"Cassie!" That was Fred's voice, raised to carry. I grabbed the robe and slippers a vamp was holding out and shrugged into them on my way to the kitchen.

And found Fred just standing there, staring at the side of our brand-new fridge. The last one had had an accident, and been replaced with a shiny new stainless steel model. It was usually pretty boring, since none of the kitschy Dante's magnets they sold downstairs would stick to it. It was a lot more interesting now.

Because there was a man peering out of it.

A man with watery blue eyes, cheeks pinker than mine, and fluffy white eyebrows. Really fluffy, like tiny sea anemones had somehow managed to attach themselves to his face. And a mass of white hair that wafted about like a merman's in the air currents of the room behind him-a room that didn't form any part of my suite.

And despite the fact that I'd expected it, despite the fact that there weren't a handful of people in the world who could bypass the wards on this place and pull something like this, I still stared at him in disbelief.

"Jonas?"

"Cassie. I do apologize for the inconvenience-"

"Inconvenience?"

"I did try calling the usual way," he said, and actually sounded annoyed. Like this was all my fault somehow. "But your . . . associates . . . continued to insist that you were away-"

"I was away!"

"Yes, and we need to talk about that-"

"We need to talk about this!" I told him, throwing out an arm. "You almost got my court killed!"

Vague blue eyes suddenly sharpened. Jonas liked to play the doddering old man when he thought it would get him anywhere, but I knew him a little too well for that now. And it seemed that he wasn't in the mood anyway.

"I did nothing of the kind. Your vampires overreacted-"

"Something war mages never do," Marco said heavily, coming up behind me.

"-which should not be surprising considering that they were trained as a vampire's bodyguards-"

"Like Lord Mircea needs the help."

"-and to guard his home, not the Pythian Court. They have no experience-"

Marco snorted. "'Cause the mages guarding the court in London did such a great job."

"Will you please tell your servant to stay out of this?" Jonas asked me sharply.

"Marco isn't my servant. And he belongs here!"

"Yes. But you do not. Members of the Corps are on their way to move you and your court to-"

"Move?"

"-temporary quarters until we can determine-"

"I'm not going anywhere!"

"-where would be best for . . ." Jonas stopped, and his pink cheeks suddenly became a little pinker. "I beg your pardon?"

"Marco is right," I told him, furious. "You had guards on the court in London. Guards we found dead when we arrived! They didn't keep anybody safe-"

"When you arrived?" Jonas asked archly.

But I was in no mood to play games. "You know what happened! You've figured it out, or you wouldn't be here-"

"It was not too difficult to figure out. And the coven leaders you chose to take with you were happy to inform me in any case. Any excuse to deride the ability of the Circle to protect-"

"With reason! Your guards didn't protect anybody!"

"There were no more than a handful on duty," Jonas said, frowning. "And most were nearing retirement. The post was a sinecure, an easy assignment for those wounded in battle or with failing magic-"

"Failing?"

The frown grew. "They were there as a courtesy, Cassie. An honor guard. The court wasn't in danger-"

"The court was just blown up!"

The frown was edging into scowl territory. "A court is useless without a Pythia," he told me sharply, "and you were not there. Without you, there was no earthly reason to believe that anyone would wish to imperil the lives of a group of little girls-"

"No earthly reason," I said, trembling, but not with cold. "But there was an unearthly one, wasn't there? And you didn't tell me."

"You knew what we are facing; I briefed you on it myself-"

"You told me the old gods were trying to return. You told me I was in danger from them. You didn't tell me my court was!"

"They shouldn't have been!" Jonas snapped, suddenly angry. "Those girls were not in jeopardy-until they became bait in a trap for you. Something that would not have been the case had all of you been in our custody from the start!"

"Your custody?" The trembling was worse now. "Your custody? The Circle was trying to kill me for most of the last three months!"

"Under my predecessor. One of many lapses in judgment on his part, which is why he was removed. And afterward, I felt some . . . consideration . . . was due you, in light of your initial introduction to us. That you should be given time to understand that there are reasons why we are the traditional defenders of the Pythian-"

"The Pythian Court is defended by the Pythia!" Rhea said, rushing into the kitchen with a child in her arms. She looked at me wildly. "Lady-"

"What's going on?"

"They're coming in!"

"Who's coming in?" Marco asked, face darkening.

And then one of the vamps cursed, and suddenly, Rhea and I were alone in the kitchen.

"The Circle," she breathed. "They wanted to take us before. I should have told you, but you were so tired, but I should have told you-"

"And I should have expected it," I said, and ran to the living room.

Chapter Seven.

The door to the foyer was open, and the doorway was full of men in leather dusters that made them look like action movie heroes. Which wasn't that far from the truth. The coats, ridiculous as they were in August, were needed to conceal the metric ton of weaponry that the Circle's powerhouses carried around. None of which could be used tonight, because there were children in this damned apartment.

I pushed my way into the crowd of vampires, half of whom had guns out. "Put them away," I said harshly. Rico, one of Mircea's Italian masters, hesitated, then holstered his weapon so fast it looked like it had simply disappeared. It was a subtle indication to our guests of how fast it could be back in his hand.

Not that it mattered; war mages weren't big on subtlety. And anyway, the rest of the vamps were ignoring me and still had theirs out. And then Marco decided to make it worse.

"Looks like you boys found backup," he told them, from in front of the line of vamps. "At least that'll make this interesting."

"It isn't going to be interesting!" I said, coming up beside him. "It isn't going to be anything. They're leaving."

The mages didn't reply, didn't move. Neither did the vampires. But what the Circle's men-and Jonas, damn him-didn't understand, was that the vamps couldn't.

Vamps might have started out human, but they weren't anymore. They hadn't been for hundreds of years in some cases. And their society never was.

Okay, yes, sometimes they acted like it; sometimes they ate and drank and laughed right along with the little human they'd been ordered to guard. But they weren't human. The war mages might act crazy by most people's standards, might take insane risks, might even be a little touched in the head-I'd certainly thought so often enough. But given a bad enough situation, they would back down. They would wait for a better opportunity. They would live to fight another day.

The vamps wouldn't.

Even if I was willing to go along with Jonas' plan, they couldn't. Because they couldn't protect me if I was out of their sight. And that was what their master, the font of their wealth and position and strength and life, had ordered them to do. So they would stand their ground, would die to a man if they had to. Or more likely would kill every single war mage here and start a possibly irreparable breech with the Circle, and Jonas didn't get that.

I just hoped someone else did.

"Marco-" I said tightly.

"Tried," he told me, without turning around. "Master's phone don't work."

"Why not?"

He shrugged slightly, and it looked like massive boulders shifting under the thin cotton of his shirt. I saw one of the war mages in front, a dark-haired guy with a cleft chin, notice.

He had no idea. Marco didn't need his size. Marco could rip the man's blood out of him through the air, in particles too small to see, without even breaking the skin. He could drain him from across the room until the idiot turned ghost white and fell off the steps, a shriveled husk who'd never had time to realize that these were not the low-level vampires he was used to. These were senior masters, and of Mircea's family line.

Which meant they could also do it in seconds.

But then, the mages had their tricks, too, and these weren't the doddering old pensioners the Circle had left to guard my court. Not if the amount of power prickling over my arms was anything to go by. Jonas might have expected my cooperation, but he hadn't been sure of Marco's. He would have sent men he could trust.

So this . . . could be very bad.

And then Fred came up beside me. "Mircea's probably at the consul's," he told me.

"The consul's?" I looked upward briefly, in the direction of my old suite, hoping that what Mircea had wanted to talk to me about was a quick trip to Vegas.

But of course not. "No, no," Fred said. "Her place in upstate New York. She's got a house. . . . Anyway, they're doing a thing out there this week, choosing some new senators."

"What does that have to do with Mircea's phone not working? He told me to call him-"

"That was before."

"Before what?"

"Before they shut the place down," Fred said, sounding way too calm. Maybe too inexperienced to read the atmosphere that had Marco's hand flexing against his thigh. "There's a bunch of bigwigs on hand, consuls and such, and you know how many enemies they have. So our consul ordered the main wards brought online for the duration. And phones don't work through them."

"Then contact him mentally!"

"We already did. But it's hard to send complex stuff across that kind of distance. I mean, maybe not for senators, but for the rest of us-"

"Fred," I said through gritted teeth. "Did you get through?"

"Yeah, well, sort of. I think the idea that you're in trouble was understood okay, but some of the details might have gotten muddled."

"Meaning?"

"That." Fred nodded at the door. Where another mass of master vamps had just appeared behind the group of mages. Half of whom suddenly whirled to face them.

"The Circle isn't the only one who has backup," Marco told them gently.

The mages still didn't reply. They didn't have to. Because their boss had just appeared like a reflection in the windows leading to the balcony.

They were the same ones where the magical news feed had been projected last night, showing the destruction of Agnes' court. The same ones where I'd seen a dozen tiny body bags being lined up on a rain-drenched street. The same ones Jonas had been facing when he forbade me to go back and try to save them.

My vision started to pulse at the edges.

"I wanted to give you time," he told me now. "But we are out of it. The war has seen to that. And recent developments have clearly shown that you need guidance-"

"Guidance like you offered Agnes?" I asked hoarsely. It was below the belt-the two of them had been lovers, and her death had hit him hard. But right then, I didn't care.

No way would he have tried this with her.

No way.

"Agnes was an experienced Pythia," he told me crisply. "You are not-"

"I seem to be gaining it quickly."

"Agnes had years of training; you do not-"

"You don't get to decide when I'm ready for an office you have nothing to do with."

"And Agnes would have been in our care in the first place, instead of in the clutches of-"

"Agnes would be ashamed of you!"