Лорел Гамильтон - The Harlequin

I nibbled on a croissant and a variety of cheese and fruit, and for the dozenth time wondered how to put a real kitchen into the Circus underground. Breakfast takeout was too damn limited. But the coffee was good. I sipped it black, because the first cup should always be black. It's the morning slap in the face that lets you know you're awake.

«Now,» said Jean-Claude, «Rafael, my friend, talk to us. What has Narcissus said or done to alarm you so?»

«He said that he would offer himself to Anita as a pomme de sang , and with that, and his tie to your love, Asher, he would be the second most powerful animal group in St. Louis, after the wolves.»

«He said this to you?» Jean-Claude asked.

«Not to me personally, no.»

«Then how did you hear of it?»

«One of my rats likes the way that Narcissus makes love. Narcissus is beside himself now that Asher's animal to call is hyena. He had offered himself to Asher as Asher's animal to call, and been turned down.»

News to me , I thought.

«Asher was flattered,» Jean-Claude said, «but we both felt it would make the other groups nervous if Narcissus was so honored.»

I fought not to look at Jean-Claude, because shouldn't someone have mentioned it to me? I sipped coffee and tried to keep my face blank, not always my best thing. I drank the coffee too fast to enjoy it, but it kept me from giving anything away, or I hoped it did.

«But Asher goes to Narcissus's club, and he enjoys the entertainment,» Rafael said.

Narcissus's club was a bondage and submission club, and entertainment could cover a lot of ground. I hadn't known that Asher was going over there. I know that it feels good to be around your animal. I liked being around the leopards, and the wolves, and even the lions. But… it was like a lot was happening and I'd been out of the loop. I didn't like that.

«Asher enjoys what the club has to offer, but he has turned down Narcissus's more personal offers, again because he thought other animal groups might take it badly if he were to show such favor to Narcissus,» Jean-Claude said.

«Narcissus seems to think that it's only a matter of time before Asher gives in to his charms.»

«He does not know Asher as well as he believes,» Jean-Claude said.

«Asher enjoys the bondage,» Rafael said.

Jean-Claude shrugged, that wonderful Gallic movement that meant everything and nothing. Which meant Rafael might be right. Again, news to me. What else was my vampire «master» keeping from me?

«If Narcissus can seduce your Asher, he will do so. He will try to seduce you,» Rafael said.

«Narcissus has tried to seduce me in the past. He failed,» Jean-Claude said.

«He says the old Master of the City, Nikolaos, gave you to him several times. He has bragged of your body and what he did to it.» Rafael studied Jean-Claude's face as he said it, as he'd studied mine. It looked like he was even making eye contact, not always wise with a vampire.

Jean-Claude gave him a lovely, blank face. «He has not bragged to you.»

«You are certain of that?» Rafael said.

«Very. He had a tendency to talk during… during. He might have talked of me while he was doing similar things to someone else. In fact, I would be surprised if he had not. He enjoyed comparing and contrasting his lovers, and his victims.»

«So you were his lover?»

«No, I was his victim. Nikolaos gave me to him with no safe word, no way to stop him from doing what he wished with me, except my own poor art of persuasion.»

Rafael laughed, an abrupt and unhappy sound. «'Poor art, false modesty from what I hear. Narcissus would give a great deal to have you back as his… victim.»

«So he has said.»

«He seems confident that Asher is the key to your bed. And if not Asher, then Anita. He believes sincerely that he will find a way to your libido again through them.»

Finally something I could address without revealing that I wasn't entirely sure what was happening with Asher and the hyenas. «You don't have to worry about me and Narcissus. He's really not my cup of tea.»

Rafael nodded, his face still serious. We couldn't seem to get a smile out of him this morning. «Am I your cup of tea, Anita?»

I felt Richard stiffen beside me. I glanced around him to Jean-Claude. «Can I talk plainly without upsetting the political apple cart here?»

«Talk, and we shall see.»

Not a rousing endorsement, but I'd take what I could get. «You're handsome, and if it was a date, we could talk, but you want to skip to sex, and I'm just not that casual about it.»

He gave me a look. It was a very judgmental look. I gave him an unhappy look back.

«Yeah, I have a lot of lovers, but they aren't casual lovers, Rafael.»

He let out a breath, sipped some coffee, then said, «Perhaps not, but there is something about being your lover that seems to up the power level of every man that you… give yourself to.»

«Not true,» I said.

«Name a single lover you have had who has not gained power from it.»

«I can name three: London, Requiem, and Byron,» I said.

«The first two were master vampires before you slept with them. It's hard to judge how much power they arrived in St. Louis with, and how much they may have gained. Byron you slept with only once. Once doesn't seem to be enough.» He sat his coffee down on his plate. «Fine, your regular lovers gain power.»

«I think you overestimate me.»

Rafael handed his plate to Louie, who stood and put it on the coffee table, as if he'd been told to do it. Rafael looked at me. He looked at me as if he would see through me to the other side. It was a look to study, weigh, and measure a person. I tried not to squirm under that gaze, but it was hard work.

«What?» I asked.

He looked at Jean-Claude. «She doesn't know, does she?»

«I am not certain that I know what you mean,» Jean-Claude said.

«Jean-Claude, every lover Anita has gains power. Asher was a master vampire in name only, almost, but since he's been in her bed he's gained enough power to have his own territory if he didn't love you both too much to leave. Nathaniel was everyone's victim; now he is becoming someone to be reckoned with. You, personally, have gained more power than you ever dreamed.»

«And you believe that it is ma petite who has given me power, not that I have shared my power with her?»

«She has her own triumvirate of power, Jean-Claude. Her own vampire servant in Damian.»

«I am not the power behind the throne, Rafael. Trust me, Jean-Claude is plenty powerful enough for both of us.»

«He is, but he gained most of that power after you became his lover.»

«I gained powers after he made me his servant,» I said, «not the other way around.»

«I've been talking to some of the wererats in Europe,» Rafael said. «They speak of your Belle Morte, the creator of your bloodline. They say that she could give power to her lovers, if she chose.»

«Belle Morte does not choose to share power with anyone,» Jean-Claude said.

«No, but she can; through sex, she can make her lovers more powerful. Legend has it that once she made kings and emperors through her touch. She changed the face of Europe through her bed.»

«She ruled from her bedroom, that is true, but not in the way you think. She chose only the powerful, only those who could give her something she wanted. And I did not gain power in her bed. I was her pawn for centuries. As was Asher.»

«Masters of the City often kill their own vampire children if they become too powerful, true?» Rafael said.

«Some do.»

«But isn't it strange that so many of the vampires who were nearly powerless around Belle Morte have gained power the longer they are away from her?»