“Easier said than done. Kristoff is here to help me find Ulfur’s remains, his essence, so we can raise him as a lich and get him away from the Ilargi.”
“You are a vespillo,” Rick said to Kristoff, nodding at my deception. “You have a necromancer already?”
I am not a vespillo!
No, but it won’t hurt if they think you are. I’d rather not have them poking around and figuring out you’re a vampire.
Bah!
“Yes, her name is Eve.” I glanced at my watch. “In fact, we have an appointment to meet with her and her . . . er . . . assistant in half an hour, so we really should get down to business.”
“What business would that be?” Rick asked politely as Janice gently shook Kristjana.
“She’s asleep,” Mattias said helpfully. “She was not nice to Pia, so we put her to sleep. She threatened to rip my lips off, too.”
“You have fulfilled only part of your bargain,” Janice said, giving up on Kristjana. “You must also retrieve the spirit left behind and escort him to Ostri. Which”-a slow, evil smile crept over her face-“considering he is now a phantasm, is going to be very difficult.”
“But not impossible once he’s a lich,” I said, hoping that was true.
Evidently it was, because her face darkened again, and she turned away with a muttered word.
“I’m afraid we cannot help with your spirit, if that’s what you are asking,” Rick said. “It would violate the terms of the agreement, you see. I wish we could help, but our hands are tied.”
“My hands were tied earlier,” Mattias piped up. He sent me a loving look. “Pia tied my hands to my feet and made me lie on the floor while she took a bath. I pretended I was her bath mat.”
“We weren’t going to tell people about that,” I reminded Mattias with a weak smile at the others. “It wasn’t like it sounds. . . .” Kristoff’s look had me stammering to a halt. “But enough about that. The business I referred to actually concerns the board of governors. You see, there’s a vampire I want to find, and I think they can help me.”
Janice bristled. “You dare to use us in that way?”
“You know, you keep asking me if I dare to do things, and I think by now we can take it as read that yes, I dare. I dare a lot, actually. Why? Because I have to. So if we could move past the dramatic gasps of horror and bugging-out eyes and pointing fingers and whatnot, and stick to the facts, I’d be really grateful.”
“I love you,” Mattias told me, and proceeded to suck on the bit of my skirt hem that he held.
Janice’s face turned beet red. “You dare-” She caught herself in time. “You can’t seriously believe that the governors would in any way aid someone who so clearly does not follow the precepts of the Brotherhood. You think we would turn over to you our database of vampire locations?”
“No, but that’s interesting that you have one.” Did you know that they have a database?
Yes. It is sorely out-of-date.
Good.
“That’s good, because I can assure you that the governors will do nothing-nothing-to aid one of the evil undead. Unless, of course, you’re referring to cleansing them of their darkness and bringing them into the light, as they all should be.”
Kristoff stiffened beside me.
Relax. That’s how they all talk.
That is not a thought prone to inducing relaxation, he answered with a mental grimace.
I fought the urge to touch him, knowing full well that I couldn’t do so without wanting to jump him.
Kristoff’s lips curled slightly.
You could at least pretend you don’t hear my smutty thoughts about you.
Why not? I enjoy them. I particularly liked the one you had about massage oil, although I prefer cherry flavor to orange.
“What exactly did you want to know?” Rick asked.
“I have reason to believe that one of the vampires has been held by the Brotherhood,” I said, picking my words carefully. I didn’t want to outright accuse them of nabbing Alec if he had gone along willingly. Then again, I didn’t know if he had done that. “I’d like to know where he is, and if he’s OK.”
“No,” Janice said abruptly.
“You don’t seem to understand,” Kristoff said, wrapping his arm around my waist. “Pia is not asking. She is telling you what it will take in order for her to turn over these two reapers.”
Mattias rubbed his head on my hip.
“You will turn them over because that is part of the agreement,” Janice said slowly.
“I’m changing that,” I said simply. “Now in order to get them, I want to know where Alec is.”
“Alec?” She frowned and glanced at her husband.
He shook his head, shrugging.
“Alec Darwin. He’s a vampire who was in Iceland two months ago. He disappeared not long after I went home.”
“Why do you care?” Janice asked.
I thought for a few seconds of lying, but I’d done enough indulging in half-truths for the day. “I had a relationship with him at one time, and although it’s over, I am concerned for his well-being.”
“Relationship?” Janice asked, horrified. “You gave yourself to a vampire?”
“Pia was not a Zorya at the time,” Kristoff said, taking us all a bit by surprise.
“That’s right,” I agreed. “And we weren’t together for very long, but I still would like to know what’s happened to him.”
“I’m sure he’s dead by now,” Janice said with malicious enjoyment. She bared her teeth. “If he is in the power of the governors, then he has been cleansed.”
“So they’d take him to the Brotherhood headquarters?” I asked.
Janice looked sullenly at her husband when he answered, “Most likely. That’s where the big storage facility is, you see. Where they keep the vampires before they are cleansed.”
I felt a bit sick to my stomach at the thought of such a thing.
Beside me, pain spiked through Kristoff. I leaned into him, offering him wordless comfort.
“Do not tell her any more,” Janice ground out through her teeth. “You have said enough.”
“Alec may well be dead,” I said calmly as he tensed up again. “But I’d like to hear that from Frederic himself.”
“Monsieur Robert does not wish to speak to you,” Janice said, whipping out her cell phone before she remembered that it wouldn’t work in Europe. She jammed it back into her bag. “But if you demand proof of that yourself, I will call the Brotherhood headquarters. I will use this phone.” She gestured to the phone next to Kristjana.
“Be my guest. Mattias, come along. Rick, can I offer you some coffee while we wait for Janice?”
Beloved, these are reapers, Kristoff protested as he followed Mattias and me out of the room and into the living area. You do not offer them beverages.
You may not, but I do. I like Rick. He’s not at all snarky like his wife. Besides, he said he was a historian, and I’d like to know more about the Brotherhood.
Why? he asked quickly.
Just curious about how they got started going after you guys. “So, Rick, you’re a historian, right? You must know a lot about the origins of the Brotherhood. How do you like your coffee?”
“Black is fine,” he said, sitting down on the couch next to where I parked Mattias, giving me a bit of a bemused look. Kristoff sat gingerly on the chair next to him, eyeing long fingers of sunlight as they spilled onto the highly polished oak floor. “And I know something about it, but unfortunately not a lot. The archives dealing with the history of the Brotherhood really only included resources that cover the time after the Lodi Congress.”
The what?
It is the name given to the body that organized the first hunt of Dark Ones.
“Huh. I know they used to just deal with helping dead folk, but then something happened to switch their attention to vampires. What exactly was that?” I asked, giving Mattias a cup before taking one for myself and plopping down on the arm of Kristoff’s chair.
