Authors: A.J. Aalto
“I’m not saying I’m going to hurt Harry.”
“You wouldn’t get past me,” I warned him. “You wouldn’t get five feet before I put you through the floor.”
“You’d try.”
“Keep talking yourself into that corner, shitpickle, see what hits you first, me or them.” I felt the bristle of uneasiness from the revenant power rolling through Felstein, and it swelled in quicksilver response to my discomfort. My arms felt flush with power, the immortal version of ancient revenants stepping up to have my back. They didn’t have to move a muscle; from where they lounged in the stronghold, the members of my house offered up their clout, and the temptation to gobble it all up and use it to throw Batten’s ass through a wall gripped me low in the belly, a sweet agony.
Batten saw it in my face. Both playful eyebrows twitched upward. “They’re giving you something.”
“It’s not something you wanna see
.” It’s not something
I
wanna see
. My skin crawled like I had fire ants burrowing under my palms and that power craved release. Every black ghost hair on my scalp prickled.
His voice dropped to a husky purr. “Wrong. Show me.”
“I’ll hurt you.”
He nodded, fascinated. “Maybe.”
The intensity of the moment broke me, and I cracked a half-smile. “You wanna sail through the air and land on your dick?”
He searched up and to the left, like the advice for how to proceed was written under the arch of his left eyebrow. “No?” Then he said, “Shitpickle?”
“Not my best insult,” I agreed with a nod. “Was hoping you missed that.”
“You can unclench your fists, now.”
I looked down at my tightly balled hands and let them fall open, the leather gloves creaking. “I would have hurt you.”
“Can you narrow down which revenants were offering you power?”
I thought about that; there were warring scents under the burnt sugar and heavy molasses, strong enough to coat the roof of my mouth, dialing from
smell
to
taste
, and though each had a slightly lemony underscent, the individual flavors weren’t familiar enough to me for me to put names to them. I counted more than three distinct signatures, though, and I suspected one belonged to Wilhelm himself.
Then the answer came to me in a rush, and I blurted, “All of them.” Heady with the knowledge that I could draw so much power in this place, I gave a soft, incredulous laugh.
This made Batten’s cop face return full force, calculating and stony. “How, Marnie?”
“Through the Crowned Prince,” I answered. “I can call
all
of them.”
ROOM 226, TARA HAD SAID
. Again, it felt like a set-up. Just before I knocked, I sensed mixed sources of emotion inside the room. The Blue Sense quickly reported that everyone was blissed-out and happy, though. Mellow. A blurry shelter of pleasure. There was no hint of a threat from any person inside. I took that to mean it was safe, and let myself in.
I hadn't even put my foot down beyond the green door before I knew this was a bad idea. “Oh, Marnie,” I whispered to myself. What would Chapel say? Or Sheriff Hood? Or Batten, for that matter, though Batten would be hard to surprise at this point. I, on the other hand, was apparently easy to surprise, and my discomfort climbed when someone shut the door behind me.
A single guttering oil lamp fought to cast light through a haze of rich, aromatic brown smoke. Through a seeming labyrinth of diaphanous curtains, I could see several niche-style beds built into the walls, making the room feel like a necropolis or ossuary full of the unquiet and lustful dead; closing in on the nearest, I could see lavishly carved mahogany stained even darker by centuries of opium smoke, scratched in places by fingernails or other accouterments. The niches were full of people, both alive and undead. Overstuffed pillows were piled in every corner amongst lethargic bodies flung across the beds or one another. A pale, mottled serpent moving lithely against the torpid sepia tableau, Junior crawled among the supine mortal bodies, sniffing at necks wherever a chin was thrown back, teasing himself. He did not sink fang; he caught a scent, relished it as his eyelids fluttered closed, and moved on, slithering among the vulnerable bodies. He paused to oblige lighting someone’s pipe for them, and caught my scent, looking up.
Weaving from one covered cubby to the next, feeling a little overwhelmed by all the smoke, I eventually found Tara slumped on her side on the bed furthest from the door amidst a pile of pink and purple pillows embroidered with gold threads. There was a long opium pipe resting loosely in her left hand, leaving her right hand to draw circles with one finger on the bedding. Bowls glittered red as several other DaySitters got their fix behind her.
She sighed when she saw me, and her eyelids drooped. Her high navy mandarin collar had come unbuttoned, revealing her untouched throat. Nobody had fed from her yet this evening. She handed her pipe over to me languorously. “You’ll feel so much better,” she promised.
“Yeah, I dunno about this,” I hedged, watching Junior slinking closer. He coiled into a squat nearby to watch, eyes flashing chrome in the near-dark. “We’ve got a big day tomorrow. Uh, will you be attending the throne... meeting… thing?”
Her lips barely moved as the words slid out of her mouth on a smoky exhale. “Nahhhhhhh. They only invited… important people.”
I blinked with surprise. I was important? That didn’t ring true. I glanced at Junior. He just watched us from within his white, zippered hoodie; his shining eyes were the only thing visible inside the hood, like some kind of bleached-out, cybernetic Jawa. “So, only the people on the invitation will attend?”
“No… many revenants will attend, depending on their standing in their house. Elders, mostly. When the Overlord summons, houses in residence on Svikheimslending will come to watch the proceedings, as is their right. But DaySitters… humans, no. UnBonded DaySitters, never.”
“Got any advice for me?”
“You’ll be expected to nominate within your house, but unfortunately for you, Wilhelm doesn’t want to be strapped to a throne. And Wilhelm always gets what he wants. His allies will make sure of it. If you say his name, someone else will nominate a different Dreppenstedt. That name will tumble in, and in, and in, again and again, to shield Wilhelm. He’s already seen to it.” She struggled to open her eyelids wider to give me a serious look, and for the most part, failed. “You want to think about that.”
I did, but not seriously, because this chick was stoned off her ass; I wasn’t dumb enough to nominate anyone other than Wilhelm. Who else would I even consider? Junior? I was a better candidate at this point. Harry? Hell, no. He’d kick my butt.
She made a
snerf
noise, and then pushed the pipe into my hand. “You want this, trust me. The things you’re about to see…”
“Things?” I Felt Junior’s flare of
irritation
, and willed the Blue Sense to settle down and go away; it was difficult to shield here, so instead, I focused on the relaxation and sultry desire in the room. “If you meant revenants, they’re men, not things.”
Tara rolled her eyes, which must have been hard to do considering she could barely keep her eyelids open. “You don’t know. You haven’t seen these things up close. You don’t know what they become. You lounge around in America with your pretty boy, and you play around with the cops, and you think you’re doing something important with your life. You don’t know what you’re coming to. You don’t know what’s waiting.”
I took the pipe and ignored Junior’s fussing with the end of it. I Felt that he was far fonder of me than he was of Tara at the moment. I didn’t think taking a hit off the pipe was a good idea, but held it to be polite while Junior worked on it, and was about to launch into the official Marnie Baranuik people-not-objects lecture when the door swung open and a flashlight pierced the smoky dark.
“MJ!” Harry barked, making me drop my opium pipe.
I snorted in surprise. “Oops.”
“If he has sunk ivory,” Harry warned, striding closer, a flashlight swinging with his march, “I will pull his half-shorn head off.”
“Sunk ivory?” I gasped, touching my throat. There were no fang marks. I had felt nothing. Had I let Junior feed? Had he mindfucked me without my knowing it? I didn’t think so. I got to my feet. “Can the accusations, Tantrum McFangus. I’m not the one hiding things in this relationship.”
“
Viens ici!”
Harry’s voice was a whipcrack. His pointing finger, indicating his boot heel, where he expected me to fall-in like a misbehaving puppy off her leash, was both insulting and tantalizing. The immortal influence that owned me completely was calling, and my guts quivered with the urge to submit. This was the Bond’s doing, ensuring that when the revenant made a decision, his DaySitter would be compelled to obey. Harry took it a step further, capturing me with his preternatural gaze and snagging my brain like a jaguar hooking prey in one paw, claws out. His mind rolled into mine, clearing any outside influences through the Bond, chasing out the whispers and temptations of others, searching for breaches in his influence.
His finger was shaking where it stubbornly indicated his side. The look on his face said if he had to repeat himself, he was going to explode. Instead of losing my own temper, I explored him empathically. Harry could not hide his feelings from me here, so close to the amplification of his master, under his own banner; insecurity rattled through him, and I realized he had been swallowing mine, soaking up my jealousy about Carole Jeanne and absorbing all my doubts and hurt. Now he was lashing out about Junior, simply reflecting my own need to blow up. Of course, with his centuries of handling human emotions, he had to know what was happening, that he was projecting my own bottled fears and putting them on like a heavy, green cloak. As empaths, we did it without thinking if we didn’t shield well in public, and through our Bond, we did this with one another often enough to recognize it. Or should, anyway.
“Harry,” I started, but he cut me off.
“
Ne parle pas!”
he snapped, clenching his fist.
Hoooo boy
. “Still not dropping the French, eh? Somebody’s
maaaaaaad
.”
“Can you doubt it?” he said crisply, and his eyes dared me to continue speaking. I took a deep breath, wondering how much second hand opium smoking I was doing in the den, but not really caring all that much.
I went to Harry’s side, pushing reassurance through the Bond, giving him an
as-if
look.
He sniffed indignantly, adjusted the perfect mother-of-pearl buttons on his shirt front in an effort to collect himself, tugged on his French cuffs one at a time, and then cracked his knuckles. “I apologize. When I am returned home, it seems I have a temper like Wellington.”
“And we both know why,” I said, coughing and waving my hand to clear the opium smoke. “I know all about your sordid past. Well, guess what, Lord Guy Harrick Dreppenstedt: I don’t care that I’m just a lowly seventh. I am not going to let anyone stick me like a pig. And I don’t care how damn delightful I am. I am not going to be trapped in this mausoleum as Captain Spanky’s brand new chew toy.”
“Wranglesome, are we?” Harry said, taking me by the elbow. I had just about had enough of people dragging me around today, and I sent him a glare that communicated that.
“I insist you come away from this place,
ma lutine
. We will speak in private.”
“But this is the best place.” I blew through pursed lips and brown smoke swirled lazily in the air. “Nothing bothers me here except Tara, but she bothers everyone everywhere, so it’s no big.” Okay, yeah, I was probably getting something second-hand. Maybe more than a little something. Had there been auras wafting around Harry's flashlight when he'd come in?
“Indeed, I can readily appreciate the lure of properly debauched hedonism, and I am convinced that you were promised revels and merrymaking if you were to join them, but his fellow’s word is not worth a farthing.”
“Junior is great.” Okay, now I knew the secondhand smoke was affecting me.
Junior is great?
“He doesn’t like Tara either.”
“Junior is not his name,” Harry said patiently, releasing my elbow. As if having suddenly remembered who he was, Harry offered me his arm like a gentleman. “If you will permit me to observe: Junior would tell you anything you want to hear, in order to keep you soft and pliant. He is as genuine as Nelson’s eye patch.”
I took my Cold Company’s arm, stepping over the prone form of Wilhelm’s eldest DaySitter, Paulina. “Are you saying Junior’s a player?”
“I am saying he’s a shameless, lascivious degenerate who would be at your throat with nary a pause for your plight or permission, poppet, the second your lashes fluttered, so one wonders at the lack of thought that went into your decision to enter his sleeping chambers.”
“His what?” I felt my molars clack together as my jaw slammed shut. Tara had invited me to Junior’s opium orgy room? I mean, it was one thing for it to be a public opium orgy room for everyone in the castle, but Junior's Adult Romper Room was a whole different wad of hashish.
Harry seemed to catch the run of my thoughts and his arm tightened, trapping my gloved hand next to his body. “Let us please be away from this place.”
I made an affirmative murmur and followed him through the curtains. I spared one final glance over my shoulder through the smoke, and, as if to prove Harry right, Junior slinked atop a prone body and struck, sudden and with youthful eagerness, causing a sleepy moan and writhe in the fresh, warm human beneath him.
Batten was standing in the hall, looking unexpectedly chagrined. “Tattletale,” I accused.
Harry chided, “MJ—“
“How dare you snitch on me.” I pointed up at Kill-Notch. “I didn’t even smoke it.”
“You were going to,” Batten retorted.
“I ought to take you out. And not on a date, but like,
kapow!
”
He blinked once. “What are you going to do, cute me to death?”
“If I have to.” I heard it after it was already out of my mouth. Marnie the Comeback Queen.