The Deadliest Bite

sometimes three different dads for her six kids), I’d figured on transitioning into the ethereal version of a commune. However, when we fol owed her out the door of Pelisor, what we stepped into was an armed camp.

Unlike Brude’s mishmash of mercenaries from every era, Marie had recruited only Romanian soldiers from World War I and, by God, they hadn’t forgotten their uniforms or their discipline. Lines of wel -armed men marched past neat rows of barracks while fields made for target practice or hand-to-hand combat held groups of fierce, serious foes who seemed sure that battle was only an order away.

Marie led us down the dirt paths, nodding graciously when men stopped to bow and then peer at us sideways. At the northern edge of the camp was a thatch-roofed cottage surrounded by wel -

tended gardens and a roughly hewn fence. The arched red door opened when we got to the arbor gate, and a wrinkled, balding gentleman wearing a butler’s uniform tottered down the path to let us in.

“My queen,” he said, bowing deeply enough that I wondered if he’d fal on his head before he was able to right himself. Then I saw he had a firm grip on the gate and relaxed.

“We have guests, Stanislov,” she said as she breezed past. “Make sure the dogs don’t get loose, wil you? I don’t want them eaten before they’ve fulfil ed their potential.”

“Very good, madam.”

I suddenly wished I’d brought Jack. He would never let another dog eat me. I glanced over my shoulder. Nope. Nothing even close to canine. Although the soldiers did look a lot hungrier than you’d general y expect in such a wel -run camp. Probably Marie didn’t let them feast on each other.

And then it hit me.

“Your queenishness?” I asked. “What do you cal your soldiers?” As she sailed toward the open door of her cottage, Marie said, “I thought you knew, darling.

Those troops are none other than the Dogs of War. They are leashed tightly here. But I am training them to tear the throat from Brude’s army.” Under her breath she added, “Even if they have to do so without the aid of my squeamish neighbors to the south.” Realizing she was thinking out loud, she finished with a flourishy sort of punch to the air, saying, “When the time comes, they wil rage, my dear, they wil rage.”

She glanced over her shoulder at me, the smile in her eyes so sly and calculating that I shivered.

Vayl put his arm across my shoulders. “We have the key to destroying Brude. Al we need is your cooperation and you could win this war.”

“I will win this war,” she corrected him imperiously. “And when I do this little universe wil step to my tune. I wil force order onto this bedlam.” She sighed. “What a shame it was that Brude never shared my vision.” Her laugh, so bitter, was clearly aimed at herself. “Leave it to me to involve myself with the most ambitious and least loyal of Satan’s elite guardsmen.” She shook her head. “I have such terrible taste in lovers.” Her eyes rested on mine, and for a moment she looked at me as an equal. “What about you?” she asked. “Are you satisfied with him?” She nodded toward Vayl like he was a piece of sculpture that she might, at some point, consider stealing.

“He’s mine,” I told her, keeping most, but not al , of the warning growl from my voice.

“Why?”

I looked at him steadily for a while before I answered, “Because it could never be any other way.”

“I thought that about Brude once,” she said, her voice dropping into melancholy.

“What changed?” I asked her.

“I came face to face with the real domytr one day,” she said. “And I couldn’t fool myself any longer.” She narrowed her eyes at me. “Have you truly faced your vampire?” I glanced at Vayl. “He’s a kil er,” I told her. “But then again, so am I. Which is why we’re such a good fit. Aren’t you lucky you found us?”

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

Saturday, June 16, 11:00 p.m.

I had never visited the site where Vayl had buried his two sons. It was like he wanted to keep that part of his past completely separate. And I respected that. But I saw enough of Astral’s feed, and Cassandra described the emotions of those moments so clearly, that I could always visualize it as if I’d been there myself, locked inside the weather-treated steel fence with the two black marble stones Vayl had bought to replace the broken pieces of the white, unreadable originals. They stil lay at the bases of the new monuments, like offerings to the bodies that lay beneath the rich, needle-blanketed sod, so precious to their surviving family member that he had etched A FATHER’S LOVE IS FOREVER into each of the stones. It was in Romanian, but Cassandra had asked Cole to translate, and felt her throat close at the catch in his voice when he’d done as she asked.

Dave said, “We can’t let Vayl down now.” They nodded, Cassandra and then Cole sneakily wiping away a tear as David continued. “This could get scary.” They looked over their shoulders at Bergman and his Rider, whose positions hadn’t changed. Then they looked back at him. “I know what you’re thinking,” he said. “I mean worse than that.”

Big swal ows. Nods. “Let’s get this done,” said Cole, leaning over to pet Jack, who kept prancing sideways and glancing toward Bergman, as if he knew something should be done and he was fal ing down on the job.

“The sooner the better,” Cassandra agreed. She handed Astral to Dave as she said, “I want that Rider off Miles now.”

He nodded and said, “Al right, cat. Let’s see how good you real y are.” He knelt between the graves of Hanzi and Badu Brancoveanu. He took off his backpack and from it pul ed two steel rods that had been folded multiple times, the same way tent poles are broken down after a camping trip.

Assembled, they were at least ten feet long, with the last section of each tipped like a spear. He careful y shoved each of them into the ground as far as he could. Tapping his shoulder, he waited until Astral had taken her place, perching beside his ear like he was just another mantelpiece to add to her col ection. And then, wrapping a hand around each pole, he closed his eyes and began to chant.

Cole and Cassandra took their places, each standing at one corner of Hanzi’s grave.