Crimson Death (Anita Blake, Vampire Hunter 25)

"Cousin said you were life energy, fertility, not death," Slane said.

"Well, I do my best, but I do raise the dead. I won't hide that I am a necromancer."

"I saw some of the stuff on YouTube from Colorado last year," Slane said. "You are the stuff of legends, Ms. Blake."

"I never know what to say when people use words like legend," I said.

"It is just the truth," Nim said. "Accept it and stop being embarrassed by it."

"I'll try," I said.

She smiled. "Since we can be of so little help, we will let you go so that you do not waste all your daylight, for I fear for our city once night falls again."

I nodded. "Me, too."

She got to her feet and both Slane and Flannery moved to help her up. I wasn't sure if it was a sign of respect, or if she really needed the help, but Nicky stood up as if he'd help, too, and we all stood up then, though I put Dev's hand in mine, along with Nathaniel's on the other side. My gun wasn't going to help me as much in here as whatever Dev was able to do. I'd be asking him in private exactly what he had done and how he'd known to do it, but not yet.

Auntie Nim leaned more heavily on her cane than she had before, and I realized that part of what her glamour had done was to give her that smooth gait. Now I saw how much she needed the cane. Her skirt had caught on itself, and I had a glimpse of her feet. One old-fashioned black shoe and one black hoof, split like the hoof of a goat. No wonder she needed the cane.

I watched her walk back to the table with Slane at her side. Flannery went ahead of us, leading us toward the outside door. I couldn't help looking at him harder than I had before. He looked like a normal human, but there was always something to mark us, Nim had said. For the first time I was wondering what a man was hiding under his clothes and it had absolutely nothing to do with sex.

49

FLANNERY GOT CALLED back into the pub for one more private word with his aunt, so he sent us ahead to the car. Fine with me, because that meant we could talk in private, too.

"What did you do in there, Devereux?" Nicky asked from behind us. I was holding Nathaniel's hand and Dev was holding his other one. The three of us abreast were taking up all the sidewalk and then some. The world really wasn't made for walking in threes; hell, twos were hard on some streets. We were getting some glances, which we could have avoided if I'd been in the middle of our hand-holding, but the two men were lovers, so screw it.

"What did you do that made her call you a witch?" Domino asked.

Dev laughed. "I added power and clarity to Anita and Nathaniel, that's all."

"But how did you do it?" Ethan asked.

Dev looked across at the other man. "I've been trained since birth like all of us in our clan."

"But trained to do what? I mean, what did you do today, just now, that was part of your training?" Ethan asked.

"To be whatever my master needed me to be."

"We know that," I said, "but what did you do in there?"

He looked at me, his face serious. "I was trained as if I was going to be one of the Harlequin in a lot of ways. They couldn't be the spies and executioners of all vampirekind if they couldn't keep clean of other people's psychic abilities."

"The Harlequin are either master vampires themselves or their animals to call are protected by their own masters against crap like this, but I'm your master and I was caught. How did you help break us free of the illusions?"

"Did you see through her illusions from the beginning?" Nicky asked.

"Yes," Dev said.

"How?" he asked.

Dev seemed to think about that as we walked. A light pole came up and we had to decide who was letting go of whom so we didn't walk into it. Dev let go and walked wide, dipping down into the brick-lined street, before rejoining us on the sidewalk. "Would it make sense if I said we were all raised to be a sort of living talisman?"

"I heard the sentence and all the words are English, but I still don't understand," I said.

"Jake will probably explain it better, but they used magic on us from the time we were babies. They sort of forged us into . . . talismans. All of us see through illusion and magic better than anyone but a true adept of the mystical arts. We can act as a sort of familiar to add to our masters when they perform or fight magical energies."

"All of us can act as power boosts and familiars for Anita," Nicky said.

"We can?" Ethan said.

"News to me," Domino said.

"She's done it with me, Micah, and Nathaniel, and I think with one of the vampires that's out of town now."

"Requiem," I said. "I may be able to use any undead for a power boost, or it may need to be one that's bloodbound to Jean-Claude and me."

"I didn't know that," Dev said. "That does give you more options."

"So you're almost proof against certain kinds of magic?" I said.

"Yeah. If you want details on how it was done and how it works, ask Jake and Kaazim."

"Could any of us do it with training?" Domino asked.

"I think you have to be gold tiger."

"Could I do it, then?" Ethan asked.

"You're part gold tiger, so maybe. Ask Jake, though you may need to have started from a baby. That's what they did with us."

"What if someone evil and crazy had won, like the Lover of Death we defeated last year in Colorado? Would you have served him, too, just like you serve me?"

Dev wasted a very nice smile on me. "I don't think I was his type."

"It's a serious question," I said.

The smile slipped away until he was almost as solemn as I ever saw him. "We were raised to serve whoever killed the Mother of All Darkness and became the new King of Tigers. They trained us to serve all the vampire bloodlines, so I guess in the end, I'm supposed to say yes."

Nathaniel stopped and turned to look up into Dev's eyes. "The Lover of Death drew power from causing death by violence or disease. The only way for him to grow strong enough to rule would have been to constantly slaughter people. Would you really have helped him do that?"

"I don't think I could have done that, but I have cousins who could have and maybe would have. Literally, Jake went through us like a litter of kittens, or puppies, and periodically made us into smaller groups that concentrated on one set of skills over another. Pride, Envy, and I were in the group that was more schooled in Belle Morte's bloodline, which is one of the reasons that we were offered to Jean-Claude and you."

"Who was in the Lover of Death's box?" I asked.

"It doesn't matter, Anita. He's dead. No one has to serve him now."

"You don't want to tell me, because you're afraid I'll hold it against the ones who would have gone to him."

"I know you'll hold it against them. I can feel it just standing here with Nathaniel between us."

I sighed and let my breath out slowly. "Is it really the jet lag that's making me so emotional?"

"You need real food and a couple of hours of sleep in the hotel, and then we need to do something outside in the sunlight," Nicky said.

"Will that help me stop losing control like this?"

"Sleep will help everybody feel better."

"Why the sunlight?" Nathaniel asked.

"Because the more daylight you get in the time zone you're in, the faster you adjust to it."

"Fine. Let's get to the car and either get food or a nap," I said. "I need to feel more like myself."

"Necromancy doesn't work here the way it does anywhere else in the world, so they keep saying. Could that be affecting you?" Nathaniel asked.

I looked at him. "I don't know, maybe."

"That's an excellent point, though," Ethan said.

"We still don't know if my necromancy will work at all here."

"We can't find out until full dark," Nicky said.

"And by then we'll be ass deep in newly risen vampires," I said.

"Yeah."

"You should try to raise a zombie while you're here in Dublin, just in case," Nathaniel said. r />

"In case of what?" I asked.

"To see if you can raise the other kind of undead to help us."

"You mean use zombies to help us fight the new vampires?" I asked.

"Why not?"

"If Ireland doesn't know what to do with vampires, they sure as hell aren't going to know what to do with zombies."

"They go back in their graves," he said.

"If I can raise them at all."

"I just think it would be a good idea to find out just how much necromancy works in Ireland."

"We are not going to have a zombie-versus-vampire war through the streets of Dublin, Nathaniel."

"I'm not saying it's a good idea. I'm just saying that it's good to know what our resources are, that's all."

"You mean like extra weapons," Nicky said.

"Yes."

"I like it," Nicky said.

"Well, I don't," I said. "I don't raise zombies without a good reason, and just seeing if I can do it isn't good enough."