“How nice,” I said, smiling at Kit Marlowe, standing to the demon’s left, who was definitely not smiling back.
The senate’s chief spy was a little disheveled, which wasn’t a bad look on him. Tousled brown curls, an in-need-of-a-trim goatee, a gold earring sparkling in one ear, and a rumpled, only mostly buttoned-up white dress shirt left him halfway between Renaissance bad boy and Captain Jack Sparrow. Only both of those versions were more fun.
“Perhaps we should postpone,” he muttered, to his other, not so genially smiling companion. Or to be exact, his frowning-slightly-in-annoyance companion, which she still managed to make look good.
The consul of the North American Vampire Senate was a golden-skinned, sloe-eyed, dark-haired beauty with a fondness for completely over-the-top dress. She’d toned it down today, maybe in consideration of the state of her house, to an Indiana Jones cosplay consisting of a pair of skintight brown leather pants, matching boots, a white silk “blouse” that revealed more than it covered, and two huge diamond studs in her ears—as in, Hollywood starlets had smaller engagement rings. Because we couldn’t take this peasant thing too far, could we?
“Is Mircea here?” I asked Marlowe, since I was slightly more likely to get a response from him.
“He was delayed. Family matter. He’ll be here shortly.”
“Thank you.” I looked at Adra. “Could I have a word?”
“Certainly.”
We moved off. “Can you do a silence spell?”
“I believe I can manage.”
I felt it click shut behind us, but I kept my back to Marlowe just in case. I looked up, and found Adra totally expressionless. Enough to leave me blinking, and staring at something completely masklike, with no signs of life at all.
Which gave the nondescript, faintly pleasant features the quality of a doll in a horror film as it slowly turns to look at you.
“My apologies,” he said as life flowed back into the mask. “That’s the problem with glamouries, if you aren’t human. You have to remember to animate them all the time. Else they just . . . sit there.”
Yeah, because there were no human features underneath for it to latch on to, were there?
I licked my lips. “If I help you, will you help me?”
The blond head tilted. “Help me how?”
“Get the vampires to do what you want. To accept the possession.”
“And in return?”
“I want Mircea protected. And you want it, too,” I added quickly. “Vamps like nothing better than to argue. If he dies, they could spend weeks, even months, debating over a successor. It could derail the entire war.”
“And why would he die?”
“People die in war from all sorts of things. Even their own allies.”
“I can assure you, my demons won’t—”
“No, your demons won’t.”
Two pale eyebrows arched. They didn’t look like he’d put any thought into them, leaving them the plain half-moons of the glamourie, but they managed to convey surprise nonetheless. And a question.
“I want two of your strongest as his personal bodyguards,” I said. “He doesn’t have to know about it. It would probably be better if he didn’t know about it. But they absolutely need to watch him all the time.”
“Even when he’s with friends?” The pale eyes lifted, to take in the knot of people behind us.
“Especially when he’s with friends.”
Adra smiled, a brief quirk of fake lips. “So be it.”
We walked back over to the group. The vamps had been dug out of the collapsed stands, and were milling about, looking miserable. And likely getting mental tongue-lashings from the masters they’d just embarrassed, because, of course, that was the most important thing. Among the smaller, senatorial group, talk was ensuing.
It stopped when we walked up.