Chapter Twenty-three
We walked out a few
minutes later to find a trio of vamps loitering in the parking lot,
next to a shiny black SUV. Pritkin swore, but I wasn’t exactly
surprised. I had at least three trace spells on me that I knew
about, and two of them were the Senate’s. The point of leaving
hadn’t been to get away; it had been . . . well, to make a
point.
Which I obviously
hadn’t done, or they wouldn’t be here.
It was late or, to be
more accurate, really early, and the lot was dark. A lone
streetlamp leaked a watery yellow puddle in one corner,
illuminating cracked pavement and a sagging chain-link fence. But
alongside the building, most of the light came from the flickering
sign outside the diner. It cast a ruddy tint across the vamps’
faces, enough for me to see that they weren’t looking too
happy.
That was especially
true when Pritkin strode over and grabbed one of them by the
collar. It was the good-looking blond who had complained about the
phone. I guess babysitting me was his penance.
Or maybe that was
being slammed against the side of their SUV.
“Are you trying to
get her killed?” Pritkin snarled, about the time a brunet got him
in a choke hold.
“Break his and I
break yours,” the brunet said matterof-factly. “And I know who’s
gonna recover first.”
Instead of answering,
Pritkin pulsed out a small section of his shield. It was only a
vague blue iridescence against the night, as filmy and
insubstantial-looking as a soap bubble. But the brunet’s arm flew
off his neck like he was giving a salute.
The blond didn’t
struggle; his expression clearly said it was beneath him. He looked
at me, past Pritkin’s shoulder. “Would you call off your pit bull?
Please? I just bought this suit.”
“And they’ll bury you
in it if you don’t answer me!” Pritkin told him
harshly.
“Too late,” the vamp
said, baring glistening white fangs.
“Stop it!” I said.
“Pritkin, they’re just standing there.”
“And putting a neon
sign over your head in the process!”
I didn’t understand
that, but apparently the blond did. “What do you take us for?” he
sneered. “Amateurs?”
“Well, technically, I
am,” a mousy little vamp said. He was perched on the hood of the
SUV, feet drawn up, watching the scene with big eyes.
Everybody ignored
him. He kind of looked like he’d expected it.
“Did anyone follow you?” Pritkin demanded, giving
the blond a shake.
“Bite
me!”
Pritkin didn’t seem
to like that answer, judging by the way the blond’s eyes suddenly
bulged. He rotated them at his buddy. “Are you just going to stand
there?”
“What do you want me
to do?” the brunet asked in Italian.
“Shoot
him!”
A muscular shoulder
rose in a shrug. “Won’t get through the shield.”
“Then help me drain
him!”
“Girl might
object.”
“Yes, the girl
might!” I said in the same language.
The dark-haired vamp
looked mildly surprised. “Your Italian is not so bad.”
“I grew up at Tony’s
court,” I reminded him.
He grinned, a sudden
flash of white in a handsome olive face. “That would explain the
accent.”
Pritkin was starting
to look apoplectic, which experience had taught me usually
precipitated pain for someone. “Would you please answer him?” I
asked.
The vamp stole a
cigarette from the blond, who was in no position to object, and
took his time lighting up. He was tall, with black hair cut short
to minimize a tendency to curl, judging by a few at his neck. That
wasn’t so odd—a lot of the younger vamps wore their hair short,
including plenty of those who belonged to Mircea. But they didn’t
also have five o’clock shadow or a tribal tat decorating one bicep,
or dress in jeans and tight black muscle shirts.
“We’re new—we flew in
last night,” he finally said, taking a drag. He blew out a breath
and regarded Pritkin through the smoke. “Mage, why would anyone
follow us when they don’t know who we are?”
Pritkin thought about
that for a beat and then finally released the blond. The vamp took
his time straightening up, brushing out the wrinkles in his
silver-gray suit. Then he looked at me. “You need him on a leash,”
he said viciously.
“Would somebody
please explain what is going on?” I asked.
“What is going on is
that your safety depends on no one knowing where you are,” Pritkin
told me, still glaring at the vamps. “And considering how we
departed, no one should. We exited directly into a ley line, under
cover of the hotel’s wards, and didn’t leave it until halfway
across the city. No one saw us—a fact that does little good if
someone leads your enemies straight to you!”
“Well, we didn’t,”
the blond snapped, rubbing his neck under the pretense of adjusting
a rumpled burgundy tie.
“That’s why Marco
couldn’t come after you himself,” the brunet informed me, leaning
back against the SUV.
“What is?” I
asked.
The cigarette glowed
against the night as he waved a negligent hand. “The paparazzi have
marked him. He was waylaid outside the hotel a couple of days ago
by a mob shouting questions, wanting photos. . . .”
“Of
him?”
“Of you. You’re
front-page news. Haven’t you seen the papers?”
“Not recently.” And
considering what they’d been printing the last time I did look,
that was probably for the best. “But I haven’t seen any
reporters—”
“They’re not allowed
in the hotel.”
“And you don’t
exactly use the front door,” the blond added. “I’m Jules, by the
way.” He extended a slim hand, which I took after a brief
hesitation. If they intended to stuff me into the SUV, they could
do it whether I cooperated or not. “And this is Rico and
Fred.”
“Fred?” I looked at
Mousy, because no way was the brunet a Fred. He smiled
weakly.
“I get that a lot,”
he said. “I’m thinking of changing it. What do you think about
André?”
I thought I’d never
seen anyone who looked less like an André.
“So Marco’s afraid of
the paparazzi?” I asked skeptically.
“More the other way
around.” Rico grinned.
“He threatened to do
something anatomically impossible to one of their men,” Fred told
me.
“Not impossible,”
Rico blew out a thoughtful breath. “The camera could be made to
fit, although the case—”
“What about the
tripod?”
“I don’t think he was
serious about the tripod.”
“The paparazzi aren’t
the issue,” Jules interrupted, shooting them a look. “But if
they’ve managed to figure out that Marco’s your bodyguard, more
dangerous types could have done the same. He couldn’t risk leading
anyone to you, so he sent us.”
“To do what?” I
asked, pretty sure I already knew.
“You want it
verbatim?”
“Minus the
profanity.”
Sculpted lips pursed.
“Well, that would shorten it a bit.”
“What. Did. He.
Say?”
“To paraphrase? ‘Let
her finish her pizza and then drag her back here. By the hair, if
necessary.’”
“Doesn’t he get it?”
I demanded. “That’s the kind of attitude that forced me to leave in
the first place!”
“Oh, he gets it,”
Rico said. “He just doesn’t want it.”
“I don’t give a damn
what he wants! He has to understand—”
“He understands that
you’re twenty-four,” Jules told me, swiping his cigarette case back
from his friend.
“What’s wrong with
being twenty-four?”
“Nothing. Unless
you’re dealing with a guy who’s well over a thousand.”
I blinked.
“What?”
“Marco,” he
confirmed, tapping a cigarette on top of the case. “Saw the fall of
Rome, or so they say.”
“The fall of—” I
stopped and stared. “Gladiators, Colosseum, guys in leather
miniskirts—that Rome?”
“That would be the
one.”
“I wouldn’t mention
the miniskirts,” Rico advised. “Marco used to be in the
army.”
“Have to wonder how
anyone took them seriously,” Jules said.
“I think if you
laughed, they cut your balls off.”
Jules paused, halfway
through lighting his cigarette, the flame dancing in wide blue
eyes. “That would do it.”
“But . . . but why is
he working for Mircea?” I asked. Vamps that old were Senate members
or headed up powerful courts. They didn’t work for masters a third
their age.
Jules shrugged.
“You’d have to ask him; I was always afraid to. But you can see why
he doesn’t react well when someone he considers a
child—”
“A fetus,” Rico put
in.
“—ignores an
order.”
“An order he had no
right to give!” I said heatedly.
“Technically, the
master gave it—”
“Who also has no
right to order me around!”
“I like this one,”
Rico said. “Feisty.”
I shot him a glare,
which had no effect, except to widen his smile.
“I guess Marco
figures, if he still has to take orders after all this time, why
not you?” Fred asked.
“Because I’m Pythia,”
I said, striving for patience.
He blinked at me,
obviously confused. “And?”
I threw my hands
up.
Jules frowned at him,
but not on my account. “Stop it.”
“It’s driving me
nuts,” the little vamp said, tugging at the polyester monstrosity
around his neck.
“You’ll get used to
it.”
“I don’t want to get
used to it. And why do I have to wear a tie, anyway? Rico doesn’t,”
he looked pointedly at the brunet.
“Rico is a law unto
himself,” Jules said drily.
“Well, I’m not used
to this.”
“What are you used
to?” I asked, wondering where a guy like Fred fit into Mircea’s
somewhat more . . . glossy . . . family.
“I just wear clothes,
you know?” he said, pushing wispy brown hair out of his eyes. “I
mean, nobody cares what an accountant looks like, as long as the
books balance. Not that we use books anymore, but you know what
I—”
“You’re an
accountant?” Pritkin asked sharply.
Fred jumped and then
regarded Pritkin warily. “Why shouldn’t I be an
accountant?”
“Because you’re
supposed to be a bodyguard!”
“Well, I am.” Pale
gray eyes shifted. “I mean, I am at the moment. I
mean—”
“He means that it’s
none of your business,” Jules interjected.
“Well, it is mine,” I
pointed out. “What is he doing here?”
I didn’t get an
answer because Rico’s head snapped up. He didn’t move otherwise or
even tense, as far as I could tell, but there was suddenly
something dangerous about him.
Pritkin must have
thought so, too, because his expression tightened.
“Accountant?”
“Never said I was,”
Rico said, his eyes on the empty street.
“Then what are
you?”
“You could say I’m on
the troubleshooting squad.”
“Troubleshooting?”
He put a hand on the
back of his waistband. “I see trouble, and I shoot
it.”
“Well, don’t shoot
them,” Jules said irritably. “We have enough
problems.”
“Shoot who?” I
asked.
“Circle,” Rico told
me, to the accompaniment of a car screeching around the corner and
into the lot.
It was actually a
limo, the kind that carted high rollers, honeymooners and anybody
with a wad of cash all over Vegas. They were almost as ubiquitous
as taxis, and often used back streets like this one as a way of
avoiding clogged thoroughfares. But the ten or more grim-faced
people piling out were too muffled up and too bulging with
concealed weapons to be anything but the Circle’s favorite
sons.
“Aren’t we supposed
to be past this?” I asked Pritkin, as a familiar six foot five
inches of pissed-off war mage got out of the limo and strode across
the lot. The imposing mountain of muscle in the long leather trench
had coffee-colored skin, a military-style buzz cut and a handsome
face—when he wasn’t looking like he’d like to rip someone else’s
off.
This wasn’t one of
those times.
“What the hell?” he
demanded in his deep voice, before he’d even reached
us.
“Hi, Caleb,” I said,
resigned.
“I was asked to get
her out; I got her out,” Pritkin said obscurely.
“You were told to
bring her in!”
“Bring me in where?”
I asked.
“HQ,” Pritkin said.
“After Jonas found out about this latest attack, he
insisted—”
“And instead, you
bring her here!” Caleb gestured sharply. “Middle of goddamned Vegas
in the middle of the goddamned night—”
“She’s perfectly
safe—”
“—with one fucking
bodyguard—”
“What do we look
like?” Jules demanded.
“—and half the world
looking for her!”
“I think the term is
‘chopped liver,’ ” Fred said.
“They’re looking for
her at the hotel,” Pritkin snapped. “Not here.”
“How the hell do you
know?” Caleb demanded. “You don’t know what this thing is—you told
the old man as much yourself!”
“You called Jonas?” I
asked, deciphering that.
“To ask if he had any
ideas about what attacked you,” Pritkin said. “After what David
Dryden told us, I had a suspicion, but this isn’t my area
of—”
“Suspicion about
what?”
“What we’re dealing
with.” He pulled something out of his coat and handed it to me. It
was a pencil sketch, heavily shaded, that looked a lot
like—
I looked up. “Where
did you get this?”
“I had one of the
Circle’s artists do it, from some old drawings.”
“Old drawings of
what?”
“The
Morrigan.”
“The
what?”
“The wife of the Dark
Fey king. After the description you gave me of what you saw, and
what David said about the High Court dialect, and what your servant
mentioned about the gods having the ability to possess . . . well,
I thought it possible. Particularly in light of the
name.”
“What about the
name?”
“It’s a Celtic title.
Some translate it as ‘Great Queen’ or ‘Terrible Queen.’ But the
oldest version, and, I believe, the correct one, is ‘Phantom
Queen.’ The ancient texts speak of her being able to take both
physical and spectral form.”
“But . . . this is
Fey?” I asked, looking at what appeared to be a raven caught in a
thunderstorm. A really wicked, pissed-off raven.
“Yes and no. Her
mother was Dark Fey, but her father was one of the old
gods.”
I felt my stomach
sink. Please, please,
please—
“Would you care to
guess which one?” he asked.
“Not
really.”
“Cassie—”
“This doesn’t have to
be about Ragnarok,” I said stubbornly. “The Dark Fey king isn’t my
biggest fan—you know that. Maybe he sent her—”
“It’s possible. But
the fact remains that the Morrigan was worshipped by the ancient
Celts as a goddess of battle, because her father was believed to
be—”
“Don’t say
it.”
“—the Celtic god
Nuada—”
“I’m not
listening.”
“—who is associated
with the Romano-British Mars-Nodens—”
“I’m begging
you.”
“—who many scholars
equate with the Greek god Ares.”
“Goddamnit, Pritkin!
Jonas can’t be right, okay? He can’t!”
“I am not saying that
he is. However, it seems strange, if, in fact, this was caused by
animus, that she would apologize and tell David that ‘they’ were
making her do it.”
I dug out another
antacid.
Caleb cursed. “And
yet knowing that this thing might be after her, you still bring her
out here!”
“Better than
somewhere it would be likely to look!”
“Wait,” I said,
crunching chalky cherry crap and trying to think. “Is David sure
that’s what she said? Didn’t he say he was lousy with the
language?”
“Yes. Which is why I
had one of our linguists visit him. She couldn’t be certain, not
having heard the words herself, but she said David seemed to have
the gist of it.”
“Okay, but still.
‘They’ made her do it.” I held out the scary-ass image. “Who makes
something like this do anything?”
“Her father,
presumably.”
Damn it, I’d known he
was going to say that.
“But Ares isn’t here!
None of the gods are here!”
“Well, it looks like
this one is,” Fred pointed out. “And how’s that work, exactly? I
thought all of them were kicked out way back when.”
“They were,” Pritkin
told him tersely. “But demigods have a human, or in this case, a
Fey, parent, giving them an anchor in this world. The spell
banishing the gods did not affect them.”
“Yet knowing a god or
half god or whatever the hell might be after her, you bring her out
here anyway,” Caleb said, beating that dead horse for all he was
worth. I had to give it to the guy; he gave new meaning to
“single-minded.” “Where she’s completely defenseless!”
“She is hardly
defenseless—”
“Thank you,” Jules
said indignantly.
“I’m with her. And
whatever that thing was, it can pass right through wards. Meaning
she would be no safer at HQ than at the suite. I told Jonas I would
ask Cassie where she wanted to go and—”
“Yeah,” Caleb said
sourly. “And he told me he wants her someplace
secure!”
“She will
be—”
“As soon as we get
her back to the suite,” Jules butted in.
“She’s not going back
to that death trap of a suite,” Caleb snapped. “And that’s
final!”
“It’s not a death
trap,” I protested.
“It is if you can’t
shift away! As I explained to that thickheaded vampire, leaving you
in that place, much less drugged and insensate, was virtually
asking for another—”
“You talked to
Marco?” Pritkin said sharply.
“Yes,
we—”
“When?”
“A few minutes ago.
I—”
“On the
phone?”
“No,
we—”
“How,
then?”
“Would you let me
finish a sentence?” Caleb said angrily. “When you didn’t show up
with the girl, Jonas assumed you hadn’t been able to get her out of
the suite. He sent us to assist, but that damned vampire wouldn’t
tell us—”
“You went by the
hotel?”
“Yes—”
“And then you came here?”
“Shit,” Rico said, and grabbed my arm.
And the next thing I
knew, I was in the SUV.
It was almost like
shifting—I didn’t remember moving, the car door opening or sitting
down, but there I was anyway. I blinked at Rico, who was in the
driver’s seat in front of me, for about a second. Until he was
snatched out of the still-open door and sent flying.
“Lasso spell,” Fred
said, as his buddy slammed into the open top of a Dumpster, halfway
across the lot. “I hate those things.”
I peered into the
front, to find the little vamp ensconced in the passenger’s seat.
“When did you get in?”
“A minute ago. I
figured we’d be leaving soon.”
“I didn’t
notice.”
“Yeah.” He sighed. “I
get that a lot, too.”
“I wish I had that
problem,” I muttered, watching Pritkin and Caleb yelling at each
other outside, while a trashcovered Rico crossed the lot in a blur.
A second later his assailant went flying into the side of a truck.
And a second after that, four war mages jumped Rico.
I sighed and started
crawling over the seat.
“Is it always like
this?” Fred asked, as Jules started forward, a fake smile plastered
on his face and a placating hand raised—only to have someone use it
to sling him into the SUV. I flinched back when he hit the
windshield headfirst, that handsome profile making an impressive
set of cracks in the supposedly shatterproof glass.
“No,” I told Fred, as
Jules shook it off and leapt back into the fight. “This is pretty
calm, actually.”
“What are you doing?”
he asked, watching me check the cushions, the floor and then the
visor over the driver’s side. The keys were under the visor, and
they fell into my lap.
“Putting a stop to
this. If they’re going to act like children, they can at least do
it out of sight of norms.”
“And you think
they’re gonna listen?”
“No. But if I leave,
they’ll have to follow.”
“Well, I don’t know
how you’re gonna get out. They’ve parked that big-ass limo of
theirs right across the exit. And the fence goes right up
to—”
He cut off as a
metallic shriek rent the air, bouncing off the surrounding
buildings and echoing down the street. “What the hell was
that?” he demanded, staring around
wildly.
I didn’t answer. I
was too busy watching the limo rise into the air, its long body
twisting and writhing as if in pain, metal screeching, car alarm
screaming and window glass popping. A windshield wiper flew off
like an arrow, spearing the old sign above the diner and sending a
wash of sparks across the pavement.
“What is this?” Fred yelled, gripping my shoulder
as the limo was wrenched in two, the violence of the movement
sending half of it crashing into the building
opposite.
And the other half
spinning straight at us.
“How things usually
go,” I told him, and floored it.