We had talked through the sunset and into the dark of night. It was nearly nine when we braked in back of HQ, under the porte cochere, and alighted from the limo. That’s what you did from a limo, though I’d never say the word aloud. Alight. I had a mental eye roll at the thought.
Eli met us there and handed me my bag of weapons, one hand holding Bruiser back. I left the men there, but my hearing was better than human, and I heard Eli say, “You hurt her and I’ll skin you alive and feed your carcass to the wild boars in the swamps. You copy?”
“I do. And I’ll break your arm if you ever accost me again. Civilized discourse is acceptable. Your hand upon my person is not.”
“Be nice, boys,” I called over my shoulder. “Be nice or I’ll beat both your butts.” Yeah. That’ll show them. I changed clothes in the ladies’ locker room, donning my second-best fighting leathers over Lycra undies—full-length leggings and a long-sleeved tight tee over the jogging bra. I now had two sets of black leathers, but this pair had already been repaired a time or two. Both sets were augmented by a thin layer of sterling silver–plated titanium chain mail, with hard plastic at the outer elbows and knees, the kind developed and worn by the Taiwanese military. Star Wars stuff. Bullet resistant all over. Fire resistant. The titanium chain-mail choker, I’d only recently discovered, was called a gorget. Who knew? This was my old fighting gear, soiled with blood and sweat and the smell of victory. The new gear was even better. And pretty, though I’d never say so aloud.
I slid into low combat boots with steel toes and rubber soles and a slit for a backup weapon in each boot shaft. Eli had packed no knives, so I assumed we were going for hand-to-hand fighting tonight, but I slid the stakes and blades I had worn under my skirt into my fighting clothes. I wasn’t stupid.
My hair was braided by a blood-servant who plaited it like a horse’s tail, into a club and then back up and into a bun bigger than my fist. I admired myself in the mirror over the sinks. I looked . . . yeah. Spiffy. Deadly, but spiffy.
? ? ?
I walked into the gym, which was, as usual, set for sparring practice. The scents were overwhelming for a moment—vamp, blood, humans. Sex. With vamps it was always blood and sex together. The big room had basketball goals and indentions intended to hold poles for a tennis net. Not that I’d ever seen them in use. It was weapons and fighting all the way in fanghead-land. As always, spectators lined the bleacher-style seating along one wall. Others clustered at the door on the far side, one I’d never been through. I made a mental note to check security there. The usual. However, one thing was new.
Weapons practice had never before included Grégoire or Girrard DiMercy. It had also never included swords. Two guys were in a sword ring fighting. Each man had two swords, and they were both bleeding through the padded white suits they were wearing. The smell of vamp blood and Gee’s blood mingled in a magical miasma that half of me thought tasty and the other half thought a little terrifying.
Beast leaned forward into my eyes. Long claws, steel and silver. Good claws. Want long claws.
“No way am I using a sword,” I muttered to her under my breath. It took years to master a sword. But Gee DiMercy and my Beast had other ideas and they didn’t mesh with my own.
CHAPTER 7
LSD . . . Psilocybin Mushrooms and . . . Tequila
“En garde, little goddess!” he shouted, and tossed me a sword through the air, hilt first, the way he’d tossed a sword to Leo. Beast reared up in me, flooding me with adrenaline and strength. Time fractured, seeming to slow and thicken. The room went brighter and greener, sharper, Beast’s sight meshing with my own.
As it flew through the air, I saw the way the hilt was made, the cross guard curving around to protect the wielder’s hand; the hilt itself was braided with leather for a firm grip. A narrow, thin, flat blade, the double edge constructed of blunted steel, for teaching and practice—not sharp, with no silver plating that could accidently harm a vamp. But didn’t classes usually start with wood swords?
Beast in charge, I stepped forward. My hand lifted into the air, moving with a languid ease, to slide fingers through the cross guard and around the hilt. The sword’s weight shifted out of the air as gravity and momentum shoved it firmly into my palm. Good claw. Fight with long claw, Beast thought.
But I had no idea how. I was a knife fighter. What Beast called her steel claws. Or a knife thrower, Beast’s flying claws. Not Beast’s long claw. Time slapped me in the face as my fingers tightened on the hilt and I whirled, feeling the weight and length of the blade as I pirouetted with it. Claw like long tail, Beast thought at me. Good for leaping. Good for balance. Good long claw. And I laughed. Around me, I felt the others, the onlookers, grow silent.
“Your Web page information suggested that you were ‘unrated in swordplay.’ Today we shall rate you.”
That sounded ominous. I said, “I’m unrated because I don’t know how to use a long sword at all. Only short swords, fourteen-inch vampire-killers. So can we skip this?”
“No.”