“I’m constantly amazed by the explanations people will come up with to avoid the obvious, when they can’t conceive of the obvious.”
“Demon?” I said. Even me, with my experience, questioned it. I kept trying to draw a line around what I believed, what supernatural, legendary tales I was willing to buy. I kept having to shift that line outward. “Like, heaven-and-hell, fire-and-brimstone demon?”
“That word encompasses a wide variety of phenomena.”
“So it could be anything,” I grumbled. I crossed my arms tightly, frustrated. Roman had a brisk, no-nonsense stride, like he had someplace to be and wasn’t about to dawdle. I had the feeling he took leisurely strolls through gardens the same way. I could keep up with him without too much trouble, letting my strides go long and wolflike. I wanted to pace. Like going back and forth inside a cage, staring out.
“This one’s very specific,” he said. “I guarantee, even if you knew what it was, you don’t have the ability to defeat it. I do.”
“How very convenient for us both,” I said flatly. He acknowledged the sarcasm with a smirk.
“Now that I’m dealing with you alone instead of Rick, I’ll need other arrangements.”
“Other payment,” I said. “Since I can’t give you vampiric permission to stay here. What do you want from me?”
He only glanced at me, not turning the focus of his attention from the path in front of him. A man with a mission. My senses were taking in everything, the hum of tires on the street the next block over, music coming from an upstairs window, the claws of a dog tapping on the sidewalk as it trotted away from us. The scents of garbage, a car leaking oil, grass and vegetation drying up in the autumn weather. The touch of a very faint wind changing direction. I was ready for anything, from any direction.
Roman only needed to know what was right in front of him. He was unconcerned.
He said, “Your loyalty. That’s all.”
His words were chilling. This was such a little thing, after all. So easy to say yes, since it didn’t cost anything right now, but it was so open-ended. He could ask for anything later on. To vampires of certain ages, of certain sensibilities, who carried ancient values into the modern era, certain words—hospitality, honor, and loyalty—had weight and depth that they’d lost for someone like me, who had grown up in a rootless, disposable modern culture. The old meaning of hospitality wasn’t about napkin rings. It held that you were responsible for the total well-being of anyone you sheltered in your walls, that you were obligated to help someone who came to you and asked. Honor touched on the core of one’s very identity, which when lost was nearly impossible to recover. And loyalty. Fealty. The word called to mind knights on bended knee before their kings. For someone of that mind-set, to break such a vow was to break the world.
That was what Roman was asking for, no matter how lightly he said the word. His gaze held an ancient gravity.
My steps slowed, then stopped. He continued a pace before stopping himself. I kept my gaze on his shoulder. Even if he hadn’t been a vampire, with a vampire’s hypnotic stare, I wouldn’t have wanted to meet those hard, fierce eyes.
I swallowed and hoped my voice worked. “In my world, loyalty is earned. Not given away.”
“And I will earn yours by protecting you and your people from this creature.”
A lurch of déjà vu made me think, I’m right back where I started. Begging someone else to take care of me. To protect me. When I’d worked so hard to learn how to do it myself.
“You’re asking me to submit.”
He frowned. “Nothing so drastic as that. I’m not asking you to give up your authority.”
He might not have picked up on the importance of that word—submit, submissive—and the shades of meaning that would be clear to anyone who’d been part of a werewolf pack. Or maybe he understood perfectly well what he was asking me to do. Maybe that was exactly what he wanted.
“I can’t answer you right now,” I said, hoping that no one else died, hoping that Mick would forgive me. “I need to talk to the others.”
“You lead this pack. They trust you to decide for them.”
“I don’t lead my pack that way.”
“Ah, one of these newfangled modern werewolves.”
I managed a thin smile. “That’s me.”
“I’m baffled by this city’s leaders’ refusal to take decisive action,” he said.
“Sorry,” I said. “But not really. Is there some way I can get in touch with you when I’ve made a decision?”
“No need. I’ll find you.”
I didn’t like that at all.
His face was angular, full of shadows in the odd nighttime lights from porches, from streetlights shrouded by bare trees. His eyes gleamed, and he frowned.