“Mircea doesn’t seem to think so.”
“Mircea doesn’t know Anthony as well as I do.”
“Meaning what?” I demanded, as someone started stabbing at the doorbell. I stared at it a little desperately. “Now what?”
“The Senate’s men, in all probability.”
“You were bluffing.”
“Not about that. I assume it is whysubrand left so precipitously. His spies must have warned him that reinforcements were on the way.”
He started for the door, and I grabbed his shirt. “You called them?” I asked, hoping that the sinking in my gut was wrong.
“No.”
“Then why are they here?”
“To take me into custody, I should suspect.”
Chapter Twenty-seven
He pulled away, and after a stunned second, I followed Louis-Cesare through the ruined vestibule. The wind had picked up, billowing out the antique lace curtains and letting in the rain. And a lot of flashing lights. They strobed the small room in disco colors of red and blue, sending a flickering rectangle of light across the walls and making the shadows of the furniture jump.
We had visitors, but not the Senate. At least, not yet.
Across the muddy tire tracks, car parts and half a ton of couture that littered the lawn, I could see a dozen neighbors lining the street in their nightclothes. They were staring at the mess and the wreck of a house beyond it with the sort of keen-eyed horror people usually reserve for traffic accidents. And across the street, a third police car had just pulled up.
I should have expected it. The wards had dropped and the glamourie had gone with them. And half a dozen vampires ripping a Lamborghini apart wasn’t exactly quiet. We’d probably woken up half the neighborhood.
“Christine!” Louis-Cesare called urgently. She’d been squelching around in ankle-deep mud, trying to rescue the rest of her wardrobe, but she looked up at her master’s voice. “Assemble a small bag, if you please. We are leaving.”
She stared at him in confusion, her arms full of muddy couture. “But . . . but my clothes . . .”
“I shall buy you new ones. Vite, s’il te pla?t.”
Her lips tightened, and for a moment, I thought Louis-Cesare was going to have a rebellion on his hands. Night was fading, and Christine’s good humor was going with it. But after a moment, she threw down the clothes and stomped past us, still muttering.
Louis-Cesare started across the street, where Radu was talking to a couple of cops. But I knotted a fist in the fabric of his shirt and pulled him back. It didn’t sound like we had a lot of time, and I wanted some answers. “What did you mean about Anthony?”
He gave me an aggravated look, which I caught in glimpses. The cops’ lights were strobing his face along with the front of the battered old house. But he stayed put. “How much do you know about the European Senate?”
“Not a lot, why?”
“Because to understand Anthony, you have to understand how he rules.”
“Then explain it to me.”
“There is not time to go into specifics—”
“Then go with generalities! Just tell me.”
“Unlike other consuls, who have to work with their Senates, Anthony dictates to his,” Louis-Cesare said quickly. “He can do so because the senators know that they cannot lose their seats as long as they accede to his wishes. Any challengers for their positions are automatically referred to me.”
I stared at him, sure I’d heard wrong. “You’re saying you take all challenges?”
“Yes.”
“But every time you step into a ring, you can lose. I don’t care how good you are! It only takes one slip—”
“And then Anthony would have to find himself a new champion,” he agreed. “But that has not happened yet, and my reputation has grown to the point that there are few now who make the attempt.”
“Like Cheung.”
“Yes. The rumor is that he is good—very good. But he chose not to challenge, although he could easily have defeated Elyas and possibly three or four others on the Senate. But he knew he would not be facing them; and he chose not to face me.”
“But . . . why take that kind of risk for Anthony? You’re clearly not that fond of the guy, or you wouldn’t be trying to leave.”
“You do not understand what the Senate was like when—” He stopped, staring across the street.
Radu appeared to be having trouble with one of the cops. The man must have had some mage blood somewhere, or else he was just exceptionally strong-minded. Either way, he wasn’t buying what Radu was trying to sell.
The others were nodding in time to ’Du’s somewhat-strident tones, but not him. His hand was on his gun, and he was shaking his head and backing toward his police car. Any minute now, he was going to—