Лорел Гамильтон - The Harlequin

«Let me go, boy. The wolf is right, I am no one's darling.» His voice held sadness, like the taste of rain on your tongue, lifetimes of sorrow in that one tone.

«Our certainty does not travel outside our triumvirates,» Jean-Claude said. «Even our wolf is drowning. How can we save all the others if we cannot even save ourselves?» His voice was an echo of Asher's, full of sorrow, so that my throat closed with it, and I thought I'd choke on unshed tears.

«Fight, damn you!» Claudia came up to the edge of the stage. Tears stained her face. Her emotions were so raw, it looked like physical pain. «Fight for us! Don't just roll over and give that bitch your throat.»

Malcolm came to stand on the other side of Richard. «Fight for us, Jean-Claude. Fight for us, Anita.» He looked directly at Richard. Richard suddenly looked wrong in the leather mask. He didn't look cool in the leather outfit, he looked like he was doing exactly what he was doing. He was hiding. The rest of us stood there in plain view. Only the bad guys, and Richard, were hiding who and what they were from the world. Malcolm gripped his shoulder. «Fight for us, Ulfric. Do not let your fears and doubts destroy us all.»

«I thought you, of all people, would understand why I don't want to be touching them when they raise the only power we have to fight these things.»

«I felt what Anita and her triumvirate raised earlier. It was friendship, love as pure as any I've known. I begin to believe the ardeur is a jewel with many facets, but it needs light to shine, Ulfric.»

«What the hell does that mean?» Richard asked, and his voice was angry and frustrated. He shoved Malcolm's hand away and looked at Damian. «You're keeping the worst of it out, aren't you?»

Damian just looked at him.

«To reap the benefits, I have to take the bad with the good. I can't do it. I can't.» He looked at me. «I'm sorry, but I can't go where this is heading.»

«What do you think we're going to do, Richard?» I asked.

«What you always do, fuck everything.»

«It was not sex she offered to my congregation, only friendship.»

«But it won't stay that way, it never does,» Richard said. He looked at Malcolm and said, «You're asking me to do something that you would never do yourself.»

Malcolm nodded. «You're right»—he nodded again—«you are absolutely right. I have stood on my moral high ground and been so certain. So certain that I was right, that Jean-Claude was not only wrong, but evil. I have said such hateful things to Anita, called her whore and witch . I have called all Jean-Claude's people that and worse to my congregation, but all my righteousness could not protect them.»

Richard nodded. «I know. Anita saved my mother and brother, saved their lives, but she did terrible things to get there in time. Things I still think are immoral, wrong, and I have to live every day with the knowledge that if I had been there I would have stopped Anita from torturing that man. I wouldn't have let her dehumanize him, or herself. I would have stood on my moral high ground and my mother and my brother, Daniel, would both be dead.» Tears shimmered, edged by the leather. «I used to be so sure of so much. Raina didn't shake my faith. She made me more certain. Only Anita, only Jean-Claude, only they have made me doubt everything.»

I drew a little away from Jean-Claude, still touching, because I was afraid to stop touching him. If the doubts were this bad touching, I couldn't imagine what they'd be like if we weren't touching. We'd just die. «My cross still works for me, Richard. It still burns with holy light. God hasn't forsaken me.»

«But he should have,» Richard said. «He should have, don't you see? If what I believe is right, if what you say you believe is right, then your cross should not burn. You have broken so many commandments. You've murdered, tortured, fucked, but your cross still works. I don't understand that.»

«You're saying I'm evil, so God should have turned his back on me?»

Even with most of his face hidden, I saw his face convulse with emotion, tears finally falling. He nodded. «Yes, that's what I mean.»

I just looked at him, and knew that it was partly vampire powers messing with his head, but that perhaps Columbine's powers only brought out what was already inside you. Some part of Richard believed what he was saying.

« Ma petite …»

«No,» I said, «no, it's okay.» My chest felt like a piece of it had been carved out, not bloody and warm, but cold and icy. As if the piece had been missing a long time, but I hadn't wanted to see it, feel it, know it. «Maybe God isn't the sex police, Richard. Sometimes I think Christians get all hung up on the sex thing because it's easier to worry about sex than to ask yourself, Am I a good person ? If as long as you don't have sex with a lot of people you're a good person, that's easy. It's easy to avoid that. It's easy to think, I'm not fucking anyone, so I'm good . It makes it easy to be cruel, because as long as you're not fucking around, nothing you do can be that bad. Is that really all you think of God? Is he just the sex police for you and Malcolm? Or is it that sex is easy to worry about, easy to avoid, and the whole love-your-neighbor-as-you-love-yourself thing that's hard? Some days it's so hard, I feel like trying to take care of everyone in my life will break me apart. But I do my best. I do my best for everyone in my life every damn day. Can you say that, Richard? Do you do your best for everyone in your life every damn day?»

«Do you include yourself and Jean-Claude on that list?» he asked, his voice so quiet, so full of emotion that it was strangely empty.

«Do you not include us?» I asked. I could feel the tears pushing in my throat, at the back of my eyes like heat. I would not cry for him.

Those true brown eyes stared at me. I watched the pain in them, but finally, he said, «No, I don't.»

I nodded, a little too fast, a little too rapidly. I fought to swallow past the tears. I thought I'd choke on them. I cleared my throat twice, so sharp it hurt. I wanted to accuse him, say, «Then what were you doing in my bed today? Why did you sleep with Micah, Nathaniel, and me? Why did you have sex with me today? If I'm not a person in your life, then…«I swallowed the words, because they didn't matter. He'd have had some answer for everything I said, or he'd have felt bad about it. Either way, I didn't want to hear it, or see it. I didn't need to hear more explanations from him. I didn't need to see him agonize over his moral quandaries anymore. I was done.

«I'm not angry, Richard. I don't hate you. I'm just not going to do this anymore. You think I'm evil. You think Jean-Claude is evil. You think what we do to keep everyone safe is evil. Fine, fine.»

«I didn't mean…»

I held up a hand. «Just stop, don't. The hand on your arm that's keeping the doubts from eating you alive was forged through sex, Richard. That calm was won through centuries of pain and sex and servitude. Jean-Claude, the evil bastard, saved Damian, ransomed him from hell. They didn't even like each other, but Jean-Claude wouldn't leave anyone with her, not if he could save him. Evil bastard.»

«Anita,» Damian said, and his face held—fear, something, as if he knew what was coming.

«You benefit from our evil, Richard. You count on us being willing to do your dirty work. Hell, I'm the Bolverk for your clan. Literally, I am your evildoer. I do what the Ulfric will not. So fine, fine, I will be your Bolverk, but we are not in the lupanar this night. We are not lupa and Ulfric this night. This night is vampire business. This night I am Jean-Claude's human servant. I am Nathaniel and Damian's master. That is the power you are hiding behind right this second. You think we're evil, fine.» I looked at Damian; I gave him a look to let him know I meant what I was about to say. «Damian, let him go.»