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We had to add one extra series of experts that whale necropsies don’t need: a bomb squad and demolition team. Listening to the bomb techs talk to the biologists about possible sources for the fire breathing inside Deimos was fascinating. Rafael had been right about videos from drones already posting online, so the entire world knew that fire-breathing dragons weren’t a myth after all. There would be doctoral dissertations written about what they learned from his body, and probably some dissertations outside the sciences, maybe about mythology versus reality, or fire-breathing dragons in myth and reality. Richard and I would be giving interviews to various groups fora while, though it would have to wait until the police declared that it was no longer an ongoing investigation. Edward and Olaf, along with several officers across a wide variety of jurisdictions, stayed as guards for the scientists.
Rodrigo’s coffin was the only one that didn’t get tumbled into sunlight. When darkness fell, he rose again. I just couldn’t get rid of this guy. He and Rodina had both betrayed us. Ru begged for their lives, but it was Rodrigo that had the bargaining chip. He knew who the last traitor was still inside the Circus of the Damned who had been reporting back to Deimos and company. That we needed to know. The name of the last traitor for his and Rodina’s lives. We agreed on the condition that I used theardeurto make them as strongly my Brides as Nicky is, but when I tried to raise theardeurthat night it wasn’t there. I fed on their sorrows and grief, but I could not bind them to me with that. Rodina said, “I will bargain if you promise to never feed on me like that again.” Ru agreed; even Rodrigo was shaken. Deimos is dead, but part of his legacy is still inside me.
Neither Richard nor I had been able to get to Jean-Claude in person inside the Circus of the Damned because the emergency crews will only evacuate people out of the underground, but they won’t allow anyone inside. Most of the shapeshifters had been lifted out using a safety harness, except for those that stayed to guard Jean-Claude and the other vampires who were still dead for the day. The two traitors that Rodrigo gave us were two of the few to get lifted out during the day. Hortensio had put his master, Magnifico, in one of the big duffel bags the Harlequinmoitié bêtescarry their vampire masters in if they have to travel during daylight. They are on the run for now, but the Harlequin loyal to us will find them. Olaf, Edward, and I may even go hunting with them. The front of the Circus was shut down because of the explosion, but the only damage had been to the stairs leading down to our home. Micah had put on a headset and communicated with emergency services to show them the debris on their side, so they could get advice on what pieces to move firstto prevent another cave-in. They’d told Micah that he first needed heavy moving equipment or a block and tackle or…Micah explained that they had people on their side strong enough to move the stones. Then it was a matter of trial and error both below and above ground to get an opening big enough and stable enough to pull people to safety. If Nathaniel and Damian hadn’t already been at the wererats’ inner sanctum trying to work magic with the brujas, they’d have never gotten out in time to work the spell that helped the rats find me and report back. If Deimos’s people had blown up the stairway just a bit earlier, then Edward and Olaf might not have found us in time. If one bite from Deimos did that much damage to me and Richard, and then a second night with a second bite especially for me, Deimos might have possessed me and used me to take over Jean-Claude just like they planned.
The wererats’ brujas isolated Queenie mystically so when the Harlequin guards executed her, Kaazim survived her death. He still looks like he’s thirty-something. If he’s aging it doesn’t show. Queenie did curse us all with her dying breath though. Something about an ancient evil that she awakened so that it would consume us, or maybe consume the city, or the world. So far nothing eldritch this way comes. She’s dead, we’re alive, time to party, once we’ve all healed.
Jean-Claude thinks that he has to fill me with his passion for life in person to chase out the last of Deimos’s grief and terror. He’s trapped below ground until nightfall, and even then he can only come out if the opening remains stable. It’s why he’s dressed in his oldest and most casual clothes. I hadn’t seen him in those black jeans in a few years. I looked forward to getting him out of them at the Jefferson County house where Micah, Nathaniel, and the rest of us that need more sunlight to stay healthy and happy stay part of each week. Jean-Claude, Damian, and other vampires travel back and forth with us enough that we’d had metal storm shutters installed on the windows like you do for hurricanes near the ocean. The shutters were perfect for shutting out all daylight and sturdy enough that almostnothing was breaking them. Wrestling the shutters open and closed, on the other hand, sucked, so we’d recently converted the downstairs to push-button electric. So much easier.
Without theardeurI wasn’t recovering like normal, so I needed IV fluids for dehydration. Richard needed them, too, and he was a werewolf. I as a more normal human needed more fluids and finally more rest. They tried to keep me in the hospital, but I wanted to go to Nathaniel and Damian until our security vetoed having more of our primaries in a single location just in case there were more traitors that even Rodrigo didn’t know about. Deimos hadn’t liked sharing information much.
I got to kiss Nicky before I went home. He’s going to be all right, but he won’t be bodyguarding anyone for a while. The Wicked Truth are trapped in the underground waiting for me to regain my ability to heal them, if I ever do.
I finally got to do a quick shower and curl up in the main bedroom in Jefferson County by myself. There were guards on duty, but I was the only one who was supposed to rest. I got ready for bed, but it had been so long since I’d slept in the bed alone I couldn’t sleep. I finally got up and found an oversized T-shirt, the kind I used to sleep in before I had anyone else in bed with me. There was a pile of stuffed toy penguins against the room’s big picture window. I’d put bird feeders outside it so on the mornings that there wasn’t a vampire in bed with me I could open the storm shutters and watch the birds. I got Sigmund, my favorite stuffed penguin, where he sat in pride of place on a little settee amid the pile of other toy penguins. I lay on the bed with Sigmund in my arms and still couldn’t sleep. I realized I didn’t know how to sleep on my own anymore. Damn.
Pierette finally knocked on the door and asked if I wanted some company, though one of the other guards yelled, “She’s supposed to help you rest, nothing else for a few hours.”
We promised to be good. I took off the sleep shirt, and she curledup nude and warm at my back. I kept Sigmund in my arms, though, so that he was our little spoon as we drifted off to sleep. Hours later Jean-Claude came home to find us asleep. I grabbed him around the neck and tried to drag him into bed with us, but he protested. “Ma petite, I am covered in dirt and debris. I must clean up first.”
I finally blinked awake enough to truly look at him. His black hair was almost gray with dust, the same for the rest of his clothes. I let go of him and just stared. “How bad is the Circus?”
“Bad enough that they would like to evacuate everyone from the underground, but some of us have to stay to make sure there are no more traitors, or damage to parts of the cave system that aren’t on any blueprint we ever filed when remodeling.”
“Did Micah come with you?”
“No, he stayed on site to supervise. Dev stayed with Asher.”
A piece of anxiety that I’d forgotten was sitting inside my chest loosened. “Thank God he woke up.”
“Dev will monitor his energy, but I believe he will be fine metaphysically. Emotionally remains to be seen.”
“Kane said Asher had broken up with him, did you know?”
“I did, but only after he had done it. His therapist thought it was important that he break up with Kane for his own sake rather than for mine or anyone else’s.”
“Agreed,” I said.
Pierette held the sheets in front of her and started to slide out of bed. “I’ll give you some privacy. I’m sure you have much to talk about.”
“Do not leave on my account, I must clean up.” He waved a finger in front of my lips. “Non,ma petite, it must be a quick shower, for dawn is fast upon my heels.”
I had to concentrate to feel it, but he was right. “Okay, shower and come to bed. I can’t promise I’ll be able to sleep again, but I want to curl myself around you.”
“That sounds lovely,ma petite. I will hurry so we do not get all of this on the clean sheets.” He rushed off to go down the hallway to the bathroom with the biggest shower and the biggest bathtub, though there was no time for a bath. It was almost dawn.
“I must see that my master is tucked up safely in his temporary quarters,” Pierette said.
“Thank Pierrot for letting you sleep your shift away with me today.”
“He does not mind, my physical closeness to you and Jean-Claude gains him power, too.” She got dressed, kissed me good-bye, and then hurried to her vampire half. They weren’t romantic with each other, more like partners, but it was still her job to make sure he was safe for the day. Asher had survived losing Kane, Scaramouche hadn’t survived losing his master, so it was better to be careful for everyone’s sake.
I put Sigmund back in his place and was waiting in the bed with just me when Jean-Claude came back. He’d taken time to blow-dry his hair, which meant there was very little time left. He crawled into the warm pocket I’d made under the sheets. The cotton sheets might not be as sensuous as the silk he preferred, but the cotton held warmth better. We lay there facing each other, our arms intertwined, the front of our bodies touching as close as possible. “I feared I had lost you,” he said.
“I was afraid of that, too.”
“When I wake I will raise theardeurin myself and feed upon you; I hope that will chase out this awful sorrow and fear.”
“I used to bitch about having to feed theardeur, but I’d rather feed on lust and love a thousand times over than people’s grief and terror. As long as I’m feeding, they keep feeling these awful emotions. I think if I didn’t stop, it would be like torture. You could break someone’s mind with it.”
