“But one not associated with Starkad, this time?” The detective fanned his fingertips in a quick, reflexive gesture of frustration. “I was hoping we could explore that angle a little further.”
“That’s not necessarily a lack of connection,” Abby Irene said. “After all, they are both of the blood. With the planting of the ring, and the attacks on his court, it begins to appear more and more that the purpose of the attacks is to draw out Starkad.”
Judiciously, the blond wampyr nodded. “It would appear so, would it not?”
Dyachenko, though, is on a different trail. “Who do you think framed Ilya Ilyich, Irina?”
She stopped, mouth open, whatever she had been about to say blown back down her throat by his question. Her hands rose and fell, hopelessly, then rose again as if warding off something only she could see. “I—can’t say. Inspector.”
Dyachenko nodded to Sebastien, which led Sebastien to the realization that he was standing closest to the door. Gently, guiding it so the latch caught almost soundlessly, Sebastien closed it.
“Off the record, Irina,” Dyachenko said, while Starkad methodically wrote another name.
She glanced at Starkad—not Sebastien, and Sebastien would have been hard-put to criticize her decision. Besides, the first loyalties were usually the deepest ones.
Starkad nodded without looking up from his task.
“Imperial Inspector Kostov,” she said. “If he was not responsible, he knew who was, and he knew of it. He should never have been on the case.”
“Kostov is no longer in the department,” Dyachenko said.
“I know,” Sebastien said. “Starkad mentioned he had become a judge.”
Dyachenko’s smile thinned. “One of his sons works for me. A lad about your age.”
“Grigor?” Irina asked carefully.
“Sacha,” Dyachenko said, all competence and calm. “Grigor is an artist, is he not?”
“Grigor is on my list,” Starkad said. “And yes. He is a very fine artist. Or he was. His brother—”
“Is a poet,” Irina said, just as Dyachenko said, “Is a policeman.”
Dyachenko got up from his chair and came around his desk. He opened the door beside Sebastien and leaned out. —Pyotr,— he said. —Send in Kostov, would you?
Moscow
Bely Gorod
January 1897
Jack had intended to lead Irina back to her loft when Sebastien returned her to him, but she insisted on returning to her habitual haunt—Kobalt, the café where they had met. Named for a pigment named for a goblin, which Jack found appropriate and disturbing in equal measure.
“This is unwise,” he said, but she shrugged and swung her handbag in a manner that precluded him enumerating why.
“If you are scared or lazy, you wait at home.”
She was not his prisoner. Sebastien was going to kill him, but what else was he supposed to do? Chain her to a steam radiator?
Jack sighed and found his hat.
Inside, it was the usual crowd of revolutionaries, artists, and poseurs—with, Jack thought, a high degree of correspondence between the three categories. Nadia, the young redheaded woman with the cropped hair—quite radical—rushed up to them and said —Irina! Have you heard?
—About Sergei?— She nodded. —I have heard, yes.
—Ilya has been arrested! The police are saying he killed Sergei for you, Irina. Is it true?
The news obviously had the effect on Irina that the girl had been hoping. —Sergei? No, I—why would I want Sergei
killed
?—
Whatever Nadia said, it was too fast and too complicated for Jack to follow, but it was easy enough to understand what Irina was saying. Over and over again,
Nyet, nyet, nyet. That was never my intention.
He found her hand under the table and squeezed it. She squeezed back, once, but from then on it was as if she had forgotten she had appendages. She just leaned forward, listening, her extremities growing ever colder to his touch. Eventually, she sat back and made a chopping gesture with her hand. —Enough, then. Enough. If Ilya killed him it was not for me.
Nadia looked doubtful, but her frown and whatever might have followed were interrupted by a demanding voice calling her name. She lifted her head and turned. Whoever beckoned must have had a claim on her, because she sighed and stood. —This conversation isn’t over.
Judging by the stubborn look gracing Irina’s features, she could not have been more wrong.
As Nadia vanished, Jack leaned over to Irina. —I think you’re not telling me all the truth about Sergei. It’s not just that you were both Starkad’s courtiers, is it?
Irina tossed her hair and sighed melodramatically. She looked down, and then sideways, before she said, —The worst kind of men show you the very best time.
Moscow
Police Palace, Kremlin
May 1903
Upon arriving in his superior’s office, Sacha Kostov obviously expected something quite different from the panel of inquisition that awaited him. Just within the door, he balked like a nervy horse. Dyachenko slipped a hand inside his elbow and drew him in, and Sebastien shut the door in his wake.
—Officer Kostov,— Dyachenko said, —I order you to remove your jacket and uniform blouse.
The serried colors that rose across Kostov’s face left no doubt as to his mortality—pink, then ruddy, then sallow. —Sir,— he protested under his breath. —There are ladies.
—There are investigators,— Dyachenko replied. —You will disrobe.
—My father will hear of this,— Kostov hissed, his voice cracking on the angry stage-whisper. The glare Kostov directed at Irina and at Starkad could have peeled paint,
in particular.
Dyachenko merely nodded, as if accepting the threat at face value, and made a peremptory gesture. —Quickly, please.
Eyes pinned on the floor, Kostov slipped off his jacket and unbuttoned his sleeves. The blouse was some blend that held a press and made a plastic, slithering sound as he shrugged out of it. Sebastien, nose flared, caught no scent of blood, and there were no marks on Kostov’s arms, now bared from the biceps down, nor any bulge of bandage beneath his undershirt.
—The rest of it,— Dyachenko said, though now a note of apology crept into his voice.
Kostov raised his chin, but restrained his protests. With one swift movement, he jerked the undershirt up over his head and tossed it to the floor. Kostov’s chest and back were reasonably fit, moderately furred, and entirely devoid of the half-moon crescents of human teeth.
“No marks,” said Abby Irene, so very gently. —Officer Kostov, you may resume your uniform. I assume you have no objection to providing Inspector Dyachenko with a blood sample?
Kostov’s head jerked from one side to the other so hard Sebastien fancied he heard it snap. —None whatsoever,— he said through clenched teeth. —Do you have a particular location in mind?
—I should think a finger prick will suffice.
Abby Irene drew a lancet and a slide from her bag and handed them to Dyachenko. Grimly, his mouth stubbornly immobile, Kostov held out his right hand, and Dyachenko pricked it and took a smear. The scent worked in Sebastien’s nostrils. Across the small office, Starkad shook his head
no
, and Sebastien knew before Abby Irene pulled out her wand what the answer would be.
Dyachenko seemed to accept the wampyrs’ determination without her confirmation, at least temporarily.
—The purpose of this little exercise, Officer Kostov, was to clear you in the murder of Olesia Valentinova Sharankova. We have reason to believe that whoever killed her wished revenge upon her patron, the wampyr Starkad, and it has come to light that your brother Grigor was also his courtier. This served as a link between you and the victim that you failed to disclose in the course of the investigation.
Buttoning his uniform blouse, flipping flat his collar, Kostov grimaced—but some of the offended stiffness dropped out of his spine. —I understand, Inspector.
—The intent was not to humiliate you, Officer, but to clear your name before all concerned.
Kostov’s nod could not have been stiffer if a puppeteer had jerked a stick to cause it. —It is not,— he said, at great length, while shooting his cuffs just so, —that I was never envious of my brother, you understand. Because I was envious, of his talent, of the attention it garnered him.
Carefully, Kostov did not glance at Starkad. Starkad had no such qualms, and calmly gazed upon the officer, not even troubling himself to hood his glances.
—I understand that it is difficult to admit such feelings,— said Dyachenko.
Kostov swallowed. —I did not kill anyone.
—No,— said Starkad. —I do not believe that you did.
Moscow
Kitai Gorod
January 1897
When Jack opened the door on Irina, she was not weeping. From the creases across her forehead and the pinch at the corner of her eyes, it was only by an act of will; he could imagine the tears frozen across her cold-red cheeks. What color would that be? The same Chinese red that had been the slow death of Sergei Nikolaevich? Or something with a bluer tone?
You do not have an artist’s eye, Jack Priest.
—Come in,— he said. —You look upset.
It was midafternoon; Sebastien was knitting socks in the darkened parlor and Jack had just pulled cheese and butter from the icebox for tea. The kettle was steaming, about to boil, and Irina nodded tightly as she shut the door behind herself, sliding the bolt reflexively.
Jack reached to touch her shoulder through the coat. She leaned into it for a second, cold wool exhaling the icy air of the street around the pressure of his fingers, and then she shook him off and moved past, into the bright, inviting kitchen. He’d drawn the shades for Sebastien’s sake, but it was no great hardship to keep the lamps burning through the day in this cold.
“Please,” Jack said dryly as she pulled out a chair. “Sit, Irina.”
Her mouth quirked. “Is bad day,” she said. “I come from Kostov again, you know?”
He knew. The kettle whistled; he went to warm the pot and pour. There was already sugar on the table, and Jack worked in silence until he could set the chipped porcelain teapot, painted with violets, beside it. Irina said nothing, seeming grateful for the silence. She shed her coat and gloves and scarf over the back of the chair, then rested her chin on her hands.
Jack poured for her, as she seemed disinclined to reach for the pot, but once the cup was in her hands she cradled it close. “Is warm,” she said. “Is good.” And lowered her face over the steam as Sebastien came into the room, trailing a wreath of variegated merino.
—Ilya?— he asked, in cool tones that somehow conveyed understanding and empaty.
—Kostov,— she answered, hopelessly. —He knew the answers he wanted.
Sebastien sat down beside her. —And you gave them to him.
She nodded, painfully, over her tea. —I didn’t know how not to.
Sebastien put a hand on her shoulder. Jack, watching, reached across and did the same thing on the other side. There wasn’t much to say that wouldn’t be useless. Jack had learned young that there were moments in life best acknowledged by quiet solidarity.
—Some revolutionary I am,— she said, bitterly punctuating the silence.
—Live to fight another day,— Jack answered.
Sebastien shifted. Jack gave him a look, forestalling the inevitable cynical comment—for today, at least. Sebastien’s long view was the last thing Irina needed now.
Minutes went by before Irina picked up her teacup and sipped the cooling tea. —Hey,— Jack said. —Sebastien has something for you.
Irina looked up, blinking as if to bring them back into focus. —Something for me?
—A gift,— Jack said, and with the hand that fell behind Irina’s back made a violent gesture at Sebastien’s jacket pocket.
Sebastien rolled his eyes, but reached in and produced a black velvet ring box. He set it on the table beside Irina’s cup and saucer.
When she looked up, her eyes wide, he nodded. She touched the box lightly, opened it, withdrew the ring and clutched it white-knuckled in her fist. “Thank you.”
Jack felt his own cheeks aching when Sebastien smiled. “You know I will not stay in Moscow forever.”
She nodded. —I am not sure I will go with you when you leave.
The wampyr looked at Jack. Jack kept his face still as he nodded. Was Sebastien really leaving this up to him?
Apparently.
Sebastien took the nod and turned back to Irina. —I’ll come back, when I can.
She lowered her gaze to her knotted fingers. When she opened them, the diameter of the ring was impressed on the flesh of her palm. Her hands shook as she slipped it onto her middle finger.
—It fits,— she said, and burst into tears.
Moscow
Kitai Gorod
May 1903
Garrett was becoming more fond of Dyachenko than she had anticipated. And it was good, so good to be on the chase again. Garrett had often thought that she was made for one thing—bringing the wicked to justice—and everything else in her life had heretofore been just frills around that main thread.
Now, Kostov dismissed, she remained sitting in Dyachenko’s office with him, Sebastien, Phoebe, Irina, and
the elder wampyr who had followed Sebastien home and now stood like a statue against the far wall, stony and silent. She almost imagined that she could sense the cold radiating from him.
Is that what Sebastien will be, one day?
“What next?” Phoebe asked, when the click of the door closing behind Sacha Kostov no longer echoed.
Garrett glanced at Dyachenko. “More interviews?” she hazarded. Police work was police work, the world round.
He nodded—not to her, but to Irina and Starkad. “If we are treating these murders as linked, the logical next step is to work down that list of all your court and associates.”
“And those who you spurned,” Phoebe said. “I imagine over the years, you did not accept everyone who wanted you.”
Garrett did not find Starkad’s towering height intimidating. Everything else about him, perhaps, but not his height. Her ingrained response to intimidation was belligerence, and she was priding herself in stepping on the impulse firmly when Starkad smiled at Phoebe. At least, Garrett presumed that was intended a smile—