I thought maybe I should shout a warning at the newcomers—battle with evil demon in progress, please leave! But I was stunned. The car very smoothly pulled into one of the empty spots, and the engine shut down. Ashtoreth regarded the car with her head tilted, lips pursed, and even lowered her spear.
Now, we rip her throat out …
I appreciated that Wolf had so much confidence in our ability to inflict damage on indestructible supernatural beings.
When the car’s two front doors opened, and the two men stepped out, one of them held up an object that suddenly flashed. Incredibly bright light filled the lot, like a strobe or a bolt of lightning. Ben and I ducked, coming together and shading our eyes.
The demon hissed in pain. The goggles—the light had gotten through her goggles. Her eyes, acclimated to darkness, couldn’t adjust. She hunched over, her arms shielding her face; her expression was wracked.
A blast of wind smacked into us, a choking smell of fire overcame me. A whirlwind, a tornado coming to instant life right over us. Ben fired to where Ashtoreth had been standing, but I couldn’t see her anymore. A maelstrom hid her.
Just as quickly, the storm ended. Dead leaves and stray trash skittered across the pavement as the wind died down. Ashtoreth was gone. That was her exit strategy.
I didn’t know what to think. I looked over at the car and the newcomers. Two men in suits stood at the open doors, looking over at us with vaguely bemused expressions, as if they were embarrassed to have interrupted a conversation. They looked like two lost salesmen in their dark suits, with their unassuming manners. They looked like—
“You!” I said, pointing, marching toward them. They weren’t wearing sunglasses this time; that threw me off. “You were at New Moon, after the fire! You’re following me! Why? Who are you?” I only got halfway to them when Ben held my arm and pulled me back. I must have looked like I wanted to rip someone’s throat out. Well, I did.
I winced, because my injured arm had started throbbing. The broken bone would heal, but it would take time. I wondered if it needed to be set. Ben and I both stank of blood and sweat.
The driver, the olive-skinned one, very casual like, as if it wasn’t the middle of the night and he didn’t just happen upon a supernatural battle in the middle of Denver, said, “I’m sorry to bother you, but we’re looking for the Brown Palace Hotel—can you tell us where it is?”
I thought about laughing but choked on the impulse. Ben did laugh, and the sound was both relieved and exhausted. He rubbed a hand through his hair and walked off a few steps, burning off energy.
“Are you serious?” I demanded.
“Um. Yes?” the man in the suit said.
I gestured over my shoulder to where Ashtoreth had stood a moment ago. “What did you do to drive her off?”
The passenger, the brown-haired Man in Black, said, “Full-spectrum light. They’re quite useful. Vampires don’t like them much, either.”
Ben returned to my side. His gun was still in his hand, but he held it lowered at his side. It wasn’t like these guys were waving silver-pointed knives at us.
“Who are you?” I demanded again.
The driver’s smile was far too calm. I wanted to hit him. “Mostly we came to say—your pack is safe. We didn’t think your care for them should be used against you, so we removed them from the game.”
I took a deep breath—they didn’t smell like anything. They didn’t have the chill of vampires. They weren’t human, either. I couldn’t tell if they even had heartbeats.
“Are you Fae, is that what you are?” But I’d smelled Fae before, and they weren’t it.
“And where is our pack?” Ben said, stepping ahead of me.
“They’re safe,” said the driver.
“That doesn’t answer the question. You haven’t answered any of our questions!” I said.
“I know. It’s all very complicated,” said the passenger. “Maybe we can explain it later.”
“So,” the driver added. “Can you tell us how to get to the Brown Palace? Please?”
Oh for fuck’s sake. “Take this road, turn right, and in a little ways you’ll get to Colfax. Take that into downtown, go left on Glenarm, then right on Seventeenth. Driving that area’s a bitch; if you don’t want to go on a safari for parking you might want to just use the valet.” The suits looked fancy enough they could no doubt afford it.
“Thank you,” the driver said. “Is it a nice place? I’ve heard it’s nice.”
I blinked. “Yes,” I said. “It’s also haunted.”
He beamed back at me. “Excellent. Thank you very much.”
I rushed forward, broken arm or no, and slammed my good hand on the hood of their car. They looked on with casual interest.
“Who. Are. You.”
“Friends,” the driver said, and climbed back in.
Then they were driving away, as if time had skipped a beat.
The whole parking lot and space in front of KNOB fell still, silent. I looked at Ben, who looked back at me. Finally, he shrugged. “I don’t know,” he said. “I can’t explain it.”
“Are they telling the truth? About the pack?”
He considered a moment. “I think they are. I don’t know why I believe them, but I do.”
I sank to the curb and whimpered. My arm hurt. I wanted some of Tina’s painkillers.
Ben sat beside me. “You’re hurt—what happened?”
I showed him my arm. Bone wasn’t sticking out, which was good, I supposed. He felt it, pressing gently. I winced.
“I think it’s already healing. Can you move it?”
“Yeah, but it hurts.” I wiggled my fingers for emphasis.
The cuts on his face were healing, fading to pink lines. The gashes in his arm, and mine, took a little longer, scabbing over as we watched. The bone would take the rest of the night to heal.
Ben put his hand against my head, and his warmth was a balm. He kissed my forehead, breathing deeply to take in my scent. “That was close,” he murmured.
“That was weird,” I said, and kissed his lips in return. Somehow, we’d lived.
I resisted the urge to chase after the Men in Black. I had a feeling we wouldn’t find them anyway.
The pile of ashes that had been Angelo was gone, scattered by the wind. He was gone, and it had happened so fast I was numb. Didn’t feel a thing. I would, the next time I went to Psalm 23 and he wasn’t there. I wondered who the Family had lined up to be the next Master, or if there even was a Denver Family anymore. Not that I cared. I couldn’t trust any of them anyway. The Denver vampires wouldn’t help us.
It had all happened in just a few minutes, and no one from the KNOB building had noticed. No one came out to see what all the commotion was about. No one else had gotten hurt. Thank goodness.
Ben and I clung to each other. After a moment, and a deep breath, he said, “You get the feeling someone is looking out for us?” he said.
Those guys in the car, of course, who’d also been at New Moon. But they weren’t looking out for us, they were just looking. Voyeurs. I didn’t know.
“No. I have the feeling we’ve gotten stuck in the middle of someone else’s war.”
“Let’s get the hell out of here,” he said, and urged me to my feet.
* * *
BEFORE LEAVING, I looked around at the spot where Angelo had disintegrated and found the coin he’d been wearing. The coin that meant the Master of Denver had been recruited, and the city was now in play in the Long Game. I wished yet again that Rick had a phone number.
Ben had some tools in the back of the car, and found a nice solid hammer to smash the design out of existence, rendering the coin useless.
“If these mark Roman’s followers, do you suppose wearing the smashed-up ones might protect us from Ashtoreth?” Ben asked.
“No,” I said. “Kumarbis was wearing one when she killed him. I don’t know that they do anything once they’ve been broken.” Still, I was proud of the collection of them
we’d gathered. Every one was an ally Roman didn’t have anymore.
I put the coin around my neck, a talisman against the dark. A reminder.
Sitting in the car, I felt safer. Not safe, just safer.
Ben asked, “What did Angelo say to you at the end? I’ve never seen a vampire do that—hang on to try to talk. It was…”
“Sad?”
“I was going to say creepy. But yeah, that, too.”
“Obsidian,” I said. “He just kept saying obsidian.”
“So we need to look out for volcanic rocks? Is there some kind of artifact? Is that Roman’s weakness?”
Nothing so arcane as that. It took me a minute, then I kicked myself for needing that long. “No. Turn around, we need to get downtown. Obsidian—the gallery Obsidian. Go.”
Ben swerved, turning the corner and sending us around the block until we were headed back—back downtown, to the vampire Family’s lair.
Chapter 13
FOR AS long as I’d known there were vampires, the Denver vampire Family housed itself in the basement of a fancy art gallery and import business, Obsidian. The business was a front, a place to launder money, a public face when one was needed to do business in the world. I didn’t think I’d ever seen the gallery actually open. The real action happened down a rough concrete staircase and through a plain door in back to a set of windowless rooms and chambers underground.
When Rick was Master, I could just knock on the door, talk my way in, and have a lovely conversation or three with my friend. Now, I didn’t know what was going to happen. Angelo was dead. Something had happened, something had changed, the balance in this Long Game had shifted. I had no vampire allies in Denver.
Ben called Cormac. “It’s not like he’ll be asleep,” he explained. “And he’ll be pissed off if we don’t ask him for help for something like this.”
He was right on both counts. I listened in, and the hunter answered on the second ring and didn’t sound at all sleepy. He and Amelia were night owls. Actually, I wasn’t sure Amelia needed to sleep at all.
After just a few words, Ben donned a wry look and held out the phone. “He wants to talk to you.”
Great. That meant I’d have to tell him we faced down Ashtoreth without him.
“Was that really Roman that called into the show?” he said. Before “What’s wrong?” even.
“Yes. I don’t know what it means.” I sounded numb. Still processing the last two hours of my life.
“What’s happening?” he said.
“Angelo is dead. He ambushed us outside KNOB, and I killed him. Then Ashtoreth showed up.”
He hesitated. I got the feeling he didn’t know which part of that to be more astonished at. He said, “Not that I’m not happy at how it turned out, but if you faced down Ashtoreth, how the hell are you still here?”
“I’m not entirely sure. Someone flashed a light at her and she got distracted.”
“Someone?”
“Men in Black. I don’t even know. They said the pack is okay. Somehow.” I wasn’t making any sense.
“What was Angelo doing at KNOB?”
“Trying to get rid of me. He had a coin, he’d signed on with Roman.”
“Jesus. But you killed him?”
“And smashed that coin to pulp,” I said, putting my hand on it where it lay against my chest. I didn’t tell him about the broken arm. It was getting better.
“Are you and Ben safe for now? Are you being followed? Watched?”
Yeah, Cormac wasn’t going to be happy about this. “We’re headed to Obsidian.”
He paused, and said, flatly, “Why?”
“Because Angelo’s dying words were ‘Obsidian.’ Something’s there.”
“Yeah, a mess of vampires who’ve probably gone crazy with no Master to control them. They’re going to blame you.”
“Yeah. So. Want to come help?”
“I’ll be right over.”
* * *
BEN HAD been hanging out with Cormac long enough that he knew the score and kept a whole kit in the trunk: not just a crossbow and spears, but a spray bottle of holy water, a pile of garden stakes, and wooden javelins. It would be the kind of thing I would tease him about, if we didn’t seem to need an antivampire arsenal so often. He also reloaded the Glock from the box of ammo in the glove compartment. Ben was a paragon of practicality.
The front of Obsidian was entirely nondescript: double glass doors between display windows containing antique furniture and gilt floor lamps. The door didn’t have an open or closed sign, and didn’t display hours. If it wasn’t for the sign above the windows, you’d never know this was a business. I was sure that was the idea. The stairs to the vampire lair were around the corner from a loading dock.
“You know what we’re looking for?” Ben asked. He had the crossbow and bolts; I had a couple of stakes in my good hand and the spray bottle tucked under the bad arm.
“No. But it makes sense, if Angelo had sided with Roman, that would give Roman a base of operations here. So we’re looking for Roman, the Manus Herculei, the Holy Grail. Whatever. To be honest, I’ve always wondered what was in the back room of this place.”
“What do we do, knock?”
I did so, rapping knuckles on glass. Nothing happened. “We move on to the back, I guess.”
“I was afraid you’d say that.”
We stepped carefully. A couple of streetlights gave us a pretty good view of the front of the building, but the back parking lot, with its cracked pavement and lone Dumpster, was mostly dark. It was the kind of place I’d been told not to walk alone when I was in college.
His voice dropped to a whisper. “Hey, Kitty—smell that?”
The place was a vampire lair—it always smelled like vampires, so my hackles were already up. But the scent Ben picked up was fresher—and moving. We stopped, back to back, looking around, even though in the dark we likely wouldn’t spot them until they were right on top of us. I might have caught a flash out of the corner of my eye, then another. Movement. We were being watched.
Since they weren’t attacking—hell, they weren’t even appearing to lord themselves before us, all smug and superior like—I kept on toward the back, trying out a service door next to the loading dock. It was locked. Maybe Cormac could break us in when he got here.
The only door left to try was the one to the basement lair. Heading down those stairs would get me cornered, trapped. Besides, I was pretty sure anyone I wanted to talk to was up here, watching us.
“Hello?” I called. “By chance does anyone have the key to the gallery? You know, so I can maybe look around?” Hey, it was worth a shot. “They’ve got to be just as nervous as we are,” I murmured to Ben when nothing happened.
“That’s what I’m worried about,” he answered.
A cornered predator was the worst kind of predator. We knew that very well. “Hello?” I called again.
A figure broke off from the shadows—Braun, standing at the corner of the building, arms at his sides. I felt a tiny bit of comfort—he hadn’t been with Angelo and the others. Maybe he wouldn’t try to kill me.
“What do you want?” he asked, suspicious.
Ben turned and aimed the crossbow at him; I put my hand on his shoulder to calm him. I glanced around—other vampires came out from where they’d been hiding, or from where they’d been stalking us. None of the ones here had been at KNOB. Had the Family broken into factions? Should that give me hope?
Ben turned again, watching the others, covering me while I talked.
“Braun, right?”
“Kitty.”
“I just want to talk,” I said. “You didn’t come after me with Angelo and the others.”
“No. You got a little banged up, I see. What happened?”
Ben and I looked like we’d done a couple of rounds in a cage fight. Cormac wasn’t going to be happy when he saw us.
“Angelo is dead,” I said.
He didn’t seem surprised. I wondered if they?
??d felt it, because he was the Master. “What happened? How did you survive?”
“He was trying to kill me—under Dux Bellorum’s orders. Did you know that?”
“Some of us didn’t agree with him,” Braun said. “We … we wouldn’t stand with him. He said he’d be back to ‘take care’ of us. I can’t say I’m sorry he’s gone. How did he—”
“I did it. I staked him.”
One of them let out a soft hiss; a couple stepped back. They all looked surprised. And I felt a tiny bit safer—they were scared of me.
I looked. There were maybe half a dozen vampires here in a circle around us, and I recognized most of them, vampires who’d been at Psalm 23 with Arturo, then Rick, then Angelo. They were like coworkers or neighbors you knew well enough to say hello to, but you couldn’t name any details about them. None of them had attacked us at KNOB. I still wasn’t sure I trusted them. We had enough stakes and bolts and holy water to take a bunch of them with us, but they’d probably get us, and it wouldn’t be pretty. But they didn’t look like hunters at the moment. They looked wary, unhappy, nervous—lost. They wanted to talk, or they wouldn’t be standing here.
I found myself hoping Cormac didn’t get here in the next ten minutes to blow everything up. I lowered the stake I’d been holding. At that, Ben relaxed a notch. Just a notch.
“So you wouldn’t back Angelo—what are you doing here?”
“Angelo may be gone but he has followers. We have to hold this place, if we’re going to keep Denver safe.”
“Safe the way Angelo was trying to keep it safe, or safe for real?”
“We’re on your side,” he said. “I think. Against Dux Bellorum, that’s the important part.”
I spoke carefully. “Dux Bellorum is still out there, and he’s close to whatever it is he’s been working toward. Angelo told me to come here, right before he died. I don’t know why.”
Braun said, “Denver doesn’t have a Master anymore. How do you expect us to help?”
I didn’t know. I didn’t know what they were feeling, or what they needed. “Maybe you could just, I don’t know, decide to help? Maybe you could get together and decide what to do next? Maybe elect a new Master? Or do you really need a Master? I mean, aren’t you all still a Family without one?”