Skin Trade

was pretty sure it was Wicked, because whoever it was hadn’t tried to hide his presence from me. Vittorio was able to hide not just from me but from Max, and if he could hide his energy signature from the Master of the City, then he sure as hell could avoid my radar.

But it was better to be sure, so I reached out a little more to that cool, wind-from-the-grave power. I touched that energy, found a taste of Jean-Claude’s power. All the vampires bound to him had a flavor of him, like a spice that had touched all their skins. Then my power touched Wicked, and him I could feel, like the word should be in bold letters. I felt him look into the air, as if he should be able to see me hovering. If it had been Jean-Claude, I could have used his eyes to look where he was looking; with Wicked it was just a feeling.

“It’s him,” I said, low to Edward. I started to say, louder, “It’s okay, he’s on our side,” but stopped in midbreath, because a different power had pushed through the opening in my shields. The opening I’d had to make to sense the vampire. I’d forgotten about Michael. I’d forgotten that he was a psychic and that his priestess had ordered him to sense my abilities.

There was a moment where I was caught between sensing the vampire outside and trying to push the witch out of my shields. It should have been simply a matter of closing the door that I’d opened, but something about Michael’s power made the door wider. It was like I’d opened a door, and he turned it into a tunnel mouth big enough to drive a semi through. The door I could guard, but the other opening was too large. And all tunnels are dark.

Darkness boiled toward me. I could see her in my mind’s eye like a cloud of night, ready to pour into that opening. Michael stood in that vision with me, if vision was the word for it. He could see it, too. He didn’t waste time asking, What is it? He acted. He was the black dog, the black man, and he did his job. It is an old, old custom that no guest be harmed in your house.

A golden glow appeared in his hand and grew like lightning to form a sword. He faced the coming dark with that burning sword in his hand. There was a second shadow over him, if a shadow could glow with light; it was larger than the man, and as the blackness framed him, rising up and up to eat the room I knew we had to be standing in, the glowing figure was more clear, and I saw for a moment the shadow of great, burning wings.

My first thought was demon; then I knew that was just the front of my brain. I knew what the demonic felt like, and this was not it. It was power, raw and real, and destruction was in that fire, but it was holy fire, and only the unholy need fear it. But it takes faith to stand that close to the flame and not be afraid. How strong was my faith? What did I believe in as the darkness swept upward and Michael stood there with his sword and the shadow of angels at his back? I had a heartbeat to think, Oh, Michael, I get it.

The man stood there between me and the dark, and I could not let him stand alone. I moved to stand with the man, Michael, and that glowing shadow, reciting as I moved, “Saint Michael the Archangel, defend us in battle”-the fire burned brighter against the dark-“be our protection against the wickedness and snares of the devil.” It was like the fire in holy objects that came when faith was all you had against the vampires. “May God rebuke him, we humbly pray: and do thou, O Prince of the heavenly host…” It was as if I were seeing the source of every glowing holy object I had ever seen, burning before me. “By the power of God, cast into hell Satan…” I was at the edge of those burning wings, and for a moment I hesitated. The darkness swept up and over the man and the glow, and I knew that I had seconds to decide. What was I; whose side was I on? Was I holy enough to step into that light?

Marmee Noir’s voice spoke in my head, or maybe the darkness all around us spoke. “A piece of me is inside you, necromancer; if you step into the fire of God, you will be destroyed like any vampire.”

Was she right?

Then Michael the man stepped back, to put himself in harm’s way again. He faced that overwhelming ocean of darkness, when it had given him the chance to be left out of it. It wasn’t even thought; I moved forward, because he was trying to take my harm, my blow, my fate, and I couldn’t let him do that. I stepped into that fire and expected to be blinded by the light, but it wasn’t like that. It was as if the world were light, and I could only see the light, flickering and real around me. The man in front of me was real, and the fire was real, but…

“Necromancer, help me!”

I didn’t understand what she meant, but it didn’t matter. Evil always lies. I finished the prayer: “And all other evil spirits who wander through the world seeking the ruin of souls. Amen.”

It was as if the power around us took a breath, the way you’d do before blowing out a candle. The power took a breath, then let it out, but this breath was like standing at ground zero of a nuclear bomb. Reality blew outward, then re-formed. I half-expected the house to be destroyed around us, but we were left blinking in the living room of Phoebe Billings’s house. Not so much as a teacup had moved.

Edward was standing very close to us, but Phoebe was holding him back. Telling him, “Wait, Michael knows what he’s doing.”

I was standing behind Michael, as I had been in the “vision”; there was no burning sword in his hand, but somehow I knew, if he needed it, it would be there.

He turned around and looked at me with dark brown eyes, but there was a glimmer in them, a hint of fire, down in their depths. Not the light of vampires but of something else.

“Anita, talk to me,” Edward said.

“I’m okay, Edward, thanks to Michael.” And I meant the double entendre. I’d find a church and burn a candle for the Archangel Michael. It was the least I could do.

“Someone explain what just happened,” he said, and he sounded angry.

“What did you see?” I asked.

“You looked up and saw something, something that scared the hell out of you. Then he”-and he shoved a thumb in Michael’s direction-“went to stand by you. I tried to go to you, but she told me it wasn’t a matter of guns.”

“She was right,” I said.

“Then every holy object in the room burst into flame.”

“You mean they glowed,” I said.

“No, flame, they burned.”

“Bernardo panicked,” Olaf said, “and threw off his cross.”

I looked at the big man. I almost asked him how he justified faith in God with being a serial killer, but didn’t. Maybe later if I wanted to piss him off.

“Once I lost the cross,” Bernardo said, and I realized that he was the only one not standing close to us, “I saw… things.”

“What?” I asked.

“Light, darkness.” He stared at me from the edge of the couch. “I saw… something.” He looked pale and shaken.

I started to ask What? again, but Michael touched my arm. I looked at him. He shook his head. I nodded. Okay, let Bernardo’s vision alone. It had scared the shit out of him, and that made it private. He’d tell, or he’d get drunk and try to forget it. It’s not every day you see demons and angels. Marmee Noir wasn’t technically a demon, but she was an evil spirit.

“What is it that hunts you?” Michael asked.

“You saw it,” I said.

“I did, but I’ve never seen anything like it before.”

I stared up at him. “You stepped in her way, twice, and you didn’t know what she was, or what she could have done to you?” I couldn’t keep the astonishment out of my voice.

He nodded. “I am the black dog, the circle guardian. You are our guest, and no harm shall befall anyone in my care.”

“You have no idea what she could have done to you.”

He smiled, and it was the smile of a true believer. “It could not have touched me.”

“Is he talking about…,” and Edward hesitated.

“Marmee Noir.”

“Mother Dark,” Phoebe said.

I nodded.

“The dark goddess is not always fearful; sometimes she is restful.”

“She isn’t a goddess, or if she is, there’s no good side to her; trust me on that.”