Page 101

In under twenty minutes, every member of the council currently not hunting something in the woods is assembled in the chamber, looking very put out. Three empty chairs on the far side of the table.

I stand, because sitting down doesn’t feel like it gives what I’m about to say enough gravity, and I lay out all the pieces I’ve gathered. I don’t lead with my conclusion. I want them to arrive at the same place I did on their own, because they have to believe it.

Eight missing people, and a ninth lying in the med center morgue. Four photographs with the same black SUV parked in the background. Same plate. Same cracked driver’s side fog light. Eleven emails, one job application, and a reply that puts Ryan at Constantin’s house. And Jessica, who was reported missing four days ago and who I watched walk out of a bar with Dominic Renard.

Hazel asks how I got the emails, and I tell her I have a duty to protect my sources. Roslyn does not look up from her notes, which is how I know she approves.

Lloyd asks if I can prove that Constantin ever met with Ryan Kowalski directly. I say no. He nods, writes it down, asks the next question. He’s building his understanding, and that’s all I’m asking for.

I said I wouldn’t give them a conclusion, but I leave them with one anyway.

“Nick is only trying to protect the people of this town. It’s what you asked of him when you made him Guardian.”

“Any objections to entering Miss Ashford’s testimony and evidence into the record?” Roslyn asks.

There are none.

“Noted and entered,” she says, knocking her gavel once.

Sigrid has Caleb by the elbow, asking him something about where you’d house a made vampire. Pete’s on the phone to the sheriff’s office, trying to find out where Anna is. Hazel looks at me with an expression I can’t read at all.

“You should go home, Ellery,” she says.

“No, thank you.”

So I sit down in the second row of folding chairs with my phone face up on my knee. The clock above the dais marks off every minute with a small click, and I close my eyes to drown it out.

At some point, Marthe sits beside me, leaning into my side, and we wait.

Chapter 41

Nick

I don’t know what I expected to find.

Storage, maybe. Antiques under dusty sheets. His own personal blood bank carefully shelved like expensive bottles of wine.

Not this.

The passage runs farther than it should, lit at intervals by bulbs in wire cages, steel doors lining the walls on either side. Eight that I can count.

I get closer to the nearest one and look through the grille.

“Anna.”

My hushed voice sounds too loud, drowning out the drip of water somewhere ahead.

“What the fuck?” Her mouth hangs open.

There’s a man crouched on a pile of blankets in the corner, staring at the floor. Young. Twenty, maybe. His jacket is torn and dirty, and he’s only wearing one boot. He lifts his head, tipping his face into the light. His eyes are black, edge to edge, and there’s nobody left behind them.

He’s across the cell, spit flying, hands clawing through the grille. The steel clangs, echoing along the corridor. All he is now is hunger.

I felt it when I woke up after taking my Rites, sharp and consuming, but my bloodline blunted the worst of it, and Mom was at my side with a steady supply of blood. He has no one.

Behind the other doors, they stir. All full but one.

“Did you know about this?”