Broken Soul: A Jane Yellowrock Novel (14 page)

I dialed Evan Trueblood, Molly’s husband, and got him on the first try. I explained about Reach and the danger. Evan was silent through the whole thing, then said, “I’ve got a place. Don’t call us; we’ll call you.” The call ended. I dialed Aggie One Feather, the Cherokee elder who was guiding me into healing and recovery of my lost past. When I told her about the situation, her reply was short and stiff, as if my problems were nothing to worry over. I hoped she was right. Rather than call the children’s home where I was raised, I dialed the number on the card of the ATF OIC—the Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms officer in charge—outside.

“Special Agent Stanley.” He sounded calm, that remote and reserved calm of people who had high-stress jobs but kept all
the reactions internalized. They either found a way to breathe through the stress—meditation or yoga or prayer or drug of choice—or they died early of heart attack, stroke, or eating their weapons.

“Stanley, we may have info about who put the bomb on the porch, or who hired it done. A friend of mine just called and told me he had been tor-”—I stopped, took a slow breath, and went on—“tortured for information about Leo Pellissier and about me. We don’t have a name yet.” I gave him the descriptions of the three who had hurt Reach. “My friend is a researcher so he had everything on Leo. And everything on me back to the first time I appeared in the world. Leo can take care of himself, but my people can’t. If I give you a list of names, places, and addresses, can you send local law enforcement to each and check for problems?”

“Does your friend need protective custody?”

“Too late for that,” I said, my chest hurting. I pressed a fist to my sternum, rubbing hard. “He’s gone underground.”
I hope.

“Text the names and contact info to me.”

“Yes. I will. And thank you.”

“Part of my job, Miz Yellowrock.” He disconnected.

I told Alex to text the OIC all pertinent contact info on my address book. We discussed who was to be included and then I dialed Del. She sounded cool and collected when she answered, but I was getting ready to ruin that. “Jane here. Get Derek and Wrassler. Tell them Protocol Aardvark. They’ll know what to do. Eli will be joining you.”

“Aardvark?”

“Yeah. It used to be Groundhog, but it got activated on Groundhog Day one year and— Never mind. Just tell them. I put the updated security protocol handbook in the primo’s office in the file cabinet under
S
for security. Hard copy only. Initiate Aardvark immediately. Under Aardvark, everyone on security goes armed at all times.”

Del made a soft harrumphing sound. “If this is a practical joke, I will not be amused.”

“I know. It’s not. There’s a bomb at my house.” Which sounded so weird just saying it. “It’s probably on the local news.”

“A bomb?” There was a moment of silence before Del said, “I’ll make sure that all necessary protocols are instituted.”

“Thanks. Meanwhile, are any vamps and followers known to wear bird tattoos?”

I could hear her tapping on a tablet or keyboard. “Blood-servants and followers of a vampire called Peregrinus,” she said after only a moment. “Why?”

“A human wearing bird wristband tattoos and a female vamp tortured Reach to get my info. A male vamp watched.”

“Dear God.” The words came out as a gasp. “The Devil and Batildis are here.” And then she added on the fragments of a breath, “Peregrinus.” The last word was whispered, as if to speak the name aloud was to summon the vamp.

“Does this mean the EuroVamps are here early?”

“No. The Three have never followed the lead of the European Council. They are outlaws. And they are utterly and totally vile.” The call ended. Del had sounded horrified. Or maybe terrified, if that was worse.

That was me, spreading good cheer everywhere I go
. The Devil, Batildis, and Peregrinus,
I thought. I’d heard the name Batildis recently. Leo had mentioned the name when talking to Grégoire.
“Your brother and your sister Batildis have begun to rally their supporters to this end. And yes, that might eventually mean the interest of Le Bâtard, though he is not scheduled to travel to these shores . . .”
I could guess that Le Bâtard was Grégoire’s sire, his brother was Peregrinus, his sister was Batildis, and the Devil was their human blood-servant. How evil and twisted did you have to be to have the nickname of
the Devil
among vamps and blood-servants?

“Alex, followers of a vamp named Peregrinus wear bird jewelry. He and people named the Devil and Batildis are likely in town.” I told him what I knew and guessed about the vamps, which wasn’t much.

“On it. The Devil, Batildis, and Peregrinus. Gotta love vamp names and their flair for the dramatic,” he grumbled. “Why can’t they just be John Smith or Sally Jones?”

I dialed Bruiser and he answered, “I am delighted to hear you’re in one piece, Jane.”

Instantly I flushed and walked away from the group. “You know about the bomb?”

“I do. I was assured you’re safe.”

His tone was odd, like maybe I should have called him first. I wasn’t sure. “Yeah. So far,” I said. And decided to pretend
that I hadn’t maybe done something wrong by not calling him immediately, and concentrate on the important stuff taking place. “People who sound like the Devil, Batildis, and Peregrinus tortured Reach a week ago. Seven days.” I was proud that my voice sounded calm and sane, though the words themselves were enough to send me screaming into the night. “He just called and told me. He gave me up. He gave up Leo and probably you and Katie and Grégoire. Everything in his database has to be considered compromised. I’m instituting Protocol Aardvark. Del, Wrassler, and Derek will bring in all the outlying vamps and servants, and get them settled at HQ. They’re good at their jobs, but they aren’t you.”

“No, they aren’t. I’m on the council house premises. I’ll get with them. You should consider bringing your people to the council house until this is resolved. Satan’s Three are dangerous, Jane, more so than any other ménage à trois in all of Mithrandom.”

Satan’s Three.
Wow, the people after me even had a title. Moving to HQ sounded like a pretty good idea on the surface. Nothing short of a rocket launcher was getting inside the place now. Of course, anything that went in might have trouble getting out. Like me, if Leo actually got his talons on me in his lair. And there was that saying about putting all one’s eggs in one basket. If we were all in one spot, then we’d be easy to find. “I’ll think about it.”

I could hear the smile in Bruiser’s voice when he said, “We’re short on space at the moment, and things will only get tighter with Aardvark in place. You might have to bunk in with someone.”

Heat exploded through me, tightening things low in my belly. And suddenly I didn’t feel so worried or dark. “Yeah?”
Oh. Pithy comeback, Jane.

“Yes. Too few beds, too many warm bodies.”

“That sounds . . . like a good idea. And fun,” I said. Bruiser’s breath hitched. “Tell Del we might be roomies. We can have a slumber party, make s’mores, do each other’s nails.”
Yeah. That was better.

“You wound me.” But I could hear the laughter in his voice, and thanked all that was holy that Eli had spent so much time teaching me to flirt when we first met. It was coming in handy.

“Later.” Smiling what I knew was a silly smile, and keeping my back to the room, I disconnected and pulled Rick’s number
up on my cell. I had to warn him that someone was gunning for everyone who’d ever meant something to me. My smile died. Rick, who was no longer on speed dial. My onetime boyfriend.

I dialed the number. When he answered, it was with a simple, “Jane.” Not Jane, darlin’. Not babe. Just Jane. Paka was standing right next to him. Or lying next to him. I knew it. I recited the problem, talking steadily, not fast enough that would suggest I was hurting, not slow enough for him to be able to interrupt.

When I was finished, he said, “Thank you. I’ll be heading in-country. You won’t be able to contact me. I’ll check back with you in a few days for updates.”

I said, “Good,” and ended the call. And stared at the blue screen. “Really good.” It was totally inadequate. And it was all I’d ever get. And I was fine. A slow smile softened my face. I really was okay.

“We got action,” Eli said.

I tucked the oversized cell into a pocket and moved back to the sushi and the horrible tequila tea and the tablets. I tossed back two nigiri pieces and watched as a new robot, this one matte black, short, stubby, and sturdy, running on tracked wheels, replaced the more linear orange robot. The black robot was carrying two tan bags, one in each heavy-duty pincer-like hand. “What’s that?” I asked.

“Sandbags,” Eli said.

“Wait. They’re gonna blow it up on my porch?”

“You want they should risk their lives carting it off to la-la land first?”

“But I just got a new front door!”

Eli laughed evilly. “Face it, babe, your insurance is going through the roof.”

“Aw, man. No!” I put my hands to the top of my head, trying to think of a way to stop this. But short of running over, grabbing the bomb, and tossing it away, risking it exploding me into a pile of meat and puddles of blood, there wasn’t anything I could do. “Nooo.”

Eli laughed again. This time the Kid and Christie joined him.

The squat robot set both bags down carefully and went back for more. The bomb box wasn’t that big, maybe a foot long, ten inches wide, and eight inches deep. Eight bags of sand and one heavy cloth blanket of some kind later, the stout little
robot rolled away, leaving the bomb box covered. The street had been evacuated; this time even the experts were gone, undercover, as we watched on remote cameras.

Nothing happened as seconds turned into minutes. Then there was a
poof
. On the hijacked video screen, dust and sand flew. All I heard from my house was a muffled
whomp
. The bomb was detonated. On the screen, my front door shuddered. The glass in its window tinkled around the remains of the bomb. Broken. Again.

“Well, your door survived,” Eli observed.

“Your window didn’t,” Alex said, snarky.

I swallowed the rest of the rocket-fueled tea and left the house, jogging back home.

•   •   •

Hours later, they hadn’t let me see anything that had been left of the bomb. They hadn’t let me see anything at all except my damaged front door and busted door window. I had made a stink about it, and still they wouldn’t let me see. Dang bureaucrats. However, they hadn’t questioned me much, my position attached to the Master of the City of New Orleans and the greater Southeast having protected me from anything in the way of legal harassment.

Conversely, it didn’t protect me from media harassment. If anything, my position as Leo’s Enforcer only made that worse. According to NBC and their repeated phone call messages, I was “newsworthy,” whatever that meant. ABC made my house continuous “breaking news,” and the local cable channel had camped outside my house for all the hours of the emergency. They were all still there now.

While the legal scientific types ran tests, hauled off the debris for examination, removed their equipment, and had a press conference in front of my broken door, I made calls and Eli took care of the house. He ordered a replacement door and window from the big-box-home-repair store, asking for the model number from memory, which was an indication of the level of violence in my life. He hammered a piece of plywood over the window opening and hammered the damaged door shut, which made the evening news.

Ten minutes after his toned body and stern face appeared on camera, a locally famous anchorwoman called him personally for an interview. He turned her down, but it was clear that she had called because she found him
interesting
, because she
flirted with him the whole phone call. Not that Eli flirted back. He was madly in love with the sheriff of Natchez, Syl.

My time was much less profitable. No one I wanted to talk to called me back.

By the time most of the cops were gone and the news agencies had packed up their equipment, it was way after midnight. Alex hadn’t located Reach. Bruiser hadn’t called. Rick was gone. I had spent the evening at a whorehouse. The only good thing was that I had pigged out on sushi. Now I was expected to show up at vamp HQ and get cut up with a sword. My life was not normal.

Testicle Stretchers

I had tried calling Leo about Reach and the three who had tortured the research specialist, but the MOC wasn’t taking calls—or it might be more likely to say that he wasn’t taking calls from me. He had surely been notified about Protocol Aardvark, and had his freedom restricted by its stringent demands, but the chief fanghead had signed off on the policy himself, so he had no one to blame but himself and me.

On the way in to HQ, where we had to list our weapons and go through a thorough pat-down, I remembered the “small gala” Leo had planned, the one about which he’d thrown a wine tantrum. I hoped he’d had to send out a couple dozen “change of plans” letters. It would serve the spoiled-brat-of-a-vamp right.

We took the fire stairs down to the gym, as the elevator had been turned off by the Otis people. I wondered how vamps liked taking the stairs—a plebeian occupation so far beneath them, or a delightful romp into the past? I made a note of the darkened stairs that wended on down, into levels I hadn’t visited yet, at least not on purpose. One level below the gym, I saw a dynamic camera, the make and model I had installed in the council house, but I hadn’t installed this one; nor was it part of the upgraded security system that Eli, Alex, and I had designed. Which meant that there was a second monitoring system somewhere based on my work too. This wasn’t the first time Leo had gone around me on security. I made a mental note to ask when I was getting paid for my design. I also made
a mental note that if I went skulking below stairs, I’d surely be caught on tape somewhere.

In the girls’ locker room I was met by frowning female blood-servants, ones I hadn’t encountered before but whose names I recognized on the personnel list as being
fonctionnaires des Duels Sang.
Which I now understood as blood-servants who served at blood-duels. They were older, actually gray-haired, which is not common for blood-servants, and had severe expressions and stocky builds. They looked like weight lifters, broad and muscular Titans. They were also crotchety, harsh, unyielding, and dressed in matching outfits that looked like catcher uniforms at a baseball game. And though they tried to hide it, they were horrified at my total ignorance of their purpose.

As if I were a rag doll, the women stripped me. I nearly decked them until I realized that they were playing the role of lady’s maid or valet or squire. But it was a near thing. When I was down to the Lycra, they stuffed me into a pair of white knickers with built-in suspenders that they called braces. Socks that went to my thighs. Flat-soled shoes that were reinforced oddly, one shoe with extra padding in front and the other with the padding in back and were impossible to walk in without a slight duck waddle.

Over the stupid knickers and my T-shirt went a plastic chest protector. Think Roman gladiator chest protector, but of heavy-duty plastic with boob shapes. Over that went a white, long-sleeved shirt that sealed up the back, lightly padded with Dyneema, a new puncture-resistant material. It was reinforced with a heavier layer of plastic foam. I was informed that this was the Mithran blood-duel version of a plastron—the underarm protector used in fencing. To which I nodded as if that meant something to me. It didn’t. Titan One told me that in Olympic fencing, it would only cover the right side. Again I nodded, though that made no sense at all.
Half a shirt?

All I knew was that the layers made fluid movement difficult. The shirt collar was a doubled length of Dyneema, secured with Velcro as a gorget. I looked like a too-tall, scrawny image of the Pillsbury Doughboy.

And then the two Titans held out another shirt with a strap at the bottom hem. They made me step through the strap and pulled the shirt up my body. The strap was a thong. Seriously. The female blood-servants dressing me called it a
croissard
,
but it was a thong. It went on top of my knickers, attaching the front of the overshirt to the back. And the thong moved. Into the most uncomfortable places. I pulled at it, trying to find a comfortable spot for the thong, but there wasn’t one until Titan Two loosened it. I was pretty sure she thought I was hilarious.

The gloves were made of Dyneema, covered with suede, and had rubberized grips. They, like the outfit, were specialized for
le Duel Sang
, gloves the European vamps insisted upon, as their duels tended to be much bloodier than historical duels or Olympic fencing. The gloves I liked, the rest, not so much. My only peace of mind came from the addition of a few surprises I tucked into my sleeves when the Titans weren’t looking.

While one of the Titans braided my hair and tucked it up under my head shield, I studied myself in the mirror. I looked like an idiot. The Titans thought I looked great as they led me to the workout room.

If Eli laughed, I’d stab him.

In that garb I stood in the doorway of the workout room and glared, but no one laughed or even appeared to think I was dressed oddly. The crowd in the underground gym was bigger than normal, whether because everyone hoped to see a rainbow dragon again or they wanted to see me get sliced to ribbons while wearing a padded, thonged monkey suit, I didn’t know.

Eli, similarly dressed, stepped to my side and muttered to me, “I’ve worn most every kind of military and paramilitary uniform currently in use anywhere. And not one has . . . um, testicle stretchers.”

I snorted in reaction and relaxed enough that the scents in the room filled my head, clamoring for attention. Blood, vamps, humans, and from somewhere the smell of fresh baking bread. I closed my eyes and let the odors take me over for a moment, only a few heartbeats, but those seconds were enough, and the perfume of the room and the beings in it brought me to the edge of an odd tranquility. The room went quiet, as I stood there, the silence of expectancy and potential violence. My shoulders dropped and I took deep breaths of the wealth of scent patterns. I opened my eyes, feeling comfortable in my own skin for the first time since the bomb.

A form dressed in black from head to toe gestured for me to join him on the fighting floor, and I was able to move as if the thong wasn’t cutting me in half. My instructor was slight,
short, and graceful, his head hidden beneath a mask like mine, but his black garb was a much cooler color than my student whites. He looked good in the outfit, even the thong part, which had two straps that divided around an athletic cup of prodigious proportions. Mithrans must believe in hitting below the belt.

My partner might have been Gee DiMercy, but Gee had been bitten by the flying light-dragon, so I was betting on Grégoire, the best fighter the Americas boasted. Better than Gee DiMercy. Better than Leo. The best. Against me. And the weapons he held to his sides were not blunted practice weapons. They were sharp enough to make the air bleed.

They looked like a death threat in steel. Like
my
death. Beast glared out at him through my eyes, and I heard her snarl,
Steel claws. Claws in hand of predator. In hand of hunter-killer.

I knew better than to let my reactions turn to fear. Vamps can smell fear. So I let Beast’s emotions roll over into anger and insult. Loudly, I said, “I’ve had too little sleep, too little food, my house has been targeted by a bomber, and this thong is miserable. You really think that oversized pig sticker is gonna scare me?”

“No, little kitten. I think it will cut you and make you bleed if you do not learn quickly enough.”
Yeah. Grégoire
. I wanted to ask him about his siblings, but not while he carried a sword. Later. I accepted my blunted practice weapons from Titan Two, who had followed me out onto the fighting floor. Maybe she was acting as my second now. Made sense. Eli usually had that job, but he was flat on his back on the mat beside me, put there by Wrassler. Wrassler was wearing practice blacks, with a sword at my partner’s throat. I wished I had a camera. Titan Two put the shorter sword, the one with the notch in the blade, in my left hand and adjusted my grip on both weapons.

“That,” Grégoire said, “and this”—he held up the longer weapon—“are flat swords.” Next he indicated our short swords. Our
cajas cortas
, loosely translated as
short box
or
short trap
. “You will not see the like of such weapons in the human world. They are made for
le Duel Sang
. They are made for killing Mithrans.”

Which meant I’d better get used to them. Killing Mithrans was how I made my money.

The mat where I had practiced last night was gone and the floor, damaged by my claws, had been sanded. Someone had
taped a large fighting circle on the polished wood away from the scratched area. Grégoire stood inside the taped circle, waiting. Not impatiently. Calmly. But somehow there was a big evil grin about his whole stance, as if he was itching for the chance to hurt me.
Oh goody
.

“Let us see what you remember from your last session,” he said, stepping out of the fighting circle. He pointed with his long sword. “Begin with your feet.”

I placed my feet in the proper positions, straightened my back, bent my knees as if I were sitting on a tall stool, and held my weapons in the first form. With his sword tip, Grégoire lifted my long sword and moved it closer in front of my body, making my body angle sharper, bladed, so as to make a smaller target. His sword tapped my arm holding the short sword and altered the angle of my elbow.

“Better,” he said. “La Destreza, the Mithran version, is fluid, flowing like water over rounded stones, liquid and graceful.” He moved his sword in a full circle, from pointing at me to his left, across his body, up even with his head, down to his right, farther down, around again at knee level, up to his left again, and back to his starting point. If it had been a bare-handed move, it would have defended against two punches, a kick, and a third punch. His sword indicated that I should try.

As best I could, I mimicked his moves. “Again,” he said. And then, “Again, right elbow not locked, but loose”—he demonstrated—“thusly.” He watched me and said, “Better. Again. Faster.”

From there, we moved into another movement. And I started to sweat.

Grégoire slapped my butt with the flat of his blade as I turned in the second movement, and at the same moment, as if he had three hands, Grégoire tossed his mask to the side. His golden hair flowed out, long and loose and glistening in the too-bright overhead lights. “Elbow out,” he demanded, blue eyes dancing in what looked like delight. “Feet move thusly. No, no, no.
Thus
ly.” A perpetually fifteen-year-old, utterly beautiful, sword master and sadist. “Yes, now faster. Turn and turn and sweep and cut and lunge and lunge and lunge . . .”

Until I was so tired I could barely lift my arms, even with Beast adding speed and strength to my human limbs. Finally, when my breath was fast and painful and loud in the room and the audience had dwindled at the lack of blood spilled, Grégoire yawned.

Bored.

Sleepy.

In the middle of his yawn I dropped the short sword and pulled the throwing knife in my sleeve. Flipped it at Grégoire. While it was still in the air, I spun another at him. And the third. With his sword he batted each away with a
ting-ting-ting
. And finished the yawn with a grin that let me see why this vampire was the best fighter in the entire U.S. He had been nothing like bored. The yawn was to tempt me, to lure me in. Grégoire was having
fun
. Vicious, venomous, nasty
fun
.

Inside me, Beast growled, the sound coming from my mouth. She rose in me fast, staring out at him. In a single heartbeat, the orbs of his eyes went scarlet, centered with wide, black pupils. He attacked. Lunging, lunging, lunging, his sword circling like the blades of a fan, razor-sharp, cutting at me. His fangs dropped down; his talons pierced through the fingertips of his gloves. He was totally vamped out. Lunging, cutting, lunging, his long sword a spinning blade of death.

I had only the long sword, the short sword still at my feet. I danced back from him fastfastfast, my blade circling through his, my feet finding balance only after my padded white uniform had three scarlet, bloody rents in them. I felt no pain, not yet. But the stink of my blood and anger filled the air. I growled again. And I lunged back. Again and again, faster, drawing on Beast’s power and speed. Circling my blade, my dull club of a blade.

The words of my very first sensei came back to me.
“Everything is a weapon, Jane. Your fingers, your forehead, a pencil behind your ear, a paper clip. Everything can be used to defend and attack.”

I drew on Beast’s power and let my body slide into the fluid motions of the Spanish Circle. As if I had all the time in the world, I reversed my motions, taking the second movement to a backhand, both of my hands finding the hilt. Whirling. I slammed the dull edge of the sword against Grégoire’s shoulder with everything I had in me. Stepped back and lunged again, while he staggered. I swung the weapon like a baseball bat, letting the weight of the dull sword pull itself around. And smashed it against Grégoire’s knee. The joint buckled. Up, over, I let the momentum of the non-weapon carry itself around and against his neck, deliberately above the gorget. I heard the thump of the weapon hitting and a snapping crack.
Grégoire’s head knocked to the side at a sharp angle and he followed it, flying across the floor to the side and crumpling.

I stood over him, watching him on the floor, my breath heaving. “Like that?”

“Yes, my Enforcer.” Leo’s liquid tones came from behind me. “Exactly like that.”

•   •   •

I had actually hurt Grégoire. Hadn’t killed him, not with the battering of a dull blade. But I had broken
something
. Something important. With a terrible sinking feeling, I realized that I had, maybe, broken Grégoire’s cervical spine with my practice blade. Beast’s power drained out of me and out of my eyes, leaving me weak. I stepped back, away from the fighting circle, and tossed the head shield to the floor.

Leo had gathered him up, and now Grégoire’s head was resting on Leo’s lap, his golden hair spread over Leo’s legs and across the wood floor. His limbs were unmoving and limp, his black shirt ripped open to reveal his pale chest. Grégoire was gasping like a human, his eyes filled with bloody tears, yet his eyes had bled back to human blue irises. Leo was bending over his friend, his black hair hanging down over Grégoire’s golden blond, the strands mixing. Leo looked pale, his skin with a slightly bluish tinge, and I remembered that he had been bitten by the light-creature. Leo hadn’t healed as quickly as Gee DiMercy. And Grégoire didn’t appear to be healing at all.