Blood Politics (Blood Destiny 4) (32 page)

“I told them!
 I told them you’d come for me!”  He peered at my face and his smile faltered.  “What happened?  You look upset.”

“You don’t want to know,” I said tiredly.

Aubrey looked hurt, but I couldn’t summon the energy to worry about his feelings.  He painted on a sullen pout, and handed out his phone to me.  I stared at it for a moment, uncomprehendingly.

He waved it in my face.
 “Your friend has been calling.  Over and over again.  He really wants to talk to you.”

It took a moment to work out who on earth Aubrey was referring to.
 Then realisation dawned.  Alex.  It was a bit late now for whatever information he had to give.  I supposed I should at least be glad that he was alive and hadn’t gotten himself into any trouble for asking questions about Endor on my behalf.  As confident as I’d been before that it would have been no problem, I was now starting to realise that the last thing I should be placing any faith in was my own confidence.  I muttered a thanks at Aubrey and took the phone from him.

“Come on.
 We’re leaving.”

He beamed at me, although there was still an edge of concern to his features.
 I ignored it and instead turned the phone on, hitting the button to return Alex’s last call, and started walking back through the woods.

“What do you want, Vlad?”

I was somewhat taken aback at the vehemence in Alex’s voice.  “Er…Alex?”

“Mack Attack!
 It’s you!  Where the hell have you been, dude?”

I couldn’t face telling him the sad story right now.
 Instead I prevaricated.  “I’ll explain later.  I need you to stay away from that shop now though, Alex.  Do you hear me?  Don’t go anywhere near it.  Go home and stay home.”

“Eh?” he sounded surprised.
 “I’ve been in already.  You were right, there was absolutely nothing to be afraid of in the slightest.  In fact,” his voice took on a confidential tone, “I also take it back about the Batibat being hideous and scary.  She’s actually rather charming.”

“Um, okay.
 Still, go home now and don’t go back there again.”

“If that’s what you want.
 You want to hear what I found about the shop owner or not though?”

Pain glanced through me.
 “Yeah, Alex, I guess so.”

“Well, you could sound a bit more enthusiastic, Mack Attack.
 This is a dude we need to be scared of.  Apparently his name is Endor.  Even without the info from the Batibat, you know what that means.”

“Not really,” I said, suddenly pausing.
 Was this really more Otherworld general knowledge that I was completely ignorant of?  Would knowing whatever Alex was about to reveal have meant that this night’s terrible events could have been avoided?

“Oh,” he said, somewhat deflated.
 “I guess you didn’t go to Sunday school then.  The witch of Endor is in the bible.  She’s a medium who King Saul calls up to contact the ghost of Samuel.  Needless to say, bad things happen as a result.”

I shook my head frustratedly.
 The bible?  That was hardly up to date, of the minute information.  “I don’t see what this has to do with our Endor.   He’s not a woman.”

“You’re missing the point, Mack Attack.
 The witch of Endor could call upon ghosts because she had the power of the dead.  The Endor here and now is using her name because he’s using the same power.  He’s a necromancer.  It’s serious black magic, dude.  He’s a nasty nasty guy.”

No
shit.  That explained why he had been so keen to kill the dryads, I supposed though.  The more dead dryads, the more dark power he could glean.

“That’s useful information.”
 Sort of.  Not really.  It wasn’t exactly surprising.

“Wait, there’s more!”

My heart sank and fingers of dread clutched at my heart.  How much worse was this likely to get?  “Go on.”

“The Batibat came across some stuff in the back of the shop.
 She doesn’t like her boss very much.  Apparently he’s using her to look after things there so he can make some money and keep his other operations going.  She’s not very happy about it.  I think he’s using various Batibats to do his evil bidding, or else.”

Yeah, I thought, or else he’ll suck the life out of them.

“Anyway,” Alex continued, “she found this thing that was ripped out of some book.  She reckons it’s his plan to get more power.  It seems that he’s looking to harness the four elements in order to boost his own strength.  That’s…”

“Earth, air, fire and water,” I filled in.

“Yes.  Mack Attack, you have to understand, that’s crazy.  First of all I have no idea how you would even go about doing such a thing.  Second of all, it makes no sense.  Those elements don’t have anything to do with necromancy.  Thirdly, can you imagine how powerful someone would be if they really pulled that off?”

I stopped walking and closed my eyes, resting a hand on a nearby tree.
 Fuck.  “Did she mention whether she knew if he’d been successful at all?”

“Nah, Mack Attack.
 She reckons he’s pretty much delusional.  I’d say the same as well to be honest.  I don’t see how anyone could do it.”

There was a moment of silence as I absorbed all of Alex’s intelligence.

Eventually he filled the void.  “So?  Did I do good?  I gotta tell you, I’m really proud of myself.  I mean, I don’t believe much of what she said.  It’s a lot of pie in the sky stuff, but maybe I actually have a bit of a calling for this, you know?”  He deepened his voice dramatically.  “Alex Florides, the super spy.”

“Yeah, Alex, you did great.”
 I could almost hear his smile from across the phone.  “Look, I have to go now.  Thanks for the info.  I mean it though – stay away from that shop from now on.  It’s too dangerous to go back.”

“What, really?
 Dangerous how?  Wait, do I need to hide myself?  Is that Endor dude going to come after me because of what I found out?”

I reckoned he probably had bigger plans than bothering with a surf loving mage.
 “No.  But still, it wouldn’t hurt to stay out of sight for a little while.”

“Sure, sure.
 Okay, I’m going to go now then.  Maybe I should go abroad?  Not, that’s too obvious.  Um, perhaps up north somewhere?”

“Bye, Alex.”

“Yeah, bye, Mack Attack,” he responded distractedly.

I hung up and passed the phone back to Aubrey.
 He was watching me carefully.  “There are bad things afoot, aren’t there?”

“Yes, there are.”

“Worse than vampires?”

“Much much worse than vampires.”

Aubrey nodded.  “Okay, then.  What do you need?”

“I need to get back to London as soon as possible.
 Can you run?”

His eyes widened.
 “To London?  Isn’t that kind of far?”

I patted him on the shoulder, trying to avoid appearing patronising.
 It was hard.  “No, you prat.  The car park.  Come on.”

Chapter Twenty Three

Twelve hours I was later I was at least feeling physically refreshed.
 I’d had what was probably the longest shower of my life, eight hours’ sleep, and a good breakfast with lots and lots of coffee.  If you could call a meal at three o’clock in the afternoon ‘breakfast’.  There was a hard numbed shell around both my heart and my thoughts whenever I even began to consider the terrible events on Haughmond Hill, but I kept pushing that oh so very recent memory away, knowing that I needed to start feeling more prepared to deal with all this necromancy bullshit.  At least for once in my life I’d really appreciated being able to travel halfway across the country via a portal.  It meant that there was far less faffing around, and far more time to really get down to business.

I’d known when I’d entered the now shiny red door to my little flat in the wee hours of Sunday morning, with all the others outside watching me as I’d entered, that Corrigan had been hoping that I’d invite him in.
 I had desperately needed the hours of solitude to get my head into gear, however.  It had nothing to do with pushing him away, and everything to do with just wanting to sort myself out. As much as I wanted to feel his arms around me, I had decided that some real undisturbed sleep was more important at this point.  I wasn’t completely convinced as to whether he had understood that or not, but I was damned sure that I’d make him realise it.

Leaving a note for Mrs. Alcoon to explain (although how I could possibly appropriately convey that there was an ex-vampire sleeping in her shop on a scribbled bit of paper, I really had no idea) I’d installed Aubrey in a campbed at the back of Clava Books.
 I’d pointed out to him in no uncertain terms that it was a very temporary measure.  He had been pathetically grateful.  Out of all of us, I was pretty sure that he was the one least happy to be back within the steel and cement arms of the nation’s capital.  I had been debating whether to invite him along to the formal meeting of the Otherworld’s great and the good that had been called for later that day, but had eventually decided that as an ex-member of the undead himself, he might have some insights that he could shed on necromancy.  Vamps weren’t exactly the same as necromancers, but I reckoned they probably lived in the same metaphorical neighbourhood.

Considering what on earth the future could possibly hold for Aubrey, I lifted up my half-empty coffee cup and stared down at my hands cupping its still warm exterior.
 My mind flitted immediately back to when they’d been in the same position around the dryad’s delicate skull.  I winced in the pain of the memory and dropped the cup abruptly.  Then I picked it up again and threw it with all my might against the bare wall facing me.  The china smashed into shards, and I watched as the remaining coffee dribbled down the wall.  I reached out for the vase containing Corrigan’s now very dead flowers and did exactly the same.  The decaying stems mingled with the dark caffeine infusion in a messy heap on my floor.  I didn’t feel any better.

I flexed my fingers and held them out in front of my eyes.
 They didn’t look any differently to how they had before I’d used them to kill the dryad.  They didn’t really feel any different.  But the knowledge of what they’d done was gnawing away at me.  Atlanteia had asked me to help save her extended family.  Instead I’d helped destroy them.

A sharp knock at the door broke me out of my self-absorbed reverie.
 Somehow the tinge of arrogance that lent itself to the sound made it clear who was there waiting.  A wave of relief shuddered through me.  Standing up I walked over and opened it.

Corrigan took one look at my face and pulled me towards him.
 For once I let him, allowing myself to lean towards his hard body.  He rested his chin on top of my head, and I sucked in his familiar spicy citrus aftershave.  Neither of us said anything for several moments.  Finally he drew back and looked me in the eyes.

“How are you doing?” he asked softly.

I shook my head slightly, realising that if I tried to speak, I’d end up sobbing hysterically.  He seemed to understand.  I sank back into his broad chest again, and remained there for several moments, trying to re-compose myself.   It occurred to me, in some dim recesses of my brain, just how happy I was that he was here.  Despite what I’d overheard from his conversation with Lucy, there had been the chance he’d feel he’d gotten everything he wanted from me during our session in the woods.  The fact that the Lord Alpha of the Brethren was right now standing in my little doorway, with his muscle steeled arms around me, meant that he still wanted to be with me.

“I’m sorry I didn’t invite you in last night,” I said, my words somewhat muffled as I spoke them into his chest.
 “I just needed the time to sort myself out.  To get some sleep and get things straight in my head.”

His voice rumbled above me.
 “I understand, kitten.  You know I do.  And you should also know that things haven’t changed since yesterday, not with us and not with the reasons behind everything that happened and everything we did.  There wasn’t a choice to make.  Endor forced our hand and we had to react.”

I sighed deeply.
 “I know.  But that doesn’t make it any better.”

I pulled back and looked into his warm eyes.
 “What’s going to happen at this meeting?  Is everyone going to be able to work together against him?”

Corrigan’s expression was serious.
 “There’s no other way this can go.  If we can’t find a way to work as one to bring him down then we really will have failed.”

I nodded, trying to ignore the hard little nugget of worry in the pit of my stomach.
 We’d all managed to sort ourselves out and be a team at Haughmond Hill, even if the results of that collaboration hadn’t gone our way.  But that had only involved a small group of us, and the fact that neither the Arch-Mage nor the Summer Queen had been there had meant that there were less authoritative egos to have to manage.  I knew as well as anyone that the clash of different Otherworld species and personalities could cause a lot of problems.  I reckoned that it would just have to be down to Corrigan and me to try to encourage them all to keep the peace.