“Maybe so,” I said. “But that’s why there are Edgeworlders. We straddle two worlds for a reason. We don’t just want to be free to visit your world. We want you to be free to visit ours.”
“So what does we do?” Cinnamon asked.
I dinged the ring on her collar. “We take you back to the Vampire Consulate,” I said. “You’re under Saffron’s protection-you have the right to claim asylum. From there, you can call Ellis and Lee, and hopefully they can work something out.”
Cinnamon looked like she’d swallowed a prune. “Do I gots to stay there?”
“Maybe. Maybe you’ll have to go back to the Palmottis, maybe not. I’m just hoping that you exercising your legal right to asylum will neutralize the effects of Mister Palmotti’s missing persons report, at least as far as our case is concerned.”
“Fuck!” Cinnamon said, then bit her lip. “I made things worse, didn’t I?”
“Don’t worry about it,” I said. “Let’s go make things better.”
Cinnamon and Tully rode with me all the way to the Vampire Consulate, Tully barely hanging on to the back of the Vespa. I don’t know how we didn’t get pulled over-two fugitives, another minor, and only one helmet between us. But we kept to surface streets, and eventually made it to Auburn Avenue, where we found the deconsecrated church that was the Lady Saffron’s home-and the old Victorian that held the Consulate offices.
“This is stupid,” Tully said, wavering. “We don’t needs to do this.”
“Yeah,” Cinnamon said slowly, looking at him for support. “Maybe we can-”
“No,” I said firmly, hopping off the scooter. “Pep talk’s over. You’re a missing person. I’m wanted by the police. Technically, I’m not even allowed to see you, and if I’m seen with you it will get you into trouble. So. We’re going into the Consulate, where you legitimately have the right to claim protection, and where Mister Palmotti can pick you up.”
They looked at me, uneasily, and I glared. “Cinnamon, I love you, and Tully, I can tell you love her, but the two of you don’t know how much trouble you’ve made,” I said. “Now let’s go inside and hope that between Saffron and Ellis and Lee, we can sort this all out.”
I took two steps across the street-then the Victorian exploded.
Coffins Aflame
A flash of heat against my face. Purple flashbulbs dancing before my eyes. My body flying through the air and impacting the pavement, skull cracking against the curb. The squeal of tires, Cinnamon’s screams, Tully’s cries, rough voices shouting. I started to lift my head, opened my eyes-and saw the heel of a boot slam down into my face.
Ow.
When I came to, I was sitting in a long, low chair, in an elegant dressing room done all in yellow and sepia, like a picture in a faded newspaper. At first I thought something was wrong with my vision; then I saw a blue egg on the desk beside me, and picked it up.
The glass felt reassuringly heavy in my hand, very real, at the same time it held dreamy sweeps of subtle color. In the light it shifted from blue to purple to red, and I could see it was dotted with little white and yellow bubbles.
Clearly, nothing was wrong with my color vision, and I set it down on the table. It was the lampshade that was yellow glass; that, the drapes, the wallpaper, and the pictures -old newspapers, aging photographs, lithographs, pages of ancient books.
“Welcome back, envoy of the House Beyond Sleep.”
I looked over to see a man, all in black, sitting on an ottoman, hunched like a vulture, staring at me. His suit was exquisite. The gleaming tourbillion watch on his wrist looked more pricey than my dead car. His cropped black hair was styled into thin frosted spikes. He ground a toothpick between perfect human teeth-but his eyes were dead black points.
“I’d say back to the land of the living,” he said, hands parting briefly, then clasping back together in a wringing motion that made him look even more like a vulture. “But, you know.”
I glanced around me, then at myself: my feet were actually propped up on an ottoman like the one he sat on. Groaning, I tucked my legs down and kicked the ottoman forward so I could sit up. As I did so, the chain holding Transomnia’s pendant bounced against my chest.
“Good eye,” I said, staring down at it. “You or your men.”
“Or women,” he said, flat and uninterested. “Sexism in such a day and age.”
“Yeah, yeah, if you do have any women working for you thugs, I’ll apologize in person,” I said, feeling my face. I was sore, but not too bruised, and I felt back to find not one but two tender, swelling lumps on the back of my head. “We marking time until I’m conscious?”
“Yeah.”
“I’m conscious. Where’s Cinnamon?”
“Safe, though a little better off than her wolf cub,” Velazquez said, standing briskly. A bit of metal flashed inside the coat as he did so, something nasty in a shoulder holster. His hunched posture had hidden the weapon while keeping it in easy reach. “Can you stand?”
“What do you mean, better off than-ow,” I said, wincing. “Was he hurt-”
“He’s fine… for now,” Velasquez said firmly. “Sorry about the boot, Lady Frost. You did a good job going to ground; bandana-and-biker jacket doesn’t fit your description. If you hadn’t wandered into our little trap-”
“Trap-the Consulate? ” I said, struggling to stand. “You blew it up to get to me? ”
“Overkill, I know,” he said, spreading his hands. “But we’re tired of dicking around with you folk, and my mistress seemed to think you would be easier to capture if… disoriented.”
“I think that building was on the register,” I said, wincing. “You bastard. ”
“The name’s Velazquez,” he said.
“You get everyone out before you blew it up, Velasquez? ” I said, rubbing my head. He shrugged, and I cursed. “Then I’ll still keep calling you bastard. Who was still in there?”
“I didn’t take attendance,” Velasquez said, still flat. “You have a problem with our methods, take it up with the Lady Scara. I’m just your escort, envoy. Can you stand?”
I stood up and my head was whirling, and not just with dizziness: what had happened to Cinnamon, to Tully, to everyone in the Consulate? I swayed a little, and he stepped forward to steady me. I towered over him. He couldn’t be over five-six, but when he checked me out it was more of an appreciative glance than an ‘oh shit you’re tall,’ which I liked.
“You,” Velasquez said, “are in the court of Sir Leopold, vampire lord of Atlanta.”
“Lord Delancaster is the vampire lord of Atlanta,” I said.
“Only in his mind,” Velasquez said. “And on TV. The real power in Atlanta isn’t Lord Delancaster or his puppet queen at the Consulate. It’s Sir Leopold, and the Gentry.”
The Gentry. Ever since this started, Saffron had been talking about static from the Gentry, and Calaphase had filled in the details-wealthy, ancient vampires who saw humans as little more than food. I even had a list of the Gentry vampires who had died. They were mad enough to have caused trouble at Cinnamon’s school just because she wore Saffron’s collar. They had a real stake in this-and yet I hadn’t given them any real thought. Why?
With a certain degree of horror, I realized that after I’d heard Calaphase call them old-school, I’d dismissed the Gentry as conservative yahoos who should get with the times-stupid of me, for two reasons. First, I should have learned from dating Philip that people were more than just the political (R) or (D) after their names-I should have made them allies in this fight.
And second… old-school implied forgotten knowledge: the precise kind of knowledge that I had looked for but Doug had dismissed. Could the Gentry be the source of the graffiti’s magic? It seemed unlikely, but regardless, forgotten knowledge was incredibly dangerous when the group kicking it consisted of people who’d lived forever and accumulated power for centuries. Against a two thousand year old undead Emperor Nero, me and Rush Limbaugh would be fighting on the same side. That thought scared me more than even the Gentry.
“-so Sir Leopold has eagerly awaited an audience with you,” Velasquez was saying. “And, as it turns out, he’s
