And swiped a hand across the bathroom mirror. And, despite everything, burst out laughing. Because guess who was scaly now?
Glamouries, the kind you bought out of a box anyway, had two parts: a base coat, which you spread over your face like lotion, and the control to tell it what to do. Rosier had removed the control when he wiped off the little patch, letting the real me shine through, because he knew a nemesis would get Pritkin’s attention better than any femme fatale. But the base of the spell had remained, and was now flaking off in pieces like week-old sunburn.
Or like dried fish scales.
I shuddered a little and started peeling them off in strips, revealing the pale, freckled skin below. It was weirdly therapeutic. Or it would have been, if I’d been able to Zen out. But of course not. I decided that maybe my breakneck pace lately hadn’t been such a bad thing. Too much free time and I started to think about all the stuff I didn’t know how to deal with.
Like that dream earlier.
Because what the hell?
It was no big deal, I told my reflection. Just exhaustion mixed with the remnants of a powerful incubus’ spell. That sort of thing was supposed to get a person hot and bothered, so the incubus could feed. Or in this case, so he could donate some energy to someone he needed to keep around a little longer.
Pritkin had wanted his damned map back, and if I ended up getting fried by an angry witch, that wasn’t going to happen. But he couldn’t fight her off and be sure of success, because he didn’t know enough about modern magic. So he’d fed me some energy so I could do it for him. And he’d fed me a lot. It wasn’t surprising that it had had some . . . lingering effects.
Like the perma-hard nips it appeared to have left me with.
I peered down the front of my towel, in case I was imagining it, but no. Things were definitely perky down there. Really perky. Uncomfortably perky.
“Stop it,” I told them.
Nothing. Except two happy little nubs that shouldn’t be there because it wasn’t cold in here. Was exactly the opposite, in fact, after my marathon shower, but that didn’t appear to matter to a body that was having incubus flashbacks.
And wasn’t that just all I needed?
“Seriously, cut it out,” I said, frowning.
And then frowned some more, when they listened to me about as much as anyone did. And, okay, this was starting to piss me off. Along with everything else I couldn’t control, I had to include my own body now?
“Damn it!” I said, feeling ridiculous and not caring because there was no one around to see me anyway. “I mean it. Cut it out right—”
“Cassie?”
I jumped, because the voice came out of nowhere, and not from outside the door. It sounded like it was right on top of me, loud and strong and echoing in the small, tile-lined box. I whirled around, staring at the soggy bath mat. And the wet floor. And the walls running with condensation.
And then, slowly, down at my own chest.
“Cassie—”
“Auggghh!” I jumped back, because I could swear that the voice had come from me. And yes, for a second there I was getting Total Recall flashbacks, and that’s not something you need when you have a life as freaky as mine.
“Cassie!”
Quaid, start the reactor, I thought hysterically, and grabbed my boobs.
“Cassie!”
“Auggghh! Auggghh! Augg—”
And then the door was kicked open by a horde of monsters.
Only, thank God, these were monsters I knew.
Things got a little crazy after that, with a dozen vamps flooding into the small space, guns drawn and faces grim. And then confused. And then looking at me like I’d lost my mind.
And maybe I had, because there was no obvious threat. Just me with my tits in my hands, my hair everywhere, and pieces of used glamourie spotting my body. I looked like a zombie stripper.
I swallowed.
“What?” Marco demanded.
I swallowed again. “I—thought I heard someone’s voice.”
“Someone’s?”
“It . . . it sounded like—”
“There!” somebody shouted.
And then glass was shattering and bullets were firing—or maybe that should be the other way around, but who could tell while being knocked to the ground? And then, while reaching back up and grabbing the shooter’s arm, trying to force it down, because the idiot was firing right through the mirror. And on the other side was—
“Hold!” Marco bellowed, before I could.
Suddenly, there was silence.
My ears were ringing so badly, it actually sounded like the vamp was still firing. But although the gun was up, it was pointed at the floor, which appeared to be intact. As opposed to the wall which had held the mirror. And which now held a few shards and a lot of holes.
A lot of holes leading to the hall.
A hall that led to—
“The girls,” I breathed. And then, through the echoing in my ears, I heard cries of alarm coming from the living room.
I shoved a bunch of vamps aside and ran through the bedroom to the hall. Only to stop short at the sight of a dozen spears of light crisscrossing the darkness, where the brightness of the bathroom was leaking through the bullet holes. And highlighting floating dust motes and ruined wallpaper and a bunch of similar wounds on the other side of the hall—which also happened to form one wall of the living room.
And while no expense had been spared on the décor around here, the same couldn’t be said for the drywall. I hiked up my towel and ran across a minefield of plaster and glass, hoping that the bar on the living room side had been enough to stop what the wall hadn’t. And ran into Rhea, coming the other way. She looked as grim as I’d ever seen her, as grim as the night she’d dragged a bunch of little girls out of a house full of homicidal dark mages, while three witches and a clueless Pythia tried to hold off Armageddon.
And then she saw me.
And I don’t think I’ve ever seen more relief on a human face. For a second, I honestly thought she was going to faint. So I grabbed her on my way past. And then we were through, into the lounge and then the living room, where—
Where I sagged against the messed-up wall, feeling kind of dizzy myself, because they were okay.
They were okay.
But only by sheer luck.
I took in the sight of a couple bullet-riddled paintings, a smashed clock, and more wallpaper that was going to need replacing—again. And that was on the far wall of the room by the stairs, which now had a new pattern of lead slugs imbedded in it. Most of them were chest high on me, meaning that they’d missed the girls only because it was night and everybody had been lying down on a forest of cots. And were now sitting up, staring at me and Rhea with wide eyes.
But they weren’t screaming. They weren’t saying anything, after those first, startled cries. Just like they hadn’t last night, even with a house coming down around their ears. But they were pale, and some of the littlest had their faces buried in the nightgowns of the older girls. And I felt my skin prickle with something I didn’t try to define as I whirled around, meeting Marco coming out of the hall.
“Are they . . .” He stopped short at the sight of them, looking relieved.
“Barely!” My voice was shaking. “Who the hell—”
“A half-wit. But he said he saw something—”
“Saw something where?”
“In the mirror.”
Anywhere else that would sound really strange. But this was Dante’s, which redefined normal on a regular basis. And while I hadn’t seen anything, I had sure as hell heard.
“Cassie!” That was Fred’s voice, raised to carry. I grabbed the robe and slippers a vamp was holding out and shrugged into them on my way to the kitchen.
And found Fred just standing there, staring
at the side of our brand-new fridge. The last one had had an accident, and been replaced with a shiny new stainless steel model. It was usually pretty boring, since none of the kitschy Dante’s magnets they sold downstairs would stick to it. It was a lot more interesting now.
Because there was a man peering out of it.
A man with watery blue eyes, cheeks pinker than mine, and fluffy white eyebrows. Really fluffy, like tiny sea anemones had somehow managed to attach themselves to his face. And a mass of white hair that wafted about like a merman’s in the air currents of the room behind him—a room that didn’t form any part of my suite.
And despite the fact that I’d expected it, despite the fact that there weren’t a handful of people in the world who could bypass the wards on this place and pull something like this, I still stared at him in disbelief.
“Jonas?”
“Cassie. I do apologize for the inconvenience—”
“Inconvenience?”
“I did try calling the usual way,” he said, and actually sounded annoyed. Like this was all my fault somehow. “But your . . . associates . . . continued to insist that you were away—”
“I was away!”
“Yes, and we need to talk about that—”
“We need to talk about this!” I told him, throwing out an arm. “You almost got my court killed!”
Vague blue eyes suddenly sharpened. Jonas liked to play the doddering old man when he thought it would get him anywhere, but I knew him a little too well for that now. And it seemed that he wasn’t in the mood anyway.
“I did nothing of the kind. Your vampires overreacted—”
“Something war mages never do,” Marco said heavily, coming up behind me.
“—which should not be surprising considering that they were trained as a vampire’s bodyguards—”
“Like Lord Mircea needs the help.”
“—and to guard his home, not the Pythian Court. They have no experience—”
Marco snorted. “’Cause the mages guarding the court in London did such a great job.”
“Will you please tell your servant to stay out of this?” Jonas asked me sharply.
“Marco isn’t my servant. And he belongs here!”
“Yes. But you do not. Members of the Corps are on their way to move you and your court to—”
“Move?”
“—temporary quarters until we can determine—”
“I’m not going anywhere!”
“—where would be best for . . .” Jonas stopped, and his pink cheeks suddenly became a little pinker. “I beg your pardon?”
“Marco is right,” I told him, furious. “You had guards on the court in London. Guards we found dead when we arrived! They didn’t keep anybody safe—”
“When you arrived?” Jonas asked archly.
But I was in no mood to play games. “You know what happened! You’ve figured it out, or you wouldn’t be here—”
“It was not too difficult to figure out. And the coven leaders you chose to take with you were happy to inform me in any case. Any excuse to deride the ability of the Circle to protect—”
“With reason! Your guards didn’t protect anybody!”
“There were no more than a handful on duty,” Jonas said, frowning. “And most were nearing retirement. The post was a sinecure, an easy assignment for those wounded in battle or with failing magic—”
“Failing?”
The frown grew. “They were there as a courtesy, Cassie. An honor guard. The court wasn’t in danger—”
“The court was just blown up!”
The frown was edging into scowl territory. “A court is useless without a Pythia,” he told me sharply, “and you were not there. Without you, there was no earthly reason to believe that anyone would wish to imperil the lives of a group of little girls—”
“No earthly reason,” I said, trembling, but not with cold. “But there was an unearthly one, wasn’t there? And you didn’t tell me.”
“You knew what we are facing; I briefed you on it myself—”
“You told me the old gods were trying to return. You told me I was in danger from them. You didn’t tell me my court was!”
“They shouldn’t have been!” Jonas snapped, suddenly angry. “Those girls were not in jeopardy—until they became bait in a trap for you. Something that would not have been the case had all of you been in our custody from the start!”
“Your custody?” The trembling was worse now. “Your custody? The Circle was trying to kill me for most of the last three months!”
“Under my predecessor. One of many lapses in judgment on his part, which is why he was removed. And afterward, I felt some . . . consideration . . . was due you, in light of your initial introduction to us. That you should be given time to understand that there are reasons why we are the traditional defenders of the Pythian—”
“The Pythian Court is defended by the Pythia!” Rhea said, rushing into the kitchen with a child in her arms. She looked at me wildly. “Lady—”
“What’s going on?”
“They’re coming in!”
“Who’s coming in?” Marco asked, face darkening.
And then one of the vamps cursed, and suddenly, Rhea and I were alone in the kitchen.
“The Circle,” she breathed. “They wanted to take us before. I should have told you, but you were so tired, but I should have told you—”
“And I should have expected it,” I said, and ran to the living room.
Chapter Seven
The door to the foyer was open, and the doorway was full of men in leather dusters that made them look like action movie heroes. Which wasn’t that far from the truth. The coats, ridiculous as they were in August, were needed to conceal the metric ton of weaponry that the Circle’s powerhouses carried around. None of which could be used tonight, because there were children in this damned apartment.
I pushed my way into the crowd of vampires, half of whom had guns out. “Put them away,” I said harshly. Rico, one of Mircea’s Italian masters, hesitated, then holstered his weapon so fast it looked like it had simply disappeared. It was a subtle indication to our guests of how fast it could be back in his hand.
Not that it mattered; war mages weren’t big on subtlety. And anyway, the rest of the vamps were ignoring me and still had theirs out. And then Marco decided to make it worse.
“Looks like you boys found backup,” he told them, from in front of the line of vamps. “At least that’ll make this interesting.”
“It isn’t going to be interesting!” I said, coming up beside him. “It isn’t going to be anything. They’re leaving.”
The mages didn’t reply, didn’t move. Neither did the vampires. But what the Circle’s men—and Jonas, damn him—didn’t understand, was that the vamps couldn’t.
Vamps might have started out human, but they weren’t anymore. They hadn’t been for hundreds of years in some cases. And their society never was.
Okay, yes, sometimes they acted like it; sometimes they ate and drank and laughed right along with the little human they’d been ordered to guard. But they weren’t human. The war mages might act crazy by most people’s standards, might take insane risks, might even be a little touched in the head—I’d certainly thought so often enough. But given a bad enough situation, they would back down. They would wait for a better opportunity. They would live to fight another day.
The vamps wouldn’t.
Even if I was willing to go along with Jonas’ plan, they couldn’t. Because they couldn’t protect me if I was out of their sight. And that was what their master, the font of their wealth and position and strength and life, had ordered them to do. So they would stand their ground, would die to a man if they had to. Or more likely would kill every single war mage here and start a possibly irreparable breech with the Circle, and Jonas
didn’t get that.
I just hoped someone else did.
“Marco—” I said tightly.
“Tried,” he told me, without turning around. “Master’s phone don’t work.”
“Why not?”
He shrugged slightly, and it looked like massive boulders shifting under the thin cotton of his shirt. I saw one of the war mages in front, a dark-haired guy with a cleft chin, notice.
He had no idea. Marco didn’t need his size. Marco could rip the man’s blood out of him through the air, in particles too small to see, without even breaking the skin. He could drain him from across the room until the idiot turned ghost white and fell off the steps, a shriveled husk who’d never had time to realize that these were not the low-level vampires he was used to. These were senior masters, and of Mircea’s family line.
Which meant they could also do it in seconds.
But then, the mages had their tricks, too, and these weren’t the doddering old pensioners the Circle had left to guard my court. Not if the amount of power prickling over my arms was anything to go by. Jonas might have expected my cooperation, but he hadn’t been sure of Marco’s. He would have sent men he could trust.
So this . . . could be very bad.
And then Fred came up beside me. “Mircea’s probably at the consul’s,” he told me.
“The consul’s?” I looked upward briefly, in the direction of my old suite, hoping that what Mircea had wanted to talk to me about was a quick trip to Vegas.
But of course not. “No, no,” Fred said. “Her place in upstate New York. She’s got a house. . . . Anyway, they’re doing a thing out there this week, choosing some new senators.”
“What does that have to do with Mircea’s phone not working? He told me to call him—”
“That was before.”
“Before what?”
“Before they shut the place down,” Fred said, sounding way too calm. Maybe too inexperienced to read the atmosphere that had Marco’s hand flexing against his thigh. “There’s a bunch of bigwigs on hand, consuls and such, and you know how many enemies they have. So our consul ordered the main wards brought online for the duration. And phones don’t work through them.”