Some of them chuckled in appreciation; others stayed quiet. All those gazes looked down on me, trapping me. I might have been the one on stage.
A few seats down, another of the vampires played with his knife, running the handle between his hands, spinning it. Wearing a suit with a brocade waistcoat and jacket with tails, he was polished and gorgeous, sharp features framed by slick black hair and a trimmed goatee, like a nineteenth-century villain, but he made the look work. He probably invented it. “Modern sensibilities? We are ancient creatures. What do human mores have to do with us?” His accent wasn’t British but rounder, lilting.
“It’s not like we kill anyone—civilized vampires don’t,” said a third, a man with long brown hair, Mediterranean features, a floofy poet’s shirt, loose tan pants, and knee-high boots. “Why kill mortals for their blood when they so obligingly make more?”
“Humans—a renewable resource.”
“We recycle! We’re green!”
Much laughter. Ha.
One of them didn’t laugh. He sat at the far end of the table from Mercedes and her cohort. He wore a simple suit jacket with a band collar shirt. On the stout side, he seemed careworn, his gaze tired, as if he’d seen it all.
“A werewolf with morals,” he said. “I never thought to see such a thing.” His voice was kind, his accent flat American. Him—I wanted to talk to him. I wondered if that was a trick he’d developed.
“Maybe it’s because I come from a country that fought a war to put an end to this sort of thing.” I pointed at the werewolves in chains and fumed. “God, what is this, the Dark Ages?”
Some of them laughed. Some of them looked at me as if I had asked a very silly question. The well, duh look. The last vampire who’d spoken, the careworn one, didn’t react at all.
“Mistress Norville, please settle. You’re under my protection here,” Ned Alleyn said.
“I didn’t ask for your protection,” I said.
How the hell were Ben and I going to hold our own against this? This whole setup—them on the stage, looking down on us, with no way for us to move to a dominant position—was contrived.
“We can always leave,” Ben said calmly. He stood straight and tall, chin up, not cringing a millimeter. It made me stretch a little taller, and I imagined my tail and ears standing up, superior.
We could leave. But as Ned said, this was supposed to be neutral ground, an opportunity to meet with each other without fear. When was I going to get another chance to size up the gathered vampire might of Europe?
“No,” I said, taking a breath, forcing myself to at least pretend that they hadn’t gotten my hackles up. “I haven’t asked any of them how old they are.”
He chuckled. “They never answer that.”
“Ned did. Can’t stop trying now.”
“Good luck with that.”
“Thanks. So, how about it? Any of you up to telling me how old you are? How about if I promise not to tell anyone else?” I raised my voice and scanned the table, looking at every one of them—not meeting their gazes, but making it clear I had noted them, and remembered. Seated at the table were three women and eleven men, plus retainers, servants, and pets. Plus the victims of the dinner. I pointed at the guy in the poet shirt. “You—I bet you’re going to try to tell me you knew Lord Byron, right?”
He laughed, a point in his favor. Guy with a sense of humor couldn’t be all bad. The rest of them regarded me with expressions ranging from amusement to disbelief. Even Ned stood aside, hand to his chin, intrigued. I had a sudden feeling they were feeding me rope, waiting for me to hang myself with it.
“Nobody? Aw, come on, I thought you were all supposed to be badass. What’re you afraid of?” Ben, bless him, smirked at them all right along with me, though I imagined he was mentally slapping his forehead. Did I have to poke quite so much? Yeah, I did.
It kept my gaze from falling to the stack of bodies in the middle of the stage.
The impeccable anachronistic guy with the goatee made an obvious sniff, nostrils flaring, and wrinkled his nose. “The bitch is in heat.”
Ben stepped forward, putting himself in front of me, and bared his teeth in challenge. I put a calming hand on his arm and moved back into view. “Well, that’s a little personal. Ned, if we’re going to be sharing like this do you want to at least introduce everyone to me? I thought you guys were into all that formality and crap.”
Ned started to speak, but the goateed vampire sneered and said, “Too much barking. It’s obscene.” He turned away from us as if disgusted.
“You hear that, honey? I’m obscene,” I said to Ben. “I think that means we win.”
“High five,” he said, holding up his hand. I slapped it and held it.
“High paw.”
Yeah, they were definitely looking at us like we were the ones on stage, now. The figures on the fringes, the bodyguards and such, had pressed forward to watch, even. I didn’t know how much longer we could keep up the banter and hold their attention.