“Alex,” I said. “Who’s heading this way on motorcycles? Moving fast.”
“Eli and Koun.”
“Okay. That’s good.”
Out of the darkness walked Leo Pellissier, his gait uneven. He was breathing hard, almost stumbling, as if he had run here from the Garden District. Or as if he struggled to be here at all. At his side walked Brute and the ever-present grindylow. Longfellow chittered in my ear. Leo crossed the grounds, heading straight for the witch’s circle and our small group. In his left hand, he carried my crown. Smoke rose from where his hand touched it.
Tex backed away from the circle and changed out the ammo in one of his six shooters. Time consuming, except for his vamp speed. He whistled his dogs close.
Leo walked around the circle. When he got to me, he raised his arms and placed the laurel leaf crown on my head. I let him.Le breloquesnapped into place. “It came to me,” he said, sounding breathless. “I do not know why.”
“And you didn’t try to put it on?” I asked.
“I have been a fool many times in my life, my Jane, but I am aware that once the crown has chosen, it will not relinquish to another until its chosen is dead. I do not wish you to be dead.” He laughed, the sound odd and strained. “Nor do I wish my head to be cleaved in two, though the stories suggest that such an occurrence is possible.”
“It would cut your head in two?”
Leo gave a minuscule shoulder twitch. “Or so it has been said.”
I looked at the circle, where nothing was happening, and back to Leo. “You’re under compulsion to stay away from me, aren’t you?”
“Yes. The pain is...” He managed a breath. Perspiration beaded on his forehead, faint bloody droplets. “Is extreme. I must go.”
“Wait.” I holstered my weapon and got to my knees. Fawn lifted the concrete bench upright and I dropped onto it, rolling up the sleeve of my armor. I pulled a small blade and pricked my inner arm, just above the wrist, in flesh I was pretty sure carried no major blood vessels. “Sip. See if it helps.” Leo stared at me. “What?” I asked.
“You do not share your blood with me.”
“Yeah. Well.” I shrugged slightly. I didn’t like people drinking my blood, but... I scowled at him. “You want to try this or not?”
Leo knelt at my side. He leaned forward and licked at the blood trailing across my wrist. His tongue was colder than the autumn night. At the first taste, his pupils went wider, but he didn’t vamp out. His fangs stayed in the roof of his mouth where they belonged. He carefully licked my blood, not allowing his saliva to touch the cut, which would seal the wound.
Longfellow crawled down my arm, clutching my sleeve in its little clawed fingers, its body and tail rocking and snaking back and forth with each step. Again I had almost forgotten about the lizard. It stuck its snout close to where Leo was licking, as if sniffing my blood. It sat back and watched, unfurling its wings slightly.
I used to kill vamps for a living. Now I was wearing their crown, apparently had a pet flying lizard who clawed into my spine to propel me through a transport circle, and the former master of the city was on his knees drinking my blood, which I had willingly offered.
“My life is so freaking weird,” I muttered.
Leo laughed softly and fell to his butt, sitting on the dead grass. His shoulders relaxed. “Ask your questions,” he murmured. Though his voice was soft, he sounded less stressed, so I guessed the compulsion had weakened, at least for a while.
I already had one answer. Now I’d get the rest of the story. “Why now? Why here?”
“When I lay in my grave, I dreamed. I traveled through the air, knowing those of my line as they slept, seeing their own dreams. And when I was powerless, the power of my master called to me. I was in Mainet’s dreams,” Leo said. “I saw his mind. The Heir had no power until Joses, theelder Son of Darkness, died,” he said, his words speeding as if he needed to say them fast. “Keeping that power bound was the reason Joses was kept alive, hanging in the subbasement of the Council Chambers. When you killed Joses, his power fell upon Mainet, but it was not the full power. It was only a—” His hand twirled in the air as he searched for a word. “Perhaps we can call it a partial power.”
I should have offered blood sooner. This was more than I had learned in, like, ever. He licked again but the blood had slowed. His eyelids drooped and he started to sit back. I pricked my skin and held it to Leo. He looked at my blood but didn’t move. His own blood began to flow from his nose, trails from both nostrils that twisted across his lips and down his chin. Thin blood. Watery.
The lizard shivered as if shaking raindrops from its hide. It inched closer and opened its mouth. It had tiny fangs. Above us, the arcenciels drew closer, their light throwing rainbows on the dead grass, their eyes watching the tableau. I looked back and forth between the lizard and the rainbow dragons. Other than general body shape, they had nothing in common and they didn’t even seem to like each other. But neither was attacking.
I shoved my arm and its trail of blood against Leo’s lips and he licked it away, taking in some of his own blood with mine. I knew that was the reason he smiled, just a touch lascivious.
Leo took a deep breath. “When you did not destroy the Son of Darkness utterly, when you kept his heart, the Heir did not receive his full power. From the moment the first Son of Darkness died true dead, Mainet coveted the full power of the Sons, and your crown, which even the fathers did not have. Whenever the year his scryer first saw you in their dreams, that is when he began to plan this night.”
I looked back at the circle, which was still empty. No more reappearances of the evil villain. “Well, crap. I was born in the early-mid eighteen hundreds. So he’s had nearly two centuries to plan for tonight. In some of his seers’ visions and plans he succeeded, or he wouldn’t still be trying to get here.”
“If Soledad would speak about the old tales, she could tell you much.” Leo leaned his forehead against my inner arm. I couldn’t see his face, his hair falling forward like a silk veil across my skin. “I know little, but I can tell you this. When the sons of Judas Iscariot tried to raise their father from the dead, an angel appeared, attempting to stop them. The sons had stolen the cursed silver coins from the ground beneath their father’s body. With them, they sought to bind the angel. For all of this time, the angel, who tried to stop the creation of my kind, has been partially bound with a chain of the cursed silver.” Leo jerked back. His mouth moved as if he was trying to speak, but instead it unhinged and his fangs clicked down. His eyes bled black.
“Tex,” I said, alerting my guard.
As I spoke, my protector staked the former master of the city. Leo slumped at my feet. “I was just forced to stake the former master of the city,” Tex said into his mic. “Again. The queen’s blood was controlling the Heir’s compulsion over Leo until now.” His tone changed, his body went fluid and liquid. He drew two swords. “Come to think of it. Something overrode her power. The Heir might be close. Maybe he decided on another tack.”
