Where did one begin? So many rooms, so little time?

The house was warded, to begin with. She got past that by sneaking in after Lucien?s frosty little manservant Gwyr after he?d taken the rubbish out. He snuffled and grumbled and cleared his throat at the mist swirling around his knees, and didn?t notice that there wasn?t much in the way of fog farther out in the street.

There were rules and regulations for these sorts of shopping trips. First, she rooted through the house. Some of the rooms smelled off, like traps or magic: she stayed far away from the office, and the basement was completely off-limits. Nothing in the kitchen, dining room, pantry, et cetera, worth having; it wasn?t silverware she was after. She wasn?t a common thief, you see. The closets downstairs were full of clothing and linen, and nothing more.

So?the study, the bedroom. She pulled out a good-sized burlap sack that she?d written the word ?SWAG? on in bold black ink, and got to work.

In the study she found the Courvoisier she?d given him, and helped herself to three of the bottles. The books she searched through, but found no secret passages or hollow tomes holding treasures inside. She barely restrained a crow of triumph when she stumbled upon his violin. Into the bag it went.

She hadn?t seen his bedroom, the night before. Poor darling Lucky, so full of propriety, so gentlemanly. It was sad, really. The room looked like it hadn?t seen a woman, much less a woman?s touch, in years. The manservant?s faint muskiness overlaid the smell of some oily furniture polish. Underneath that, the room smelled overwhelmingly of the lawyer-man. It was a point of pride for her to roll about on his bed and lay her own personal smell down. Take that, lawyer-man.

His closet was a smorgasbord of delights, she discovered when she had to dive into it to escape Gwyr?s suspicions regarding the squeaky noises the floorboards were making. Five of his shirts, a pair of his shorts, and a pair of boots with especially shiny buckles?oooh, shiny?went into the bag. In his bathroom, she stared at the toothbrush for five long minutes before deciphering what it was for. A tablespoon of toothpaste was slathered onto it, and she shoved the whole thing into her mouth.

After the manservant left off his investigations of that noise, she wrote in the foam sprayed all over the mirror: GWYR IS A BIG FAT POOFTER.

Two hours later, she?d gone through the last of his drawers. She was getting ready to absent herself from the premises when she heard the barrister speaking to his busybody servant. A hand clapped over her mouth stifled the squeak of dismay. A look darted around the room showed her the closet, the armoire, the dresser, the tall bed?

?the tall bed?

Getting the SWAG bag under the bed was a bit of a stretch, but she managed. He was going to see the mess on the mirror. He was going to notice the way she?d pawed through all his clothing. She stuffed a fist into her mouth as his footsteps signaled his entrance into the room, and stopped breathing when she heard the door shut. The squeak of the bedsprings above her flattened her out. His boots thunked onto the floor beside the bed, inches from her nose. She didn?t dare blink as the springs squeaked again.

And then?and then?

?and then he started snoring.

Poor tired barrister. She waited another hour, just to be certain, then wriggled out from under the bed and sprang to her feet. He?d fallen asleep atop the blankets and sheets, fully dressed save for his boots (which she eyed covetously before electing to leave alone.)

She smiled down at his dear, silly face turned into the covers. He carried a cloud of ill-concealed anger with him everywhere he went, it seemed; she?d followed him for two nights before showing up at his townhouse for that lovely little fireside chat. A touch of temptation slithered through her, to kiss the frog, to drain him dry, to pat his cheek?

?that?s when she noticed the earring.

It was a pretty little thing, a confection of ivory and gold. She couldn?t help but grin at the sight of it. His breath caught when she slid it out of his ear, but by then she was already dissolving, fading into a mist less noticeable than his own indrawn air.

Five of his shirts, a pair of his shorts, a pair of his boots, three bottles of Courvoisier, his violin and his gilded ivory earring. That was the sum total of items that had been taken from the Barrister.

Gwyr stood at the door of the man's office and watched Lucien pace across the room, flexing his hands at his side, muttering under his breath, and arguing with himself. He calmly stepped aside as a book went sailing past him and crashed in the hall. The faithful manservant knew the contents of the entire house could have been stolen right under their noses and it would not have set the Barrister into the state he was in. He'd witnessed the man turn a blind eye to greater material losses.

However, the loss of the man's violin upset the younger man.

The Barrister was not one to keep a journal or diary and record his memories and thoughts in writing. However, the man's violin was as close to a diary that he kept. The notes and melodies that were drawn out of the instrument resonated with the man's memories, emotions and thoughts. That he rarely played for anyone but himself spoke volumes to the private nature of his performances.

"....right out of my ear!" The loud crash that followed did not even faze Lucien's manservant. More than the loss off his violin, it was the loss of his earring that struck the Barrister the hardest.

The enchanted earring was a gift from the Lady Skye early in their courtship and Gwyr had never seen it off the Barrister's person. Beyond it's magical properties, it signified the risks they were both willing to take. Lucien had held onto it, even worn it through all the trials they faced. Gwyr watched the Barrister sink into his chair and rub his thumb over the palm of his hand. It was the last remaining vestige Lucien had left of Alysia.

The faithful manservant stepped into the man's office and began to straighten the overturned guest chairs silently.

"Gwyr?"

The tone of the Barrister's address stopped him. "Yes Sir?"

"Find her."

"Yes Sir."

The faithful manservant had already done an initial sweep through the structure by the time Lucien got down to the stables. The Barrister ran his hands over his head as he stepped into the building that had been cleaned out of everything...save the muck in the stalls.

"Geesumpetes..." he muttered almost inaudible as he ventured further into the stables. He walked into the stall where the sorrel, his favorite mare, had been kept and looked around, as if some clue would jump out at him to tell him who was responsible, or a hint would strike him to tell him this was a sick joke.

Nothing.

No bridle, no beast, no blankets. Even the tools to clean out the stalls had been stolen. Bastard.

Lucien paced along the stalls, the exasperation in every footstep echoing through the vacant building. This had to be a cruel joke. The carriage...he understood. The horses....as much as it pained him, he understood. Maybe even the bits and saddlebags. But the brushes? The pails? The pitchfork? The... Lucien stopped pacing and shot a look at Gwyr.

"The dog, she was gone when I got here, Sir."

The thief even took the stray dog that followed him home that night.

"I need you to leave for the outpost and bring back a few horses." The quiet tone of the Barrister's voice brook no argument. Gwyr nodded and headed back into the townhouse to prepare his trip, leaving Lucien alone in the vacuous building.

Cold blue gaze swept over the stable before the man whirled around and put a fist through the wall.

Kyrie. She was a study in contrasts, that one. Rebekah knew it. Rebekah saw it. That lovely lithe body under a big shapeless bag of a robe, those sharp black eyes in such a sweetly biddable face, that way of moving that promised poetry and delivered the point of a sword. Oh yes. She?d puzzled out the surface of the relationship between the Priestess and the Barrister; now it was time to dig deeper, to test the supports and look at the structure, to kick the tires and check its teeth. Time to go hunting. And so she did, dancing soundless as moonlight along the rooftop highway, seeking mercy in a woman's name.

She watched the Priestess from her rooftop perch, fingertips light on the shingles. The woman moved as if she had one foot in sea, and one on shore. In between the sands clung to the skin, like the silk of?not such a shapeless robe. Delicious. But perhaps it was the lamplight that lent her silhouette solidity past the softness. Hush, hush, the hem of that long white robe whisked. A hand reached out to find the cold metal of the street's bright sentinel, the tall streetlight burning overhead. She turned about it in a slow arc?the better to see where she'd been, perhaps? An empty road at her back, and an open one stretched before her. Kyrie tipped her head back, as if to navigate by the starlight eclipsed by the lamp. ?Firs' star I see t'nigh', I wish I may, I wish I migh'...?

Rebekah?s ears caught the soft-voiced murmur with ease. The Peredvizhniki were wanderers, artists who in protest against the established artistic community of St. Petersburg set themselves up as an ever-moving counterbalance, mobile exhibitionists who refused to settle either into their supposed place or time. The 10th century Exeter Book contained a poem in Old English about an old warrior, who roamed the cold seas and walked paths of exile. The sad-faced man, the protagonist, the wanderer. Eardstapa. Wanderers. Would they have seen the woman walking the street below, clinging to the lamppost that lit her way, as kin?

?'Ave th'wish I wish t'nigh'...? the soft singsong went on. More Beckett than Brecht, this woman. Waiting for Godot, with a whimsical grace.

Did they get what they wished for, those wanderers? The warrior was long since given over to dust, and the artists were subsumed into the establishment. What did this alabaster arabesque of a woman, this perfectly wrought geometry of form distilled into someone whimsical enough to wish on a star...what did she wish for? This is what drew Rebekah out at last, what led her to walk to the edge of the roof as calmly as a middle-aged middle-management paunchy old git might shuffle out to get his morning paper. This is what led her to drop down into the dark.

Faintly, as she sauntered up behind the woman, she heard half a whisper of the wish itself, ?...untouched....? She deliberately knocked her boot against the cobbles as a warning of her approach. Kyrie?s slow spin became a whiplash at once, silk hissing as the air settled in her sudden stillness, facing the dark and the form that had gone bump in the night.

?I can see,? Rebekah croaked as she straightened, ?what he sees in you.? Her neck crackled and popped as she twisted it this way and that.

The Priestess? ashen lashes shuttered, dark eyes drifted as she, perhaps, sought to put a name to Rebekah?s face. ?O' whom do ye speak??

?Lucien Mallorek.? Rebekah had cleaned up, at least a little: new pants, in a rough-napped leather; and a shirt that might well have been the barrister's; the boots, if not new, were at least not falling apart. She had a way of walking that made her legs seem longer than they really were. And her eyes, my God, they were full of stars...though it might only have been the reflection of starlight reflected in Kyrie's own limitlessly dark gaze.

?I see.? Commendably, Kyrie kept more than a hint of dubiousness from both face and tone. ?If ye know sigh's o' me in other eyes, then ye know m'name. Wha' are ye called??

?Rebekah. Though ofttimes they just call me mad and have done.? Her grin was as sharp as the air after the knife's cut. ?You're the Priestess. And you've no reason to trust me whatever.? Oh, this was such a gamble, but she didn?t have time to win the woman over, didn?t have time. The faerie lord was closing in, she could feel it: terrible fingers slipping through the air, sifting it for proof of her presence.

?Rebekah.? The name of a woman who betrayed a husband and one son for the sake of another. Crafty, and sweetly sly. ?Wha' brings ye ou'?? She might have meant night or North, for they were just on the edges, where the city began to crumble, concrete buckling here and there against the uprising of tree roots.

?Him. And by extension, you. How d'you find the evening, lady ma'am?? She prowled along the remnants of sidewalk until their outstretched hands could lace fingers together and secure an orbit, one around the other. ?Have you got a minute??

?It finds me well, an evidently, so do ye.? Still one hand on the lamp, she gently swayed on her held axis. ?I do. Wha' would ye ask o' me??

?A name.? Rebekah stopped there, at that certain distance, and tucked her hands into the back pockets of her fancy leather trousers. She held her breath. It wasn?t difficult to do; breathing was strictly optional, for her.

The Priestess stilled, suspended. Not even the silk stirred. ?Wha' name...?

?The name of the man or woman or thing or creature what's got the poor git's soul.? Ringlets bounced on her shoulders as she put her head to one side and peered at Kyrie.

?Who 'as Lucien's soul?? She straightened, letting her hand slide off the cold metal. She asked the question as if there were more than one poor git in her life with a missing soul, or as if suspicion drove her to be absolutely clear. ?Will 'e nae tell ye 'imself??

?The name didn't come up during the course of that conversation, 'ey? He was too sodding busy picking apart my problems. As he does. As you well know.? Rebekah?s booted feet settled shoulder-width apart.

?Then perhaps ye should 'ave another conversation,? the Priestess responded, imperturbable.

Hellfire! Rebekah bit back the snarl before it could make the sound it so desperately wanted to make. ?He's coming apart. You see that??

?I see it.?

Part of Rebekah?s paranoid soul was relieved to discover that it was not, in fact, all in her head. Another part grew more frantic yet at the affirmation. ?And you set a secret over the state of his life and his soul? I don't reckon he's in a position to save himself. Not anymore. He's too far gone.? Save for the effort in breathing that it takes to speak, she hadn't moved a muscle. She was afraid that if she did, she?d go for the pale woman?s throat.

?If ye follow 'im as well as ye follow me, ye will see wha' sort o' creature 'as 'is soul.? Silk hissed, though Kyrie did not seem to shift. ?I will nae speak tha' dark wizard's name.?

?Don't reckon it's right for him to be damned for a woman who couldn't even be bothered to live for him, in the end.? Dark wizard. Dark wizard. Dark wizard. The words drummed in her head in place of a pulse.

?We all make our choices.? Though thoughts haunted the corners of her eyes, the Priestess kept silent whatever ghosts possessed her, save to say, ?Love makes us do strange things.?

A laugh like a whip crackled between her teeth. ?You don't know the half of it, Priestess. I'll see you again.? I'll remember you, was wound through the weft of her words.

Perhaps, but whatever part the Priestess did know, she held close. Very close. Hush, hush, whispered the silk robe as she resumed her walk without another word spoken.

(Adapted from live play with Kyrie Elision)

Rebekah was still buzzing with possibilities firing like an electrical storm along her every synapse when she returned to Lucien?s townhouse. The hour was very, very late. Before hunting she?d taken Fio?s jacket, left behind after the debacle with Salvador, to Fio?s house. She?d known about the keys in the pocket of it, of course, but she?d hoped to find one or the other of them there. Well?and they weren?t; so it was their own fault that she?d had to use the keys, now, wasn?t it? She went in. She sat down at the al-Amat kitchen table and spread the pictures that had been in the other pocket of the jacket to have a little look-see. While she was looking at them, she counted off seconds.

Precisely thirty of them passed before a hole in reality opened out in the hallway of the apartment, and Ali al-Amat stepped out of it, guns trained on her head. Nice alarm system. A certain tension had entered the negotiations then, but no one had been attacked, no one was shot, none of that unpleasantness occurred before Fio came home.

The Helston looked at her with those big brown eyes, and a most amazing thing happened to her. She?d ?she?d been perfectly honest. Well, mostly perfectly honest, anyroad.

?Lucien Mallorek is dying,? she told them.

?I saw him just the other night, Rebekah. He looked perfectly healthy to me,? Ali said. Such an ungracious bastard.

?He'll still be walking and talking when it's all over with. Everything looks the same on the outside, 'ey?? she said to them, as Fio aimed her attention like an arrow, as Ali stood above the Helston with his hands tight on her shoulders like he wanted somebody, anybody to strangle. ?But on the inside, he's dying. He sold his soul and he's going to pieces over it. He's losing who he is. There's not going to be any Lucky left, soon.?

?So,? Ali asked her, finally, ?why are you here??

That was the moment in which she?d finally admitted it out loud, past her own terror, past a sick haze of vodka fumes. ?I?m going to get it back for him.?

?How?? the Helston asked her at once. Not why, but how. That made her squirm a little uneasily in her chair.

She covered it with an impatient gesture. ?I?m going to bargain for it, once I find out who?s got it.?

??with what? By your own admission, you?ve been living in the sewers for most of the year,? Ali replied, his expression incredulous.

Then came the second terrible admission. She scowled at the glass of vodka they?d given her once it was established that no, Ali was not going to be allowed to shoot her; and said, ?I?m going to offer the faerie lord in exchange.?

?You?ve got to be joking. How??she came after Fio, by the way, a few weeks ago.?

?Never?you?mind. I?ve a plan for it, that?s all you need to know. I?ve got to know who the dark wizard is who?s got his soul in hock, though. That little bit o? pretty Kyrie refused to tell me.?

Ali shut his eyes in disbelief and resignation. Another bloody plan, she read on his face, clear as daylight. Fio?s expression was more complex, a commingling of hope and mistrust. ?Rebekah,? she said. ?You want information from us. You?re going to need to be a little more forthcoming.?

She almost broke, then, came very close to bending her will over the Helston, of forcing the other woman to tell her what she wanted. But she didn?t do it, stopped herself trying at the last second. And even though she hadn?t, even though the woman was sublimely ignorant of her own capabilities?somehow she?d known it.

?The lord?s weakest inside the boundaries of Arcadia at the dark of the moon,? she?d told them. ?Thought I?d go there, take a few others with me. Maybe you. I know some what would do it for free. You might be a little harder to convince.?

?Arcadia is a long, long way past the Veil, Rebekah,? Ali responded finally.

Well, and she hadn?t truly expected an enthusiastic response, had she? She looked at the Helston to gauge her reaction?and found the woman looking straight-on back at her, something different in her face, something subtle?harder, more calculating maybe. Something that judged her and automatically found her wanting.

?I?ll do what I have to do,? she muttered at them. ?If it means half a dozen bargains, I?ll do it. I don?t care.?

?Why?? Ali demanded of her.

And she didn?t want to answer, but they had the name, she knew it, or they?d not have been so prickly and careful to begin with. She had her mouth half-open to answer, her gaze flicking between the two as she sought an adequate lie?

?Say it, or I won?t believe it.? Even the Helston?s voice had changed, becoming clipped and accentless.

A lie detector? Fabulous. Perhaps Fio wasn?t as ignorant as she?d believed. So she gave them something that was absolutely true, and absolutely meaningless within the hierarchy of her motivations. ?Because I love him. Because I?ve always loved him, as long as I?ve known him. Because he?s a good man, and he deserves better than this.?

?She?s telling the truth,? Fio murmured.

?Somewhere a thousand gods are laughing at us all, can?t you tell?? Ali responded to her, just as quietly.

?The name.? Rebekah prompted them.

It didn?t matter; she might as well have not been in the room, for all the attention they paid her. Fio looked up at her husband, who looked down at her in return. ?I trust your judgment,? she said to him, and Ali almost, almost flinched at that?it was a little thing, quickly controlled, but it made one wonder.

Then he looked up. ?Lord Veighn Yhaull,? he said, and her dead heart clenched tight in victory, there in her chest. ?I?m told he just opened a shop in town.?

She?d made her exit as quickly as she dared, after that, her mind afire with plans and possibilities. She?d hunted, then she?d gone back to the townhouse, watched it slumbering under the night?s heavy hand for long minutes before waking Lucien to be let in.

Once he went to bed, she spent a restless hour or two roaming the ground floor of the building: chewing her nails, arguing with herself, discarding this plan or that. Gwyr?s absence meant that nothing was quite as tidy as it ought to be; when she walked into the kitchen, she found the towels she?d used to clean up with still lying on the floor. Meaning to burn them, she swept them up and took them to the still-smoldering fire.

That was when she saw the letter, crumpled up on the floor. She plucked it up and read it. Then she read it five times before she was certain that she wasn?t dreaming. Clutching it as close to her heart as her own hope, she ran from the house.

(The story of Rebekah?s bargain with Lord Veighn Yhaull continues here.)

Once upon a time...

Le Caf? Carrefour. The Crossroads Caf?. Streetlights filtered through the leaves on the trees lining the Boulevard Saint-Germain in Paris. A crowd of chattering women clattered by, delighted to have given up their winter wool for summer?s flash and glitter. A rumble of engine exhaust trailed behind them as a car passed. Somewhere nearby a man was playing a flamenco guitar, plucking the strings faster than Rebekah could possibly think. She was on the Left Bank of the Seine, the river faintly flavoring the air under the heavier currents of petroleum, food, old stone and humanity. She?d completely lost track of time.

She slouched a little deeper in the chair on the sidewalk and stared at the untouched bottle of wine on the table before her. The play of light spilling out of the windows of the caf? conflicted with the shadows of the awning overhead and the headlamps of the cars driving past, making the print on the bottle?s label difficult to read. She didn?t care, especially. She certainly wasn?t going to drink it. Vin rouge, she?d told the waiter. As ordinaire as you can sodding well make it. He?d complied, and hadn?t come outside since. It was just as well; she was the only one sitting at the sidewalk tables of this overpriced pretension to a historic past. Hemingway drank here, read a little brass plaque by the door, and Oscar Wilde loved the oysters. Buggering liars, the lot of them. She knew for a fact the place was only twenty years old.

The big bells at the Abbaye de Saint-Germain-des-Pr?s rang out a resonant change of the hour. Rebekah counted out twelve bells. Midnight. As the last stroke faded into a breathless hush, a woman slid into the chair across the table from her.

Well. Rebekah blinked once. That was different. She allowed her gaze to slowly wander upward. A smart red suit, tailored to fit a slender frame. Long fingers held a clutch purse close. Red fingernails. A deep vee of pale skin revealed by the suit, the exact color of the stucco on the building behind her. Gloriously white, perfectly straight hair spilled over shoulders, framed a neck made for sinking one?s teeth into. A small pointed chin, a rosebud mouth every bit as red as the suit. Prominent cheekbones pulled the face into a heart shape. The eyes were a dark and fathomless blue. The right eyebrow, as white as the hair, was uplifted in an arch query.

Rebekah kept her breath from catching with an effort. The woman was fantastically beautiful, and she felt an instant kick of lust in her gut. She was perfectly beautiful. She was too beautiful. The woman?s face tilted just slightly, and all at once the vision became hallucination: the nose and lips too small, the eyes and forehead too large. Everything about that face slid out of sync, became alien. Not human, whispered a little voice inside her. She trusted the whisper, and admitted further evidence when a single deep breath proved that the woman had no scent whatever.

?Bonsoir, Rebekah,? said the woman to her, in a voice like nightingales yearning for love. Rebekah watched the woman?s lips move as she spoke; and that, too, was out of sync. Well. Well, well, well. She?d wandered a long way from Rhydin over the years. She?d stayed away from the Followers of Set, kept a low profile, played her own games and stayed out of trouble. And yet?trouble managed to find her.

?Ouais?? she croaked. A fast glance around proved them alone, but she switched to English nevertheless. There was a slightly smaller chance of anyone overhearing and understanding them, and it might tell her what this creature was. ?And who are you??

?May I drink?? The woman replied, indicating the bottle and glass with a glance. Her English was just as flawless as her French.

?Go on,? Rebekah said, and watched the woman.

Miss White-hair poured the wine and held it up to the light as if she honestly cared about its legs, then took a tiny experimental sip. After the fourth or fifth sip, the fifth or sixth coy glance, Rebekah realized that the level in the glass hadn?t dropped at all, and she also realized that she?d had quite enough.

?So?? she demanded. ?D?you really expect me to believe you went to the trouble of digging up my name so you could sit here, drink crap wine, and make eyes at me??

The woman?s mouth curved up into a tiny enigmatic smile. Her fingers curled around the bowl of the glass, and the graceful curve of her neck deepened. She did not answer, but sipped at the wine once more.

Watching her, Rebekah was hit by another surge of desire, muddled and urgent, dreamlike. The frisson of unease tingling in her fingertips intensified. ?Quis es?? she repeated herself, this time in Latin: who are you? And waited for the answer.

?Ignosce mihi,? the woman said. Forgive me. ?Vini avidus sum.? I am greedy for wine. The level in the glass still had not dropped. ?I have invested this avatar with more of myself than I normally do,? she continued, reverting to English, ?and I had forgotten the pleasures of mortal senses.?

Absolute ice flashed over Rebekah?s skin. Avatars? Gods, demigods, mages who?d given up life for power in the depths of the Ether?what else might she be? She kept her face smooth with an effort.

?I am the Keeper of the Balance,? the woman murmured like sorrowing birdsong. ?You may call me Eiderdown. I would like very much to sign you to a contract, Rebekah bint Tariq al-Ishraq.?

Faerie, whispered that little voice. A title, the name, a contract, an avatar. It made sense. She was sitting across a table from the physical focus of an elder lord of faerie. A monster that made Rebekah herself look like a puling child in a mud puddle, and it was dressed in a chic suit and smiling at her with Roswell eyes. The guitarist stopped playing mid-verse.

She was so f**ked.

?There are five books that were once in my possession,? Eiderdown was going on between tastes of wine, as Rebekah wrestled her terror under control. ?They have been taken from me. I have neither the time nor the inclination to recover them myself, and so I would like to employ you to bring them back to me.?

?Five books.? Rebekah thought she sounded remarkably calm. She was very proud of that. Hadn?t lost her touch, no. ?Reckon you?ll forgive me if I don?t leap up to sign straight off.?

The avatar of Eiderdown gestured with the glass; Rebekah, watching it, saw it drag through the air a fraction of an inch later than the stucco-pale hand. Not as if it were sinking into the thing?s flesh, but as if time were being perverted somehow, an overlay, a juxtaposition of the Dreaming from which the faerie came and reality?her mind balked at further contemplation, shuddering away from the thought itself.

?Consider this an interview, for both of us. We will talk, and we will see how we deal with each other. If we do not suit, I shall depart and nothing more will be required. You are quite safe, for the moment. This I swear on the heart of Arcadia. Tell me, Rebekah, why were you made??

?What?? Her relief was arrested by the non sequitur of a question.

?For what purpose were you made??

?I?? who had asked her that? Ever? ??you want to know about my Embrace??

?Yes. If you explained it, the reasoning behind certain of my intuitions will perhaps reveal itself. Please.? The tiny smile put in another brief appearance. ?I am simply dying to know.?

The memories were so old that they had become caricatures of themselves, tenth-generation copies of copies, the delicate silver tints of the desert at night broken down into a rough-edged sepia. Rebekah unearthed them, turned them over, held them in her spread and empty hands. What had this to do with anything? How could the faerie use it against her? All Setites were born to corruption, but Rebekah?s particular flavor had its own twist.

She reassessed what she knew. Faerie were bound by their word. The elder lords were further bound to Arcadia, their own bloated power unable to sustain itself for long outside the borders of the heart of the Dreaming. Beached whales, that was the analogy. What else? They could not lie, but they made up for it by being abominably clever, twisted as fallen angels, wicked as the birth of sin. She kept her hands in her lap instead of running them over her face as she wanted. They were bound by their word. If she were very careful about the contract, if she kept her word and her head, if she managed her risks, she could come away from this with everything she?d ever wanted.

?My family and I were camped three days? ride from Medina,? she said at last. ?We were riding south to Mecca for the hajj. I was to be married afterward to a merchant that my father knew. I was afraid. I couldn?t sleep.

?Can?t say how he got past the guards. He looked young, seemed very handsome. I was unmarried, you see. My life was circumscribed. Hadn?t so much as seen a man who wasn?t family, ?ey? My mother said that the merchant would be a good provider. But I had heard from my brother, who had met him, that he was old and fat. No teeth. Like that. When this man came into my tent and my mother and our maid slept right through our talking, I thought he was an angel come to rescue me from my fate. And he was, I suppose. Only not as I?d imagined.? Rebekah felt the smile twist itself crooked inside, but never let it get to her face.

Eiderdown nodded, her great almond eyes inscrutable. ?Why did he choose you??

?He was looking for dinner, and I was the only one awake. He meant to drink and have done, he told me later, but he found me sitting over my father?s shatranj board.?

?What is that?? Something in the avatar?s gaze sharpened to a painful focus.

?It is...? Rebekah frowned. ?A game. Chess came out of it.?

?The sight of you playing chess stayed his hand??

?He asked me what I was doing. I told him that I was thinking on a game. He wanted to know whether I enjoyed games. It never occurred to me to lie?he was my angel, why shouldn?t I tell him the truth? I said that I adored them. He said that he would teach me far better games than that, took my hand, and led me out of the camp. I died that very night.?

?Games.? The avatar?s razor stare was fixed on a point just over her left shoulder. ?Ah. Yes. I understand, now.? Eiderdown blinked at her and smiled, lovely and wry. Rebekah felt that helpless craven craving anew, and licked her lips. It had to be nearly one o?clock. Why hadn?t the caf? closed? Rebekah risked a look over her shoulder to discover the four men manning the place sitting at a table, cigarettes burning down to ashes, glasses full of wine untouched. They were staring at the avatar with expressions of such sick longing on their faces that she felt her own lust roll over and die.

?Don?t worry about them,? Eiderdown caroled. ?They will not remember.?

?It?s not them I?m worried about,? Rebekah muttered. ?Suppose I find the books for you. What do I get in return??

?What would you like?? The avatar swirled the wine in the glass.

Nothing ventured, Rebekah told herself. ?I want to be mortal again.?

The faerie examined her as if she were an especially fascinating insect. ?Do you? Your mortality could be regained by the simple expedient of killing you. Surely that is not what you want??

No, the lust was definitely, unequivocally dead. Rebekah suppressed a shudder. ?Human. I want to be alive and human.?

?Ah,? the avatar said again. ?Yes. You will do.?

I?m dead now.

That?s not a real big surprise. I mean, it happens to everybody, am I right? Well, except those undead motherf**kers. Anyway, I always kinda hoped that I?d end up with cancer, cough up a lung or a pancreas or whatever, and bite it. As much as I smoked, I figured that was what was gonna happen if everything else didn?t get me. But the odds said that everything else was gonna get me, even as careful as I played it. So I enjoyed myself while I could, and let me tell you, it was a wild f**king ride. Were you around that night I got the bounty on Madison Rye? That was badass in ways I could not even begin to describe.

But when I did finally buy it?I mean, I expected a knife, maybe. Thought I?d get shot, or something bigger and badder than me would flatten me. I was a good mage, no lie, but I was pretty low on the totem pole in the greater scheme of things. What I did not f**king expect was to be eaten alive by shadows. It was every bit as bad as the nightmares?the ones that you had when you were four years old?led you to believe. Worse. I?ve seen what?s left of me in the boneyard, and it?s f**ked up. Now that I?m dead and it does me no goddamned good, I even know who did it. That *sshole leech Sinjin Fai.

He?s part of this, see. It?s all connected. I don?t know what the f**k Rebekah thinks she?s up to, writing this s**t out all third-person coy like it?s someone else telling the story, but believe me, she?s leaving out some important parts. Stretching the truth. Screwing with your head, making herself out to be some kind of martyr. Whatever. Look. Here?s the truth.

First off, she killed that kid Anne?s mom, then basically locked her up alone in that hotel for six months. Then she dumped her on Ali. Then Ali couldn?t handle Anne, because big f**king surprise, Anne?s crazy, and he dumped her on the courts. They didn?t know what to do with her either. I get that. I mean, it?s probably more than any one foster family can handle to have this cute little eight-year-old offering blowjobs in exchange for a later bedtime, then setting the house on fire when she didn?t get her way.

Second, she makes it sound like she was all crafty and careful with Eiderdown, specifying living humanity in the deal they cut. See, this sets you up to believe later that Eiderdown betrayed Rebekah. She didn?t. You gotta be careful with the fae, and Rebekah wasn?t. Stupidity hurts, I know. I guess that?s why she feels like she has to rewrite the story to make herself look good. All Rebekah asked for in exchange for the books was mortality, and you better f**king believe that Eiderdown was going to give that to her exactly the way Rebekah foreshadowed it with that story earlier, only Sinjin and Ali and their little butt buddies hauled her sorry *ss out of the fire.

I was there for that part. I had to be, see. I was working for Eiderdown all along.

But I?m getting ahead of myself. I?ll start at the beginning.

So as I was saying. Hello, Amazon f**king Basin. I was up against a tin wall that probably had jaguars waiting on the other side of it, listening to the rain hammer on the roof so hard that I couldn?t think, drinking really bad beer. I like Mexican beer, don?t get me wrong. This tasted like it was brewed out of somebody?s outhouse, though.

I knew who she was as soon as she walked in. She didn?t have the flat Aymara face that everybody else around there had, or the dark skin, or the beaten-down hardness. She danced in smiling, like she didn?t see every man in the place look at her and think ?rape rape rape.? It just reinforced my opinion of her?vampire or not, this chick was dumb. She was wearing some kind of long coat that was soaking wet, and her hair was plastered all snaky to her face.

She skipped right up to me and asked, ?Judah Bishop?? She sounded like Billie Holiday and Bobcat Goldthwait had a baby. Funniest goddamned thing I?d ever heard.

Once I was done laughing, I said, ?Yeah, that?s me. Sit down, have a s**tty beer with me.?

We talked until almost sunup, moving to a cinderblock house I?d rented out once the bar closed. I revised my earlier opinion of her from stupid to stupid and crazy. The things Eiderdown told me about Anne made more sense. I felt kind of sorry for her on the one hand, knowing she was slated to die. On the other?she was a leech, who f**king knew how many people she?d killed already, and she got herself into this.

I kept it together, though. We made plans to hunt for the book that was in cyberspace, set up terms of payment, discussed options for the other books. I kept my armor up, just in case, but she never even tried to put a move on me.

We found the one book about a month later, on the cyberspace side of London. I told her I?d damaged it?you should have seen her freak the hell out when I told her that, but I said the contents were okay?and that it needed to stay where it was. She picked up two of the others?I didn?t know what she?d done with them at the time, but it turns out she gave one to Sinjin and one to Ali for safekeeping until she had them all ready to turn over to Eiderdown. (Again, stupid. She should have kept them together. But it helped me, as you?ll see in a minute.) It was really starting to look?doable. Boring as f**k. We were down to the one the dude Nia had, and the one Anne had.

I thought about it, and then I realized that Eiderdown gave me an out. A way to make more money, a way to work a little fun in.

So I went to Anne.

Once upon a time, not so long ago?

It was an unassuming little clearing in the old pine forests south of the city of Rhydin. A paved road wandered a winding path through the trees to the open space and ended there. There was a pad carved out of the brush, big enough for a helicopter or a full-sized truck, and a concrete-reinforced ramp led downward into the rich black earth. There was a glow of electric lighting from below, but it was not enough to pierce the darkness where she watched and waited.

The mage Judah Bishop had received new information. The house in town was a ruse, a blind, a trap; this was where Anne was hiding. A hole in the ground. Rebekah?s fertile imagination conjured up images of rats and worms and bugs, things that crawled in the earth rather than lived above it. Her daughter deserved better than this, surely.

Fifty feet out, where she stood at the edge of the treeline, her supernaturally enhanced senses could only detect a whiff of chemicals, a hint of diesel exhaust. Over and above the sounds of the world living and dying in the time just after sunset, she heard the sighing of vents and fans circulating air, and the sound of an engine running. She could discern no heartbeats or breathing, no conversation.

Well. Perhaps Anne had assembled an army of the dead to crawl about in her foxhole with her. It was not beyond the realm of possibility. Rebekah rubbed her hands up and down her arms, then spread them wide and gave herself over to dissolution.

In mistform her senses were just as dissociated as her body: the world became a frantic shifting puzzle, muted and jagged, the edges overlapping and shifting past without pause. This was earth, said something like her fingers, and her vision picked out insect life sprawled out in half a dozen different dimensions. Her thoughts were in pieces, sluggish, unable to assemble the overload of information into the coherent whole to which she was accustomed. It was so useful, the mistform, but she hated it, hated the reminder of how close to madness her existence lay.

I must go here, said a thought, and she drifted toward the ramp. Her toes, her hair, one shoulder skimmed the surface of the pad. Too many ears explained to one thought that the engine sounded like a generator. Another thought wondered why a generator would be run in an enclosed space, but the two did not converge. Down the ramp she went, sniffing concrete and looking with a fly?s kaleidoscope vision at the buzzing light that illuminated the cavernous room below. There were columns, and painted lines, and a place for a guard to sit, and her jangling thoughts decided that perhaps it was a parking garage. There should be a way in, down, deeper, darker, they chimed in together, and she began to sift herself toward the far wall of the garage.

She made it precisely to the center of the space when the trap was sprung. There was no wall, nothing for her to hear, smell, see; but she felt herself brush against it and stick like glue, felt it wrap around her like bands of iron and tear her every shrieking molecule out of the air and into an assemblage of herself again.

As she stood immobilized in the middle of the garage, her rolling eyes caught sight of a door opening in the far wall. An entire circus? worth of freaks gamboled and capered through it. Some of them were missing limbs, some faces. There were pigmen and dogmen, men with tails, with wings, horrific wet squirming things that yowled in delight at the sight of her. None of them were clothed, and most?might have been male, once, but they were now so mutilated that it was impossible to know for certain. They walked and lumbered, limped and shambled their way into a rough half-circle around her. All of the ones with hands carried large-caliber pistols. All of the pistols were pointed at her.

The center of the circle parted like a curtain drawing aside for the beginning of the grand show, and a young woman stepped through. She had long blonde hair and great limpid dark eyes. The long skirt of her white dress fluttered at her ankles, revealed her bare feet.

She smiled at Rebekah and said, ?Hello, Mother.?

Allahu akbar, Rebekah whispered in the screaming silence of her skull, Allahu akbar. God is great, God is great, over and over. She could not move, could not reach for the earth or shift her shape or even speak. There was no getting out of this. Allahu akbar.

?You abandoned me,? Anne said in a voice every bit as lovely as her face. ?Let me show you what it?s like.? Turning to the things flanking her, she instructed, ?Shoot her until she has no face left. When the field lets her go, you will know to bring her inside.?

As Anne turned to leave, Rebekah?s head was suddenly released from whatever held it immobile. She struggled in an instant, whipped it back and forth, but could do nothing more?running through her bag of tricks availed her not at all.

?Anne!? she screamed, as the door opened and the graceful girl stepped through it. ?Anne! Please!?

Then the monsters began to shoot and her mind splintered like poor Humpty Dumpty's shell, never to

Once upon a time, not so long ago...

Something wavers through her awareness, something fey and strange and distant...a radio playing scratchy tunes in another room, the sparkle and twitch of lightning on the horizon. That old time gospel music resolves a note at a time into the sound of a woman?s voice. Color bleeds across her eyes, melts into her retinas. Dark, murky color...striated dark marble that has been etched over with chalk in unreadable scripts, unrecognizable symbols that nevertheless invoke a primitive, feral horror.

She knows herself. She is Rebekah, Tariq?s daughter. Al-Ishraq: The Illumination. She was human. She is not human, now. Now she is a miracle, a vampire, a Follower of Set. She remembers the bullets crushing her face, battering her skull, tearing holes in her head. She recalls an apotheosis of pain, and then?nothing. She cannot recall why she was shot. She remembers the urgency of her task: there was a faerie lord whose books were stolen by?by whom? The bullets took more than her beauty, more than her consciousness, she realizes.

As she fumbles through her memories, she gains a little more knowledge. Proprioception tells her that she has all her limbs; she is lying flat on a hard surface. A table. Her arms and legs will not move. This is, she thinks, not only because there are metal bands strapping her down to the table. There are also people standing around it. Their faces are obscured somehow, blurred, ciphers. They are women, all of them?this is indisputable even though they wear cloaks hiding their forms. They are indisputably women because they are holding her down with sharp, cruel fingers. It takes six of them to do so, apparently, though she is not moving.

Everywhere around her there is the stink of rotting blood, of corpses collapsing into putrefaction. The stench has a physical presence. It whispers into her ear stories of experiments gone horribly wrong, of delight and joy taken in torture. Some of it, she thinks, was her own?but if that is so, she wonders, then why have they stopped? She is not in pain now. Despite that absence, she is afraid. She believes absolutely that she is going to die in this place, with its hard faceless shadow-women and its sullen wavering candlelight.

At her right hand is another woman, this one like a shaft of light cast into the murky room, tall and proud and inhumanly beautiful. The woman wears no concealing cloak. She has long blonde hair, dark brown doe's eyes. She is flawless. She is extraordinary. Anne, whispers a voice from one of those myriad holes in her head. Anne, she decides, is the one who stole all the books. She, Rebekah, came into Anne?s redoubt to retrieve a book or several books. She was captured. They shot her. She was cut with small sharp knives, fed just enough blood to heal her, cut again.

Anne is speaking, now. ?Surely you did not think you were going to get away with this?? Rebekah has the sense that this is not the first time she has spoken those words. There is a certain ennui in her adopted daughter?s adult voice. The words are rote.

?How did you find me?? Rebekah asks. She recognizes her own words as well. Her voice is broken and rasping.

Anne laughs, high and sweet. ?Ali and the mage sold you out. Did you think they would not care for money more than you? Ali hates you for what you did to him. And the mage is only interested in money.?

Fear stabs through her, sharper than those delicate little knives employed for her torment. ?The lord will not forgive this.? Rattling shudders wrack her small frame, under the sharp hands of the six women.

?The lord will never know, mother dearest.? Even her voice is music in the marble-walled room.

?They're wrong, you know.? Ali and the mage. She scrabbles for an answer, for some way to redeem herself, to pin the blame on someone else. Desperation rides every nerve. Terror makes love to her dead heart. ?It wasn't me. I was running for Sinjin. Sinjin masterminded the whole thing for the lord.?

Anne pauses. Her head tilts. Rebekah senses that this is a new answer, something not given during their previous conversations. As her vision fades under the force of all that fear, the room going blurry as if seen underwater, Anne?s distorted angelic voice speaks again. ?Hmm. That's as may be. We'll have to find him too. We may as well put you up for safekeeping until we do.?

The words have a finality to them. The hands on her arms and legs tighten. And then Anne lays her cool fingers on Rebekah?s naked chest, and true agony begins as her flesh is reshaped. All the terror and certainty of death was a mere prelude to this. Every bone in her body is being broken and reknit, over and over again. Every organ is simultaneously stretched and crushed. Her universe is red raw pain more pure than any truth...and then it fades, as does the sight of Anne's face, smiling impossible beauty at her.

That is the last thing she sees, her daughter?s gently smiling face. After that there is only darkness; and the sounds of her own screams ringing in her ears, screaming for blood, seas and oceans and worlds of blood to feed her thirst and heal her hurt, forever and ever, hunger without end.

Lucien had not realized the carriage had pulled up in front of his home until the driver rapped on the door and asked if they were at the correct location. So engrossed was he in his own thoughts that the barrister missed the odd looks from his neighbors as he walked up to his front door. So consumed was he with his musings over recent exchanges that stirred his ire that he didn't hear a long time elderly neighbor call his name. The barrister unlocked his front door and walked into his home without any idea that anything might be amiss.

He shut the door behind him and latched it. That offered the first inkling something was not right. The sound of the securing lock carried a sharper and hollower edge to it. So did the sound of his own footsteps. The second inkling was that it felt...colder...in the house, even with the warmer weather. Nevertheless the sound and the temperature differential were so slight, they didn't trigger any immediate alarms.

However, the barrister was stopped cold when he stepped into his office...and found the room completely bare. His desk, and moreso the contents he kept in it, his books, his chairs, even the rug on the floor...everything had been stripped from the room.

Bekah! was his first panicked thought. He raced up the stair, taking the steps two at a time to the upper floors. He was heading for her room when he passed the first spare bedroom off the second floor landing and skidded to another cold stop. All the contents of that room was also gone. It had also been stripped down to the walls, the floors and structure. Anything that wasn't nailed down was gone, from cabinet to chamber pot. A search through every room in the house revealed the same thing...each room stripped bare. His own bedroom was not spared: it was devoid of any furnishings, clothing or other personal possessions.

Lucien's footsteps thundered through the empty house as he raced back downstairs. He was about to whip around the newel post and head down to the basement to check it. However it wouldn't be necessary. He would not have to see the basement to know that whatever possessions he had there were gone as well.

Hands slipped into his pockets and the man's shoulders sank. His steps were hushed and deliberate as he made his way into the study. Lucien shook his head as he saw the bottle and the two glasses. Lips pressed to a thin line as he looked over the chess board set up for battle. Not a sound was made as he reached down and picked up the note written in her hand.

The breath he had been holding he let out silently as the note was crumpled in his hand.

?It started when I spoke to you for the first time, d?you remember? I brought you your retainer.? One case of cognac, value inestimable, a bottle of which was now sitting in an empty room, abandoned.

?I remember,? he said and wrapped his arms more snugly around her waist as the horse passed through the gate in the city?s wall, headed north. Tough and competent men, poised and flint-eyed, armed with halberds and laser pistols, watched them pass through and returned to their duties.

?Didn?t know about your soul, then, I didn?t. And I thought?you seemed so unhappy.? The sounds of Rhydin?s strange night insects swelled around them. This close to the city the road was broad, paved and welcoming; the sorrel?s hooves clopped a steady accompaniment to her tail. Rebekah settled her head against the barrister?s shoulder.

?It wasn?t hard to see, eh?? he muttered.

?I thought it was that you'd settled too hard into your life, 'ey?? His chest at her back was warm as the promise of life itself through the thin fabric of her t-shirt. Surely if he looked hard enough at her, she thought, he?d see the alabaster and iron of her old bones shining through her flesh. She felt him nod, press a kiss against her shoulder; and she went on. ?So I thought, well, I'd help you with that. And I thought, you know, if I took the things away, it might give you a different way of looking at it all, 'ey??

He let out a long breath. ?That's why you took the horses and the violin,? he murmured. ?And...? He shook his head then, words evidently failing him.

?Right.? She nodded, curls rustling against his chin. ?Only I had it all wrong.? She took a turn through the trees lining the road; the cobblestones soon devolved into dirt. Between her knees, the beating of the mare?s great heart was soothing as a lullaby.

?Wrong?? he queried. ?About??

?The source of your unhappiness. But it was too late by then.? Turning her face up, she gave him her most marvelous grin. ?So I thought I might as well follow through and get your attention.?

?That you certainly did, Bekah.?

?Did you worry?? She asked him, as they went further into the trees where the fairyflies sparkled and sputtered. The road began to bear left. She slowed the horse, eased her into the tall grass on the right-hand verge. When a barely visible path opened up, she took it without hesitation. The horse, used to the way, did not hesitate either.

?No.?

?Were you angry?? she wondered next, as the big old trunks swallowed them whole.

She felt him nod, heard him reinforce the gesture with, ?Yes.?

?Mm.? She mulled that over for the next few minutes, as the path led deeper and deeper into the woods. Outrageously-sized ferns and smaller trees brushed their knees. A close inspection would show recent activity up and down the path: a few branches broken, the marks of cartwheels in the soft soil.

?You had taken things that were important to me. Things I thought I needed,? he said into the subtle thumping of the sorrel?s hoofbeats.

She nodded, mulled that over as well as the path straightened out. Starlight and moonlight made themselves visible through the dense canopy overhead as it thinned. ?And did you?? She?d timed it just so, asking him the question as the scenery changed dramatically.

The path opened out into a meadow, almost perfectly round, ringed by trees on all sides and sloping up into a hillside on the far end. Running water told a story of its own: spilling down from an abrupt rocky outcrop, it ran over the lip of the stone and tumbled into a pool at the foot of the hill. Lucien?s other horse lifted its head from its grazing by the pond, whickering a cheerful greeting. Her coat sheened blue-black in the light of the moon-and-a-half; after one last demure glance, she returned to her dinner.

?Did I what?? He sounded distracted as he asked the question; in the next instant he was dismounting, sliding down the one horse and crossing the meadow to the other as soon as his boots touched.

?Did you need them?? She asked his retreating back.

?Not all of them,? floated back to her.

Smiling, she followed suit, touching down and catching the mare?s reins to lead her off toward the waterfall.

?Hey, stranger,? he was whispering to the other horse as Rebekah ambled past; with love in his voice and gentleness in the hands that ran over the sleek black coat.

She left him to it and took care of the one they?d ridden, pulling off the blanket and bridle, occupying herself with currying the horse with a brush she?d produced from?somewhere. The sorrel stood still for it, drowsy, a hip cocked as though it were a ritual between them. Patting the mare?s rump, she turned and disappeared into the yawning darkness behind the falling water.

He found her there after his happy reunion was concluded. The barrister walked warily, cautiously into the mouth of the cave; she heard his footsteps over the steady crash of the water, and smiled where she sat on a square bale of hay, cleaning the bit. There was only a pace or two of darkness before the light crept in; around an outcropping of rock the tunnel split in two directions. Straight forward it opened out into a larger space, lit by the familiar glow of Lucien's own oil lamps. To his right, the contents of his stable were arrayed for safekeeping, with tack hung from the walls, hay bales arranged, buckets stacked, and saddles and blankets on sawhorses.

He stared, and stared, and stared, dumbstruck. When at last he spoke, it was to give her one of his signature expressions: ?Geesumpetes,? he said.

?Reckon you wouldn't've liked it if I?d pawned it all.? She croaked, smiling still, head bent, her focus on the piece of steel and cloth in her hand. ?Rest of it's down the hall.? She tipped her head in the direction of the deeper cave.

He stood there watching her, the endless rain outside providing a backdrop for the scene. Then he turned and walked away, venturing deeper into the cave. She knew what he?d see: the coatrack that belonged in the front hall, and the umbrella stand; the bar, and stacks of books, and sticks of firewood for a fireplace that existed in another part of the world. Further along was his armoire, the bed neatly reassembled; the mirror and stand and pitcher from his bathroom. There was the massive desk from his office, and the chair neatly set behind. The floor and walls were so smooth that they had to have been finished by hand or machine, rather than nature; the bizarre homeliness of the scene was furthered by the rugs she'd stolen and laid out to soften the rock.

Her bootheels thump-thumped down the corridor until she reached the edge of the rugs; then she stopped, crossed her arms, and surveyed him surveying his possessions. His fingertips brushed over the surface of his desk as if to test its essential reality as he walked past it slowly. He stopped and stood in the middle of his recreated bedroom and looked at it all. With his back to her she couldn?t see his face, and mourned the lack.

?Incredible,? he murmured under his breath.

?Welcome home,? she told his back and went on watching him, toying with half a smile.

There was a beat of silence as he glanced over the space once more. ?I like what you've done with the place,? he remarked quietly as he turned to face her. She had to hastily clap a hand over her mouth to stop herself hee-hawing like a mule. Sweeping his arms out to encompass the space, he asked, ?How did you?do this??

?One piece at a time.? When he crossed to her and took her hand she tickled her fingers along his broad palm and asked him again, ?Are you hungry? There's the cheese you bought, and a loaf of bread, and I think some grapes.?

?Yes. I could use a bite to eat,? he said, surrendering to the inevitable. ?Was this where you stayed and hid out??

She tugged the man off toward the ?kitchen,? where freestanding cabinets held dishes, and a table from another room had been repurposed to hold the contents of the countertops. The kitchen table sat waiting, with the big cast iron pot from the kitchen fireplace squatting beside. ?It was, though I hid a lot deeper than this. They go for miles and miles, and connect up with the sewers under the city.?

He sat down on the bench at the kitchen table, although he didn't loose his hold on her hand. Looking up at her, he asked, ?How long??

Damnable memory. What she?d had before was bad enough, and Anne?s blowing her bloody head off rendered it useless. The past streamed and swam around her. ?I've stayed here off and on for?five years, I think? I found it after my house burned. But I was living in Infinity City, then. I hadn't any need for it.?

Pale blue eyes moved past the furnishings and casework to the walls themselves before returning to her. ?What made you finally seek me out??

?I needed someone to talk to,? she said. It was one of the more honest things she?d ever told him. ?About everything that had happened. I couldn't trust my feelings for Sinjin and Salvador, and my relations with Ali are...? it took half a minute?s pondering before she finally decided on, ??complicated. You weren't ever anything but fair and honest with me, even when it wasn't what I wanted to hear.?

Another memory swam past: her in her stiff blue silk dress, sitting on a carriage bench; the barrister seated across from her. Her entreaty, his gentle but firm denial of what she?d wanted: him. ?I trusted that.?

Lucien tugged lightly on her arm and pulled her to him. ?I?m glad you did, Bekah. I?m glad you came back.? His voice was sure and solid, as solid as the arms she went into like a promise, as real as the muscled chest under her cheek. He smelled of wood shavings and fine leather. ?A lot of history between you two.?

Ali. ?Something like that, yes.? She rolled his heartbeat around the walls of her skull, comforted by it. ?He tried to kill me when he was a boy; it could only go up from there, 'ey??

?You've known him that long?? he asked, patently surprised.

?He was eighteen or nineteen. I'm not sure how old he is now, honestly.? Time was a slippery bastard. She was nearly as bad at time, these nights, as she was with names.

?He was hunting you?? His tone was very deliberate, as if he entertained thoughts of revenge.

?Mm-hm. That was what he did, back then, you know. I was Nexus-hopping with my childe Nicholas, looking for a safer Egypt for us. Found that one. I thought it technologically advanced enough that those old feuds would be behind everyone. I was mistaken.? She rubbed her cheek against him.

Slowly he trailed a caress over her arm. He drew another deep breath...her mouth quirked at herself as she caught herself remarking silently on it. He seemed to be deliberating; when he finally spoke, it was to ask, ?So what happened with Ali that got him to stop??

?We got away from him that weekend. He followed me here, to Rhydin, and I eventually persuaded him to a truce. And so it's been.? The sheer staggering weight of history left out of that explanation could have filled a twelve-volume set, but now was neither the time, nor the place.

A comfortable silence settle over them again for a breath or two, before he broke it to ask, ?How did you meet her??

No question who he was asking about, there. ?I was in Paris, on my Earth. Lived in different places there, once I left Infinity City and Rhydin. She met me there and offered me the job of finding the books.? She was so forthcoming after clamming up so tight for so long that the barrister?s head had to be spinning. She eased herself out of his grasp, went to a breadbox and started the business of making his dinner. So domestic, for someone who never ate: there was wine, from his bottle, into his glass; cheese and bread, butter and...no grapes, sadly, but there were a couple of apples laid out for him. She brought it all to the table.

He sat at the table, watching her as she slipped from his embrace and went about preparing his supper. A pensive furrow remained creased upon his brow. When she laid it all out, he slid aside to give her room to share the bench with him. ?Why you??

Clever man, picking it all apart. ?Reckon it was because Anne had one of the books. Still does, so far as I know.? She dropped onto the bench beside him, settling her shoulder against his.

Forgetting himself, he offered her a slice of cheese. She shook her head at it. He slid an arm around her as a consolation prize. ?The books. Sin has one, Anne has one, one is lost past the Veil?? He was clearly trying to recall. ?And you have two. Yes??

She shook her head. ?Gem traded one to me for Ali's violin. Sinjin took that one and, so far as I know, still has it. Anne has one of them. You've got one. One is lost in the Dreaming, and...? she trailed off, scowling. Memories spun around her like snowflakes, swam past like slippery fish. Who had the fifth?

?And?? He bade quietly.

Night-black eyes flicked up to his. ?...and I don't remember.?

He nodded slowly. ?Well...maybe we can send her off on a wild scavenger hunt and keep her busy.? Pairing the cheese with a piece of bread, he bit into it. Chew, swallow. ?How do you kill her??

It?s not that easy, Lucien, she told him in the silences of her own skull. Aloud, she said, ?Stab something enough times and it?ll die.?

To his credit?he?d promised to have more faith in her?his expression was one of acceptance. ?Very true. But things have an inconvenient way of coming back to life in between the stabbings.?

?Good point.? She grinned at her own bad pun, propped an elbow on the table and watched him heat. Her head was full of the unkillable Judah Bishop.

?You and I could just disappear from Rhydin...leave everyone there with their troubles and issues and just live here,? he suggested, tipping his head toward the deeper caverns.

?Mmm.? She rubbed her chin against his shoulder like a scent-marking cat. ?They'd find you and haul you back. Too many people depend on you, lawyer-man.?

He slid the remaining food away, slipped his arms around her waist and pulled her closer. ?I wouldn't be missed in the least. I will become just a faded memory.? Something in the quality of his smile suggested he knew it was a hopeless cause.

Her head settled against his shoulder; her eyes rolled that way, toward the bed. Speaking of faded memories? ?The earring and violin and et cetera are on the dresser over there, by the way.?

He rested his cheek against her head and glanced over at the dresser. ?How did you get everything here? The second time, I mean.? He was evidently still boggling over it.

?First time everything fit in a bag. Second time I hitched the horses to the carriage and brought them. Bit of a scrape down the path, there. Third time I had movers come and get everything.? She picked a grape off his plate, bounced it on her palm.

?You had movers come to the house and then had them deliver everything out here?? His voice was rich with incredulity as he looked back toward the mouth of the cave. ?How did you get them into the house??

Oh, it was the wards he was tripping on. She?d been invited into the house, so she could come and go, but hadn?t the ability to invite anyone else. She had the vague understanding that it was due to some past accident, but hadn?t inquired. ?Oh, that.? Snapping the grape up between her fingers, she waved it lazily. ?I didn't. I carried it all out to them.?

Lucien leaned his head back to regard her?not with anger, but with surprise. ?You emptied the house out on your own? In one night??

?I was very thirsty afterward,? she admitted, and sighed out the scent of him.

He pressed a kiss to her shoulder, then let his attention drift through the furnished cave. ?All this, to get my attention, so I might look at things from a different perspective??

That kissed shoulder rose and fell on a sinuous shrug. ?It gave me something to do.? She successfully hid a smile, spun the grape back onto his plate.

?Surely there must have been many other things you could have busied yourself with.?

?I did.? Tipping her chin up, she smiled archly at the ceiling. And that was also the truth, but he didn?t need to know what, now, did he?

He followed her gaze upward, baring his throat; she leaned into him and smeared a kiss down the column of it. ?Reckon you can take it all back in the morning, or I can help you with it tomorrow night.?

His eyes closed briefly at the kiss. ?Or the night after that. Or perhaps after that.?

Hmm. A recurring theme. ?Needing a vacation, are you?? Blackened eyes danced. She was terribly warm in the circle of his arms.

?That all depends, now.? His arms had swallowed her whole, surely.

?On what?? she asked.

?On whether or not you would go with me.? he replied.

?Here, I meant. I'm already here.? Wriggling an arm free, she waved it at the ?room? around them.

His attention chased the sweep of her arm across the room before returning to her. ?It's a perfect vacation spot.?

?Well, then.? She straightened up, harrumphed like an old judge drawing the court's attention. ?We'd best get to vacating.?

He got up from the table, loosing his arms from around her and walked around the 'kitchen,' glancing about. Turning to face her, he slipped his hands into his pockets. ?What are we facing here? With the faerie lord??

The change in subject didn?t surprise her; his hands in his pockets was a tell. She wondered, not for the first time, what he kept in there. ?She's old. And she's cunning.? She could be describing herself, couldn't she? ?With the faerie...they've their own power, and the power of their office. Cut the office away and she'll be weaker.?

?The office??

?The mantle. She's the Keeper of the Balance.?

?How does one cut the office away? Upset the balance of things??

He was closer than he could imagine. ?Magic.? She tipped her head to one side, watching him. ?And a dream.?

A brow rose. ?What manner of magic? And what manner of dream??

Entirely too close. She wrinkled her nose at him. ?We can talk about it in the morning.?

He thought to press the issue; she could see it in his eyes as he walked back to where she was still seated at the table. He knelt down before her, his arms gone around her, teasing her with kisses. She took the first from him, and a second, and a third, bent forward to steal them. But she could only distract him for so long?soon enough he was circling around to it. ?Bekah?? His lips were so rich, it was all she could do not to sink her teeth into them. ?What magic?? They moved against hers, luscious and slow. ?And what dream??

Her fingers had been busy with the knot on the tie that bound his hair back; at those questions they went still. ?Tomorrow,? she whispered that against his cheek, just above the line of his beard. ?I promise.?

Rising, he lifted her into his arms as if she weighed nothing. ?All right,? he whispered.

When he woke in the morning, she was gone.

{Adapted from live play with Lucky Duck, with thanks.}

Let me just state for the record that I am sick and f**king tired of people jumping me from behind.

Okay, wait, back up. I know I said I was dead before. And I was, and I?m not now. Look, it?s complicated, you know what I?m saying? Just trust me when I say that not only am I not dead now, I am less dead than I have ever been in my life.

I know. I know. Just trust me.

Aoife needed space. She knew Judah. She didn?t know me. So I moved out before she could tell me to leave. Killed me to do it, metaphorically speaking. But she couldn?t handle it. She doesn?t sleep much in the best of times, due to s**t I?m not going to explain to you now because it?s none of your goddamned business. But she hadn?t slept at all since I?d come back, and it was really starting to scare me. So I rented a room at the inn and started working on getting my cashflow rectified. I was used to going to sleep with her beside me, though. The bed at the inn wasn?t the bed I?d built for us. I?d been working my *ss off at the Marketplace. I?d finally gotten a contract with a decent furniture maker who?d seen what I?d been doing.

So I was, I think, kind of forgivably out of it as I was walking back to the Inn that night. I was occupado. I try to stay alert, but I can?t power entropy armor twenty-four-seven and get anything else done. And despite the bloodlines, I?m not a god.

When she hit me?I mean, you?d think five feet and a hundred pounds wouldn?t do much to a guy like me, right? But you give a five-hundred-year-old vampire a hundred pounds to work with and she will f**k your s**t up, I kid you not. My *ss was on the ground in a heartbeat. I had enough time to think, ?uh.? Then she clamped one of her cold little hands on my forehead, planted a knee in the middle of my back, and yanked my head up. I knew this was coming as soon as I found out she?d survived her little ride through Anne?s Torture Machine Extravaganza. I just didn?t know when.

When was now.

She?d written the word DEATH on the knife in black Magic Marker. I know this because she waved it in my face before she set it against my neck. I felt it shave me a little too close for comfort. ?Judah, darling,? she purred in my ear like a cat with a bad case of laryngitis. ?It?s been such a long time.?

?I?m not Judah,? I had time to say.

Then I felt the blade bite in.