Dark Queen (Jane Yellowrock #12)

“What about Marco?”

“One of Leo’s people drank him down. Julietta Tempeste sent him and his Blood Master to the home of the CEO of Madderson Construction. The next day Marco was hired. Old man Madderson, whose construction company has done business with Leo for fifty years or more, is upset that he let Leo down, and also horrified that a vamp had access to his mind and will to that extent.”

“Bambi/Mike?”

Eli’s lips twisted down, just a fraction of a fraction, and I knew it wasn’t good news. “She didn’t make it. They were doing CPR on her when the helo landed. Leo turned her, according to her wishes in her sign-on papers.”

I looked away. If she survived the devoveo, the years of madness that a vamp went through after being turned, Bambi would wake up two or ten or twenty years from now, with a savage desire to drink down every human she saw. “Okay. What do I do?”

“Rest. Sleep as much as you can. Starting tonight we go on fanghead hours. As soon as the upstairs paint is dry enough, we work out. Practice swords,” he added when I looked puzzled. “You’re gonna Zen. I’m gonna beat your ass.”

“You can try.”



* * *



? ? ?

We fought and practiced and fought again all day, making plans to keep ourselves alive. We ate great food and lounged on the porch, we mounted cameras and tested them, and we even managed to nap. If there hadn’t been the Sangre Duello and our deaths hanging over us, it would have been fantastic.



* * *



? ? ?

Night breezes were blowing in through the open windows, carrying out the stench of paint and floor cleaners and other toxic stuff. I was stretched out on a leather upholstered bench, faceup, staring at the tongue-and-groove ceiling. My arms were out to allow my chest to move more freely as I was trying to remember how to breathe and I tried to suck in air to keep from asphyxiating. The padded wooden practice swords I had used to defend myself were by my sides on the floor. Sweat had pooled under me and ran off the leather seat to puddle beside them.

There were fifty of the benches, in ten different colors of leather, placed all around the third-floor walls. They had been offloaded from the barge as part of the staging furnishings. They were hard and stiff, but I might have to sleep here because I might never be able to move again. My hands and feet were tingling. I was pretty sure I was dying.

Eli fell to a bench beside me, stinking of sweat, trying to recover. Bruiser and the B-twins had worked us to exhaustion. My honeybunch moved to stand over us, sweating and blowing, trying to get his breath back. “You’ve improved vastly. And fortunately,” Bruiser said, “as challenged, you get to choose weapons.”

“Also, your second or your primo or your Enforcer may fight for you, and your primo is in great need of exercise,” a bored voice said. “He also has the ambition, and some say the skill, to best Grégoire as the finest swordsman in the Americas.” Edmund stepped from behind a roof support. “This,” he said with a delighted grin, “will be an epic battle.”

I managed a grin too, and then concentrated on surviving. Lying there, staring at the ceiling, I decided I wasn’t going to die. Not today. Not tomorrow. Not at this Sangre Duello at all. I had to stay alive. For my friends.



* * *



? ? ?

I was sitting on the sand as the sun rose, watching clouds roll in, dark and angry and filling up the horizon from the distant water to the vault of the sky. The waves had changed from soft and lapping to a high surf that sprayed me with salt and wet down my clothes and my braid. I was alone, resting, after studying the fight list, looking for weaknesses in the opponents and their fighting styles. It was what Beast called tracking, hunting prey, following spoor, finding tall limb over water. Ambush!

“It’s Fight Club,” I’d said to them all, “but with swords and knives. And we can cheat. Got it.” Except that, even with discussing the fighting weaknesses of Titus’s strongest vamps, I felt a creeping panic beneath my skin. I knew that people I loved were gonna die. People fighting challenges that were intended for me. And if Leo lost the final battle with Titus, and if I didn’t win my own fights, the witches in the United States would take on the EVs. They might win, but they’d more likely be killed in a massive paranormal genocide. My godchildren would die. At some point the military would take on the vamps, but likely not in time to keep the vamps from coming ashore. I had tried not to think about this. Tried not to emote about this. But the Sangre Duello was dire. This was the final battle against the EVs. The biggest, baddest uglies on the face of the earth, landing to kill us.

So I’d stomped off, to sit on the sand and stare at the dawn storm rolling in. In twelve hours the vamps would be here. Leo and his people first. Then Titus. And whatever vamps would try to kill us all.

Maybe at first my Enforcer, Gee DiMercy, or my primo, Edmund Hartley, would take my matches and defeat my enemies. And like the coward I am, I’d let them. And maybe they would win for a match or two or seven. But eventually, at some match with an older, better fighter, they would lose. One, or the other, or both, would be maimed or die. Because I let them fight for me. Eli had tried to explain rank to me. Had tried to tell me I wasn’t a grunt anymore, not frontline troops. The pep talk hadn’t helped.

Because after the best of the sword fighters were down, Eli would try to fight for me. He was looking forward to it, to facing battle again. So I’d disable him to keep him back. And then, while he cursed me for taking him out, I’d fight. And because we had worked our way up the lists, this would be the best fighter of them all.

Beast is best hunter. Beast is best ambush hunter.

I stared at the coming storm as the sky went darker instead of lighter with the dawn. Rain splattered on me and dimpled the sand. And Beast sent me a vision of tall branches and soaring rock faces, wet with rain, trees lashed by wind.

Beast whispered inside me, Half-form teeth and fangs and claws. And Beast will drink the blood of her enemies and eat their hearts. Beast is big-cat. Beast will rip out throats of her enemies.

And lead me further down the path of blood and death, I thought. Because I can’t figure out how to get off that path or how to change direction.

Or maybe the angel Hayyel will pop in and save me.

Right. Sure. Not.

Beast chuffed with amusement.

“Jane,” Alex shouted from the house. “See if you have a cell signal. If so, call someone onshore and see if you get through.”

I rolled over and dialed the number of Gee DiMercy. The call went through. And I gave my Enforcer directions, instructions, and, when he argued, orders. I’d developed the belief that Titus would betray the agreements whether he won or lost. And I had an idea how to defeat that.





CHAPTER 16


    A Mad Witch Is Never a Good Witch





The outdoor shower worked, the bathers’ privacy assured by clapboard walls and a twisting cattle-path-style entrance. There were small and medium palm varieties planted around it and around the house as landscaping. Lounge chairs were on the sand at one beach so vamps and humans could watch the moon rise. More chairs at another so humans could watch the sun rise. And chairs at a third for sunset watching. On such a small island, most of the beaches were in line of sight from each other.