12

Matt Smith (who is not the Doctor) and Adam

Water is wet and vampires are treacherous.

MATT SMITH HAD BEGUN TO WONDER IF LENKA’S DEATH or something else had interfered with Guccio’s plans. That Bonarata had people waiting to usurp his power wasn’t a surprise to him. Werewolves were a little more honest about it, usually, but when a race was governed by the meanest bastard around, one generally had to prove that one was the meanest bastard over and over again. Until someday one wasn’t, and someone else got to fight all the time.

Matt glanced across the room at Bonarata, who seemed to be giving the “good-bye and good riddance” speech to Adam and Marsilia. Or maybe one finds someone else to take out one’s enemies. Just how likely was it that Guccio had managed all of this without Bonarata’s noticing? Bonarata, the Lord of Night, who had been a prince of the Italian Renaissance, seemed unlikely to be the sort of man who overlooked an attempted coup.

If Guccio and Adam fought, thought Matt, watching Bonarata carefully not look at Guccio, then Bonarata could not lose. If Adam killed Guccio, he was down one rebel. If Guccio killed Adam, he would be considerably weakened.

Matt set his napkin on the table and started to get up at the same time Bonarata and everyone at the head table got up.

—

ADAM DREW IN A BREATH AS THE BOND BETWEEN HIM and Guccio tightened. He wondered, briefly, how long Guccio had been planning this moment. Wondered if he should kill Bonarata or let Guccio do it—and then kill Guccio.

Today wasn’t going to be Guccio’s day if Adam had anything to say about it. Not because he was a fan of Bonarata’s—he wasn’t. But Bonarata was the best path to peace for Adam’s people. If Bonarata died and Adam was involved, even if only as a “blood slave,” the same hell that Larry had promised if Adam killed Bonarata on his own would still rain down upon his family.

Quickly, Adam did as instructed. Maintaining the handshake, Adam leaned forward as if he were going to do one of those European manly hugs that were so popular on the mob movies he’d grown up with. He reached up and put his free hand on Bonarata’s shoulder, feeling the vampire stiffen in surprise and the beginning of a realization that all wasn’t well.

That Guccio hadn’t been talking to some waitstaff or minion when he’d said, “Hold him.” That he’d been commanding Adam.

Guccio also began to move.

Bracing his legs, Adam pulled Bonarata sharply toward him with their clasped hands. At the same time, he used the hand on the vampire’s shoulder to push him into Guccio.

Surprised by the unexpected impact, Guccio hadn’t managed to draw whatever weapon he’d been reaching for, and was trapped momentarily with his hand tangled under his jacket.

Adam used that moment to pull Bonarata around and into Marsilia. He trusted Marsilia would hold Bonarata off Adam long enough for it to be clear that Adam wasn’t trying to kill the Lord of Night and wasn’t under Guccio’s control. He also hoped that she’d be able to keep any of Guccio’s confederates from killing Bonarata while Adam was taking care of business.

To help that result along, Adam said, “Protect him, Marsilia.” And also as he faced Guccio, who was rapidly recovering his balance in all senses of the word, Adam said, “Don’t let him kill me, either, please.”

The table erupted in a spray of drinks, crystalware, and dining utensils as Guccio seized the tablecloth (moss green today). The vampire cracked the cloth like a whip, turning the remains of the meal into airborne weapons.

A water glass hit Adam in the chest hard enough to hurt, and the pitcher of ice water shattered at his feet, making the footing treacherous. Adam trusted the soles of his shoes to protect him from the glass, but the water- and ice-covered floor would be slick.

Guccio smiled, showing white fangs. Then, instead of attacking, he began a slow, backward dance designed to keep Adam on the wet floor and allow Guccio to pick his strike.

Adam thought the fangs were intended as some sort of threat display, but, since they were only slightly longer than those of Mercy’s cat Medea, they didn’t do much to intimidate him. Guccio had kept the tablecloth in his left hand, gripped lightly near the fabric’s center. More interesting was the dagger Guccio held in his right hand.

Adam knew weapons. This one was old and well made. The blade bore designs in bright silver, and Adam assumed it was real silver. He was also pretty sure that the designs were probably a sign that the blade was—

“Careful,” Elizaveta called. “There is magic in that dagger. Old and corrupted. I can’t tell what it does.”

Yes. That’s what he’d thought. Probably it wasn’t a problem—ensorcelling blades, no matter what D&D had taught a generation or two of young people, was no easy matter. That’s why smiths like Zee had been so prized and feared.

—

THE FIGHT STARTED BEFORE MATT COULD PUT A WORD in Adam’s ear—and he wasn’t sure what it would have been, anyway. Everyone else got up from their tables, too. The little healer’s people got her out of the room, though she didn’t look too upset by the fight and kept turning around to get a look.

And it was a pretty thing, this fight. Matt thought of himself as a peaceful man. But he couldn’t deny that there was beauty in violence, a battle between two well-trained warriors.

Guccio was typical of noblemen of his era. Flash and pretty words that sought to disguise just how dangerous he was. Becoming a vampire hadn’t slowed him down or given his blows less power. He had been fighting for hundreds of years, and every moment of that showed, both in his movements and in the choreography that he gave this fight.

—

ADAM LET GUCCIO GUIDE THE FIGHT WHILE HE PAID attention to the vampire’s fighting style. The most notable thing about it so far was how much the vampire liked to talk.

“How did you manage to slip my leash?” Guccio asked. He held the dagger low and centered, its tip pointed at Adam’s heart. But he was being careful, choosing his strike, because even though Adam was bare-handed, he was still a werewolf.

Adam didn’t answer, so Guccio found his own answer. “You belong to Marsilia,” he said sagely. And also incorrectly.

Adam, who’d been thinking about ending this quickly, decided that maybe the vampires here needed a demonstration of what a werewolf could do. Bonarata didn’t need to believe that Adam could take on a Gray Lord—but maybe he should know that Adam wasn’t a weakling, either.

“No,” he said softly. “I belong to Mercy.”

Adam knew a little something about fighting with a blade. The Army had begun his education, but he’d had half a century to add to what he knew. The best knife fighter Adam had ever encountered held a knife just like Guccio did. Guccio was the product of an earlier age, with all of those years to practice.

While most of his attention was on his opponent, Adam was aware that the room had burst into motion as soon as the tablecloth had announced the beginning of the battle. Bonarata had taken control and was ushering his people out of the room as quickly as possible.

—

MATT HELPED THE NONCOMBATANTS—HUMAN, VAMPIRE, and other—get out of the room. Interestingly enough, Bonarata was doing the same thing.

When they both helped a young woman to her feet, Bonarata tried to catch his eye—Matt supposed he couldn’t help himself. There was always a lot of debate about what advantages the vampires might have over werewolves. Matt had always felt that it was the need most wolves had to establish dominance by meeting eyes. It was handy with other wolves, quite often preventing bloodshed or misunderstandings. But doing it with a vampire was a mistake.

Matt’s beast was cannier than that. Matt said something to the sobbing woman and handed her over to another woman—and the two hurried out of the dining hall.

A vampire who’d been pulling a table out of harm’s way bumped into Bonarata—and the Lord of Night grabbed the other vampire and broke his neck. Reaching out with a casual hand, Bonarata broke off a chair leg—there was getting to be a lot of broken furniture around—and stabbed the helpless vampire through the heart.

A second assassin launched himself from the top of a nearby table. But before he got close to his target, Larry the goblin, in a very ungoblin-like public display of why one should never underestimate goblins, leaped on top of the diving vampire and beheaded him with a garrote. The body, both parts, dropped to the floor just behind Bonarata, with Larry crouched on top of the biggest part.

Bonarata spun, already poised to kill whoever was behind him. Seeing the tableau there, the canny old vampire came to the right conclusion and stopped his attack before Harris had to give up his life by being stuck through with a chair leg that would otherwise have impaled Larry. Bonarata gave both goblins a shallow bow of thanks and turned his attention back to clearing the room of nonessential personnel.

—

ADAM’S ATTENTION WAS ON HIS OPPONENT, BUT HE was aware when some sort of scuffle around Larry erupted in blood, but Larry was still on his feet at the end of it. Adam had to trust he could take care of himself.

One of the diners, a human, passed by Guccio too closely. He casually backhanded her with his left hand. She collapsed to the floor in a broken heap. Dead, Adam judged grimly, before she hit the floor.

But he had no time to mourn for a nameless stranger. Guccio whirled the tablecloth quickly overhead and cast its spreading folds at Adam, then he rushed in right behind it.

It was a classic two-pronged attack: dealing with either threat left one vulnerable to the other, and if Adam tried to move fast enough to counter both, he risked losing his footing. Rather than trust the treacherous floor, then, Adam jumped backward, onto the table he’d so recently been eating at. He landed near the back edge of the table.

He leaned a little and added a little extra thrust with his legs, which pulled the table over with him on top. He grabbed Guccio’s tablecloth and rode the table to the ground, putting the upended piece of furniture between him and Guccio.

The vampire leaped into the air like a demented ballet dancer, soaring neatly over the table. He aimed a kick at Adam’s leg as he brought the dagger down in a sweeping slash at Adam’s neck with inhuman speed.

Adam was happy he wasn’t human, either. He twisted his hips and pivoted to avoid the kick and snapped the tablecloth at Guccio’s blade. The kick missed completely, and the tablecloth fouled the dagger strike, so it missed its target and only sliced a burning line across Adam’s shoulder.

Guccio’s momentum carried him past Adam and he stopped a few feet away, raising the wetted dagger to his forehead in a mocking salute that claimed first blood. As he stepped back from the salute, he stumbled on an overturned chair and was momentarily distracted.

Adam moved in with a strong front kick, but the wolf, catching some motion that seemed wrong, warned him. Adam aborted just in time to avoid being hamstrung when the vampire brought the dagger up between them. The stumble had been a feint, and it had nearly worked.

Adam pulled the kick but had to struggle to control his forward momentum. Guccio took advantage of Adam’s lost balance and used the pommel of the dagger to strike at Adam’s head. Adam blocked the dagger, but not the knee that drove into his stomach.

It hurt, with a dull pain that built to a crescendo, darkening his vision in waves that ebbed and flowed. Vampires were almost as fun to fight as werewolves.

—

WITH THE ROOM MOSTLY EMPTY, MATT GAVE HIMSELF over to the spectator sport in the center of the cleared floor.

Guccio was an excellent fighter; there was no doubt of that. But once in a while there comes a fighter, human or other, so beautiful to watch that he turns the fight into great art, something that Matt felt a privilege and honor to watch. Sugar Ray Robinson had been such a fighter, both graceful and powerful. Matt had seen Robinson fight many times, as often as Matt could manage.

Adam Hauptman was another of Robinson’s ilk.

He moved no more than he had to in order to avoid an attack, a half inch here, a quarter there. He stayed mostly on the defensive, letting the vampire give away his secrets. Neither Adam’s face nor his body gave anything away, and he appeared relaxed and in control—not a usual sight for a werewolf in a fight against an opponent as good as Guccio de’ Medici, who was from a cadet branch of that very famous family, Matt was given to understand. Harris had been a wealth of information about Bonarata’s people.

“Hauptman can fight,” said Bonarata quietly. For a moment, Matt thought he was being addressed.

“Yes,” agreed Marsilia. “He is accounted fourth among all the werewolves in the New World. He is young for such a rank—but this is why it is his.”

—

ADAM NOTED THAT THE ROOM HAD EMPTIED WITH surprising speed, keeping collateral damage to a minimum. A handful of observers—among them Bonarata—spread around the room, careful to avoid the combat zone. He trusted they were all people who could defend themselves. One dead innocent in this mess was enough.

He and Guccio circled the room, hopping over fallen chairs and discarded tableware. Twice more, they exchanged blows, with neither taking any serious damage. Adam needed to end this decisively, but the vampire’s dagger meant that he held that advantage in reach.

They circled for a few more seconds, then Guccio slid smoothly into a long, gliding lunge. Fast as a striking snake, the dagger flicked toward Adam’s stomach. Only a shift in weight had signaled the move, but Adam leaped back a pace, forcing the vampire to either fall short or commit to an awkward running attack. Guccio, proving he was no novice, aborted the lunge before closing enough to allow Adam to engage.

Guccio sneered. “I see you have some training,” he said. “Your teacher was inferior. Your footwork is wooden—”

Me and Muhammad Ali, thought Adam, though he didn’t respond aloud. We float like a butterfly and sting like a bee. No one was perfect—and fighting was always one big compromise. But his footwork was fine.

Guccio was still speaking, trying to distract Adam with words. “You are too concerned with defense to mount a proper offense. I had expected more from you—the great Adam Hauptman. Allow me to educate you.”

Guccio snatched another tablecloth and dropped it over his left arm. It hung at knee level.

“This is the cloak,” he said. “Its use is to confuse and conceal.” He gave the dagger a quick flourish, moving his dagger hand beneath the cloth. “The dagger hides behind the cloak,” he said. “And now begins the game. Where is the dagger, and where will it strike?”

As Guccio moved, he made the cloth dance in a way designed to lead Adam into making assumptions about his movement and the dagger position. Twice Adam was sure he saw the beginning of an attack, but the wolf disagreed, reading the vampire’s intention differently. Adam listened to the wolf.

Guccio moved the cloth in a fluttering swoop, while the dagger appeared in a reverse grip, slashing at Adam’s throat. The blade lay backward along Guccio’s arm. Most blocks or grabs would result in serious damage to Adam’s hands. As it blurred across Adam’s throat, the vampire bent his wrist back, allowing the blade to snap forward and take a wider path. Guccio’s body was close behind it, sliding in an arc past Adam.

Adam jerked his head back. The blade sang as it passed by, slicing open nothing but air. Adam threw a hard jab. He hit, but the fluttering cloth had made him misjudge, and it was just a glancing blow, barely hard enough to make Guccio throw in a short step to regain his balance. The vampire whirled past Adam, discarding the tablecloth. The green woven linen fluttered to the ground to land across the dead woman’s feet.

As Adam pivoted to face the vampire again, a sharp pain drew his attention to the fork sticking out just under his ribs on the left side. Guccio must have grabbed the fork with the tablecloth and used the cloth to conceal it.

Silverware, real silverware was sterling silver, 90 percent silver. Everything except the knife. Had Guccio stuck him with a table knife, Adam could have pulled it out and expected his body to heal in a reasonably rapid fashion.

The fork burned.

Guccio grinned at him, then tilted his head, listening. Adam heard it, too. The fork had penetrated Adam’s diaphragm, allowing air to seep into his chest cavity. His left lung was slowly collapsing, and pulling the fork out would only serve to accelerate the process. Wounds made with silver had to be healed just like humans heal. This small wound changed everything, and they both knew it.

Adam backed up slowly, and Guccio shadowed him, the vampire’s movements lazy. He was confident of his victory. Now that the prey was wounded, there was no hurry. Werewolves kill their prey quickly, but vampires, like cats, enjoy playing with their food.

Adam intended to use Guccio’s confidence and eagerness against him.

He opened the pack bonds. Although the only one of his pack nearby was Honey, she was a deep well of power, and she gave it freely. Her energy trickled into him, cool and refreshing, swallowing pain.

Adam continued backing away, breathing shallowly. He angled along an overturned table until he bumped into one of the larger tables, where someone had been clearing the table and left one of those carts with a black tub on top, a tub filled with dishes.

Bonarata’s people dined off fine porcelain china.

The busboy—busperson?—had kindly stacked the plates for Adam. He picked up several in his left hand and with his right he Frisbeed the top one at the vampire.

Guccio was less than ten feet away.

Some people might think a plate a poor weapon. Some people weren’t werewolves who could launch the things at speeds a major-league pitcher would envy. The first plate hit the arm Guccio lifted to block it and exploded, sending sharp fragments of glazed porcelain flying like shrapnel. The impact also knocked the knife from Guccio’s hand. It flew, hit a table, and fell to the ground a dozen feet away. Not entirely out of play but close enough.

The second plate took Guccio full in the throat, the narrow edge sliced like a knife, parting flesh and opening a second mouth that bled dark, viscous blood.

The third plate struck Guccio in the forehead, shattering on impact and leaving another bleeding cut with large shards embedded in his skull.

Staggered by the rapid impacts, Guccio took another couple of steps back. Blood from his forehead ran into his left eye. He wiped it clear and opened his mouth to say something.

And Adam pulled the H&K from his shoulder holster. The first shot took the vampire just below his left eye. A .40 wasn’t the biggest caliber in the world, but modern ammunition made the most of it. Adam wasn’t carrying target rounds.

A large portion of the vampire’s head blew outward, fragments of bone and tissue flung eight feet or more.

The vampiric magic that bound Guccio to his half life didn’t give up easily. Guccio wasn’t dead; he swayed on his feet with a confused expression on his face. Apparently his high-velocity lobotomy had degraded his thinking skills because he just stood there. The raw tissue writhed and pulsed in the open wound as the vampire’s body struggled to repair the damage.

“A gun?” said Bonarata quietly.

“Why didn’t you shoot him earlier?” asked Marsilia. “You had time to do it after you sent Iacopo to me.”

“Because,” Adam said, “I needed Bonarata to know that I can defend my territory from vampires without any help at all. Guccio is one of your strongest vampires. He attacked me armed with a dagger—and I could have defeated him with a stack of plates.” He put two more rounds into Guccio, this time between his eyes.

Guccio dropped bonelessly to the floor, faceup. There were three neat holes and only a little blood from the gunshots. The real damage was hidden from sight. He had been a pretty man, but his features were only visible for a moment.

Dead vampires as old as Guccio dry up and turn to ash pretty quickly.

“The gun just makes things quicker.” Satisfied Guccio was permanently dead, Adam looked at Marsilia. “But if I’d used the gun right at the beginning, there would have been one less casualty.” He looked at Bonarata. “In my territory, I’d have used the gun.”

“Why was he fighting so hard?” asked Larry. “He acted like he actually had a chance. Once Adam saw to it that the assassination did not take place, Guccio was ended. Even if he had taken Adam out, his element of surprise was gone. You wouldn’t have let him live.”

Bonarata looked around the mostly empty room and sighed. Besides Adam’s people, there were five or six vampires.

“My people,” Bonarata said. “How many of you were obligated to follow Guccio while he was alive?”

All of them raised their hands.

“Raising new children is troublesome,” Bonarata said. “You all understand how it works? You collect sheep and tend them. And in a few years, five or six on average, if you are careful, you will have one prepared who can become your child. For that one, you will have tended a dozen who, for one reason or another, will never live to become vampires. Once you have changed your fledgling, for years afterward, sometimes decades and sometimes centuries, you still have to feed them and make sure that they are not misbehaving. Eventually, you hope, they will go out on their own and be able to produce their own children.”

“I am Bonarata’s child,” said Marsilia. “And I know a few others, but there are only a few of us.” She gave Bonarata a quick, affectionate smile. “He is too lazy to tend children.”

It must have been an old joke because he smiled back. “We vampires are selfish creatures.”

Marsilia completed it by saying, “It is the only reason vampires haven’t taken over the world.”

Bonarata said, “Stefan is the only vampire I know who never was tied to his Master by magic-driven obedience. I myself destroyed my maker when I decided what I wanted to become. I could not afford to have someone who I would have a hard time refusing.”

Wulfe had been Bonarata’s maker.

Marsilia said, “We believe that once a vampire can survive on his own kills rather than needing supplementary feeding from his maker or another Master to maintain their humanity, it is time to release them from obligation. When a child of mine quits feeding from me, the tie of obedience fades, though it doesn’t disappear.”

“Usually. Usually it can be revived,” Bonarata said. He looked at Larry. “Which is the logical path for a vampire like Guccio to follow. He could force obedience not only from his own children, but their children, too. And through them, their children. All he would have to do is feed them from his own vein, and they would be his.” He looked around the room, where people, mostly vampires, were returning now that it was as safe as anyplace vampires laired could be.

While Marsilia and Bonarata had been explaining things to Larry, Stefan had walked briskly into the room. He looked around, and his eyes found Adam’s and ran down his body, taking in the damage. Stefan caught the arm of another vampire and listened to her intently. He turned on his heel and walked back out. Adam figured he’d been sent by Honey, who’d know something had happened but not what.

Smith, who’d appeared with a tablecloth that he’d ripped to pieces, produced a knife from somewhere and started cutting Adam’s suit jacket off him.

Larry said, “So your people here, most of them, had to obey Guccio and not you—and you didn’t think it was a problem until today? If Guccio had won, he would have turned your own people on you.”

Bonarata smiled, but it didn’t touch his eyes. “Oh, I knew it was a problem.”

“And he decided to use Adam to solve it for him,” murmured Matt Smith, sounding as though he might admire that.

Stefan said, “Being lazy. I expect he had contingency plans had Adam failed to eliminate Guccio.”

He’d returned from a different door, and Adam had missed it. He had Bonarata’s healer, Stacia, by one hand. She regarded Adam with big, sad eyes.

“It really was a compliment of sorts, Adam,” Stefan said, his eyes steady on Bonarata’s. “If he’d thought you would lose, he wouldn’t have set you up—because then Guccio would have had nothing left to lose and Iacopo would have had to bestir himself. How did you arrange that Guccio ‘discover’ that gris-gris?”

Bonarata said, “You knew what I was when you brought your friends here. You have no cause to be angry.” But there was a pleased air about the Lord of Night that told Adam he was happy to be discovered. He was proud of the play he’d engineered.

“He played us,” said Adam.

Marsilia shook her head. “My life is so much more peaceful now that I do not live in your world, Jacob.” She looked at Adam. “He arranged it all. Wheels within wheels. What if Guccio had managed to suborn Adam? Did you know, Jacob, that Adam’s mate is peculiarly immune to vampiric powers? That she might pass that on to Adam?”

“No,” said Adam grimly. “He didn’t. Until you just told him. Thank you.” Speech was a little difficult with a collapsed lung, and that wasn’t improving with time as air escaped. He decided that he was okay if everyone in the room, except Matt Smith, thought that Guccio had never had Adam in his thrall. It might keep the next vampire from trying it.

Adam’s jacket was on the glass-covered ground in shreds. Smith unbuckled Adam’s shoulder holster and handed it, without a word, to Harris. He ripped the shirt around the fork but paused when Adam spoke.

“Is she?” Bonarata said, arrested. “She turned into a small dog, Lenka told me. A wild dog. Was it a coyote? Is your wife a walker, Adam? A descendant of Coyote? Fascinating. So Wulfe wasn’t lying as wildly as I thought he was. If I had known, I would have kept her longer.”

Adam raised an eyebrow. “Not likely,” he said—and coughed, which really sucked. He didn’t want to collapse in front of the present company, so he concentrated on breathing for a bit.

“Mercy is slippery,” Marsilia said. “If you had kept her, you’d have regretted it. I’m sorry, Adam. Even if he didn’t know, he’d have figured it out pretty soon. She did something as interesting as escaping his clutches. He would make a point of finding out about her—and what she is is no longer as secret as she kept herself before she joined your pack.”

Bonarata smiled.

“What he knew,” said Stefan grimly, “because he had opportunity to experiment on Lenka and her mate, was that a single feeding without consent would never be enough to hold an Alpha werewolf. I expect that he took great pains to make Guccio think that werewolves, for a vampire of his power, would be easy prey, without mentioning the little quirk that makes Alpha werewolves much trickier.”

Unless they are traveling without their packs, thought Adam. He figured he’d keep that one to himself.

“So this was a setup,” Smith said, returning to his self-appointed job of stripping Adam’s shirt. He didn’t bother with a knife. The silk was strong, but the stitches gave way to werewolf strength without trouble. “You kidnapped Adam’s mate to take care of your little issue with your subordinate?”

“No,” said Marsilia before Bonarata could say anything. “He’s quite able to run twenty plans at the same time without a sweat. He was honestly concerned that our situation in the Tri-Cities might cause trouble for him. But once we were here, he decided to use one problem to eliminate the other. If he had changed his mind about what we are accomplishing, he’d simply have killed Adam after Adam killed Guccio for him. If Adam had really been caught up in Guccio’s play, he’d have killed them both.” She looked at Adam. “He is lazy—but that doesn’t mean he isn’t dangerous. Guccio was allowed to forget that. You should not be like Guccio.”

She looked at Bonarata. “You are getting bored, Jacob.” Interestingly, Adam thought, Bonarata was starting to wince every time she called him Jacob—even though he himself had insisted upon it. “Time was when such a one as Guccio would have been taken care of long before it got this far. You enjoyed playing with him, and that is dangerous. Not just for you—you can take care of yourself—but for those who depend upon you.”

Bonarata looked at her. “Stay, my beautiful, deadly flower, my Bright Blade. Stay with me, please? I need you. You see what I am become without you?”

Marsilia shook her head, and said, not ungently, “Not for all the gold in the ocean or gems in the sea would I stay with thee more.”

“This is going to be unpleasant,” said Smith to Adam, reaching for the fork.

“Wait,” said Stefan.

“Wait,” said Adam. “Guccio wasn’t coming for me. I found him heading for Harris and Smith. Smith should have given Guccio what he wanted, a wolf under his control.”

“Guccio just needed a werewolf,” said Marsilia. “Any would do. Then he could cause a war in which the werewolves were the cause of Bonarata’s death. If it became known that Guccio killed him . . . you wouldn’t know it, but Bonarata has friends, many nearly as dangerous as himself. If Guccio and a werewolf tried to kill Bonarata? Then Bonarata could retaliate by moving into the Marrok’s territory. Smith isn’t one of your wolves, Adam, but he is one of the Marrok’s.”

“Would you have avenged me?” Bonarata asked Marsilia softly.

“I might have helped Guccio kill you,” she said. “We’ll never know now.”

Bonarata laughed.

“His plans are like hydras,” Stefan said. “With many tentacles woven together. He doesn’t care which path is taken as long as all possible outcomes leave him on top.” He turned to the fae healer, who had been swinging his hand in hers and looking at a broken table as if it were a Picasso. “Iacopo owes this wolf a big favor,” he told her. “Would you heal my friend?”

“She doesn’t have much power left,” Bonarata said, though he didn’t really protest. “She used a lot for Adam’s mate, our little coyote.”

“It’s not a big wound,” Stefan answered. “It’s just in an awkward place.”

He brought the healer to Adam and released her, murmuring something in Italian. She nodded, using those awkwardly big movements Adam had seen before.

Smith had backed up. Stefan put his hand on the fork. “Brace yourself, wolf,” he said.

Adam nodded, and Stefan pulled the silver out of the wound. Almost immediately the little healer put her hands on Adam’s side, and warmth replaced the burning of the silver. A moment or two, and he could breathe again. She staggered a little as she removed her hands. Her skin was paler than it had been a moment before, and he was pretty sure she was thinner, too. She reached up toward his burning shoulder, but he caught her hands before she could touch that one. There had been magic in the dagger, but his wolf assured him that it had only caused the wound to be slow to heal; there was no corruption in it.

“Enough, little sister,” he told her. “That one won’t trouble me much. You fixed the bad one. Thank you.” He kissed her hand again because it had seemed to please her so much the first time. Then he leaned down and kissed her cheek. “Be well,” he told her.

“Niki,” called Bonarata. And when a roundish human woman came over to his call, he handed the healer into her care. “Take her to her room,” he said. “But stop in the kitchen and see if Cook has some food for her.”

People were moving about the room now, righting tables, cleaning up the glass—and the dead. Bonarata saw Adam look at Guccio’s ashes, and said, in a pained voice, “Those plates were two-hundred-year-old Limoges. It will be very expensive to find replacements.”

Adam would have said something scathing, but the woman who had led them to their table this morning stopped in front of Bonarata and dropped to her knees, spilling the tablecloths she was carrying as she did so.

“He wouldn’t let us tell,” she said in a whisper. “I tried, I tried to break his hold, Master.”

“Annabelle,” Bonarata said gently. “I know.”

She sobbed, shuddering. “You are most gracious.”

“No,” Bonarata said, his voice still soft. “You misunderstand me, child. I know.”

She froze. Bonarata sank the dagger that Guccio had been fighting with through her back and into her heart. She fell, hitting the floor as ashes rather than a body. Apparently the dagger was rather more deadly to vampires than it was to werewolves.

“Pity,” Bonarata said. “She was useful.” He looked around at his vampires, who were suddenly all actively engaged in whatever work they could find. “I trust that she will be the last I have to put down over this.”

“Did you see him pick up that dagger?” asked Smith very quietly.

Adam shook his head, but Larry, who was too far away to hear something that quiet, caught Smith’s eye and wandered over.

When he stood nearby, he said, “Elizaveta called it to her—and then gave it to Bonarata.”

“Mmm,” said Smith.

Adam looked at Elizaveta, who was seated at a table drinking a cup of tea. She met his eyes, smiled, and sipped her tea.

—

BONARATA INSISTED ON TRAVELING WITH THEM TO Prague. He had still not heard from his man there. Since they were headed that way, it would be only courtesy to allow him to travel with them.

Bonarata spent the whole time they traveled in conversation with Marsilia and Stefan. Mostly Marsilia—and it didn’t sound like business. The bits and pieces Adam overheard were more like old friends catching up.

Adam made sure that the Lord of Night stayed away from Honey. Upon being alerted that Bonarata was coming, she had dressed in jeans with an oversized baggy shirt that smelled like Smith’s. She’d scrubbed her face of makeup.

When he’d first seen her new guise, Adam said, “You could wear a bikini, and I would not let him touch you.”

She’d smiled grimly. “I’d kill the old bastard first. And we still need him alive. So I’ll keep out of sight as much as I can.”

“And if you kill him, I’ll help you bury the ashes, and we can blame Guccio,” Adam said.

Honey grinned at him and held up a fist, which he bumped with his own. But when she made explosive noises and let her fist open and drift down to her side, he just watched.

—

THEY LANDED AT THE FIELD DAVID CHRISTIANSEN HAD arranged for them. No questions were asked except those pertaining to the care and refueling of the plane. David’s contact even provided them with two vans.

When Adam asked, Smith and Harris chose to come with them.

“Are you sure?” Adam asked them.

“You don’t think Mercy is with Libor,” Smith said.

Adam shook his head. “You heard Libor on the phone.” Adam had phoned the other Alpha to tell him they were on their way. Libor had merely told Adam his address and hung up. “Did that sound like a gleeful arrogant bastard who has successfully babysat the woman another Alpha managed to lose?”

“Then you may need all the people you have,” said Harris. “We’ll come.”

Bonarata had been speaking to Marsilia. He looked at Adam.

“It is nearly dawn,” he said. “I had intended to go speak with Kocourek, since he has not seen fit to answer his phone. But people I sent here last night tell me that his seethe is abandoned—and has been for a few days. There is no one to question there.” He smiled at Marsilia. “I did let this go too long. Kocourek was one of Guccio’s making. I had forgotten, because it was so long ago. But since it is empty, there is time for me to accompany you to Libor’s bakery, and I just happen to know the way there. We are old enemies, Libor and I. I can at least spare you the usual trouble when two Alphas meet. He’ll dislike me more than he dislikes you. I will deal with the vampire issues tomorrow night. If your woman is still not found, I will help you then.”

He seemed unworried about the coming dawn. Marsilia and Stefan could teleport. Maybe Bonarata could also. And wasn’t that just a lovely thought.

Adam called Libor to warn him that he was bringing Bonarata, too. Libor was worryingly nonchalant about the Lord of Night invading his den.

—

THE BAKERY WAS CLOSED, THOUGH IT WAS NEARLY dawn, as Bonarata had noted. Adam could smell the baked goods the whole quarter of a mile they walked from where they’d had to park the vans.

Honey and Smith both looked at Adam as they neared the front door. But Mercy was somewhere else. He couldn’t talk to her through their bond, but he could feel it pulling him away.

“Let’s go see what Libor has done with my wife,” he said, and knocked on the door.

Since Libor knew they were coming, it didn’t take a minute for someone to come to the door. A less dominant wolf—not quite submissive—answered, and he went white when he saw Bonarata.

“Libor knows I’m bringing him,” said Adam. “Take us on in to him, and your part is done.”

The heart of the building was the kitchen, and that was where the wolf led them. Neither Bonarata, nor Stefan and Marsilia, had needed an invitation—which was why Adam would never make his pack’s home out of a business.

The big room was filled with people, mostly wolves but not all, mixing, rolling, and baking. Huge electric fans in the ceiling sent the warm air on out, but it was still ten degrees warmer in this room than it had been outside.

It might have been full of people, but when the broadly built man stepped out of a storeroom with a fifty-pound bag of flour on his shoulder, there was no question who the Alpha was in here. He felt them, too. He looked at them, set the flour down, and strode toward them, wiping his hands on his apron.

He took the whole of them in at one glance, his eyes lingering a little here and there. When he took his apron off, the work in the kitchen slowed. He hung it up on a hook on the wall and said, gruffly, “Get to work. There are hungry people who will be here in a couple of hours, and they expect us to feed them.” He spoke in English, then switched to another tongue and, presumably, repeated himself. When he finished, his people went back to work, with only a few surreptitious looks at their visitors.

He caught the attention of the wolf who’d been their guide. “Go get Martin and Jitka, eh? Bring them to the garden.”

Then to Adam and his people, Libor said, “Follow me, gentlemen.” He saw Bonarata and grunted. “And you’ll have to let me know how it is that the vampire who was trying to kill your wife is now traveling about with you. Though I know Iacopo Bonarata well enough not to be surprised.”

Harris, Smith, and Larry took up the rear. The goblins liked it best when no one noticed them. Smith evidently felt the same.

The garden was an unexpectedly beautiful spot of nature in the center of the bakery. The Vltava Alpha walked to the end, then turned and faced them.

“I’m Libor of the Vltava,” he said.

“Adam of the Columbia Basin,” Adam responded. Then one by one he introduced his party, though he’d told Libor who would be coming and why. Since there were so many old beings in the courtyard, he began with the women, starting with Honey because she was the closest. Mercy would scold him for being old-fashioned.

“I have heard of you,” Libor told Honey. “Peter was a good man, a good werewolf. The world is a darker place without him in it.”

Honey blinked more rapidly than usual. “Yes,” she said.

“Honey killed Lenka,” Adam told Libor.

Libor looked at Bonarata with yellow eyes as he said, “Good. This is something that should have been done long ago. When I depart this world, not doing something about Lenka will be part of the cross I will bear on the way to Paradise.” He turned, took Honey’s hand in his, and kissed it. “If she could, she would thank you.”

Adam moved the introductions along. Bonarata was on his best behavior—but that might not last.

“You are Bonarata’s Blade,” Libor said, after Adam introduced Marsilia. “I have heard many stories, enough to make me regret that we never met while you were here.”

She nodded gravely. “I’ve heard stories about you, too, Libor. It is probably best that this is our first meeting.”

He smiled. “Undoubtedly true. And still . . .”

When Adam introduced Elizaveta, the other wolf smiled with genuine happiness.

“Your name is well-known,” he told her gravely in Russian. “And those who speak of you do not exaggerate your beauty.”

“I have heard your name, too. And they who speak of you do not exaggerate your skill at flirtation,” Elizaveta responded, but she was pleased.

Adam started on the men, but Libor said, “Iacopo Bonarata and I know each other well. I will have some words for you later about your vampires here in my city, and for this reason, I allow you here in my home.”

“You will find me eager to listen,” said Bonarata.

They exchanged toothy smiles. And Adam continued introductions.

“The Soldier,” said Libor. “I have heard stories about you.”

“Exaggerated, I’m afraid,” said Stefan. “I have heard many things of you also. I would not want you for an enemy.”

Libor smiled. “I would agree that it is good not to be enemies, you and I. Though I don’t know that we will be friends.”

Adam introduced the last three all at the same time.

Libor greeted Harris and Larry and said, “Goblins do not usually interest themselves in the affairs of wolves.”

Larry smiled easily. “Usually you aren’t so entertaining,” he said.

“And I’m getting paid,” said Harris. “When I get paid, I’m always interested.”

“And Smith,” said Libor, his body quiet and his eyes yellow. “Smith and I know each other.” There was an edge in the other Alpha’s voice—a lot of the old wolves had history.

Smith looked at his feet and smiled peacefully. “They needed a copilot who could haul around vampires and werewolves,” he said. “Harris was fine, but he needed me to help out because the rest of his people are either human or they won’t travel with vampires.”

Libor stared at him for a moment longer, closed his eyes, and heaved a sigh. “It has been a long time,” he said.

Then Libor looked at Adam and said, “Your mate brought trouble on her tail.”

“She usually does,” he agreed gravely.

A pair of people came into the garden then.

“Let me introduce you to my wolves,” Libor said heavily. “This is Martin, my second, and Jitka, my third. I’ll let them tell you how they lost your mate.”