Dark Queen

Beast thought at me. Like meat. Dangerous prey meat. Eat meat of stone. Beast can be big, best ambush hunter.

It was a boost to existing magic, and it made me feel pretty good. Calmer. Stronger. Which meant there would surely be a backlash at some point, that other shoe dropping, because nothing in magic is without cost. It might also be a mood booster, because I felt more hopeful than I had only a moment past, the weight on my shoulders still heavy, but not full of terror.

Feeling better even though nothing in my life was really improved, I went back to Molly’s chair and knelt on one knee on the sand. Lachish had already moved away, into the dark again. I kissed her cheek and said, “I love you, Molly Meagan Everhart Trueblood.”

“I love you too, Jane Doe Yellowrock. Now go kill bad things.” She shooed me away.

“Yes, ma’am.” Standing, I walked toward the house, shoving aside the small niggling thought that Molly could be passively drinking down all the death on Spitfire Island, just like a moon witch in full-moonlight absorbing lunar magic power. Could be growing stronger and more deadly death by death. No. Not Molly. Not pregnant with a witch child that might die from the death.

Enough of this crap. I can’t suspect everyone I love.

I strode back into the beach mansion and into my shared room. I knelt, pulled my luggage out from under the bunk bed, and rattled around in the bags and suitcases until I found the box of magical trinkets. I left a mess of unfolded clothes, dirty clothes, and toiletries on the floor and I didn’t care.

The ruby was in the box, and I lifted it out, a smoothed crystal of stone, smaller than my distant memory, smaller than the ruby that Dominique had worn. This stone was zipping with scarlet motes of magical power too, racing in a round pattern. I yanked the clasp off the new ruby and let the moonstones clatter from the wire into the bottom of the box, catching the ruby in my other palm. I scrounged around some more and found the necklace I had bought when I first came to New Orleans, one I had worn dancing, and bent the focal stone free from its wire wrapping. Pressed the wires around the rubies to hold them in place on the chain so they were encased together. I hooked it around my neck, centered them close to the gold nugget I always wore, and made sure it all could be seen easily. I made my way to the third floor, straightening my back, firming my face and my steps.

I was partway up when I heard Sabina speak. “Emperor Vespasianus’s weapons master, Salvatrice Bianchi, challenges Pellissier’s Adelaide Mooney to a death match. Are both present?”

I raced the rest of the way to the third floor.

Sal and Del stepped forward. Sal was a behemoth of a woman, broad and tall and muscular, her two feet of hair braided into a long column and wrapped in leather at her back, the hair-sheath reminiscent of a binding on a horse’s tail. Her fighting leathers were old and scored and torn. Del was dressed in golden leathers smeared with the blood of previous opponents, matches I hadn’t witnessed. I’d seen Del in a skirmish and sparring, but never in combat.

The bell chimed. My heart lurched.

Del dashed forward, her swords circling, cut, cut, cut, cut. Blood flowed, steel clashed. Del’s opponent dropped to one knee, bleeding from two head wounds, a hank of scalp and hair on the floor. I started to shout encouragement. But Salvatrice dropped her left sword. Before it landed, she pulled a small blade. Stabbed up. Into Del’s body. Catching her at the unprotected spot where thigh armor met abdominal armor plate. Sal’s sword clanged to the floor.

Del made a small sound of surprise, like, “Oh.” She stumbled.

Salvatrice rose to her feet, stepping closer to Del. Drawing the blade up Del’s side, along the protective plate, through her body. Scarlet pumped over Salvatrice’s hand, to her elbow. Splatted hard on the wood outside of the octagonal. Salvatrice twisted the blade to the side and across, a move that cut through bowel, kidneys, liver. And descending aorta.

I could hear the sound of things inside of Del tearing, separating. “Oh,” she said again. Del fell, her knees and hips going limp. She landed on the wood floor, Salvatrice falling with her, in a languid motion. Removing the blade with an upward twist.

Sal stood, her blade dripping.

Brian said, “Results of this duel are acceptable to the Onorios.”

How could they be acceptable?

“This round to Titus Flavius Vespasianus,” Sabina said, as if unperturbed at the death. “Has Leo’s primo signed papers to be turned?”

Dacy raced forward, her face blanched whiter than the moon through the windows. “I will not lose my daughter. I decide for her.” Dacy dropped to the floor, an ungainly motion for a vamp, and ripped her own lower arms lengthwise, to increase bleeding. Placed one wrist to her daughter’s mouth, the other deep inside Del’s body. But Del didn’t drink. Didn’t swallow. After two long minutes, Dacy rose to her feet and turned her back on Del, bloody tears streaking her face. She said, “Take Adelaide to my bed.” And the heir of Clan Shaddock walked down the stairs as her people rushed to wrap Del’s body in bloody sheets and carry her down.

I was certain I wasn’t breathing. Certain that my heart wasn’t beating. Del was my friend. Had been my friend. Del was dead. Or could Leo’s healing blood potion save her? How good was it?

Sabina said, “Aloisio Esposito, tercero of the Europeans, has challenged Pellissier’s secundo heir, Grégoire. The bout will begin in five minutes, to allow time for blood removal. This will be the last bout of night one of the Sangre Duello.”

I knew about Aloisio. This was going to be bad.

I slid unnoticed into the shadow of one of the wood-beam roof supports. I reached up and gripped the two rubies and the gold nugget together. My other hand went into a pocket to grip the Glob, though I didn’t remember putting it away. I prayed a wordless prayer, begging. Did God really hear the ones who fell away? I had personally fouled a baptismal pool full of holy water. Would he hear the prayer of someone with so much blood on her hands? Surely it was God that had sent Hayyel to me. Unless the angel was hanging around my life to exact heavenly justice on me at some predetermined point. I didn’t know, and I feared that my faith had grown thin and worn and was full of holes.

* * *

• • •

We stood on the sand.

Aloisio Esposito, tercero to Titus, or, as some vamps called it, troisième, was third in line to the crown of the Europeans, the current Master of the Cities of Madrid, Barcelona, Lisbon, Marrakesh, Casablanca, and the Balearic Islands—basically Spain, Portugal, and Morocco. He’d been fighting for centuries, had a head count of more than a thousand names—humans and vamps—and he was nearly as old as his emperor. Aloisio was not a pretty vamp; his face was scarred by pre-turning sword cuts and his back was rumored to be marked by the scars of whip lashings. But he had vibrant, caramel-colored eyes and he was tall and slender as a reed, with well-defined shoulders and a tapering back. He walked like a racehorse, with a long, rangy stride and a slight bounce in his step. Aloisio Esposito had not lost a first-blood bout in centuries. He hadn’t lost a death match in, well, ever.

Sabina did not announce anything or ask about weapons. She said nothing as they approached the central octagonal.

Grégoire and Aloisio were both wearing black, their matte fighting leathers new and well armored. The death bell rang, the note pure and clean and deadly.

The attacks were so fast I could hardly see the movement of the blades, glistening in the dim glow of the lights mounted above us. They clanged, clanked, shushed as blade slid upon blade. Blood flew in scarlet drops. Grégoire’s hair was stained scarlet. Aloisio’s neck was bleeding. Just above it, his earlobe was nicked and missing a wedge. Step, step, step, feet silent in this dance of death.

Weapons a blur.

I wasn’t breathing. The Glob flashed with a blistering heat.

In the same instant there was movement in my peripheral vision. Flashing.

I dropped. The blade thunked into the pillar above me, right where my eyes had been. Perched on my toes, I whirled. No one was there. Looked back to the duel. It was even bloodier. Splatters flying in the air. Splatters on the sand. One landed on my face, cold vamp blood.

I grunted, my eyes still whipping around the space, away from the duel, which was in its seventh second, searching for anyone who looked wrong, who wasn’t watching the fight with enough attention, or with too much attention. No one looked out of place or guilty. My eyes slid to the side, refusing to focus. And I realized someone was beneath an obfuscation spell. Bancym M’lareil? I pulled on Beast-sight and the rubies heated in my hand. I saw the form of the woman on the far side of the sand, hidden beneath the witch working. Now that I knew where to look, she was slender and muscular, arms akimbo, swords at her sides. I let go of the rubies and she vanished from sight. Had Dominique been using the ruby to keep track of Cym? Yeah. Made sense. Fast thoughts. Fast as the blades.