“For this alone, I would call you queen,” Thema murmured happily, her accent rich with her African heritage.
“Hey, Alex,” I said, grinning around the macerated steak. “Put away the queen’s raw steaks and clean up the grill, wouldja?”
He narrowed his eyes at me, so much like his brother that I burst out laughing—which sounded like a cat growling. I was still laugh-growling around the steak and bread as Koun pulled the SUV along the winding drive. Behind us, four more SUVs followed. Koun was deeply focused on the task of negotiating mountain turns, but I realized that he was smiling. A harsh, stoic man, a warrior to a Celtic queen, a Roman slave, soldier, fanghead for nearly two thousand years, he smiled too seldom.
Watching him from the corner of an eye, I leaned the seat back, propped my funky-looking boots on the dash, and licked the steak grease from the fingers of one hand. I ripped more meat and bread off and chewed noisily. Licked some more. My tongue was part cat, and its rough surface cleaned things up nicely.
Koun’s smile spread slightly. “My Queen should perhaps know that modern manners are relatively new in the world, that her lack thereof is not shocking to me, as it was to Leo Pellissier and his ilk. Inmyday, we ate with our fingers and licked them clean. It is an efficient method of eating, allowing a hungry person to get all the fat and nutrients from their skin.”
Ilk?I grunted, wondering if I could make him laugh. “Squatting over an open fire, meat on a spit, and then you rubbed bear grease and ashes into your skin as grooming?”
Calmly, a strange light in his eyes, Koun said, “Ashes are efficient topical antibiotics, as is rendered animal fat. My Queen is deliberately attempting to insult me?”
“I’m tribal. My ancestors probably did the same at one point. But yeah. Goading you. Being difficult. Seeing where the chinks in your armor are.”
Eyes on the road, Koun lifted his eyebrows, his pale eyes twinkling. “I have nochinks. I am perfect.”
I snickered. “Yeah. Okay. Glad you told me. I musta missed the announcement.”
He laughed, and his shoulders relaxed beneath the armor. Bingo. Mission accomplished.
I knew a lonely redheaded witch-vamp who might like Koun if he was happy more. Not that I was going to matchmake. Nope. No way. Especially not from within my clan, where my interest could be considered by some to be an order. Ick. However, Icoulddo things to make Koun feel like smiling more often, though so far, the only things that seemed to get a rise out of him were battle, me goading him, and me being crude—the Leo comment to the contrary.
I finished my sandwich, used premoistened handwipes kept in the glove compartment to clean up, and pulled up the address on my tablet so I could study the area where we were headed. Time passed.
“How many people are we bringing to this fight?” I asked.
“Us, three other Mithrans, and six humans,” Koun said. “And, as you might say, a buttload of weapons.”
“The humans are not to engage the enemy,” I said.
“My Queen will leave all such decisions to the chief strategist of Clan Yellowrock and the Dark Queen’s Executioner,” he said mildly, giving me his official title.
I grinned, showing my extralong canines. “You gonna make me, you blue-skinned Smurf-boy?”
Koun burst into laughter for two full seconds before clamping off the amusement, his rock-hard abs shaking just a bit. I was making progress. His wide eyes said that he didn’t hear his own laughter often, and never twice in one day. He swallowed and forced his face into its usual emotionless, unreadable expression. “Yes, My Queen. I will tie you to the back of the SUV and leave you behind, to keep you safe, while the human warriors and your Mithrans secure the house and grounds.”
“You can try it, but I’ll beat your butt, Elmo.”
Koun’s breath shook with silent laughter. His toneheaped with sarcasm, he said, “My Queen. I am happy to be either Smurf or Muppet, should it pleaseYour Majesty, butGroveris the blue furry creature. Not Elmo. And if we have an accident whilst your feet are on the dash, the safety balloon will break both legs, likely your pelvis, and possibly your spine. You can shift to heal, I know this, but we have insufficient steaks for that.”
“Airbag, not safety balloon.”
“Mydeepest apologiesfor my error,My Queen.” Yeah. Definite snark in the “my queen” part.
I called that progress. “Direct route,” I said. “And speed it up, slowpoke. You may consider that an order, Smurfy.” He maintained his leisurely pace, but I elected not to swat him with my claws. Instead I went back to the sat maps.
Our target was a small house on East Avon Parkway, up near Beaver Lake. I went through sat pics and street-to-street Google cams, getting a feel for the topography. A block out, I closed the tablet and checked my weapons. Put the special cat-ear comms set on. “Testing. Yellowrock.”
Into my ear, Alex, back at the inn, said, “Got it, Janie.”
Koun stopped a half block out, and I opened the door. We were downwind. I caught the scent of battle. “Blood. A lot of blood,” I said.
“And silence. We are perhaps too late.”
I snarled. Bruiser might be injured. Or dead. Adrenaline shot through me.
If he was dead because Koun didn’t drive fast enough, I’d behead my self-appointed chief strategist of Clan Yellowrock. I pulled on Beast speed, her night vision, her stealth, and raced into the darkness. Not that Koun would lose me, not with nighttime vamp vision and vamp speed. I pulled the Benelli and vamp-killer blade. Leaped over the back fence. In midair I spotted people lying in the dark under the stars, everything looking green-gray-silver in Beast eyes. Dead vamps. Dead humans.
