Chapter Forty-six
My Sire was here. I felt him before I saw him, the brush of his power spreading out over the great hall like ripples in a pond. Small ones, subtle ones. Ones no one else seemed to notice.
Feelers; he was looking for me. And he was good—he was very good—and he knew my power signature like he knew his own. I stayed very, very still.
The young vampire I was riding looked around, from his less-than-dignified place on the floor. He appeared somewhat bewildered, the panic having cleared his head. He hadn’t planned to come here, into the audience hall, which, frankly, terrified him. He’d been on an errand when I’d suggested a shortcut, one he was now deciding he could live without. He scrambled to his feet and fled, forcing me to make a hasty decision.
Hoping the minor hop would go unnoticed, I jumped to a passing human who was carrying a tray of glasses. Magic swirled all around us, from the little sparks off gowns and coats, to the background hum of the wards, to the multicolored clouds that sparkled everywhere. Surely, no one could see through all that—
Dorina.
A flash of dark eyes in a thunderous face flicked across my inner eye.
I batted it away and jumped, right before a couple of guards grabbed my very bewildered ride, spilling his champagne. They took him away, while I rode a low-level master in another direction. It was more of a risk, but his magic somewhat cloaked my own. I hid in the haze of his power, staying quiet, wishing I dared try to influence him, even though it probably wouldn’t have worked.
But I couldn’t risk finding out, not with Mircea so close.
I could see him now, dark, lean, and dressed in a sleek tuxedo instead of the velvet robes he was entitled to. He looked strangely human among the glittering throng, like a raven among peacocks—ah. He hadn’t planned to be here tonight.
He was supposed to be at the apartment in New York, charming the mages who made weapons into making them for the Senate. And into finding ones powerful enough to be of use in Faerie. He was to lead the assault on the fey that was soon to come, and wanted to be sure of a steady supply of arms. But then something happened. . . .
Caedmon, the one who wanted our gift. He had been pressing his suit, while Mircea had been finding arguments to stave him off, to keep us here. And was now wondering why he’d bothered.
I felt a sharp pang at that, the longing of a child for the father who’d never wanted her, who had locked her away—
His head turned abruptly in my direction.
I cursed myself. Stupid! Stupid! I knew better. Emotion was the easiest thing to read, especially if that emotion involved you. He’d laid a trap and I’d fallen into it, and now he was coming this way.
The master I was riding smiled, and bowed. He felt honored; I did not. I had been careless, and now we were being surrounded.
Mircea’s vampires, so easy to pick out in a crowd, their power ghostly white against all the richer colors, started converging on all sides. They looked like spectral angels, perhaps vengeful ones. I looked desperately around for an advantage.
And found it above my head, in a swirl of angry magic from several arguing vamps. Not nearly as big as before; the room was still somewhat cowed from the lashing the consul had dealt the other master. But displeased, quarrelsome. Offense had been given and apology was demanded.
So I jumped, not out this time but up, into the angry clouds, and looked down through the glittering swirls of their power at the master I’d just left, who was bowing lower now and wondering what the great man wanted from him.
The great man wanted me, but didn’t find me. He was angry, but hid it well, making small talk with the vamp while mentally searching the surrounding area. He was worried; he knew what I could do, and better than the rest. I wanted to talk to him, to explain, but that . . . did not always go well. Sometimes he listened; many more times he did not.
And this time, I could not take the risk.
I also couldn’t hold free flight for long, and started looking around for an avatar.
And found something else.
One of the main advantages of being a dhampir is the natural camouflage. We register as human, even to high-level masters who ought to know better, unless they have something approaching Mircea’s facility with the mind. Fortunately, few do.
Unfortunately, all of them are able to smell blood, especially freshly spilled, and I was covered in it. And I didn’t exactly have time for a shower and change. So there was no hope of switching places with a human servant, grabbing a tray of drinks, and just waltzing my way into where I needed to be.
Of course not, I thought grimly.
That would be too easy.
And then there was the small matter of being out of time. Dorina didn’t fuck around. When she decided on something, she went for it, and that little party in Mircea’s rooms had held me up. I needed to get to the consul and I needed to do it now.
So I ran, but not through the dark-as-pitch passageways. I didn’t know them and didn’t have time to figure them out. And, anyway, Marlowe had probably flooded them with his people by now.
Of course, he had people on the main thoroughfare, too, the one cutting a swath from the entrance hall along the front of the building, forming an extended audience chamber. They were so thick there that this had to be it, had to be where the consul was holding court. I couldn’t see her yet, because of the length of the damned thing, and because there were a crap ton of people everywhere. But I could see Marlowe’s masters.
And vice versa.
They were already headed this way, and they were fast, but so was someone else.
And I didn’t mean me.
“Stop them!” I told a nearby guard, one of the ones dressed in Roman-looking armor that were standing at attention everywhere, guarding the Senate. They were there for show more than anything else, standing around all night trying to look shiny and not too bored. But they were bored, and the nearest was now looking hopefully at me.
“Protect me, goddamn it!” I told him. “Do your job!”
They did their job.
I started for the great hall at a dead run, and from every side, Marlowe’s masters jumped out at me. And looked everything from comically surprised to seriously pissed when the Senate’s ceremonial guards jumped for them. And quickly demonstrated that they’d been picked for more than how good they looked in a leather skirt.
Meanwhile, I ducked between masters, dodging the knives Marlowe’s boys had switched to, because I guess they didn’t want to spray bullets into the crowd. There was no time for subtleties, or apologies for the drinks that went flying or for the important types who got elbowed or for the outfits worth the price of a house that were splattered with hors d’oeuvres. There was only time—
For nothing, because somebody grabbed me.
But it wasn’t Marlowe.
Dorina had been hovering in the air overhead, and had dropped down on top of me like a bird of prey taking a mouse. Suddenly, I was seeing everything through the garbled vision of two sets of eyes. And even more worryingly, I was running again, correcting the stumble I’d taken when she took me and fumbling at my belt for the gun and—
Oh, no you don’t!
I’d finally spotted the creature, riding a nearby woman. It had been startling, disturbing. A black miasma that crouched over her like a malevolent shadow.
But I could do little about it as I was. My freed consciousness was extremely limited in ability, and was only slightly better with an avatar. To attack the creature enough to drive it out, to force it back inside its own body, I needed mine.
And, to my surprise, it came running into the gallery a moment later, chased by what looked like an army of vampires.
One of which was quickly attacked by another.
I stared for a moment, at the sight of senatorial guards flowing out to protect a dhampir.
Then I dropped down to join her, and to finish this—
Only to discover that she was fighting me.
I felt our hand spasm, dropping the gun we’d been holding, and our feet falter, sending us stumbling into a column. She was trying to take us to the floor, to ground us until one of the dark-haired master’s servants could subdue us. Or, worse, until Mircea could.
I felt him move this way, having seen her come in and realizing that something was wrong. But he didn’t know what yet, didn’t see the threat. And even if I’d wanted to try the explanation I’d rejected earlier, there was no time.
Not for him.
I hesitated, because Mircea had warned me against this. Do not contact her directly, he had said. Do not force a reintegration lest it all start again, and you damage her as you once did. Let it happen naturally. . . .
But there was nothing natural about what we were. And he underestimated her; he always had. She wasn’t a child anymore, but a woman hardened by combat and toughened by experience. And she would hate me for this, for leaving her out of the decision, for letting this murderer succeed.
As I would hate myself.
Dory, I said, and felt the shock reverberate through her.
My head snapped up, and my eyes stared blankly at a slur of faces, some surprised, some intrigued, some horrified as they realized that a dhampir savage had been allowed to roam freely among them.
I didn’t care.
Because the voice came again.
Dory . . .
I swallowed, and then jerked to the side, so that a vamp who’d been jumping for me slammed into the pillar instead. He sprang off, embarrassed and furious, and I elbowed him in the face, grabbed him by the hair, and smashed his head a few times into the heavy silver tray a frightened human servant was holding like a shield. And when that still wasn’t enough, I kicked him at a senatorial guard, who sent me a nod of thanks before introducing the guy repeatedly to the wall.
I barely noticed, being too busy staring into the air, because I persisted in the idea that I was going to see Dorina.
But I couldn’t see her.
She was me.
And she was talking—oh, yes, now she was talking, in a flood of words and images and feelings, so much, too much.
“Stop it!” I yelled, and staggered into someone—
Mircea.
I stared up at him, and knew my pupils were blown wide by the change in his expression. “What is it?” he growled, although he already knew.
“She’s talking,” I said in wonder. “She’s finally talking—”
“Dorina!” Mircea shook me. “Stop it—I warned you! This is dangerous!”
“No.” I gripped him back, trying to sort through everything she’d sent. Trying to understand—
“I’m getting you out of here—”
“No!” I gripped him harder, my fingers biting into his arms. “There’s a problem—”
“I know that!”
“Listen to me. Someone’s trying to kill the consul but it isn’t her. It isn’t Dorina. I think—I think she’s trying to stop it, but—”
“—augghhh!”
Light exploded everywhere, searing, painful, overwhelming. And blinding. Suddenly, I couldn’t see a thing.
I also couldn’t hear. Or, rather, I could, but far too much. Something was confusing my mental control, letting in the surrounding voices, all of them, all at once. And unlike in a human gathering, these conversations weren’t just audible. There were mental voices, too, many more than could possibly fit into a single room, no matter how large. For there was almost nothing but masters here, pulling me in, smothering me under the weight of their vast families, turning a thousand guests into a million, a sea of voices, threatening to drown me.
I jerked back in self-defense, panting and disoriented, but that left me almost totally without senses, and the threat was growing. I could feel it, crawling along my spine, etching my mind like acid. But I couldn’t find it, even though it was getting closer, even though it was about to spring.
Damn it! I had to see.
But something saw me first. For it had been looking for me, too, feeling me as a subtle presence, as I had felt it. But not being able to locate me, either.
So it had uncloaked itself, showing its true form for the first time. And my body’s reaction to its power had told it exactly where to look. I’d just started to regain control, to begin filtering out the voices, and to dampen down that terrible light, when it hit: vicious pain and blinding static, the defense mechanisms of my prey. They were strong enough to stagger me, to cause me to clench my teeth on a scream as I fell back against the wall, to leave me gasping in agony.
But not strong enough to stop me.
Not this time.
Mircea had stumbled against the column, caught in the attack because of his proximity to me, and was as debilitated as I had been the first time. But this wasn’t my first time, and there’s a truth about pain that most people never learn, unless they’re really unlucky. Or really long-lived, long enough to have felt almost every kind there is. Pain has a signature to it, a type, a song. The first time you experience a new one, it’s a bright, white-hot, cutting edge; or a searing, brain-twisting burn; or a shattering, soul-crushing thud; or any of the thousand other forms it takes to torment you.
But the second time? Or the third? Or the fiftieth? No. It’s still terrible, still rage inducing, still debilitating, but it’s not the same shock as at first. You know this song, all its terrible highs and dismal lows; you can hum it with your eyes closed, because it’s just that familiar. Not like a friend—never that—but like an old enemy you’ve grown to know as well as to hate, his weapons and his limits.
You know what he can do to you.
But you also know what he can’t.
Which is why I came off the wall with a roar that scattered people in front of me, like a school of fish parting when a shark swims by. It would have been interesting another time, to catalogue the different reactions: young vampires spilling drinks on themselves in shock, or sinking to the floor in horror. Older, mid-level vamps, all but disappearing through doors and stairways, melting into the darkness, going dim. And then there were the oldest ones, bright, bright, so incredibly bright, their power eclipsing that of the others around them, wherever they were standing.
They did not run. They did not hide. But they also did not attack, holding back, seeing what I would do.
And looking vaguely surprised when I passed them by, uninterested.
For I was after something else, something deadlier than any of them, something I’d encountered before. Something that was still attacking: cutting, harsh and cruel. But not enough.
This time, I would have it. This time, I would kill it. But I had to find it first.
And it was no longer riding the woman I’d seen earlier. I found her, looking wide-eyed and shell-shocked, being supported by two others. So my prey wasn’t just riding, then, but controlling.
Who was it controlling now?
I didn’t know, and it was getting harder to concentrate. The creature knew I was hunting it, but wasn’t concerned, was laughing at me, and sending static from all sides now. I couldn’t see anything but leering vampire faces; couldn’t hear anything above the static’s awful roar; couldn’t use my inner eye, not with the massive crowd everywhere, hiding the one I needed to see. There were so many voices—
Until I screamed, the psychic shock waves spreading across the room like a scythe through wheat. Vampires, mages, human servants—they all went down. All except two. The vampire queen, standing still and terrible at the top of her dais, and the man suddenly running at her from across the room.
I had no weapons, and there was no time to get inside his head. I saw the queen glance at me as I started to run, not for her but for the creature clothed in the flesh of a man. I failed to reach him, but not because I was too slow. But because I was thrown backward, not slapped this time but belted, so hard and so fast that I hit the wall again, a dozen yards away, before I could blink. And the jolt of the blow—
Put me back in charge.
But the tag team handoff was a little abrupt, like me face-planting onto the nice marble floor when I bounced off the wall. It left me feeling like a punching bag that somebody had beaten all the stuffing out of at the gym. I somehow managed to get my shaky arms underneath me, to raise my head—
And then just stayed there, blinking in confusion, as what looked like a desert storm blew up in the middle of the room. It engulfed the man leaping at the queen, which would have been strange enough, because that’s not something you see every day. But then the whirling winds hardened into what looked like a shell of earth, a large globe behind which another storm broke with blinding fury.
I saw what looked like a hundred spells hit the sides of the shell, all at once, in bursts of color and light. Saw the consul blink, a tiny thing, a half expression. Saw her power spike as she fought to keep the fury contained. And heard Dorina tell me that she couldn’t sustain that level for long.
No shit, I thought back groggily.
I’d no sooner had the thought than the great shield cracked and buckled and shattered, exploding in a thousand pieces that lashed my face, even this far away. I saw something fall out of the other side, in swirls of dissipating magic. Saw it crash against the bottom steps of the dais and shatter like glass. Realized that it was the man, who was nothing but a collection of charred bones now.
The sand-laced winds had scoured him clean.
The consul was untouched, but not unscathed. I saw her stagger back against her throne, and the fact that she’d actually show weakness told me what the man had been carrying. Those explosions must have been caused by more of the superweapons we’d encountered, hundreds of them, enough to leave even a consul vulnerable.
And somebody was prepared to take advantage of it.
Through half a dozen doors, vampires surged into the room, all but flying at the dais. But they weren’t wearing the clothing of just one family. They weren’t from a single clan, and several were from competing ones. Which told me that this wasn’t—
—a normal assassination. They were being—
—controlled, by that creature who had attacked us at Claire’s—
—and who was here, riding someone new—
—but who? There was no way to know—
—except it wouldn’t be one of the controlled, lest we attack them and the creature lose its focus—
—but there was no one else! No one still conscious—
—no one except—
My eyes widened.
And then I grabbed the knife my last assailant had dropped, jumped up and threw—
Straight at the consul.