Bone Crossed (Mercy Thompson #4)(49)
Author: Patricia Briggs

When he finished, he looked at Stefan’s stubborn face and shook his head in exasperation. "Stefan, for God’s sake. What are you doing? You belong nowhere. She doesn’t want you. She couldn’t be more plain if she had killed you outright. Estelle is foolish. She thinks she can rule when Marsilia is gone. But I know better. Neither of us is strong enough to hold the seethe unless we could work together – but we will not. There are no ties between us, no love, and that is the only way two nearly equal vampires can work together for long. But you could. I would serve you as faithfully as you have served all these years.

We need you if we are to survive." He had begun pacing again. "Marsilia will see us all dead. You know that. She is crazy – only a crazy woman could put her trust in Wulfe. She’ll have the humans hunting us again, not just this seethe but all of our kind. And we will not survive. Please, Stefan."

Stefan went down on one knee and wrapped his arm around my shoulders. He bowed his head and whispered to me. "I am sorry." Then he stood up. "I am an old soldier," he told Bernard. "I serve only one, even though she has forsaken me." He stretched out his hand, and this time I felt him pull something from me as his sword appeared in his hand. "Would you try me here?" he asked.

Bernard made a frustrated noise, then threw up his hands in a theatrical gesture. "No. No. Please, Stefan. Just stay out of it when the fight begins."

And he turned and ran. It wasn’t like the way Stefan could disappear, but it would have pushed me to keep with him – and I’m fast. It was fast enough that he probably didn’t hear Stefan say, "No."

He stood beside me and watched Bernard until the vampire was out of sight. And he waited a little more. I watched the female slip out of the trees and found another one as he left his cover. That one Stefan raised a hand to and got a salute in return.

"It will be a bloodbath," he told me. "And he is right. I could stop it. But I won’t."

I wondered suddenly why Marsilia had let him live. If he knew where she slept, and no one else did, if he rose before her and could take himself wherever he chose, then he was a threat to her. She surely knew that if Bernard did.

Stefan sat on a likely boulder and linked his hands over a knee. "I meant to come to you when darkness fell," he told me. "There are things I need to tell you about this link between us – " He gave me a shadow of his usual smile. "Nothing dire."

He looked out at the water. "But I thought I’d clean up my front porch a little first. The newspapers have been piling up because no one is living there now." I had the sinking feeling I knew where this was going.

"I was thinking I’d have to call and have the newspaper stopped – and then I read the newspaper. About the man you killed. So I went to Zee and got the full story."

He looked at me. "I’m sorry," he said.

I stood up deliberately and shook as if my fur was wet.

He smiled again, just a quirk of his lips. "I’m glad you killed him. Wish I’d been there to watch."

I thought of where he’d been, tortured by Marsilia, and wished I could watch him kill her as well. I sighed and walked over to him, then put my chin on his knee. We both watched the water flow under the sliver of moon. There were houses nearby, but where we sat it was only us and the river.

Chapter 9

I LEFT STEFAN FINALLY I NEEDED TO GET UP EARLY TO get back to work, and it might be nice to have some sleep. When I glanced back over my shoulder for a last, concerned look, he was gone. I hoped he hadn’t gone back to his house – that didn’t seem like the smartest place for him to hang out – but he would do as he pleased. He was like me in that way.

The lights were on at home, and I redoubled my pace as soon as I saw them. I dove through the dog door and found Warren pacing in the living room. Medea sat on the back of the couch and watched him with an annoyed look on her face.

"Mercy," Warren said with relief. "Get changed; get dressed. We’re attending a peace powwow with the vampires, and you were specifically requested."

I ran into my room and shifted back to human. What with one thing and another, I had a roomful of dirty clothes and nothing more. "We’re talking peace-treaty time?" I asked throwing dirty pants over my shoulder.

"We hope so," Warren said, following me into the room. "Who shot you?"

"Vampire, no biggie," I said. "He wasn’t aiming to kill. I don’t even think any of the shot stuck."

"Nope, but you won’t be happy about sitting down tonight."

"I’m never happy sitting down when there are vampires around – Stefan usually excepted. What did Marsilia say?"

"She didn’t call us, and we couldn’t get a lot of sense out of the vampire who did. She read a note, then giggled a lot."

"Lily?" I looked at Warren.

"That’s what Samuel said." He pulled a shirt off his shoulder, where I must have thrown it, and dropped it on the floor.

"She called him, too?"

He shrugged. "Yes. Marsilia wanted him there, too. No, I don’t know what it’s about, and neither does Adam. However, it’s unlikely that she’s going to annihilate us once we get there. Adam sent me here to bring you when you got back. I think he wanted you dressed, though."

"Smart aleck," I told him, hopping into my jeans. I found a decent bra and put that on. I finally found a clean shirt folded in the shirt drawer. I wondered who’d but it there.

It’s not that I’m not neat. In my garage, every tool is exactly where it belongs at the end of the day. Sometimes there’s a little friction when Zee has been in there because he and I have a different idea of where some of the tools should be.

Someday, when time presents itself, I’ll clean my room. Having a roommate forces me to keep the rest of the house reasonably clean. But no one cares about my room, and that puts it pretty far down on my list of to-dos. It’s below, for instance, keeping solvent, saving Amber from Blackwood, and attending the meeting with Marsilia. I’ll almost certainly get to it before I get around to planting a garden, though.

I pulled on the clean shirt. It was dark blue and emblazoned with BOSCH GENUINE GERMAN AUTO PARTS. Not the shirt I’d have picked out to pay a formal call on the Vampire Queen, but I supposed she’d have to take it or leave it. At least it didn’t have any oil stains.

Warren picked up a handful of jeans and unburied my shoes. "Now all you need is socks, and we can go."

His cell phone rang, and he tossed the shoes at me and answered. "Yes, boss. She’s here and almost dressed."

Adam’s voice was a little muffled, and he was talking very quietly – but I still heard him. He sounded a little wistful.