He started grinning again.

I pointed the brush at him like a weapon. "Stop it, Vasco."

He was stil grinning when he picked the sheet up and inhaled loud enough that I could've heard him without the supernatural hearing.

As quickly as the grin had appeared, it vanished. He dropped the sheet to the bed with a look of shock and horror.

I folded my hands in my lap with a sigh as Vasco leapt to his feet and started cursing in a slew of Italian. Although I couldn't understand what he was saying, I understood what he was feeling. He was afraid, not just for me, but for Renata too.

I managed to catch the word, "Foolish," and then that too was sucked in and drowned out by another long line of fast and indecipherable Italian.

"Great," I said. "That's nice, Vasco. Can you repeat that? In English, please?"

He froze. Apparently, he hadn't realized he'd been speaking Italian.

After a moment, he blinked. "What have you done? What have you both done? You heard what she said last night!"

Impatiently, I started pul ing the curls of my hair back, tying it off with a long black ribbon.

"I heard a lot more than you did, Vasco."

He sat back on the bed heavily. "What is done is done."

"It is," I said. "Now tel me about the next chal enge."

"Signore dei Sogni. Lord of Dreams."

"Sognare?" I asked, remembering the Elder's name. Sognare had never been, in my opinion, one of the crueler Elders. In fact, in the past two hundred years I couldn't remember him bothering me at al .

"S," he said.

"Lord of Dreams?"

Vasco nodded. "His power has to do with dreams, inspiring them, control ing them."

I tilted my head. "But that's impossible. We don't dream."

"If Sognare wants you to dream, you wil ."

That was interesting. I'd never heard much about Sognare. Actual y, come to think of it, I hadn't heard much about the Elders and their specific powers.

I'd seen Sognare several times. And if you ask me, he reminded me an awful lot of the way humans portrayed their fictional wizards. However, that was probably because he was the oldest vampire that I'd ever seen. His gray beard was long enough to sweep the floor.

"That doesn't sound very physical," I said.

"Mental." He shrugged. "Physical. It is both."

I picked the fox blade up. Cal it a hunch, but I had a feeling Cuinn wasn't going to let me leave him behind.

Vasco eyed the sword. "It is true?"

"This?" I lifted the blade.

"The volpe spirito," he said.

"Renata told you?"

"S," he said. "She explained some. I have been a.s.sured that you have not gone deliriously mad and that your wits are stil about you."

"Wel , not yet," I said.

He offered his hand. "May I carry it? I know they are peculiar about such things, but you cannot walk into this chal enge armed, as it is not a chal enge of weapons."

Not visible ones.

I waited for Cuinn to add more, but he didn't.

Cuinn?

Aye?

Will you let Vasco carry you?

He seemed to consider it.

Then he surprised me by saying, Aye, I suppose.

I handed the sword to Vasco, hilt first.

Vasco took it. I turned toward the door when a heavy thump made me turn on my heel. The fox blade was planted firmly in the floor. I watched as Vasco struggled to retrieve it.

I heard Cuinn give a little snicker of laughter.

"Cuinn," I said, this time aloud.

Vasco gave me a look and tugged on the sword again, bracing his booted feet several inches apart. The sword wasn't budging. I had a feeling it wasn't going to, either, supernatural strength or no. Vasco swore and this time I heard him say, "Volpe!"

All he needs to do is ask nicely.

"Vasco, ask nicely."

"What?" He looked startled.

"You're going to give yourself an aneurism; just ask him nicely!"

He blinked. "Why?"

I moved toward him and the sword Vasco and moved out of the way. I pul ed the sword out of the stone in one fluid motion. "I'm not handing the sword to you until you ask nicely."

Vas...o...b..inked again. "Per favore?"

That'll do.

I handed the sword to him. Vasco removed his own sword from his back sheath and laid it on the bed. He slipped the fox blade into his sheath, checking it with his hands. He seemed satisfied that it fit.

I let the surprise show. "It fits?"

"The sword and sheath were blessed by one of the Stregheria."

"The what?"

"Stregheria," Vasco repeated. "An Italian Witch. The sheath wil fit any sword."

"And the sword?" I asked.

"The sword wil kil a vampire."

"That's a nice thing to be carrying on your back."

"Right now I am carrying your volpe spirito trapped in steel, and this too is a nice thing to carry on one's back."

I didn't know if he was teasing or not. "You're saying my sword can bring true death to one of our kind?"

"S, or anything that you wish it to kil , for that matter."

Cuinn, I mental y purred at him.

Aye? he said again, but this time he sounded irritated.

Is this true?

His ears swiveled back as he rested his maw on his forelegs.

It is.

You didn't think to tell me, why?

'Cause ye'd find out eventually.

I shook my head. "Let's go."

Vas...o...b..wed. The pommel of the fox blade was hidden behind the long braided tresses of his hair. I opened the door and stepped out in the hal , too busy giving in to my irritation to be particularly afraid.

Chapter Eleven.

Renata turned toward the doors as I made my way before her. I caught a flash of her dress, blue velvet so dark it was almost black, before I sank graceful y to my knees and fixed my gaze on the stone below me.

"Vasco," she said and he rose from his kneeling position, knowing her wil and taking his seat among the other Elders.

To me, she asked, "Is it your wil to proceed?"

I dipped my head lower. "It is, my lady."

"Lucrezia," she said, "summon Sognare."

I sensed more than saw Lucrezia get to her feet. She moved past me, and as she pa.s.sed, the bulk of her heavy skirts brushed the side of my body.

A spark of anger flared through me and I fought to conceal it. The double doors clanged closed and the room was suddenly fil ed with eerie silence. It was a silence that belonged to an empty room, but it was not. It was only a room ful of vampires that had no real reason to make any noise. Or so I thought.

A rustle of material sounded. Someone whispered, "Little rabbit."

I looked up then, turning my face toward the sound of Gaspare's sour voice. He sat beside Baldavino, who reclined at ease, rol ing his eyes at Gaspare's comment. The hair brushing his shoulders was as gold as a lion's mane. Both of the Elders wore deerskin breeches, but where Gaspare's velvet jacket was black, Baldavino's was the solid color of pine needles.

I met Gaspare's eyes and the look of taunting malice in them.

Cuinn's androgynous voice crooned through my head, Your mother was an ogre and your father the dribble from a goblin's a.r.s.e.

I gave a short and unexpected laugh.

On the dais, Gaspare's hands clenched into fists. "You dare to laugh at me?"

Aye! Cuinn's voice was a deadly hiss in the confines of my skul .

"Perhaps," I said, "or perhaps it occurs to me that you would dare loathe the rabbit when you yourself are a terrible huntsman, Gaspare."

I heard the sound of his chair clatter to the floor a moment before his fist bal ed in my hair. He jerked my head back and drew his other hand back as if to strike me.

Renata's voice cracked like a whip, ful of heat and command. "Gaspare!"

I narrowed my eyes in defiance.

He used the grip he had to pul me up high on my knees. "Wretched little b.i.t.c.h!"

I heard the hiss of steel sliding from a sheath.

"Let her go." Vasco's voice dripped with cold fire as he pointed the fox blade at Gaspare.

Gaspare snarled and spat, "You would protect her?"

Vasco's eyes brightened with power, rocking waves of an azure ocean. His voice dripped with unrelenting chal enge. "S."

I took the opportunity the distraction presented, catching Gaspare's hand between my fingers. I am a vampire and we are al supernatural y strong.