Joe gave her a curious look. "Okay. Go on."

She ended her story with her walk through the underground. "It didn't strike me until just now, but it's odd that there weren't homeless down there. It's cold in the tunnels, but it's out of the wind and snow."

"Even the human homeless are better at sensing threat than those of us who live comfortable lives." Joe refilled her mug with more of the warm, delicious Empire Bites Back. "Those tunnels haven't been safe for weeks."

"Why not?"

"I've heard stories about something living down there. People start talking three beers into their evening." He made a gesture that took in the whole bar. "We get a mixed clientele in here. More and more human yuppies going for a walk on the wild side, but the core clientele is still the longtime Spookytown residents. If there's something going on, they know about it."

"Do you think there's a link to the election?"

Joe shrugged. "Maybe. Nothing surprises me anymore."

He pulled out his cell phone. "I'm calling the others. They're going to want to know you're safe, and I want an update on Perry."

"Me, too." Talia wrapped her hand around her mug. She was just about ready to unb.u.t.ton her coat. Her toes were a ma.s.s of pins and needles, bringing back childhood memories of long walks home from school. She and her brother used to stand over the forced air ducts in the floor to warm their bare feet while their mother brought dry socks. Somehow, the cold hadn't seemed so bad as a kid.

Nothing had. What the h.e.l.l, Max? You never asked me if I was all right.

And she hadn't had a chance to tell him about Mich.e.l.le. Had he already known that she was dead? It was an ugly thought. Talia bit her lip, wondering what the Hunters were doing and how deeply Max was involved.

She looked up as Joe closed the phone. "How's Perry?"

"I talked to Errata. He hasn't regained consciousness."

"Oh."

Joe grimaced. "Lore filled me in a bit more. Now that the police know you're still in the area, they'll be looking for you that much harder. It's better if you don't go back to Lore's place."

Talia glanced at the frost-painted windows, dreading the cold outside. "How late are you open?"

"As long as you need."

She gave him a startled glance.

"Hey," he said, picking up a knife and cutting the end off of a lemon. "Take it easy. That's what friends are for."

Talia took a breath to speak, but changed her mind at the last moment.

"Thank you," was all she said.

Chapter 21.

Thursday, December 30, 7:30 p.m.

Downtown Fairview

Darak was walking downtown, minding his own business, when the guy a block ahead walked through the alley wall.

For a moment, he wondered if that last blood donor had been knocking back more than Jell-O shots. She'd been the cheap and cheerful type, but he hadn't expected chemically altered. It would be a sad day when vampires had to start demanding organic.

Or, something might be more sinister than a funky meal.

Lengthening his stride, he covered the distance to the piece of old brick wall. His boots scrunched on snow and sand, the buckles and metal bits on his jacket jingling in chorus. It was cold enough that the bricks wore a rime of frost that sparkled in the streetlights.

He pounded on the spot where he'd seen the figure disappear just to be sure there hadn't been a door. Back in the day, secret pa.s.sages were denarii a dozen.

His breath came out in a puff of surprised steam when his fist pa.s.sed right through the bricks. Gah! He s.n.a.t.c.hed his hand back. He'd seen too many ghosts to enjoy that.

Except that his hand felt like it was crawling with ants. Magic. Someone was using spells to take a shortcut.

An unexpected ripple of triumph curled his lips. After Mich.e.l.le's ghost had fled, he had looked long and hard but had found no real clues to the spell caster's ident.i.ty-but this was something. There might be two or three magic users in a city at one time, but not a whole phone book of them. In his experience, one always knew about the others. If he could find the man who walked through walls, he'd be on his way to the necromancer.

Portals closed fast, sometimes in seconds. Without wasting another moment, he pushed through, feeling as if an entire swarm of bees was pressed against his body.

And stepped into an old corridor. It felt clammy, like a bas.e.m.e.nt. The floor was covered in worn green broadloom, the wallpaper flocked red vinyl. A hotel? Something skittered by on the floor. An abandoned hotel?

He was alone. Seconds after the figure used the teleportation spell, the magic would have begun to decay. Darak had followed, but he hadn't gone as far. His quarry was somewhere up ahead.

He sniffed the air. Yes, there were other vampires nearby. He began marching toward the smell, the heavy thump of his boots barely m.u.f.fled by the thin carpet. A feeling of profound creepiness descended on him. Outside of his own movements, the place was utterly silent.

He pulled out his Smith & Wesson. It was a .357 Magnum loaded with vampire-ready ammunition. He was a "just in case" kinda guy.

A pair of fire doors blocked his path. He was tempted to kick through them, doing the bad-a.s.s thing, but magic made him wary. He opened the door a crack, looking and listening. He could hear male voices now, and detected maybe a few dozen individual scents. The long hallway ended in a meeting room. One of the doors was propped open with a chair, the barely padded kind found at wedding banquets everywhere. The chair was kept company by a pair of vampires holding a.s.sault rifles.

Darak opened the door slowly and went through, sauntering as if he had every right to be there. One of the guards started talking to his shirt cuff.

How many voices did he hear? Three? Four? It would be better if he asked nicely and they told him what he wanted to know. Then they could all get on with their nights. But he was always up for a good Plan B.

Through the doorway, he caught a glimpse of a long, bare table and more of the banquet chairs. Vampires, mostly male, were sitting and standing around it, looking at a large map. His view was eclipsed by four more males hurrying to intercept him at the door, presumably called via shirt cuff intercom. Better than the shoe phone, he supposed-but then few humans that age would have remembered Maxwell Smart.

The four newcomers all had a.s.sault rifles, too. One of them looked like the figure who had gone through the wall. Well, magic portals were one way of ensuring a fast commute to work.

The first of the newcomers caught sight of the Magnum. In a blink, he lunged for it. He was fast for a vamp, but Darak was older, faster, and overall meaner. The vamp hit the wall and the next one was on his knees, the Magnum at the crown of his head, before the rest had their eyes focused on the problem.

The guy on the floor was panting, a thin sound trickling from his mouth. Darak hadn't even warmed up. He heard the click and rustle of the a.s.sault rifles getting ready and aimed. "It's going to take a lot of bullets to bring down this much Undead body ma.s.s. I can take you all out before it starts to itch." A lie, but if you said it with the right amount of bravado, it usually worked.

"What's your business?" said the lead flunky.

Good. Questions made things better. Darak slid the Magnum back into its holster, but didn't let his hostage up. "Darak of Clan Thanatos seeks audience."

He didn't have a clue with whom, but that's what he'd come to find out.

More shirt cuff dialogue. Up close, he could see curly wires leading to the vampires' ears. He wondered how many of this happy gang there were, and how far they were spread out. What the h.e.l.l had he stumbled on? Darak felt the stirring of misgivings.

Finally, the one in charge nodded, motioning the others aside. Darak barely resisted the urge to step on his victim. He let him up instead. The guy scrambled away on all fours for a few feet before getting to his feet and running behind the others. Yeah, he had a future as muscle. Not.

Turning his shoulders to fit through the door, Darak pushed past. He took his surroundings in at a glance. The room was large enough to seat a hundred people. Chairs and folded tables were stacked along the wall, some sitting on a platform on casters, as if they would be rolled away at any minute. Cheap chandeliers hung from a damp-stained ceiling, the gla.s.s baubles fluffy with dust. Otherwise, there was no furniture to get in the way of a fight.

Then he looked back to the vampires gathered at the table. His heavy tread hitched when he saw who was in the center seat. He'd found his necromancer. Mothereffing Sons of Dis!

"Looking for someone, rogue? Or should I say Brute? That's what they called you in the arena, is it not?"

Belenos, King of the East, gave him a beatific smile, and what a horrible smile it was. Darak's eyes watered with the desire to look away. Belenos had been a warrior of the north, as tall and strong as a Viking ship's prow. Now he was a ma.s.s of scars, one eye completely gone. He was using his right arm, but something about his movements looked wrong. There was no way he would swing a sword freely until it healed-if it healed. Beheading his victim must have been hard.

"Yes, this is what the b.i.t.c.h queen did to me."

"Omara?" Darak was perversely impressed. It took talent-and sorcery-to hurt a vampire that badly.

"She broke the law, maiming another monarch."

He was wrong. Technically, she hadn't broken any rules. Killing was forbidden; punishing for trespa.s.s was not. The story went that Belenos had been trying to kidnap one of the local witches at the time, so Darak didn't have much sympathy for the poor-me routine.

"If she hates you that much, why are you in her territories?"

"Frank, aren't you, gladiator?"

"Saves time."

"You don't bow to royalty?" He made a gesture to a flunky, who began to roll up the map. Whatever was on it wasn't for sharing.

"No."

"I thought as much. Are you in town to cheer on the democratic election?"

"No."

"You're not buying this move by Omara to put her puppets in public office? It would take a fool not see she's moving in on the human power structure."

"I don't do politics, any flavor."

"Ah, yes." Belenos looked amused. "Your reputation for utter neutrality among the vampire kingdoms is remarkable. I'd say you hate all us monarchs equally. If you had a weakness, I'd say it was a taste for Robin Hood dramatics in favor of the downtrodden."

"I don't do tights and lacy shirts, either. Clan Thanatos is a mercenary unit."

"Is that why you're here? For a job?"

Darak thought quickly. His misgivings were turning into full-scale alarm bells. The map on the table, from what he'd glimpsed, had looked like a diagram of the sewers. Whatever Belenos was up to was going to be on a big scale. "The opposite. I'm looking for whoever started the fire at the medical clinic. I could use a skill set like that on my team. Necromancy is a rare talent."

"I'm flattered," Belenos said dryly. "But I'm otherwise occupied."

Got you, b.a.s.t.a.r.d. Hearing the confession gave Darak a spark of satisfaction. "Too bad. We pay well."

"Maybe I have a job for you instead," the king said. His look was thoughtful. "You could be exactly the tool I need."

"Yeah? We don't come cheap."

"Then what does it take to buy your time? What do you want?" Belenos fixed him with his one topaz eye.

I want to go home. I want to kiss the soil of Rome and walk the streets a free man. As an outlaw, as the murderer of his n.o.ble sire, it was the one thing his size and strength couldn't win. The Undead never forgot a crime.

The spike of painful longing came unbidden, as if summoned by the sorcerer-king's gaze. Darak turned his head away, focusing instead on the table. Besides the rolled-up map, there were candles, an incense burner, and a small quartz ball no bigger than a plum sitting on an ornate gold stand. Magic.

The king was watching his face. "I see there's something you want. If it's within my power, it's yours. A small price to pay for a job well done."

Amnesty? As a king, Belenos could arrange it. Maybe. Possibly. It wasn't out of the question.

Yes it was. Belenos was sc.u.m. Instead, Darak named a ridiculous figure, just to see what would happen. "Half up front."

Belenos shrugged, as if that were coffee money. "Agreed, but once you're paid I get a hostage to hold until the job is done to my satisfaction."

"Standard terms."

"It won't be straight combat. I've got other allies-or perhaps I should say interested parties-who are prepared to cover the usual a.s.sault activities. I would need you for more targeted work."

"What are our orders?" Darak asked, tension roughening his already gravelly voice. For a fee like that, the stakes had to be high. What the h.e.l.l is going on?

Belenos sat back, lacing his fingers behind his head. "That's something I can't tell you until the time comes. And when that will be depends on the weather."

That's interesting. "How many men will I need?"

"More is better. Many of the best fighters are out of Fairview at the moment, but I understand there is a pack of h.e.l.lhounds doing guard duty. I've run into them before. Nasty brutes."

Darak grunted. He remembered the hound in the Empire. Young, serious. Carried himself like he'd seen more than a few battles. "When do I need to have the men readied?"

"When the airport is opened again."

"What's the signal?"

"I'll find you." Belenos's eye flicked to the quartz ball on the table. So he's using it for remote surveillance. "You'll have your instructions then. In the meantime, bring your hostage to the pier midnight tomorrow and collect the first half of your payment. And don't think you can take my gold and run. I'll be watching your every move. Go about your usual business. Muster your men, but do it quietly."

"I've done this before," Darak said dryly, a little offended.