'What is it, ma petite? You look troubled.'

'Was the Lover of Death able to take over the vampires he made like this?'

'No, never.'

'Could he control zombies?'

'No.'

'So how the hell did we end up with a master vampire that can jump bodies like the Traveller, make rotting vamps like the Lover of Death, control zombies like a necromancer, and control shapeshifters through a bite from his puppet vampires?'

'The Traveller can move to almost any body that is his animal to call or a vampire; this master can use only his own creations, which was a gift that the Dark Mother possessed, and when she was in her prime I am told she could control all types of undead, not just vampires.'

'How about the rotting bite and controlling shapeshifters through it?'

'She made the Lover of Death, but like Belle Morte's ability with sex it was something that sprang to life in the Lover of Death's line of vampires. Most powerful master vampires can control their animal to call through a bite.'

'Not a bite through another vampire they've created and possessed, though,' I said.

'I am not sure. I will ask the Traveller if he has that ability.'

'But either way, Jean-Claude, where the hell did this vampire come from? We don't have that many rotting vamps in America.'

'That is true, and one this powerful I should be able to sense, but I cannot.'

I turned and made him stop fussing with my hair. 'Jesus, that's right, you're the king. You can sense vampires that have blood-oathed to you, at least a little.'

'You sense vampires, too, ma petite.'

'I can if they're not master level and not trying to hide.'

'I believe that even some master vampires could not hide from your necromancy now. We have all gained power from my rising to the head of this country's vampires.'

'They gave up the power to you so you'd protect them from the bogey vampires.'

'They feared the Mother of us all, and what the Lover of Death forced his descendant to do in Atlanta.'

'He didn't possess the Master of Atlanta, but he drove him crazy and made him and his vampires slaughter people. It's similar enough to what this master is doing,' I said.

'Perhaps this master was hiding not from the human law, but from the Council.'

'What do you mean?' I asked.

'This new master is powerful, but he is not more powerful than the Mother of All Darkness, and if he is a rotting vampire, then he descends from Amor de Morte, which means until they were both destroyed he must have feared them possessing or destroying him.'

'You mean he waited for us to kill everyone he feared and now he's outing himself to us?'

'I am not sure it is that simple, because he sounds quite mad. There is no real logic in madness, ma petite, though the mad always believe they are quite logical.'

'Crazy is never logical outside the head of the crazy person,' I said.

'My point,' he said.

'So now that we've destroyed all his competition, this new master is challenging us, or is he too crazy to care about us like that?'

'I think the latter.'

'Shit,' I said, 'does he have a body for us to find and destroy?'

'The Traveller still does, and he is the oldest of us left with the ability to jump from body to body, but if someone destroyed his original form he would die in truth.'

'But Mommie Darkest didn't die when her body was burned up.'

'Non, but the body that had been trapped in Paris wasn't her original body, or so I am told.'

I thought about it and shook my head. 'You're right, it wasn't. She'd traded bodies before, which was one of the reasons she thought she could take mine or make me get pregnant so she could take the child over.' I shuddered, as if I could still feel how evil she'd felt inside me. She had been the darkness made real. The night itself giving breath and life so it could slip in your window and do everything you feared would happen in the dark.

He went back to fussing with my hair. I wasn't the only one who had been afraid of the DARK, if you spelled it with all capital letters.

'Killing the spirit-walking vamps is so damned hard,' I said.

'Oui, you must first trap them in a body long enough to destroy them.'

'It only worked last time because she wanted to possess my body. It made her stay put long enough for my necromancy and your power to help me kill her.'

'Then you must find what this new master vampire wants badly enough to stay, as you say, put, so you and Edward can slay him.'

'Can you help us find him? I mean, you're king with metaphysical ties to most of the vampires. Can you use those ties to hunt for him?'

'In all honesty, ma petite, I do not know. The powers attributed to the old Council head, the Mother herself, were more her magic than any power given to her as the leader of the Vampire Council. I am not the first vampire or the creator of our society. I am a leader, but not that kind of leader.'

'The female vamp was created by him. Maybe if we use her as a link we could trace it back to him like a psychic cell phone. You have her phone turned on, and then you trace where she's getting her messages from.'

'It is a good thought and one worth trying, ma petite.'

'But you don't think it will work,' I said.

'I do not know, and that is the truth.'

I took in a deep breath, let it out slow, and changed topics while I tried to think of how to find the new big bad vampire. 'So there's nothing anyone can do for Micah's dad?'

'Nothing that vampires can do for him, I am afraid, but we did save one of your law enforcement officers, Travers.'

I started to turn and look at him, but he kept my face turned so he could keep doing my hair. 'You sucked the ... corruption out of Travers?' I asked.

'No, Truth did.'

'You brought Wicked and Truth with you?' I said.