“We’ve come here to ask you a few questions,” I said. “About veinburn-and about a vampire named Varma.”
Sometimes the direct approach works; sometimes it doesn’t. This was one of the latter times. Morfran’s carapace turned completely brown-the same color as the table and floor, I noticed-he whirled about, and his twig legs became a blur as he fled for the foyer.
“I told you he’d run,” Devona said.
“You were right.” Neither of us bothered to get up and give pursuit. There was no need.
A few moments later, Morfran was carried back to our table, squirming, legs flailing madly, carapace rapidly changing colors from red to yellow to brown.
“He almost got past me,” Lyra said. “I guess I still haven’t gotten the hang of this body yet.”
“You did great,” I told her. “Now if you could just hold him still for a moment while I explain a few things to him?”
Bennie’s newest-and strongest-bouncer smiled sweetly, the effect somewhat spoiled by Honani’s jagged mixblood teeth. I hadn’t had a chance yet to tell her about what had happened at the edge of the Wyldwood with the soul that had previously occupied her current body, and I’m not sure I wanted to. The knowledge that Amon had Honani’s spirit-and worrying what the Dark Lord might seek to do with it-would only plague her. But I made a mental note to talk with Bennie before I decomposed. With her wealth and devotion to her staff, I hoped she could arrange for some way to protect Lyra from Amon, should it come to that.
Lyra squeezed Morfran and the demon’s carapace creaked alarmingly.
“Careful,” I warned. “We don’t want to reduce him to kindling now.”
“Oops. Sorry.” She eased up. Morfran struggled a bit more, until it became obvious he wasn’t going anywhere, and then he finally gave up and just hung motionless in Lyra’s massive arms.
“Okay, here’s the situation, Morfran,” I said. “Before the waitress brought your drink over, I spiked it with a potion specially prepared for you by Bennie herself. She serves a lot of potions, you know. Some work to induce a state of sexual readiness in someone whose spirit may be willing but whose flesh needs a little more help. Other potions work just the opposite: they suppress sexual functioning. These are used these for clients who refuse to pay their tabs or for those who mistreat the staff.”
I wished Honani hadn’t been too proud to accept the aid of one of Bennie’s potions when he’d visited Lyra. If he had taken one, she’d probably still be alive and in her own body.
I went on. “To put it simply, Morfran, you can’t get it up anymore-or whatever it is males of your species do. And you won’t be able to until you receive the antidote. If you cooperate and answer a few questions, I’ll make sure you get it. If not, you’ll miss out on the final week of your mating season.” I’d learned from Shrike that Morfran’s subspecies of demon was mindlessly driven to copulate during this time, and the potion Bennie had created for Morfran was a cruel one: it removed sexual functioning, but actually increased desire, making it all the more effective when it came to convincing delinquent customers to make good on outstanding debts.
Morfran’s carapace edged toward black now. “It doesn’t matter. I have quite a bit of money; I can easily afford to purchase an antidote from a witch somewhere else.”
“You could try. But Bennie’s enchantments aren’t easily removed. It’s true you might find someone who’ll hit on the right formula to remove the spell eventually, but it could take some time. Easily a week.”
“Oh, much more than that, I think,” Devona said. “He might still be looking this time next year.”
Morfran’s shell had gone completely black now. I wondered if it was a sign of anger, or maybe fear. Whichever, it was clear we were getting to him.
“You don’t understand,” he said quietly, with an edge of desperation. “The people I work for would be most displeased if I told you anything.”
“By ‘people’ you mean the Dominari, right? I sympathize with you, Morfran old bug, but all I can tell you is to ask yourself which is worse: talking to us and maybe having the Dominari find out, or going the rest of this year’s mating season desperately needing to have sex, but without any lead in your pencil.”
Morfran regarded me for a moment, his head tilting back and forth slowly this time. Finally, he let out an edgy buzz of a sigh that already sounded tinged with the beginnings of sexual tension and frustration. “Very well. What do you wish to know?”
We asked the demon some questions, and he answered them clearly, quickly, and concisely. I was fairly certain that he had nothing directly to do with Varma’s death-it was clear the Red Tide vampires had been responsible for that-and so when we were finished, I had Lourdes bring over the antidote. Morfran practically inhaled the potion, and then scuttled off back to the more carnal sections of Bennie’s establishment, no doubt intending to make sure the antidote worked as advertised.
And so Devona and I said goodbye to Lyra, who I wished well in her new profession, and Devona alone (as she insisted) thanked Lourdes. Bennie gave us both kisses on the cheek-despite the nasty condition of mine, Dis bless her/him-and we left the House of Dark Delights to follow up on what we had learned from Morfran.
We headed for Skully’s.
TWENTY
The bar was still busy as hell, and there were a few new suspicious-looking stains on the floor since the last time I’d been here, but the atmosphere seemed calm enough now. But considering why Devona and I had come back, I doubted it was going to stay that way for long.
The juke box was singing “Bewitched, Bothered, and Bewildered” when Devona and I walked in, but as soon as the trio of heads caught sight of me, they stopped. The middle one said, “Not you again!” and all three shut their mouths tight and closed their eyes, as if they were little children who thought they could make me vanish by pretending I didn’t exist. I noticed none of the patrons complained about the performance being interrupted.
Devona and I walked over to the bar and took a pair of stools suddenly vacated by a couple lykes in human form who wrinkled their noses in disgust as they left.
“What did you expect, roses?” I muttered as they walked off.
Skully was busy at the other end of the bar filling a mug of beer for the pierced warlock I’d seen the last time I was in here. The Arcane man still seemed somewhat familiar to me, and while he waited for his beer, I studied his face, but I still couldn’t place him. When Skully handed him his beer, the warlock noticed my scrutiny, but instead of looking upset, he merely gave me a nod and walked over to sit at the same table he’d been at when I’d fought Honani earlier. I wondered if he’d been sitting there alone drinking the entire time I’d been gone. Maybe he was just a solitary type who wanted a relatively quiet place to hide out from the Descension Day madness. Still, there was something about the man that bothered me…
My thoughts were interrupted as Skully came down to our end of the bar.
“Hey, Matt! I’m surprised to see you back so soon-and with your arm reattached, I see. Business?” He nodded to Devona, and from the tone in his voice he would have smiled if he’d possessed the lips and facial muscles to do so. “Or pleasure? Wait, let me guess. Has to be business, as bad as you look. You shouldn’t be in here: you should be over at Papa Chatha’s getting some more work done.”
“This is my new friend Devona. Her father lost something-something very important-and I’m helping her look for it.”
“Oh?”
“Her father’s name is Galm, and the object is called the Dawnstone. Sound familiar?”
Skully shook his fleshless head. “No, should it?”
“Yes, because according to my source”-who was at that very moment most likely expending a great deal of fluid, as he’d put it-“you’re responsible for its disappearance from the Cathedral. Or at least your bosses the Dominari are.”
Then something happened which I’d never seen before. Tiny pinpricks of crimson light began to blaze deep in the cold darkness of Skully’s eye sockets. “I think maybe you’d better leave, Matt, and take your new friend with you.”
He started to turn away, but I grabbed his pudgy, hairy wrist and stopped him. “I know there’s a Dominari- run lab upstairs, Skully. A lab that’s been awfully busy lately cranking out veinburn.”
