Angie Baby slid from the chair and walked calmly to her mother. She put both hands over her mother’s and squeezed. Molly closed her eyes and forced herself to take a breath. It wasn’t magic. It wasn’t anythingparanormal. It was mother and daughter and that connection I would never have and didn’t remember from my own youth. Wet heat prickled under my eyelids as Molly slid her hands free and wrapped herself around Angie, holding her close.
Edmund dropped away from my hand and landed on his knees, offering the box to Molly. “There is nothing here but my honor,” he said. “My honor is all I have left of who I was, and I would not sell it at any cost. But I would give it. I would promise it to you and to yours.”
“Why?” Molly asked. “That makes no sense for a fanghe—a Mithran.”
“The priestess Sabina has divined much about the state of the world and about our species. She has said that my life is wrapped inextricably with you and yours,” he said to Molly. “And with my mistress.”
That was news to me. “Did she get around to saying why?” I asked.
“All she said were nonsense syllables, perhaps in her mother tongue.”
“And they were?”
“Bubo-bubo,” he said. “Senseless.”
But it wasn’t senseless, nor was it in her mother tongue. It was the scientific name for the Eurasian eagle owl. I had flown in its shape once, for a chance to sit in a tree and listen in on a vampgather.
Later Sabina had seen me in the tree and she spoke to that owl. It had been eerie enough to make me want to lift wings and fly far away. She said something like “I know not if you are real, or prophecy, or the mad imaginings of an old, old sinner.” My flight feathers shivered and my taloned feet danced on the limb. “If you are prophecy, if you are the breath of God on my stained and darkened soul, then know this, and take my words back with you to paradise. We still seek forgiveness. We still search for absolution.”
Much later even after that, she had said of the raptor, “It came to me, at a time of gathering and blood, when we put Katherine to earth to heal. It cried out its lonely call to me, a bird of the night, a bird of a different place andtime. The owl has long been a harbinger of change, of danger, of loss. You are that beast of change and loss. That harbinger of bitter defeat. Of true-death.”
Go, me. I was part of a prophecy. My life was weirder and weirder. Molly was watching me as if reading my mind and I flashed her a grin and shrugged, hoping to throw her off my train of thoughts. But Edmund’s words were enough to make me believe him. I said to Molly. “He’d make a pretty watchdog.”
Edmund inhaled a breath that he hadn’t bothered with until now and said, “I am a far better protector than adog.Or even a werewolf. And I have pledged you my honor.”
“Y’all are all angst and indecision and drama queens, worse than a bunch of old men on a street corner.” Pointing at Molly, I said, “You deal with this. Get yourself together and chill. And make nice-nice with the fanghead. I’ll be back later and I expect you to be one happy family.” I pointed at Angie. “You. No vamp boyfriends until you are at least twenty-one years old. He’s your protector, not your honey bunch.” Angie frowned mutinously and I frowned right back. “Don’t make me go all big-cat on you.” I pointed at Evan. “You are one cool dude. Keep things together and don’t let them kill each other or blow up my house once I leave.”
Evan might have smiled beneath his fried beard. The fire had burned off a lot, but he was still hairy enough that it was difficult to tell.
My business partners clattered back into the room, dressed in jeans. Or Alex clattered and Eli glided. He had been hanging around the corner with a weapon drawn. I said, “We have a lot to debrief before we all leave, so let’s stop this here.
“Any new thoughts on why Antoine kept Ming prisoner?” I asked my little group. “I mean originally, before his daughter took over.”
Edmund rose to his feet and said, “Antoine kidnapped Ming near the time that Immanuel, the Damours, Adrianna, and others were to make a play for Leo’s Blood Master status. I believe that is one reason why Adriannaand Rafael became Anamchara and allied with the Damours is that they intended to challenge him to a blood duel. Had they won that challenge, there would have been all-out war between the Mithrans and witches all across the colonies. Such a war would have played into the hands of the Europeans. Perhaps that very thing was part oftheirplan, and the shaman Antoine was being coerced or maneuvered by them.”
I said, “Yeah, yeah, we’ve been over and over this. He had Ming. He knew where the Damours were. He went to kill Immanuel and died instead.”
Edmund said, “You killed Immanuel, but you didn’t save Antoine. Or the other female witch. They may believe that you were responsible for Antoine’s death. And also that their fellow witches are fools for aligning with the Mithrans. They may wish to halt any such parley and drag us back into war. There is seldom only one reason for treachery, but many, interlaced and tangled.”
Eli said, “I get the vengeance angle. So they kept Ming alive but stoned, feeding her humans when they could, biding their time for revenge against Jane and the witches who ‘let it happen’”—his hands made little quotations around the phrase—“and the vamps who started it all.”
I said, “Our problem is the timeline. The women have had Ming for months. Why did they wait to hit me?”
“Changing someone into something vampish, but not a vamp, someone capable of beginning and possibly winning a war with vamps, might take time,” Eli said.
“No,” I said. “It happened to Bruiser in days.”
“But,” Edmund said, “they didn’t have a priestess to make it happen in the proper time.”
“And they might have had to wait on probate on Antoine’s estate to get the second brooch,” Alex said. “And the third and fourth brooches, which we haven’t added into the equation.”
I nodded. “Okay. We’re all on the same page, meaning we still don’t know enough. Next subject. Bruiser hasn’t sent a text or called about the girl smelling like Onorio.”
“And there’s nothing,” Alex said, “in the files or histories about female Onorios at all.”
“Fine. Molly, do you have the anti-DNA charms?” She nodded. “Good. I’ll have Leo’s CPA send you a check.” When her lips parted, I said, “What? You thought those were favors for me? Heck no. You made big bucks, baby.” Molly ducked her head and blushed, delight glimmering in her eyes.
“We’re late,” I said to the Youngers, “and so are you,” I said to Edmund and Molly. “Lachish isn’t going to get well by tomorrow night on modern medicine alone. You need to get to Tulane to donate blood to Lachish and add your magics to her healing. We need to get the security set up at the Elms. We have a conclave to put together.” And with the new charms, we might just pull it off. “Let’s all get crackin’.”
