Staked (The Iron Druid Chronicles, #8)(6)

“Oh, gods below, yes. Horribly. Still paying for some of my missteps. I think there are some I haven’t paid for yet. Trying to make it right, though.”

“What’s the difficulty, if I may ask?”

I made a raspberry noise at the enormity of the question. “I have plenty of difficulties, but right now I’m worried most about the vampires. They all want to kill me, and I don’t think I can talk them out of it. They’re actively pursuing me now.”

The hedge of hair above the rabbi’s eyes dipped, and his mustache drooped in a frown. “There are vampires here? Is this why you are in town?”

“I’m sure there are some here, but I’m in town for this,” I said, pointing to the binder. “The names and addresses of vampires around the world.”

The rabbi froze except for his beard, which began to stir even though there was no wind. I was beginning to recognize that as an emotional tell and I had to suppress a shudder, because semi-sentient facial hair is viscerally disturbing.

“How did you acquire that?” the rabbi asked.

“Using the magic you sensed. I stole this from the bank on Front and York. There are thousands of names here. Maybe tens of thousands—the type is small. I’m not sure which ones are the leaders, though. And I’m also unsure how I’ll make much of a dent in the list before it becomes moot. The leadership will soon know that I have this list and alert everyone to move. But maybe some of them will be stupid enough to keep the same names. I can at least use that to track some of them.”

“Extraordinary.” Keeping his eyes on the binder, his hands moved that sad, smooshed everything bagel to his mouth. The schmear of cream cheese drooped out from the edges and some of it fell, ignored, onto the precipice of his beard, hanging. It bobbed up and down as he ate mechanically, thinking.

<Look at that, Atticus. Totally rude. Didn’t even offer me a bite.>

You just had five bacon sandwiches for breakfast.

<Yes, but what about second breakfast?>

I doubted the rabbi was a Tolkien fan, so I said to my hound, I don’t think he knows about that.

“Perhaps … well. Mr. O’Sullivan, I would like to offer my assistance if you would accept it.”

“You’d come out of retirement for this?”

“Absolutely. Vampires are one of the clear evils that the Hammers of God still fight. We would relish the chance to take advantage of this.”

“We? You’re speaking for all of them?”

“I believe I can safely say they will join us with enthusiasm. They have been finding more vampires recently in any case. Something has been disturbing them, making them move in the open.”

“That would be my doing. I’ve had mercenaries hunting them, and some are trying to hide while others are trying to fill the power vacuum left by those we already staked.”

“Admirable. We are on the same side, then.” He grinned at me, a brief flash of white underneath the hair. “Is refreshing, yes?” He nodded as he spoke, and the cream cheese fell onto his coat. I wanted to point it out to him but also didn’t want to let slip this moment of accord.

“Yes, it is,” I said. “How many of your friends might join in?”

“There are hundreds of us scattered around the world.”

“All right,” I said. “Rabbi Yosef, I’ll make you a deal. We’ll go scan this and you can send the file to your associates. For every thousand vampires the Hammers of God eliminate, I’ll give you five years of youth.”

“How?”

“Immortali-Tea. It’s just natural herbs and some bindings, nothing diabolical about it. You see the results before you.”

“Hmm. We would stake a thousand vampires if we could in any case. It’s our duty.”

“Great, so it’s win-win. I guess you’re not able to sense vampires the way you can sense me?”

“No. Our power comes from the Kabbalistic Tree of Life, so they are invisible to us as dead things. And I should stress that we cannot sense you personally, only the use of your magic, which is very attuned to life.”

“Yeah,” I said, smiling at him, “being bound to Gaia will do that. Hey, uh, you got a little schmear there—”

“Oh! Thanks for telling me.”

We set about the scheme immediately. It would take us hours to scan and get the files out, and before the day was through, Werner Drasche would definitively know I had them. The Hammers of God would have a short window in which to act.

“If you move to catch the ones in this hemisphere before sundown,” I said, “that will be your best chance. The ones in Europe—the really old and powerful ones—are going to hear about the security breach while they’re awake and have a chance to move tonight.”

“We must take what the Almighty offers us, then.”

“Well, caution your people too,” I warned him. “There may be traps waiting at these addresses instead of vampires. I would vastly prefer this strike to be an unequivocal win for the good guys. Just once.”

“May it prove so,” the rabbi said, a quirk in his beard indicating that he might be happy. “Even if we fail to slay a single one, I am glad we met today, Mr. O’Sullivan. It confirms that I have done right to choose a calmer, quieter path. This great good we are about to do would not have been possible had I clung to my zealotry.”