Blood Rock Page 4

  “Oh,” she said. “I-I’m so sorry—are they OK?”

  I stood there, swaying. “No, he’s—” My mouth grew dry. “He didn’t make it.”

  The line was quiet. “Oh, God, I’m so sorry,” the woman said.

  “Yes, well, yes,” I said. “I hate to inconvenience you, but … can you fit us in?”

  “I’m so sorry,” she said. “I-I’m so sorry. We just filled our last slot an hour ago.”

  I was stunned. I had known they were squeezing us in, but—”Are you sure?”

  “We had three slots left and filled five before the principal called me and told me to stop,” the woman said. “I’ve been calling the rest of the appointments and canceling—”

  “I see,” I said quietly. “Thank you.” I hung up the phone, staring at it. “Damnit.”

  Cinnamon stared up at me, eyes welling up. “I’m goin’ for a walk,” she said.

  “Go to her,” Rand said, taking the phone from my hand and redialing. “Hello? Clairmont Academy? Yes, this is Detective Andre Rand with the APD, badge number—”

  I followed Cinnamon, who kept her back to me, snuffling. “I don’t wanna talk to you,” she said. “You wants me to go to school, but can’t even find a good one—”

  “We’ll find you a school,” I said, putting my hands on her shoulders. “Look, I know what you want. I’ll find a way for you to have a real life—”

  “How?” she said bitterly, turning. “I’m a total freak. Look at me. Look at me!”

  I stared down at her. At her orange hair, her yellow cat eyes, her tattooed stripes, her huge ears, her twitching tail. This time of the month, fine orange fur began encroaching upon her pale olive skin at the edges of her normal hair. You couldn’t not know she was a werekin.

  But none of that mattered to me. “What?” I asked. “All I see is my daughter.”

  Her eyes welled up even more, and then she grabbed me and squeezed me so hard the air once again left my lungs. “You big sap,” she said, still crying. “Always gets me with the sticky-sweets. Lucky for you Rand snagged us an appointment at three.”

  I looked over at Rand, smiling, but there was a glint in his eye which seemed to say there was more to his favor than just soothing Cinnamon’s broken heart … and I knew precisely what he wanted for his quid pro quo.

  “Wonderful,” I said. “More than enough time to break the news to my ex-girlfriend.”

  Undying Lover

  We delayed the inevitable by getting breakfast-for-lunch at Ria’s Bluebird Café. And not just because it was right across the street from Oakland Cemetery: I love the place, and for more than the food. It’s always amusing to watch a server’s expression as tiny little Cinnamon plows into beef brisket, while big old me nibbles at soysage, sweet potatoes and a tofu omelet.

  While Cinnamon finished up, I sipped my sweet tea, scanned the street, and found myself noticing graffiti where I’d never seen it before: a sloppy caricature sprayed on the side of an Atlanta Journal-Constitution newspaper box; something political stenciled on a sidewalk; even colorful bubbly capitals sprayed on the brick wall of the Cemetery itself. Nothing as elaborate as the tag that killed Revy, but, still, graffiti was ever present.

  But then the check came, it was only twelve-thirty, and our appointment at the school wasn’t until three; and so we no longer had a good excuse not to drive the five minutes to the nearby Consulate and deliver the bad news to my childhood sweetheart.

  The Vampire Consulate of Little Five Points isn’t actually in Little Five Points. It’s at another five-pointed intersection in the Sweet Auburn area downtown. There, hidden away in a quiet set of buildings made from a deconsecrated church, is the court of one of the most powerful vampires in Atlanta: the Lady Saffron, nee Savannah Winters … my very ex-girlfriend.

  “Fucking fang,” Cinnamon muttered curtly, and when I glanced at her, she glared and looked away. “I—I means, I hates this place. She always smells funny.”

  “She is a vampire,” I said, pulling into the tiny lot behind the converted Victorian that served as the Consulate office. I dug out our vampire district parking tag and hung it from the rear-view mirror. “She may be almost vegetarian, but she’s got to drink at least some blood—and who knows how much her girlfriend drinks. There’s bound to be a smell.”

  “Hey, I likes the smell of blood, but she’s always stinking of leather … or rubber.”

  “Damnit.” I put my hand over my eyes and rubbed. “I really didn’t need to know that.”

  “Share the love, I says,” Cinnamon said, and I looked over to see her grinning.

  “You set me up,” I said.

  “And knocked you over,” she replied, flicking a hand out, catlike. “After all, she was your giiirlfriend. Don’t you knows what she’s into?”

  “Better than you,” I grumbled. “Fine, fine, just for that, you’re coming inside.”

  “No problem,” Cinnamon said, and then: “I do too likes her. I was just messing with ya.”

  We stepped through wrought iron gates and passed signs for Darkrose Security Enterprises and the Junior Van Helsing Detective Agency. The former was the security force belonging to Darkrose, Saffron’s new girlfriend; the latter was a Scooby-Doo grade paranormal detective agency which had tried and failed to take out Saffron shortly after she became a vampire. Now, through a sequence of events that had never been adequately explained to me, both rented space from the Consulate, even down to sharing a receptionist.

  Through the glass doors of the porch we could see that today that receptionist was Nagli, a cute little Indian college student that was one of the better Van Helsings. She looked bored out of her mind, but after buzzing the two of us in she immediately perked up.

  “Hey, Cinnamon,” she said brightly. When Nagli was perky, she was darned cute, and I couldn’t help grinning back at her. “And hey, Dakota. The Lady Saffron is in the garden.”

  I led Cinnamon through the middle door behind Nagli, through the shared conference room, and out into the garden. In the church’s former preschool playground now stood trellis after trellis of honeysuckle, hydrangeas, and clematis. When first planted they were low hedges that burst with stunning color in summer and fall. Now they were a maze of high vines, winter green and oppressively dark, that opened up around a white gazebo.

  Savannah Winters stood there in the sunshine in a ruffled Southern belle dress almost as red as her hair. Over the dress she wore a black leather corset with red lacing, that daring touch that I had so liked. Dark leather gloves protected her hands to the elbow, and she wore a huge red bonnet with black lace; but where Revenance had caught fire at the first direct touch of daylight, “the Lady Saffron” strolled through it unconcerned, with bomber goggles and a UV monitor as only concessions to the nuclear fire of the Sun.

  Once I had thought Savannah had won her post as the Queen of the Little Five Points district through vampire nepotism—after all, her maker was Lord Delancaster, the head vampire of Georgia and one of the most famous vampires in America.

  The truth was, “the Lady Saffron” was immensely powerful, frighteningly brilliant—and a daywalker. I think your typical vampire was scared shitless that she would crack open their coffin at high noon and ram a polished sandalwood stake straight through their heart.

  “Dakota,” Saffron said, turning, smiling at us from beneath her umbrella—a broad, closemouthed grin which dimpled up her delicate oval features. “And Cinnamon too! What a wonderful surprise. Come, you must join me in the gazebo.”

  Her dainty little gloved hand leapt out and grabbed mine in a vicegrip of steel. Typical—you couldn’t date Savannah without learning to deal with being tugged around—but now she had vampire strength I stayed extra close so she didn’t accidentally pull my arm out of its socket.

  Cinnamon started actually skipping alongside us, a victorious little smirk on her face as she watched me being dragged along. I reached out and snagged her wrist, and Saffron led us both up onto the gazebo in a li
ttle train. Happy happy, joy joy.

  “Something to drink?” she asked, releasing me and gesturing towards a wicker table, where a frosted pitcher filled with a green liquid sat precariously close to her laptop. She picked up a heavy-bottomed glass and twirled the green leafy sprig sticking out of it. “Mint juleps?”

  “Sure!” Cinnamon said brightly.

  “No, and no,” I said. “I’m driving, and she’s underage. And really? Drinking, before one in the afternoon? Isn’t that a bit early—”

  “A bit late, actually,” Saffron smirked, sitting down in the table’s matching wicker chair and bumping the mouse on her laptop to bring it to life. “I should have already turned in hours ago, but I’ve been burning the midday oil working on my thesis.”

  “That’s … wonderful,” I said. I couldn’t complain: I’d been on her about her unfinished PhD for years. “But for us it’s too early, in Cinnamon’s case by several years. Sweet tea?”

  “Certainly, Dakota,” she said, tapping the laptop and speaking into its microphone. “Nagli, could you—” There was a curse out of the laptop’s speakers and then the “intercom” went dead. “Well!” Saffron said, mock shocked. “You certainly can’t get good help these days. But no matter, I’m so glad to see you! You never come around anymore. Cinnamon keeping you busy? How is the school shopping going? You must look into a Montessori school—”

  This was ridiculous. Whatever Saffron was, she was no Scarlett O’Hara, and the weird bomber goggles made her look more Victorian steampunk than Civil War plantation. Finally I could take it no more, and said sharply, “Kill the Southern belle act, Savannah.”

  “Now, Dakota,” Savannah smirked, “I’ve told you never to call me that, not here—”

  “You’re right,” I said, remembering my real reason for being here. “My Lady Saffron, I’m here on Consulate business.”

  Saffron froze, staring at me with those bizarre goggles; then she lifted them up and squinted at me. “But … I haven’t given you any Consulate responsibilities—”

  “No, but wearing the sign of the Consulate means responsibility can fall in my lap,” I said, leaning forward to pat her dress. “Saffron, I have terrible news. You remember Revy?”

  “Revenance, from the Oakdale Clan? Of course,” she said … and blanched. “No!”

  “Yes,” I said. “He … he’s dead.”

  “You’re certain he’s not just … missing?” Saffron said, leaning forward. The wicker arms of the chair creaked under her delicate gloved hands. “Are you absolutely certain?”

  “Yes,” I said. “He died right in front of me, Cinnamon and Rand—”

  “Dear God,” she said, crossing herself, her mouth opening in unguarded shock, exposing her cruel fangs for the first time since we’d arrived. “Wait, Rand? You mean, Revenance died in front of Uncle Andy? But why … why was he even there? What happened?”

  “It was a magical attack,” I said. “The police’s expert couldn’t handle it, so they called me in. I tried to save him, but … ” My face fell. “But I failed. I’m so sorry.”

  “A magical attack?” Saffron asked suspiciously. “You mean a wizard attacked him?”

  “No. Not directly,” I said; vamps and wizards didn’t mix. “It was enchanted graffiti.”

  Saffron’s eyes widened. “I … didn’t even know that was possible.”

  “I didn’t either. Incredibly powerful magic—and fast too,” I said, gesturing at my forehead. “That’s how I got dinged—”

  “Fast? The graffiti … moved?” Saffron said.

  “Oh, come on,” I said. “You’ve seen my tattoos move, same principle—”

  “Oh, do I remember your tattoos moving,” Saffron said, first lascivious, then embarrassed in the very next moment. Cinnamon sneezed, and Saffron raised a gloved hand to her brow. “I’m sorry, that was inappropriate, given the circumstances and company.”

  “Yes, please, thank you,” I snapped. “If you would stop hitting on me every time I came over here I would be much more likely to come over here.”

  “Dakota,” Saffron said. “I thought we were going to be friends again—”

  “Friends,” I underlined. “Not girlfriends.”

  “Dakota,” Saffron said reprovingly. “There’s no need to get snippy—”

  “I’m goin’ for a walk,” Cinnamon said, hopping up and leaping over the banister of the gazebo, tail fluidly slipping over the rail. She glared back at me. “The reason I said I hates this place is that you always fights when you comes here.”

  In the silence that followed, Saffron and I stared at each other uncomfortably.

  “Sorry,” I said, embarrassed. “I thought we’d stopped bringing up reminders of ‘us.’”

  “Sorry,” Saffron said, equally embarrassed. “You’ve recently bled. It’s, uh, agitating me—and can we please leave it at that? You were trying to tell me—”

  “About a magical attack,” I said. “A giant graffiti tag, all magical, all energized. Revenance was trapped in it. It was tearing him apart—”

  “Oh no,” Saffron said, swallowing. “Did it—”

  “No,” I said. “But it had him effectively trapped. The police tried to rescue him, then I tried. We all failed. He held on as long as he could—”

  “But he wasn’t a daywalker,” she said soberly, putting her goggles back on.

  “No,” I said. Watching a vampire die was … horrible. I could still hear his screams. I cast about for anything else to talk about. “What I don’t get is how it worked. It held him there for hours. The mana should have dissipated, but it seemed like it was getting stronger.”

  “Perhaps there was a hidden caster,” Saffron said, “feeding magic to it—”

  “There was a guy,” I said, describing the jerk with the hat and skateboard, gloating as Revy died. “But he was hundreds of feet away, and there was no magic flowing off him, like from a classical wizard. I can feel it, with these vines. The tag, on the other hand, was just bleeding mana. It was definitely a power source, or maybe plugged into a power source—”

  “Maybe,” she said thoughtfully, “it was feeding off Revy.”

  “Can’t be,” I said. “Magic is derived from life force, and vampires aren’t alive—”

  Saffron hissed, quietly but with full fangs. “I’m shocked to hear that from you, Dakota,” she said, and with her eyes behind the goggles I couldn’t tell if she was really angry or just messing with me. “I had to devote a whole chapter in my thesis to debunking that myth.”

  “Well, send it to me,” I said gladly. “Prove me wrong.”

  “It is a bit technical,” she said smugly.

  “I was a chemistry major,” I replied. “I can handle anything the soft sciences put out.”

  “Them’s fightin’ words,” Saffron said, turning her laptop towards her with a vicious smirk. “I’ll email it to you. Maybe you can send me comments.”

  “Sure,” I said. Then, again bringing the conversation back to Revy, “But even so … he may have been writhing, but he sure wasn’t dancing.”

  Saffron paused her search. “Who cares whether he was dancing? Just because he’s not an official skindancer doesn’t mean his writhing couldn’t generate magical power—”

  “Except that normal movements don’t obey skindancing rules,” I said, “so the random surges of magic they generate usually average out to a null effect.”

  “Could it have been … a magical capacitor?” Saffron said, resuming her typing. “Powered up slowly over time by sapping Revenance’s life force?”

  “I … don’t think so,” I said.

  “Don’t think so,” Saffron snapped, “or don’t know? Did you think to check?”

  “Yes, Saffron,” I said. What was wrong with her today? The explanation about the blood wasn’t cutting it—the news about Revy had really put her on edge. “I studied capacitor designs after last year’s incident, and I looked for them while the tag was active. I didn’t see any—”

&nbs
p; “Well, now that it isn’t, check again,” she said. My face fell, and she frowned. “What?”

  “They’re not going to let me back onto the scene,” I said. “The magical investigators, the Black Hats, seemed to think that some clever defense attorney would make hay of a magician—”

  “For the love,” Saffron said. “Well, hopefully they took pictures—what?”

  “Savannah,” I said softly. “This is me. I did doublecheck. But after the firemen put … put Revy out, the tag was a burnt ruin. There’s nothing left to photograph.”

  “Damn it,” Saffron said. “Sorry. I should have known you would look.”

  I shrugged. Yeah, but—”Anyway, a tag with that kind of surface area is usually a magical radiator—any mana Revenance generated would just leak away in the air. I’ve never seen such a large magical mark, except for maybe the Harris Mural at Emory.”

  Saffron looked up into the air sharply, sun reflecting off her goggles, remembering. The mural was a striking slow-moving magical pageant in Emory’s Harris Hall, powered by the rays of the sun. No Harris School of Magic alum ever forgot its ever-changing abstract colors.

  “You should check that out,” Saffron said slowly. “It’s only about twenty-five years old. The painter might still be alive. There can’t be too many people who could paint a magical painting big enough to kill a person—maybe the painter of the Mural could give you some names that could kick-start your investigation.”

  “I’m not really investigating this,” I said, taken aback. “I mean, it’s a police matter, and they practically kicked me off the scene—”

  “Dakota, you have to look into this,” Saffron said urgently. “I mean, it would be stupid for them to not ask you after all you did for them last year. Who’s more qualified?”

  “Rand said as much,” I said. “He seemed to think Philip would want my help, and he definitely wanted me to talk to you on behalf of the Vampire Consulate, so here I am.”

  “Well, that will make things … simpler,” Saffron said, oddly uncomfortable. “So, if you are our representative, Dakota … can you deliver a message to the police for me?”