Medeia Tenebris stood in chains before Aldam, vampire king of the Middle East. She had been captured in the border regions between Saudi Arabia and Yemen while on her way to visit a witch who had expressed interest in becoming a vampire on a certain Darknet forum Medeia frequented. She had taken the utmost of precautions, fully expecting that the Wayfarers had laid a trap, but what she hadn’t been expecting were fellow vampires. None of her defensive Weaves could protect against Death magic. And so she had been captured.

Everything had been for nothing. She had survived ignominious defeat outside Midnight, left for dead among the bodies of her followers and forced to feed on the blood of crows until she had the strength to crawl from the forest. When she finally escaped, prized dragon collar in hand, she swore to one day return and exact vengeance. But apparently it wasn’t meant to be.

She studied the man sitting in the throne before her. Aldam was beautiful, yet terrifying. His features were typical of Gulf Arabs, with thick brows, big eyes, and a vaguely aquiline nose hooking down over those blood-red lips. He was unusually pale for an Arab, of course, and his eyes shone with a blue that no mortal man could ever possess. It was like starlight, that blue: magical, yet distant. He looked like he could be anywhere from twenty-five to thirty-five, but the agelessness of his face was an illusion of course, because Aldam was one of the oldest vampires who ever lived.

In his hands, he held the dragon collar Media had retrieved at such great cost from the forest outside Midnight.

She tried to hold his gaze, but the longer she stared into his blue eyes, the more she saw, the layers of his soul peeling back. On the surface she perceived unfathomable cruelty, a man who would skin his own men alive to prove a point. But beyond that she saw a haunted man, a man who had known a thousand years of unimaginable pain and torment. A man who might not be entirely sane.

At last she had to look away.

“Tell me, what is a rogue from Raquel’s den doing in my domain?” Aldam asked. When Medeia didn’t answer, Aldam added: “Did you know she has offered a reward of a hundred million dollars for your head? The queen of Africa is not pleased with you.”

Medeia sighed. There was no point in lying to him. While Medeia might be strong enough to resist whatever compulsion his witches would use on her, she doubted she’d survive whatever torture he might have planned thereafter. Aldam was not known to be merciful.

“I was recruiting,” Medeia said. “You know this. You laid the trap.”

“Recruiting witches who want to turn into vampires…” Aldam tapped the collar he held with a bone-gauntleted hand. “It was you who used Death magic outside of Midnight, wasn’t it? Enough to draw the attention of the Wayfarers.”

“Yes,” Medeia said.

“You were creating undead?” Aldam asked.

“Yes,” Medeia answered.

“To what purpose?” Aldam pressed.

“I was going to infiltrate Midnight,” Medeia said. “I planned to capture a dragon shifter, and make him undead.” She didn’t feel the need to tell Aldam that the dragon who had fallen into her hands was Jeddah Flavius Vespasianus III, the very king of Midnight himself. Or at least he had been at the time. She had heard rumors that he had since stepped down.

“What then?” Aldam asked.

“I would use the shifter to work my way through the citizens of Midnight,” Medeia said. “Converting dragon families one at a time until every last resident was undead and under my control. Midnight would then become a vampire coven. Mine.”

“Interesting,” Aldam said. “And then you would own North America and become a member of the Council of Seven by default. I applaud the ambition, and I can certainly see why you require witch accomplices. Controlling that many undead would be… unwieldy. So you failed, obviously, or you wouldn’t be here.”

“I failed,” Medeia agreed.

“So let’s say the witch you came here to meet was real, and not some wild goose chase I engineered, what then?” Aldam said. “What would you have done?”

“I would have converted the witch into a vampire and trained her for a year,” Medeia said. “During that time, I’d also stage a trap for some Orions, and capture them. Make them into my undead minions. Then I’d return to Midnight and try again.”

Aldam smiled, baring his vampiric fangs for the first time. “A woman who takes after my own heart. The question is, what do I do with you?”

The vampire king was silent for a time; he simply stared at her with those brooding eyes.

Medeia shifted uncomfortable under his gaze, finally dropping her chin toward her feet.

She sensed movement from the throne, and when she looked up Aldam was standing.

“I will sponsor you,” the vampire king of the Middle East said. “Because I like your spunk. Plus, I want to spite Raquel. It’s an insult that she offers a paltry hundred million dollars… the combined GDP of the countries I rule is a hundred times that.”

“Sponsor?”

“I will give you three vampires witches,” Aldam said. “Each with a minimum of ten years experience with Death Weaves, so you won’t have to spend the time training them. And I will give you twenty good men. Vampires ready to die at your command. Not undead Orions, but just as good. With this small group serving you, you won’t have to delay… you can return to Midnight and set your plans in motion immediately.”

Medeia wasn’t sure whether to feel thrilled or caged. The latter feeling was winning out. “And what, perchance, do you ask in return?”

“Perchance!” Aldam slapped his knee as if she had said the most entertaining thing in the world. “No one talks like that anymore, dear girl! You have to work on updating your vocabulary sometime. Though I suppose when I speak Arabic I use a lot of archaic words as well.”

Medeia stared at him, smiling patiently. “My apologies. So in return for giving me these vampires you want…?”

“Ah yes,” Aldam said. “In return I will ask certain favors of you from time to time. And permission to travel throughout North America whenever I please.”

He had essentially avoided the question once again. Medeia decided to try a third time: “Favors?”

“Yes,” Aldam said, his eyes boring into her, daring her to question him one more time.

He wasn’t going to clarify, that was obvious. Unfortunately, Medeia didn’t really have the option to say no at the moment. She glanced around the cave that served as his throne room, at the hundred or so vampires lining the walls who would tear her apart if he gave the word. She wore no dragon bone accessories—her captors had stripped them away first thing—so she couldn’t even defend herself.

Yes, she was firmly in his hands. For now.

“Do we have a deal?” Aldam said.

Medeia smiled coldly and bowed. “Yes. Thank you, Great King.”

He tossed the dragon collar to her feet and it landed with a heavy thud. “Then go before I change my mind. I will have the promised vampires join you at the surface. They will return your bone accessories.”

Medeia scooped up the collar, bowed once again, and quickly retreated from his presence.

She would use the vampires he gave her to take Midnight, and at some point, when the capital city was almost hers, she would find a way to dispose of them.

Midnight was hers, and hers alone. There would be no favors granted. Not to anybody.