Pirate's Alley (6 page)

“That’s the Elder from Asia, from Tokyo, I think. His name’s Sato,” Alex said, nodding toward the dark-haired man who entered with Willem Zrakovi. Both wore ankle-length black robes.

“Since when do wizards wear robes?” I whispered. “That’s falling into every human stereotype ever created.” Jeezum. Next thing you knew, they’d be waving around magic wands.

Speaking of which, I moved my bag containing the elven staff between my feet so I could get at it if I felt the need to wave something around myself.

“The First Elder thought they’d look more intimidating in robes than in business suits,” Alex whispered back. “They look like they’re on their way to a costume party at Hogwarts.”

Finally, a handsome black man of indeterminate age walked out of the back, accompanied by a handsome Frenchman whose age I knew all too well.

Jean Lafitte looked great for a 230-year-old pirate who’d recently died for at least the fourth time that I knew of. He was six-foot-two of alpha pirate, his dark hair pulled back in a short ponytail, his dark blue eyes sharp and serious. He had full lips, a strong chin, and a jagged scar along his jawline in case one forgot how lethal he could be.

The indigo double-breasted waistcoat emphasized his slim waist, and light-colored breeches were tucked into black leather boots that almost reached his knees. Add the ruffled white shirt and he was ready to attend any nineteenth-century ballroom in style.

He gave Jake a light, somber nod and let his gaze linger on me a second before taking a seat next to Toussaint Delachaise. His companion took the center chair and pulled the microphone toward him.

“If everyone could take a seat, please.”

This was my first look at Adrian Hoffman’s father, Geoffrey, the First Elder and also the representative for the UK and European Union wizarding communities. I saw the resemblance to his son. He wasn’t as flashy as Adrian, but had the same bone structure, the same good looks, the same haughty bearing. I guess one didn’t become grand poobah of all wizards without cause for arrogance. He’d probably been horrified that his baby boy had fallen for a vampire, conspired with elves, and gotten himself turned.

I’d spent a lot of my sleepless nights thinking about the First Elder, putting together my theory as to what he knew, and when he might have known it. I was ninety-nine percent certain he was up to his robe-wearing ass in the whole elf-vampire-wizard political mess. I couldn’t prove it, however, so I had no intention of sharing it here unless I got backed into a corner.

After the introductions, including an awkward moment when Hoffman forgot the Faery Queen’s name and called her Ravine instead of Sabine, the room fell quiet. I waited with my eyes glued to the closed door behind the dais. Of all those charged with crimes, who’d come out first? Would it be Adrian himself, who’d conspired against a fellow wizard and set me up to be killed? Lily, the elf who’d started the whole conspiracy? Etienne, her vampire conspirator? Jonas, the necromantic wizard who’d turned against his own people for money? Or the Axeman of New Orleans, the big, lumbering undead serial killer who’d become the conspirators’ weapon?

“The first thing I’d like to do this evening,” drawled Hoffman, looking down at a stack of papers he’d placed before him, “is call for the testimony of the person who was at the heart of all the problems experienced in the preternatural world three weeks ago. The person, indeed, at whose feet the bulk of the blame could rightly be placed.”

Good. Lily would go first. She deserved every punishment they could throw at her.

Hoffman looked up, and I froze when his cold brown eyes came to rest on me.

“I request that Drusilla Jane Jaco, the sentinel of the New Orleans region, take the stand.”

Oh, shit.

CHAPTER
5

The world around me had turned alien and surreal. I took a deep breath to steady my nerves. The First Elder’s son was in trouble, and he needed a scapegoat. As sentinel, I might as well have cloven hoofs and little nubby goat horns sprouting from my head.

I just thought it would take him longer to go after me.

My knees shook when I stood up.
Be ready to think on your feet,
Rand had said, and I wished I’d pressed him more on what he meant.

Walking to the front with my chin held high, I kept my eyes on First Elder Hoffman. I hadn’t done anything wrong, other than be born with enough elven magic for both wizards and elves to find it threatening. Hoffman would do everything possible to put Adrian in a good light, which meant putting me in a bad one.

He wasn’t getting away with it. If he thought I’d stand by meekly and take one for the team to avoid ugly political fallout, he had the wrong wizard. I’d almost died, Alex had been shot, and I’d been forced to kill Jean.

Jake had shoved the messenger bag containing the elven staff in my hands as I climbed over him to the aisle. I didn’t find it reassuring that he thought I needed to be armed. The tense posture and sudden alertness of both Rand and Jean as I took my seat behind the witness table offered an important reminder, however. I had allies on the council. Strong allies. They just didn’t happen to be sitting in the First Elder’s chair.

The next surprise came after I’d vowed to tell the whole truth and nothing but the truth upon pain of having my powers stripped, or some equally horrible fate. The door behind the dais opened and another security guy escorted the prisoners out of their holding room.

If I hadn’t been trying to keep a wary eye on the First Elder, I’d have smirked at the vision of Jonas, Adrian, Etienne Boulard, and the Axeman attached to each other with glittering, magic-enhanced ankle shackles. Except there should have been a fifth person in that group. Lily was the guiltiest culprit. She’d hired Jonas to use his necromancy in resurrecting the Axeman to kill me, which had led to the death of Rand’s mother. She’d blackmailed Adrian into betraying a fellow wizard, forced Jean to shoot me, and conspired to overthrow Mace Banyan as head of the Synod.

I glared at Rand, making use of our ability to telepathically communicate by bellowing,
Where the hell is Lily?

He winced and hunched his shoulders.
Stop yelling!
Leaning to one side, he whispered something to Mace, and the Elven Synod leader’s dark gaze slid to me before he spoke. “Mr. Hoffman, before we continue, I’d like to address the absence of one of the defendants tonight, Lily Aleese.”

Hoffman’s face compressed into a sour look very much like his son’s habitual sulk, which told me Lily’s absence hadn’t been scripted. “Ms. Aleese is key to these proceedings, Mr. Banyan.”

Mace assumed a sorrowful expression that looked about as genuine as a cheap cubic zirconia in a diamond mine. In his gray suit and gray band-collared shirt, with his perfectly matched heather-gray overcoat thrown across the table, he looked urbane and oh so sincere. I knew better; he’d had the same expression when he apologized for kidnapping me and then plundering through my mind with the finesse of Ferdinand the Elven Bull.

Freaking elf.

“Unfortunately, the severity of the charges against Lily precluded our waiting for the council to assemble.” He reached across the table and dug in a pocket of his overcoat, pulling out an envelope. “Lily Aleese was executed, as per elven custom, forty-eight hours ago in Elfheim, following a Synod trial. I have time-stamped photos of her body, with and without her head, should you wish to take and examine them.”

Photos could be doctored. It took a lot of effort for me to remain seated and silent, and I shot a questioning look at Rand. He hated Lily as badly as I did. If he said Lily was dead, I’d believe him.

He gave me a tight smile and nodded. Inside my head, I heard him as clearly as if he’d spoken aloud:
Mace insisted we do it by the old rules, but she’s definitely dead. I killed her myself. And she suffered.

Somehow that didn’t make me as happy as I would’ve expected. The elves were brutal. I’d seen what they did to Rand after he’d helped me escape Elfheim. He’d been beaten, and badly. The only reason he didn’t get another punishment for bonding with me was that our alliance, and his mother’s death, had made him too powerful. I had no doubts he could dish out suffering as well as the next elf.

While Hoffman examined the photographs, I looked over at Jean to see how he was taking the news about Lily, but his attention rested with one person only: Etienne Boulard. They’d been friends in their human lives, before Jean had become so famous he earned a magical form of immortality, and Etienne, a French Louisiana plantation owner, had become a Regent of the Realm of Vampyre. Etienne had betrayed Jean, and they both knew it.

Much like the question of whether or not I’d continue an elven pregnancy should I find myself in that predicament, I had no answers to the question of whether I’d stop Jean if and when he tried to exact revenge on Etienne. That had a much greater likelihood of happening than me getting pregnant with elf spawn. Jean didn’t forgive a betrayal, plus he had a couple of major advantages. He couldn’t be turned vampire and he couldn’t be killed, at least not permanently.

I didn’t like Etienne’s odds.

From the vamp-in-dawn’s-early-light look on his face, Etienne didn’t like his odds either. He fidgeted in his seat and looked everywhere except at Jean. His gaze came to rest on me briefly, and I saw a flash of the insolent, confident vampire he’d been a month ago. Only a flash before he looked down at the floor.

“Very well.” Hoffman passed the envelope back to Mace. “In future, however, I hope the elves will abide by the procedures we’ve established for the council.”

“In future”—Mace looked at Rand—“we’ll have no more such treachery within our ranks.”

Rand was starting to look a lot like the Mona Lisa. I never trusted her little smile, and if Mace had any sense he wouldn’t trust Rand’s. I had no idea what my significant elf was up to, but I had no doubt that Rand had a scheme. He always did.

Then again, Mace deserved whatever he got.

“Ms. Jaco.” Hoffman slipped on a pair of reading glasses, probably to give him a more scholarly appearance to go along with his silly black robe. Nearsighted wizards used magic to correct their vision. “Is it true that you conspired to interfere with the affairs of the Elven Synod during the last two weeks of November?”

“Uh … no?” I hoped that little question mark at the end wasn’t evident to anyone but me. I expected Hoffman to accuse me of setting up Adrian, not interfering with Synod business. Where was he going with this?

He peered at me through his little glasses, which gave him a piggish appearance.

“Does that mean you deny entering into a blood bond with Quince Randolph, who at that time was the incumbent clan leader of the fire elves? And that the nature of this bond was purely for Mr. Randolph’s political gain?”

Rand’s jaw clenched, but he didn’t say anything. This was Mace Banyan’s work; he hadn’t wanted Rand on the Synod, much less sitting on the Interspecies Council. Rand had gotten the council seat because our bond gave him an in with the wizards.

I gave Mace my most evil stink-eye. “I wouldn’t say it was purely political, no.”

Hoffman took off the glasses and settled them atop his shiny bald head. Now he looked like a pig with glasses on his head. “You’re telling me that you and Mr. Randolph are living as husband and wife, as such bond-mates are called in our culture?”

He smiled. Evil bastard.

Damn it. Everyone knew Rand and I weren’t living together, but if I admitted that I only bonded with him to avoid turning loup-garou, Jake would be in big trouble. That wasn’t going to happen.

“Mr. Randolph and I are working on our relationship after entering the bond based on our intense physic”—I choked and grabbed the bottle of water on the table, wishing it were rum—“physical attraction.”

Behind me, Alex coughed, or maybe it was Jake. I didn’t dare look. I kept my eyes on Hoffman.

“I see.” He paused and rolled his eyes heavenward. Pig pig pig.

“Is it true you refused to cooperate with the Synod when they attempted to determine your powers after you were claimed by the ancient elven staff known as Mahout?”

“Hey, they kidnapped me.” This was starting to piss me off. I was not the one sitting over there bound in magical ankle bling after being caught with the proverbial smoking gun.

“And is it not true, Ms. Jaco, that it was you who killed Captain Jean Lafitte last month?” He looked down the table at Jean. “
Kill
being a relative term, of course.”

That one was true, and I met Jean’s gaze with what I hoped was an apologetic look. He was beyond apology. His dark blue eyes were hard as the marble on the courthouse floor, and his movements as he got to his feet were slow and deliberate. The pirate was still healing.

“This is a farce, Monsieur Hoffman. You attempt only to excuse the actions of your son, and every man and woman in this assemblage is aware of it. I suggest we allow Mademoiselle Jaco to tell her story as it happened, and then deal with those who are truly guilty. I can assure you that she, like myself, was a victim. Do not use Jean Lafitte for your perverse behavior. I will not tolerate it.”

Yeah. What he said.

Hoffman and Jean stared at each other for what seemed like a week and a half before the First Elder backed down. “Very well, out of respect for you, Captain Lafitte. Ms. Jaco, would you give us the account of your
victimization
?”

If ever a word had dripped with sarcasm, it was that one, but I resisted the urge to dish it right back. I’d call him names in private later, and I’d hunt like hell for proof that he needed to be in that lineup of bling-wearing suspects. Tonight, I had the clear moral high ground and I planned to keep it as long as possible without slinging mud.

So I began to talk. About taking elf lessons with Adrian. Taking him with me to the vampire club L’Amour Sauvage, where he met Terri and where we’d seen Lily talking to Etienne. The meeting with wizard Jonas Adamson, the only registered necromancer in the area.

“Did you suspect that Mr. Adamson was in league with Lily Aleese?” Hoffman asked. He’d remained bland-faced throughout my story until Jonas was mentioned.