where is the letter? I must have it!” Just remember, eventually he stopped being an asshole, I told myself as I swung my feet onto the floor. I would’ve glared at him, but why waste a perfectly good expression on the broad back of a clueless vampire? He’d turned away from me, so anxious to read the letter that he’d begun to search for it himself.

“Hey!” I yel ed. “Get outta my trunk!”

He rose to his ful height, holding his cane in one hand and a pair of black pantyhose in the other. “What are these?” he asked, hefting the hose. “They seem not to stop where garters would be required.”

I put my hand to my chest because, seriously, I thought my heart might’ve skipped a couple of beats. It was the first time he’d seen my clothing as something not straight out of a museum. “They’re a new invention,” I said. “They stay up al by themselves.”

He dropped the cane, not even noticing as it clattered against the rug, and used both hands to stretch the waistband. “Fascinating.”

“Yeah. Uh, how did you… sleep?”

He shrugged. “As usual.”

“And when you woke up? How did you feel?” He dropped the hose. “I could think of nothing but the woman whose portrait Berggia showed me yesterday. Her face has begun to haunt me. Come, where is the letter? I cannot wait for it a moment longer.”

“Geez, quit being such a freaking Romeo before I have to gag or something. Here.” I trudged over to the bed table.

I couldn’t remember half of what I’d written, I’d been so tired at the time. That’s the last time I touch you, Sterling, you damn leech!

Vayl was so excited to read it that he rushed to the table before me, and for a few moments we stood together, two people sharing space meant for one. He was bent over, ful y involved in the message I’d left, his hands flat on either side of the ivory stationery as if to keep it from flying off and leaving him stranded there.

He’d turned the lamp on. He didn’t need it, but he’d probably done it for my sake, so as not to freak out the old gal during her rude awakening. I was glad of the light, though. It gave me the chance to fol ow the dance of his short, dark curls across his head and down to the strong expanse of his neck. My fingers ached to glide down that path, to slide under the col ar of his dark almond shirt and feel the muscles of his back move under my hands. He stil wore suspenders, which I found oddly charming, and tonight they held up a pair of gray pinstriped trousers that made it real y hard to look away from his ass. But I managed it when he shoved the paper into my face.

“The words look lovely, almost as if she painted them.

Tel me what they say.”

Tel me what they say.”

I tried to back up, but the bed got in my way, so I ended up bouncing on my butt a couple of times as he moved toward the bench. I watched him get comfortable. “You want me to… read it out loud?”

“Yes.”

“Won’t you be embarrassed?”

“Not unless you run out and tel everyone in the street what you have just read.” He stared me down, and I discovered a spectacular reserve of happiness saved just for this moment when I rejoiced not to have ever been one of his victims.

“No. I wouldn’t.”

“That is what I thought.” He nodded. “Proceed.” I held up the paper, tried to ignore the pain behind my eye that signaled the beginning of a nasty headache, and began reading.

My Own Vasil,

Can you imagine how happy your letter made me? Before it came I was falling into the worst kind of despair. But now I have hope. Maybe heroes exist after all, and you are mine. But the way will not be easy. Because you cannot see me, my love. If I stood next to you and whispered, “I love you,” into your ear, you would not hear it. Some prisons are so hard to break free from that it seems nearly impossible to think that we could ever be together. But I believe in miracles, Vasil. So come if you can. Try your hardest to see me, and I believe you will.

Your own love,

Jasmine

I’d dropped my head into my hand at the last line.

Embarrassed to have to read it out loud, but also feeling every word to my core, I knew my knees just wouldn’t hold me anymore. When I looked up, Vayl was gone.

I scrambled to my trunk, puled out the Party Line, and stuck the pieces into place. “Bergman! Vayl’s gone! I mean, I don’t know where he is, but I’m assuming he went out to hunt or something. Have you got him?”

“Hang on.” I heard the tapping of keys. Bergman said,

“Yeah. Looks like he’s heading to the Djemaa el Fna.” I grabbed Grief, my holster, and the jacket that hid both.

“He’s headed to that Seer’s place. Find the address for me, then tel Cole and Sterling to meet me there.”

“Okay, but… okay.”

I weaponed up, threw on the jacket, and ran down the stairs. Each step felt like a nail in my skul . Ignoring the pain, I slammed out the doors, gasping a little at the change between the cool, air-conditioned riad and hot, dry Marrakech.

People fil ed the sidewalks, and as I moved toward the old city’s central square, I passed an equal number of gaping tourists, bright-eyed immigrants, and smiling natives. Some of the last bunch felt I couldn’t live another day without their services, but I turned them al down and, miraculously, they moved on, probably uninterested in keeping up with my pace, which was nearing a run.

Bergman said, “I just got done talking to Monique. She says Sister Hafeza Ghoumari lives just off the Rue El Koutoubia. I can guide you most of the way just watching Vayl’s blip. But when you need the right door, you’l be able to find it easily. She says it’s real y distinct, with dots like brown rivets in a flowery pattern at the top, and then more dots going down the front that are in more of a triangular pattern. Also the doorframe is set with a mosaic of white and yel ow tile.”

“Okay. I’m entering the Djemaa el Fna right now.

Where’s Vayl?”

“He’s on the north edge. Looks like he’s just leaving.

Uh-oh.”

“What?”

“He’s moving kind of slow. Like he does when he’s hunting. You’d better hurry, Jaz. I think he means to get a bite to eat before he visits the Sister.” Shit!

At night the Djemaa el Fna is like a city unto itself. And negotiating the crowds without getting your pocket picked or punching a butt-groper in the face was a feat unto itself. I skirted audiences gaping at the amazing feats of Tazeroualti acrobats and ordered myself not to get caught up in the wonder of their twisting, leaping tricks. I strode past circles of men roaring at the rambling tales of storytel ers whose nimble fingers mixed herbs and fire to make moving il ustrations in the air above their handwoven baskets. I shouldered past tourists bartering over silver jewelry or standing in line to have their fortunes told. And al the time I talked to the ring on my finger. Out loud. Like a crazy woman.

“Tel him,” I whispered. “Tel him I’m coming. He doesn’t need to do this. He doesn’t want to do this. Deep down, he knows it’s wrong. Don’t let him tear up his own soul… or…

whatever it is that makes him so… Vayl.”

As if in response to my pleas, Cirilai warmed my hand.

But it wasn’t much of a comfort. I could feel him, just beyond my reach, his powers rising like a winter storm. And in my own pounding head, an echo to the pain drumming through my brain, Hurry! Hurry! Hurry!

“Bergman! I’m through. I’m on the Rue El Koutoubia now.”

“Okay, turn left. Do you see the police station?” I looked at the building. Funny. No matter where you are in the world, you can tel cops work inside the place just from the way it holds itself. No fril s. With just enough bars and cement in the picture to bring prison to the minds of those who walked through its doors. But I read the sign to make sure. COMMISSARIAT DE POLICE. “I’m in the right place,” I told him.

“Vayl’s about two blocks past that. And Sister Hafeza is another couple of blocks west. Got it?”

“Yeah.” I pocketed my Party Line. No sense in Bergman hearing what I was about to say. And I real y didn’t want him to know what I was planning.

As soon as I left sight of the police station I broke into a run. Cirilai and my Sensitivity took me straight to Vayl. He was stil on the street, his attention whol y focused on a man who’d stopped halfway up the block to talk to a group of three friends. They al wore light gray jel abas and mustaches so heavy that their lips had given up the attempt to dig out from the avalanche.

“Lord Brâncoveanu! Whew, you’re a fast walker. I thought I’d never catch up to you!”

Vayl whirled, so pissed to be interrupted that he was actual y snarling. Oddly, that put me in a great mood. I shook my finger at him and grinned. “You went off without your supper. And here I’d prepared something especial y luscious for you.”

His eyebrows shot up. “You did?”

“Absolutely!” I strode up to him and slapped him on the back. “Big fel a like you needs his nourishment, right? We can’t have you staggering around Marrakech like one of those forty-day fasters, now, can we?” I linked my arm through his and drew him into a side street. “Here, let me take you to the feast, okay?”

Halfway down the block he stopped. “I am nearly at my destination. To backtrack now would waste time I do not have. Sister Hafeza—”

“Can wait a damn minute,” I growled. “Look. You promised yourself to stop hunting.”

“I did no such thing.”

“Yes, you did.”

“Not at al .”

“Vasil, you made a solemn vow—”

“Poppycock.”

I stared up at him. “Oh. My. God. You’re a pompous dick and an asshole. You’re a pockhole!” His nostrils flared so wide I’d have sworn he’d just gotten a good whiff of Yousef and Kamal. “Your services are no longer necessary. Gather your things and—” I waved him off. “Even in your current state you know I’m good for you. In fact, I’m probably the only thing standing between you and a permanent gig in Vampere hel . So listen up. I know you. I know what you’re going to do to yourself if you start hunting again, and I promised myself to help you. Which is why Berggia and I arranged wil ing donors for you these last three days who agreed to make it look like they were victims. But today I overslept, and obviously Berggia got sidetracked too.” Probably by the demon bitch. I can see this whole mess being one of her underhanded schemes. I went on. “I can see you’re hungry.”

Red flared in his eyes. “Starving.”

“So do me.”

We stood in a wide street lined with pink and brown buildings, some of which had rickety awnings attached above their tal doorways. These displayed smal lights that did little more than beam down, laserlike, on their museum-quality doors. The buildings were souks whose owners, during the day, would set out huge plaid bags ful of herbs and spices, or hang hand-spun skeins of wool from long white poles. Pleasant shopping even at noon, because swaths of material had been stretched across the street from roof to roof to cut the glare so that people could stand and haggle. At night, however, that meant deep shadows fil ed the al eyways.

Vayl pul ed me into the darkest spot, where part of a wal had crumbled away and no one had bothered to repair it. I don’t know why I thought he’d argue against my plan. He wasn’t the vampire I knew. He was a prequel. Like the Statue of Liberty must’ve looked when we first got her. Kind of obnoxious and brassy until she developed that eye-pleasing veneer that only the pounding of the elements and surviving to a ripe old age wil get you.

Stil , when he wrapped one arm around my waist, when my hands flattened against his chest, I couldn’t help the anticipation. And when his fangs sank into my throat, my gasp wasn’t purely pain. I closed my eyes and held him, fal ing into the rush of emotion like I’d just come off a water slide. Except when I surfaced I only had a second to gasp for air. Because it was already time for another ride.

Just like I had on the tower in Australia, I reached for Vayl through Cirilai. But this time, understanding the power he’d given me then to walk in his past, I visualized the specific time I needed to relive. And as my blood and Vayl’s powers danced, I opened my eyes. Over my sverhamin’s shoulder I focused on a window, its bars as black as the snakes that had once kil ed his beloved dog.

No, I don’t want to go to his childhood. Take me to 1777. Show me why Vayl really left England.

Yeah, I’d mostly bought his story that he’d taken Helena away for her own safety. Except for the part of me that didn’t buy the idea of Vayl running. From anybody.

Like hard edges wil when you’ve stared at them too long, the bars blurred. Then they started to bend. I blinked.

And when my vision cleared I realized I’d been gazing out of my carriage, leaning forward because mud from the large back wheel had splattered up onto the glass. I looked closer. Yes, there it was staring back at me. The reflection I’d hoped for.

A dark-eyed Rom whose curls were long enough to tie with a velvet bow at my neck. I wore a white shirt with a straight, stiff collar. It was covered by a superbly tailored black suitcoat unbuttoned to reveal my gold waistcoat. I could feel the quality of my matching breeches beneath my hands. One clutched my thighs so tightly I might have given myself bruises had I not supped of immortality. The other held a black walking stick that matched the shoes whose gold buckles twinkled up at me as if to remind me of the event I had just deserted. The accessories whispered, Opera , while my white knuckles shouted, Danger!

My home filled the frame of my window like a painting.

So unreal, those three lovingly crafted floors of redbrick and mortar fronted by a broad brick stair. The door had been whitewashed, as had the window frames. Pink roses arched over the entryway. I found that strange, even though I had lived in the house all these seven years. It seemed to me that somewhere the home I had taken from a dead man should show black, like the corruption that oozed from my heart, filling my lungs with such vile hatred that sometimes the desire to maim, to murder, overcame all other thought.

But the brightness of the people within those walls stole all the shadows away. I did not deserve them. Not Berggia, nor his kindly wife. And never my dearest Helena, whom I would have chosen as a daughter even had she not been a helpless orphan when I found her begging on the streets the night after I vanquished the wolf who had tried to destroy her.

“Father!” Her scream, too faint for any but my ears, pulled me out of the moving carriage. Later I would castigate myself. Self-pity had blocked my senses from detecting her fear and pain. Else I would have leaped to her rescue sooner, would have burst through the door before Roldan could have done more than startle her as she sat in our flower-filled drawing room, reading from one of the many books she could never convince me to touch.

By the time I reached her, Helena was lying on the floor beneath the wolf, the bloody gashes on her arms and long rips in her skirts raising in me a fury such as I had not experienced since the deaths of my sons.

I knew, deep in my mind, that if I had been a human father I would have roared my rage, and perhaps even the chandelier would have shaken in response. But I had traded fire for ice, and now I was glad of the cold wind that swept through my murderous thoughts, forcing them into order, adding a thread of calculation that would make Roldan’s death more likely and infinitely more painful.

I strode forward and, grabbing the wolf by both his ears, yanked backward. His scream, high-pitched as Helena’s, brought a smile to my lips.

I took stock of my daughter. Shock had distanced her.

The hands that held her torn bodice closed shook like leaves in a storm.

“Helena!” I snapped. Her eyes came to mine, hurt that I would speak to her so given her terrifying circumstance. I steadied my tone, willing her to respond in kind. “My flintlock is in my desk. It is loaded with silver.” She nodded.

“Lock yourself in the study with it and shoot anything that tries to get in. Either Berggia or I will come for you when this is over. Do you remember the secret knock?” Her head bobbed again, but this time she seemed more self-assured.

“Then go.”

She rushed from the room, shoving the door closed behind her as if it were the gate to hell itself. Perhaps a real lady would have swooned, or at the least begged to stay under my direct protection. I had certainly tried to raise her in that vein, knowing full well the misery that accompanied a life led outside Society. But my ward had learned early that her world rotated on two axes, and if she meant to survive she must develop a backbone strong enough to hold her steady no matter which way it tilted. My grandmother had been such a woman. But I had never told Helena how my heart swelled when I saw her jaw jut and her shoulders lift, reminding me of the tiny woman who had fought bullies, bandits, and corrupt sheriffs to ensure my survival.

I lifted the wolf by his ears, forcing another squeal from him as I flung him against the wall. He recovered quickly, pulling himself up onto his enormous paws, growling so deeply that I felt the rumble shake the back of my chest.

He charged, the weight of his massive body making the floor quake under my shoes. I yanked my silver dagger, a constant companion since Helena had entered my care, from its cradle in the hollow leg of my walking stick. And then he was on me.

We toppled into Helena’s favorite Louis XIV settee, our impact throwing it backward, sending my dagger flying. My head slammed into the floor with a force that might have stunned another man. A real man. I did not even feel it.

Hooked fangs longer than my fingers slavered at my throat. I shoved my fist into the maw that they surrounded, gaining another yelp for my collection. Roldan gagged and jerked his head back. But he was no green street fighter. Even on the defensive, he kept his wits clear enough to rake his enormous black claws down my sides, scoring me so deeply that I suspected bone now showed between flaps of flayed skin.

I cried out, but still and all, not for myself. For my girl, whom this monster had bled and bitten, whom he had attempted to defile.

I kicked, a sharp jab to his soft underbelly that compromised Roldan’s balance even further. As he staggered off of me I kept hold with one hand and rolled with him to the wall. When I had him pinned, I shoved my fangs deep into his throat, pouring the ice of my cantrantia into his blood, knowing now that my core power would not slay, but only slow him.

His tongue drooped from his gaping mouth, stray flecks of saliva freezing in midair. I released my grip and lunged for the dagger, which had dropped onto the hearth of our empty fireplace. My body screamed, tortured by the stretch as much as if the Church had laid me on its altar. I felt dampness on my cheeks and realized two bloody tears had escaped my narrowed eyes. And in that moment I felt the separateness of my selves. One half weeping in protest for the anguish the other half must eternally push it through.

My fingers wrapped around the dagger’s hilt, a fine leather-wrapped handle that fit snug as a tailor’s tuck in my hand. I slid free of the wolf’s snapping jaws and staggered to my feet. Blood soaked what was left of my shirt and suit coat. I had knocked over Helena’s reading table, shattering a lamp, which had soaked her books with whale oil. My sitting room was in shambles—and for the first time since I had crossed its threshold I could finally relax. This was my territory. Roldan must pay the price for crossing its boundaries.

He charged me again. I looked into his fiery yellow eyes. And laughed. When he leaped, I spun, shoving the dagger deep into his side. It was not a killing blow, nor did I mean it to be. Silver takes Weres slowly, painfully. That was how I wanted Roldan to die. That was how the men who hurt my children would always go.

I hauled him up by the scruff of his neck, dragged him to the front doorway, and threw him into the street, my dagger still hilt-deep in his flank. My satisfaction at seeing him tumble into the gutter where he would die like a beggar snapped as a shot rang out from inside the house.

I spun, running so quickly to the study that the wind of my passage blew the window draperies midway up the parlor wall. Parts of the shattered door cracked beneath my feet as I swept into the room, one glance telling me all that I needed to know. A Were lay dead on the floor, his features already melting back to human. Another, still in his man’s form, had dealt Helena such a bruising blow that she lay unconscious over his shoulder. He could take her through the window, but we both knew how badly the shattered glass would cut her.

He stared at me from the center of the room, surrounded by thrown papers and the items that the gentleman who had built the home felt he needed for his comfort. A tall, hickory desk full of cubbyholes and drawers. Two ladder-back chairs to sit on either side of it.

A chaise on which Helena occasionally lounged, regaling me with stories of her tutors (less often their amazing revelations regarding history or mathematics than how she tricked them into spending entire afternoons roaming the park, listing the names of flora and fauna she had known since her toddling days). Beside it, a table holding a vase full of flowers she had picked from the garden only that morning, and two half-burned tapers held aloft by matching silver candlesticks.

“Put her down,” I ordered.

He hesitated, staring toward the door as if measuring his chances of escaping me with Helena weighing him down.

“Make me a deal first.” He spoke with a broad cockney accent, tossing the limp patch of hair blocking his sight out of his way as he spoke. I smelled the greasy sweetness of his unkempt locks from across the room, and my stomach turned that Helena should have to bear his touch.

“What?” I snapped.

“My freedom for her neck.”

I inclined my head. “Done.”

The Were deposited Helena on the chaise and moved toward the door. My next question made him hesitate with his hand on the latch. “I must ask. Why would you take the word of a vampire?”

He glanced back at me. “Aw, now, yer being modest.

Yer not just any vamp. All hoity-toity, living in this house here, surrounded by humans. Kinda like a Trust, as it were,” he said, his grin revealing an overabundance of brown teeth dominated by sharp, yellow incisors. “Which means yer Vampere. Which means you put a whole lotta store in contracts.”

“I am impressed at your knowledge of the inner workings of the Trust. And yet you have somehow managed to miss the most important rule.”

“What’s that?”

“That Trust members must be protected at any cost.

Even if that means breaking a solemn vow.” Before the scoundrel could do more than widen his eyes, I strode forward and seized him by the throat. At the same moment a short but immensely broad-shouldered olive-skinned man burst through the door. He brandished a sword, while the white-aproned woman behind him held an iron skillet aloft with both hands.

“Berggia, does that weapon contain any silver?” I asked.

“Not that I know of, sir.”

“Did that monster hurt my baby?” asked the woman.

Her hips were even broader than the man’s shoulders.

“I am afraid so, Madame Berggia. Unfortunately, he

—” But that was enough for her. She swung her frying pan down over her husband’s shoulder and smashed it into the Were’s head. He fell limp in my hands.

“That’ll teach ’im,” she announced. Dropping the pan on the floor, she rushed to the chaise to tend to Helena.

“Call the bobbies,” I told Berggia. “We shall treat this as a human matter. Which means we must first remove the wolf that lies in the gutter outside the door.”

“Excuse me, sir, but they came and took it away already.”

“You saw?”

“Yes. That was what sent me and the wife running inside from the errand you sent us on.” I did not bother to tell him that the chore had been a ruse of the wolves to remove them from the premises. I could tell from the haunted look in his eyes that his story would not bear interruption. He said, “It was strange enough that two people were loading a bleeding wolf into a carriage. But even more bizarre that one of them, well, seems like I saw the same lady during the war. She was a’leaning over one of the dying chaps. And after it was over, they both stood up and walked away.”

“How did you recognize her again?” I asked, a ring of ice encasing my heart. Berggia, who had never stepped away from a task in all the years I had known him, blanched. “Come, now, man. I must know.”

“Hu… her dress belt looked like it were made from snakes. Like living, moving ones that intertwined at the clasp. And this gel had the selfsame belt on.” And now, surely, my heart had stopped altogether. For Berggia must have witnessed one of the cubs of Medusa herself.

“What was it, sir? What did I see?”

I strode to the desk and began pulling out papers.

Though I could not read their contents, their seals told me enough. Only the ones most vital to our travels would be packed. The others must stay to make it look as if we meant to return. Because the Berggias had to understand our plight, I said, “That werewolf wanted Helena for his own. He is obsessed with her. And now he is in the hands of a Gorgon.” I tried to speak as clearly as I could despite the necessity for speed and my growing fear for my daughter. “Gorgons can eat death.”

I waited for the Berggias to recover from the initial shock. They had seen enough in their time with me that it did not take long. I continued. “I will not describe to you the nature of this consumption. It is”—I looked up to find them both staring at me from pale, still faces—“quite ghastly. But you must understand that once Roldan—the wolf—agrees to the Gorgon’s terms, he will become beholden.”

“What do you mean by that?” asked Madame Berggia. She had maneuvered Helena’s head onto her prodigious lap, and was now smoothing back her shining brown hair.

I had emptied the drawers and now moved to the safe that was hidden behind a series of books on the occult.

Turning my back to them (Not because it is difficult to face the fearful eyes of those completely dependent on me, I whispered to myself) I said, “The Gorgon will return when Roldan’s life has run its natural course. And every night thereafter she will eat Roldan’s death until the Were’s soul shatters.” I heard Madame Berggia gasp, but did not turn around. Reaching into the safe, I pulled out all of my earthly goods.

“How long do you suppose that will take?” asked my valet.

I deposited the small trunk in which I kept my cash and valuables onto the desk. “It depends on the wolf. But I doubt that Helena will survive him. So we must take her out of the country. And we must leave tonight.” Opening the trunk, I began to load it with papers.

Berggia said, “What do you want us to do?”

“Take Helena upstairs and tend to her. I wish we had time to call a surgeon around, but we must trust that she will wake soon and make a complete recovery. While she sleeps, pack as if we are simply taking a short trip. But take everything we cannot do without. I shall go and book tickets on the first steamer out of port.” (And then we will board the second. Perhaps that will throw Roldan off long enough for me to devise a better plan.) Sharp pain, beginning at my neck and shooting around to my spine, ending at the backs of my knees. Which had begun a fine tremble. I felt Vayl’s former reality melt away and reached out for it, as if I could give it enough support to find out what happened to Helena. “No, no,” I heard myself murmur. “Where’d she go?”

I felt something impeding my hand, which wanted badly to reconstruct the picture in my head, and realized it was a broad, hard chest. I rol ed my head straight, letting the wal behind me provide support for a heaviness I was pretty sure my neck couldn’t yet handle, and peered up at my sverhamin. He stared down at me, his eyes dark as a forest path. I watched him lick my blood from his lips. Felt him press his handkerchief against my wound, his fingers so warm I could feel each one of them through the linen.

“You are too generous with me, my Jasmine, you always have been.”

“What?” I slapped my hand against his so he couldn’t back away. “What did you cal me?”

His eyebrows twitched. “Are you quite al right?”

“What is my name?” I demanded.

“Madame Berggia, of course. It always has—”

“You just cal ed me Jasmine.”

He pul ed his hand away, leaving me to hold the temporary bandage. Even if I hadn’t been able to read irritation in the lines between his forehead and beside his lips, I’d have sensed his withdrawal from a mile away. No wonder Wraiths were often found encased in the ice of their own breath. Eventual y you get so cold nobody wants to touch you.

He said, “If I did, which I am certain I did not, it was no doubt a slip of the tongue engendered by the fact that I have been corresponding with a lovely woman from this city who goes by that name.”

“You’re so ful a shit,” I muttered.

“Excuse me?”

“I said I need to learn to knit.” I began trudging in the direction of Sister Hafeza’s shop. I was real y trying to feel like crap. It seemed like the appropriate moment and al .

But my postdonation high had kicked in, big-time. And I had to think Vayl whispering my name was a hopeful sign. An unbreakable curse showed no weak seams to begin with.

I’d just found one. Which meant this state Vayl had found himself didn’t have to be permanent after al .

If I skipped down the street, would he pul out the pockhole and try to fire me again? It might be fun to tel him to shove the snooty. Only then I wouldn’t get to read any more hot love letters. Oh! No, I didn’t… yup. Just shower me with confetti now, girls. Because I’ve just dreamed up the best note motivator ever!

I said, “Speaking of that Jasmine chick. She didn’t just have a courier drop her letter by. She brought it herself.

While you were, uh, sleeping.”

“What? I missed her?” I didn’t dare look at him; he’d pick up on my barely disguised glee. “Did she resemble the portrait?”

“Why wouldn’t she?”

“Oh. You know how artists take liberties.” Aw, man, don’t tell me 1777 Vayl is shallow too!

“Would it matter?” I asked.

“Not the least,” he said. “But now I know the face I envision every time I close my eyes is genuinely hers.”

“Oh, okay. Wel , uh, then you could understand why she wanted to take a look at you too.”

“She… wanted to see me? During my day-sleep?”

“Wel , we said no. But this girl, she’s very strong-wil ed.

Just insisted. Said things like she couldn’t go another day without gazing upon your manly visage or some such thing.

And we couldn’t be responsible for her jumping off a parapet, could we? So, you know, we gave her a peek.” Now I just had to look. Vayl was staring down the street we’d turned onto, past the crowds of pedestrians, into a world that looked like it kinda freaked him out. “What did she say?” he whispered.

“She was concerned that you sleep with your mouth open. Because, you know, bugs and dust can get in.”

“Oh.” Destitute. What, had he forgotten the note already? I decided to let him off the hook.

“And she liked your butt.”

He jerked his eyes to mine. “What?”

“Of course, being a lady, she couldn’t say it out loud.

But you were lying on your side, so there it was, al outlined by your, um, that thing you wear to bed. And I could just tel .” His chest swel ed with the breath he took. “I wil write her tonight. I wil demand to meet her.” His hands clenched.

I could tel he was imagining what he wanted to do to her…

me… with them. It took my breath away.

When I final y managed to gulp myself back to reality, I said, “What about the vamp she’s with? Aren’t you worried about him at al ?”

Vayl’s voice dropped into the sexy growl that set parts of me on fire. “She wil leave him wil ingly once we have…

spoken. I am sure of it.”

Me too. “Um, Lord Brâncoveanu?”

“Yes, Madame Berggia.”

“If you don’t mind my asking, how many women have you… you know… since you became a vampire?” He shrugged. “I have lost count. For a time all I knew were women, as if only they could keep me from completely destroying myself.”

I imagined Vayl rol ing in a virtual sea of naked bimbos and felt sick. “Oh.”

“I have tried many avenues of excess, Madame Berggia. None of them have given me the reward which I Berggia. None of them have given me the reward which I seek. But somehow, looking at this portrait of Jasmine, I feel she may be the key.”

“Uh.” Me? The key? More likely the nitro that blows the key to bits.

“Perhaps Madame Hafeza can confirm my suspicions.”

“Wel , there’s her shop.” I pointed to a two-story building in the middle of the block, the door of which had been left open to al ow the night breezes in. Above it hung a sign bearing the international symbol for psychic, a pentagram with the Seeing Eye at its center.

We stepped inside, the smel s of incense and dried herbs covering the scents of the street behind us. Al we could see was a single room, as broad and deep as a bus station, with light wooden shelves lined up to form three wide aisles halfway to the back. Finely woven carpets covered every inch of the floor, and the wal s were tiled, not in some typical geometric pattern, but on one side to depict a woman with flying blue hair riding a stal ion across the desert. On the other side litter bearers carried a queenly figure down a palm-lined street.

The shelves were packed with books. Smal plaques on the edges organized them into categories—if you spoke Arabic or French. I did see a few titles in English. But nothing I’d ever heard of.

Vayl whistled. “Sister Hafeza must be immensely wealthy to have col ected so many tomes in one location.” As if she’d heard her name, a woman nearly six feet tal threw open the beads that curtained off the back room and strode up behind the blue-tiled counter that held a cash register, credit card machine, matching black containers for office supplies, and a pack of tarot cards.

“You’re here!” she announced in a deep alto. I took in her heavily shaded eyelids and cheekbones, perfectly outlined lips, and long red nails. She wore an ankle-length dress in pink satin that, along with her strappy heels and curly brunette updo, screamed nineties prom. The Adam’s apple sealed the deal.

“Sister Hafeza?” I said.

Vayl pointed at her. “That is a man!”

Aw, shit.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

I wanted to smack myself in the forehead. Or club Vayl in the back of his. I forced a smile, the kind only Lucil e Robinson can shine on impossible situations. “He’s sick,” I told Hafeza.

“I am not!”

I ignored him. “He thinks it’s 1777.”

“It is!”

“See?” I looked at him. “Tel me you’re not this big of a schmuck about transgender people in the twenty-first century.” I turned back to Hafeza. “Or do I misunderstand?

Are you just into the clothes or—”

“No,” she confirmed. “I was born in the wrong body.”

“There is no such thing!” Vayl bel owed.

“See there?” I pointed at my boss. “He never yel s. Or swears. But lately that’s al I get.”

Vayl stepped forward, his brows a straight line, his eyes nearly black. “I have had it with the both of you! Now, tel me how it is that you are masquerading here as a Sister of the Second Sight before I tear you limb from limb.” Sister Hafeza’s hand fluttered to her massive, wel -

constructed breasts. “You are a forceful one, aren’t you?

Wel , basical y, I went to the initiation. And Sister Lizia, that’s the Highness right now, wel , she touched me and, of course, she knew right away who I was and where I belonged. Because I am a Seer. Only”—Hafeza gestured at her large frame—“somewhat unique among women.”

“And not even Moroccan,” Vayl said bitterly.

“Nope. I’d place your accent at, um, Atlanta?” I asked.

Hafeza nodded, her broad smile letting me know how pleased she was that I’d recognized her roots. “But you didn’t come here to discuss me,” she told Vayl, laying her red-nailed hands gently on the countertop.

He stood stubbornly silent, his fists clenched at his sides.

Hafeza nodded at me, though she kept her eyes on my currently questionable prize. “I see you’ve tasted recently of your companion here,” she told Vayl.

My hand stole to my neck, my fingers brushing the wounds that he’d reopened over the old scars. They wouldn’t be easy to hide from the rest of the crew. Should I get a scarf like Kyphas’s? And if I did, would I somehow manage to accidental y decapitate myself with it?

Vayl said, “Who I feed upon is none of your business.” Hafeza fluttered her lashes at him, like they both knew he was joshing. “What did you feel when you bit her?” she asked.

His lips pressed into one another. For a second I thought he wasn’t going to respond. And then he whispered, “Power.”

“That should prove to you she’s not who you think she is,” Hafeza told him. “But you can trust her. And for the same reason that you can trust me, even though I’m not who you thought I’d be.” She turned her hands over and let him see her empty palms. No weapon here.

He final y nodded and dropped his hands onto hers.

She closed her eyes. Nothing happened for so long that I started to get bored. I picked up a book and read the title.

How to Make Love to a Man by Alexandra Penney. Real y?

People needed directions? And if so, did that mean I was doing something wrong?

Vayl blew out a quick breath. I looked over to see Hafeza clutching at his fingers, her nails digging into his skin until drops of blood rose from the wounds. Her lips drew back and through her snarl I could see her molars grinding, as if she was trying to chew through ropes.

As quickly as it started it ended. She jerked her hands away and pressed them against her stomach. “You are in some deep shit, my friend.”

Vayl didn’t even glance at me. “I know.”

“No, you don’t. But I understand why, so I’l try to make this as clear as I can. You haven’t escaped Roldan yet, al right? The only way to make that happen is to accept the help of a warlock named Sterling.”

Vayl jerked, the blood from his hands splattering onto the counter tiles as he moved. “Warlocks are evil.”

“You should know better than to believe everything you hear,” said Hafeza.

Vayl dropped his eyes to his hands. “Al right, then, what about my sons? Did you… See anything about them?” Hafeza cocked her head sideways. “You’re something of a legend among my Sisters, Vasil. According to the Enkyklios files, this search of yours has been persistent, to say the least. And we’ve always given you the same answer. But you’ve changed. You’re more alive than dead now.” She glanced at me. “I think I know who to credit for that. And maybe that’s why the vision has changed.” Vayl’s fingers arched, the tips digging into the countertop so intensely they turned white.

“Um, Lord Brâncoveanu?” I said. “You’ve already broken one of those in the past few weeks. Here.” I handed him the book. “Maybe you could work on this instead.” He curled his hands around the binding without replying or even looking at me. It was like, if he let his eyes waver from Hafeza, maybe she’d disappear, and then he’d never find out what she had to say. And then he’d surely die. He said, “What did you See?”

“You wil meet your sons again. Only this time the three of you won’t die together.” Vayl let out a breath I didn’t even realize he was holding. Hafeza went on. “But I stil see death stalking al of you. Whatever surrounds your reunion could stil destroy your line forever.”

“Thank you for the warning.” Vayl hesitated. Then he got that determined look you see on people right before they jump into extra-cold water. “One last question, if you would. I need to find a woman named Jasmine.” He pul ed out the note I’d written him earlier and handed it to her. “Can you tel me where she is?”

Hafeza took the paper and, without even blinking, handed it to me. “This woman wil lead you to her.” She leaned forward, making sure Vayl got the drift. “So stop threatening to dump her. It’s bad for your karma.”

“If you insist.” Vayl pul ed out a wad of bil s.

Hafeza held up a hand. Topaz jewels glittered on every finger. She said, “I couldn’t take payment from you.

Especial y when I have one more piece of bad news.” Vayl’s hand dropped back to his side. “What is it?” She pointed to me. “Your companion here is in deeper trouble than you can understand right now.” Vayl smirked at me. “Is Madame Berggia in some sort of gambling debt?”

Hafeza pounded her hand on the counter and a tile cracked. I winced. Even once-removed we were hel on furniture. She said, “Save her and you save the woman you love. Remember that.”

Vayl and I stared at each other. Suddenly I understood how the Beast felt every time Beauty cringed at the dinner table. I wanted to pound my chest and yel , “I’m inside here, dammit!” Maybe if I burst into song. Hey, it worked in the movies.

As we left the store I said, “Lord Brâncoveanu?”

“Yes?”

“Do you like music?”

“Yes.”

“Yes.”

“Would you… like for me to sing to you?”

You could’ve planted beans in those eyebrows they furrowed so deeply. “No.”

“I figured. You know, even when I was little I couldn’t pul off the fairy-tale princess bit.”

“Oh?”

Though he couldn’t care less, I explained. “I kept fighting off the dragons when I was supposed to be clapping myself on the cheeks and screaming, ‘Prince Chahming, come saaaave me!’ You know what happens when you battle dragons, right?”

“What?”

“Your tiara fal s off and the monster stomps it into pieces. After which your mother refuses to buy you another one because they’re too damn expensive, even though you know she got the first one at a yard sale because you saw her peel off the masking tape.”

Vayl patted me on the shoulder. “Madam Berggia, I know you must be worried after what Sister Hafeza said to you, but please let me assure you that I wil protect you with my very life.” In other words, Stop acting crazy, lady. You’re starting to scare the natives.

I sighed. “Okay.”

CHAPTER TWELVE

Our cease-fire lasted exactly ninety seconds. And then we began to argue. Ignoring the balmy night, the crowds of people out for a strol , the ancient residences with their towering wal s and exotic gardens loaded with palms and lemon trees, we hissed at each other like a couple of pissed-off geese.

“Hafeza said to use Sterling,” I reminded him, real y warming to my lie now that he’d annoyed me. “I told you he’s an old acquaintance that Berggia cal ed in when he realized Roldan might catch up to Helena after al . But he’s not going to do us much good in a fight if he has to worry about protecting her ass at the same time!”

“I must ask you to please refrain from using such language! What if Helena—never mind, you clearly do not care anymore!” he repeated, like he, too, thought I’d gone deaf. “I cannot, in good conscience, leave Helena unguarded in the riad while we men go chasing after some mystery mage. That is why you and her maid, Kyphas, must join us as wel . I am thankful Berggia taught you how to shoot.”

“Oh, yeah, that’l come in so handy against a mage!

Vay—I mean, Lord Brâncoveanu! We—”

“I wil hear no more on the subject. Helena wil remain under my watch because I am the only one qualified to protect her!”

“You say that, but you react just like any other guy when you get kicked in the nads!”

Silence until we stepped up to the riad’s doorway. And then Vayl asked, just as he opened the door, “What are nads?”

Cole stood in the foyer, staring, having heard Vayl’s question. His expression caused a smile to sneak onto my face. Waving at Cole I said, “Have Berggia tel you. I’m going to get Helena ready to go.”

But before I did that I had my own preparations to make.

I stepped into my room and raided the worn black pack I used to tote weapons in. Ten pounds of gear later I whispered to myself, “Okay, so am I ready to move?” I touched Grief, stil holstered at my shoulder. Practiced pul ing the bolo that had saved my ass enough times I’d begun to consider giving it a name. Because holy water would only piss the mage off, I’d unstrapped the syringe that contained my mobile supply from my right wrist and belted on a longer contraption that held what looked like a chrome pipe. Spring-loaded just like my syringe, it was built to telescope from each end when the hilt hit my hand, so that within seconds of activation I held a stainless-steel staff almost exactly my height. Usual y it rol ed around in the bottom of the bag, used only on hand-to-hand workout days because it was great for bashing if you had to fight in close.

But girls my size tend to avoid those situations like we skip closing time at seedy bars. So I only brought it out when I needed to defend against spel s from men whose magic hated the taste of refined metal. As soon as I spun the staff, the protective runes along its length added even more oomph to the shield, al owing me time to activate my second line of defense.

On my left forearm I’d wrapped a guard that ran from elbow to wrist. Stainless steel wrapped by leather, it provided practical protection against weapon strikes and fanged or clawed attacks. Upon a specific set of hand signals, it also sent a suggestion to my attacker that he should back off before I separated his head from his shoulders. Since Sterling had designed the piece, I trusted that it worked, though I’d never needed to activate it before.

Knowing Cole, Sterling, and Kyphas were also preparing to go up against the mage, I took my time deciding whether or not Vayl’s cane should make the trip with us. It stil lay inside my trunk like a lost treasure. Final y I nodded. “Might as wel assume we’re going to succeed,” I said as I picked it up.

Holding the cane in the middle so that its blue jewel seemed to light the way, I ran to Bergman’s room and pounded on the door. “Miles! Get off your fat ass and lemme in! Work to do!”

Nothing for maybe a ful minute, during which I made intermittent loud sounds and escalating threats. And then, shuffling and whispers. Who was he talking to? Had Raoul returned Astral already? The door opened a crack. His eyebal said, “I’l be right down.”

“Okay.”

The door closed. I backed up, leaning against the wal , crossing my ankles and arms until I was comfy for the wait.

When the door opened again Monique came out, so busy rearranging dishes on her tray that she didn’t notice me.

But Bergman did. He jumped and yelped, slamming the door behind them so hard that I heard a picture fal off the wal inside his room.

Bergman and Monique looked guiltily into my grinning face.

I said, “This place has excel ent room service.” They replied at the same time.

Bergman: “We were just talking! About winter, because it’s been so long since Monique has seen snow. And sheet

—I mean sleet! Not sheets! No sheets were discussed in there!”

Monique: “He is so thin! I just wanted to offer him nourishment!”

I laughed. “Bergman, we gotta go.”

“Okay, then.” He waved at Monique like she was boarding a bus. And, hilariously, she waved back before heading downstairs.

Deciding it was time to let him off the hook, I changed the subject. “Vayl’s waiting for us. I stil have to get Kyphas and Sterling.” I glanced through the hal window into the courtyard. Our warlock was back at the gazebo. Which meant Kyphas was probably hiding from him. “C’mon,” I ordered.

His shoulders slumped. “Al right.”

Her room was just down the hal from Bergman’s. I patted him on the shoulder when we got there. “Cheer up, Miles. Didn’t anyone ever tel you that guys are supposed to be happy when they’re getting some?”

“I’m not getting any!” Bergman shouted just as Kyphas opened the door.

She arched her eyebrows at our sci-guy, who looked to be searching for handy trapdoors in the floor.

I beamed. “This night just gets better and better.” CHAPTER THIRTEEN

Sterling and Cole sat waiting for me in the riad’s romantical y lit courtyard.

Cole wore a calf-length overcoat whose lining had been removed as a nod to the weather. He’d stil look weird strol ing around Marrakech dressed in gangsta duds, but it was better than walking down the street with his rifle flapping. And what a weapon. Before his death, Pete had caved to Cole’s nagging and bought him a Heckler & Koch PSG1, which was arguably the most accurate sniper rifle in the world. With it he could strike multiple targets with very little lag time in between. Ideal if the mage turned out to be less of a loner than we’d anticipated.

As I settled in across from the men, Sterling growled,

“Where’s the demon? You didn’t leave her alone with that defenseless little stick boy of yours, did you?”

“He’s more skil ed than he looks,” I said. “Besides, she’s stil under contract. Anyway, she was right behind me.” I looked. Nope. No Kyphas. Squelching the uneasy feeling that she’d fol owed Bergman, not to kil , but maybe to try a little torture like she’d done with me, I went on.

“Miles said he’d get Vayl.”

No need to explain that I needed five more minutes away from the Madame Berggia persona he’d forced on me. I knew they could see it in the way I pounded his cane onto the floor tile.

Cole patted me on the shoulder. “Don’t worry. We’l find the perfect target for your frustrations tonight.” He turned to Sterling. “Unless you’re planning on blasting the bad guy with something menacing from your pocket-o’-doom?” The warlock had been hiding his hands behind his back, which made me more nervous than I liked to let on.

Now he brought out an antique teapot.

“I was expecting something a little more… penis shaped,” said Cole.

Sterling smirked. “My best stuff is designed to put the victim completely at ease before it strikes.” He tipped up the lid so Cole and I could look inside. It already contained half a cup of dried leaves and some dehydrated berries.

“When this is boiled, it’l fil the air with an odor that’l deeply relax anyone who smel s it. I have a special wax to plug our noses, which wil protect us from the other effects.”

“Which are?” Cole asked.

Sterling said, “They vary. But overal people find it hard to concentrate on a fight. It begins to seem pointless and sil y to them. So at one end of the spectrum they’l be less aggressive during battle. And at the other they’l give up al their secrets, because suddenly they love everybody.” Cole clapped him on the shoulder. “I like having you along. We should work together more often.” Sterling’s smile leaned closer to sly than I felt comfortable with. “That may have already been arranged.” I began to say, “What do you mean by that?” But somewhere around the word “do” Bergman jogged into the courtyard, completely winded from his previous run down two flights of stairs and a couple of short hal ways. Have I mentioned that he sits too much?

He gasped, “Vayl’s gone.”

“Again?” Goddammit! Suddenly he’s harder to keep track of than a pissed-off teenager. “Are you sure?” I asked.

His reply was to point over his shoulder, where Kyphas had just joined us carrying an open note and a closed envelope. I went over and snatched the riad’s stationery from her hand. Out loud, I read,

My Friends,

I cannot, in good conscience, ask you to risk your lives in a cause which began—and should end—with me. My tiff with Madame Berggia before was, I fear, a ruse designed to distract you from my true intent.

I would never forgive myself if any of you ladies were harmed in the coming battle. Therefore, I am going to face the mage alone. Please make sure Helena reaches a safe haven. When the war in the Colonies has ended, I think perhaps she should sail there, but until then, my dear Berggias, I leave the choice in your capable hands.

Please accept my deepest gratitude. And a final boon, if you will? The delivery of my second note to Lady Jasmine.

— Lord Brâncoveanu

Kyphas curtsied with a mocking grin, saying, “It’s such fun being Vasil’s secretary. I like it a lot better than the maid gig,” as she handed me the envelope. Since I didn’t trust myself to hide my reactions, I took it into the gazebo and sat down on the couch with it, only then realizing that my legs had begun a fine tremble.

What if he dies before we can get to him?

Nonsense! Granny May set down her embroidery and stood, moving to the clothesline to take down her dry laundry. Vayl may be a little off-balance right now, but that hasn’t dumbed him down any. You know he didn’t leave without some idea of how he was going to succeed.

So do I have time to read this, or should we just go?

Give it a look. Granny May couldn’t hide the curiosity sparkling behind her bifocals. Maybe it’ll help.

I tore open the envelope. The thick paper felt like a ten-pound weight in my hand as I opened it.

My Dearest Jasmine,

I think that I shall not survive this evening.

Perhaps it is for the best. I chose this existence out of rage. But vengeance only carried me through its first year. And since then, no direction has restored to me that which I squandered on the day I became Vampere.

When I saw your lovely eyes, staring solemnly at me from your portrait, I felt as if I had known you since my soul’s creation. My only desire has been to set myself before you in the hope that you will see in me something for which I have given up looking. But it is not to be. Perhaps we will meet again when time has ended and you and I are no longer bound by any tie that love cannot break.

Yours,

Vayl

I want to cry. And hug this damn note like it’s my old teddy bear. But I don’t see anything in it that could help—

Read it again! demanded Granny May.

And that was when I saw that he’d signed it, not with the name he’d used in his old life, but with the one I’d always known him by. I sprang to my feet.

“He signed it Vayl!” I came out of the gazebo with the note high in my hand. “He signed it with his modern name!” Cole let me take his hands and even jump up and down with him a few times. Then he said, “I have no idea what that means.”

“The curse is beginning to break, I think because we keep hammering at it. And our Vayl is waving at us through the cracks. He wants us to find him tonight because he has no problem with women fighting alongside men. And he real y wants to survive. So we wil find more clues to where he’s gone and what he’s up to. We just have to look for them!”

Sterling, lounging on one of the padded chairs with one bare foot swinging over its arm, held up a finger. “And what do we do when we find him? We’re al about stealth, remember? What if Vayl and this mage are fighting in the middle of the street?”

“We improvise. We’re good at that, aren’t we, Cole?” Cole pul ed back his jacket so he could brush his hand down the rifle he held at his side. “We usual y figure out pretty quick where to point and shoot.”

“I’m prepared,” Bergman bragged. He looked over his shoulder. Seeing that Monique had chosen to give us privacy, he raised the sleeve of his baggy pul over.

“Miles!” I came forward to make sure I’d seen right.

“What are you doing with those rockets strapped to your wrist?”

He gave me that look. The one smart people save for stupid questions. “I’m a terrible shot with a gun. With these, al I have to do is look at what I want to hit and I can count on a bul ’s-eye.”

“You did read my report on the Patras mission? The last thing we need is for you to shoot somebody ful of miniature robots and have their head explode, like, two weeks later!”

Bergman shoved his hands into his hips so hard that if he’d been an eighty-year-old man he’d have dislocated them. “You are completely exaggerating!”

“Not by much!”

Cole jumped between us, massaging our shoulders like a boxing coach as he said, “Come on, guys, is this any way to start a rescue operation?” He looked at each of us until we shook our heads. “Good,” he said. “Now I suggest we kiss and make up. Jaz, you start with me, then we can work our way around the circle—ow!” He laughed, rubbing his chest where my punch had landed.

I said, “You’re supposed to be fal ing out of love with me, remember?”

“Already done,” he announced. “Remember? That was my goal for our NASA job. Which I aced. So any sex I have with you from this day forward wil be purely platonic. Even medicinal. You know, like California pot.” I narrowed my eyes. “Ah. So afterward you’re going to forget where you parked your car and experience a mounting craving for cocaine?”

He laughed again. “Exactly.”

Kyphas made a sound that landed somewhere between fingers-in-the-car-door and lioness-guarding-her-kil . It gave me chil s. Which pissed me off.

“Come on,” I said, looking at her but directing my words to the courtyard in general. “We’ve final y got a bankable reason to kick some ass.” I strode past the demon, purposely brushing her shoulder with mine. “Oh, and Kyphas?” I smiled into her flushed face. “Bring your li’l scarfy-thing.” With no other choice, she fel into line behind me, walking beside Cole with the watchful air of a bodyguard. Or jealous lover. Either way, the look he gave her said their time together was already running to the bottom of the hourglass.

I hid my smile by directing it at Bergman, making it encouraging. He’d rol ed his sleeve back down to cover his secret weapon, and now fol owed Kyphas at his safe-secret weapon, and now fol owed Kyphas at his safe-distance pace. Only because I was watching did I see him send Kyphas a glare that she responded to with a smirk. If she’d known my old roomie the way I did, she wouldn’t have been so happy to have pissed him off. Because Bergman only jutted his jaw like that when he’d decided to do something extreme. Usual y those decisions resulted in rad new inventions that made people like me squeal with delight. I suspected this didn’t qualify as one of those times.

As I began to calculate our chances of successful y intervening in a Vampere/mage battle, I knew I didn’t have time to go proactive on Bergman’s ass. Vayl’s predicament and my race against death took priority. So I told myself, Wait and watch. Miles isn’t likely to try anything stupid until, well, ever. Now, since Sterling is on my side, is he going to be affected by my staff? Damned Wielders, their rules are even more confusing than the Vampere.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

Entering the Djemaa el Fna at night is like joining a huge party. The noise sucks you in. Not just crowd murmur but laughter and shouts and everywhere the music promising entertainment, fascination, maybe a great hookup that could turn into something more permanent down the line.

And then the smel s. My stomach rumbled, reminding me I’d missed supper and possibly lunch as wel . Because Morocco’s most famous square held culinary delights that could’ve kept me munching for months. We passed stal s lit by strings of bare lightbulbs where white-shirted men gril ed kebabs stacked with lamb and fresh veggies for customers lined up three and four deep. Other restaurants displayed long buffets offering fresh figs, shrimp, chicken, olives, and sausages. At their edges smal wooden tables and benches fil ed with chattering natives and gawking tourists were tended by white-uniformed waiters who knew so wel how to dance among the crowds that they never bumped a shoulder or dropped a dish. Al of it had my mouth watering so badly I actual y had to lick my lips and swal ow.

I might have seemed to be wandering, awestruck, among the food vendors and street performers. But by now I was used to the silk-costumed musicians playing upbeat tunes on instruments ranging from handmade drums to three-stringed guembri. Even the pyramids of red-shirted acrobats barely distracted me. Because Cirilai had stirred when we’d entered the square, the exact kind of clue I’d hoped Vayl would provide. Unfortunately the feeling was so vague I had to force my hit-and-split nature to sit stil and listen. It felt like another step back, to the time when he’d tried to train me to track vampires, starting with him. But I counted it as progress. Because it led me to a middle-aged man who looked like al the moisture had been sucked from his skin sometime in the last decade.

He wore a forest-green jel aba over tan work pants and a white dress shirt. He sat inside a circle of people pressed against one another like mosh-pitters doing a practice run.

And he smel ed of unwashed soul. His audience zeroed in with a fascination born as much of his parasitic pul as his craft, the tools of which surrounded him. A faded rug under his knees. A flute held in one gnarled, brown hand. A round container the color of a canvas sail that reminded me of Granny May’s old hatboxes, only it was half the height.

Because the creature inside didn’t need much of a ceiling.

It uncoiled slowly as the man set the roof of its mobile home aside, his head already swaying in a rhythm the shiny black cobra found riveting.

“Who is it?” Sterling asked me, noting the attention I was paying to the snake charmer.

A slope-shouldered guy with a thick brown mustache overheard him and said, in German-accented English,

“That’s Ahmed. You should stay for the whole show. I can assure you it’s like nothing you’ve ever seen.” No doubt. I motioned to Cole, who walked right up behind Ahmed, while Kyphas fol owed close behind.

Proximity gave our crew’s backup Sensitive the chance to sniff him out. A sharp nod confirmed my suspicions. “He’s the mage,” I said, using our Party Line to get my point across quick. “Vayl found him too, but he’s clearly gone now and I don’t see any signs of violence. Be alert.” Ahmed slowly brought the flute to his lips, dancing it to the music in the same way he wanted the cobra to respond.

It stared at him through pupils so opaque they seemed to hide the secrets to hel as it slid out of the box onto the sole-smoothed bricks of the square. I had to admit the song was sort of hypnotic. Or maybe it was Ahmed’s sinuous dance, al done through movements of his torso and head, which the serpent fol owed with intense fascination.

Even while I watched the cobra recoil its lower half and raise its head nearly a foot off the ground I knew Vayl wouldn’t have bolted. Something more than his fear of snakes had changed his plans, and we had to find out what.

So I backed away from Ahmed’s inner circle, nodding for Cole and Kyphas to join me. Cole paused long enough to drop a bil into Ahmed’s bowl, which he held at the corners and only unfolded at the last minute. Like the ones Miles had given each of us, it contained a tracking device that would al ow us to find Ahmed again even if he spent it, because the receptors rubbed onto the fingers of the next person who handled the bil .

Bergman and Sterling, standing at each of my shoulders, pretended they hadn’t seen the drop as they backed away with me. But they couldn’t hold on to the casual front when Ahmed’s cobra began to levitate. The crowd gasped, moving with us as the snake swayed in midair, now truly dancing with its master.

“Hey, mister, you take a picture with Ahmed, the snake charmer?” someone asked Bergman. I glanced to my right at a deeply tanned man wearing western clothes. His twelve-year-old son nodded encouragingly at us as his pop said, “Only thirty euros. Great deal for once-in-a-lifetime souvenir!” The photo peddler peered at Miles from the corners of his eyes, which were nearly hidden behind a mass of dark brown hair. I stared at his cal oused hand, already open as if Bergman couldn’t possibly consider denying him the outrageous fee, then I looked to Cole for verification.

Barely a nod that he’d also scented wolf howling behind the man’s shadowed eyes, and something even more foreign sliding under his son’s skin. Ahmed had al ies after al . And one of them wasn’t even supposed to exist.

Oh. Fuck.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

I’l say this about my crew. We figured out quickly how to communicate without making a sound. Within seconds eyebrows, hand signals, and a couple of mouthed words had confirmed our worst suspicions.

Roldan hadn’t just hired a mage to curse Vayl. He’d sent part of his own pack to guard the Wielder in case we figured out what was going on and tried to reverse the spel .

The wolf’s-head tattoo just beneath his ear instantly confirmed the photo sel er’s affiliation. But it got worse.

Because the kid twitching under his hand had actual y been grown up for a while. Which had to mean he was a Luureken.

I thought Luureken were just myths. Teen Me glared at Granny May, who didn’t say a word, but concentrated on her stitching. So she appealed to me instead. Gran used to read stories about them to us—fairy tales! she insisted.

Yeah, I badly wanted to deny reality too. But I’d just smel ed one. And al the psychic bel s and whistles clanging in my head now made me wonder how much of Granny May’s big, leather-bound book of “fairy tales” had actual y been original stories written by my mother’s mother. I wished she was alive so I could get in her face and demand an answer. Especial y now, when al I could remember about the Luureken were the basic details.

Luureken are the runts of the litter. They usually die unless one of their siblings bonds with and protects them.

In that case they survive, but they look like kids forever.

Which is, maybe, part of the reason they become so savage. They fight from the back of that same brother or sister using a badass weapon called a raes. Which I’d hoped was also a Mother Goose tale.

It’s no story. Granny May final y looked up from her embroidery. Weres can’t carry full-grown humans into battle, but they have no problem with Luureken. And you’re right, they are brutal. As soon as a fight begins they turn into little spike-skulled berserkers who are happiest when they’re biting your ear off as they spill your guts.

I sighed. Why do I never get to face an enemy whose OCD is al about lining up the handles on his coffee mugs?

Only moments had passed since the photo sel er had propositioned Bergman. But now that our technical consultant knew he was facing a couple of man-form Weres he had no clue how to deal with the situation. So he fel back to dictionary definitions. “Cobras are poisonous,” he said.

The Were replied, “Ahmed keeps his snakes calm.

Very tame. How about a nice picture for twenty euros?” He gestured to the boy, who seemed too thin for health. A ragged scar jigged down his cheek, reminding me of torn paper that never glues back quite right. “My son is an excel ent photographer.”

I thought, Really? Then would you like to tell me why he’s carrying a raes under his shirt? I’d only seen drawings of the Luureken’s chosen weapon. But they exactly matched the modified ice pick that I’d seen when he’d bowed to me. According to legend, any solid contact with the tip would set off a charge that buried it inside the opponent’s body. The Luureken tried to hit their enemies midchest, because upon total immersion, a hook the size of a Brazilian tarantula jutted from the pick’s tip. One massive jerk and the Luureken could yank out an enemy’s heart.

After which he or she general y ate it.

Bergman looked at me, panic squeezing his lips into a straw-sucking pucker as the Luureken’s big brother pushed him to make a deal.

Say “no,” I mouthed.

“Not today, thanks.” He tried to move away with me, but found himself trapped by a man who’d come up behind him to shake his fist at the Were.

“These are my friends!” he announced through the boy he’d brought along to translate so we’d know what a big favor he was doing us. “How dare you try to charge such outrageous prices for a photograph!”

I slapped myself on the cheeks, biting my lips so they wouldn’t drop the obscenity that had tripped off my tongue when I’d seen who was shouting over Bergman’s shoulder.

But I couldn’t stop myself from saying, “Yousef! What are you doing here?”

Kamal looked at me sadly. “We fol owed you.”

“That’s cal ed ‘stalking’ in America. It’s wrong.” I should know. I’ve done it enough times.

Kamal shrugged, about as disinterested as a kid in history class until his eyes wandered to the beauty now standing at my shoulder. His jaw dropped.

“Oh, no,” I said, shaking my head like that was the cure for stunned admiration. “This woman is way out of your league.” I pointed at Kyphas, who was looking at him the same way a chocoholic views a pan ful of fudge. “Don’t even—”

Yousef interrupted, bursting into broken English, which he’d obviously been practicing ever since our last confrontation. “You arrre pretty!”

I held up both hands. “Wow, you’re rol ing those R’s like a lumberjack on a wet log. Good on you, dude. But I’m married,” I lied. “So you’re SOL. Go away.” Yousef waited for Kamal to finish translating. Then he gave me the universal prove-it gesture. I waved Cirilai under his nose. He threw up his hands and said, “Pah!” I pleaded with Kamal. “Tel your buddy he’s going to get hurt if he keeps coming around me.”

Kamal spoke my words to Yousef, who grinned broadly.

“No!” I snapped. “I mean really hurt!” Yousef reached out to hug me. I shoved Vayl’s cane into his diaphragm and, with a simple leg sweep, knocked his feet out from under him, sending his butt to the bricks.

Before he could react I darted into the crowd, using al my training plus a black scarf I hastily traded a lady my sunglasses for to disappear.

As my would-be lover’s delighted gasp faded behind me I murmured into the Party Line, “Okay, here’s my idea.

Cole, is that you giggling?”

“No! Never! Although now I real y wish I’d bought you a whip and some leathers for your birthday… Mistress Berggia.”

“Hey! Masochistic stalkers are not funny. I mean, I’m contemplating kil ing the man, and al I can think about is how much that would turn him on!” Roar of laughter from my entire crew. “Thanks for your support,” I drawled. “Can we get back to business now?”

“We’re al ears,” Bergman said loyal y. Then he added,

“And cameras.”

“No!” Cole exclaimed.

“Yup. I got a primo shot of that guy Yousef’s face after she pushed him down.”

“Madame B.!” Cole said. “You have to let me put that one up on my Facebook page!”

“You are an assassin for the United States government!” I hissed, covering my mouth to make sure no one could overhear. “What the hel are you doing on Facebook?”

“Don’t worry, I go by my alias. You know, Thor

“Don’t worry, I go by my alias. You know, Thor Longfel ow?”

“I do know Thor Longfel ow, and if he doesn’t get his shit together pretty soon, parts of him are going to be a lot shorter!”

Cole did his rejected-beauty-queen huff. Then he said,

“Your sense of humor has shriveled like an old spinster since Vayl forgot what time it was.”

I thought about slapping myself in the face again in the hope that some sense of reality would return in which I would not be forced to discuss my stalker and social networking while I tried to save the man I loved in the middle of goddamn Marrakech! I took a deep breath. It didn’t help. So I went to a fresh juice stal . Bought five oranges. Took them to the nearest open trash can and hurled them into it as hard as I could. By the time I got to number four I felt my balance begin to return. So the last one felt like a bonus squishy. While I was gazing into the garbage, pondering the dead fruits and ignoring the fact that people had begun to give me extra space when they passed by, Cole spoke again.

“Um, Madame B.? Are you stil there? You know we were only kidding around, right? Just trying to lighten the mood a little since it now looks like we’re about to go against some badass Weres who might just tear us al into tiny pieces considering we probably have an ounce of silver between the five of us. That is, unless they feel their pack is too smal . In which case, I don’t real y wanna become a part-time wolf.”

“The moon is barely a fingernail tonight. Maybe they won’t be able to transform,” came the voice of Kyphas.

Such a strange, positive note among al the gloom and doom of the past few minutes that I felt my focus begin to fragment again.

Then Sterling said, “Not likely. They’re guarding a mage, after al . You can bet the day he found out they were coming he dusted, washed the sheets, and cooked up a potion that would force their change.”

I rol ed the kinks out of my neck. Sighed. “Which just reinforces Cole’s point that silver would come in handy right about now. Anybody?”

Cole said, “My ammo wil take them down, even tear pieces off them, but it won’t kil them.” Kyphas said, “My blade contains silver,” just as Bergman noted, “There’s some silver in your bolo, Jaz. I don’t know if it’s enough to fatal y poison a Were, but I’d bet it’l make them sick for a while.”

And if we could count on his rockets taking a head or two, that would even up our odds a lot more, but that invention of his was notoriously unreliable. At kil ing, anyway.

“Al right, then, here’s the plan,” I said. “I’m betting Vayl took off because he suspected Ahmed had more than two Weres guarding his back. I do too. So, since Cole and I are Sensitives, we’l each have to take a search party around this square so we can find the rest of the guard detail and either take them out or disable them. Hopeful y we’l also cross Vayl’s trail.”

Sterling said, “I’m carrying a supply of the Shining Shadows.”

“Wel , we may survive this night after al ,” I said.

“What’s Shining Shadows?” asked Kyphas.

Sterling said, “It’s a powder that glows in the dark. Not only that, once the lights have been kil ed, whatever it’s touched wil freeze for approximately five seconds.” I could hear the hunger in her voice as she said, “You’re good.”

He drawled, “I’m also saved.”

“Kyphas!” I snapped. “Quit being such a soul whore and get with the gang! Okay, slight change of plan now that we can light up the Weres. Cole, I’m going to want you to pick them off, though the rest of you need to understand he’l just be slowing them down. Only a dose of silver or decapitation wil kil them. And even Cole’s not gonna be successful if we can’t figure out how to cut the electricity, so Bergman, total darkness is your job. Cole, can you make your part of the plan work?”

He said, “If I can find a rooftop that isn’t teeming with people.” I looked around. He had a point. A distressing number of those surrounding the square were covered with outdoor restaurants.

I said, “Make that your priority. Everybody else meet up here. I’m standing near the southeast corner of the square.

You’l know the place because the dancers are dressed in blue satin tunics and red caps.” While I watched the men whirl in circles so fast it was a wonder they didn’t stagger off into the crowd, I kept up a running commentary. It helped keep me from entertaining the slimy suspicion that when we found Vayl, the Weres would’ve already shredded him to the bone.

I said, “When everybody gets here Sterling can hand out the Shining Shadows and then we’l treat this square like it’s actual y round and we’re the hands of a clock with Ahmed at the center. Half of us wil move clockwise. The other half wil go the opposite direction, starting at the edges and working our way inward. We’l mark the Weres we find, and whoever sees Vayl first wil alert the others. At which point we’l meet up again on him.”

Before I’d finished talking my crew had found me. I expected more teasing about Yousef the Spankmeister, but they’d al pul ed on their work masks. And since Cole was away scouting sniping spots, nobody thought to make a crack

about

the

Shining

Shadows’

remarkable

resemblance to guinea pig wangs as our warlock handed out the cinnamon stick–sized tubes. They were ful of colorless powder held in place by plain paper glued to each end of the tube.

“Puncture the paper just before you’re ready to use the blowtube,” Sterling instructed. “Aim and exhale hard, just as if it was a dart gun. The powder wil do the rest.” I said, “Remember, we’re just working the powder until we’ve made sure al the Weres glow. Nobody makes an aggressive move until we’re a ful group and Cole’s found a likely spot for sniping. That means you, Kyphas.” The demon didn’t even try to defend herself. Just said,

“Who’s my partner for this party?” Brightly. Like she wasn’t aware of how deep Bergman’s hate ran or how Sterling itched to zap her back to hel .

My heart sank. I knew I had to pair with her. Neither of them would make it ten steps before al -out war broke out.

Then Sterling said, “I’l do it.”

I turned to him. “Are you sure?”

He leaned his head, just a tick, toward Miles. Whose face had gone bright red with suppressed emotion as Kyphas smiled invitingly at him. “You can scent Weres,” he said. “I have my own ways of finding them. It’l be faster like this.”

But no safer, I thought as I watched him stride past Kyphas, not even waiting to see whether or not she’d fol ow him into the crowd. She gave us a mocking salute before turning to trot after him.

“That demon…” Bergman growled.

“Isn’t worth your dried scabs,” I finished. I tugged at his sleeve. “Come on.” We walked away from the dancing Berbers and their clapping audience, letting ourselves be swal owed by the human tide that ebbed and flowed around the Djemaa el Fna.

Three minutes of searching yielded our first targets, standing among another mob of spectators. They were listening to a toothless old storytel er weave a tale of how listening to a toothless old storytel er weave a tale of how the spirit of a spring named Amina once chased an old widower named Khalid straight into his hut, and wouldn’t al ow him to haul water to his garden until he promised to let his son marry her.

As the storytel er spoke, he threw glittering salts into the boiling pot at his feet. Out of the smoke danced an image of Amina, her blue-skinned body as fluid as water, her silver eyes flashing as she ran after Khalid waving an oar-shaped fish that looked just as alarmed as the old man at the violence she threatened. Meanwhile Khalid’s son, who the storytel er identified as an innocent youth named Saïd, stood beside the hut’s door like a potted shrub, so paralyzed by the conflict he didn’t know who to cheer for.

While the storytel er captivated his audience with a chase scene that included fish slapping and clotheslining, I walked right up behind the Were, whose arm rested on the shoulders of what looked like an eight-year-old boy who was trembling al over. But the Luureken was neither a kid nor scared. He was just barely containing a constant, maddening rage.

I opened my psyche—took a big sniff just to be sure.

When I nearly puked from the scent of burning flesh and blood, I signaled to Bergman. He pul ed the stick from his pocket, broke open the wrapping, and pretended to cough.

Sterling’s spel ed powder shot out of its container and onto our marks’ backs, leaving a splatter I could see only because lately I found it harder not to.

We’d just turned away from the crowd and begun a new search when Sterling’s report came into our earpieces.

“We’ve got two over here. Shining them up right now.” I said, “Excel ent. We’ve just done a pair and I’m sensing more ahead of us.”

I signaled Bergman to hand me a powder stick and step back, because we were approaching one of the tent restaurants. I’d spotted two male Weres standing together beside a half-size picnic table while their Luureken tore into bowls of, wel , it sure as hel looked liked sheep’s heads from here. “Two pairs on our end,” I told Sterling as Bergman and I maneuvered toward the counter.

My heart threw itself against the wal of my chest as Cole said, “I’m in position on a roof at the eastern edge of the square. I’ve been scouting the area through my scope”—pause for a metal ic-sounding adjustment—“and I’ve found Vayl. Looks like he’s tracking somebody.”

“Where is he?” I asked, scratching my nose to hide my demand.

“Almost underneath me at booth number eleven. I’l keep an eye on him.”

No! I want to be the one to— “Excel ent work, Cole. We have found eight, repeat, eight targets for you so far.” I nodded to Bergman, who nailed his two, then bumped into the guy behind him and made loud with the apologies when the Were turned to see what the fuss was about.

That caught the attention of the Luureken, who stopped eating for a hopeful check on the kil -order. Which put the other Were on edge. He leaned forward to calm his rider, at which point I marked them both.

Bergman had already begun to move east. I caught up to him within a minute, and I asked, “Cole, can you give us a landmark for Vayl’s location?”

He said, “Make for the twelve green patio umbrel as.” Suddenly I felt Cirilai go dead on my finger. Eerie.

Scary. Like standing in the middle of the woods when even the crickets stop singing. I wanted to turn around. Go back to the riad and lock myself in my room until Bergman invented a reliable time machine. Or better yet, cal Kyphas from her place by Sterling’s side. Snatch up her offer like it was a half-legal land deal. But the reason I survive is deeper than whim, and it reminded me now. Keep moving, deeper than whim, and it reminded me now. Keep moving, it whispered, and I obeyed.

I only knew we’d reached the rendezvous point when Bergman’s hand, firm on my wrist, brought my eyes up to his. He pushed me onto a bench at yet another fil -your-face place, and said, “Madame B.”

“Yeah?”

He sank down beside me. “You keep forgetting to breathe.”

I forced myself to inhale. “Better?”

He searched my face. “Jesus, how bad do you have it for this guy?” I shrugged, shook my head. Even if I had eloquence, I stil wouldn’t have been able to put the words together. He nodded. “Al right. I’m sorry to do this to you, but it’s for the best.” He leaned back, the table hitting him halfway up the spine as he said harshly, “Remember after Matt died?”

I felt my eyes widen. You son of a bitch! You bring up the worst moment of my life now ? At the worst moment of my life? How dare you! Gluing my lips together, wil ing the tears back, I jerked my head forward.

He said, “Wal off your heart like you did then. You can’t save Vayl if you can’t think.” He pul ed a handkerchief out of his pocket and dabbed at my nose. Showed me the blood he’d mopped up. “Whatever’s doing this to you isn’t helping either.”

I took another breath. Pul ed off my Party Line and nodded for him to do the same. No reason for Kyphas to get an extra thril off my misfortune. “It’s Brude. I don’t want Sterling to know. But it’s getting—physical—now.”

“I’m not going to let that fucker take you down.” I let out a chuckle. Couldn’t help it. The image of bony little Bergman spinning Brude over his head before throwing him out of a WWE ring cheered me. “You are the best friend I could ever hope for.”

He leaned back. “You’re not going to hug me or anything?”

“Nope.”

“Good. Now come on, show me that cold bitch who makes bad guys want to push her off the sides of mountains.”

I took another breath, this one not nearly as forced.

“Okay, let’s go.”

He helped me up. Not that he thought I needed it. Just that he wanted to preserve that moment, when I’d inevitably look up into his eyes, so he could show me the love he’d always be too shy or stuck in his own gears to be able to voice. I slapped him on the back, letting my own feelings shine right back at him. And, strengthened by my best, most loyal buddy at my side, I strode toward the vampire I did not want to survive without.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

When I saw Vayl, whole and vital, leaning so casualy against one of the carts whose owner sold ginseng and cinnamon tea along with big hunks of spice cake I felt…

nothing. I’d been certain as tornadoes and prostate cancer that he was already gone. Because I had no il usions about myself. Somebody like me, a hired kil er whose best legacy was a niece she saw mostly in pictures, didn’t deserve the love of a man who could shatter bone in his fist and transform blood to ice. Wraiths like him were the legends of their kind. I didn’t even know my neighbors. So, logical y, I should’ve found his remains. But I hadn’t. And that made me…

I put my hand over my heart. Felt it beating, leaping almost, against my palm. But the void was stil there inside me. As if I couldn’t decode my own internal messages anymore.

Anytime you want to stop this bullshit you go right ahead. Granny May was sitting in her lawn chair, French-braiding Teen Me’s hair. She spoke from around the comb she stuck in her mouth when she needed both hands for plaiting.

I don’t know what you mean.

Admit it. You hate loving Vayl this much. Wearing his ring. Walking in his past—he’s becoming a part of you now. You can say all the pretty, noble things you want to, but this closeness terrifies you. Because you know what it is to lose. To be alone.

My throat went hot. Okay, since it’s just us, I’ll admit I haven’t felt this vulnerable since Matt died. But I want to grab life. I want to grab Vayl, preferably by that luscious ass. But there’s this—fear—worse than anything I’ve experienced on the job. I could face a hundred Weres tonight and it wouldn’t shake me the way the thought of losing Vayl forever does.

You’re in love, Granny May said.

Why does it have to suck so much?

Because it’s so precious.

What do I do?

Leave him. I felt my heart stop under my hand. Or stay, and celebrate each moment you have with him. Taste the laughter and drink the kisses and inhale the caresses because that’s why you’re here.

Oh. So it’s not to make Albert yell until he’s hoarse?

Granny May chuckled. We’ll talk about your father another day. Now go on. I believe you have a job to do, you slacker.

I glared at Teen Me. Stop teaching the old woman slang. It’ll go straight to her head and the next thing you know she’ll want to go buy herself an iPod and a pair of Jimmy Choos.

We took a second to ponder Gran’s plain brown loafers, then we burst into laughter. It was like emptying a submarine’s bal ast tanks. I felt myself begin to lift, and my whole attitude toward the coming fight and the vampire who had no idea what part we meant to play in it began to transform.

Another quick look to set my bearings. The green umbrel as belonged to a parade of carts sel ing the same kind of tea out of copper pots and the same kind of cake in white flowered bowls that fil ed the wheeled wagon Vayl had chosen. Bergman and I stood at the edge of a crowd near number seven. Vayl’s cart had a line of eight patient snackers being waited on by a white-capped gent whose matching jacket made him look more like a hospital orderly than a food salesman. But what he did, he did wel and with a friendly attitude that al owed for Vayl’s uncamouflaged presence. Then I saw that my sverhamin held a glass of tea in his hand and the merchant’s patience made even more sense.

Before I could figure out who was commanding Vayl’s attention, Sterling sauntered up to me. “Chil , you are a long way gone for somebody who’s got work to do right here.” Kyphas’s laugh was meant to snap my last nerve. But I’d final y hit my groove, and nothing was going to fling me out now.

I said, “Don’t worry about me. I’m just thinking a few steps ahead like Vayl would want me to. Which, now that we’ve found him and marked the Weres, I don’t see any point in delaying, do you?”

He spread his hands. “I’m ready for the next step.” Bergman said, “So I guess you’re going to want the lights to go out pretty soon.”

I nodded. “Yeah. As soon as Cole gives the okay, we’re set.”

Cole’s voice came through our earpieces, calmer and more level than usual. “I’m in position. Ready to go when the lights fail.”

“I’ve been talking to Sterling,” Bergman told me.

I turned to him. “And?”

He said, “We have a plan. I could tel you, but I’d rather just show you.”

I raised my eyebrows. “You’ve come a long way from the old magic-is-evil days, you know that, Miles?” I said quietly.

He shrugged. “What is it they say? If you’re not growing, you’re rotting? I don’t want to rot.”

“Good. I’d stil love you if you were a zombie, but it’s more fun not having to bury parts of you in the garden.” I gave him the go-ahead gesture and half watched him help Sterling set up. But the rest of my concentration centered on Vayl. You wouldn’t think there’d be much to see. Kinda like viewing one of the time-worn angels hovering over Michelangelo’s grave. But then most people didn’t know what to look for.

Though he stood as stil as one of those lamenting saints, he was so close to losing control I wished I could pul a fire alarm and clear the place before innocent people got burned. His eyes, dark as unforgiven souls, lit with occasional bursts of red like exploding stars. His fingers, resting on the cloth-covered counter, had dug in deep enough to leave permanent indentations the blue material couldn’t quite disguise. And, this was new—or maybe real y, real y old—he was biting the inside of his mouth, his lips, his cheeks, bleeding himself to keep the monster on its leash.

I looked in the direction he’d glued to and instantly picked up on a muscle-bound Were with a hiker’s tan and sun-bleached ponytail. He sat at the edge of one of the rooftop eateries that surrounded the Djemaa el Fna, a spot Monique had recommended for its exquisite food and excel ent views of the glittering, smoke-blanketed square.

As I sized up Vayl’s target I decided he had to be the one leading this pack. His size alone would’ve convinced me. But it was also the way his eyes moved across the crowds, measuring, considering, never stopping. No surprise, then, that his Luureken looked more like an imp than a child, with huge ears framing a pockmarked face and orangey-red tufts of hair sticking out from beneath his skul cap.

I jumped when Kyphas spoke. Why do I keep forgetting she’s here? I should ask Sterling if she’s toting some sort of I’m-no-threat sachet.

She said, “Are you real y just going to stand here and watch while the rest of your crew saves the day?” she asked. “Let Bergman and Sterling deal with the lights?

Al ow Cole to pick off the Weres? Watch Vayl make a fool of himself? I didn’t realize you were such a passive little slave.”

I stared into the demon’s eyes. When I smiled she pul ed away from me. “You’re sweating. Why is that when the evening is cool? Don’t you want us to break the curse?” She shrugged. “I don’t care when Vayl thinks he is. He’s nothing to me.”

“Sure. But the Rocenz does matter to you. And the fact that we’re about to restore the mind of the one guy who can not only find it, but keep it out of your hands permanently, must be making you nutso.”

“Not at al .”

Nobody can lie like hel spawn. They learn it in the cradle. But, then, so had I.

I started to say something, then I changed my mind.

Instead, “Kyphas, do you ever stop with the manipulating?”

“I have no idea—”

“We’re about to massacre a bunch of werewolves and their riders. Do you think you could manage to cut the bul shit for three seconds?”

Final y, a thread of humor in those hazel eyes. “Yes.”

“I’m going to ask you a question and I want you to answer it fast, without even thinking. Can you at least do that?”

Slight frown at the chal enge. “Of course.” I motioned for her to take a break from the Party Line, and I did the same. Then I asked, “What do you want, just for yourself?”

“Cole.”

I laughed.

Her hands curled into fists. She said, “It’s not funny!”

“I’m not laughing at you. I’m laughing because, deep down, you are such a girl. I mean, of course you want Cole.

Everybody does. He’s adorable.”

“You don’t.”

“I’m not a girl.”

She stared at me. “No. You’re Eldhayr.”

“Did you have to stoop to name-cal ing?”

She smirked. But the half smile vanished almost instantly as she scanned the rooftop where Cole had settled. “He’l never have me.”

“You mean for good.”

Hurt in those eyes when they came back to mine, which surprised me. I hadn’t realized she felt so deeply for him already. Damn, but he had a way. She said, “Your honesty is no virtue.”

I shrugged. “My dad used to love tel ing us that the biggest obstacle on any course is the one sitting between your shoulders.”

“What is that supposed to mean?”

Obviously Kyphas’s digs weren’t heavily populated with military men or she’d have total y run with the reference. I said, “You’l never snag Cole because you don’t believe you can.”

“I am hel spawn.”

“Yup.”

“He wants me. Yet he despises me.”

“Oh, yeah.”

She threw up her hands. “What else is there to say?” I shrugged. “I guess nothing. I mean, you and I both agree that you could never, ever become the kind of woman he could love. So just keep on yanking our strings and throwing temptation in our paths. Maybe one of these days you’l have us al in hel with you. And that’l be even better. Right?”

She nodded. Doubtful y.

I turned to Bergman and Sterling just as they were emptying their pockets. They reminded me of a couple of fifth graders comparing treasures. I could almost hear the discussion.

“I’ve beaten this Pokémon game so many times I’m dreaming about it now. I’l trade it to you for that Snickers bar, your free pass to the basketbal game, and the combination to Heidi Neyedmeyer’s locker.”

“Okay, but the Snickers bar’s kinda melty. It’s been in my pocket for, like, three days.”

“No problem.”

“Deal.”

I replaced my Party Line so I could snoop. Their conversation wasn’t nearly as fun as the one I’d imagined.

Bergman was saying, “… stil think the hardest part wil be distracting everybody from what we’re doing. There’s”—

Bergman gestured around helplessly—“no privacy.” Sterling said, “Stickman, if you’re that worried about it, I can toss the ingredients for my special tea into this dude’s pot instead of using mine.” He nudged his elbow toward sel er number seven. “In thirty seconds nobody within a hundred feet wil care if we’re dancing naked on the tables.” Bergman frowned down at himself. “Are we going to want to dance naked… anywhere?”

Sterling chuckled. “I hope not, for my sake. You’re too damn skinny to turn streaker!”

“Everybody stays dressed,” I ordered. “Sterling, keep the goodies stowed. We may need them later. Bergman, relax. Nobody gives a crap what you’re doing as long as you act normal; they’re too busy having their own lives.” Muttering something that sounded like, “If you say so,” Bergman watched Sterling unpack, wel , it looked like a Bergman watched Sterling unpack, wel , it looked like a wooden dandelion. A late-phase one, after the bloom has gone to the spunky white seed that reminded me strongly of my landlady’s Sunday-go-to-meeting wig. Except where the hair made me want to pile drive her into a frozen pond to see if the spikes were as sharp as they looked, the carving was so intricate I wondered if its artist had studied under the guy who’d done Vayl’s cane. Or maybe taught him.

I slapped the cane against my leg, wondering idly if the sword it covered contained any silver, as Sterling nodded at Bergman. “Just like we discussed, now,” he said.

Miles eyed the junction box nearest our position. He took a breath so deep that for a second I could detect his ribs straining against the material of his shirt. “Okay, I’m ready.”

Sterling caught my eye. “Okay, Chil . Whenever you give the word.”

I checked on Vayl. No movement from him or the roofbound Were. “Cole, are you ready?”

“I’m set. Should I take out restaurant boy first?” I considered our options. “Yeah,” I decided. “Do it right before the lights go out. I figure Vayl wil move on him as soon as the funkiness begins, and I don’t want any friendly fire casualties tonight.”

“But…” Bergman lowered his voice. “Can Vayl handle him in his present condition? Especial y if he doesn’t know what we’re up to?”

“It doesn’t matter what year Vayl thinks it is,” I said.

“He’s stil the baddest fighter in this square. Probably on the whole damn continent. He’l be fine.”

Bergman shrugged. I looked from him to Sterling to Kyphas. “Ready?” Each of them nodded.

“Okay,” I said. “Cole downs the Weres. Remember they’l be wounded, not dead, so we may have to deal with a couple of them before we can move in and grab the mage. Sterling, you’re going to be able to immobilize Ahmed before he can put the whammy on us?”

“It’s what I do.”

“Kyphas, are you prepared?”

She pul ed the tahruyt off her head and slid it lovingly through her hands. “Oh, yes.”

I pul ed out my bolo, slipped it into Bergman’s belt, and covered it with his shirt. “Just in case,” I whispered as he pul ed up his sleeve. He glanced down. “Oh!” He went so pale I put out an arm to steady him. He jerked away. “I’m fine!”

I shoved my hand back in my pocket, contacting the poker chips I kept there, imagining that I’d piled them on a green felt table where I could hear the click clack as they slid through my shuffling fingers, constantly revising their positions but never losing their integrity.

I said, “Miles, you and Sterling begin as soon as the Were goes down. Cole?”

“Yes, dear?”

“When you’re ready.”

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

Cole’s shot cracked across the square like the signal for a set of kickass fireworks. The pack leader fel back in his chair, his Luureken and the people at the surrounding tables staring dumbly as they tried to figure out what had happened.

At ground level, a few people looked for fire in the sky.

And they got it. Bergman released four of his missiles at the junction box. They didn’t want to go up, however. They were made to seek the warmth of bodies, and the street below was packed with them. Which was where Sterling’s wooden seedpod came into play.

He whirled it above his head, chanting, “Up draft. Up breeze. Up current. Fly!” The seedpods broke off the stem, formed a carpet of white that sped after the missiles, caught them, carried them high over the heads of the crowd, and slammed them straight into their target.

Sparks flew. Blue threads exploded from them, reached over the screaming crowd and slammed into two more junction boxes, throwing the square into darkness.

Panic, both in the restaurant, where they’d just figured out the man on the floor was bleeding from a massive head wound and his “kid” had been shot as wel , and on the ground, where a fire had started in one of the mobile food stal s when someone accidental y tipped over a pot ful of boiling oil.

I saw Vayl cast his eyes around at the rising chaos before separating himself from cart eleven and heading toward the downed Were. I wanted to fol ow him. But his memory stil rested back with Ahmed.

“Cole?” I asked. In my earpiece I heard another shot.

Then another. He didn’t speak until he’d taken six altogether.

“Three pairs down,” he said professional y. “I’ve got men moving on my position. I’m relocating. If I can, I’l do the rest after I lose these chasers.”

“Roger that,” I replied. We both knew he’d try like hel to even our odds, but time was not our friend.

I tossed Vayl’s cane to my left hand, jerked my right wrist, and felt my staff slide into my palm, its cool handle reminding me to take deeper breaths as it stretched to ful length. Fol owing my lead, Bergman pul ed my knife. He stared at it doubtful y, like he thought it might leap out of his hand and stab him while he wasn’t looking. In the end he took a tighter grip and checked his missiles. Four stil nestled in the sheath he’d created for them. Encouraged, he pul ed out the wal et-sized tracking unit that would al ow us to find Ahmed again.

Sterling watched Kyphas transform her scarf into the flyssa that would, hopeful y, stick to Weres this evening. But he didn’t prepare anything extra for our trip back to the mage. Just fol owed at his easy pace as Bergman led us back to the bil Cole had left with Ahmed earlier.

We shoved our way through the yel ing, panicked crowd toward one of the streets that led away from the square and final y found Ahmed trying to make his escape with his arms ful of half-hat boxes. He hadn’t waited long for an escort, but then maybe he’d realized they were indisposed.

We’d passed two of them on our way to intercept the mage.

One had been lying across a picnic table trying to hold its intestines inside its body cavity while its Luureken lay in a pool of blood at its feet. The other Were had toppled into a juice sel er’s cart, burying itself in mounds of ripe, orange fruit. Its rider had disappeared, leaving a blood trail we didn’t have time to fol ow.

didn’t have time to fol ow.

“Ahmed,” I said as we surrounded him. “We have some business with you. Leave the snakes.” Kyphas took the boxes and put them down as Sterling grabbed the mage by the wrists and forced his hands into a clapping position.

Sterling banged their foreheads together as he whispered,

“Bound to me now.” His bracelets reached out, clasped onto Ahmed’s wrists, and then twisted into one another until they seemed to be made from one single line of bone.

I traded amazed looks with Bergman, our specialized contact lenses making our awed faces look even greener with envy as we watched Ahmed try desperately to twist his hands free. But the shackles had become so tight he could barely wiggle his fingers.

“What—” he began, but Sterling held up a finger.

“You can talk—later. Now fol ow me.” Just words to Bergman. But I felt the magic behind them, like the thickness in the air before a storm. My whole body tightened as it surrounded me, and I took a second to congratulate myself that Sterling was on my side. It must feel to Ahmed like being bitten al at once by a thousand mosquitoes.

Our warlock took us back toward Vayl. But before we got there the lights flickered on in the west half of the square. And we were attacked.

We did have some warning. A flash of neon. The scent of wolf. I yel ed, “Sterling, guard the mage!” Then a white-furred form took me to the ground, its snapping jaws so close to my jugular I could feel snippets of skin come away in its teeth.

It had seen the staff in my right hand and managed to pin that wrist to the ground. The other I rammed into its mouth. The scrape of my metal gauntlet against fangs made me shiver as I brought both knees up and smashed them into the wolf’s ribs. Its claws raked down my right arm, but then they lifted and I was free. I swung the staff like I meant to ski down a mountain. It hit square, bruising flesh, splintering bone, making the Were scream in agony.

It staggered one way, I rol ed the other, abandoning the staff for Grief. But not soon enough. The Were’s Luureken, a flame-eyed girl with such deep facial scars that parts of her cheek flapped independently as she screamed, launched herself at me. Though spikes had emerged from her head and her body had grown a hard, outer shel , I figured bul ets could stil penetrate at close range. If I could only grab my gun.

The Luureken had every advantage. Position. Speed.

Madness. And a nightmare weapon. The raes was so close I could already feel it piercing my skin. For a split second I knew that nothing I did or said was going to prevent the claw inside it from ripping out my heart.

I felt a moment of relief that my whole life didn’t flash before my eyes. Some things you just never want to rehash.

But I did see Vayl as he’d been the night before he forgot me. His eyes flashing like a gemstone, green on green under green until I knew if I dived into them al day I’d never find their ultimate source.

He’d whispered in my ear, “Woman, you make me want to shout.”

And I’d said, “Go ahead.”

To which he’d replied, “I am too busy listening. Did you know the world was singing?”

“You’re such a softie.”

He’d kissed me. On the bel y button. “Tel no one. If news gets out they wil not even hire me to curl the poodles’

hair at Le Puppeez Salon.”

Regret. So enormous that I suspected it would swal ow the world. The raes speeded toward my chest. And then a blur, coming from my right. The whine of metal cleaving air, changing tones as it met skin and bone. Instant blindness as blood spurted into my eyes. And I knew, somehow, I was saved.

I felt a cloth hit my face. Used it to wipe my sight back as I regained my feet. The Luureken lay dead at my side, the spot between its forehead and mouth a mass of gore and brain tissue. The Were had toppled over next to it, panting heavily from its original wound and the secondary smashing I’d given it.

Around us people screamed and ran, flapping their arms like spooked chickens. I felt about that connected to them as I released Vayl’s sword from its sheath and, in one smooth motion, decapitated the wolf that had just nearly ended me.

Kyphas stood next to me, wiping her sword on a second piece of cloth that she’d cut from the Luureken’s shirt. I used the one she’d thrown me to clean Vayl’s blade and then threw it down, aiming it to cover the oozing mass of grossness that was the Luureken’s former face.

“Thanks,” I said.

“You owe me,” she said, nodding to our second pair of attackers. The Were lay, headless, near Sterling’s feet, and neither he nor the mage seemed to be able to look away from the carnage. It hadn’t returned to man-form yet, but I recognized the Luureken sprawled next to it, my bolo buried in its chest. It was the scar-faced “kid” who’d been hanging out with the snake-photo scammer.

“I said thanks,” I told her. But my eyes were on Miles.

Who was staring at his bloody hands and starting to shake.

I retrieved the knife, wiped it clean, and went to him.

“Bergman!” I snapped.

His head came up like I’d kicked him.

I shoved the hilt into his hand. Blew out a sigh of relief when he took it. “Your crisis can wait. In fact, that’s the great thing about them. They’re like the IRS. They know where you live, and as soon as you’ve decided you’re going to survive the most horrible experience of your life after al , they’re knocking at your door to make sure you pay for it.” When he gave me a smal smile I said, “Now let’s find Vayl and get the hel outta here.”

I’d like to say my extra sense led us right to him. But the big crowd surrounding the snarling creatures pretty much gave it away.

Cole found us just as we’d muscled our way to the front.

“Should we cal this progress?” he asked

I wasn’t sure how to answer. Did a word like that fit on a street that had heard the screams of invaders and absorbed the blood of defenders so often in its history that the battle waging across its bricks now wouldn’t even make the footnotes of its autobiography? I watched Vayl confront the leader of Ahmed’s guard pack, his wound already nothing more than a pink puckered spot mostly hidden by his thick black fur and the fal of drying blood on his head and neck, and understood how little the world would ever care about what happened in the next five minutes. Hel , even finding out that Luureken weren’t just fairy tales wouldn’t make them blink. Most of the crowd around us were seeing the leader’s froth-mouthed little berserker with their own eyes, and al they could think about was what an awesome story it would make when they final y found a computer café so they could post it to their travelogues. But for me and my crew, Vayl’s victory here meant everything.

We watched like guest surgeons at an operation while amateur bookies took bets and the people with money on the fighters screamed al around us. We’d already missed the first few moves, so we could only guess what had happened from existing injuries. The Were, bleeding from new wounds across his shoulders and flanks, was going after Vayl like my sverhamin had just drowned his latest litter. And it showed. Vayl’s coat hung in shreds from shoulders to wrists. Blood trickled steadily down his arms and the back of one leg. I saw claw marks on his thighs as wel as a bite on the face that had just missed his eye.

The Luureken, whose shoulder stil slumped from the slug Cole had shot through it, hadn’t escaped the sharp edge of Vayl’s weapon, a butcher’s cleaver he must have stolen from Chef Henri. Because he’d sliced four spikes off the Luureken’s head, leaving behind freely bleeding stumps.

I cal ed from the front of the crowd, “Lord Brâncoveanu, it’s us. We need to get moving. We have Ahmed.” He ignored me. I understood. This was his battle now. It should’ve been over a lot sooner. Except Vayl was…

savoring… the violence. His eyes bright red with bloodlust, he repeatedly wounded when he could’ve kil ed. And al I could do was admire him. Because no one had forced him to become the vampire Pete had partnered me with. The quiet, control ed creature who never hunted, and kil ed only for his adopted country. He’d pul ed himself out of the mire without help. That took guts. And strength. And honesty. I couldn’t remember when I loved him more.

But there was such a thing as overkil . And the longer we waited, the more likely it would be that the other two Luureken-mounted Weres would show up to swing the odds.

I murmured, “Keep a sharp eye out. The other guards could be—”

A scream and a thump on the back stopped me. I turned around, raising Vayl’s cane like a club. What I saw was Bergman being dragged away, gaping members of the crowd leaning in to get a good look and maybe a camera-phone shot of whatever had hooked him through his side.

“Miles!” I bolted after him, shouldering past muttering bystanders who’d only now begun to realize that they weren’t watching a performance set up just for them. In my favor was the fact that the wolf was slowed by the crowd as wel . Plus he had a rider and dead weight to drag. I caught up with them less than a minute later when he tried to swing around orange juice cart number twenty-seven and col ided with a red-robed water sel er, sending the man, his enormous tasseled hat, and al five of his shiny golden cups crashing to the ground.

I threw myself at the Luureken, so keyed on vengeance for Bergman that no amount of cute could veer me off, not even the lumpy-headed-pup look this one wore. I brought the rider off its mount, our impact making it drop the raes and sending Vayl’s sheath flying. Bergman screamed again as the hook jarred inside him.

“Miles! The bolo! For chrissake, use it!” I yel ed.

Losing its rider had staggered the wolf. But it recovered fast. And its chest wound wouldn’t keep it from turning on my friend. I prayed that he wasn’t too deep in shock to react as I jammed the sword into the Luureken’s neck, felt muscle give, and then bone. It fel to the street like an abandoned dol .

A scream, more animal than human, and yet I wasn’t sure whose mouth it came from until I saw Bergman trying to shove the limp Were off his chest. I ran over to help, and together we slid it aside, stil breathing, but not for much longer.

Bergman gazed up at me, his face so bloodless I’ve seen pinker corpses. “How bad is it?” he gasped.

My eyes did not want to drop to that wound, to take in the torn and bleeding flesh. But we both needed to know. I froze my face into an unreadable mask. Leaned over him and pul ed up his shirt.

My relief put me on my ass.

“What is it?”

I looked up at him, smiled at his bravery. My good Miles, not even crying like he would’ve been only a few months ago. “I don’t know how you did it. Probably al those hours you spent sitting in front of computer screens. But your limited amount of body fat has al commuted to your love handles. And that’s what the Were snagged. It’s going to hurt like a muther for a long time. And we stil have to worry about infection. But I think you’re going to make it.” We grinned at each other. I’d have hugged him, but I figured he’d had enough shocks for one day. Then his smile vanished. “What about Ahmed?”

“The others can take care of him.”

“Not with the rest of the wolves on the loose!”

“Dude. I’m not leaving you bleeding on the ground in freaking Marrakech! Besides, there’s only one or two left that we real y have to worry about, and they’ve both been shot—”

He shook his head. “You’re not thinking straight. Vayl might never come back to you if you’re not there tonight.

Monique gave me her number. I’l cal her. She’l help me get to a hospital.”

I couldn’t speak. Miles had been around before Vayl.

Before Matt, even. I suddenly realized he’d been the first person after Dave and Evie to real y be there, day after day. Even later, somehow he’d remained a presence. And now, with a goddamn claw shoved through his side, he wanted me to leave?

He reached up and squeezed my hand. “I stil want you to be my partner. You and Vayl both. But how can that happen if he spends the rest of our lives in a history book?

Go get him back. Please. ” He tightened his fingers until it hurt. For once, the shutters that closed off every mystery behind his eyes opened wide, and I could see how much this meant to him.

But my father had been a Marine. I knew what he’d say if I left a man behind. I knew what I’d think of myself. I sat on my heels, so torn by this decision I couldn’t bear to look at him. Then it hit me.

I glared into the gathering crowd and shouted, “Yousef! I know you’re out there, you mangy little perve! Yousef!

Where—that’s better!” I said as my stalker squeezed himself between a couple of Japanese tourists and knelt down beside me.

“You arrrre—”

“I know, I’m pretty. Is Kamal with you?”

He jerked his thumb over his shoulder. A beat later the boy worked his way into our circle, apologizing to the people he’d had to displace as he went. As soon as he saw Miles he did one of those girlie screams that made you wonder if his voice real y had changed, and his eyes began to rol up in their sockets. I slapped him hard on the thigh, which got a giggle from Yousef.

“Kamal! Don’t pass out, dammit, I need you to speak for me!”

He turned around, holding his hand behind his back as if I needed to be fended off. “Don’t make me look!”

“For chrissake, Kamal, just tel Yousef I need him to stay with my friend, here, until the woman who owns our riad shows. Her name’s Monique Landry. I’m betting she’l be here in less than three minutes, four if she decides to cal in a rescue helicopter.”

Kamal translated. Yousef shook his head.

Kamal said, “He wants to go with you. To fol ow. Always to fol ow.”

I grabbed Yousef by the col ar and twisted until his face began to turn red. “You tel this son of a bitch if he doesn’t watch over my friend I wil never, ever choke the shit out of him again. You got that?”

Kamal talked. Fast. Yousef’s vigorous nod was al I needed to see. I slapped him across the face. Twice. He kissed my hand. Can I pick ’em, or what?

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

Returning to Vayl’s battle felt like watching an überlong chase scene. Oh look! The cars are a little more dented and I’m pretty sure that tire is going to go flying off the rim before it’s over, but they’re still driving!

As I caught Cole’s eyes and gave him a reassuring nod, I tried to swal ow that Vayl’s-enjoying-the-shit-kicking-way-too-much feeling and concentrate on what to do next.

But I couldn’t. It was the fact that even Marrakech has authorities, who I didn’t want to piss with if I didn’t have to.

And though our whole operation hadn’t taken more than a few minutes, they were certainly on their way by now. Plus, blood was every-damn-where. Vayl’s worst wound seemed to be on his calf. Hard to assess from where I stood, spinning his cane in my hand, debating my next move.

Except that I could tel he was favoring it, and every step he took left a bloody imprint on the street.

I went to stand by Sterling, who had Ahmed by the arm.

Kyphas held the other. She’d been studying the mage like a biologist dissects a frog. She noted my presence with a shrug of one shoulder and went back to her thoughts. I reminded myself not to leave her alone with the Wielder. My life could depend on it.

Sterling glanced away from the snarling Were with its blood-streaked fur and shrieking rider battling a scarily silent vampire to ask, “How’s the genius?”

“He’l be okay.” I didn’t think I could say more without bawling, so I stopped.

“You’re hurt,” he said, his eyes acknowledging the gashes on my arms.

I shrugged. “I’l heal. But we’ve gotta get Ahmed outta here before we get shredded by whatever remains of this pack. Any ideas?”

Cole drew his PSG1 out from under his coat. “Yup.” The people standing closest to him gasped and drew away as he took careful aim at the snarling fighters. He went so stil that for a few moments he seemed to have left his own body. No sparkle in his eyes. No breath.

Vayl slashed at the Luureken, causing it and its Were to rear back.

Cole squeezed the trigger.

Vayl’s opponent roared with pain as chunks of its chest blew away. The bul et traveled through its back and into the Luureken’s bel y, throwing it from its mount.

“That’l work,” I said.

Cole restashed his rifle and moved forward, grabbing Vayl by the elbow. “Helena’s in trouble,” he said. “The only way to save her is to get the mage out of here now.” He jerked his head backward at Ahmed, whose lips had begun to tremble. “Come on.”

More than anything, Vayl’s decision to cooperate was based on his trust in his valet. At least that’s what I decided as we double-timed it down the street, leaving the crowd behind us in chaos. He didn’t question Cole’s sources or wonder aloud how a servant could generate a rescue plan.

He just came along.

Our plan had been to haul Ahmed back to the riad and force a reversal spel from him. But that was before we found out about his shaggy friends, none of which did we want within scenting distance of Monique. We couldn’t go to the city’s safe house, because we weren’t on official business. Which left another hotel—also putting innocents at risk—or Ahmed’s place.

I picked the mage’s pocket with a sweet little move I’d learned from a prostitute in Thailand, one that Sterling found so disturbing he pul ed his own wal et out and stuffed it down the front of his pants.

“Like I’d try anything like that with you,” I said as I checked out Ahmed’s ID.

“You won’t now,” he said defiantly.

“That’s for sure.” I flipped the long black case closed and slipped it back into the mage’s pocket. “Turn right at the end of the block,” I said. “He owns a music shop about five minutes from here.”

The knowledge would drive me a little crazy if I dwel ed on it. I’d probably passed the place twice during my scouting trips around Marrakech, never realizing who owned it or what he was doing to Vayl. I turned to my partner, looking for the kind of comfort he hadn’t given me in days. “You look pretty toasty,” I told him.

Vayl swept a lily-white hanky from his breast pocket and dabbed at his face. I couldn’t decide if I was more floored by the fact that it had total y missed being spattered by blood in the first place, or that he even had a pocket left after that melee. “If, by that, you mean I am nearly done in, you may be right. This life has left me soft, just when I most need battle hardening.”

“Wel , sir, most vamps I’ve met would’ve been smoke within a couple of seconds of meeting those Weres back there.”

He glanced down at me, the bite on his face already completely healed. “I could have finished them quickly,” he said. Not bragging. Just tel ing it like it was. “At first I did not because I knew the best way to infuriate Roldan would be to kil them slowly. But then I began to think that I should only kil for the right reasons. And the very idea confused me. In fact, it infuriated me. Why would I think such a thing?” I hid a triumphant smile. “Maybe you’re changing.” He pounded himself on the chest. “I am eternal!” I laughed. “You’re such a goril a.”

“I am no such thing. Why do you persist in—” I cut him off with a wave toward his leg. “Your pants are so bloody they’re sticking to your skin. Do we need to bandage it right away?”

He wrinkled his nose. “The Luureken bit me.”

“How… doesn’t matter. Come on, we’ve got a lot to do before the rest of the Weres regroup, and first aid for you is at the top of the list.”

We entered a neighborhood that was, once again, fil ed with stores whose roofs had been used as anchors for swaths of sun-shading material. None of the souks were open for business at this hour, but the signs above the doors showed even the il iterate what to expect inside.

Pottery. Rugs. Jewelry. Musical instruments so numerous you could barely see the wal s beneath them. When it was open. Tonight the door was locked, making it resemble a dark brown Hitler mustache against the pink skin of the building’s outer wal . Which went straight up, as if it had been built to imprison whoever wandered inside.

Sterling glanced over his shoulder. “Look, Chil , it’s like a third-world band closet. What do you say we go shopping for that guitar?”

I didn’t ask Sterling how he knew the address matched our mage’s ID. Sooner or later I’d figure it out, and it wouldn’t do to look ignorant in front of the captive. So I said,

“Sounds like a plan,” and watched him pul Ahmed toward the shop, his hips and shoulders moving to that internal rhythm that marked him as surely as a tattoo. At the mage’s other shoulder, Kyphas seemed more like an attachment, built for the ride, but not committed to it.

She was, however, wil ing to hold on to the mage while Sterling dealt with the Wielder’s lock. In fact, she seemed fascinated by Sterling’s amulet, watching with the greed of a jewel thief as he pul ed it out from beneath his shirt and a jewel thief as he pul ed it out from beneath his shirt and held it between his cupped hands. When his fingers began to glow red, I shouldn’t have been surprised at my own reaction. My Sensitivity had jumped a few notches since I’d last rubbed against Sterling’s powers. But this was eerie.

Like breathing air from a hot oven.

I glanced at Cole, but he didn’t seem to be as bothered by the warlock’s rising powers as I was. He’d pul ed his Beretta and was watching Kyphas do her tahruyt-to-sword trick. So I unleashed Grief and said to Vayl, “This could get hairy. Here.” I handed him the cane. “If you twist the blue jewel at the top, the sheath wil shoot away from the sword that’s hidden inside.”

Vayl eyed it careful y before taking it firmly in his hand.

When his eyebrows lifted a notch I felt another spurt of excitement. He’d recognized it, at least subconsciously.

Minuscule progress, but stil enough to make me want to hug him. I managed to control myself, but only because Sterling was moving his amulet across the lines of the doorway.

He murmured, “Evendium. ” When the lines glowed yel ow he backed up. “It’s protected,” he said. He blew out his breath, fast and hard, as if he could release every ounce of tension that way. And maybe it worked, because his face settled and his shoulders relaxed. He reached into one of the pockets of his cargo pants and dug out a plastic zip-close bag containing a substance that resembled grape jel y. But when he pressed it against the top right-hand corner of the door it stuck like chewing gum. Circling the amulet over the spot like he meant to hypnotize it, Sterling began to hum. It wasn’t a tune exactly. But I could feel the music thrum through my feet, and, weirdly, I wanted to dance.

Cole was already waltzing with Kyphas. Spinning her around the shadowed, dusty street like they’d been partners for years. She threw back her head and laughed, her hair flying behind her like the tail of a racehorse. As she smiled up into his sparkling eyes she seemed to shed al her layers of treachery and deceit. For those few moments she wasn’t übergorgeous or evil. She was just a pretty girl with her arms around a boy she couldn’t resist. Except the hand that was wrapped around his shoulder held a sword that could easily slit his throat.

Who was I to judge? I held a lethal weapon too, and I couldn’t wait to swing my partner. I reached out to Vayl, but the demon had already shoved Ahmed into his hands, so it was Sterling who two-stepped me down the block. We flew past the other dancers, skating over the cobblestones like they were coated in bowling-lane wood, the air whistling past our ears as if cheering us on.

“The door.” Vayl sounded surprised. “It has unlatched itself.”

We stopped.

“Excel ent,” said Sterling.

I shuffled toward the entrance after him, my elation deflating like a post-birthday bal oon as I realized he’d sucked us into his spel . Cole and Kyphas held hands al the way to the door, then Cole looked at her, shook his head remorseful y, and jerked away.

As I shouldered past Sterling I said, “What you did was out of line. Making us dance like puppets just so you could pul off some minor magic.”

“You wanted inside. I assumed that meant—” I tossed my head, slapping him with my braid. “You haven’t changed. It’s stil al about how people can help you manipulate—”

Sterling interrupted me. “But I’m helping you!”

“Tel me that wasn’t a Bardish spel .” Silence. I nodded grimly. “You’re already into the change, aren’t you?” Even less response this time. “And how do you figure you’re going to help us when pirates hear a Bard is operating in Marrakech?”

“Well, I’m sure as hel not gonna tel them!” He looked around the circle of people who’d become fascinated by our exchange. “And neither are you.” The threat, sung softly, stil raised the hair on the back of my neck. Vayl barely reacted. Cole went so pale for a second his hair was actual y darker than his skin. Kyphas raised her hands as if to say it was beyond her realm of interest. And Ahmed looked like he wanted to throw up.

I turned my back to him. We both knew his threat probably wasn’t necessary. Until he took the oath, and al that went along with it, it was unlikely that anybody would be interested in dicing him up so they could squeeze the magic into an elixir so treasured only the mega-rich could afford it. Stil , I was pissed. And that gave me an excuse. To ignore my disappointment that the joy hadn’t been real. And that coming down had reminded me so forceful y of how little was good in my life right now. I switched Grief into firing mode and prepared to enter Ahmed’s souk. But I couldn’t bury the thought that, considering Vayl had just bitten me, the reaction might’ve lasted longer if Sterling hadn’t stuck his nose in. Normal y it wouldn’t bother me. But I had so little of him left to hold on to. That our warlock had cut the moment short stuck in my throat like a chicken bone.

Feeling frustrated and raw, I kicked the door open, half hoping that I’d find the remaining Weres standing on the other side ready for some hand-to-hand ass kicking. The door slammed into the wal , then sprang shut again. I heard Cole snort behind me.

Vayl said, “I must say, Madame Berggia, I have never seen a lady deliver quite so brutal a blow to an entryway before. Perhaps next time you might simply walk through?” As I looked up into his bright brown eyes, five different responses occurred to me, most of them containing some form of obscenity that would, no doubt, get the poor housekeeper fired again. Then my sense of humor returned from vacation wearing an exoskeleton T-shirt and carrying a bag ful of exploding cigars. I smiled.

And I said, “Where I come from, this is just how we enter a strange building, Lord Brâncoveanu. You should see what we do with suspicious packages.” He sighed. “You make very little sense to me. I suppose I must assume this has something to do with Sister Hafeza’s prediction. However, where I come from, ladies do not risk unpredictable situations before gentlemen. Or, in fact, at al .” He stood, waiting for me to let him pass.

When his eyebrows rose a whole centimeter I fluttered my lashes like a real girl and waved him in.

Because I refused to budge, he had to slide past me to get through the narrow door, his whole body rubbing slowly against mine as he made sure he wasn’t stepping into an ambush. I closed my eyes and relished the moment. The smel of Vayl, so unique that it made me feel as cozy as hot chocolate. The feel of his chest pressing against mine, his tight, flat stomach brushing just close enough to make my bel y ring jingle against my skin. Our thighs met, and I licked my lips, remembering al the times nothing had separated our bodies and we’d tried desperately to hold off, to take one more minute for exploration, but the passion had stolen our senses and al we could do was try to breathe while it rode us.

“Madame Berggia?” The low rumble of his voice, sweet and dark as brown sugar, glided straight down my throat.

Which I had to clear before I said, “Yeah?”

“Are you quite al right?”

“Um.”

“Good. Fol ow me.”

Gladly. Because your ass is a work of art, my dear. I could watch it all day and—probably get my head blown off if I don’t pay attention now.

We’d entered a shop that was like the evil twin of Sister Hafeza’s place. Smal and dark, it was impossible to view in one sweep because at the squat service counter just a few steps in, it swerved and ducked, its countless cubicles each containing enough instruments to supply a smal , North African orchestra. Drums of al shapes and sizes lined up like mischievous kids against every vertical space, from which hung gongs, hand harps, and instruments with trumpetlike bel s at the end but way too many curves in the middle to go by that name. Anything you could get a halfway decent tune from had been crammed into the souk.

Sterling couldn’t stop grinning. He cocked his head at Ahmed, who he’d taken charge of again. “What a shame you’re such a creep. Otherwise we could’ve been buds, man.”

We spread out, Vayl taking the upper floor while Cole, Kyphas, and I each chose a different turn and Sterling led Ahmed straight toward the back. Within thirty seconds we’d each cal ed, “Clear.”

With nothing spectacular to report in my section, I wandered over to Cole’s, where I found him admiring a drum. Shaped like a wine goblet, it came almost to his thigh. “Check this out.” He rubbed the head, which, according to the tag, was covered in goatskin. “It’s an antique.”

“You should come back and buy it,” Kyphas said as she joined us. Cole, looking over her shoulder, gave a short laugh.

“Not on my salary.”

Sterling cal ed to us from a back corner of the store,

“We need to have a family meeting!”

Vayl joined the three of us, and together we found Sterling and Ahmed standing beside a concrete pedestal.

Instead of a statue, it held a wide china bowl painted with blue flowers and green vining leaves. The mage had fil ed it with blue-stained water. And in the middle of the bowl, floating on a spun-glass rose, was the round, marblelike bal from an Enkyklios.

Cole reached for it. “Don’t!” I said. “What, did you total y ditch the class on germ warfare?”

“I might’ve been surfing that day,” he admitted. “Aw, come on, Madame B., don’t rake your fingers into your hair like that. You’l give yourself curly red horns and then I’l be forced to go buy a matador costume.”

I pul ed my hands free, clenching my jaws together as I said, “Wel , you’re not playing in the ocean today. So assume anything you haven’t identified is laced with smal pox until proven otherwise.”

“Okay.” He looked around until he found a couple of mal ets. “Can I pick it up with these?”

“Maybe,” I al owed, “but I don’t want to take the chance of a booby trap blowing us al to smithereens. Sterling?” I pointed to the Enkyklios bal . “Is this rigged?” He shoved Ahmed back to Vayl. From the look on his face, the mage didn’t appreciate being handled like a basketbal , but with his wrists firmly bound al he could do was scowl as Sterling muttered some words over what should be a smal treasure trove of information. He got no response. “It’s clear. And by that I mean it’s not trapped.

And it’s empty. Whatever was recorded on here is long gone.”

I watched Vayl study it, hoping it might trigger a memory as I said to him, “Okay, so we’re in Ahmed’s shop, and we know he’s the mage Roldan hired to mess you up.

But we’ve just found an Enkyklios bal . And we also know that Sister Yalida had an Enkyklios with her before she and the Rocenz disappeared over eighty years ago.

Coincidence?”

Vayl said, “I have very little idea what you are talking about. However I do not believe in coincidences.” I nodded. “I guess some things never change. So we have to ask, why is it here?”

“Symbol?” Cole guessed. “Maybe Ahmed is part of some guild and this is where they meet. But to keep it secret from everybody else they use the Enkyklios bal .” Now he was real y warming up to the idea. “Maybe the bal s are in shops al over the city, you know, to mark where their hidden tunnels come out.”

“Mages are the most solitary of al the Wielders,” Sterling said. “No way is Ahmed part of a guild. Right, buddy?” He shook the mage’s arm, but the only response was a dark red flush that rushed up Ahmed’s neck and didn’t stop until it reached his forehead. My stomach twisted at the thought of how much we were pissing this guy off. The same guy who’d managed to wipe centuries out of Vayl’s mind. And who’d attracted the notice of the most powerful werewolf in Europe. I decided then and there that he could never go free. Not if any one of us wanted to survive to see the fol owing dawn.

“Maybe you want to take him to the office,” I suggested.

“You know, so we can talk a little more freely?” Sterling nodded and jerked the mage back toward the front of the store.

Kyphas said, “I think Sterling’s right. Wouldn’t displaying the Enkyklios bal defeat the purpose of keeping whatever it’s hiding secret?”

Cole’s shoulders dropped. I smacked him on the back.

“It’s okay. You’re stil a badass sniper and one hel of a linguist.”

“What do you think it is?” he asked me.

Before I could answer, Kyphas said, “Maybe it’s a trophy.”

trophy.”

“That sounds plausible,” said Cole, gaining a look of adoration that explained just how far she’d fal en for him.

I glared at her, demanding that my inner crowd think up something cutting to say about what was probably hanging on the wal s at her place. But they seemed to be off their game, because none of them came up with a great retort before the perfect moment had passed. Instead Vayl said,

“I believe Miss Kendrick may be right. However, if Ahmed does take trophies, I have seen several items in this shop that lead me to believe he has a practical purpose for them.

And that he puts them to that use before he displays them.”

“What do you mean?” Cole asked.

He pointed to a wooden instrument hanging on the wal .

Shaped like a viper’s head that’s been smashed by a passing truck, its “fangs” were stretched so far to the front that they had to be connected at the tips by a wooden peg.

Ten ivory strings ran from the peg, over the hole between the “fangs,” back to the head of the instrument.

Vayl took care not to touch the strings as he said, “The vampire who ripped me had spent his humanity as a pirate.

Part of the booty he tore from the last ship he took included a lyre just like that one. He loved to tel the story of the battle he waged just to kil the siren who guarded it.” His eyes locked on Cole’s. “Like the Enkyklios bal , it had carried within it special powers. I can tel you similar stories about that flute and those castanets.” His workman’s fingers brought our attention to simple, everyday products that were only made unique by the way they were displayed.

The flute stood on end, held aloft by a hand carved out of mahogany. The castanets hung from a glittering silver chain that had been secured to the ceiling by four white cup hooks.

“Sterling touched that flute,” I said. “He would’ve picked up anything out of the ordinary on it—if it stil held magic, I mean.”

Vayl nodded and started expounding on his idea that Ahmed had stolen the items primarily so he could drain the magic from them. Old story, real y. Lazy bum oozing with talent but zero work ethic doesn’t want to put in the practice and study time despite the fact that it could lead him onto new paths that no one has ever walked before. Instead he puts his smal store of energy into making off with other people’s treasures.

Teen Me had stopped listening almost after Vayl’s first word. In fact, for the past thirty seconds she’d been running up Granny May’s back porch steps, pausing at the top to jump off, and then running back up them again to repeat the whole process. The entire time she kept repeating, Vayl was ripped! Holy shit! No wonder he never talks about it. It must’ve hurt like a muther not to take a whole year to turn, like every other Vampere. And his, what do you call it?

Sire? Was a pirate? Is that cool, or what?

Or what, I told her. Ripping isn’t something you do out of kindness. It’s harsh, and usually lethal for both sides.

Considering that the vamp turned Vayl’s wife first, we can pretty much bet Vayl’s Sire was psycho.

Was? Or is?

What do you say we never find out?

Vayl had stopped talking. Had come so close to me I could feel his power brushing against mine, a sweet friction I could hardly bear without touching him. I closed my eyes.

“Madame? Are you quite al right?”

I stared at him, my mind a complete blank. Cole came to my rescue. “Now that we’ve scouted the shop, we’d better secure the whole building before we question Ahmed. You know, in case his buddies come back before we’re ready to deal with them. And, uh, our boss is stil bleeding.”

Work. Right. That’ll get me through this. Or kill me.

Sad, right now, that I don’t know which would be worse. I said, “Let’s go old-school and barricade al the doors and windows.”

“I’m on it.” Without even a glance at Kyphas, Cole went off to secure the second floor before finishing the job below.

Ignoring the demon’s pout, I fol owed him up to Ahmed’s living quarters, grabbed a couple of clean T-shirts when I couldn’t locate a first-aid kit, and came back down to find that everyone except our sniper had assembled in the office, a smal room whose wide door opened to the service counter.

Sterling had dropped the mage into a wooden chair on rol ers that creaked like an eighty-year-old man whenever Ahmed shifted his weight. Our warlock had made himself comfortable by sitting on the edge of a battered wooden desk that held a PC, miscel aneous office supplies and, on its other corner, a blood-soaked vampire.

At the opposite end of the room, Kyphas, probably under orders from Sterling, had fil ed his teapot with water and set it on a hot plate that stood on top of a filing cabinet so old the handles had been replaced with knotted bandanas. While she waited for the water to rol , she leaned against the doorframe and stared unwaveringly at Ahmed.

“Tel her to stop,” he final y whispered. “I am a devout man. A Mage of the Seal. I cannot be tempted by feminine flesh.”

Kyphas nodded.

I said, “Did you see that, Ahmed? She’s making a mental note. That’s what hel spawn do. They figure out what you don’t want. Then they offer you everything you think you need.”

“Huh-huh-hel spawn?” he squeaked. “In my shop? Make her leave!”

her leave!”

I went up to Vayl and motioned for him to lift his pants leg. It was work to keep the holy-shit-you’re-missing-a-hunka-yerself! off my face as I began cleaning and bandaging. I managed it by interrogating the asshole who’d made the past few days complete misery for me.

“Ahmed,” I said. “Why would I want Kyphas to go when I’m considering asking her to reach down your throat and rip out your kidneys?”

He cringed. Wow. These pixie-dust types don’t have a whole lotta backbone when their wands are pulled out from underneath them.

“What have you done with Helena?” Vayl demanded.

“What?” Now our prisoner was both scared and bewildered. Good mix? Maybe. You never can tel until it al boils over. Speaking of which, the teapot had begun to whistle. Sterling handed Kyphas a pouch ful of, wel , it looked (and smel ed) like potpourri.

“Dump it al in,” he said. Typical. Leave it to the warlock to keep the secret ingredient to himself until it was time to make real magic.

At the same time Vayl was struggling to stand. I could feel his anger and frustration rising.

“Lord Brâncoveanu—Vasil,” I said. “You’re making this extra hard to—”

“I care only for Helena’s welfare!” Vayl snapped.

Cole poked his head into the door, the barricading evidently up to his standards. “I think I can help.” He strol ed over to Ahmed’s chair, and whispered at length into the mage’s ear. It was almost comical to watch the change come over his face. His expression went from confused and scared to piss-your-pants freaked. Then Sterling’s fun-mix hit the air and he fel into a happy daze.

Natural y we’d al stuffed our nostrils with Sterling’s special wax, so it only felt like we’d been congested for a week.

Wel , al of us but Vayl, who’d flat out refused. Because, as he’d continuously reminded us, warlocks are evil.

When my sverhamin began to smile, I mean real y show fang, I thought, Uh-oh. But Ahmed had hit the confessional and I didn’t want to miss a word.

He looked dreamily into Cole’s eyes and said, “I just wanted the money, that’s al . It takes money to buy components. And more money to experiment with new combinations that wil impress the Ardent enough to convince them to bestow upon you the title of Mage of the Scrol . Roldan had money. Sooooo much money.” Ahmed rol ed his head around to stare at me. “You have lovely hair.

It’s like curly, red wood shavings.”

“Her hair is not red,” Vayl said, wagging his finger at Ahmed like the bad boy had forgotten to take out the trash.

“Sil y.”

“Oh you.” Ahmed circled his head around and grinned foolishly at the vampire, who’d begun shoving his finger forward like he was trying to stab Ahmed with it. Or saw off a piece of butter for his corn on the cob.

Ahmed stared down at his feet. “I think I’m in trouble.”

“Why is that?” I asked.

“Look at my little toe. It’s stopped dancing. You know what that means?”

I caught Sterling’s eyes. He shrugged. “What?” I asked.

His entire face puckered. “I’ve been a bad, bad boy.” He started to cry. Vayl, his forehead crinkling in sympathy, went over to pat him on the shoulder as Ahmed said, “I have scary werewolves living in my basement. You know what they eat for breakfast? Raw sheep’s liver. Liver is supposed to be cooked, you know!”

Cole took my arm and escorted me to the corner of the little office opposite the file cabinet, at which time he asked,

“If I laughed out loud, how hard would you kick my ass?” I shook my head. “This is so not the scene I was I shook my head. “This is so not the scene I was imagining. How are we supposed—oh no. They’re—Cole.

Tel me they’re not…”

He nodded, biting his lip to keep it from betraying him.

“Yes, Madame B., I’m afraid so. Your loveypoo is hugging the mage who cursed him. Who is hugging him back. It’s a total hugfest. Do you want a hug?”

“No!”

Sterling held out his arms and nodded, so Cole and he embraced while giggling idiotical y, and then, of course, Kyphas had to stick her big old boobs into it until everybody in the goddamn room was snuggling like a bunch of drunken idiots doing the Closing Time Dance.

I heard a crack, looked down, and realized I’d just broken the pencil sharpener. When I looked up… huh. I caught Ahmed in the middle of a crafty expression that didn’t fit with his recent behavior. I checked his wrists.

“Sterling! Your cuffs are loose! See what happens when you cuddle during an interrogation?”

“Bound to me!” the warlock shouted just as Ahmed, in a single move, sprang from his seated position to a crouch on the same chair.

Instead of tightening, Sterling’s wand fel off Ahmed’s wrists, dropping to the brown tiled floor as if its two parts held no power at al .

Everyone moved at once.

Sterling dove for the wand, whispering the words that united the halves and twisted them back into a warlock’s conduit.

Kyphas grabbed the teapot off the hot plate. She threw it at Ahmed, screaming, “You might as wel start burning now!”

Seeing the container with its boiling contents flying his way, Ahmed yelped and jumped off his chair toward the desk. The tea splattered against the wal , at which point he jumped again, this time aiming for the filing cabinet.

What is this guy, half bullfrog?

I lunged to intercept him and caught his feet just as he tried to land. He crashed to the floor, squealing with pain as Vayl and Cole landed on top of him.

Sterling came after, waving his wand over Ahmed’s head. As he chanted words under his breath, some of which sounded a lot like curses themselves, I squatted down by the mage so he could see my face. Pul ing out Grief, I made it ready to fire. Then I said, “No more pissing around, you little fuck. You cursed my sverhamin. Now you reverse it. Or I put a hole in your head.” I pressed Grief against his temple.

“They’l kil me!” he protested. I pressed harder. He squal ed, “It’s not that easy to do! I need time to prepare!”

“Or maybe you just need to stop breathing,” I said. “I’l bet that would do the trick. What do you think, Sterling?”

“That could work,” he said easily. “But it makes a hel uva mess. We’d appreciate a few seconds to get clear before you pul the trigger.”

“Hmm, good point. Okay, I’l count down from five, and then Lord Brâncoveanu, you, Sterling, and Berggia back to the door. Okay?”

Vayl, staring at my gun like he’d never seen me, or a firearm before, nodded so slightly I’d never have caught it if I wasn’t clued in to every one of his gestures.

I said, “Five. Four. Three. Two—”

“Al right!” Ahmed wiggled his butt back and forth a couple of times, like he thought he could unbalance the men shoving him into the floor. Then he gave up.

And said, “Legerut. ”

Cole and I snapped our eyes to each other. Stil on his knees beside the mage, he mouthed, Did you feel that?

I nodded.

Ahmed’s spel had slid over me like a mint-scented shiver. But it had moved past me. I looked at Sterling, whose wand hand had risen sharply. For a moment a sparkling blue shield burned around him like a second skin, revealed only by the presence of magic that ran counter to his. Kyphas didn’t act nearly as concerned. I figured she’d only transformed her scarf into the flyssa on the off chance that we’d al ow her to impale Ahmed if this latest move turned out to be another ploy.

I expected Vayl to react least, as usual.

He’d pul ed away from Ahmed, managed to stand before the spel hit. At first he just stared off into the distance, his jaw clenching at whatever played out on that invisible horizon. Then his head jerked back, like something massive had him by the throat.

“Vayl!” I lunged for him, but Cole wrapped his arms around my waist and whispered, “You can’t interfere now,” as Vayl’s hand shot out, the fist that he’d clenched around his cane trembling from the force of his muscles straining, resisting. His other hand went to the wal , through it, and found a beam to brace himself with as his lips sheared back from his teeth in a look of such grinding pain that I moaned his name again.

His eyes came to mine. Locked on. And I swal owed my fear. Instead I poured al the love I felt for him, every ounce of strength, the last shred of my dreams and plans for us into those bruise-tinted eyes, and only when their orange flecks began to fade to honey gold did I remember to breathe. First his hands dropped. Then his head. No one spoke. Or even looked around. We just waited.

Final y Vayl stepped away from the wal and looked down at Ahmed. Only my position al owed me to see the colors changing in his irises. Like the storm clouds that tel you it’s time to run to the basement, now black framed them, and in the centers, a deep, bloody red.

“Vayl,” I whispered.

“I remember.” His voice, so low none of us should have heard it, permeated the room like the rumble of a tsunami.

He lifted Ahmed by the col ar of his jel aba, rising slowly so we could see the mage begin to choke inside his own clothing, observe Vayl grab him by the hair and turn him so he had no choice. He must face the vampire he’d cursed.

“I remember everything you did to me. What you made me relive.” He fastened his hand around Ahmed’s neck, lifted and shoved so that the mage moved on the tips of his toes, holding on to Vayl’s wrists to prevent a fal . His eyes were so wide I half expected them to pop out and rol down his cheeks as he stared into the blizzard of cold fury he’d unleashed. Though Cole and I were mostly immune to Vayl’s powers, we stil shivered as icicles began to form in Ahmed’s nose hairs and every exhalation pasted another layer of frost around the rim of his mouth.

“It wasn’t me!” he insisted. “Roldan—”

“I wil see to him in due course,” Vayl said. “But you had a choice. You took your pay. You wound your spel .” They’d moved into the shop now, and what could we do but fol ow?

We watched, silent witnesses as Vayl slammed Ahmed against a wal , sending brass instruments of al shapes and sizes crashing to the floor. The dissonant shriek of sound accompanied the mage’s moan.

Vayl said, “You shoved me back into a hel I thought I had escaped. You tore me from the woman I cannot survive without. This wil not stand.” His free hand went to Ahmed’s chest.

Holy Christ, is he gonna rip out his heart? I stepped forward.

Ahmed blubbered, “Wait! Please! The redhead said you needed information on the bauble in my back room.

The Enkyklios bal ? It’s part of Roldan’s payment! I can tel you why he had it in the first—ulp!”

Vayl shook his head. “No. You are done.” He covered Ahmed’s open mouth, stil wagging with suggestions and excuses, with the hand that had threatened his heart. And suddenly al of the bel s in the shop began to clang. The breeze, focused by his cantrantia so that only the mage felt the ful effect of Vayl’s power as a Wraith, came cold as an Arctic storm, splintered into his eyebal s, iced his veins, turned his skin blue. Before Vayl had finished even Ahmed’s fingernails had frozen solid.

Vayl turned, looked at us silently.

I knew the moment required something immense from me. But before I could dredge up the right response the front door flew open, Cole’s cabinet barricade splintering like rotten wood under the onslaught of two massive werewolves. The platinum streaks in the larger wolf along with his big-eared rider proved that he and his Luureken would have to be put down the old-fashioned way. The second wolf’s dark brown fur marked him as the one we’d seen hip-deep in oranges with no partner in sight. Now we knew his rider was a dimpled blonde with hate burning like hel fire in her eyes.

The Luureken each brandished a raes in one hand and a fury so deep it seemed to paint the doorway black. We only hesitated a beat or two, but in that time Vayl had already moved to meet them. He left Ahmed to fal like a block of glacial ice behind him and sent the gale of his rage ahead of him, knowing we had our own ways of dealing with his fal out.

The Luureken didn’t. They froze in their seats, the spittle from their furious shrieks beading like pearls on their cheeks. Their Weres, whose wounds had taken on the pink of new tissue from the outside, evidently stil hadn’t ful y pul ed together on the inside. Because I could hear those torn and shattered tissues crackle and break like thin ice.

Their mouths opened, fearsome howls cut off instantly by the rime building inside their throats. And that was al the time we needed.

I hauled Grief out of its holster like a gunfighter in a ten-step standoff. Pumped every bit of ammo I had left into the bodies of those two wolves. And watched them fal with about as much satisfaction as I felt when I witnessed my towels spinning in the dryer.

Cole shot a single round into the leader’s Luureken, sending it tumbling out of the doorway in a shower of destroyed wood and blood splatter.

The female berserker just sat where she’d rol ed when her mount had gone down, stil paralyzed by Vayl’s attack.

We gathered around it. Kyphas nudged it with her toe. It blinked so slowly we could hear the frost on its eyelids crackle.

“Now what?” asked Cole.

We al jumped as the other Luureken came flying back through the door and slammed into a huge gong that Ahmed had erected, making such a racket that everybody with the exception of Vayl covered their ears. I wanted to assume the body-thrower was an al y, but the crouch I took reminded me not to hesitate too long because bad guys had ways of putting you off your guard too. Then Raoul fol owed the body through the door, his face such a dark shade of red I’d have suspected imminent heart attack if he hadn’t already, you know, gone over.

“Pick up your trash!” he thundered as he glared at the five of us, giving the rest of the dead only a brief glance. He slammed his fist against the doorframe and al the shattered door pieces pul ed back together, closing the shop behind him. “And while you’re at it, dump this in the garbage too!” He shoved Astral into my arms.

She looked up at me, her eyes crossing slightly as they met mine. “Hel o!”

met mine. “Hel o!”

“Hey, kittybot.” I gave her a brief inspection, did the same for Raoul, and took a wild guess at the problem.

“Astral, tel me you didn’t freak out Raoul’s girl.” Raoul waved me off. “Astral was fine,” he snapped, his accent thicker than I’d ever heard it. “Better than that. She was so charming I was surprised little birds didn’t appear and start singing as they flew tiny circles around her head.” I felt the knot in my chest loosen. If my cat had ruined Raoul’s chance at romance I wasn’t sure I could forgive her.

Cole decided to be daring and ask, “What happened?”

“Nia spent our entire date cooing over that dratted half animal.” He threw up his arms. “How was I supposed to know she was a cat lady?”

I holstered Grief and tried desperately to make the transition from Were-kil er to Spirit Guide confidant.

“What? ”

“She told me she had twenty-four cats when she was human. Liked them better than people!” He nodded to assure me I hadn’t heard him wrong. “How can you like a cat better than a person? They don’t even talk!”

“Hel o.” Was it my imagination, or did Astral sound offended?

I looked at Cole and shrugged. “I got nothing.” Cole murmured, “I could tel him there are other fish in the sea, but he’s not going to want to hear that for at least a couple of weeks.”

Vayl stepped forward. “Raoul, I have just remembered that you and I barely get along. Would you agree?”

“I suppose so,” Raoul said careful y.

“I think, in this case, that is to your advantage. As is the fact that I am older and, therefore, a great deal more experienced in these matters than you.”

Raoul’s mouth dropped slightly, but he nodded like he was wil ing to hear Vayl out.

“You wil feel better if you kil something evil. And we seem to have happened on a generous supply.” He motioned to the wolves, al of which would recover to attack us again. Unless Raoul wanted to send them into the next world—which he could pretty much do with a word and a tap on the head.

I knew he was giving the idea serious consideration when he took a look around the place, his eyes resting on broken displays, the casualties, our diverse array of weaponry.

“You people need your own cleanup crew, you know that?”

I said, “Does that mean you’re staying?”

“What’s the upside for you?” my Spirit Guide asked.

I pointed at the surviving Luureken. “They seem to have some Rocenz-related information.”

Vayl asked, “Do you recognize this breed?” Raoul nodded, suddenly sober. “How do you intend to get them to talk? I’ve never seen a berserker articulate enough to get past a scream.”

We al looked at Sterling as Vayl said, “You have never seen the greatest warlock on earth in action either.”

“Then I’l dispatch these Weres for you, shal I?” Raoul asked.

We nodded, except for Sterling, who pointed to the frozen female and said, “Leave her to me.” CHAPTER NINETEEN

Are you sure you want to do this?” asked Raoul. It was the third time he’d said it, confirming his unease with our plan, which was, I’l admit, one of our most grisly. My Spirit Guide leaned against the desk in Ahmed’s office with his arms crossed, the extra creases in his uniform reflecting his agitation as a framed picture of King Mohammed VI grinned over his shoulder.

I looked up from the corpse whose forearm skin I was carving off with my bolo and was glad for once that Vayl wasn’t there to see me despite the fact that Sterling’s spel , and this particular component of it, had al been his idea.

Which was, maybe, why he’d volunteered to keep watch over the one Were Raoul hadn’t sent to the netherworld—

the female Luureken who was stil mostly an ice pop with rage fil ing lying beside the front door.

She was alone at the front now, because at Sterling’s direction we’d dragged al the dead back to the office. Then Cole and Kyphas had gone out to find the bodies of the other Luureken. Their job was to bring back pieces of at least two of them, which were also necessary for his spel .

Impossible? Maybe for anyone else. I gave them even odds.

I glanced at Raoul, whose grimace told me he was less grossed out, but more offended, than me. I said, “What is it?”

“Mutilating corpses is a crime,” Raoul informed me.

“So is trying to kil us.” I finished slicing off a patch about three inches square and threw it in the middle of the floor. The slap of dead flesh against cold tile made my teeth ache. I hit the bathroom to clean up, and by the time I came out Cole and Kyphas had returned, pale but triumphant.

Predictably, the demon was the one who presented Sterling with their prizes.

“On the floor with the other one,” he told them, pointing to where he’d be working.

Cole sank onto the chair, not even protesting when Kyphas began to rub his shoulders. He just stared at the two flaps of skin they’d retrieved as Raoul asked, “What is the purpose of this ceremony?”

I stood in the doorway, unable to let Vayl out of my sight for long, and said, “We’re raising the ghosts of the Luureken we kil ed.”

Sterling knelt over the skins, adding his own mix of herbs and powders. He hummed under his breath, the lightning-trapped sphere of his amulet swinging in wide circles as he moved.

Raoul asked, “How is that possible? Sterling’s no medium.”

“Nope. But then, they won’t be real ghosts, so it’s a good balance.”

He nodded. “Ah, il usory spirits?”

“The best kind. Of course, our little berserker in there wil think they’re real ghosts. And that’s al we need.” He glanced up. Muttered something I couldn’t understand.

Cole asked, “Getting a text from the saint patrol, Raoul?”

“They’re out of their comfort zone again.” His eyes glittered as he glanced at me. “It should please you to know they’ve actual y come up with their own phrase for the danger you put me in, which doubles as their order for me to return to base.”

“What is it?” Cole demanded.

“DEFCON Parks.”

“DEFCON Parks.”

I moaned. “That’s just lame.”

Raoul chuckled. “And now you’ve described half the Eldhayr.”

I cocked my head, realizing suddenly the risk Raoul had taken saving my life. Vouching for me with the bigwigs upstairs. Showing when I cal ed despite the fact that my closest relationship was with a creature who’d al but trashed his soul. “How much trouble do you get into hanging out with me?”

A sudden, rare smile. “Only enough to make it worth my while.”

I walked over to stand beside him. He stiffened a little when my shoulder brushed his, but relaxed almost immediately. “I think they’l clear you for this deal. It looks nasty from the outside, but Sterling’s got tight control of the situation. We know whatever we can find out about the Weres and the Enkyklios bal could get us a lot closer to the Rocenz. Al we’re gonna do is some creative information gathering.”

Vayl said, “And if that does not work, you should leave.

Because I wil not relent until the Luureken has told me what I need to know in order to free Jasmine.” He’d come to the doorway, his fierce expression reminding me more of Lord Brâncoveanu than my sverhamin. I felt a heavy weight settle on my chest, but before it could sink in he said, “She has suffered long enough. I wil have an end to it.” I hadn’t realized how much I’d missed having Vayl in my corner until that moment, when it was al I could do not to run sobbing into his arms like some spineless airhead. I turned to Sterling. “How’s it going?”

“Give me some room,” he replied.

We shuffled into the open space behind the counter, each of us taking turns watching him work and gauging the mood of the thawing Luureken that stil sprawled in the blood of her comrades. Cole pul ed out his Beretta and stepped away from Kyphas’s ful -body lean, making her plant both feet wide to keep from stumbling. She nearly stepped on Astral, who sat quietly at Raoul’s feet like he’d found her off switch. He crouched down and ran a finger along her forehead and back between her ears, making them twitch to the side. The other hand reached down and pressed into the heel of his boot. When his thumb jerked back, the hilt of a knife came with it. He pul ed it free and stood, holding it comfortably at his side, a shining blade just long enough to pierce a Luureken’s heart.

Sterling ignored our preparations because he was stil busy with his own. He added a few more dried leaves to the pile, whispered over it, “Shades of shades, rise and speak, mouth my words.”

His amulet seemed to be moving on its own now, drawing a circle around the pile on the floor. He hesitated another second. Then he brought his left hand up to the chain, pul ed the necklace straight and stil . A bolt of shiny silver light shot from its glittering center down onto the concoction. It caught fire, burned white-hot, and then stopped, leaving nothing but ash behind.

He leaned over again, only this time he drove his fist into the pile. Sparks flew from his ring as the ash exploded into the air. It reminded me of a volcanic eruption, only in miniature. When Sterling stepped back, however, not a single speck of the material had settled on him.

“Where’d it go?” I whispered.

“Around,” he assured me.

“Uh-huh.” I looked at the ceiling doubtful y. “Nothing seems different to me.”

Sterling’s jaw worked itself long enough that I realized I’d just insulted him. I sighed. Why did I always land the bril iant, sensitive types? “I’m just asking you what the Luureken is going to see that I’m not,” I said.

“Oh.” He glanced at Vayl, who raised an eyebrow.

“Her words often take more than a single meaning,” my sverhamin explained. “Perhaps this would be a good rule for you to remember before the two of you end up destroying another building.”

I stared up at him, thinking, Oh, so he knew all along.

Yeah, Pete probably trotted out all the gory details of my solo exploits for him. And still he demanded to bring me on as his assistant. Which is kind of how I feel right now.

Back to square one, before he’d even looked at me sideways. Which isn’t fair. Maybe he feels just as confused as I do. Who’s ever going to know with a guy who signals his deepest emotions with a twitch?

Save it for later, I answered myself as I turned away from him and locked my hands behind my back. We’re working, so let’s work. And if we’re going to ignore the fact that we both decided to gloss over what should’ve been a major reunion moment, then fine. It would’ve been weird with an audience anyway. Especially considering the fact that Vayl’s first reaction to becoming uncursed was to kill the guy.

Then I felt his hands slide over mine. Cirilai had ridden up my finger. He pushed it back down, then raised my arms just enough so he could push forward, press his hips into my back. The rumble of his voice worked like a bel , ringing through my body as he said, “I am curious as wel , Sterling.

Wil the il usions only be visible to the Luureken?” Sterling’s smile seemed to acknowledge more than the question as he looked down at the original spot of his spel .

“You’l see the il usions. She’l see ghosts. And hear them, in whatever language they were in the habit of speaking. I’d rate the freak-out factor at about a nine and a half.” I felt a grin play at the corner of my lips, now that I understood. And especial y now that Vayl’s thumbs were rubbing my palms while his fingers wrapped my wrists so tight it felt like he never planned to let go.

Less than fifteen seconds later the two Luureken whose remains Cole and Kyphas had salvaged rose out of the floor. Even though Sterling had only created echoes of their spirits, I felt their rage like needles rol ing along the length of my exposed skin, an acid-green hatred that spewed on everything it touched.

How such ordinary-looking people could contain al that madness I couldn’t guess. At first glance they resembled a couple of child-sized grown-ups dressed in street clothes.

But you can’t hide real evil. The man who’d masqueraded as the snake-photo sel er’s son had come, the scar crawling along his face and down to his neck like an active disease. Joining him was the flame-eyed girl that Sterling and Kyphas had original y marked. Her scars, which had been even deeper in life than her partner’s, pulsed as if she stil had a heartbeat.

“I’m going to fuck somebody up,” she said to her partner, her voice high as a child’s as they paused by Ahmed’s desk.

“We’re dead, Cleahd,” said the man. “You don’t get more fucked up than this.” It was supposed to be a joke, but neither of them laughed. They just stared at each other with eyes the color of burning logs that kept getting brighter, and hotter, until I began to be amazed one of them didn’t burst out screaming.

Final y Cleahd shoved the knuckles of her first two fingers against her lips and said, “Wrul , one of us is stil alive. Don’t you feel it? She’s waiting.’” Sterling caressed the ring on his pinkie and whispered, mouthing the words Wrul spoke moments later.

“We have to talk to her,” he said. “Come on.” Ignoring us as if we were just a set of drums Ahmed had decided to use as doorstops until he had time to price us, they drifted into the hal and toward the surviving Luureken, who was just beginning to sit up. They sat across from her, staring into her confused face as they tucked their knees under their chins and wrapped their arms around them like schoolgirls preparing to play a good game.

At nearly the same time the third il usion walked through the front door. It was the leader’s rider, looking so real that I reached for Grief before my brain reminded my hand that Sterling was just that good.

The first two berserkers looked at the new arrival and whispered his name, “Nedo,” worshipful y. Then they waited for him to speak, like it was his job to ask the questions they wanted answered. Weird how the rules of life fol ow into the afterlife, and then even into the magical faking of it.

I glanced at Sterling. He’d closed his eyes. I thought I heard him chanting as Nedo leaned over the wild-eyed survivor, grinning with huge enjoyment when she yelped and crab walked straight back into a bin ful of maracas, knocking it over and spil ing them with a clash that official y made Ahmed’s the loudest scene I’d ever lingered at after the kil ings were over. I hoped the neighbors wore earplugs to bed.