On the floor of the hull, one of the bodies rolled over, straining against Monique’s bindings and the floor itself. Smeared in blackened, scorched blood, she stared at me. Seeing me through my own magic, inside my own vision. The woman staring at me was the Firestarter, Aurelia Flamma Scintilla.
Monique wasn’t alone in her soul home, and the Firestarter could see me here. Which meant that in some way, all of the beings lying on the hull were actually here. And so was I.
I had killed another spiritual presence in my own soul home once, and the body, in real life, had died too. It was possible that I could die in Monique’s slave ship soul home if I wasn’t very careful. I flattened myself against the flat ceiling above and behind me.
Once before, I saw Aurelia up close and personal, or at least her illusion. Dark haired, dark eyed, skin like milk but with a faint, pale olive tint. She had been wearing black nun’s robes, and might be now as well, though here they were stained in old dark blood. Beside the Firestarter was a bloody vampire female, her dark hair clotted with filth. She turned her face away, as did the others bound in the hull.
But the Firestarter. That one didn’t turn away. She stared at me.
Monique murmured, “Join us, place your power with the Firestarter. Together we will drain and rule all the vampires in the world. With you and the primo-Onorio, we have the Rule of Three needed to govern and control.”
The woman couldn’t count, unless the Rule of Three meant something besides the total, which was way higher.
“Why would I volunteer to be shackled?” I asked, watching the trussed bodies.
“We are not master and slave,” Monique said. “We are friends. We have willingly wrapped ourselves in chains, all working together.”
The others kept their faces turned away, hiding their identities, but they pushed up to sitting positions in slow concert. The actions were either choreographed, or it was the same kind of control used by the Flayer of Mithrans. A chill started in my fingertips and raced up my body. Monique Giovanni had worked for the Flayer. He had the unusual ability to bind and control and use the bodies of the people around him. Either he had taught her how to do that, or she had figured out how his power worked and made it her own.
An Onorio who could use uber vamp mesmerism was a new thing. And that was scary enough to make me mouthy. “Yeah? I don’t see you in the blood and the rot. That’s convenient.” I didn’t try to hide the sarcasm.
Monique was Onorio and also more than Onorio. She had bound the others, and I was pretty sure she had convinced them they were there willingly. This vision had meaning, each element both a spiritual reality and a symbol of the physical world. These bound paras and Monique were sowing violence among the vamps, building discord and fear and war between masters of the cities. That violence was the rot and the blood. They were working together, willingly at first, but now bound; that was the meaning of the vision of the captives in the soul home of Giovanni. They didn’t have enough willing helpers. Or perhaps willing sacrifices. They needed more. They wanted Bruiser to come to them willingly. They wanted me. There were other Onorios in the Dark Queen’s retinue and territory, and if they got me, they probably got them—Bruiser, the B-twins, all the vamps sworn to me, the outclan priestess, just to think of a very few. Taking me would leave very few slots to fill in any combination of the Rule of Three. And there was a senza onore in the NOLA witch null prison, a woman named Tau. A very dangerous woman.
And . . . Thema and Kojo were creating strife in Lincoln’s clan. I needed to keep a careful eye on them. Crap.
When I entered the vamp world, I was a wild card. I had somehow managed to rearrange everything. Monique was perhaps another wild card. She was a warrior Onorio with access to magic and mind tricks. She could take over the world.
The boat-hull vision began to fill with smoke: purple, charcoal, deepest black. I flattened myself even more and reached for my body. I had learned a lot, but it wouldn’t be worth it if I got stuck here. The ceiling, however, felt solid even in my amorphous form.
Pain lanced along my forehead. I jerked, trying to get out.
“Give me the relics,” Monique said.
The pain along my forehead grew, something digging into my scalp. “Give them to me,” she said, spittle hitting my face. Monique was attacking me. My hands shot up and caught hers. I stood. Wrenched my body hard left. Shifting her over my bent knee, rotating my frame from toes to scalp. Using the bound wrists of the woman, her own weight, and the chair her feet were still taped to. Throwing her to the floor. My motion was so fast, so hard, her chair broke into chunks and sharp splinters that went flying. I landed atop her chest, a knee in her solar plexus.
Breath whooshed out of her. She grunted with pain.
I flipped her facedown, the chair slamming into the floor again. I pulled her arms up and her body back into a bow. Her bones cracked. She grunted.
I hadn’t even opened my eyes. I stretched her harder, one knee now in her spine, her head bent back over her butt. I leaned toward her ear and whispered, “Try that again, and I’ll burn your slave ship.”
She stiffened under me. Or she started fighting for breath.
I was suddenly back in her soul home.
Purple clouds rose from the bloody floor. Magic like a fine mist and smoke lifted toward me.
My mind filled with images of death. Me dying by exsanguination, my blood being collected in a big blue bucket.
A vision of Grégoire dancing with a sword against three opponents. Beheaded. Blond hair flying.
A vision of Tex bound in silver as someone killed Martha and Jangles. As his dogs howled and called and he raged.
Edmund trapped in a deep pit, mostly filled with water. Silver chains weighing him down. Silver needles stuck into the flesh of his neck, which was purple-black. Poisoned. Dying.
Is not real, Beast thought at me.
Monique was using these images to keep me out of her mind while trying to bind me.
I said, “This ain’t my first rodeo, you little bitch.” Beast’s claws ripped through the images of the people I loved being tortured. Beneath them was the bloody floor and the four bound helpers. I couldn’t see what they planned. I needed to know—
Monique slashed at me, her power like hot knives.
In the clouds of purple energies, I caught a glimpse of vampires. I saw Monique with le breloque resting loosely on her head. A vision of Bruiser being killed, stabbed with blades.
“We will kill all Onorios who refuse to align with us,” one of her prisoners said.
Ah . . . I pulled back on her body and leaned away at the same time, my body weight doing the work.
From her rotting soul home, from the faces in the clouds of her magic, I heard French chatter, too fast to follow. Commanding tones.
Monique and the others were working with European vamps, ones not bound, not present in the soul home. With magical assistance, the bound ones were watching the vamps. Monique planned to betray them. Especially one of them. Male. Old and powerful. Faces swept by in the rotten hull of her soul home as I searched the vamp faces. Which one was her ultimate target?