Silence Fallen (Mercy Thompson #10)(84)

Lenka bucked and struggled, but Honey held her fast. Elizaveta didn’t seem worried.

After a moment, she stood up.

“No,” she said sadly. “The band keeps her under control, but it is a simple thing, if powerful. It makes certain that she follows the orders she is given.”

Honey looked at Adam then.

He said, “It is a kindness.”

She nodded.

She had to let up, just for a second, to get the knife she kept strapped to the inside of her thigh. The one that she hadn’t drawn during the fight because she needed to be sure that killing was the right thing to do.

Lenka almost broke free, but she wasn’t quick enough. She was malnourished, and that had hurt her fighting abilities. She was neither as strong nor as fast as she could have been. Now she was tired, too, and her speed was half what it had been in the beginning, though the fight had been relatively short.

She couldn’t avoid the small blade that slid into the joint between her spine and her head. She died when the blade slipped in, but it took a moment for the air to leave her lungs and her body to quit moving. Honey’s blade wasn’t silver, but it was deadly enough.

Honey pulled the blade out when Lenka was dead. He couldn’t always tell with vampires, but werewolves were easy—their smell changed.

She wiped the blade clean on her pant leg. It wasn’t a prudent place in a building filled with vampires, but he thought she was not in the mood for prudence. She sheathed the blade and accepted Adam’s hand up. She didn’t need his help rising, but he knew the touch of pack would center her. She stood, letting him hold her for half a breath before she slipped away.

As soon as she was standing, Adam turned his attention to Bonarata. Adam knew he’d been taking a chance by turning his back on the vampire. But Honey came first, and he had people in the room who would watch the vampire for him.

As it turned out, Bonarata had had other things to occupy himself with. The Lord of Night was staring at Lenka’s body with an expression Adam had seen on junkies looking at a dime bag, a deep need that overwhelmed any other thought or emotion. But the expression faded as Lenka’s blood died with her. Leaving Bonarata with an expression that looked very much like regret and relief on his face.

“Adam,” said Stefan urgently.

“Beside you,” said Smith, at nearly the same moment.

Adam reached out and wrapped a hand around Honey’s biceps and blocked her with his body as she launched herself at Bonarata.

“Stand down,” he told her, pulling her close to his body so she could smell pack and Alpha. So she could feel his command sink into her bones.

He felt her resistance, though she never pushed against him. She just leaned her forehead to his shoulder and said, “Lenka was a wolf I’d have hunted the moon with. Not a friend. But she was smart and tough. Peter had stories . . .” Her voice trailed off.

Adam didn’t take his eyes off Bonarata, who was beginning to look at Honey the way he’d looked at Lenka. Adam didn’t want to share intimate things in front of the vampire, but for Honey he’d do what he could. He put a smile in his voice. “Peter had a thing for powerful women.”

She laughed wetly against him. “I guess he did. I miss him.”

He kissed the top of her head. “We all do. You should go change your clothes and clean up.” He looked around for someone to send with her.

Stefan said, “I’ll go up with her.” He was watching Bonarata’s face, too.

Dressing Honey to seduce had, in retrospect, been a stupid thing to do. Adam glanced at the body on the floor. A stupid thing, but he couldn’t regret it. This poor creature was free now.

Keeping his body between Bonarata and Honey, Adam turned her over to Stefan. They walked slowly, but no one in the room spoke or moved until after they were gone.

When the door shut behind them, Bonarata blinked and came back to himself. Ignoring the body, as though Lenka had not been his . . . “sheep” was the wrong word, and Adam couldn’t find a right one . . . “victim,” maybe. As though Lenka hadn’t been his victim for centuries, Bonarata said, in a light, casual voice, “I had asked you to meet with me here to tell you that I have disturbing news.”

Standing close behind Adam, Smith inhaled and made a sound, and Adam wondered if he was going to have to send Smith out, too. It was probably a good thing that they weren’t pack; the two of them weren’t connected at all really. Rage was one of those emotions that tended to snowball between pack members.

“What news?” asked Marsilia. Adam thought that she had decided to play mediator, then remembered that he’d asked her to do just that. To get them out of there in as short a time as possible, so he could go find Mercy.

He reached out to Mercy and found her. Just knowing that she was still okay was enough to settle his wolf a bit. But, like Bonarata, Adam made an effort not to look at the dead wolf on the floor. Impossible not to smell her, though.

A chime sounded, a slightly different chime than the one that had announced last meal.

“Ah,” Bonarata said. “First meal. Why don’t we discuss matters over food?”

“Agreed,” said Adam. “We have news for you as well.”

Bonarata led the way into the dining room. Marsilia and Elizaveta followed him. The two goblins, Harris slightly to the back of Larry—like a guard—fell in behind the women. Smith, taking up the tail end of the line, stopped by the dead werewolf. He went down on one knee beside her and touched her forehead.