Filed to story: Court of the Vampire Queen Novel???
“Talking to yourself is generally frowned upon.” Grace strides through the door and shuts it behind her. She looks as tired as I feel, circles beneath her eyes and her hair escaping its braid. She raises her eyebrows at me. “You look like shit.”
“I was just about to say the same thing about you.”
She shrugs. “Nothing more than the truth.” Grace drops onto the bed across from me. “I don’t suppose you have good news? Because all I have is bad.”
“Tell me.” I have a feeling she’s going to get sidetracked as soon as I tell her about Azazel. Beyond that, I’ve always been one who prefers the bite of bad news before the soothing of good news. My life has had little of the latter until recently, and certainly not enough to get used to it.
“He’s upped patrols from when you were last there. There are fewer gaps in his security than expected. There was also a large group of vampires who arrived today who seemed to be new, or at least not locals, based on how they were received.”
He’s pulling in his people. I should have expected as much, but it seems like such overkill, at least until I consider the value and strength of his captives. My father will be taking no risks with them. He wants them locked down and he’ll do whatever he has to in order to ensure it. “Well, shit.”
“Pretty much.” She pins me with a long look. “What happened while I was gone?” She keeps talking before I have a chance to respond. “Don’t bother to lie and say nothing happened because I know it did. There are blood stains on the floor and there’s still magic lingering in the air.”
I glance guiltily at the floor. “I thought I got it all.” Wait a damn minute. I whip around to look at her. “Since when can you see magic?” Now that I think about it, she mentioned something about it before, but I was too rattled from that first dream with Wolf to notice.
“Since always. Old family trick. Which is why I know you’re not anything as simple as a dhampir, though I’m not going to pry on that. This?” She makes a circle with her finger to encompass the room. “Different story. You went into your dreams with those vampires again, didn’t you? But there’s something else.”
I drag in a breath. There’s no point in hiding the truth from her. If I can’t utilize Azazel, as least I can ensure she’s able to contact him. “I summoned the demon.”Grace surprises me. Instead of practically tackling me to get more information, she pulls a sleeve of crackers out of her purse, hands them over, and waits until I tentatively nibble on one to start questioning me. “You summoned Azazel.”
“Yes. I tried the blood circle and it failed miserably, but he ended up showing up anyways.” I haven’t had a chance to think about that too closely, which was likely best. I can’t imagine Azazel noticed every time someone says his name. It isn’t common, but statistically someone had to use it occasionally in a way that had nothing to do with summoning the demon himself, which meant he was either close or he’s keeping an eye on me. Maybe he was hoping I’d change my mind about the original bargain and try to summon him without my men around.
The thought isn’t comforting in the least.
Another thing to add to the list of worries. I don’t think Azazel can force me to agree, but he seems overly invested in it. Maybe it’s just to mess with Wolf, but I can’t take anything for granted now. Maybe the demon simply has a quota of deals to meet. The thought is strangely hilarious.
“Mina.”
“Sorry. Right.” I shake my head, trying to focus. “He said he could help with getting Malachi, Rylan, and Wolf out, but he won’t budge on the terms of the bargain. It’s seven years’ service in another realm.” I sigh. “I can’t risk it. It’s not even about time moving differently. It’s about the bond. It might just flat out kill all four of us, which kind of defeats the purpose of rescuing them in the first place.”
It takes several long moments before I realize Grace hasn’t responded. I look over to find her staring off into the middle distance. “Grace?”
“Just thinking,” she says slowly. “Did you reject the bargain?”
“He’s coming tomorrow to collect his answer.” It speaks of long experience that he gives his marks time to consider the offer. It’s easy enough to reject something with such a high cost, but given enough time to realize how few options you have? Seven years begins to sound much more reasonable. “It’s not going to matter. I might be willing to pay the price of time, but I won’t pay with our lives.”
“We’ll think of something.” She still sounds strange, distant, as if her mind if jumping forward a thousand times faster than mine.
Considering how woozy I feel, that’s not saying much. I finish my cracker and set the package down, waiting for my stomach to decide if it will hold. I don’t have high hopes. Nothing stays down. I press my hand to my neck where Rylan bit me in the dream. It doesn’t feel any different, but I can’t get the memory out of my head. Even if my blood didn’t suddenly become poisonous, my vampires won’t agree to drink from me when they see how haggard I look. I hardly have blood to spare at this point.
“We keep saying that, but no solutions are magically appearing.” I look down at my stomach. If I had my magic under control… If I could even access it…
Then I think about how fierce Malachi was at the thought of my being pregnant. That was before it even happened. I press my hand to my stomach. If I lose them… My brain tries to shy away from the thought, but I force myself to power through. If I lose them, this baby might be my only connection to them.
Selfish thought. Horrible in so many ways. I still can’t shake it.
I squint at the sky lightening through the cracks in the curtains. “What time is it?”
“Early. Five.”
Five? I slept through the night, even if I hardly feel rested at all. That seems to be happening more often than it’s not. No matter how many hours I sleep, I still wake exhausted. I shake my head slowly. “Wait a minute. It’s tomorrow. That means Azazel—”
The lights go out.
“Fuck!” Grace scrambles for the lamp on the nightstand between our beds. It clicks, but the light doesn’t come on. “What the hell?”
“Little hunter.” Azazel’s voice seems to come from everywhere and nowhere at the same time. I twist, trying to see, but even a vampire needs a little light to see. A dhampir needs more yet, and there is none to be had in this room.
“Little seraph.” His breath tickles the shell of my ear. “Did you think to trap me?”
Fear surges through me. Azazel has always been scary, but it’s nothing compared to what he is now. I try to swallow past the need to scream. “No. No one’s trying to trap you.”
“And yet you are here with her.”
“Not for that!” I can’t guarantee Grace isn’t here for that. She’s overly interested in Azazel and has good reason to be. She wants answers about her mother. Would she try to kill him, even if it meant I failed?
I don’t know.