When the guilty vote was again unanimous, Wlodek sat for a few seconds. "I am going to depart from tradition here and offer this execution to Lissa," he said, turning his gaze to me as I leaned against the cave wall. Normally I hated executions but this one—I was going to take it. I nodded at Wlodek and stepped away from the wall. I walked behind Sebastian who stood there, facing the Council. He knew, somewhere in his mind, that he was going to die. I wasn't going to drag it out. There might have been a gasp or two in the room when I went to mist in a heartbeat and perhaps a few more gasps when my claws appeared behind Sebastian, slicing through his neck so swiftly they weren't even a blur. I rematerialized behind Sebastian while he was still standing. Slowly he toppled before me, his head remaining on his shoulders until he pitched forward. It rolled away then and the body turned to ash. Wlodek never blinked while this occurred. I returned to my spot between Gavin and Merrill.
* * *
"Lissa, will you turn me to mist sometime?" Charles hurried to catch up with me as we walked out of the cave later.
"You want to be mist?" I asked. "You can do me a favor at the same time. You can tell me if you see or hear anything while I take you flying. Merrill, do you mind if I do this?" I asked.
"No, Lissa. Go ahead and take Charles." I took Charles's hand and turned us both to mist before lifting into the air and flying over the trees in the park-like area around the cave. The moon was nearly full, which gave us a magnificent view of all of it. Someday, perhaps, I would fly free over the English countryside during a full moon, just to see if I could catch up with any werewolves. That might be something to see. I turned around after only a few minutes, landing Charles next to Wlodek, Merrill, Gavin and Brock, who were nearly to the waiting cars.
"Did you see or hear anything?" I asked Charles, who was wide-eyed with wonder.
"Honored One, you should ask her to take you, sometime," Charles was as happy as I'd ever seen him. "That was amazing. We flew over the trees so fast they were almost a blur."
"I'm glad you could see it, I was afraid you wouldn't be able to," I said. "Most of my passengers are frightened out of their wits."
We rode in silence afterward to Wlodek's mansion. Wlodek was going to place the call to Tony upon our arrival. It would be five hours earlier where Tony was; it was nearly three in the morning in London.
Rolfe got a hug when I came through the door. The tall vampire was waiting and held the door open for all of us. Merrill cleared his throat a little so I let Rolfe go and walked along behind Wlodek and Charles. Gavin came up beside me and placed a hand on my neck, rubbing my nape with his thumb. Extra chairs were placed inside Wlodek's study; even so, Gavin pulled me into his lap. Wlodek didn't raise an eyebrow. Charles had his laptop plugged in quickly while Wlodek settled himself behind the desk. Charles came forward, lifted Wlodek's cordless phone from its cradle and dialed the number. Tony answered on the second ring. Charles had the whole thing set up on speaker, although we could hear both sides of the conversation anyway. I assumed it was in case Merrill or anyone else wanted to comment so that Tony could hear.
"Director, this is Wlodek, Head of the Council," Wlodek identified himself.
"Hello, Honored One," Tony replied. At least he knew how to address Wlodek properly.
"It is my understanding that you not only used ash from rogue vampires but blood from our Lissa as well to perform experiments," Wlodek got right to business.
"That is true," Tony admitted. "But the results were highly successful. I can send you any of the records and the digital images, if you wish. I know you will be impressed." Tony was trying to make this come out in his favor by courting Wlodek.
"Young man, we are aware of what vampire blood will do to humans if it is introduced into their bodies in small amounts. Please tell me that these experiments were not performed on humans."
Tony hesitated for a few moments. "Well, we did go forward with a few human subjects," he admitted.
"How many?" Wlodek demanded.
"Six," Tony replied.
"Director, I hope that you are not one of those six. Regardless, you have condemned each of them to death. While the initial results may appear wondrous and promising, the truth is that such a small amount of vampire blood causes a reaction in the human body. The human antibodies see the introduced blood or tissue as a virus or other disease, and marshals the body's defenses. The vampire DNA then fights back. The entire process is extremely harmful to the human, resulting in a very rare blood disease. Are you familiar with Blackfan Diamond Anemia?"
Tony was tapping on his computer; I could hear his fingers hitting the keys. "Holy shit," he said after a bit.
"Normally the human is born with this condition," Wlodek went on, "and sometimes the disease can be dealt with by performing bone marrow transplants or administering treatments of steroids. This will be a particularly virulent strain, however, and there will be no cure. Your humans will be dead within three months. I suggest that you prepare them for this."
"And you know this how?" Tony asked.
"Do you think that we are stupid or without resources of our own?" Wlodek's voice held contempt. "These experiments have already been performed by scientists within our own race. When we saw the results of these experiments, we shut them down swiftly. If you had asked, the information would have been provided to you. Go ahead—test your subjects. The disease will already be present."
This information was whirling in my brain. This was awful. Tony and that other man had used my blood to kill innocent people. If he'd been in front of me right then, I might have slammed him through a wall. And then another thought hit me, which caused me to gasp aloud.
"Oh God, oh God," I moaned, sliding out of Gavin's lap. "Tony, I still think you're scum but you have to listen to me! Are you listening?"
"I'm listening, Lissa."
"This is what Xenides and Rahim are doing, Tony. They've compromised the flu vaccines. They've introduced vampire DNA into the vaccine and since nobody will know right away, they can kill half the world's population with tainted vaccine. That's what they were doing in France, Germany, Belgium, Great Britain and Atlanta. I'll bet there are pharmaceutical companies that manufacture the vaccine in all those places. This is terrible!" I was gasping for breath.
Tony was shouting and cursing, suddenly. "I have to go!" he yelled and the line went dead.