This was a bad idea. Audrey felt it chill her to the bone, despite the cashmere wrap about her shoulders. She set her hands over the votive candle on the table and let the light and shadows play over her fingers.
When she had heard what happened to Eliot and Fiona-after worrying for weeks and weeks when they’d disappeared-that they’d fought in a war in Hell. . she had almost died.
She had sworn to kill Louis for his recklessness.
Then she calmed and understood that it had been a logical move for the Infernals. . that her children were more powerful than ever. . and that certain opportunities now might present themselves before the end of the world.
It was a childish dream that she could love again or that her family could ever be whole.
She sighed.
A pity she had not the courage to cut
She looked across the walkway and saw moonlight flicker like a thousand fish upon the waters of the Canal Grande of Venice. Lovers strolled arm in arm by the sidewalk cafe. A breeze ruffled the jasmine in their planter boxes and filled the air with their cloying scent.
She was surrounded by people in love in the most romantic city on Earth. . ironic, because she was alone.
This was the spot where she and the then-masked Louis Piper had talked all night, waxed poetic about life and longings and how only simpletons fell in love. As the dawn had broken upon the canal and tinged the silver waters red, they had lifted one another’s masks-and she had felt the piercing of her heart, and known that she was a simpleton, too.
Love.
Cornelius had told her even the Primordial Ones had loved after a fashion, although it had been a savage thing compared with the refined emotions of their Age.
The waiter came and refreshed her cup of minted Turkish coffee. “Still waiting, madam?”
She nodded.
Indeed, what a simpleton she was then
She was about to turn and walk away, when she spotted him.
Louis, the Grand Deceiver, and the only man who could so irritate her, hurried through the crowds. When he saw her, his face lit with all the passion and intensity she remembered from their first morning together. He wore a tuxedo with tails and diamond studs-and turned every woman’s head.
“Audrey, beloved,” he said, and reached for her hands (which she pulled away). “I would have rather died than be late, but there was something of the utmost importance that required my personal attention.”
He implored her to sit, and she reluctantly did so.
“Really?” She mustered as much icy sarcasm as she could, and yet Atropos, Cutter of all Things, and Death incarnate, felt her heart flutter and her pulse race with warmth she thought she would never feel again.
A black cat leaped onto the linen-covered table between them-its tail fluffing into Louis’s face.
Louis stiffened and grabbed the animal by the scruff of the neck. In response, the cat’s claws extended and dimpled into the tablecloth, dragging it with him.
“Don’t, Louis.” She gently took the animal and set in the seat next to her.
The waiter stared at the cat, frowning-but Audrey stopped any protest from him with a single glance.
She stroked Amberflaxus and the cat turned and turned and nuzzled her hand for more. “I’m surprised more people haven’t noticed this poor creature by now, and drowned it in a well.”
Louis shrugged. “That might be for the best.”
“You don’t mean that.”
He thought about it a moment. “No.” He narrowed his eyes at the cat, then his gaze roamed over her gown, and his mood brightened. “You look absolutely radiant tonight, my dear.”
Audrey stopped petting Amberflaxus and held up her hand. “Let me make it clear that I came only because you said you wanted to talk about the children.”
His smile flickered to life. “Do you think you can lie to me? About this? Your coquettishness flatters me.”
Audrey closed her eyes. How could she forget? Louis, the Father of Lies, of course, would hear the false words spilling from her lips.
She exhaled. “Yes,” she admitted, “I came for the children
His smile turned mischievous, and he reached into his tuxedo and pulled out a folded manila envelope. He pushed it across the table.
Audrey opened the flap. Inside were two sheets of curling vellum that felt rough and cold even through her gloves. She unrolled them and read along the top:
WARRANT OF DEATH
Her breath caught as she scanned the bottom of the page, seeing the filled-in name: ELIOT POST.
She flipped to the other page and saw: FIONA POST.
Only Louis ever had the ability to render her speechless-but this, even for him, was going too far. Audrey, however, found her voice. “How did you get these? You shouldn’t have even been able to enter Altium-”
Louis waved her concerns away. Yes, yes. Technicalities and details. That pesky
“Unless one of us gave it to you,” Audrey whispered. “Unless you had help.”
“Before you ask how and who,” Louis replied, “allow me my little secrets for a while yet. Without an air of mystery, I fear I would as bland as all those other dull Immortals in your life.”
Audrey knew prying information out of Louis when he was being difficult would be harder than wrestling the ocean. But what Immortal in their right mind would have helped Louis? And the more important question: Why?
She returned her attention to the documents and pulled off her opera gloves. She had an opportunity. She slid her finger down the center of the pages-then across-and then made two diagonal marks with her fingernail.
The pages shuddered, sparked with magic, and flowered into a thousand shreds of confetti.
Audrey brushed the trash off the table.
“Well,” Louis said, raising an eyebrow, “that should keep Fiona and Eliot safe from the League-at least until the Council can come to consensus again. Which should that take what? A month? All summer?”
“Perhaps,” Audrey murmured.
Would Lucia wait that long? Had the League ever taken action without its bureaucratic processes?
“Does that then satisfy your need to tend to our children first?” he asked.
“No. It delays the danger; it does not eliminate it.”
Louis sighed. “The world in which our children live will always be filled with danger. We cannot eliminate it, and it would be foolish to try.”
Audrey considered this. . but said nothing.
“There is one more thing we might do, however,” Louis whispered and looked about. “We can gather support, in secret, for the coming war. Not for one side or the other, but for
Louis would not mention such a thing unless he had already taken action. “You will not be able to keep
“No,” he admitted. “The best secrets are the ones least kept.”
“When they find out-both families-we will have to take bold, bloody action. Will you be ready for that?”
“It gives me chills of pleasure when you speak thusly,” Louis purred.
