let me drown in your sweet flesh." He moved in for a kiss as he said the last, and I had to pull back. I slid off the bed, away from him. I wanted to run screaming with frustration. I had not meant to do this. Fuck.

"If another master had bespelled Requiem, what would you do, ma petite}" Jean-Claude said.

I thought about it, frowning. "I would try to break the spell. I would use my necromancy and try to break the spell."

"Exactement."

"But, I did it. I can't break my own spell, can I?"

"Why can you not?"

I thought about it again. "Because . . . well."

"It is not your necromancy that has bespelled him, ma petite, but your power through the vampire marks, through me. Use your necromancy to free him, as you used your ties to the wolf to free you from Marmee Noir."

It made sense, but... "I don't know."

He spoke softly in my head. "You broke Willie McCoy free of the Traveller when he had possessed Willie's body. You used your necromancy to drive him out."

Willie was one of our least powerful vampires. He was manager at the Laughing Corpse, our comedy club. The Traveller was one of the vampire council. He had come to town in "person," except that he traveled by jumping from body to body. He could use any vampire body that wasn't strong enough to keep him out. He had possessed Willie, and tried to use him to hurt me. I had used my blood and my tie to Willie to find him in the dark where the Traveller had hidden him. Find him and bring him back to himself.

I thought carefully, because I was still not that good at the mind-to-mind thing, "I'd accidentally raised Willie from his coffin during the day once. I already had a tie to him that I don't have to Requiem."

He whispered through my mind, "Through the ardeur you have a bond to him that you did not have with Willie."

"How can I use necromancy to break him free of the ardeur, if I'm counting on the ardeur to be his bond to me. That doesn't make any sense."

"Perhaps the logic is a bit circular, but what do you have to lose, ma petite}" He spoke aloud, finally. "Look at him."

I pressed as much of me against as much of Jean-Claude as I could, then turned and looked at Requiem. He watched us like a man who was dying of thirst, and was only inches away from a cool, soothing pool, but there was a glass wall between him and it. I finally realized something. "It's not just the ardeur he's craving. It's the blood. He's hurt and he needs blood."