Midnight's Daughter(57)
“No!” I hopped up and was immediately sorry. The room tilted sideways and I sank to one knee before strong arms caught me. I looked up into a pair of concerned emerald eyes, and discovered that they were even more breathtaking at close range. “I don’t know. After a month of searching, I don’t know a damn thing. You think you could enlighten me?”
“But, if you are her friend, surely she told you?”
“Told me what?” I was still feeling grateful to him for the revved-up healing, but my nerves had taken a beating. If I felt better, I’d probably have been bitch slapping that pretty face by now.
He seemed to realize that and spread his hands apologetically. “That she is with child. Your friend is carrying the next ruler of Faerie.”
I stared at him for a long moment, then burst out laughing. Claire? In a dalliance, not just with a Fey, but with their king? When did she fit it in, between growing my weed and doing the grocery shopping? I got this crazy image of her taping a note on the fridge in her fine, precise hand: “Out screwing Fey king, be back around eight. Don’t forget to feed the cats.” It was absurd.
“Is she well?” Caedmon asked Louis-Cesare in an undertone. “I haven’t lent energy to a human in some time; perhaps I overdid it—”
“She isn’t human,” Louis-Cesare corrected him. “She is dhampir.”
“Truly?” The Fey’s eyes brightened above a surprised smile. “I have heard of such beings, but never before had the pleasure of meeting one.” He unfastened his cloak and draped it around my shoulders. It was soft and clingy, and smelled slightly of some kind of subtle cologne, or maybe that was just him. I couldn’t seem to get a scent catalog on the Fey. It was like he was a breath of wind that blew scents to me from every direction except his own. It was confusing, but also intriguing.
He peered into my face, eyes literally glowing with curiosity. “My people can never resist any new experience,” he said. “We find one so rarely.”
“Uh-huh.” The idea of seeing just how many new experiences I could show him flitted across my mind. “And how did Claire end up dating a Fey?” I asked.
“That is a very good question,” Caedmon replied unhelpfully. He pulled me nearer despite the fact that this also brought him into closer contact with Stinky, who was clinging to me like a limpet. My thoughts were too confused to protest, even had I felt like it. Why hadn’t Claire mentioned any of this? And why had I noticed nothing unusual? I thought I’d remember something like a seven-foot-tall glowing Fey hanging out in our living room.
“The Fey will find your friend. You cannot so much as look for her without risking her life,” Louis-Cesare commented, derailing my train of thought. “Do you truly think Dracula will hesitate to do as he says?”
No, I didn’t. Which brought me back to my previous dilemma. I could ignore Drac’s ultimatum, stall for time and hope Caedmon managed to rescue Claire. But however powerful he might be, he obviously didn’t understand our world very well, and that gave Dracula a huge advantage. I couldn’t leave Claire’s fate in the hands of the Fey any more than I could dump the whole problem on Mircea. Somehow, I was going to have to get her back on my own. I just wished I had even a vague idea how.
Chapter Thirteen
Radu’s place looked exactly as I would have expected, if I had bothered to think about it. Our car passed through a crumbling stone gate and up a long drive to a graveled parking area. It fronted a complex of outbuildings and a two-story main structure surrounded by colorful explosions from out-of-control bougainvillea, hibiscus and jasmine. Unfortunately, neither the overgrown foliage nor the deep twilight managed to conceal the house. The original Spanish exterior, which had probably featured simple adobe walls, was now thick with Moroccan tile work, carved pillars, gilt cupolas and more wrought iron than a New Orleans bordello.
I would have said as much, but I wasn’t looking any better. We were all a little worse for wear—except for the Fey, who was fresh as a daisy, damn him. Of course, he’d had his own seat, while I’d been relegated to the roughly one-eighth of the back not taken up with Bergtroll. Olga had been persuaded to leave her army behind, but there had been no way short of violence to stop her from coming (and even Louis-Cesare had balked at attacking the grieving widow). And then there was Stinky.
I’d had to hold him on my lap due to the lack of space, and even with the window down, things had gotten pretty ripe—to the point that Olga had started edging away from us, giving me maybe an inch of extra space there at the end. When even trolls think you reek, things are bad. The pièce de résistance, however, was the wards. I’d felt them crackle no less than three times on the way in, and had been grateful that we were expected. But even so, everyone’s hair was standing on end by the time we finally arrived, and Stinky was little more than a round fur ball with legs.
Louis-Cesare came up beside me and, before I could protest, lifted me into his arms and started toward the house. He’d done the same thing to get me into the car, but I’d been fading in and out and had hardly noticed. I would have told him to put me down, but my legs did feel a little wobbly.
Radu gave us a surprised glance when we got to the door, but refrained from comment. He was dressed in what counted as somber attire for him—black velvet and jet beads that glittered in the light from the old-fashioned lantern he clutched in one pale hand. The absence of electricity told me immediately how serious he was taking this. No plain everyday wards here—the big boys must be online to send us back to the days of candles and lanterns. It did make for a nice ambience, though, since Radu’s demented designer had not yet made it inside. Cathedral ceilings with old wood beams met us in the entryway, which featured a simple, open-tread staircase leading to a gallery landing. I spied an ominous sign for the future, however: the classic lines of a wrought-iron chandelier now dripped with a couple hundred rock crystals.