Chapter 3
I drew on all my training to beat down my panic. “The decision to spy on you was mine. It was wrong and I am willing to accept any consequence.”
Ezra growled, his pupils going red and his fangs dropping.
I ignored him because Maud’s eyes were still purple, and while the blood from her tear ducts and nostrils had slowed to a tiny trickle, her pulse was thready. The weight of her in my arms had nothing to do with her body mass. I swallowed through a thick throat. “Please help my sister or allow us to help her.”
“Begone!”
The light faded from Maud’s eyes, her pulse weakening under my fingertip. The ache of all our unmade memories pressed against my chest. I hadn’t saved her from our father—hadn’t just found her —only to condemn her to death.
“I don’t want the power word!” I cried. “I’m not here for any test.”
It was if time suspended. Maud’s pulse was a barely burning coal, her life force almost totally gone.
I bowed my head, my grip on my sister my only firm hold on reality. “Please,” I said again, more softly.
“I’ll give you thirty seconds to explain.” The Brooklyn-accented voice no longer came from Maud but from the air around us.
“Thank you.” I carefully transferred Maud to Ezra’s gentle hold and scrambled to my feet. “How should we?—”
My sentence ended in a scream as the ground dropped out from under me and I plummeted into the darkness. It didn’t end. I yelled until my voice was hoarse, but eventually, even my terror-fueled adrenaline dissolved into shallow pants. I kept trying to swallow and couldn’t, too freaked out to do anything more than fall.
Eventually a tiny pinprick of light appeared far below my feet. I squinted at it, positive it was wishful thinking, but the light grew larger, until I tumbled out of the darkness, slowing to a stop on a cushion of air before being deposited onto a thick rug.
I lay sprawled on my back, catching my breath and gathering my wits. Neither Ezra nor Maud were present, but Cherry Bomb, my Brimstone Baroness, was. Not just in the way she always was, as a voice in my head either. I brushed crimson strands of hair away with clawed fingers, my skin hardened to an armor comprised of sharp-edged scales frosted in the same toxic green that my eyes now were.
I hadn’t been forced to change; I’d chosen to while in that darkness. Might this be a bad idea? Maybe. I wasn’t sure any antagonist would love having my demon-lite form on their nice rug. But something in my gut knew it was safe, that this would keep me from being possessed like Maud was.
“Well, this is a trip,” said the person who’d hijacked my sister’s vocal cords.
The woman lounging in the wing chair had patrician features, her shapeless hand-spun robe the same cool hue as her blond hair. Nothing about her appearance matched her voice.
“What did you do with Ezra and Maud?” I said.
She smirked. “The vamp is shitting bricks, but both of them are fine. The woman’s injuries are gone.” When I narrowed my eyes, she held up two fingers. “Scout’s honor. Milk in your tea or black?”
Her question felt like a test.
I sat up and gingerly surveyed my surroundings.
For an imposing, impenetrable stone fortress, the inside was surprisingly snug, with bright tapestries and multiple fireplaces, lush plants, and overflowing bookcases, as well as an inner courtyard visible through the picture windows with reflecting pools and a small arched bridge.
A supe-vulture sat on a dented cactus, its gaze trained on me.
I resisted the urge to shoot it the finger.
A long wooden table held a teapot covered by a colorful tea cozy, next to two delicate porcelain cups on saucers alongside a sugar bowl and small creamer.
How I’d fallen downward into this place when it had been visible in the distance from the path above was anyone’s guess, but I put the question aside because my host was tapping one foot, waiting for my reply.
“Brandy.” I stood up. “Neat.”
She quirked an eyebrow. “That wasn’t one of the options.”
“Nope.” I plopped myself down on the nearest sofa. “But it’s the right answer.” I pointed at the shoes peeking out from under her Handmaid’s Tale robe. “You’re wearing marabou feather slippers, likely with a satin-covered kitten heel. Those are brandy drinking shoes.”
Her coarse robe shimmered and transformed into a silk dressing gown in the same ivory as her slippers, with the same feathery trim at the cuffs.
She extended a foot and looked down at her slipper. Satin-covered kitten heel for the win. “They aren’t to dress code, but no one ever notices the shoes. I’m impressed.” She strode over to a cabinet and flung open the door, revealing a dazzling array of bottles, more styles of glasses than I could name, and several stainless-steel devices that looked like torture instruments but that I recognized from a high-end cocktail bar that Darsh, Sachie, and I sometimes frequented.
The woman poured us each a snifter of brandy then, handing mine over, settled herself into a round chair piled high with cushions, her legs tucked under her.
“Thanks, uh…” I raised an eyebrow in question.
“Daphne.”
I nodded. “I’m Aviva.”
She held the glass up. “Cheers. Here’s to outside-the-box thinking and not drinking another damned cup of tea.”
“L’chaim.” The sweet alcohol was fruity with an undertone of oak. Really, I was more of a wine person, but any booze was welcome if it calmed my frayed nerves.
“We’ve got top-shelf brandy and your friends are safe.” Daphne tilted her head at me, her green eyes icy. “You, however, still have to answer for your actions.”
“I know,” I said somberly. I cradled my snifter in my lap.
“I heard what you said to ‘Shiny Jimmy.’” Her lips quirked. “You don’t want the word yourself, so I’m guessing you’re here to tell me not to hand it over to the vampires.”
“Exactly.”
She made a noncommittal sound, but when I tried to explain further, she held up a hand.
I sipped my brandy to avoid snapping back at her.
Darsh had estimated that the blood volume collected from the murdered half shedim was maybe good for a dozen vampires, tops.
“If my knowledge of dark magic is accurate,” he’d said with a wink.
It probably was. Darsh had unplumbed depths. But that meant that whoever was behind this didn’t intend for all vampires to be able to procreate.
I’d been told that person knew of my existence, so they could have added at least one more half shedim’s blood to their stockpile. They hadn’t, ergo, they had the amount they required.
A vampire not wanting to share power. Quelle surprise.
Thus, we’d followed rumors and breadcrumbs and whispers and gotten as far as the map and this fortress, where this mighty guardian resided.
However, if we’d found this place, then that vampire had as well, because they’d had months, if not years of looking for it. Yet, somehow, they’d been stonewalled.
Our conclusion? They didn’t yet have the word necessary for the dark magic ritual to allow them to breed. We’d have heard if it had been attempted—or successful.
“Why are you wearing stretchy denim?” Daphne toyed with her glass. “You pegged my slippers but are wearing that?” She made it sound like I was an enigma clothed in sackcloth and dog shit.
Thanks to some demon forfeits at the Hell, Ezra learned that the closest Brink entrance to this fortress was via Babel. Specifically, a secret rift in a far corner of the vampire megacity. He’d created a portal into Babel from the yacht that placed us at the little-known rift.
The portal from Babel into the Brink would be monitored in some way by the procreation-seeking vamp, though we hadn’t seen anyone there, but it was a risk we had to take.
As was that the second Maud and I stepped into Babel, we were forced into our shedim forms. Anticipating this, we wore stretchy clothes to accommodate the brief transition from human body to shedim and back to human. But we also required sturdier outfits than sweats for the rigors of the Brink.
Denim with give was our best option, and I succinctly explained as much.
“That’s boring,” Daphne grumbled, stroking the feather trim on her silk robe.
I barely refrained from rolling my eyes. “Look, I’m guessing since you’ve got a whole fortress set up to protect the power word that you don’t want it falling into the wrong hands. And if vampires can procreate, that’s a bad deal for humanity.”
“What I want is irrelevant.” Daphne sipped her brandy. “I don’t even know the word myself, just that it has powerful healing abilities and anyone deemed worthy is capable of carrying it.”
“Carrying it how?”
“At the back of the throat.” She shot me a “duh” look.
“Like a stifled scream,” I said.
She chuckled. “Kind of.”
“The vampire intends to use it in a blood magic ritual. That’s dark magic. Evil.” Six half shedim had their lives cut tragically and horrifically short because of it.
“Blood magic is simply as benign or malevolent as the user’s intention.”
“Then healing isn’t always a good thing. Not if it gives vampires this ability.”
“Healing is healing.” She said it in the rote, slightly bored tone of a speech uttered dozens of times before. “Once the power word is released, it’s wiped from the user’s memory.”
“Is worthiness tied to intent?” Maybe I didn’t have to worry. Maybe this test took care of things for me.
Her head shake dashed those hopes. “Survive the test. That’s the only requirement.”
“What’s the test?”
“Damned if I know.” She wiped a drop of brandy off the rim of her snifter. “That’s literal. If I tried to find out, I’d be damned. I’m just a glorified administrator for the sentient fortress magic.”
My shoulders slumped.
“There is some good news for you.”
Wearily, I met her gaze.
“So long as one person carries the word, no one else can have it. And it can’t be taken by force. If you took the test, survived, and never used it…”
“Then no one else could either.” A simple solution. Except for the part where failed supplicants were turned into new sections of the bone wall, and that thing had stretched out as far as I could see. “Any chance of marking on the bell curve?”
Daphne snorted. “Magic sentience is more old school pass or fail.”
“What are my chances of success?”
“Less than one percent of one percent.” She pursed her lips. “That doesn’t tend to deter people.”
“When was the last time anyone was successful?”
“Nineteen thirty-two. What a grand day that was.” She set down her glass. “Want to give it a go?”
“Can’t you, I don’t know, pause the test, or just refuse supplicants until we’ve stopped this vampire?”
“Funny. And no. This institution doesn’t cater to the whims of mortals.”
I wasn’t taking this cockamamie test. Even if I passed (unlikely), I’d be stuck with a power word in my throat. The one time I’d had a breadcrumb stuck there over lunch, I’d almost gone mad. Would I have to direct all my energy into keeping from blabbing it like a juicy secret that was just too good not to share? No, thanks.
I drummed my fingers against the brandy snifter. Vamps were near indestructible, and yet procreation was so important to the person behind this that they’d killed all those half shedim. So why hadn’t he or she attempted the test yet?
Employing video game logic, which was as sound as anything else right now, they’d sent a minion or a succession of them to attempt it before they tried themselves. You didn’t need to know the exact odds to know that they weren’t in your favor.
“Could you tell me the name of the most recent supplicant?” I said. “That’s administration, right? Your area?”
“It is, but…” Daphne pushed the sleeve of her robe up, revealing flesh glowing with deeply carved magic runes.
I shivered.
She let the sleeve fall back into place. “The NDA is a bitch. But there is a way you can ask.”
“To clarify, you mean ask the sentient force that turns people into bone walls and carved runes in your skin instead of sending you a perfectly harmless e-signed document?”
“Got it in one.”
I swallowed. Somewhere in the multiverse, there was a version of me who’d become an accountant. Lucky bastard.