I’ll catch something, I thought, still looking around for—
I almost said Pritkin, but stopped myself. Damn it! That hadn’t been him!
After Rhea managed to get me from soaking to just damp, I wrapped another towel around me and we moved to what I guessed was her room since her overnight bag was on the bed. She transferred it to the floor and got me under the covers, helping me to sit up against the headboard because I was too antsy to lay down. She left but came back almost at once, with the tray she’d abandoned in her hands, the one holding the hot chocolate I’d almost forgotten about.
“I’ll be right back,” she promised, putting the cup in my hands and wrapping her own around them, until she was sure I could hold it.
And even then, I almost sloshed it onto the bedcovers after she left, because I was so freaking weak.
What the hell was wrong with me?
I flexed my shaky digits, and they looked okay, but felt like an old woman’s. I drank the cocoa anyway, using my raised knees as a table and cupping my hands on either side of the mug. It was piled high with fat, squashy marshmallows and little chocolate shavings and was the perfect temperature between scalding and merely hot. Yet it could have been water for all I cared. I didn’t even taste it.
But after a few moments, the chills that had been wracking my body lessened, and I started to feel slightly better. I drained the mug, more for the heat than anything else, and got out of bed. I shucked the towel, wrapped a blanket around me and sat at the old-fashioned dressing table. It was an antique, even in this era, with little worm holes that somebody had patched over and sanded down, giving the wood a faintly burl-like quality.
I stared at the wooden swirls and saw again the billowing steam churning in the air. Too much for any one bath to account for, or a dozen for that matter. Why hadn’t I noticed that? Was that when I’d fallen asleep—if I had? When I first saw the creature start to coalesce?
I couldn’t remember.
But I remembered those eyes—black and gleaming. And then glimmering down at me, brightened by stolen power. My power.
I’d seen ones like them before, on a windswept plain in Wales, while fire blew in the background and an ancient god tore open the skies. And again in that very room, that very tub, gleaming in the lamplight. And later in the softness of the bed nearby, while Pritkin and I moved together as one . . .
Incubus eyes.
But that didn’t make any sense. Pritkin’s incubus had no reason to attack me, and even if it had, we were over a century in the past! It had no way to reach me here.
So, was it another incubus? One drawn to me because of my borrowed powers, the same way the Were had been? I’d never heard of an incubus assaulting a master vampire, who could easily kick them out and possibly also kick their asses. Incubi were not the strongest of demons, and generally preferred to seduce rather than outright assault.
But then, I wasn’t a master vamp. I just had a connection to one, a connection formed by a spell that used incubus magic as the conduit. Had some enterprising demon realized that I might be the pathway to a feast of epic proportions, one that Mircea couldn’t avoid without closing the link between us?
I guessed it was possible—although he’d found me pretty damned fast. But maybe a conduit pulsing with incubus magic was a big draw, and I wasn’t under the demon council’s protection in this time period. I had an alliance with them at home, but here . . . I was fair game.
But there was still one big problem. Whoever had attacked me had worn Pritkin’s face. How had it known to take that form?
Because I’d never heard of the incubi having mental powers. The closest was a sort of empathic ability that let them know what their partners were feeling. And even that was hit or miss with many, including Pritkin, whose human half watered down the gift.
But maybe it didn’t need to read my mind. Maybe I’d done the work for it, my brain conjuring up the image I wanted to see in its place. Perhaps that’s why incubi were said to attack in dreams: you didn’t need a glamourie if your victim’s brain automatically cloaked you in the skin of their fantasy lover.
I shook my head despite the fact that there was no one to see it. No. I just didn’t believe it. I knew I’d been attacked by the Were almost as soon as I arrived, but it had already been here. It had been talking to Gertie only a few rooms away, and as soon as my scent hit it, it had attacked.
That made sense; I could accept that. But I didn’t think there were any random incubi haunting the Pythian Court! Either one got really lucky, or . . .
Or what?
I didn’t know.
I shivered again, and drew the blanket closer around me. And then wish I hadn’t. Because in the course of adjusting it I glanced up at my reflection.
The dressing table’s mirror wasn’t the best. It looked like the bedrooms had ended up with all the furniture that no longer made the grade for downstairs: tables with scuffed legs, faded carpets, a chaise lounge on the other side
of the bed that had a worn patch where the butt was supposed to go. And a mirror that was not only mismatched, but also missing a lot of the silver backing and pocked with spots.
But despite that and the low lighting, I could still see myself pretty well. Damp blonde hair straggled around a face that should have been flushed from the bath, but instead was dead white with dark circles under the eyes. It wasn’t a good look for me, and neither were the sunken cheeks and shadowed blue eyes. They’d seen some shit in the last five months, and that leaves a mark.
Of course, it does something else, too.
I stared at my reflection, and felt my anger rising.