Bone Crossed

I LEFT STEFAN FINALLY I NEEDED TO GET UP EARLY TO get back to work, and it might be nice to have some sleep. When I glanced back over my shoulder for a last, concerned look, he was gone. I hoped he hadn't gone back to his house - that didn't seem like the smartest place for him to hang out - but he would do as he pleased. He was like me in that way.



The lights were on at home, and I redoubled my pace as soon as I saw them. I dove through the dog door and found Warren pacing in the living room. Medea sat on the back of the couch and watched him with an annoyed look on her face.



"Mercy," Warren said with relief. "Get changed; get dressed. We're attending a peace powwow with the vampires, and you were specifically requested."



I ran into my room and shifted back to human. What with one thing and another, I had a roomful of dirty clothes and nothing more. "We're talking peace-treaty time?" I asked throwing dirty pants over my shoulder.



"We hope so," Warren said, following me into the room. "Who shot you?"



"Vampire, no biggie," I said. "He wasn't aiming to kill. I don't even think any of the shot stuck."



"Nope, but you won't be happy about sitting down tonight."



"I'm never happy sitting down when there are vampires around - Stefan usually excepted. What did Marsilia say?"



"She didn't call us, and we couldn't get a lot of sense out of the vampire who did. She read a note, then giggled a lot."



"Lily?" I looked at Warren.



"That's what Samuel said." He pulled a shirt off his shoulder, where I must have thrown it, and dropped it on the floor.



"She called him, too?"



He shrugged. "Yes. Marsilia wanted him there, too. No, I don't know what it's about, and neither does Adam. However, it's unlikely that she's going to annihilate us once we get there. Adam sent me here to bring you when you got back. I think he wanted you dressed, though."



"Smart aleck," I told him, hopping into my jeans. I found a decent bra and put that on. I finally found a clean shirt folded in the shirt drawer. I wondered who'd but it there.



It's not that I'm not neat. In my garage, every tool is exactly where it belongs at the end of the day. Sometimes there's a little friction when Zee has been in there because he and I have a different idea of where some of the tools should be.



Someday, when time presents itself, I'll clean my room. Having a roommate forces me to keep the rest of the house reasonably clean. But no one cares about my room, and that puts it pretty far down on my list of to-dos. It's below, for instance, keeping solvent, saving Amber from Blackwood, and attending the meeting with Marsilia. I'll almost certainly get to it before I get around to planting a garden, though.



I pulled on the clean shirt. It was dark blue and emblazoned with BOSCH GENUINE GERMAN AUTO PARTS. Not the shirt I'd have picked out to pay a formal call on the Vampire Queen, but I supposed she'd have to take it or leave it. At least it didn't have any oil stains.



Warren picked up a handful of jeans and unburied my shoes. "Now all you need is socks, and we can go."



His cell phone rang, and he tossed the shoes at me and answered. "Yes, boss. She's here and almost dressed."



Adam's voice was a little muffled, and he was talking very quietly - but I still heard him. He sounded a little wistful.



"Almost, eh?"



Warren grinned. "Yep. Sorry, boss."



"Mercy, get a wiggle on," Adam said in a louder voice. "Marsilia's holding things up until you're here - since you were a material part of the recent unrest."



He hung up.



"I'm wiggling. I'm wiggling," I muttered, pulling on socks and shoes. I wished I'd had a chance to replace my necklace.



"Your socks don't match."



I marched out the door. "Thank you. Since when did you become a fashionista?"



"Since you decided to wear a green sock and a white sock," he said, following me. "We can take my truck."



"I have another pair just like it, too," I said. "Somewhere." Except I thought I'd thrown out the mate to the green sock last week.



THE WROUGHT-IRON GATES AROUND THE SEETHE WERE open, but the driveway was clogged with cars, so we parked off the gravel driveway. The Spanish-style adobe compound was lit with orangish lantern-style lights that flickered almost like the real thing.



I didn't know the vampire at the door, and, very unvampirelike, he simply opened the door, and said, "Down the hall to the stairway at the end and downstairs to the bottom."



I hadn't remembered there being a stairway at the end of the hall when I'd been here before. Probably because the huge, full-length-and-then-some painting of a Spanish villa had been in front of it instead of leaning against a side wall.



Although we'd entered on the ground floor, the stairway we were on took us down two full flights. I can see in the dark almost as well as a cat, and the stairwell was dark for me - a human would be almost helpless. As we descended, the smell of vampire clogged my nose.



There was a small anteroom with a single vampire - another one I didn't recognize. I didn't actually know more than a handful of Marsilia's vampires by sight. This one had silvery gray hair and a very young-looking face, and was dressed in a traditional black funeral suit. He'd been seated behind a very small table, but as we came down the last three steps, he stood up.



He ignored Warren entirely, and said, "You are Mercedes Thompson." He wasn't quite asking a question, but his statement was far from certain. He also had an accent of some sort, but I couldn't place it.



"Yes," said Warren shortly.



The vampire opened the door and swept us a short bow.



The room we entered was huge for a house - more a small gymnasium than a room. There were stands of seats - bleachers really, on either side of the long side of the room. Bleachers filled with silent watchers. I hadn't realized that there were so many vampires in the whole of the Tri-Cities, then I saw that a lot of the people were human - the sheep, I thought, like me.



And in the very center of the room was the huge oak chair festooned with carvings and accented with dull brass. I couldn't see them, but I knew the brass thorns on the arms of the chair were sharp and dark with old blood... some of it was mine.



That chair was one of the treasures of the seethe, vampire magic and old magic combined. The vampires used it to determine the truth of whatever poor being had the brass thorns stuck in its hands. It's gruesomely appropriate that a lot of vampire magic has to do with blood.



The presence of the chair raised my suspicions that this wasn't to be a negotiation for peace between the vampires and the werewolves. The last time I'd seen that chair, it had been at a trial. It made me nervous, and I wished I knew exactly what the words were that had been used to invite us here.



It was easy to pick out the werewolves - they were standing in front of two rows of empty seats: Adam, Samuel, Darryl and his mate, Aurielle, Mary Jo, Paul, and Alec. I wondered which ones Marsilia had specified and which were Adam's choice.



Darryl was the first to notice us because the door was almost as silent as the crowd of vampires. His eyes swept over me from head to toe and for a moment he looked appalled. Then he glanced around the crowd - all the vampires and their menageries were dressed up in their finest, be that ball gown or double-breasted suit. I thought I saw at least one Union army jacket. He looked at my T-shirt, then relaxed and gave me a subtle smile.



It seemed he decided it was okay I hadn't dressed up to meet the enemy. Adam had been talking rather intently with Samuel (about the upcoming football game, I later found out - we don't discuss important matters in front of the bad guys) but looked at his second, then looked up as we walked over to him.



"Mercy," he said, his voice ringing in the room as if it were empty. "Thank goodness. Maybe now we can get some business done."



"Maybe," Marsilia said.



She was right behind us. I knew she hadn't been there a moment ago because Warren jumped when I did. Warren was more wary than I was - no one snuck up on him. Ever. The side effect of being hunted by his own kind for most of his century-and-a-half-long life.



He turned, shoving me behind him, and snarled at her - something he wouldn't have normally done. All the vampires in the room rose to their feet, and their anticipation of blood was palpable.



Marsilia laughed, a beautiful, ringing laugh that stopped a second before I expected it to, making it more unsettling than her sudden appearance. Her sudden, businesslike appearance. The only other times I'd seen her, she'd worn clothing designed to attract attention to her beauty. This time she wore a business suit. The only concession to femininity was the narrow skirt instead of pants and the rich wine color of the wool.



"Sit," she said - as if she were talking to a poodle - and the roomful of vampires sat. She ever looked away from me.



"How kind of you to make an appearance," she said, her abyss-dark eyes cold with power.



Only Warren's warmth allowed me to answer her with anything approaching calm. "How kind of you to issue your invitations in advance, so I could be on time," I said. Perhaps not wisely - but, hey, she already hated me. I could smell it.



She stared at me a moment. "It makes a joke," she said.



"It is rude," I returned, taking a step to the side. If I got her mad enough to attack me, I didn't want



Warren to take the hit.



It was only when I stepped around him that I realized I was meeting her gaze. Stupid. Even Samuel wasn't proof against the power of her eyes. But I couldn't look down, not with Adam's power rising to choke me. I wasn't just a coyote here, I was the Alpha of the Columbia Basin Pack's mate - because he said so, and because I said so.



If I looked down, I was acknowledging her superiority, and I wouldn't do that. So I met her eyes, and she chose to allow me to do so.



She lowered her eyelids, not so far as to lose our informal staring contest, but to veil her expression. "I think," she said in a voice so soft that only Warren and I heard her, "I think that had we met at a different place and time, I could have liked you." She smiled, her fangs showing. "Or killed you."



"Enough games," she said, louder. "Call him for me."



I froze. That's why she wanted me. She wanted Stefan back. For a moment all I could see was the blackened dead thing that she'd dropped in my living room. I remembered how long it had taken me to realize who it was.



She'd done that to him - and now she wanted him back. Not if I could help it.



Adam hadn't moved from where he'd been standing, telling the room he trusted me to take care of myself. I wasn't sure he really thought so - I knew I didn't - but he needed me to stand on my own two feet. "Call whom?" he asked.



She smiled at him without looking away from me. "Didn't you know? Your mate belongs to Stefan."



He laughed, an oddly happy sound in this dirge-shadowed room. It was a good excuse to turn my back on Marsilia and quit playing the stare game. Turning my back meant that I didn't lose - only that the contest was over.



I tried not to let the sick fear I felt show on my face. I tried to be what Adam - and Stefan - needed me to be.



"Like a coyote, Mercy is adaptable," Adam told Marsilia. "She belongs to whom she decides. She belongs everywhere she wants to, for just as long as she wants to." He made it sound like a good thing.



Then he said, "I thought this was about preventing war."



"It is," said Marsilia. "Call Stefan."



I lifted my chin and glanced at her over my shoulder. "Stefan is my friend," I told her. "I won't bring him to his execution."



"Admirable," she told me briskly. "But your concern is misplaced. I can promise that he won't be hurt physically by me or by mine tonight."



I slanted a glance at Warren, and he nodded. Vampires might be hard to read, but he was better at sensing lies than I was, and his nose agreed with mine: she was being truthful.



"Or hold him here," I said.



The smell of her hatred had died away, and I couldn't tell anything about how she felt. "Or hold him here," she agreed. "Witness!"



"Witnessed," said the vampires. All of them. All at exactly the same time. Like puppets, only creepier. She waited. Finally, she said, "I mean him no harm."



I thought of earlier tonight, when he'd turned down Bernard even though I was pretty sure he agreed with Bernard's assessment of her continued rule of the seethe. In the end, he loved her more than he loved his seethe, his menagerie of sheep, or his own life.



"You harm him by your continued existence," I told her, as quietly as I could. And she flinched. I thought about that flinch... and about the way she'd let him live even though he, of all her vampires, had reason to see her dead - and had the means to do so. Maybe Stefan wasn't the only one who loved.



It hadn't kept her from torturing him, though.



I closed my eyes, trusting Warren, trusting Adam to keep me safe. I only wished I could keep Stefan safe. But I knew what he would want me to do.



Stefan, I called, just as I had earlier - because I knew he would want me to. Surely he knew where I was calling from and would come ready to protect himself.



Nothing happened. No Stefan.



I looked toward Marsilia and shrugged. "I called," I told her. "But he doesn't have to come when I call."



It didn't seem to bother her. She just nodded - a surprisingly businesslike gesture from a woman who would have looked more at home in a Renaissance gown of silk and jewels than she did in her modern suit.



"Then I call this meeting to order," she said, strolling to the old thronelike chair in the center of the room.



"First, I would call Bernard to the chair."



He came, reluctant and stiff. I recognized the pattern of his movement - he looked like a wolf called against his will. I knew he wasn't of her making, but she had power over him just the same. He was still wearing the clothes I'd last seen him in. The harsh overhead fluorescent lights glinted off the small balding spot on the top of his head.



He sat unwillingly.



"Here, caro, let me help." Marsilia took each hand and impaled it on the upthrust brass thorns. He fought. I could see it in the grimness of his face and the tenseness of his muscles. I couldn't see that it cost



Marsilia anything at all to keep him under her control.



"You've been naughty, no?" she asked. "Disloyal."



"I have not been disloyal to the seethe," he gritted out.



"Truth," said a boy's voice.



The Wizard himself. I hadn't seen him - though I'd looked. His light gold hair had been trimmed close to his skull. He had a vague smile on his face as he strolled down from the top of the bleachers across from us. He used the bleacher seats as stairs.



He looked like a young high school student. He'd died before his features had had a chance to grow into maturity. He looked soft and young.



Marsilia smiled when she saw him. He hopped over the last three seats and landed lightly on the hardwood floor. She was shorter than he was, but the kiss he gave her made my stomach hurt. I knew he was hundreds of years old, but it didn't matter - because he looked like a kid.



He stepped back and reached out a finger and ran it over Bernard's hand and down to the chair arm.



When he picked it up it dripped blood. He licked it off slowly, letting a few drops roll down the palm of his hand, over his wrist, until it stained the light green sleeves of his dress shirt.



I wondered who he was performing for. Surely the vampires wouldn't be bothered by his licking blood - and I was sort of right but mostly wrong. Bothered might not be the word, but there was a generalized motion from the stands as vampires leaned forward and some of them even licked their lips. Ugh.



"You have betrayed me, haven't you, Bernard?" Marsilia was still looking at Wulfe, and he held out his hand. She took it and traced the drying blood, letting her mouth linger over his wrist while Bernard quivered, trying not to answer the question.



"I have not betrayed the seethe," Bernard said again. And though she grilled him for ten minutes or more, that was all he would say.



Stefan appeared beside me. His eyes were on the sleeve of his white dress shirt as he casually fixed a cuff link, then he pulled the sleeve of his subtly pin-striped gray suit over it with a just-right tug. He looked at me, and Marsilia looked at him.



She waved her hand at Bernard. "Get up - Wuife, put him somewhere obvious, would you?"



Shaking and stumbling, Bernard rose, his hands dripping on the pale floor all the way to the stands, where Wulfe cleared out space on the bottom tier of seats for them both. He began cleaning Bernard's hands, like a cat licking ice cream.



Stefan didn't say anything, just ran his eyes over me in a quick survey. Then he looked at Adam, who nodded regally back, though he smiled a little, and I realized that he and Stefan were wearing the same thing, except that Adam wore a dark blue shirt.



Mary Jo saw the resemblance and grinned. She turned to say something to Paul, I thought, when a surprised look came over her face, and she just dropped. Alec caught her before she hit the floor as if this wasn't the first time she'd done something like that. Leftovers from the close brush with death, I hoped, not something the vampires were doing.



Stefan left me for Mary Jo. He touched her throat, ignoring Alec's silent snarl.



"Relax," Stefan told the wolf. "She will take no harm from me."



"She's been doing that a lot," Adam told him. That he didn't step between his vulnerable pack member and the vampire was an unsubtle message.



"She's waking up," Stefan said just before her eyes fluttered open.



And only after Mary Jo was clearly awaken did Stefan look at Marsilia.



"Come to the chair, Soldier," she told him.



He stared at her for so long that I wondered if he would do it. He might love her, but he didn't like her very much at the moment - and, I hoped, didn't trust her either.



But he patted Mary Jo's knee and walked out to where Marsilia waited for him.



"Wait," she told him before he sat down. She looked at the stands across from us, where the vampires and their food sat. "Do you want me to question Estelle, first? Would that make you happier?"



I couldn't tell who she was speaking to.



"Fine," she said. "Bring Estelle here."



A door I hadn't noticed opened on the far side of the room and Lily, the gifted pianist and quite insane vampire who never left the seethe and Marsilia's protection, came in carrying Estelle like a new groom carried his bride over the threshold. Lily was even dressed in a frothy white mass of lace that could have been a wedding dress to Estelle's dark suit. Though I'd never seen a bride with blood all over her face and down her gown. If I were a vampire, I think I'd only wear black or dark brown - to hide the stains.



Estelle hung limp in Lily's arms, and her neck looked like a pack of hyenas had been chewing on her.



"Lily," Marsilia chided. "Haven't I told you about playing with your food?"



Lily's sapphire eyes glittered with a hungry iridescence visible even in the overly brightly lit room.



"Sorry," she said. She skipped a couple of steps. "Sorry, 'Stel." She smiled whitely at Stefan, then she plopped Estelle's limp form on the chair, like a doll. She moved Estelle's head so it wasn't flopped to the side, then straightened her skirt. "Is that good?"



"Fine. Now be a good girl and go sit next to Wulfe, please."



Lilly had been in her thirties, I thought, when she was killed, but her mind had stopped developing far earlier. She smiled brightly and skipped over to Wulfe and bounced down to the seat beside him. He patted her knee, and she put her head on his shoulder.



As with Bernard, Marsilia stuck Estelle's hands on the thorns. The limp vampire came to shrieking, screaming life as soon as her second hand was pierced.



Marsilia allowed it for a minute, then said, "Stop," in a voice that fired like a.22. It popped but didn't thunder.



Estelle froze midscream.



"Did you betray me?" Marsilia asked.



Estelle jerked. Shook her head frantically. "No. No. No. Never."



Marsilia looked at Wulfe. He shook his head. "If you control her enough to keep her on the chair, Mistress, she can't answer with truth."



"And if I don't, all she does is scream." She looked into the bleachers. "As I told you. You can try it yourself if you choose? No?" She pulled Estelle's hands off the chair. "Go sit by Wulfe, Estelle."



A Hispanic man came to his feet on one of the seats behind me. He had a tear tattooed just below one eye and he, like Wulfe, hopped down to the floor via the seats, though without Wulfe's grace. It was more as if he fell slowly down the bleachers, landing on hands and knees on the unforgiving floor.



"Estelle, Estelle," he moaned, brushing by me. He was human, one of her sheep, I thought.



Marsilia raised an eyebrow, and a vampire followed Estelle's human at three or four times his speed. He caught up to him before the man had made it halfway across the floor. The vampire had the appearance of a very elderly man. He looked as though he'd died of old age before being made a vampire, though there was nothing old or shaky in the hold he kept on the struggling man.



"What would you have me do, Mistress?" the old man said.



"I would have had you not allow him to interrupt us here," Marsilia said. I glanced at Warren, who frowned. She was lying then. I'd thought so. This was part of the script. After a thoughtful moment Marsilia said, "Kill him."



There was a snap, and the man dropped to the ground - and every vampire in the place who had been breathing stopped. Estelle fell to the ground, four or five feet from Wulfe. I glanced away and unexpectedly caught Marsilia staring at me. She wanted me dead; I could see it in the hungry look she had. But she had more pressing business just now



Marsilia gestured at the chair in invitation to Stefan. "Please, accept my apologies for the delay."



Stefan stared at her. If there was an emotion on his face, I couldn't read it.



He'd taken a step forward, and she stopped him once again. "No. Wait. I have a better idea."



She looked at me. "Mercedes Thompson. Come let us partake of your truth. Witness for us the things you have seen and heard."



I folded my arms, not in outright refusal - but I didn't go waltzing over either. This was Marsilia's show, but I wouldn't let her have the upper hand completely. Warren's hand closed over my shoulder - a show of support, I thought. Or maybe he was trying to warn me.



"You will do as I say because you want me to stop hurting your friends," she purred. "The wolves are more worthy targets... but there is that delicious policeman - Tony, isn't it? And the boy who works for you. He has such a big family, doesn't he? Children are so fragile." She looked at Estelle's man, dead almost at her feet.



Stefan stared at her, then looked at me. And once I saw his eyes, I knew the emotion he was trying to hold back... rage.



"You sure?" I asked him.



He nodded. "Come."



I wasn't happy about doing it, but she was right. I wanted my friends safe.



I sat on the chair and scooted forward until my arms wouldn't be stretched out trying to reach the sharp brass. I slammed both hands down and tried not to wince as the thorns bit deep - or gasp as magic pulsed in my ears.



"Yum," said Wuife - and I nearly jerked my hands away again. Could he taste me through the thorns, or was he just trying to harass me?



"I sent Stefan to you," Marsilia said. "Will you tell our audience what he looked like?"



I looked at Stefan, and he nodded. So I described the wizened thing that had fallen to my floor as closely as I could remember it, working to keep my voice impersonal rather than angry or... anything else inappropriate.



"Truth," said Wulfe when I finished.



"Why was he in that state?" Marsilia asked.



Stefan nodded so I answered her. "Because he tried to save my life by covering up my involvement in Andre's... death? Destruction? What do you call it when a vampire is killed permanently?"



The skin on her face thinned until I could see the bones beneath. And she was even more beautiful, more terrible in her rage. "Dead," she said.



"Truth," said Wulfe. "Stefan tried to cover up your involvement in Andre's death." He looked around. "I



helped cover it up, too. It seemed the thing to do at the time... though I later repented and confessed."



"There are crossed bones on the door of your home," Marsilia said.



"My shop," I answered. "And yes."



"Did you know," she said, "that no vampire except Stefan can go into your shop? It is your home as much as that ratty trailer in Finley is."



Why had she told me that? Stefan was watching her, too.



"Tell our audience the why of the bones."



"Betrayal," I said. "Or so I am told. You asked me to kill one monster, and I chose to kill two."



"Truth," said Wulfe.



"When did Stefan know you were a walker, Mercedes Thompson?"



"The first time I met him," I told her. "Almost ten years ago."



"Truth," said Wulfe.



She looked toward the bleachers again and addressed someone there. "Remember that." She turned to stare at me, then glanced at Stefan as she asked me, "Why did you kill Andre?"



"Because he knew how to build sorcerers-demon-possessed. He'd done it once, and you and he planned on doing it again. People died for his games - and more people would die for yours, both of yours."



"Truth," said Wulfe.



"What care we how many people die?" asked Marsilia, waving at the dead man and speaking to everyone here. "They are short-lived, and they are food."



She's meant it rhetorically, but I answered her anyway.



"They are many, and they could destroy your seethe in a day if they knew it existed. It would take them a month to wipe all of you out of existence in this country. And if you were creating monsters like that thing Andre brought into existence, I would help them." I leaned forward as I spoke. My hands throbbed in time with my heartbeat, and I found that the rhythm of my words followed the pain.



"Truth," said Wulfe in a satisfied tone.



Marsilia put her mouth near my ear. "That was for my soldier," she murmured in tones that reached no farther than my ears. "Tell him that."



She lowered her mouth until it hovered over my neck, but I didn't flinch.



"I do think I would have liked you, Mercedes," she said. "If you weren't what you are, and I wasn't what I am. You are Stefan's sheep?"



"We exchanged blood twice," I said.



"Truth," said Wulfe, sounding amused.



"You belong to him."



"You would think so," I agreed.



She let out a huff of exasperation. "You make this simple thing difficult."



" You make it difficult. I understand what you are asking, though, and the answer is yes."



"Truth."



"Why did Stefan make you his?"



I didn't want to tell her. I didn't want her to know I had any connection to Blackwood



whatsoever - though probably Adam had already told her. So I attacked.



"Because you murdered his menagerie. The people he cared about," I said hotly.



"Truth," Stefan ground out.



"Truth," agreed Wulfe softly.



Marsilia, her face angled toward me, looked obscurely satisfied. "I have what I need of you, Ms. Thompson. You may vacate the chair."



I pulled my hands off the chair and tried not to wince - or relax - as the uncomfortable pulse of magic left me. Before I could get up, Stefan's hand was under my arm, lifting me to my feet.



His back was to Marsilia, and all his attention seemed to be on me - though I had the feeling that all of his being was focused on his former Mistress. He took one of my hands in both of his and raised it to his mouth, licking it clean with gentle thoroughness. If we hadn't been in public, I'd have told him what I thought of that. I thought he caught a little of it in my face because the corners of his mouth turned up.



Marsilia's eyes flashed red.



"You overstep yourself." It was Adam, but it didn't sound like him.



I turned and saw him stride over the floor of the room without making a noise. If Marsilia's face had been frightening, it was nothing compared to his.



Stefan, undeterred, had picked up my other hand and treated it the same way - though he was a little more brisk about it. I didn't jerk it away because I wasn't sure he'd let me - and the struggle would light Adam's fuse for sure.



"I heal her hands," Stefan said, releasing me and stepping back. "As is my privilege."



Adam stopped next to me. He picked up my hands - which did look better - and gave Stefan a short, sharp nod. He tucked my hand around his upper arm, then returned with me to the wolves. I could feel in the pounding of his heart, in the tightness of his arm, that he was on the edge of losing it. So I dropped my head against his arm to muffle my voice. Then I said, "That was all aimed at Marsilia."



"When we get home," said Adam, not bothering to speak quietly, "you will allow me to enlighten you about how something can accomplish more than one purpose at the same time."



Marsilia waited until we were seated with the rest of the wolves before she continued her program for the evening.



"And now for you," she said to Stefan. "I hope you have not reconsidered your cooperation."



In answer, Stefan sat in the thronelike chair, raised both hands over the sharp thorns, and slammed them down with such force that I could hear the chair groan from where I stood.



"What do you wish to know?" he asked.



"Your feeder told us that I killed your former menagerie," she said. "How do you know it to be true?"



He lifted his chin. "I felt each of them die, by your hand. One a day until they were no more."



"Truth," agreed Wulfe in a tone I hadn't heard from him before. It made me look. He sat with Estelle collapsed at his feet, Lily leaning against one side, and Bernard sitting stiffly on the other. Wulfe's face was somber and... sad.



"You are no longer of this seethe."



"I am no longer of this seethe," Stefan agreed coolly.



"Truth," said Wulfe.



"You were never mine, really," she told him. "You had always your free will."



"Always," he agreed.



"And you used that to hide Mercy from me. From justice."



"I hid her from you because I judged her no risk to you or the seethe."



"Truth," murmured Wulfe.



"You hid her because you liked her."



"Yes," agreed Stefan. "And because there would be no justice in her death. She had not killed one of us - and would not, except that you set that task to her." For the first time since he sat in the chair, he looked directly at her. "You asked her to kill the monster you could not find - and she did it. Twice."



"Truth."



"She killed Andre !" Marsilia's voice rose to a roar, and power echoed in it and through the room we were in. The lights dimmed a little, then regained their former wattage.



Stefan smiled sourly at her. "Because there was no choice. We left her no choice - you, I, and Andre."



"Truth."



"You chose her over me ," Marsilia said, and her power lit the air with strangeness. I took a step closer to Adam and shivered.



"You knew she hunted Andre, knew she'd killed him - and you hid what she did from me. You forced me to torture you and destroy your power base. You must answer to me." Her voice thundered, vibrating the floor and rattling the walls. The suspended lights drifted back and forth, making shadows play.



"Not anymore," said Stefan. "I do not belong to you."



"Truth," snapped Wulfe, suddenly coming to his feet. "That is fair truth - you felt it yourself."



Across from us, high in the bleachers, a vampire stood up. He had soft features, wide-spaced eyes, and an upturned nose that should have made him look something other than vampire. Like Wulfe and Estelle's human, he strode down the seats. But there was no bounce to his step or hesitation. His path might as well have been straight and paved for all it impeded him. He landed on the floor and walked to Wulfe.



He wore a tuxedo and a pair of dark-metal gauntlets. Hinged metal on the top and chain link below. He flexed his fingers and blood dripped from the gloves to the floor.



No one made any move to clean it up.



He turned, and in a light, breathy voice, he said, "Accepted. He is no man of yours, Marsilia."



I had no idea who he was, but Stefan did. He froze where he sat, all of his being focused on the vampire in the bloody gauntlets. Stefan's face was blank, as if the whole world had tilted from its axis.



Marsilia smiled. "Tell me. Did Bernard approach you to betray me?"



"Yes," Stefan said, without expression.



"Did Estelle do the same?"



He took a deep breath, blinked a couple of times, and relaxed in the chair. "Bernard seemed to have the seethe's best interest at heart," he said.



"Truth," Wulfe said.



"But Estelle, when she asked me to join her against you, Estelle just wanted power."



"Truth."



Estelle shrieked and tried to get to her feet, but she couldn't move away from Wulfe.



"And what did you tell them?" she asked.



"I told them I wouldn't make a move against you." Stefan sounded utterly weary, but somehow his words carried over the noise Estelle was making.



"Truth," declared Wulfe.



Marsilia looked at the gauntlet-wearing vampire, who sighed and bent to Estelle. He petted her hair a couple of times until she quieted. We all heard the crack when her neck broke. He took his time separating her head from her body. I looked away and swallowed hard.



"Bernard," Marsilia said, "we believe it would be good if you return to your maker until you learn the habit of loyalty."



Bernard stood up. "It was all a trick," he said, his voice incredulous. "All a trick. You killed Stefan's people - knowing he loved them. You tortured him. All to catch Estelle and me in our little rebellion... a rebellion born from the heart of your own Andre."



Marsilia said, "Yes. Don't forget that I set up his little favorite, Mercedes, to be the lever I needed to move the world. If she hadn't killed Andre, if he hadn't helped her cover it up, then I could not have sent him out from the seethe. Then I could not have used him to witness against you and Estelle. Had you been of my making, disposing of you would have been much easier and cost me less."



Bernard looked at Stefan, who was sitting as if it would hurt to move, his head slightly bent.



"Stefan, of all of us, was loyal to the death. So you tortured him, killed his people, threw him out - because you knew that he'd refuse us. That his loyalty was such that despite what you had done to him, he'd still remain yours."



"I counted on it," she said. "By his refusal, your rebellion is robbed of its legitimacy." She looked at the man who'd killed Estelle. "You, of course, had no idea that your children would behave so."



He gave her a small smile, one predator to another, "I'm not on the chair." He pulled off the gauntlets and tossed them into Wulfe's lap. "Not even by such a slim connection." His hands were bloodied, but I couldn't tell if it was from one wound or many. "I've heard your truths, and can only hope you'll find them as galling as I."



"Come, Bernard," he said. "It is time for us to leave."



Bernard rose without protest, shock and dismay in every line of his body. He followed his maker to the doorway, but turned back before leaving the room entirely. "God save me," he said looking at Marsilia, "from such loyalty. You have ruined him for your whim. You are not worthy of his gift - as I told him."



"God won't save any of us," said Stefan in a low voice. "We are all of us damned."



He and Bernard stared at each other across the room. Then the younger vampire bowed and followed his maker out the door. Stefan pulled his hands free and stood up.



"Stefan - " said Marsilia, sweet-voiced. But before she finished the last syllable, he was gone.