Blood Trade

CHAPTER 14 Try Not to Poison Me

Before I could ask, Kathyayini continued, “I don’t got so much time, so listen. Long years past was cold iron, blood, three cursed trees, and lightning. Red iron will set you free.” Which made no freaking sense. She rocked some more, her blue dress emerging from and falling into shadows, the crevices of her face deepening and softening, like the way the moon shadows show the folded hills and valleys of the Smoky Mountains—the Appalachians. Kathyayini added, “All that is for later, not for today. Today is for this: shadow and blood are a dark light buried beneath the ground.” Neither riddle made sense, but I had learned that they weren’t meant to. They were simply meant to light a path into a possible future.

“The one you seek,” Kathyayini said, “she is bound to the earth. She didn’t mean to be bound, but she cannot get away now.”

“Uh huh. Okay.” My phone buzzed like a hornet in my pocket, but when I reached for it, it wasn’t there. Yet I still felt the buzzing in my pocket, against my thigh.

Something was very, very wrong. I had told Eli that the church might not really be here in our reality, but I hadn’t considered what that might mean about where I’d be if I went inside. “Kathyayini, where am I?”

She waved her hand as if waving away my question. “Neither here nor there. Nor any place in between.”

“How do I get back?”

“You done asking questions of me?”

Not really, but I didn’t want to stay wherever I was. “For now. Thank you.”

Kathyayini tossed me something and I identified it as I caught it. A coin, larger than a penny, heavier than a quarter. The metal felt cold, the engraving smooth and ancient. “You want me again, you come here at night and put that coin on the ground. I’ll come.” She waved the back of her hand at me, like shooing a fly. “Go now. We talk later, if you need.”

Behind me, the church doors opened, allowing in a strong breeze that swept through, making the candle flame flicker and sputter. I backed slowly toward the old church doors, my eyes on Kathyayini. When the door appeared in my peripheral vision, I turned and went out into the night and down the steps. And remembered to breathe. A fog had roiled up outside, moving on the breeze in fitful gusts of shadow and white, and I couldn’t see anything except the old trees just to my sides, which I was sure hadn’t been there before.

The church doors slammed shut, making me jump and turn. Behind me, the church was gone. “Crap. Crap, crap, crap,” I whispered.

“Jane?” a voice called, sounding muffled and distant, directionless in the heavy air.

“I’m here,” I shouted.

“Where? Say again!” Eli appeared in the mist, both hands clutching weapons, a nine mil in his right hand, his shooting hand, and a vamp-killer in his left. He brought up the gun, centering it on my chest, finger resting gently on the trigger. I had no doubt the gun was ready to fire.

I raised my hands. “Easy there, Eli.”

“Prove to me you are who you look like.”

That was a weird request, but no weirder than anything else had been lately. “I want a steak, still mooing, hold the salad.”

“And?”

Weirder and weirder. “And your brother, the computer geek criminal, wants ravioli. What about you?”

“I eat the steak and the salad. With beer.”

“I’m guessing these were identifiers. What’s going on?”

Eli approached slowly, growing firmer out of the fog. “Open your mouth.”

I frowned but opened my mouth and stuck out my tongue. “You want me to say ah too?”

“Nope.” He sheathed the knife and ejected the round from the chamber before he holstered the weapon. “Just looking for fangs.”

I tucked my chin uncertainly. “Say what?”

“You are the third Jane Yellowrock I’ve seen in the past two hours, and the others had fangs. I staked them both and took their heads, but when I did, they vanished, body and head. Illusions, but with tactile stimuli.”

“You staked me and killed me.” My tone went flat.

“Yeah. It sucked killing you too. Especially the first time. It was easier the second time.”

I wanted to laugh, but I knew he was serious. The fog rolled in thicker, as if trying to separate us, and Eli stepped closer, until his sleeve brushed mine. “Stick close. This way out. By the way, where are we?”

“An old Indian woman I saw said ‘neither here nor there.’”

“Yeah. That’s what I thought.”

Which seemed a little strange, but fit the evening so far. Around us, the fog thinned and the wind that caused the white to roll and billow fell still. And suddenly we stepped to the curb and into the street. I looked back and saw only an empty lot, narrow and filled with saplings. No fog.

“I want to go back to Miss Esmee’s,” I said.

“Yeah. And have a good, stiff drink.”

I said nothing to that as we got in the SUV and drove sedately away. I looked back once and saw a hint of white fog, but that was all. Then I faced front and said nothing, studying the coin by the streetlights we passed. It was blackened, but I could make out the head of a dragon on one side, a dragon with huge spiked teeth. I turned the old coin over and over in my fingers as the sun rose, ending the strange night with a wash of pale pink, shrimp, and soft persimmon clouds against a golden sky.

• • •

Back at Esmee’s, I knocked on the Kid’s door. When he opened it, he was wearing a sheet and the stink of garlic and sweat; he needed a shower. Badly. I handed him the coin. “Shower and get logged on. Tell me about this—everything you can find. What it is, where it came from.”

“Breakfast,” he croaked.

“Shower. I’ll whip up some eggs.”

“Try not to poison me.” The door closed.

“Funny guy,” I murmured. In my room, I toed off my boots, tossed my clothes on the bed and pulled on a stretchy tee and soft sweater, with clean jeans and fuzzy socks with half boots against the cold floors. Louisiana might not have what I think of as cold winters, but the house was chilly. Downstairs, I didn’t have to worry about poisoning the Kid, because his brother was already frying eggs and bacon, making toast, and percolating coffee. He even had tea steeping under a padded tea doily. “You’re not worried about taking over Jameson’s kitchen?” I asked as I poured a mug of strong black tea and added a slice of fresh lemon.

“I asked permission. He wasn’t thrilled,” Eli said as he slid a pile of scrambled eggs onto a plate, “but I promised to keep Esmee away from the battlefield, and we reached an accord.”

“Ah. So. What’s today’s schedule?”

“Sleep. At least eight hours. Then I say we chase some Naturaleza vamps and take a few heads.”

I hid my smile behind my cup and sipped. “You got any idea where we should look?”

“Yeah. Alex collated the addresses of properties owned by the fangheads on Hieronymus’ kill list and compared them to properties owned by Silandre and Esther. They’re on my bed, listed in order from most likely to least likely. I say we pick one, go in a few hours before sunset, and clean house.” He dished up a rasher of bacon and put my plate in front of me before filling two more. Knowing I should wait for the rest of the expected diners, I dug in. Good manners were never my strong suit. I was better at killing things.

The Kid joined us at the table shortly, his wet hair straggling down his neck, sticking to his dark skin, dribbling onto his vintage Grateful Dead tee. He was wearing sweatpants and smelled a lot better, like strawberry shampoo. He set his laptop and the coin on the breakfast-room table and shoveled in bites while he logged in and started a search. Silent and comfortable with that silence, we ate. When we ran out of bacon and eggs, Eli got up and slid more onto our plates, having left the food cooking on the stove and timed it just right.

By the time I cleaned my plate with a triangle of toast and poured myself a second cup of tea, the Kid was done. Still wordless, he spun the tiny laptop around and pushed it to me. On the screen was an exact replica of my coin, a dragon head on one side, and what looked like a wagon wheel inside a square frame on the other. Of course, my coin was blacked with tarnish and filth. “Head of Ketos. Greek silver coin,” the Kid said as he poured another cup of coffee, starting to wake up. “Ketos was a sea serpent. Latin was Cetus. There’s a constellation by that name. Probably worth something on today’s market as a collectable and just for the silver.”

Sea serpent, not dragon. Somehow that made me feel better. “Huh.” I studied the coin. “Wonder how an old Choctaw woman got one.” When no one answered, I tucked it in a pocket and sipped my tea. Eli read a newspaper, a real paper newspaper, the New York Times, and the crinkle of paper and stink of ink took me back to my earliest days in the children’s home. Usually there were eight children in one house, and a married couple, sometimes with children of their own, living there with them, in an attempt to give the children the American ideal of a two-parent, two-gender family. The housefather had read the newspaper every morning, absorbed just like Eli, the smell and sound so distinctive. His name was Carlton. Or maybe Kevin. Something like that.

Eli said, “Media is reporting the number of deaths due to vamps. Locals are having meetings about it.”

“Yeah?” I said. “Maybe they can bore the fangheads to death with their meetings.”

Eli snorted. “Civilians.” It wasn’t a compliment.

Silent as a cat, Rick entered the room and peered into the empty frying pans. “Bro, that’s evil to fill the house with bacon smells and not leave a man any.”

Eli offered one of his microsmiles and said, “Feel free to cook anything you want. Or you can wait on Jameson. He’ll feed you after eight.”

“I’ll cook,” a soft voice said from behind. It was Soul, and I realized that she had been nearby for quite a while, her scent on the air. Today she smelled blue with touches of rain, which was weird, but that was what Beast thought. Soul handed Rick a cell. “You talk. It’s Monica.” Rick’s skin went a faint pink, and his breathing changed. His pheromones shifted from hunger into pleasure.

Rick has another woman in his life.

He wandered out of the room and toward the back door, his voice sounding far too interested, nearly cooing. Beast hissed with displeasure. I sipped tea, feeling a sense of space open up inside me, wide and empty. I wasn’t sure what I was feeling, but it wasn’t happy. It was empty and lonely and . . . betrayed. Yeah. How stupid was that? Feeling betrayed because my boyfriend-who-wasn’t was chatting up some girl named Monica. Monica. Bet she had blond hair and big boobs and humongous green eyes. Or blue eyes. Yeah. Wonder how she’d look after tangling with Beast. A wry frown drew my mouth.

Eli got up and left. Alex picked up his tiny computer and wandered away, engrossed.

The sound of sizzling bacon rose from the hot frying pan. I sipped, but the tea had gone cold. After a few minutes, my lack of sleep caught up with me and my eyes started to close of their own volition. Rick still hadn’t come back in. I stood and said, “Night.” Soul didn’t reply, so I headed up the stairs, except that my feet went the other way, to the back door where Rick had gone, and outside.

I smelled him in the distance, his voice a murmur. And then he laughed. Heat shot through me, the heat of anger, the heat of jealousy, spiked and scorching. I wanted to go to him and break the phone into little pieces. And then break him into little pieces.

Instead I slipped silently to the garage and inside. I stood in the darkness, letting my eyes adjust, letting my nose tell me the state of the caged vamp’s health. I heard him breathing, scenting me as well. He was awake. And he no longer smelled sick. He smelled dry and dusty, like old ashes, dead roaches, and shed snakeskins. And he also smelled vaguely meaty, like a raw steak left out at room temp too long. Disgust made my shoulders cringe and made me want to look behind me for ambush, but there was nothing there. I knew that.

I moved through the dark to his cage, whispering. “Hey there, you blood-sucking piece of crap. Is it time for you to die, Francis?”

He didn’t answer. Something slithered across metal and I drew on Beast’s vision to see in the dark. Everything went sharply silver and green, the silver bars of the vamp cage looking like something out of a Disney movie, the thing inside like something out of a Wes Craven or Gregg Hoffman horror film. I leaned against the limo nearby, my weight on my left elbow—and was glad when an alarm didn’t go off—and studied the thing. It was vaguely humanoid, but its eyes were multifaceted, like a fly’s, black and sparkling. His chest was covered by a carapace, gleaming and dark, maybe brown. His hands were trying to transform into pincers, like a crab’s claws, and they were a shimmery dark shade, maybe blue. The transformation had been fast. He was still wearing pants, which was a blessing. His feet were unchanged, except for the toenails, which had grown out curved and thick, like a really bad case of toenail fungus. I let my mouth curl at the thought, knowing from the swivel of his eyes that he could still see in the dark better than I could. Vamp vision was better than Beast’s.

My big-cat growled deep inside and padded close. In Beast’s vision, with the lights off, I could see the faint shimmer of magics on the vamp’s transforming body. And now, standing still and close, I could smell the magics, oddly familiar beneath the ammoniac stench, but the memory wouldn’t come. I let it slide away for now.

“The Cajun vamps. They got you some food?”

“Not enough,” the vamp said, the consonants sounding mushy, as if his mouth didn’t work right anymore. “Hungry.”

“Fame Vexatum,” I said. “Get used to it. If you live, it’ll be the only way you will survive.”

“I would rather die,” Francis said after a long silence.

“That won’t be a problem, actually. In fact, you’ve become a liability. The longer you stay here, the more you heal and transform, the greater chance that you’ll cause me problems.”

“Yes. You speak the truth. You smell of anger.”

“Yep. I’m pretty unhappy. So you give me something right now, something I can use to find my friend, Misha. Something I can use to locate Narkis and Zoltar. Something that will take me to the leader of the Naturaleza. Something. Or I’ll kill you. That’s simple enough.”

He tilted his head, and I realized that his neck had grown thicker and was jointed. Ick. “Our leader, if we had one, would need to communicate with us, mind to mind.”

“Yeah. So?”

“That is my gift. If you are wise, you might determine what it means.”

My whole face scrunched up. “Say what?” The vamp in the cage turned his head away. I shrugged and said, “No more food until you talk, Francis. Not one drop.” I left the garage.

Without looking into the shadows that might be hiding Rick, I entered the B and B, climbed the stairs, and found my bed. Or I’m moderately sure I did, because I woke up lying on my stomach, face mostly buried in pillow, fully clothed, hours later. The sun was still up, light slanting through the blinds. I no longer felt empty inside. Rick had moved on to Monica. I could accept that. I had hurt him so badly when I accused him of killing me that, of course he moved on. Who wouldn’t?

I blinked, lashes hitting the sheets. I didn’t like that Rick had a girlfriend. But I didn’t have to like it. I just had to live with it. I sighed, feeling the mattress move under me.

“I don’t need a guy,” I mumbled into the linen. “I love this bed, and it’s better than any guy.” The memory foam was even better than the mattress back at the freebie house in New Orleans, and that was saying a lot. I rolled over and stretched, pulling muscles that felt a lot better than they had recently. Shifting had been good for me, and when I’d shifted back, I had kept all the hard-earned muscles. I hadn’t been sure I would.

I made my way to the bath, stripped, and stumbled into the tub and beneath a scalding hot spray of water. I stayed that way for a long, long time, breathing in the steam, before I soaped and shampooed and shaved off all the body hair that had grown back with the shift. Feeling better, I shut off the water and wrapped one towel around my head and my body in another; this one was huge, bigger than a beach towel and ten times fluffier. I shoved the shower curtain.

I froze, steam swirling around me. Bruiser leaned against the counter, his arms crossed, his head tilted slightly to the side, an intense look on his face.

He was shirtless, his arms to his sides, lightly gripping the marble countertop at his back, his dress pants hanging low on his hips and resting over his bare arches. A coiling tension stirred within me—Beast rising.

Scattered on the counter behind Bruiser was an electric razor with three large circulating heads, an old-fashioned shaving brush and modern razor, a green deodorant bottle, toothpaste tube and toothbrush, what looked like bottles and jars of cosmetics, and a man’s black leather zippered toiletries bag. There was also a man’s shirt on a hanger, a tie draped around the neck, and a pair of men’s socks on the floor. I’d been too sleepy when I entered to see any of that stuff.

Crap. Bruiser had taken the room next to mine.

Bruiser, who had betrayed me.

Icy heat flushed through me from the soles of my feet to the top of my scalp. I had to stop and swallow down the acidic fury. The memory of being held down as Leo and his heir— My breath stopped in my throat as the remembered pain flashed through me again, the feel of fangs tearing through my throat, ripping, cutting; none of the painkilling, laving tenderness of a true feeding, but the torment of a forced feeding. Tears filled my eyes and one hand lifted to my throat to rest there, my pulse pumping hard beneath my fingers. “You let him force a feeding from me.”

Bruiser’s eyes were hard and hot with some emotion I couldn’t name, some strange combination of anger and self-loathing and unknown purpose. But he didn’t say anything; he just stood there, leaning against the counter, his gaze penetrating.

“I know we’ve talked about this,” I said. “I know I should just be able to forgive and forget. But I still remember. Every time I see you, I remember.”

He didn’t move. He scarcely breathed. Waiting for something I didn’t understand.

“I know,” I said, my throat growing tight and painful with unshed tears, “that you were blood-drunk. I realize that you were dead and the priestess brought you back to life and that assuming command of your own mind after something like that must be nearly impossible. I truly understand that you had no control. But still . . . you let it happen. You were there. Letting them . . .” I took a breath that ached all the way into my lungs, “letting them hurt me.”

Stupid tears rolled out of my eyes and slid down my cheeks. Burning. I caught them on the back of my hand and wiped them on the towel. My fingers were shaking and colder than they should have been on my hot face. I opened my mouth, taking in a breath, scenting the man before me, a tangy scent, prickly and warm, the color of sunlight on sand in Beast’s mind. My big-cat was staring at Bruiser through my eyes, watching him like prey. Silent, she nudged me, and I said, “You have to say something now. I’m done.”

His jaw bunched and relaxed, bunched and relaxed. A soft plop of water hit the drain from the showerhead. Bruiser opened his mouth. “I would—” He stopped and took a slow breath. His hands tightened on the marble, fingers whitening before he relaxed. “I would give,” he said, his voice rough, “everything I am to keep you from being hurt. And that includes my freedom.” I didn’t reply, and another drop fell, measuring the silences between us.

“Freedom?” I asked. How does a blood-servant get freedom? Bruiser shrugged, his steam-damp shoulder moving stiffly. He went on more softly, “I remember, in my nightmares, the feel of your body.” I took a sharp breath, loud in the silence. “My hands holding you still. I remember the fear and the shock of being unable to move. Being frozen. I couldn’t stop them.” He shifted on the counter, putting one hand back flat against the marble. “I couldn’t stop myself. I was totally, completely under compulsion. For that I deserve for you to hate me. But I—”

He stopped again and raked his fingers through his hair, making it stand up straight and spiked, damp from the steam. “But it seems no matter what I do, I’m treading on your pain. As now. I am here because Leo sent me.”

I didn’t gasp or drop my towel, but whatever crossed my face made his mouth wrench to the side. He looked at the floor, his hair curling in the steam. Speaking to the tiles, he said, “I’ll never keep anything from you, Jane. Even when it may be uncomfortable. Painful.” Seconds went by. The shower dripped, loud in the silence.

I shuddered out a breath, feeling my throat relax just a hair, just a hint. A tear fell across my cheek, but this one felt different. No longer hot and burning. “Why did Leo send you?”

“He hired you in New Orleans for a job none of us could do. And you did that job, even when it meant killing his son. In his own way, he respects that. Before he sent me here, Leo said, ‘Jane Yellowrock has a propensity for luck.’” The words were stilted, a perfect mimic of Leo. He went on, imitating the MOC. “‘She looks for the truth, no matter how unappetizing, and uncovers it, much like a muckraker or a gravedigger, but one who carries a stake and knows how to use it.’” Bruiser chuckled, but there was no humor in the sound.

“When he heard that Mithrans were changing shape in Natchez, Leo arranged to get you involved. Some of his people told Hieronymus about you.”

Silently, everything began to click into place. Some of his people . . . Like Reach. Son of a gun. “He couldn’t just up and send me himself. That would imply that he forgave Hieronymus, which isn’t the fanghead way, not without a lot of bowing and scraping and pleading on Big H’s part, but he could make sure things were okay in his territory.”

Bruiser nodded. “Politics.”

“I hate politics. And vamp politics more than most.” I stared at the primo until his eyes lifted from the floor to me. “Can I ask questions?” I asked.

“I presume that you mean something more along the line of an interrogation.”

“Pretty much. But I need to get dressed.”

“I like you the way you are.”

The last of the pain seemed to ease away at his amused tone, and I said, “Tough. Give a girl some privacy. “

Bruiser shrugged and left the bathroom, letting in colder air before he shut the door. I shivered hard and clutched the damp towel. I went to my own room and was dressed in thirty seconds, my T-shirt sticking to my damp skin. I was braiding my hair when the primo entered my room from the bath. He was wearing a dress shirt with a subtle pattern in the weave and the dress pants, wrinkled from the steam. He stopped in the doorway and stood there, watching, as my fingers twisted and tugged my wet hair, saying nothing, his face as impassive as a vamp’s. For reasons I didn’t understand and didn’t want to explore, I didn’t ask what he was thinking.

“Twenty questions,” he reminded me.

“Tell me what you mean about having freedom.”

“What else do you want to know?” he murmured. He shoved the covers out of the way and sat on my bed. The action was odd, as if it was summertime and the comforter was hot.

“Months ago, we were fighting vamps here in Natchez. I finished off mine, and you finished off yours, and I said something. I don’t remember what. But you whirled on me, swords out. And you didn’t recognize me. At all.”

“What else?” he asked, his face taking on an intrigued attentiveness. “What else do you want to know?”

“Why has your scent changed?” I swallowed at the shift in his eyes as something feral stared back at me. “What are you?” I finished, whispering. Knowing that was the question he had been waiting for.