Blood in Her Veins

  From the doorway came a crash and a deep rumble. A blackened claw bigger than the opening busted through, burned wood snapping and splintering. A yellow arm pushed the claw through. No. Not a claw. A shovel, with steel teeth along the bottom. What the drivers of heavy machinery called a bucket. It was the front-end loader that had been parked in the street. Jerking the bucket side to side, the loader ripped out the old entrance. The ceiling above shuddered, the weakened second floor trying to drop through. The creature and Margaud turned to the heavy vehicle. Edmund backed away from the mechanical claw, laughing with delight, his head thrown back with joy. Dang vamp. He was having fun.

  For the first time in the fight, I could also see Margaud’s face clearly. She was perhaps the most beautiful woman I had ever seen, even in the silver gray of Beast sight, even with her face twisted in hate. The ugly expression was darker than the hell the swamp demon had been called from, foul, dreadful, seeking only pain and death.

  The huge bucket with its steel claws jerked and tore as it worked its way forward, the tractor tires gripping on the damaged wood floor. The yellow machine was forcing its way inside like in some child’s film about sentient machines. The loader rolled inside, revealing Eli sitting in the glassed-in cage, his face like stone, his hands working the controls. The demon attacked the loader, throwing itself against the clawed bucket, Margaud’s body a mirror image, fighting an invisible menace. The bucket jerked forward and up, picking up the demon, the steel claws catching it at its middle and tilting, lifting. The swamp demon roared, its voice matching the sound of the huge engine. Eli carried the demon, rushing to the wall beside the stage. He slammed the bucket into the wall, the claws ripping through the demon and cutting into the plaster on the far side. Black blood sprayed.

  The demon shuddered and screamed. Lucky hit with one of his dissipate spells. And the demon melted into a puddle of mud. Clermont whirled to Margaud. But she was gone. He clutched his middle, which was bleeding, and caught himself on a chair, holding himself upright, amazingly still whole, in the middle of the ruined blood bar.

  Clermont gripped his side and belly, holding in what passed for guts in vampires, and made his way across the wrecked floor to the vamp on the stage. He rolled the unconscious, broken vamp over and tilted back the bloodsucker’s head, as if opening an airway. But . . . vamps don’t need to breathe. I understood when Clermont’s fangs snapped down and he bit his own wrist, holding it to the vamp’s mouth. The blood flowed fast for several seconds before the vamp’s eyes snapped open and he swallowed. He gripped his master’s arm and pulled it tight to his lips, sucking.

  Lucky groaned and rolled over, clutching his side and ribs. He activated a healing spell, one I could see in the dark of the bar, which was probably red and orange, but in big-cat vision looked green and silver, shot with blue, in the weird colorblindness of the feline.

  Edmund made a quick whip/slash motion and sheathed his swords. Elegant and beautiful. And if I was guessing right, he was a better swordsman than Leo Pellissier’s Mercy Blade. Better than Leo. Maybe even better than Grégoire, who was known to be the best swordsman in the entire United States. Edmund had been hiding things from us all.

  The clatter/roar of the front-end loader changed to a cough and went silent. The plasticized glass door opened, and Eli stepped out of the loader cage and dropped to the floor, where he caught his breath and held it for a space of heartbeats. He moved away from the machine, his body stiff and slow. He was badly wounded to be showing any sign of weakness.

  “Honest to God,” he said as he stepped to the wall where the bucket was stuck. His voice was just a hint breathy as he went on, “I thought Vin Diesel as Riddick had it all wrong, but there are movie mud monsters. And worse. This one melted on a wood floor and disappeared.”

  “It’ll be back,” I said. “Its maker or controller, or both, didn’t get what she wanted. And she got away.”

  “Who?”

  “The person in the homemade ghillie suit. Margaud.”

  Eli frowned, pulling the name out of his memory, making associations with a demon and a bar fight. “The sister of the two Hulk wannabes with the Amazon this afternoon? The one that made all this small-town, love-triangle, witch-vamp shit happen?”

  “Yeah.” I couldn’t argue about the estimation or the language. Sometimes shit is the only word for a particular situation.

  He looked around the burned blood bar. “Margaud. Makes sense.”

  “Questions to ask Solene if we can break the circle. Or in the morning, if we live that long. You need vamp blood to heal. Edmund?” I called, looking around. He was gone.

  “You need to shift back,” Eli said, as if we were debating. “And I don’t know where the slimy little bloodsucker is. I never saw him in the battle.”

  “He was there. We’ll talk about him later. How long?”

  Eli frowned, a downward quirk of his lips. “It lasted one-twenty-seven seconds.”

  One hundred twenty-seven seconds. A little over two minutes. It seemed like an hour. But my partner was right. Where was my vamp helper? Why had he taken off after facing a mud demon and fighting our way out of a mess?

  Clermont snapped his arm away from the healing vamp, licked his wound to constrict the fang holes, and stood. He walked over to Lucky, still lying half under the burned pool table. He knelt close to the witch and said, “We been played. Our children been played. Or entire peoples been played, by a human what can call her up a demon. We been enemies a long time. We been friends only since our families join. I say we stronger dat little time when we joined. I say I sorry I din’ see what happening to my boy and to your girl. I say I sorry I such an ass, even if you don’ take my sincere apologies.”

  Lucky put his hand into Clermont’s and let the vamp pull him to a sitting position, his legs stretched out and his back resting against a blackened pool table leg. “I accept. And I offer you my own, how you say, sincere apologies.”

  “We not much leaders we not able to see a common enemy.”

  “Divide and conquer work best on dem what blind to dangers,” Lucky agreed.

  “We not some dumbass politicians. We leaders. And right now, we need our strength. I offer you, Lucky Landry, father of my daughter-in-law, gran’father of my—of our—gran’boy, Clerjer, blood of my veins, to make you strong to fight.”

  “Long as I don’ got to kiss you, I accept.”

  “I’m told I kiss real good. Maybe I’m insulted, yeah?”

  Lucky chuckled and his face wrenched in pain. “Okay. I kiss you. Hell, I kiss dat ugly frog demon if it fix my ribs. And I thinking I got lung problems.”

  “Got you pneumothorax, you do,” Clermont said. “I hear air leaking and blood gurgling.”

  I remembered the vamp leader was a surgeon, back in his human days.

  “To fix you, I gone stick a needle like a tenpenny nail in you side right here”—he touched the witch’s side—“and den I’m gon’ drain my blood inside. Heal you fast. Den you drink some my blood and be heal for real.”

  “I not gon’ wake up dead, am I?”

  “No. You still be pain-in-de-ass coonass witch, what walk in de day.”

  “Do it, den, wid my thanks.”

  “Lucky? Clermont?” We all turned to the stage door where Bobbie stood, holding her grandson on her shoulder. “The vampire you sent to protect us says the fight’s over.”

  “Vampire?” Lucky asked.

  Edmund eased Bobbie away from the door and stepped out. Behind him came Gabriel, looking pink-skinned and healthy, and behind him, a gentle hand on his shoulder, came Shauna. So that was where Edmund had gone. To check on the people downstairs. Go, Ed. I nodded at him, a slight inclination of my head. He nodded back, his gaze serious and intense. Weirdly, Edmund walked to me and knelt at my feet, his swords back and behind him like wings. I looked down at the top of his head in confusion. What was this? I loo
ked around in growing panic.

  “Ed?” He didn’t answer. Just knelt there.

  Whatever Ed was doing, no one else seemed to notice or care. The others—witches, humans, and vamps—ignored us and gathered at the pool table where they huddled together with their faction leaders in what was probably a group hug/blood-feeding/bloodletting. Eli, who was still moving stiffly and clearly needed to feed on a vamp sometime soon, looked over Edmund and me, chuckled softly, and turned his attention to the room, evaluating entrances and exits and possible close-quarters fighting. Not looking at the hugging. No longer looking at Ed.

  From the doorway, Alex walked into the bar, saying, “Just gag me with a spoon and get it over with. All that huggy, kissy, mommy, daddy crap.” The brothers fist-bumped. Idiots. Every single one of them. And the worst was Edmund, still at my feet, his head bowed. I wasn’t sure what gave me the impression, but I had a feeling Ed was laughing at me.

  I considered my vamp helper in light of the battle, the problem with humans, witches, a starving vampire, and a baby locked together in an underground lair, all afraid and angry, and decided it had turned out much better than it might have. “Get up,” I said, hearing a long-suffering note in my two words. Edmund stood with a flair that might have come from the Middle Ages or a Hollywood set. “Ed, I take it you taught the young vamp idiot how to feed without sex?” I said.

  “Yes, my master,” he said, sounding quietly subservient and yet somehow managing to convey his hilarity.

  “Having fun, are you?”

  “More than you can possibly imagine, my master,” he said, with heavy emphasis on the last two words. He was determined to call me master. To get under my skin. Or to bind himself to me in some way I couldn’t comprehend.

  “Teaching proper feeding habits doesn’t take long when one is experienced in such matters.” He added, “My master.”

  I narrowed my eyes at him, thinking, No freaking way. I had enough responsibilities to deal with. “Once you get over the chuckles,” I said, “would you be so kind as to heal my partner? Eli’s hurt from when that thing knocked him across the room.”

  “Yes, my master.”

  “And since you can heal without sex, make sure you don’t annoy him with any come-hither pheromones or whatever you do to get sex. Because I’ll let him shoot you if you do.”

  “Spoilsport,” he said, wandering over to Eli.

  I watched as Edmund spoke quietly to the Youngers, and then presented a blade, hilt first, to Eli, and lifted his other wrist to be cut. Satisfied, I walked over to the huddle of BO citizens. “Okay. Get your crap together and meet me at the bed-and-breakfast because I need to know everything you know, and can guess, about the demon and about Margaud, and about her brothers, and everything about that dang wreath. Because no way is it all disconnected.”

  In the corner of the room a flame flared up. With a pop of speed, Gabe raced for a fire extinguisher and put it out, kicking the smoking remains of drapery away.

  “Fine,” I said. “First we make sure the fire is out. Then we talk.”

  • • •

  I got a good look at myself in my mirror as I changed out of my wet, smoke-damaged clothes, and the pelt I wore in my half form was pretty awe-inspiring. Knobby joints, retractile claws on my fingertips, narrow waist, no boobs to speak of, feet shaped like huge paws that had ripped my sneakers into ruined shreds, and a body of solid muscle, covered by a golden pelt. I shoved the cell into my jeans pocket and inspected myself closer. The brown/black nose looked a little odd, but the gold shining eyes totally made it work, especially with the gold nugget necklace. I had never thought this about myself before, but pelted? Even with the jeans and T on top, I looked hot. Weird. But hot.

  Beast and Jane are not hot. Beast and Jane are best hunters. Beast and Jane are worthy of best mate. Beast and Jane are best at everything, Beast thought at me.

  I chuckled under my breath, grabbed a robe, and went to shower off the smoke stink.

  • • •

  It was two a.m. before everyone was finally healed and the fire was deemed completely doused. The rain had drained to a drizzle, though water still shushed through the magnolia leaves, swirled in the streets, and pooled in the ditches and low-lying places. The witches were still encircled, studying the wreath, and not much had changed with them, except this time they weren’t wet. Seemed they had figured out how to add a water-repellent aspect to the electric dog collar ward.

  Leaving human blood-servants to keep watch for changes in the witches’ activity level, others to keep watch for the demon and Margaud, we gathered in the living room of the B and B. I had quickly made notes on the things I needed to know, and I started the little tête-à-tête by saying, “The vamps of Bayou Oiseau never had a formal parley with Leo and his peeps. The witch coven never met with the New Orleans witch council. I thought both parleys had taken place. Honestly, I don’t have a crap-dang care why they didn’t take place. They will take place next week. Lucky, Clermont, nod if you want to keep your heads on your shoulders.”

  It may have been the honest agreement that the meetings needed to take place, or it might have been my pelted and glowing-eyed aspect that forced them into compliance, but both nodded. Beast chuffed, feeling her power over the gathered. Beast is good ambush hunter.

  I smiled, showing her teeth.

  Clermont cleared his throat, laced his hands over his stomach, stretched out his legs, and crossed his ankles, every bit the relaxed gentleman. He was tall, lean, and gangly at nearly six feet, with dark brown eyes and blondish hair, a combination that seemed common in this area and had been replicated in the genetic makeup of his son. Somewhere he had found clean apparel and changed out of his smoky, bloody clothes. Now, like the first time I saw him, he was dressed in worn jeans, an ironed white dress shirt, a gray suit jacket, a narrow tie, and boots, which were ubiquitous in Louisiana. His reading glasses were perched on his head, reflecting the light. “Lucky and I been talking, we has. Already confirm appointment with New Orleans’ councils.”

  “Good,” I said.

  “Share, we do, all intelligence we know ’bout dat wreath. Corona. Breloque. It first appear in 1927, day de blood bar open. Professor be playing piano, lady singer singing, though I forget her name, it be so long ago. My sire, he dancing wid a local gal, blood-slave, she was, and thunderstorm outside. Rain pouring down like what it done today. Hard falling, it was. And there be a crack of thunder. And, like poof. It appear in middle of stage. All by it lonesome.”

  Lucky said, “The witches heard about it. My family ancestors, the Bordelon sisters, asked to see it. The vampire said no. We not see dat breloque until my Shauna took it and brung it to us.”

  Clermont frowned. Maybe Shauna would be considered a thief in the eyes of the courts, providing that the corona belonged to the vamps under some form of finders-keepers rule of law, but I couldn’t let that topic become the center of the discussion. Before anyone could accuse Shauna of stealing, I said, “And were either the vamps or the witches ever able to use it?”

  “No,” Clermont said, his mouth forming a totally human smile. “Back before de electronic revolution, la corona sat on top my TV for years. Best rabbit ears dey ever was.”

  Lucky laughed. So did I. And if there had been tension in the room, it dissipated. “Okay. So where was it kept when Shauna and Gabe got tricked into causing all this trouble?”

  “It in my gun closet. Locked to keep the young ’uns out. Key hanging on my bedpost on leather thong.”

  I looked at Shauna, who was pretty as a picture, sitting beside her husband, snuggled on the sofa. She looked abashed and tucked her head down under her husband’s chin, snuggling their child up close in her arms. The silence pulled like a long length of taffy, and she finally spoke into it. “When I saw Margaud and Gabe together in the bar, I went home, packed, got the key, and took the wreath. Then I strapped Clerjer into hi
s baby seat on the airboat and went home to Mama and Daddy.” She turned her clear, blue gaze to her hubby. “I was a fool.”

  “No, Shauna, my love, I was de fool,” Gabe said.

  “You were all fools, but we don’t have time to list the ways,” I said, thinking Shakespeare, with the height, breadth, and depth of foolishness. “So what does the wreath do?”

  “I can tell you that.”

  I swiveled on my satin-upholstered chair to Alex, standing in the doorway. His skin looked darker than its usual caramel, and his hair was kinked high from the rain and the humidity. Except for the laptop, he looked like a nineties rapper, in boxy pants and oversized T-shirt. “I found it in the new database.”

  That meant Reach’s database, the one he was still learning how to use. Alex turned the laptop around, and on the screen was a picture of a marble statue of a man wearing a wreath—laurel leaves standing up at attention—but this wreath was stone, not metal, and it was missing the lower part, the part with the writing. I started to say that, but Alex said, “It’s a statue of Julius Caesar, commissioned in the seventeenth century for the Palace of Versailles. And he’s depicted wearing what was called a civic crown. The civic crown, also worn by Napoleon and other kings, is the laurel leaf part of the corona. The lower part is what I’ll call a band crown, as seen on Greek kings and consorts, like you see on this silver coin, called a silver tetradrachm.” He displayed a picture of a coin with a woman’s face on it and then zoomed in with his fingertips on the touch screen. The crown was a narrow band and did indeed seem to have etchings on it that might—or might not—have been a match to the ones on the corona. “I haven’t actually seen one of the band crowns, but they were worn by queens or consorts in the BC era. And it shows these little marks. See? Here.” He pointed.

  “Fine,” I said. “I see the marks and I acknowledge the research, but—”

  “Someone combined the two crowns, a laurel leaf civic crown and a band, worn by a consort. A witch took the two concepts and melded them into one. Like this.” He punched a corner of the screen and a picture came up, which matched perfectly the corona in the street, surrounded by witches, standing, dry, in the rain.