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“I’m doing what I can,” I told her, which was true. It felt like I hit the ground running every day, yet never caught up. And now I was supposed to sit in our big audience chamber solving other people’s problems when I couldn’t even fix all of my own?
“Rhea says there’s usually a grace period after a new Pythia comes on board,” Tami added. “To let her get things sorted out. But it’s normally only a couple of weeks. It’s been months now—”
“There’s also a war!” I said, wondering why I was holding a phone.
“Yes, and that’s bought us some time, but it’s also brought up a lot of new issues that people want addressed. You’re going to have to start seeing at least a few of the big names on the list—”
“Soon,” I promised.
“You said that last week,” Marco said. And then he and Tami both crossed their arms and looked at me.
“Aren’t you supposed to be fighting?” I said, glancing pointedly at the guns Tami had heaped on a counter.
“No. We’re explaining the issue and waiting on a ruling from our Pythia,” Tami said.
Great.
Somebody was squawking something out of the phone, so I put it to my ear. “Hello?”
The squawking stopped. “Hello?” It sounded tentative.
“Who is speaking, please?” I asked impatiently.
“G-Gerald?”
He sounded like he wasn’t sure, which made two of us. “Who?”
A long sigh came through the line. “Batman.”
Oh, right. “I want to speak to Mircea,” I told him.
There was a pause.
“You know,” he gritted out. “I’m not supposed to do this, but I can tell you that they’re about to take a break. If you get here in an hour or so, you might be able to catch him—”
“Where’s ‘here’?”
“The new senate hall, at the consul’s home in New York—”
“Thanks, I’ll be there.”
“Cassie!” That was Tami.
“All right, this one goes home,” I said, patting Daniel on the shoulder and receiving a grateful look in return. “Guns are permitted only for the original group under Marco’s control. Newbies have to earn the right to carry, and they are only assigned outside work—in the hotel and casino, but not in the court itself—for at least a month after arrival. You guys need to work together to come up with a training regimen for them so they don’t freak out at the kind of stuff that goes on around here.”
“And what are you going to do?” Marco asked.
“Get a bath.”
Chapter Six
I was glad I had an hour, and not only because I was pooped. But because of that thing everyone does when they’re going to see an ex. You know the one I mean. Even if it’s over and you know it’s over and you don’t even want it to not be over, you’re not going to show up looking less than your best.
Like in spaghetti-stained jeans, washed-off makeup, and hair that had dried on its own after being electrocuted by a merman.
Okay, that last part was more my life than most people’s, but you get the idea. It was gild-the-lily time. And I had one hell of a place to do it in.
My old digs were downstairs, serving as housing for some of my bodyguards, because they liked being close and didn’t mind the bullet holes in the walls. I’d lived there when it was just me, but with the whole Pythian Court showing up, I’d needed more space. Something I suspected had been anticipated by a mind far older and sneakier than mine.
