The King

  Abalone reached for the black diamond and affixed a kiss upon the stone. Then he was gone, his shuffling footsteps retreating as he made his way back along the corridor.

  Wrath waited until even his keen ears could hear nothing. Then in a hushed tone, he said, "I want that young male taken care of. Supply him from the treasury enough wealth to carry his generations forth."

  "As you wish, my lord."

  "Now, shut that door."

  Soundless. Seamless. They were closed in with nary a squeak.

  For the longest time, Wrath walked around the claustrophobic space, imagining the fire kindled and throwing off warmth as it broke down aspects of the plant material, the roots, the powders ... turning nature's bounty into poison.

  "Why her?" he asked. "If they killed my father and want the throne, why not me?"

  Ahgony shook his head. "I have asked myself that. Mayhap they did not want an heir. Who succeeds you in your line? Who would be the next on the throne if you had no young?"

  "There are cousins. Distant ones."

  The royal families tended to have limited offspring. If the queen survived one birthing, they did not want to risk her unnecessarily, especially if the firstborn was male.

  "Think, my lord," Ahgony prompted. "Who would be in line for the throne? Mayhap one who is soon to be born? They could be biding their time for a birth, after which they would target you."

  Pulling up the sleeves of the cloak, Wrath looked down at his forearms. Following his transition, he had been inked with the family lines, and he traced what was permanently in his skin, tracking who was was living, who was dead, who had young, and who was pregnant--

  He closed his eyes, the solution to the equation presenting itself. "Yes. Yes, indeed."

  "My lord?"

  Wrath let the cloak's sleeving fall back into place. "I know who they are thinking of. It is a cousin of mine and his mate is heavily with young the now. The other evening they were saying they prayed unto the Scribe Virgin for a son."

  "About whom do you speak?"

  "Enoch."

  "Indeed," Tohrture said grimly. "I should have known."

  Yes, Wrath thought. His chief adviser. Seeking the throne for a son who would carry the family fortunes into the future--whilst the male himself placed the crown upon his own head for centuries.

  In the silence, he thought of his own receiving room, the desk with parchment covering every square foot of its surface, the quill pens and ink pots, the lists of issues for him to tend to. He loved all of that, the conversations, the judgments, the calming process of coming to a decision thoughtfully.

  Then he saw his father's dead body with its gloved hands, and his shellan's blue fingernails.

  "This shall be handled," he declared.

  Tohrture nodded. "The Brotherhood shall find and dispatch the--"

  "No."

  Both of the Brothers stared at him.

  "They went after my blood. I shall shed theirs in response--personally."

  The faces of the two trained and bred fighters became impassive--and he knew what they were thinking. But it mattered not. He owed vengeance unto his lineage and his beloved.

  Across the way, there was a squat, coarse bench beneath the table and he pulled it out. Taking a seat, he nodded over at the cauldron.

  "Ahgony, go forth and extol the life force of my mate. Make it known far and wide that she survived. Tohrture, stay herein with me, and await the return of the murderers. As soon as they hear the news, they shall come here again to make a second attempt--and I shall greet them."

  "My lord, mayhap I could offer my service unto you in a different fashion." Ahgony looked at his Brother. "Let us escort you back to your mate, and allow us to engage whomever shall come here."

  Wrath crossed his arms over his chest and leaned back against the wall. "Take the torch with you."

  FORTY-ONE

  Beth just had to go and look at herself in the mirror.

  Even though she was in a whole new territory of exhaustion, she simply had to get out of bed, stiff-walk across the thick carpet, and zero in on the glowing light over the sinks in the bathroom. As she went along, her body was a contradiction of sore, tense muscles and liquefied, loosey-goosey innards--and her brain apparently had voted to go with the latter: She couldn't keep a thought in her head, fragments of the previous day and night burping to the forefront, but not having the traction to offer any concrete cognition.

  Catching sight of her reflection, she was taken aback: It was as though she were looking at her own ghost--and not because she was pale. Actually, her skin was radiant and her eyes sparkling even though she was bone tired, like she'd gone to Sephora and had her makeup done professionally. Hell, even her hair belonged in a Pantene ad.

  No, the specter part was all about the Lanz nightgown she'd put on: flannel, and big as a circus tent, the white-and-pale-blue pattern was like a cloud around her, billowing everywhere.

  It made her think of Beetlejuice, the movie. Geena Davis and a lower-BMI, less angry Alec Baldwin stuck in the afterlife, prowling around their house in baggy sheets, about as scary as Casper.

  Looking down, she bent over and picked up the drugging kit that had never been used. Rezipping it, she put it back where she'd found it, on the counter between their two sinks.

  God, whether it was the aftermath or all the hormones still in her bloodstream, the whole experience was a dreamscape, as hazy a memory as it had been a wrenching, vivid experience.

  But what had come before her needing was getting crystal clear. Like someone whose symptoms didn't tie together until they received a diagnosis, she thought back over the previous four months ... and strung together the mood swings, the yearning for a child, the cravings, the weight gain.

  PMS, vampire style.

  This whole getting-fertile thing had been on its way for a while. She just hadn't strung together all the signs ...

  Refocusing on the mirror, she went in for a close-up. Nope, her features were all the same. She just felt as though they should be different.

  Like with her transition.

  Wrath had helped her through all that as well. And it was funny, as with the needing, she'd had vague weirdnesses for some time before her change had come, too: restlessness, appetite stuff, headaches in the sun.

  She had to wonder if finding out she was pregnant was going to be as big as discovering she was a vampire.

  Putting her hand on her lower belly, she thought ... actually, it probably would be.

  For some reason, she went back to waking up after her transition. First thing she'd done was go into the bathroom for the mirror. At least then she'd had fangs to show for all of it. Now, any changes that might be going on were on the inside.

  At least her abdomen was still swollen. Although that was more likely just the weight she'd put on thanks to her Breyers diet.

  Or she could be pregnant. Like, right now.

  As she pictured the guy in the AT&T infinity x infinity commercial, she knew that even though Wrath had serviced her, she'd be crazy to think he'd magically turned a corner in the road and was suddenly going to be all happy-happy about starting a family.

  Again, assuming she was pregnant.

  Meeting the reflection of her own eyes, she wondered what the hell she'd put into motion. There were things in life you could undo.

  This was not one of them--

  Her stomach let out a noise like her heart was spelunking down to her butt. Glancing at the thing, she muttered, "Okay, people, let's all get along."

  With her guts grinding on the food she'd thrown into them, she turned around and walked back for the bed.

  Except that was not where she ended up.

  Instead, she went into the closet, pulled on a blue bathrobe and shoved her socked feet into a pair of pink UGGs that Marissa had gotten all the females in the house as a joke.

  The First Family's quarters were so sumptuous that Beth didn't spend a lot of time looking or thinking about the way they we
re turned out, and as usual, she was relieved as she left them. Yeah, sure, the place was lovely--if you were a sultan. For godsakes, it was like trying to sleep in Ali Baba's cave, jewels twinkling on the walls and the ceiling--and not fake ones, either.

  And no, she'd never gotten used to the gold toilet.

  The whole thing was absurd--

  Holy crap, she thought as she locked the vault back up behind her. How did anyone raise a kid in that environment?

  A kid that was halfway normal, that is.

  Heading down the stairs to the second floor, she realized there was another aspect of the whole child thing she hadn't considered: She'd been so focused on getting one, she hadn't considered having one in this kind of life.

  They'd be a prince or a princess. The former the heir to the throne.

  Oh, and P.S., how do you tell a kid his or her father had been shot in the throat by someone who wanted the crown?

  God, why hadn't she thought about any of this?

  Which was Wrath's whole point, wasn't it.

  Stepping out of the staircase, she went to Wrath's office, only distantly aware of conversation rising up from the foyer.

  She was a little surprised that he wasn't behind the desk. She'd assumed when Fritz had brought up the food that her hellren had gotten sucked into work.

  Stepping into the room, she stared at that huge wooden boat of a throne and then squinted, trying to imagine a son--or a daughter--sitting behind it. Because screw the Old Laws: If they had a little girl, Beth herself was going to make sure her hubs changed the rules.

  If the British monarchy could do it, so could the vampires.

  God ... was she really thinking like this?

  Rubbing her temples, she recognized that all of this was the tip of the iceberg Wrath had been crashing into--and meanwhile, she'd been Fisher Pricing it in her head, enjoying an internal debate on cloth diapers versus Pampers, what kind of video monitor to buy, and whether or not she liked the new crib styles at Pottery Barn.

  Infant and baby stuff. The kind of things she'd watched Bella and Z wrestle with, and purchase, and use.

  None of what had been on her radar had been about raising children into adulthood. Which was what Wrath had been focused on.

  Suddenly, the pressures inherent in that great carved chair had never seemed so real: Although she had witnessed them firsthand, the true burden of it all didn't really set in until this moment ... as she pictured a child of hers sitting where her mate did every night.

  She left the room fast.

  There were two other places he would be--in the gym or maybe in the billiards room.

  Oh, wait, no one was in there anymore.

  At least until they got new furniture.

  Man, what a mess this was.

  Hiking up the nightgown and the robe, she hit the stairs at a trot--until the jiggling of her internal organs made her nauseous and she had to slow it down.

  Crossing over the mosaic depiction of the apple tree, she figured she could ask whoever was in the dining room to--

  The moment she came under the arches, she froze.

  In spite of the fact that it was not mealtime, the entire household was at the table--and something awful had happened: Her family was like a collection of Madame Tussauds versions of themselves, the bunch of them arranged motionless in the chairs, with faces that had the right features, but expressions that read wrong.

  And everyone's eyes were on her.

  As Wrath's head lifted and angled her way, it was like her transition all over again, when she'd come out of her father's basement and walked in to find the Brothers at the table. The difference, of course, was that back then there had been surprise in the room.

  Now, it was something altogether different.

  "Who died," she demanded.

  Back in the Old Country, Xcor and his Band of Bastards had stayed in a castle that appeared to have risen from the earth, as if the very stones of its construction had been rejected by the dirt, expelled like a tumor. Situated upon a scruffy, otherwise uninhabitable mount, the construction had glowered over the small hamlet of a medieval human town, the fortification not so much regal as resentful. And inside, it had been no less uningratiating: Ghosts of dead humans had wandered the many rooms and the great hall especially, knocking things off heavy tables, swinging cast-iron chandeliers, toppling stacks of burning logs from the fireplaces.

  Indeed, they had fit in well there.

  In the New World, however ... they lived on a cul-de-sac, in a Colonial with a master suite the color of one's lower intestine.

  "We did it! Verily, we have the throne!"

  "We shall rule fore'ermore!"

  "Huzzah!"

  As his fighters congratulated each other and proceeded unto the alcohol, he sat upon the sofa in the living room and missed that castle's great hall. It seemed more fitting a space to play witness to the history they had set in motion and succeeded at.

  Eight-foot ceilings and velour couches just did not make the grade for an event of this magnitude.

  Besides, their castle ... had formerly been the seat of the race's First Family. Wrath's dethronement announced at the very place he had been born and reared would have had such greater resonance.

  Mayhap this weak, suburban locale was what was robbing him of the joy his fighters shared.

  Except no, it was something else: This fight with Wrath was not over.

  There was no way it ended here, like this. Too easy.

  Reflecting upon his journey to this moment, Xcor could only shake his head. Before he had come unto the New World, flying across the ocean at night, things had seemed rather much in his control. Following the death of the Bloodletter, he had taken the reins of the soldiers and enjoyed centuries of conflict with the Lessening Society after the Brotherhood had come to Caldwell.

  Eventually, however, after all their successes in the field, there had been no one save humans to chase after, and it was difficult to find much sport in those rats without tails.

  He had wanted the throne as soon as he had landed because ... it was there.

  And perhaps he knew that unless he took the crown, he and the Band of Bastards would be hunted: Sooner or later, the Brotherhood would discover their presence and want to exert superiority over them.

  Or eliminate them.

  Through his efforts, though, those tables had been turned; he had gained power over them and their King. And that's what was so strange. The sense that he was in some way out of control now was illogical--

  As Balthazar let out a whooping laugh and Zypher poured more gin--or was it vodka?--Xcor's temper lit.

  "He has not responded yet," Xcor cut in.

  The group of them turned upon him with frowns.

  "Who has not?" Throe asked as he lowered his glass. The others had red plastic cups or were drinking from the bottle.

  "Wrath."

  Throe shook his head. "He cannae have one, as legally he is powerless. There is naught he can do."

  "Do not be naive. There will be an answer to our cannon shot. This is not over the now."

  He got to his feet, a restlessness drumming through his body, animating him with twitchy movements he struggled to keep within himself.

  "With no disrespect intended," Throe hedged, "I fail to see what he can do."

  Turning away from the joviality, Xcor said, "Mark my words, this is not over. The question is, on the basis of his reply, may we still sustain."

  "Whither goest thou," Throe demanded.

  "Out. And I shall not be followed, thank you."

  "Thank you" was rather more like "fuck you," he thought as he dematerialized through the flimsy front door and reappeared upon the lawn.

  There were no more houses in this part of the development, the only other structure a pump house for the municipal sewer system.

  He tilted his head back and considered the sky. There was no light from the moon, a cloud cover that promised more snow blocking out the illumination.


  Yes, in this moment of his triumph, he felt no great joy or sense of accomplishment. He had expected to be ... well, happy would be one word for it, although that emotion was not in his lexicon. Instead, he was as empty as he had been when he'd arrived upon these shores and ill at ease to the point of anxiety--

  Oh, fuck. He knew the cause of the worry.

  It was his Chosen, of course.

  Whilst his men enjoyed the illusion of victory, there was only one place he wanted to go--even though it would undoubtedly put his life at risk.

  And go unto the north he did.

  Traveling upon the frigid night air, his molecules scrambled in a wave to the foot of one of the mountains on the very farthest edge of Caldwell's territory.

  Standing amongst the pines and oaks, his combat boots planted in the crusty snow, he looked up even though he could not see the apex of the mount.

  He could not, in fact, see much more than that which was three feet afore him.

  The great smudging of the landscape ahead of him was not based on the weather or the terrain. It was magic. Some kind of sleight of hand that he could not understand, but could not question the existence of.

  He had followed his Chosen here.

  Back when she had gone unto the clinic, and he had been terrified that the Brothers had hurt her in retaliation for feeding him, he had waited for her to emerge from treatment, and followed her here. Indeed, she had been manipulated into providing him with her vein. Had saved his life not through true choice, but a conceit created by Throe--and not for the first time did he regret sending that fighter unto the Brotherhood. If he hadn't sought to punish the male as such, neither one of them would have e'er met her.

  And his pyrocant would have remained unknown to him.

  For truth, lack of knowledge of that female's existence, of her scent and the taste of her blood, of those shattering, stolen moments in that car, would have been such a boon to him.

  Instead, it was as if he had taken a saw to his own leg and cut it off.

  He had unwittingly volunteered to cross her path.

  Staring at the edge of the mist, he braced himself and crossed into the barrier. His skin registered an instant warning, his inner instincts activated by the force field, teased by a rootless feeling of terror. Proceeding forth, his boots crunched through the ground cover, only a slight rise informing him that he was, in fact, beginning the ascent up the mountain.

  In this moment of triumph, the only place he wanted to be was with the female he could not have.