Soul Taken (Mercy Thompson #13)(88)

I turned and caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror. My face was filthy from where I’d touched it. I looked at my hands.

“Marsilia sure has a vast collection of dirty books,” I said.

There was a pause. “You are in a bathroom,” Warren told me, a hint of laughter in his voice. “I’d guess you could wash your hands.”

“Do you suppose she’d mind?” I asked. I tried to make it funny, but the bathroom had an untouched quality that made me uneasy—as if it didn’t want to be used.

“If she does, you can buy her a new towel to go with the doors Darryl is taking pleasure in destroying.” Warren’s voice was dry, as if he understood my hesitancy and thought it ridiculous.

Which it was.

“Thanks,” I said.

“Anytime, darlin’,” he said, sounding as though he’d come back into the bedroom. I could hear him drop down to look under the bed.

The soap on the dish wasn’t wrapped, but it didn’t look as though it had ever been used. I turned on the water and watched it suspiciously. Sometimes if a faucet wasn’t used often enough, the water was gunky. It looked and smelled okay—and it even warmed up fast. The soap smelled of lemons, but not too strongly.

I used a washcloth to scrub my face and spent some time on my hands. When the water ran clear, I turned it off and dried on a nearby towel. The white towel was smudged when I finished, so apparently I hadn’t gotten all the dirt with the washcloth. I bundled the mucky things together and set them beside the sink, where the cleaning crew couldn’t miss them.

“Bathroom is clear,” I said, starting for the door—and caught a glimpse of something in the huge old bathtub. There hadn’t been anything in it when I’d checked it a few minutes ago.

Now it held an assortment of encyclopedia volumes. Five of them were leaned up against the back edge of the tub, braced by the three on the bottom. They were mismatched and from different places in the alphabet. The first one was The World Book Encyclopedia in gold-embossed leather, Volume 19, W-X-Y-Z. The second one was from a set of Encyclopedia Britannica, Volume 1, A-ak, Bayes. My eyes had moved to the third one, registered it as the T volume from a different set of World Book—and that’s when I realized that, taken as a whole, they spelled WATCH OUT.

Schooled by Hollywood horror movies, I dropped to the floor. Nothing happened. I felt like a fool as I got to my feet. I hoped Adam hadn’t felt the way my heart had pounded.

“Warren?” I said. “I think I found the missing encyclopedias. And possibly the ghosts that should be here.”

He didn’t say anything.

I thought of that thump I’d heard. The one I thought meant that he was looking under the bed. An unconscious body falling to the floor would sound like that, too. I drew my gun but stayed where I was.

“Warren?”

I couldn’t feel any distress from him through the pack bonds. He wasn’t dead. He wasn’t feeling pain or stress—I was pretty sure I’d know it if he were. If this was another joke, I’d shoot him. My gun wasn’t loaded with silver bullets so it probably wouldn’t kill him.

All of the lights went out.





13





Adam’s words rang in my head. “Don’t split up. Don’t get complacent.”

We had done both, Warren and I. My fault more than his. But I didn’t have time for “should haves” and “what-ifs” right now. I concentrated on here and now.

“Guns don’t work in the dark without specialized equipment,” Adam had told us on some training session or other. “If you can’t see your target clearly, you’re too likely to shoot your friends.”

The werewolves and I could see just fine at night, outside where there was always some sort of light. In this house with no windows, I was blind.

I holstered my gun and drew the sword. I didn’t bother to be quiet about it. Whoever had taken down Warren already knew where I was. It was as dark as a cave, and my enemy thought that these conditions would benefit them. It was my job to make them wrong.

I wasn’t helpless without sight. Movement would make floorboards shift, fabric rub, and my ears were very sharp. I concentrated on what my senses could tell me. I heard one person breathing and hoped it was Warren.

We were in a vampire’s house. It might be midafternoon, but I had seen Wulfe awake and moving during the daytime before. Vampires only have to breathe when they want to pretend to be more human or when they want to talk—which requires air. I had a very good nose, even among the werewolves. I opened up my other sense, too, the one that let me feel magic in the air.

I heard and smelled nothing. Moreover, when I tried to reach Adam using our mating bond, I could not get through. It was still there, but I couldn’t touch it. The same was true of the pack bonds and my bond with Stefan—which I tried in a fit of desperation. Someone was interfering. Something. I knew what it was.

“Soul Taker,” I said.

A brush of air current had me raising the katana across my body. After I held it there, something hit it. A touch, not a blow, metal on metal that rang softly rather than a proper clang.

Wulfe was mocking me.

I had to assume that my opponent knew exactly where I was. Maybe Wulfe had some of that specialized equipment Adam had talked about. Maybe vampires didn’t need any light at all in order to see. Either way, standing around waiting to be attacked when he could see me and I couldn’t see him seemed stupid.