17

"HOW CAN YOU love him?" Richard asked.

I turned to look at him. He stood, shoulders hunched, rubbing his hands up and down his arms, as if he were cold. But I knew he wasn't cold, or at least not the kind of cold that blankets and skin warmth could fix. It was a coldness of the heart, or the soul, or the mind. That cold that eats a hole through the middle of who you are, and leaves something dark and awful behind.

I looked at him, and wondered how to answer his question. How to answer without making the pain in his body worse. I sighed, and finally realized that the only thing I could give him was the truth. Whatever we were to each other, whatever else we might someday be to each other, truth, at least truth, was between us.

"I asked you a question," he said, and his power warmed the room like opening an oven to peek inside. The heat dissipated almost as soon as I'd felt it He was trying to control himself.

"Why do I love Nathaniel?" I asked.

"That's what I asked," he said, in that angry voice.

"Because he never makes me feel like a freak."

"Because he is a freak," Richard snarled. "Anyone looks sane beside him."

I felt my face shutting down. Felt that flatness that I used when I was really pissed and trying to control it.

"Perhaps this is not the time for this conversation," Jean-Claude said in a careful voice.

We both ignored him.

"First," I said in a very tight, careful voice, "Nathaniel is not a freak. Second, he's willing to disrupt his entire life if he got me pregnant, and you're not. So I'd be careful before you throw stones at his character."

"If you're pregnant, I'll marry you."

The room was suddenly full of one of those silences so thick you should have been able to walk across it. I stared at him for a second, or two, then said, "Jesus, Mary and Joseph, Richard, is that all you think it takes to fix this? Marry me so the baby won't be a bastard, and it's all better?"

"I don't see anyone else offering marriage," he said.

"It's because they know I'll say no. Every other man in my life understands that this isn't about marriage. It's about the fact that we may have created a little person. And we need to do whatever is best for that person. How will marrying anyone make this work better?"

He looked at me, and there was such pain in his face, such struggle, as if I'd said something incomprehensible. "If you get a woman pregnant, you marry her, Anita. It's called taking responsibility for your actions."

"And if it's not your baby? Could you really raise someone else's baby? Could you really stay married to me, and play Daddy, as you watched the baby grow to look like someone else?"

He covered his face with his hands, and he screamed, "No!" He showed me a face ravaged by rage. The room was suddenly hot again, as if his power were raising the actual temperature. "No, I'd go crazy. Is that what you wanted to hear? Is it?"

"No," I said, "but you needed to hear it."

He frowned at me. "What?"

"I appreciate the offer, Richard. Really, I do, but if I was going to marry anyone, it would have to be someone who would be okay no matter who turned out to be the father."

"So, you'll marry Nathaniel, or Micah?" The heat bit along my skin.

"I am not going to marry anyone, don't you get that?"

"You just said--"

I cut him off. "No, that isn't what I said, or what I meant. It's what you heard."

"You're pregnant, Anita."

"Maybe I'm pregnant," I said.

"Don't you want a father for your baby?"

I stared at him, wondering what could I say that he'd actually hear and understand.

Jean-Claude stepped close to us, not between us, but as if the three of us were a shallow triangle. "I believe what ma petite is saying, Richard, is that marriage is not part of her plans, and that having a baby will not change that." His voice was his pleasantly neutral one, the one that he used when he was trying to persuade, or calm, and not make things worse.

"And if it's my baby, then I'm just supposed to be okay with Nathaniel and Micah raising it?"

I hung my head. What could I say to that?

"Ulfric," Claudia said, yelling that one word, the way a drill sergeant yells at a bad recruit.

He looked at her. "What?" His power bit along my skin again.

"First, control your power, it's biting along everyone's skin. You're the wolf king, you need to set a better example."

"What I set for my people is my business, rat."

She continued as if he hadn't spoken. "Second, you're making Anita feel worse than she already does."

He made a wordless sound, almost a yell. His power went back to just being heat, but not painful. His voice came careful, each word thick with suppressed rage. He was swallowing it, but it was still there. "I don't want to make Anita feel worse, but if she's pregnant then she has to know that she can't keep living the life she's living."

"You still want to trap her," Claudia said, "trap her and put her in some kind of 1950s cage."

"Marriage is not a trap," he said. "You make it sound like I want her barefoot and pregnant."

"Don't you?" she asked, and her anger was softer now, as if she finally understood he wasn't being a jerk, he just didn't understand himself.

"No," he said, and he meant it. He turned back to me. "You said it yourself, Anita, whatever's best for this little person. Do you really think being a federal marshal, and dealing with all kinds of violent crime and monsters, is the kind of life that a baby needs?"

"Jesus, Richard," I said, "you're still trying to take away my life. To take away what makes me who I am. You love me, but not who I am. You love who you want me to be."

"Isn't that what you want from me?" he said. "Don't you want me to change who I am, too?"

I started to say no, then stopped myself. I thought about it. Was I asking him to change as much as he was asking me? "I want you to embrace the life you already have, and be happy in it, Richard. You want me to totally change my life, and try to fit in some white-picket-fence picture that doesn't match your life, or mine."

"I am so sick of you accusing me of wanting to put you behind a white picket fence."

"I may be pregnant, and suddenly you want me to marry you, and give up being a federal agent. We aren't even sure there is a baby, and you're already trying to impose your idea of what our life should be on me."

"Could you really keep working on serial killer cases, and killing monsters, after you have a baby?"

I stared at him. "What do you think having a baby will do to me, Richard? Do you think just because I have a baby I'll become this other person? This softer, gentler person? Is that what you think?"

"May I add something to this discussion?" Samuel asked.

Richard and I said no; Jean-Claude said yes. Samuel ignored us and did what Jean-Claude said.

"If my wife is any example of having children in these rather extraordinary circumstances, then softer is not what will happen. Thea was gentle with the children. There was indeed a new softness that I had never seen, but with everyone else..." He shook his head. "I had never seen her so ruthless as after Sampson was born. She was more determined than ever to make our base of power strong and secure. Any threat to us was destroyed immediately. Even with the help of servants she insisted on caring for him herself, and with the feedings, well"--he shrugged with hands up--"having to wake every two hours to breast-feed meant very little sleep. Lack of sleep makes anyone's temper worse, and makes the most expedient solution look good."

I was thinking, Breast-feeding? Oh, no, so not my gig.

Richard said, "You're saying that to make me feel what--worse, better?"

"Ask someone you trust then," Samuel said. "Ask a woman how exhausting and overwhelming a new baby can be. I have three children, two of them twins. I did what many fathers do when they have children later in life; I did more of the baby care with the twins than I did with Sampson. My power base was more secure, and there was less... business to occupy me. I think I had been too exposed to modern America. I had this odd idea that I should be very involved with the twins. It gave me a new respect for what Thea went through with Sampson, when I was more occupied with business. A child is a great blessing"--he patted his son's leg when he said it?but like other great blessings, they require a great deal of time, attention, and energy."

I shook my head, waving my hands in the air as if to erase all of this. "I can't deal with this now. We've got to change topic, at least until I take the test and find out for sure. If the test's positive then we can talk, but until we know for sure, this topic is closed."

"You can't just change the topic," Richard said.

"Yes," Jean-Claude said, "she can."

"What if I don't want to change the topic?" Again I got the impression that Richard was spoiling for a fight.

Micah finally said something. "Anita is only asking to change the topic until we know for sure, Richard. That makes sense."

"You stay out of this!" Richard yelled it at him.

"Don't yell at Micah!" I yelled at him.

"I'll yell at whoever I want to yell at," he yelled.

Claudia yelled us both to silence. A huge, deep sound that made us all look at her. "Are your hurt feelings the only thing that matters here, Ulfric?" She shook her head. "Nathaniel's right, you'd piss on her if you could, if that would make her yours and yours alone."

He growled and took a step toward her.

"No," Jean-Claude said, "no, Richard."

"Are you picking a fight with him?" Micah asked. He sounded puzzled. He was right, it wasn't like Claudia to start the fight. She'd finish the fight, but not start it.

She actually looked at the floor. I think she was counting to ten. "I don't want to start a fight with anyone, but I'm tired of the attitude."

"What attitude?" I asked.

She pointed at Richard. "His attitude."

She wasn't the only one, but out loud, I said, "I don't think your starting a fight with Richard will make me feel better."

"I'm sorry for that." Then she gave Richard a completely hostile look. "But he's like so many men. He thinks that if he could just get you pregnant, just get you married, you'd be the perfect little woman."

"I do not think that," Richard said.

"You don't?" she said.

"No," he said.

"Then what's with the proposal?"

"You're supposed to propose if you've got someone pregnant."

She gave a nod. "And what's with Anita not being a federal marshal, or a vampire executioner?"

"The life she's living right now just doesn't seem like the kind of life that would be good for a baby."

"No," I said, "it doesn't."

He turned and looked at me. "You agree with me."

"Yes, of course, I agree that my life won't work with a baby. But this is the only life I have, Richard. This is who I am. I can't remake myself just because there may be a baby."

"Yes," he said, "you can. If you want to badly enough, you can change."

"Are you going to give up being a teacher?"

He looked away, and shook his head. "I love being a teacher."

"And I love being a federal marshal."

"You hate it, too."

"Yeah, sometimes I hate it, and maybe I'll burn out on all the violent cases. Maybe I'll reach a point where I can't do it anymore. But I do enjoy the police work, and I'm good at it."

"You enjoy seeing mutilated corpses?"

I shook my head. "Get out."

"What?"

"Ma petite, please," Jean-Claude said, and came to hold me. I didn't pull away, but I stayed stiff and unyielding in his arms. I was so angry I couldn't even think. All I knew for certain was that I needed Richard to be somewhere else, because if he stayed here saying stupid shit, I was going to say something unforgivable, or he was. We were close to the kind of fight that there is no fix for.

Samuel's pleasant and oh-so-reasonable voice came. "Perhaps we should discuss the topics that will allow all of you to survive this weekend, and keep sovereignty of your own territory in your own hands."

That got everyone's attention, even Richard's. "What are you talking about?" he said.

"If Anita's powers are as disruptive to other Masters of the City as they have been to Augustine, then what will you do? What will the other masters do when they see Augustine follow her and Jean-Claude around like a lovesick dog? She ordered Augustine around, she exhibited necromancy that controlled a Master of the City. That is legend among us, Ulfric, but not present reality. I saw Augustine strain against her compulsion. I do not know, even now, whether he used his full powers on Anita because he wished for sex with a woman of the ardeur once more, or to keep her from bespelling him completely. Better to be tied to her by love and lust than by blind obedience. In truth, I am not certain that Augustine himself knows why he did it, or what might have happened if he had chosen another defense." Samuel sighed. "You cannot take her to the ballet tomorrow without knowing if her attraction is universal, or whether it is mainly Belle's line that is susceptible to it."

"Were you drawn to her?" Jean-Claude asked.

"I feel some attraction, yes, but not to the degree that Augustine did. I am not fighting to keep from touching her, or doing what she says. I sense her power, and when she was using her necromancy, it was most impressive, but no, I did not feel compelled."

"Then is it just Belle's line?" Jean-Claude asked.

"Or perhaps only vampires that have experienced Belle's ardeur are strongly drawn."

I was finally relaxing into Jean-Claude's arms. "That would explain it." He didn't sound like he believed it was that simple.

"But, Jean-Claude, you must understand that I feel her power. I am over a thousand years old, and a Master of the City. I have as my animal to call a siren. I am not a small power, yet she does have a certain"--he seemed to search for a word--"attraction even to me. I am not burdened by it, but it is there. You said you wished my advice."

"I do."

"I advise that you find a way to test her powers before she meets the larger party."

"How?"

"I know that Maximillian of Vegas has one of Belle's line as his pomme de sang candidate. He would be thrilled if you asked to see one of his candidates early. He will see it as a point of favor."

"We would have to see at least one candidate from each of the masters, then, in private."

"But if it goes wrong?" I said. "Aren't we running the risk that whoever we 'experiment' on may be metaphysically bound to me forever?"

Samuel nodded. "Yes." He looked at me like What's wrong with that?

"It wouldn't be fair. I can't experiment on them, run the risk of binding them to me, if they don't know what the risks are."

"But they have come hoping to be your new pomme de sang" Samuel said. "They have come hoping to bind themselves to you."

"Jason has been Jean-Claude's pomme de sang for years, but if he decided to go back to college, or change jobs, or fell in love, and didn't want to keep being a pomme de sang, he could do that. We'd miss him, and I think he'd miss Jean-Claude, but he has choices. He isn't trapped into being Jean-Claude's pomme forever." I moved away from Jean-Claude and faced Samuel. "What you're suggesting takes away their options. It's like making them a slave without asking first if that's what they want."

Samuel smiled at me. "Freedom and fairness are very important to you, aren't they?"

I nodded, and frowned. "They're important to everybody."

He laughed. "Oh, no, Anita, you would be amazed at the number of people who try to give away their freedom at every opportunity. They much prefer that someone else make their decisions. As for fairness, you said it earlier, life isn't fair."

"No, life isn't fair, but I try to be."

He nodded, and stood, clapping his hands together. "She is a rare find, Jean-Claude."

"Thank you," he said, as if the compliment were all for him, and none for me.

"To make these experiments with their knowledge, Anita," Samuel said, "needs Jean-Claude to admit to the other masters that you, all of you, have no idea what the extent of your powers are. You would have to admit weakness, and confusion, when what you must have this weekend is strength, surety, and unassailable power."

"No one's power is unassailable," I said.

He gave a small bow. "Touch¨¦, but my point is still valid. To expose that much of your uncertainty to some of the masters would be nearly suicidal." He came to stand in front of me. "Think upon this, Anita: if you are with child, then it is no longer just your life you risk. Is your sense of fair play worth the risk of letting the other Masters of the City see your weaknesses? For what will they think, if you admit to this being a new power? Might they think that they should destroy you before you enslave us all?"

Jean-Claude moved to my side. Micah came to my other side. I just stared at Samuel.

"I mean you no harm, Anita, but I am not as insecure as some. The insecure ones will be your danger."

"If we can't tell the truth, what do you propose?" I asked.

"You couldn't simply lie?" he asked.

"I'm not very good at it," I said.

He smiled and looked at Jean-Claude. "How have you managed with her and the Ulfric? They are both most unwieldy."

"You have no idea," Jean-Claude said.

Samuel laughed again, then his face stilled, as if the laughter had been a trick of the eye. "Tell the masters that you wish to see how powerful their candidates are, and whether they can withstand your full powers. Tell them that if their candidates are too weak, they may be enslaved as any servant, for Jean-Claude is so powerful that that has happened with some lesser vampires of the Church of Eternal Life."

"That actually did happen with some of the church members," I said.

He smiled again, but it never reached his eyes. "So I had heard."

I glanced at Jean-Claude. "Did you tell him?"

"No."

"You have spies in your lands, Anita. You are too great a power not to have spies from all the masters that agreed to come here. None of us would have come to your lands without some intelligence of our own finding. None of us trust any of us that much."

"Great," I said.

"But it sets up the situation perfectly, Anita. You can tell the truth, that you wish to see if the candidates are strong enough to withstand your powers, for a true pomme de sang, as you so accurately stated, is not so closely bound to you metaphysically. To eat only from those who are already bound to you is like eating your own arm. It may fill your stomach, but it takes more energy from you then it gives to you."

"It took us a little while to figure that out," I said.

He gave another small bow. "Your new pomme de sang must be independent, and strong enough to play his part. It is a reasonable request."

"It is a good plan," Jean-Claude said.

"And what if they all fall under my, whatever, spell? What if I'm too much necromancer for any of them?"

"Then the ball is canceled," Samuel said. "You cannot play Cinderella if all the princes will want you."

"I'm not Cinderella," I said, "I'm the prince."

He smiled, but again it didn't reach his eyes. "Very well, Prince Charming, but the point remains the same. You cannot play Prince Charming if all the princesses want you, because as good as you may be, no one is that good." He looked at Jean-Claude then. "Not even Jean-Claude."

That look, and that comment, made me wonder if they really were "friends" the way that Jean-Claude and Augustine had been. They said that they weren't, but the look meant something.

"We will do as you suggest, Samuel. I know that I can rely on your discretion not to share any of this."

"You have my word," he said, then he looked back at me. "I would never endanger you. I want you to try to bring Sampson into his power, Anita. I would not insist it be done first, but I would prefer sooner to later."

"I know it won't be tonight," I said.

He smiled and this time it filled his eyes with soft humor. "No, not tonight. I think your plate is quite full enough without adding Sampson to it."

He bowed to Jean-Claude. Sampson followed suit. They turned on their heels and left.

Claudia's voice broke the silence. "Do you want me to go out and get a pregnancy test?"

"We have two of them in the overnight case," Micah said.

My throat was suddenly so tight I couldn't breathe.

Nathaniel and Lisandro came through the far hallway. "What did I miss?"

I looked at him, and the look on my face must have been a bad one, because he came to me, and wrapped his arms around me, and I let him.

"She's missed a month; you don't have to wait until morning to take the test," Claudia said.

I wanted to tell her to stop. Stop talking, stop helping, but she was right.

I wasn't just two weeks late like I'd told Ronnie. My period could move around by up to two weeks, later or earlier, depending on my hormone cycle, I guess. If I used the count that most women did, I was nearly four weeks late, not two. Two weeks into the month of November, but four weeks past when I should have bled. Four weeks, yeah, the test should work.