Finally Dead (Eve Benson: Vampire Book 1) (36 page)

She got
ready to strike, but Warren shook his head. Lying to her so plainly he nearly
didn’t need to bother with it.

“No. I’m
not
in on it. I don’t think Marcus or Mags is either. Someone here has
been trying to grab power though, and I…” There was a low sound as the power
tried to rise up to a higher level. Then, just as it started to cast over her,
the man spoke. “I bind you to my will. To my thought. You will do what I
command, without question!” There was probably more to the whole thing, but it
was cut short, since Eve was strangling him with her right hand. Two light
kicks from her, to his ankles, and he was on his knees. Her pale hand still on
his neck.

“Um, guys,
help? Warren just tried to put a compulsion on me. I don’t know why, but it
doesn’t fit. I need someone to pick him up and keep him from making noise for
the rest of this thing.”

To her
surprise it wasn’t one of her people that came then, but
Leslie
. Eve got
ready to fight, but the woman, for whatever reason, seemed to be on
her
side.

She
sounded that way, at least.

“I can
take him off in his car. Why would he try to do that? I heard the words… I’ve
been listening to you all night, because a Council investigation is
always
a thing to be wary of. I heard him say that you were his girlfriend. If so,
what could he gain by bespelling you? Wouldn’t you aid him in any way needed?”
She seemed confused then, as if remembering things.

“Would…
If he was doing this to
you
, then what about others? I have some missing
time from last week, and woke on the side of a road, healing from wounds. There
were others too, Lamont, Lars and Tara…”

Eve
looked back at where the people were several hundred feet away, Warren gasping
slightly, unable to get enough air to speak. That meant casting magic was out,
too. Probably. Oh, good Mages could do that silently, but if that was Warren,
he would have done
that
rather than giving himself away like he had.
Still, powerful counted too, and she didn’t doubt that he was that, did she?

“Lars
the tall guy? He’s a Manthori?”

There
was a nod then.

“Tara is
one too, but Lars uses his compulsion to convince everyone they’re normal. Do
you think that we may have had magic cast on us?”

She had
to wonder now, didn’t she?

“Guys? I
think we need to bring this in. Maggie? If you aren’t working against us, could
you… and Lars, work with Lamont to get Jim and Ellyn the Mages alone? Be
careful, and don’t let them cast any spells, or go for a pocket. Zack, would
you meet us over here? Barb, you might have to mention that to him, I don’t
know if he can hear me.”

The
Greater Demon was standing there in front of her already, just appearing. He
nodded.

“Good
work. We need to catch the others, and not make too big of a scene here, but I
think you broke open the core of this. I’ll see about sending people home.
There are some problems coming though, so we need to be careful about all of
this. One wrong move and we’ll start a war. Our side will win, but if we have
to do it, let’s not have it be in the middle of my territory?” He acted like
she understood everything, which she really didn’t.

“The
Mages, some of them, have been trying to start a war?”

He
glanced at Warren and nodded.

“Kind
of. They used the info in the books I wrote to try and take over other groups.
That was going to be the plan, at any rate. The thing there was that they
managed to sneak their way into a
lot
of people’s minds. It’s mainly the
three here though, pulling the strings. I picked up on it a few months ago, but
it wasn’t really my business. Honestly, it still isn’t, not at this level, but
you’re my friend, and gave me snacks. I can take the leftovers home with me,
right? Great job on all that by the way. Really good. Have you considered
catering as a business? I know that you’re busy right now, but that won’t last
forever, and you have some training there. You can practice, and have me test
things out for you. That sounds like a great hobby, don’t you think?” He seemed
pleased enough about it all, but gently removed her hand from Warren’s throat,
allowing him to grab at it with both hands and gasp for a while.

It was
cute, in a manner of speaking, since the other Mages were walked away from the
group without any kind of fuss at all. They weren’t even being threatened with
death. It seemed like they’d just been asked to come and talk. Which sort of
made sense. They thought of these other people as their friends, didn’t they?

Their
buddies, and comrades in arms. Fake weapons that were actually coins being
flipped, and battles that were designed to be fun, more or less, but that still
seemed to count. So why would they doubt that these people had their best
interests at heart?

That
only held if Maggie and Lars weren’t actually in on the whole thing, of course,
but Zack looked at her and shook his head.

“No,
just these three, trying to take over the world. All of it, which is ambitious
enough. There might be more to it, but it isn’t anyone here. I can’t share all
of it, you’ll need to figure that part out on your own. Then, no one ever told
me that Mages were lacking in hubris, did they? So, what do you want to do now?
This is your show, Eve.”

It was?
Well, she kind of got that
Zack
would think that. She’d invited him,
after all.

Ellyn
and Jim looked scared and Warren was still on his knees, his neck red from her
manhandling of it. Eve smiled and waved at them.

“So, did
one of you set up Mark to try and rape Maggie? Compelling one mage to take over
the mind of a Vampire, so that if things went wrong… it probably would have
worked too, if you hadn’t forgotten about Fred.”

That got
Jim to make a face.

“Who?”

Eve
nodded, “
exactly
. Fred Who, the Human boyfriend that had instructions to
call the Vampire embassy if anything happened to Maggie here. Even to mention
Mages. Just a failsafe, but that’s why they work. So, that was your idea Jim?”

He shook
his head, refusing to speak. Which was smart.

Never
talk to the cops. Her father, the Police Chief, had told her
that
one
often enough. He should know, too. The job of law enforcement was to find
illegal things. The laws were so convoluted that almost everyone was doing
something they could be arrested for at any given moment. Talking just let them
find out what it was more easily.

Only
they
weren’t
the police, were they? Even if they were official, it was
in a different system, and they didn’t have to play by the same rules at all.

“No big.
Let’s take them in for questioning. Can we bring Bob Millhouse and Lisa Wiese
in on this one? Warren is their boy, so they should be in on it, to see that we
aren’t railroading him, or anything.” She glanced at the three, who weren’t all
that old looking, and shook her head. Some Mages could look young though. They
could be hundreds of years old even and she wouldn’t be able to tell the
difference. Not unless they dressed in styles that were way out of date. Even
then, that could just mean they were a bit retro.

Zack
volunteered to take them to the mall, and bring Lars, Tara and Lamont along
with him, leaving Barb to sign autographs, since it was good for business.

“Plus,
she doesn’t get to do a lot for fun. Shall we?”

It
wasn’t until Lamont yelled, after a Node opened in space, that Eve realized he
hadn’t gotten who, or
what
, Zack really was. Still he went along with the
others, since he was the one carrying Ellyn. The rest of them stayed for hours,
until a friendly police officer actually drove by and got out, taking a few
cookies for the road.

“Remember
to be packed up before midnight. Park rules, even with a permit.”

He was
friendly about it, but then, he’d been bribed with junk food, so it was fair
enough. Also, he was pretty certain that Maggie was Chief Sims daughter, and
being polite to her friends was a good idea. If he ever wanted another
promotion. Eve stayed until last, making sure that none of the kids got stuck
out there alone. There were three whose ride just didn’t show, so she piled
them into Mark’s truck and sent them all off with him, to be delivered to their
destinations safe and sound.

If Zack
really wanted the remaining food stuff he’d have to wait until the next day.
She simply wasn’t going to run into town carrying it all. Back to the mall, she
thought, since that was where the prisoners were going.

Besides,
she had books to shelve, didn’t she?

As she
ran back, trying her best to break a land speed record, using the environment
smoothly to both hide from prying eyes and push herself to greater quickness,
she noticed that Bey was there along side of her. He didn’t make
any
noise, which was better than she was doing by a hundred times. Her feet
shuffled and clapped against the ground, but he was almost like a ghost. It was
another thing to learn, she knew. For the longest time he didn’t speak, just
keeping pace with her as she tried to go faster and lose him.

That
didn’t happen, of course.

This
went on until they were at the edge of the mall parking lot, which was almost
twenty miles away from where they’d started. It was nearly empty, being after
midnight. By about half a minute. They’d left early, not wanting to tick off
the police by overstaying their welcome.

She
paused, trying not to scream as the pain got worse from stopping, but after a
moment Bey spoke to her, his words friendly.

“You
have done excellent work tonight so far, Eve. You showed intelligence, quick
thinking and skill. The night is not over, however. When we go in, you will be
given the chance to save the lives of the Mages. Perhaps it will be another of
us, but my guess would be they turn to you, who are practically one of them. Their
people are not foolish, but tend to be merciful and tender hearted with their
own, so they will seek to pass such a judgment to another. I cannot tell you
how to choose, but you should be prepared for it to come. It may not. If they
are wise, that will be the case. If you feel you must act however, do so
without hesitation. There is nothing to gain by waiting, once the answers have
been delivered.”

She
nodded, and started to walk, not bothering to speak. She didn’t want to be
rude, but what was she supposed to say to that? She kind of liked Warren, and
the others… Well, not so much for them. They wouldn’t be too hard to manage. It
wasn’t like killing left her feeling bad anymore. That was one of the dangers
of being a Vampire though, she knew.

If you
didn’t feel bad when you killed a person, then it was a
lot
easier to
kill the next one. To take out anyone that got in your way. Knowing that wasn’t
enough reason to leave evil people alive though, or
stupid
ones. It
didn’t really matter if these three had intended to do harm or not. They had,
and would have kept on doing it, if caught and not punished well enough.

Since no
cage could really hold them for long, that left one way to stop them that no
one would be able to get around. At least she didn’t think so. Death, the right
kind, was rather final, wasn’t it?

She
looked up to see Cormack behind the counter at Yoghurt World, the place
gleaming, even in the dim mall light. The white marble counters were clean and
the whole place spoke of something both old and new at the same time.
Glittering,
and
old fashioned.

The man
smiled and raised a rag in his hand to wave. She did the same, and cutely
enough, so did The Bey. The
Lord
. She knew what the name meant, and that
it was a title, not a proper name, but she didn’t know what else he might have
once been called. It hardly mattered at the moment, so she went into Candles
and More, the little chimes over the red painted, glass centered, door making a
small sound.

She
nearly called out, knowing that the people were all in the back. It was close,
but she
almost
made her words into a flip thing that would have turned
the serious tone of the place into something lighter. If not happy, then at
least gallows humor. That wasn’t the right mood to set for the moment though.

“We’re
here. Bey and Eve.” It was a bit stiff and formal, but she heard an answer,
from Bob.

“Back
here. We’ve been waiting for you both.”

Not for
long, it seemed. Lisa did the actual honors, setting the complicated spells
that would force the three in front of them to tell the truth. It took a bit,
about twenty minutes for each of them, but no one complained about the wait.
Bey just stood, so she did too, with Edom coming to her other side. Backing her
up?

Lenore
was on his far side, with Zack next to her.

All her
people. Really, everyone in the room was, except for the bad guys. Even Warren
kind of counted as a friend though. Not one of her besties maybe, but close
enough that she was going to feel bad about executing him.

As soon
as Ellyn, the last to be spelled, was under, Bob moved in to ask the questions.