“When is?” The Venator sighed. “Sorry—I promise this won’t take long, what I have to say.”
“Get on with it, then.”
He cleared his throat. “So I looked into that thing you told me about—the diseased Red Bloods?”
“And?”
“I couldn’t find anything on it, not in any of the official files.”
Allegra bit her fingernails. “No?”
“Forsyth laughed. He said he’d never heard of such a thing. Said I was letting the voices in my head drive me crazy,”
Kingsley said, not sounding terribly insulted. Over the centuries, Allegra knew, he must have gotten used to the barbs and comments from the Blue Bloods. “I didn’t tell him I heard it from you. I didn’t want you to get in trouble.”
“He’s lying. There was a body in that van. I saw it.”
“Yes,” Kingsley said. “I found the ambulance records, the one for the clinic that the Conduits use. Here’s the thing: the records show there was a dead body in that van, but I checked San Francisco; there aren’t any familiars who have been reported missing or recently deceased.”
Allegra could not believe what she was hearing. Charles had told her to her face that it was a human familiar in the body bag. She had seen it herself—she tried to remember—the body had certainly looked human. “So what, then?”
“I don’t know. I can’t get any answers. But I asked around a little more and… I don’t know what to make of it, but apparently there’ve been a few vampires missing.” Kingsley exhaled.
“Missing?” No. It couldn’t be. Allegra thought of her fear that had led her to check the body. The fear that those who hunted the vampires were loose in the world again; an enemy they had eradicated centuries ago. It couldn’t be happening again. She thought of Roanoke and the missing colony. And there’d been others over the years—one or two here and there—vampires who’d gone off-Coven, maybe, or did not report to the Wardens. It was nothing, Charles had assured her.
There was nothing to fear. She’d had her doubts—she’d had so many doubts over the years, she realized, but she’d done nothing about them. All those doubts about what had truly happened in Florence; the secret Charles had been keeping from her.
“Yes. A few of the new Committee members who’d just been inducted can’t be accounted for.”
“What did the Elders say?”
“They won’t speak to me,” Kingsley said. “Anyway, I don’t know what to make of it. I’m sure it’s nothing. maybe a couple of kids playing hooky. But I thought I should tell you. You’ll tell Charles, right? I mean, he should know that someone’s not telling the truth.”
“Yes. Yes I will.” Allegra said. They said good-by
e and hung up.
She returned downstairs, almost surprised to find Ben sitting on the living room couch. “I’m so sorry, but I have to go to Charles right now.”
“I understand,” Ben said bravely. Allegra wanted to comfort him, but she had no time to explain.
FORTY-THREE
Bluebeard’s Castle
Sam laid out the map on the table and briefed the team on their rescue mission. They were in the necropolis, huddled in the small room inside the Venators’ quarters. It was almost a week since Deming had been kidnapped, and Mahrus had joined them as well, after returning from a short trip to Jerus-alem to check on the Coven there. Schuyler decided not to confront Mahrus with what Catherine had told her for now, as she did not know if she believed it.
“Catherine says the castle is located on the edge of Limbo, right at the mouth of the river Styx,” Sam said. “There are only two entrances to the castle. The drawbridge over the moat is the main one, but there’s a second, secret entrance from the Palace of the zaniyat Babel that leads directly to the dungeons.
The Harvest Bonding is set for Lammas, and as suggested, we’ll move the day before. Catherine will leave all the doors unlocked in the basement of the brothel so that we can get through. There won’t be a new batch of girls until next month, so the place will be pretty deserted, she said.”
He pointed to the next place on the map. “Once we’re in the dungeon, we make our way up to the castle. It’ll be heavily guarded on the outside, but inside there’ll be just the usual crew of domestics. Probably a few trolls, nothing we can’t take care of. Deming should be held here.” He pointed to the highest tower. “The Bluebeard room.”
“Bluebeard—you mean like the fairy tale?” Schuyler asked.
“Not every fairy tale is made up,” Jack explained. “It’s Baal’s… ‘nickname.’ He’s had numerous brides.”
“The brides—they’re all dead? Like in the story?”