Dominik
I can’t stay still, pacing up and down my office. More than once, I throw myself down at the desk and make a half-hearted attempt at working, but then I’m on my feet again and wearing a track in the carpet.
Attila watches me. He’s dismissed the other guards to ensure they are fresh should they be needed. My chosen vampires might be able to withstand daylight, but it doesn’t mean they are happy to be up during the day.
Everyone needs coffin time, except me.
“What did the gargoyle want?” Attila finally asks me.
“To warn me to stay in my lane,” I respond.
Attila growls under his breath.
“I know, the Kobór clan and his security have been getting above themselves for a while, but with the mating of their leader, it should settle down. Viktor anticipates I might use this period of time to move into new areas of business.”
“Did he say that?”
“Not in so many words.” I contemplate what the stone statue warned me about. As much as it seemed to be about Lucy, it could apply to many aspects of our respective operations in Budapest.
And I can’t say the thought didn’t occur to me, as it clearly has to Ferenc. Our working relationship, our personal relationship has been interesting during all the decades we’ve inhabited the great city. His assistance with the vault was invaluable.
It’s the reason, or one of them, I followed the hot-headed werewolf to London, able to assist him, to a degree, as he battled the authorities, including the spectacularly badly named Monster Force, as well as battling his own worst enemy…himself.
I do not make such errors.
The door to the office bursts open, and a thrall practically falls into the room. At once, Attila is on his feet and has his fangs at the creature’s throat, ready to rip it out.
“Wait,” I snarl. “This thrall has been watching Lucy for me.”
Attila withdraws his fangs and allows the thrall to straighten up but still keeps tight hold.
“My king.” The thrall tries to execute a bow and fails because Attila has him. “The human I was watching—she is being hunted.”
“What?” It’s my turn to grab the thrall by the throat.
I sink my fangs deep into his neck and pull a draught. It makes me sick to my stomach, but I need his memories, and this is the quickest way to get them from a thrall.
Which is when I see them. The vampires sacrificing themselves for Damek. Walking in the day, even if it means death.
They follow her, hang back as she enters the market hall, then surge in. Splitting up in order to surround her, they move through the crowds as if there is nothing there at all.
“Where is she?” I demand of the thrall. “Do they have her?”
“No, no, my king, they do not,” he gibbers. “I lost her. And they did too.”
I fling him to one side, blood still streaming from the wounds I made. I grab the decanter on the side and take a long swig of the liquid within.
“My brother is not going to give up,” I growl at Attila. “And he doesn’t get to touch my property.”
“Do you require the other guards, my Lord?” Attila asks.
“This one, I’m going to deal with on my own. Take some thralls and bring her belongings back to the nest. Lucy Cushing will not be staying at the hotel tonight or any night.” I glare out at the day through the tinted windows. “She is mine and no deranged relative is going to threaten her.”
With a snarl, I descend to the bowels of the building and change my form to the easiest one to control to move quickly thorough the sewers and basements of Budapest.
As a mist, I can slip through gaps and enter anywhere, but even as a daywalker, it’s difficult to hold this form in the daylight, so instead I keep it to the shadows until I reach the area near the market, where I ascend onto Vaci Ucta and reconstitute.
I pull my cuffs down and straighten my tie as I make my way through the many tourists who flock to the city to visit the markets this time of year.
If my appearance surprises them, most don’t take a second glance.
Even the humans who do know what a vampire is, and most of them don’t, know when not to challenge a creature like me.
The heavy clouds above the city decide to disgorge their load of snow, and it falls thickly, causing the place to empty out of those who do not wish to get cold, and it should make finding my Lucy a little easier.
Providing I find the vampires who are stalking her first.
Then I will find Damek, and I will deal with him once and for all.