Authors: Anthony Francis
The Magical Security Council.
Those words hung in the air. My ploy had worked: we would replace fangfights at the OK Corral with something more reasoned, more modern.
And
I’d
be heading up it all.
Oh, shit.
“Well … is that it?” Saffron asked, voice ringing with unexpected authority. “Are we all now in agreement? Are we now done?”
“Of course, my Lady Saffron,” the lich said.
“Thank you,” she responded. “Then I am taking my people. All of them.
Now.
”
With Vladimir guarding our backs, Saffron, Darkrose, Delancaster and I picked our way out of the wrecked hall. The freed captives were gathering in the foyer: Delancaster’s servants, Darkrose’s bodyguards—and Nyissa’s driver.
Then Iadimus carried Nyissa out to us, and Saffron flinched like she’d been slapped. Her gaze quickly bounced between me and Nyissa, face mottling with rage, and I realized she’d detected the link Nyissa had forged between us. But then, just as quickly, Saffron relaxed.
“The Lady Nyissa stepped up to defend the Lady Dakota,” Saffron said, stepping forward, gently touching the cowl of Nyissa’s robe, “and this was the thanks she got.”
Iadimus stiffened, then let Nyissa down gently into Saffron’s extended arms.
“My most profuse apologies, Lady Saffron,” he said. “It will not happen again.”
We practically mummified our vamps with curtains, then rushed them out to the limo. Even Saffron, covered in a heavy coat, hissed in pain as sun glinted off parked cars; but even after having been starved and forced to drink blood, she did not catch on fire.
We retreated to the Four Seasons Hotel, where Saffron booked a linked set of suites that made my hotel look as shabby as my cardboard box under the bridge. While a servant tucked in the nearly comatose vampires and Saffron called a doctor for Nyissa, I called Cinnamon.
“Mom,” she said, voice brimming with relief. “Are you safe?”
“I am,” I said, and explained what happened. “And are you?”
“Yes,” she said. “We’re with Lord Buckhead in the Underground. “
“Good,” I said. “Cinnamon, honey … Vladimir’s coming to take you back to school. After that … you have to go back and stay with the Palmotti’s.”
Cinnamon was speechless for a moment. “But … Mom—”
“Cinnamon … right now, you can’t stay with me. I’m about to be arrested.”
“No!” she said. “Mom,
fuck,
you saved the whole city.”
“The police don’t know that,” I said, “and if they find you with me, they’ll take you away. Is that what you want? Or do you want to stay in the Underground, be on the run forever?”
“No. I wants to come home,” she said. “And I wants … I wants to go back to school.”
I felt something relax deep within me. “Then go back to school, love,” I said. “Vladimir will keep you safe until we work this all out. You can trust him.”
“I trusts you, Mom,” Cinnamon said.
We said goodbyes, I closed the phone—and then my jaw opened in shock. Saffron had walked out of the vampire’s suite in her bathrobe, closed the door—and then dropped the robe and stalked towards the window, buck naked but for her bomber goggles.
“I can’t thank you enough, Dakota,” she said, passing me, flaming red hair over ghostly curves, stepping straight up to the window—and throwing the curtains wide. The bright morning sun streamed in, and she hissed and flinched. There was a searing sound, smoke rose from her skin—and then it began to dissipate, and she slowly turned her head towards the sunrise.
“Oh thank you, God,” she said. “I’d just die if they had taken my daylight.”
Something smart alecky, like
clearly not
, popped into my lips—but didn’t pass them. I stood there watching her for a while, watching the sun gleam off that skin, reddening, first like a rash, then more like real color was returning. Part of me wondered how that worked, made me want to give the papers of the world’s only vampire vampirologist more than a token read. The rest of me was just so glad she was alive.
“Dakota, my behavior’s been
unconscionable,
” she said, stepping up to me, then giving me a huge hug in her birthday suit. “Tell you what. I’ll forgive you if you forgive me.”
“Uh … deal,” I said, uneasily embracing her naked body. Can you say …
awkward!
But I knew her well enough to know that while part of her was deliberately tweaking me, the rest of her really did think nothing of it. Oh, Savannah. “Friends?”
“Always,” she said. We hugged again, longer this time. “I missed you.”
“I missed you too,” I said. “I wish I’d realized sooner you never left.”
There was a knock at the door, and Saffron cocked her head. “Room service,” she said, mouth quirking up in a smile. “Oh, Dakota. I did miss you. I want you collared again, if you really are going to do this ridiculous Daniel-in-the-lion’s-den thing—”
“Saffron,” I began, but room service knocked again, and I gave up. “I’ll think about it.”
“Fair enough,” she said, putting her hand on her hip, still standing there nude before me, the window, God and everybody. “Now … I need to sun and feed, I mean, get real
human
food in me, before the fungal symbiote destroys any more of the outer layers of my skin.”
On the way down in the elevator, my phone rang, and I whipped it out. The number was PHILIP DAVIDSON. I clenched my jaw, found my wits … and put the phone to my ear.
“Oh,
hi
, Philip,” I said.
“She said nonchalantly,” Philip replied. “So, Dakota … vampires who haven’t been seen in days or weeks are back on the radar. Savannah Winters charged a suite at the Four Seasons, and Lord Delancaster’s office has called a
press conference
. And the DEI’s remote viewers woke up screaming that something
mammoth
went down somewhere in Atlanta around four a.m. I can’t see the whole picture, but I can tell this is all part of the same elephant. Fill an old friend in?”
“Oy,” I said. “All right, Philip. Here goes.” And I
told
him. Not in half measures, either. I talked, the elevator landed, I kept talking, I crashed in a comfy chair in the lobby and kept telling him as much as I could without giving away any confidences that would get me killed.
“Oy,” Philip said. “You’ve cleaned up a mess, and created a bigger one.”
“Not likely,” I said. “You didn’t see it. You have no idea what we were up against.”
“Then you have to give me an idea,” Philip said firmly. “You have to come in.”
“Philip,” I said. “I can’t just drop by the DEI office. I’ll be arrested on the spot.”
“Right now, we all just want to talk to you,” Philip said. “I can get them to hold off on any new charges at least until we debrief you—I play golf with the U.S. Attorney’s husband. But I can’t do that if you’re on the run. You need to turn yourself in. Now’s the time.”
My eyes widened as a short, rumpled figure wandered in to the lobby of the Four Seasons—Detective McGough. “You aren’t kidding,” I said. “You sell me out?”
“Of course not!” Philip said. As if on cue, Detective McGough noted the phone on my ear, waved politely, and hung back as Philip denied having led him to me. “I wasn’t responsible for the raid on the werehouse, and I’m not going to turn you in now. You can’t do my job if you stab everyone you meet in the back
…
and besides, Dakota, you’re a friend.”
“Whatever you say, Philip,” I said distantly. “See you soon.”
I hung up, pocketed the phone slowly, and stood.
“All right,” I said, proffering my wrists. “I’m ready.”
“Ready for what?” McGough asked, jamming his hands in his rumpled coat.
“To turn myself in,” I said, lowering my hands. “Isn’t that why you’re here?”
“No,” McGough said, with a rough shake of his head. “That’s something you need to work out with Rand. I heard through the grapevine you’d be here … and we need to talk.”
“Heard through the grapevine?
How?
” I said.
“What, you don’t think your guardian angel knows where you are?”
I stared at him blankly. For a moment I thought he was being completely literal; then I got it. “My mysterious benefactor in the APD, revealed at last.” My mouth curled up in a smile. “What did you do, feed the texts through a friend in the National Security Agency?”
McGough’s eyes bugged. “No, but damn close,” he said. “How’d you figure—”
“Well,” I said, “Mystery texts are all spooky, and it was a Fort Meade area code.”
“Headquarters of the NSA,” he said. “Not bad. Actually, it was an old college roommate, now in a CIA field office
also
in Maryland. Very good contact to have, like your Special Agent Davidson. I’m impressed you looked up the area code. Not many people would have done that.”
“Not many people used to date Special Agent Philip Davidson,” I said.
“That’s not what I hear,” McGough laughed. Then his face grew serious. “You did good with what I gave you, Frost, but I’m not here about the case—I’m here about the aftermath.
Especially
about that stunt you pulled this morning with the vamps.”
“Well,” I said, “once I—wait a minute. How
did
you know I did good with what you gave me, much less what went on last night? I haven’t spoken to the police yet … ”
“I’m not here on police business,” McGough said. “This is strictly Wizarding Guild.”
“
You’re
working for the Wizarding Guild?” I asked. “While working on the APD? Isn’t it a huge no-no to have a practicing magician on the Black Hats?”
“Yes, yes, and no—and I’m not a practicing magician,” McGough said. “I have only the barest hint of a magical bloodline, and hardly do any magic at all.”
My brow furrowed. “Then … why are
you
in the Wizarding Guild?”
“I,” McGough said firmly, “am a magical forensic investigator. I know as much magic as ten average wizards, but every week I find some perp abusing magic in a new way. I don’t have time to learn how to do card tricks with pixie dust—I have a job to do.”
“You go, Detective McGough,” I said. “So … what’s up with this?”
“The Guild has ‘requested,’” McGough said, “that you accept a representative onto your magical oversight committee until a body with legitimate authority is established.”
“Huh,” I said. “Have they. Well, tell the Guild that I will consider their request.”
“It’s not really a request,” McGough said.
“It wasn’t really a request when they put it to you,” I said, “but it is a request when they put it to
me
. Right now
I
determine the makeup of the Council, and even then every appointment also has to be approved by the vampires and the werewolves.”
McGough put his hand to his brow. “Damnit. Damn those stupid, touchy,
violent
fangs and claws. All right, I think you’ll like who they’ve chosen, but I’ll tell the Guild we need to be sensitive about our request. The last thing we want is a vamp-werekin war.”
“Good, you do that,” I said. My mouth quirked up in a smile. “Seriously, you old toad … it will be good to work with you, officially this time.”
“Oh, it won’t be me,” McGough said. “My relationship with the Guild is strictly incognito—has to be, or I couldn’t help prosecute crimes. The Guild picked someone you already know, a friend with good relations with the Guild here and in San Francisco … ”
At first I was completely baffled. Then I slowly realized there was only one person he could have meant, although I couldn’t for the life of me figure out why they’d picked him. “Alex?” I said. “Alex Nicholson? Valentine’s former assistant? The fire magician?”
McGough smiled. “Right first time, you tattooed witch.”
“Oh, blow me, you old toad,” I said, grinning back at him. “Hey, can we go get some coffee? I’ve been up since seven yesterday, and we can fill each other in on the walk.”
We talked on the way to Starbucks, me filling him in on all that had happened and him filling me in on what stake the Wizard’s Guild wanted with the Council. After I had a full cup of coffee in me, felt a bit more energized, I steeled myself and asked the question.
“One more thing, you old toad,” I said. “Can you give me a ride?”
“Where to, you tattooed witch?” McGough asked.
“City Hall East,” I said, holding out my hands. “I need to turn myself in.”
McGough scowled, then pulled out his handcuffs. “All right,” he said. “It
is
time.”
At Homicide, I was questioned. Oh, was I questioned: first by McGough, then by Rand, then by Philip, and then by more detectives and agents, for hours and hours and hours. Helen Yao had to practically
sit
on Damien Lee whenever I mentioned anything even
vaguely
nefarious. But something
…
different
…
was in the air, and eventually it was Assistant District Attorney Paulina Ross who came in and spilled the beans on why I hadn’t been charged.
“I received a package in the mail,” Ross said. “New evidence in the case against you.”
“What kind of evidence are we talking about here?” Lee said. “The U.S. Postal Service is not a typical link in the chain of evidence.”
“Not for the prosecution,” Ross said, with a slight smile, “but for the defense
…
gold.”
Lee’s jaw dropped. “Do you have a present for me, Miss Ross?”
“Oh, yes,” she said. “A box of videotapes. The security cameras from the Masquerade.”
Now
my
jaw dropped.
“I’m having them checked out, but I think they’re genuine,” Ross said. “And they show, from multiple angles, virtually the whole assault on you, Miss Frost. What you did was
clearly
self-defense. I could never in good conscience push this forward. We’re dropping all charges.”
I was stunned. “Thank you … but …
how?
” I said. “The person who took the tapes … I can’t see why he would have kept them … ”
“There was a note attached,” Ross said, somewhat uncomfortable. “It said, ‘Lay off Frost. Valentine had it coming,’ and it was signed, ‘T.’”