“Well, then I won’t use one, either.” He put their normal bowls aside, opened a drawer, and got out two dish towels. “Let’s wrap ’em up in this.”
He tossed one to his daughter, traded her a spoon for his half gallon, and they were off, walking through the hotel-sized kitchen, outing via the pantry. As they emerged at the base of the foyer’s grand staircase, he put a hand on Bits’s shoulder.
“I’m glad I’m off tonight.”
“Me, too, dad. How’s your foot? Are you okay?”
“Oh, yeah. No worries.” He kept the pain and the limp to himself. “Bone’s going to heal just fine. Manny took care of it.”
“He’s a good human.”
“He is.”
They walked up the red-carpeted steps together. In spite of the Your Majesty decor, all that gold leafing and the crystal, those marble columns and the painted ceiling high above, this was home. This was where the Black Dagger Brotherhood lived with their families and took care of Wrath, Beth, and L.W. This was where the best lives for all of them transpired, here under this heavy roof, here within these stout stone walls, here protected by the mhis that Vishous threw.
A fortress.
A fucking vault, which was where precious things belonged, safe from theft or destruction.
The movie theater was way down on the second floor, past the Hall of Statues, out into the staff wing. Given that it was after twelve, on a work night, no one was around. The fighters on rotation were out in the field. The injured who needed treatment or rehab were in the training center. And the staff were on break to eat after having cooked, served, and cleaned up First Meal. Meanwhile, Mary was in session with Zsadist down in the basement. Wrath and Beth were playing with L.W. up on the third floor. And the other shellans and kiddos were in the bouncy castle out by the pool.
So it was nice and quiet.
The movie theater was a professional gig: Stadium seating with padded leather ass-palaces. A candy counter and popcorn machine maintained, as everything was, by Fritz. A huge screen, framed by red velvet drapes, that had just been updated. Dolby surround sound and then some, with the kind of woofers that made you feel the T. rex’s footfalls in Jurassic Park all the way through your marrow.
Rhage and Bitty took the two seats right in the middle, halfway up the rows. It was where they’d sat the night before, so the remotes to the computer system were in the drink cupholder between them.
Work of a moment to rent the movie on Amazon and get things rolling.
As they popped their lids and settled in, Rhage exhaled long and slow.
Perfect. This was just—
“Cheers, dad.”
Bitty was holding out her spoon, and Rhage clinked his against it. “Cheers, daughter.”
In the dark, as the adventure in the movie began, Rhage smiled so wide that he forgot about the ice cream. Everything was right in the world. All circles completed. Nothing gray in any area of his life.
He had his daughter.
He had his beloved shellan.
He had his brothers and his buddies.
Yes, there was stress, and the threat to the species continued, and the fucking humans were always up to shit. But he felt like his life was similar to this fortress of a house.
Solid against the storms and assaults of Fate.
Capable of withstanding anything that was thrown at it.
It was the first and only time he had ever felt like this, and it made him believe, deep in his bones, that no matter what, nothing was going to change. His Mary was his heart and soul. His Bitty, his future and his hope. His brothers and friends, the limbs on his body.
And what a wonderful thing that all was.
Digging into his Rocky Road . . . he had no idea what was coming his way. If he had, he would have chosen a much different ice cream.
Like motherfucking vanilla.
Caldwell, New York, 1913
“Oh, but she was a lovely one, she was. And her sister. Right?”
As Jabon the Younger went on about things that had been already forgotten by the party being addressed by him, a sense of restless boredom crept up Rhage’s body sure as if it was sewage seeping through the floorboards of the pub. Indeed, he had to relieve himself not just of this tedious company, but the place he was in. The air here was thick with the sour sweat of raucous patrons and the cloying mead from the tankards that abounded in every meaty fist.
Jabon leaned in. “Tell me what you did to them.”
Rhage focused on two drunkards seated upon stools across the crowded cramp of the establishment. They were humans with beards thick as dog fur and clothing the color of manure. Unsteady from their imbibing, their shoulders bumped and separated by turns, the contacts a metronome counting down until the inevitable fight erupted.
“Wouldnae you speak, then.” Jabon moved his chair closer and put his smooth, pampered hand upon Rhage’s forearm—but he reconsidered this impulse as Rhage shifted his gaze over. Immediately, he retracted the feather weight. “But you conquested them both. At the same time, presently. You must tell me what it was like.”
Rhage returned to the two laborers over there on the stools. Things were coming to a boil, and he was concerned one or both were armed.
“Are you coming on this next eve, at least? Unto my home? You will find further conquests, I promise you.”
The laborer on the left, the one with the darker hair, whipped his face toward his compatriot. Brows furrowed, chin extended, face red as a barn door, he sputtered what couldnae be aught but curses. And then he shoved up to his feet, steady as a two-legged table. Called unto confrontation, his compatriot promptly lurched off onto his own boots.
A push. A shove. And then the hand of the one who had started it went inside his sloppily made coat.
“—you must come on the morrow. I have told many you will be in attendance. And I promise, there will be females of availability—”
Rhage clamped a grip on the back of Jabon’s finely constructed high-collar jacket. Shoving the male down under the table, Rhage ducked as well as the first lead shot rang out. With the discharge of the gun, the drunken joviality of the establishment lost its ebullience. There was no shouting in alarm, however. This was not the first time such had happened and humans commenced to take cover as if they had been well-drilled in the response.
Beneath the table, Jabon’s pale eyes widened and he clutched his fine coating tightly, pulling the lapels up close to the front of his throat as a fragile chain mail of wool and silk and cotton.
There was an ensuing rustle of bodies and shuffling of feet, the crowd scrambling to duck under oak tables and chairs, beside the stone hearth, behind the bar—although that latter was stopped by a barman with his own gun who held his turf with greater interest than whatever was occurring within his pub. ’Twas a good businessman, that one.
“What shall we do?” Jabon put his face all the way down on the rough, stained floorboards. “What shall we do, what shall we do . . .”
Rhage rolled his eyes. The danger would not last long and he was right. Three shots off and it was done.
Through the sturdy table legs and the twisted bramble patches of upended chairs, Rhage assessed the damage with little interest. Both combatants were down and unmoving so he sat up and stretched, rotating his bad arm. Jabon stayed down as if he had taken up a new pursuit of becoming a carpet. Most of the others did the same.
The door to the pub opened and closed as someone entered. Rhage did not pay that any mind. This human establishment was known only for trouble of their variety. The enemy did not come upon this theater of human depravity often, as lessers did not court with them if they could avoid it. The same was true for vampires, although members of the species could pass far easier among the rats without tails. And one did wish for adventure.
Adventure was all one had, really.
The human mat formed by all those who had sought to avoid the bullets began to break apart as heads were lifted and torsos tentatively rose.
The curling impatience as characteristic to Rhage’s corporeal confines as his blond hair and his blue-green eyes took its cue and weaved through his muscles and his bones. Ever on the move, he turned to take his leave not only of the humans and their silliness, but of Jabon’s incessant nagging—
The strike came from the left and it was a full-body one, something large and heavy taking Rhage back down to the floor. It was whilst he hung for the briefest of moments in midair that he noted two things: One, as his vision swung ’round, he witnessed a bullet passing through the space from which his flesh and blood had been forcefully vacated, the lead slug burrowing into the oak paneling of the pub’s homely wall, creating a circled coffin for its honed metal body.
The second realization was that Rhage knew who had come upon him.
His savior was not a surprise, either.
The landing was hard as he bore both his own heft and another’s of similar tonnage, but he cared not about the bruising. Looking through the forest of table and leg anew, he eyed the resumed skirmish whereby the initiating combatant, briefly resurrected, had raised his gun once more and attempted to ensure death had indeed arrived upon his fellow drunkard.
The threat he represented was currently being addressed by the other patrons, however. Several jumped on him and disarmed him.
Rhage was able to take a deeper breath as the boulder upon him was removed. And then a hand extended toward him to help him up.
He laughed and accepted the lift. “That was rather fun!”
Darius, son of Marklon, did not, evidently, feel the same. The brother’s blue eyes were the color of slate from disapproval. “Your definition of that word and mine are not the same—”
“You must come as well!”
Rhage and his brother in service both looked down at Jabon, who had popped up from under the table like a gopher from a hole.
The cloying aristocrat clapped his hands. “Yes, yes, you as well. On the morrow’s eve at my home. You know where it is, do you not?”
“We shall be working, I’m afraid,” Darius announced.
“Aye,” Rhage said, though he had no particular plans.
“There will be females of noble blood.”