His bed had been moved into my room, so stairs wouldn’t be a problem. I had been sleeping in Eli’s old room, and would until Bruiser came back and we decided where we’d stay. Bruiser and Koun were off tracking down enemy vamps, unaligned rogue vamps, and taking heads, starting with the most recalcitrant vamps in HQ’s basement.
Mercy was a dead concept in my heart right now. Either vamps agreed to be bound to one of mine, swore loyalty, and accepted very junior status in one of my clans, where they could be monitored, or they were beheaded. My executioner had appointed helpers. The Dark Queen had three ax wielders. They traveled with portable chopping blocks, which they didn’t bother to clean between uses. Bruiser had opened the trench where Sabina’s chapel used to be, drained the water out, and my people were filling it with vamp bodies on a regular basis. No fancy funerals. Nonothing. Just unmarked bodies in a pit, the heads tossed into a different pit. My humans watched them burn in the sun with each dawn.
I sipped my tea. As I moved my arm, the charm bracelet tinkled. It was drained of power. The bracelet, her feet, a pile of bloody bones, and a bloody white habit were all that was left of Sabina when they found her. I figured I would give the bracelet to my goddaughter when I saw her again, but for now, I wore it in honor of the priestess.
“What did we do about Derek?” Eli asked.
My heart clenched, which he surely felt. “We had a funeral. A big one. Marching band through the streets of NOLA. Dancing and wailing.” Tears gathered in my eyes. “He was in a white casket in one of those glass sided carriages, drawn by white horses instead of the traditional black horses, because his mama wanted them. We gave his family a significant gift. We... We grieved.”
Eli nodded. Time passed. We sipped, enjoying the quiet and the rain. “So,” he said.
“So,” I repeated.
“We gonna talk about how I know when your heart beats? When it speeds up and slows down? That our hearts are beating in sync now?”
“We could. Or we could just let it lie and see if it goes away.”
Eli made a ruminative sound. “And if I want to talk about it?”
“Stop being such a girl,” I said.
Eli chuckled. “Okay. How about we talk about Leo’s presence in the city and his change in status. The priest’s collar was a shocker.”
“He’s outclan.”
“I got that part, babe. I’m more interested in how that came about and what it means for the future.”
“I only know what Leo told me, half of which he guessed about.”
“Better than nothing.”
“Okay. After the fire, Sabina swam back. It was nearly dawn. She busted through into Leo’s mausoleum. The heat had woken him, and he’d been trying to get free, but he wasn’t strong enough yet. Or coherent at all. Sabina fedhim, but she didn’t have much to spare. She was burned badly. She got him to safety in the water pit. She fed him and brought some humans to feed him. At some point, she disappeared and never came back.”
I looked down at my hands on the oversized tea mug. The saying on the side read “Undead Life Sucks” and showed a vamp with bloody fangs. It wasn’t funny, but the mug held more tea than most. I said, “Grandmother must have trapped Sabina shortly after we were at the Damours’ warehouse. According to one of the now true dead vamp prisoners, theu’tlun’taate her piece by piece while she screamed.”
“Not your fault, babe,” Eli said.
“Yeah. Right.” But we both knew I was blaming myself. Old life patterns, like accepting guilt not my own, were hard to break, no matter the evidence. I picked an easier subject. “I’ve been reading Immanuel’s journal while you lazed around and drank vamp blood,” I said.
“And?”
“All the troubles in New Orleans went back to my Grandmother and to Immanuel. To the time in the 1800s when Tsu Tsu Inoli—Mark Black Fox, a skinwalker of Grandmother’s lineage, and nearly as old as Gramma—ate him.”
“And do you know why?”
“Yeah. And it’s the reason Grandmother ate Sabina. To get the artifacts that were in vamp hands. Artifacts, amulets, made with arcenciel blood. So they could change time to suit their needs, and use the powers in the amulets to save the remaining Skinwalkers and bring back skinwalker power. I’m figuring Gramma blamed all vampires for the destruction of our people and wanted vengeance. Instead she and Ka are imprisoned in null rooms.”
“Changing time. Seems to be the theme of your life.”
I snorted. “And the ringleader—puppet master—is still out there. Leo’smy master, Mainet. He has a title. The Heir. Which is scary because it means the heir to the Sons of Darkness”
“Leo’s outclan now,” he said, “and since the outclan can’t be bound, technically, Leo has no master, unless it was firmly established before Leo rose again.”
“Mmmm.”
“The Heir? You challenged him to war.”
This time I flinched a little.
