DEEP INSIDE THE basalt caverns of the Ninth Legion’s subterranean stronghold on the Isle of Staffa, Quintus Seneca woke in darkness. Without thinking he reached for the woman of his dreams, the sweetly submissive lowland dairy maid who had enchanted him from the moment he had enthralled her. He would make love with Fenella Ivar as he drank from her veins, and begin his night with those two gratifying pleasures. Only when his cold hand touched empty linens did his folly disperse.

Fenella would never be with him anywhere but in his dreams.

Although she had died a year ago, her loss remained an open wound. His poor love had died twice, in fact: once when Quintus had turned her undead after a lethal attack, and a second time during a battle with their immortal enemies, the McDonnel Clan. The fault for both of her deaths lay on him, and no weight he had ever carried in life had felt as crushing.

She had saved his life, and he had repaid her by sending her to her final death.

The door to his bed chamber opened, and a plump figure slipped inside. His second undead female creation, Bryn Mulligan, had brought a goblet of fresh blood. A former village whore who possessed none of Fenella’s grace or beauty, she had still provided a welcome distraction these last months. Quintus had not turned her to serve as his new lover, but he sometimes still used her when his needs became pressing.

“Fair evening to you, Tribune.” She stopped at a respectful distance and bobbed in a deep curtsey. “Prefect Strabo awaits you in the outer hall.”

A veteran centurion, and one of the few survivors of their last clash with the McDonnels, Titus Strabo had taken Fenella’s place as Quintus’s prefect. He dutifully reported every night on the progress he was making with replacing the troops lost in battle. In most ways he had become an acceptable second in command, although he had little imagination, and sometimes spoke with a surliness that grated.

“Very well,” Quintus said. He would not hurry himself to attend to Strabo, whom he resented for surviving when Fenella had perished. “Bring that blood to me.” When she did he drained the goblet, and then inspected her smiling face. “What have you to tell me of your efforts, my dear?”

“Another ten female mortals have been turned, milord.” Bryn cast her gaze down with her customary deference. “Once I have instructed them, with your permission they shall be placed to service the garrison.”

He nodded, pleased that she sought his approval for her plans. The women she was teaching to work as whores would soon be ready to leave Staffa and be placed where they could enthrall large numbers of male mortals. Once enslaved the men would be used in various ways to protect and serve the Ninth. The strongest would be sent to Staffa to be turned and join the legion.

Quintus rose and dressed before he had Bryn fetch Strabo. His prefect presented himself in the hooded black cloak he’d worn over his uniform since being wounded. It billowed around him as he knelt and saluted with a forearm across his chest.

“Your vanity annoys me, Strabo.”

“Apologies, Tribune.” The prefect stood and tugged back the hood, revealing his scarred face.

Simply looking at the man further soured Quintus’s mood. One half of Strabo’s head still showed his weathered, rugged features, close-cropped hair and bullish neck as they had been. Burns from the battle had left the other side bald, darkened and twisted. Streaks of shiny scars extended around the blob that remained of his ear and disappeared under the edge of his chest plate. The contractions of his flesh as he’d healed pulled one side of his mouth up like an unending sneer.

Looking away from his prefect’s ghastly visage would have been a sign of weakness, however, so Quintus kept his gaze steady on the unmarked half of his face. “What have you to report?”

Like every other night the news proved unremarkable. Strabo had dispersed the newest recruits to complete their training, and adjusted the ranks of two cohorts to accommodate them. Fresh thralls had been delivered by one of their black ships from the lowlands. No sign of the McDonnel clan had been seen by any of the scant patrols on the mainland.

“You must send more search teams to the highlands,” Quintus told the prefect. “Have them begin at the ridges closest to the sea and work inland from there.”

“Had I the men to spare, I would, Tribune,” Strabo said, his ruined mouth struggling to shape some of the words. “The first cohort is barely a hundred men, and none with tracking experience. The second you sent to the lowlands to continue gathering blood thralls.” He flicked his fingers at his scarred cheek. “I and two others are all that is left of the third, and the rest–”

“–have perished,” Quintus finished for him. “As I am well aware, Prefect. Your training methods are proving too leisurely. Cut their blood rations to half, and double the drills.”

Strabo’s remaining brow arched above the narrow black crescent of his eye. “Tribune, to starve the newly-turned is to invite frenzy.”

“Then post guards to protect the stronghold thralls, you idiot,” Quintus snapped. “Or must I do your work as well as instruct you on how to manage it?”

“Not at all, my lord.” Strabo bowed. “I shall see to it directly.” He glanced at Bryn. “My lady.”

Once the prefect departed Quintus regarded his whore mistress. “He shows more respect to you than me.”

“He is bitter over his deformities,” she said, startling him with the shrewd observation. “And I dinnae flinch away from him as the new mortal females do.”

“Has he a bed slave?” When she shook her head, Quintus felt a little less annoyed. “Go to his chamber tonight and tend to him. Perhaps you can leech some of his ill temper before I lose mine and relieve him of his scorched head.”

Bryn’s cheeks plumped with her smile. “As you command, milord.”