The two vamps raced in, popping into place directly in front of him. They both looked shocked to be summoned and compelled, and instantly they drew dueling swords. The two were facing Shaddock, swords up, in a stance that meant impending combat.
Shaddock vamped out. Fully. Black pupils in scarlet sclera, fangs too long for his actual vamp-age. He was seriously ticked off, his power a frozen sizzle on my exposed skin, like nothing I had felt from him before. Thema and Kojo vamped out too. Fast, that immediate instinct-vamping that meant their human selves were lost beneath bloodlust and violence. Both of them were wearing silver earrings, a show of power that they hadn’t paraded since they first came to Asheville.
“Crap,” I said. I wasn’t a vamp but I could move. I pulled on Beast’s speed and my own skinwalker gifts, and skidded to a stop between the three, my weapons sheathed, arms out to the sides, feet and head moving to keep them all in sight. They spread out around me. No matter how I maneuvered, I had two vamps mostly behind me. Adrenaline shot through me. They began to circle me. Crap. What was going on here? “Easy. Easy there, boys and girls.”
The smell of vamp was astringent and floral and heated. They stared at one another. No one looked at me. Which was strange enough to prick my predator warning system. Something was about to happen between the three vamps.
“Get in the cars. Care for the cattle,” Shaddock said to the two vamps. Cattle. I hated that term for humans.
“We will not,” Thema said.
Softly, speaking slowly, I said, “I don’t know what this is, but no blood challenges. Not here, not now. And Linc, especially no duels with your guests.” Or whatever they were. They hadn’t sworn to Shaddock, and I didn’t know why. And I hadn’t cared. Until now.
The master of the city slowly took his predator gaze off his guests and put it on me.
Koun popped in from the dark. Barreled into the two vamps behind me, sending them flying. He stood at my back, swords drawn. Thema and Kojo dashed back to us, their swords out at Koun. “Do not make me kill you all,” Koun said calmly, as if the possibility of him dying wasn’t on the challenge table. Idiot man would get himself killed fighting against multiple powerful vamps.
My powers were different from a master of the city; I couldn’t summon people like Linc could. But I had the power of my office—not that I knew how to use it yet. But I knew how to use the power of the skinwalker. Power was power. Right? Maybe? Sorta?
I took a slow breath and thought about le breloque, its magic, its purpose, its meaning, and I wrapped myself in the mantle of the Dark Queen. My head went up, my nostrils flared. The paranormal power that came from the Dark Queen’s position threaded through me, strengthening my bones, rooting me to the earth. I reached out with that magic. “Put down your weapons,” I said, my voice cold and demanding. “Now.”
They lowered their swords. I was so surprised that I didn’t know what to do next. And it hit me. They had obeyed me. Holy crap.
Shaddock ignored Koun, speaking to me in his old-fashioned country accent. “I took in the broken humans just like My Queen demanded, just like all the others left in my broken city when her enemies came here searching for her, destroying everything I had built, and killing so many of my scions. Every human will be attended to and cared for and healed as best my people are able. These two? They drink from my cattle and give back nothing.”
“We fight your battles,” Kojo spat. “Our swords have been yours.”
“I got plenty of warriors. What I need are Infermieri.”
I had never heard the word before, but it sounded like a title.
Shaddock turned his eyes to me, trying to roll me with his mesmerism. Like the vamped out state, it was a challenge. I wanted to stick my tongue out at him, but unlike Leo, Shaddock wouldn’t find me amusing. “You can’t roll me, Linc,” I said, my power brushing across him. “Don’t even try.”
He blinked slowly, as if he hadn’t known he was trying something wrong and now had to get himself back under control. His pupils constricted slowly, and his sclera pinkened to a watery blood shade. But his fangs stayed down on their little hinges.
“What’s an Infermieri?” I asked.
“Infermieri heal the broken cattle and heal Mithrans in danger of true death. These two are old and their blood would be potent. When they came to kill the Flayer of Mithrans, I accepted their swords at my side to defeat him. But that danger’s long gone, My Queen. They drink from my cattle but don’t feed or heal them. They leave ’em half drained and blood drunk. And beyond the use of their swords in war, they ain’t bothered to swear to me.”
“Bad guests who outlasted their welcome?”
“Something like that, Queenie.”
“Okay. But this sounds like a long-term problem. What happened that made all-a y’all get so bent outta shape tonight?”
“I am not bent,” Thema said.
“Their blood is powerful as all get out, while my best healer scions are worn slap out. You created a problem, and I don’t have enough healthy healers to deal with it. They know how stretched my people are, yet they refused help to heal the new broken cattle from tonight’s battles.”
It was common knowledge that the two didn’t want a blood-family, but I hadn’t known they were abusing the humans they drank from by not sharing blood in return. “You two got a reason for this?” I asked. “Or are you both just buttholes?”
The two glanced at each other, probably saying dozens of things in that one glimpse. Kojo said, “Our blood is old. It can be dangerous to those unaccustomed to it. It is not wise to share it.”
I’d had blood from vamps two thousand years old. They weren’t telling the full story here. “So that’s why you hang around Shaddock’s place and my place. So you can move back and forth, hoping no one notices that you drink but don’t share your blood. That’s—” I almost said mean, something left over from a childhood spent in a Christian children’s home. I changed it to “unacceptable.”
“Their belongings will be removed from my clan home,” Shaddock said, “and delivered to the Winter Court of the Dark Queen.”
“Fine,” I said. “I’ll have my people look for an unaligned Infermieri, which I’ll be happy to share with you and your scions.”
“I once had such a Mithran. If she will come home that will help greatly.”
I tapped my mic. “Alex, you got that?”
“On it now.”
Shaddock inclined his head, telling me he had heard. He took two steps away and sheathed his swords, jumped into his vamp-mobile, and it pulled away fast.
“It is nearly dawn,” Koun said. “The Consort is on the way to pick us up. You two will curl up in the trunk.” Koun looked at me. “The Consort will drive. I will be your protection, with you in the back seat. There will be no argument, My Queen.”