"Oh. It's cool, man."

"That is gratifying," I said. I was struck by the notion that Freddy was not a great intellect, and that inference led me to wonder how he made it across the continent in one, unparboiled piece. "How did you get here?"

"I stowed away in the luggage compartment of a jet that was supposed to land on the right coast of Florida in the middle of the night, dude. Turned out it wasn't the baggage compartment at all, and I froze solid when we reached cruising alt.i.tude. They opened some kind of hatch or something and I got dumped."

"Dumped? As in, onto the ground?"

"Yeah, man."

"When you were 'dumped,' did some frozen green matter come out with you, by any chance?" "Yeah, dude. How did you know?"

"Just a lucky guess." I exchanged glances with Werm, whose eyes had gone wide with wonder. He had obviously come to the same conclusion as I. The plane's septic system had jettisoned Freddy along with its chemically treated waste. "What a charming anecdote," I went on. "Where did you, er, land?"

"In some marshland. It cushioned my fall, but I was still unconscious for a while. I'd sunk into just enough mud to protect me from the sun."

"My, but you are a lucky young man," I observed.

"Do continue. What happened then?"

"When I came to, I cleaned myself up and followed the smell of food."

Speaking of smell, I imagined that Freddy would have been somewhat fragrant after being flushed with the waste and then marinating in mud for a spell.

"On the subject of food..." I began.

Werm interjected, "Don't worry, William, I explained to him about your house rules."

Freddy held up the fingers of his right hand as if he were about to take the Boy Scout oath. "I won't kill any humans. I promise. I don't believe in it, dude. I'm a live-and-let-live guy. You feel me?"

"Indeed," I said, hoping he didn't mean that literally. "I'm sure you're a civilized man if Tobias calls you friend. And if you stay that way, you're welcome to remain here as long as you like."

"Thanks, dude." Freddy smiled, giving the barest glimpse of a mature set of fangs. This blood drinker might seem youthful, but he was no fledgling. I wondered at his background. Since I hadn't brought him to the New World as part of my smuggling operation for peaceful European vampires, I a.s.sumed he was a product of the indigenous western vampires like Tobey. Perhaps I'd ask him one day if he stayed in the city long enough.

"C'mon, Freddy, I'll get you a beer," Werm said, and his new friend followed.

When they'd left, I saw Jack's friend Otis sitting on the bar stool directly behind where they'd stood. He was furtively fiddling with an electronic device, and when I greeted him he nearly jumped off his seat.

"Hey there, William," he said, stuffing the gadget in the breast pocket of his workshirt-a shirt bearing for some unknown reason a patch embroidered with the name Kenny. If Otis was attempting to secrete the apparatus, he was doing a poor job of it. An earpiece still dangled from his pocket. "Gotta go," he said abruptly, and drained his beer in one gulp. Wiping his mouth with the back of his hand, he disappeared into the pressing crowd.

I turned back to Seth, who refilled my gla.s.s. "Strange guy, that Otis," he remarked.

I took a sip of Scotch. "If Jack didn't have strange friends, he wouldn't have any friends at all."

Jack h.e.l.lfire and d.a.m.nation. My sire was the last guy I wanted to see tonight, and there he was, sitting at the bar. I ramped up the mental shield I used to keep him from sensing my whereabouts and skulked into the shadows behind the wildly gyrating young people on the dance floor. Normally I wasn't the skulking type, but I just didn't want to deal with him again so soon. I'd hang out for a while, and if he didn't run along home pretty quick, I'd skedaddle back to the garage.

The crowd milling about the bar shifted and I saw what looked for all the world like Otis taping a conversation that William was having with Werm and a vampire I'd never seen before. Usually a strange vamp in town was enough to put me on red alert, but I relaxed when William's body language said he wasn't a threat.

Since the new bloodsucker had gotten the Good Housekeeping stamp of approval from my sire, the only remaining question was what Otis thought he was doing with that little voice recorder. I knew what it was because Iban had one just like it that he used to dictate movie-directing ideas.

Werm and his friend cleared out as I made my way closer. William said something to Otis, who downed his drink and turned to go. He made for the back door and I went after him, reaching him just as he made it there. I got his biceps in a vise grip and dragged him out into the alley.

"What's with the voice recorder, Otis?" I asked without preamble.

"Huh? What voice recorder?"

I plucked the gizmo out of his pocket by the ear-buds. "This voice recorder."

"That-well, that's..."

n.o.body I knew had ever accused Otis of thinking fast on his feet. "Since the cat's got your tongue, let's just skip ahead to the next question. You were using this to spy on William. Now I want to know why."

Then the d.a.m.ndest thing happened. Before my eyes, Otis changed into something very unOtislike. In a little poof of sparkly pastel light, he lost a third of his height and all of his Otisness. In fact, instead of the guy I knew, before me was...Stevie Sparkle?

His hair looked like blue-tinted Christmas tree tinsel, only finer, and his skin had an unnatural creamy perfection that glowed like a flawless pearl. This was the blue-haired Stevie who Huey had been seeing inside the sh.e.l.l of the homely, oil-streaked Otis! The Otis exterior was only a cover for a fey glitter-rock icon who didn't look a day older than he did when I saw him on seventies TV variety shows.

I looked him up and down, still unable to believe my own eyes. Even Werm wouldn't be caught dead-if you'll pardon the expression-in the skintight outfit Stevie wore. The spangled electric-blue number had been his trademark, as I recalled. A chick I was dating at the time said he wore it to emphasize the color of his eyes, which were as otherworldly a shade of blue as his hair.

She had a crush on him.

I can't believe I actually bought that woman drinks.

Otis/Stevie looked down at himself as if he was just as shocked as I was at his appearance, and just like that, he was back to looking like the old Otis again. I'd scared him so badly he'd dropped his glamour by accident.

"Dude," I said accusingly. "You're a fairy!"

Otis jumped a little as a skinny goth came out of the men's room down the alley and pa.s.sed us on the way back inside the club.

"Keep it down," Otis said.

"Somebody's gonna hear you and think I'm...you know."

I nearly laughed. "You're worried that somebody's going to think you're gay? That's the least of your problems, pal. I've heard all about you-you fairies. Real fairies, I mean."

William had told me about the fey a long time ago, but I'd never met one before, and I wasn't sure I believed they existed until now. William had said they were troublesome creatures-a race of charming and supernaturally beautiful thieves and tricksters never to be trusted.

"That's faerie," Otis corrected peevishly, p.r.o.nouncing it FAY-ree. "And most of the stories they tell about us are just old wives' tales. For instance, I've never stolen a baby in my life."

Baby stealing? I stared at him. I'd never heard that one before. "G.o.d a'mighty!" I had so many questions-and accusations-I didn't know where to start. "You're Stevie Sparkle?"

Otis sighed. "That's what I look like naturally. For a little while, back in the seventies, I got a chance to let my freak flag fly, as they used to say."

"So you actually were Stevie. You hid in plain sight," I observed.

"Yeah. Kind of like you do."

He was right about that. We vampires have learned to adapt to our environments by taking on what humans consider to be normal lives. Except for not going out in the sun, we hold everyday-that is, everynight-jobs, like mine. Never being seen in natural light helps us disguise our pallor. Also, I tried to avoid the kind of lighting they have in most retail stores. But hey, a boy has to go to the twenty-four-hour Wal-Mart once in a while just like anybody else.

"So," I mused, "you got to go around in your real skin back then, not having to get by on glamour to hide what you really look like so as not to freak people out."

"Yeah. When glitter rock was popular, my natural look was perfect; I fit right in. In fact, n.o.body could outshine me. Before that, the only time I got to drop the glamour was on Halloween. And, you know, at parties."

I didn't even want to know what kind of parties he was talking about. "So people thought the shiny hair and eyes and skin were part of the act. They must have thought you had one h.e.l.lacious makeup artist."

"They thought it was some kind of special effect, like in Star Wars." Otis laughed uneasily.

"So what are you doing here?"

Otis shrugged and looked at the floor. "Oh, you know-it's a fun place."

"I'm not talking about the club, dammit." For one of the fey, he was a terrible liar. "Try again. What is an undercover faerie fey doing hanging out with a bunch of vampires? And why were you spying on William?"

"Uh...," Otis mumbled.

Now this was just sad. Fairies, that is faeries, were supposed to be clever and quick, not as big and dumb as a man can come. I drew back my lips and extended my fangs. "Don't even think about lying to me."

Otis froze, mesmerized by my display of badness. People-human or otherwise-never failed to find my full vamp-out mode...

inspiring. I used it to inspire reluctant people to talk, shut up, stop doing what they were doing, or do exactly what I said to do- whatever my needs happened to be at the time.

"I, uh, guess I just like vampires is all," he said.

"Always have."

"n.o.body likes vampires," I said, leaning close enough for him to see that special quality in my eyes. It's a feature most vampires learn to mask to keep humans from running away screaming. When my eyes dilate completely, my blue irises disappear into blackness, taking on a subtle, doll-like emptiness that says more clearly than words ever could: Do not be deceived, human.

Despite the walking and talking and all other evidence to the contrary, this creature is dead. And deadly.

"Um, okay, would you believe...I like the coffee at the garage?" The coffee at the garage looked a lot like the kind of pitch they use for waterproofing down at the docks, and probably tasted worse. I seized Otis by the back of his shirt and hoisted him into the air. "No more games, Tinker Bell. We're going to talk to the big dog."

When I hauled Otis before William and whispered to my sire that we had to have a serious talk, he told Werm to close the bar immediately. Most of the patrons took it in stride, although Ginger seemed a little put out. She tried to cling to William, which seemed kind of strange for her, but he gently shooed her away. Then it was only me, William, Werm, Otis, and Seth. Whatever Otis had to say for himself, Werm probably needed to know, too, and there was no point in keeping things from Seth either as he'd always been an ally.

William looked from me to Otis. "What's this about, gentlemen?"

"I caught Otis taping your conversation with that vampire that was in here earlier," I said.

"I wasn't doing that, honest," Otis argued, drawing himself up.

I s.n.a.t.c.hed the recorder out of his pocket. "Want me to play it for William?"

Otis deflated visibly and hung his head. I was almost sorry for him, especially when I thought about how terrified he'd always been of my sire.

"When I confronted him, he got spooked and dropped his glamour. He's a faerie, and he's been hiding it from us all the time he's been hanging out at the garage."

I heard a little growl from Seth, who came around from behind the bar to stand beside Werm. Werm just looked surprised. "Hey, Jack," Werm said. "I know you're a good ol' boy and everything, but I never figured you for a h.o.m.ophobe." I silenced him with my shut-up-or-I'll-bite-you look. Seth bent to whisper something in his ear. "Oh," Werm said.

William took a menacing step toward Otis. "You are one of the fey?" he asked. He leaned close to Otis and sniffed. His fangs came out. "Yes, you are. Why have I not smelled the Sidhe on you before?"

"Because he never let you close enough," I said. I now knew why Otis avoided William whenever he could. I had always thought it was simple fear. After all, William was the baddest blood drinker on the continent. But part of that fear was of being found out for what he was. The question was, why was he hiding?

"I always knew there was something not quite human about him, but I didn't know what until tonight," I said.

William's eyes narrowed and he jabbed Otis in the chest with one index finger. "You knew Jack was a relative child amongst blood drinkers, and since the fey are almost unheard of on this continent, you were pretty well a.s.sured he'd never seen-or smelled-one before. You've been a fixture at his place of business for years now. It looks as if you've been spying on the both of us. And now you'll tell me why."

Otis just stood there, mesmerized by the sight of William's razorlike fangs fully extended.

William leaned closer. "I tasted fey flesh more than once in my youth. I rather liked it. If you don't answer my questions, I'll offer you to my two offspring so they might know that pleasure as well."

I heard Werm whisper to Seth, "What is fey flesh supposed to taste like?"

"Chicken," Seth whispered back. "They say."

Otis started to crumple to the floor, and I got a better grip on the back of his shirt to help him stand upright. "What's it going to be, buddy?" I asked with a wink toward William. It wasn't the first time we'd had to use the bad copgood cop routine on some recalcitrant bad guy. "You know we don't want to eat you. But you give us no choice if you don't tell us what's going on."

"Okay. Okay. But can I have a drink first? I need a stiff one."

William nodded to Werm, who scurried behind the bar and poured Otis a whiskey. I settled the wayward faerie on a bar stool and we all gathered around him.

He took a gulp of his drink, followed by a deep breath. "I'm part of a secret society among the fey," he began. "We're what you might call...watchers."

I glanced at William, who was wearing his poker face. "What is this secret society dedicated to watching?" he asked evenly. "Or should I say who?"

"Um, you," Otis muttered.

"Say what?" I said.

"That is to say-vampires," Otis clarified.

"What about shape shifters?" Seth asked.

"Not so much," Otis said.

Seth looked a little hurt and walked back behind the bar.

"Although we're supposed to report any unusual activities by anybody that's not human," Otis continued. "But with vampires, we're supposed to doc.u.ment everything. Which ones get made by who. Which ones die and how. Even who you guys hang out with." He shrugged apologetically.

"That's why you've started hanging out here at the bar as well as at the garage," I accused. "You've been a fixture at my place of business since forever. You know it's my job to help William import peaceful vampires from Europe and ride herd on the ones already here. And when Werm opened the bar, you knew it would attract weird characters, human or otherwise, who might be in Savannah, so you started spending time in here, too."

Otis shrugged, not bothering to deny it. I thought about the fact that it was Otis who always had the latest gossip about the odd happenings in the nonhuman community. It had been Otis, after all, who had alerted me and William to the Alabaster being found adrift with its crew and cargo dead.

Just lately I had found out that Jerry liked to pa.s.s the time at my place of business because his werewolf cousins-the ones who wanted to eat him for daring to leave the pack-were afraid of me. Now I find out that Otis just hung around to spy on me. And here I thought it was my warmth and personality that kept them coming back. It was all enough to hurt my feelings a little, to tell the truth.

"If something happens, like if a fight breaks out between nonhumans, what are you supposed to do?" I asked. I had wondered why Otis had remained conspicuously out of the conflict when Jerry, Huey, and I had to help Seth out. Rennie had an excuse to stay away; as a human he would have been torn apart. And Rufus got a pa.s.s because we still didn't know what he was exactly.

But as a Sidhe, Otis's powers of trickery alone would have come in handy, like Werm's did.

"I'm supposed to stay neutral," Otis explained.