“Are you sure we’re heading in the right direction?” Jude asked, turning in a full circle and looking up at the bare, stark branches above them. “I feel like we’ve passed that tree before.”

“Not completely sure, no,” Eva said as the two of them made their way down the isolated foot path that cut through the park. Even in the middle of the day, and with most of the leaves down, it was overcast enough to make it oddly dark. “But Letizia said we should be able to find the place now. It’s gotta be around here somewhere.”

“It’s almost noon,” Jude grumbled, anxiety increasing. “What if we don’t find it in time today? Do we have to come back tomorrow? Does it absolutely have to be noon dirt?”

“Listen, I know what you know, and that’s not very f—freaking much.” Eva caught herself just in time. She’d been trying to cut down on the swearing, she’d told him, which had gotten a lot more frequent thanks to recent undead events, and she wanted to avoid slipping where there might be consequences. Now she had her corporate-patience voice on, the one she used to deal with disgruntled mall patrons, or Jude when he was dancing on her last nerve. Jude had just resolved to keep his mouth shut when her face brightened and she batted at his arm.

“Wait,” she said. “Look.”

As they rounded a bend in the path that looked just like so many others, the object of their search came into view all at once, like the circle had just sprung into life from thin air. Suddenly he felt very small.

Jude leaned his head back to look up at the sky and the sharp obsidian spires like black dragon’s teeth that bordered his vision. He shivered again. He’d been here before. This circle was burned into his brain, tangible as if he could touch it—and now, tentatively, he did reach out to touch the nearest black crystal spike. It was strangely warm, despite the overcast day, and he could swear it was softly vibrating.

He sucked in a breath, overwhelmed with the place, the recognition almost like a physical impact hitting him dead in the chest. He’d been plunged into the presence of it all, memory enveloping him like the surface of water closing over his head.

There was a definite charge in the air, like the moment before a storm—or a fire. He’d grown accustomed to the feeling in his old life, his old job—calling, more like. Once their lives’ mission had been to drive directly toward fires and run inside when anyone sensible would be fleeing the opposite direction. Before every job, there was a charge like this between them, rising adrenaline, shared anticipation, fear and excitement and resolve all at once. Had something like that happened here? Was there a night like the one five years ago that would be forever seared into someone’s mind, caught and preserved here at the stones like a fly in amber, or clinging to the area like a ghost?

Shaking the morbid thoughts away, Jude made himself focus on the here and now, focus on physical details to ground himself. Count the spires—one, two, three, four…

Someone had stuck some pieces of paper to the stones, duct taped to the smooth surfaces that would probably repel thumbtacks or even nails. Posters, torn and faded by the weather and time. Some of them looked like they might be for missing people, but Jude couldn’t make out more than the vague shapes of photos and letters too worn to read.

Strange—hadn’t Letizia said this place couldn’t just be stumbled upon by random non-magical people? You had to know where it was, and presumably, what it was. Apparently they weren’t the only ones, not by far.

“Looks like there was one hell of a party here,” Eva said, nodding to the middle of the stones.

There stood a small tower of wood, still smoldering from what had undoubtedly been a bonfire. Beside it, a pile of three-quarters burnt clothes lay on the ground, corroded with a foul black liquid that looked like it had somehow frozen until it was almost as hard as the stones around them. The mess was half-sunk into the ground, melted and re-formed, as if the whole thing had been doused in acid.

“All that’s left of Cruce, I guess,” Jude said. “Good riddance.”

“I don’t like this,” Eva muttered back. “Bad sh—stuff’s gone down here, and is probably gonna go down again. Let’s just grab the dirt and get out of—”

“Hey!” a voice shouted from the other side of the circle, and then someone was barreling toward them. Someone they had both seen before, quite recently, but not pleasantly.

“Oh, it’s you,” Jude said as the young man with the torn clothes and filthy red hair approached. Apparently they were just letting anyone find secret circles these days. “Run out of mall-goers to harass?”

“I wasn’t harassing anyone,” the scruffy punk retorted. Sighing inwardly, Jude reminded himself of what Milo had said—that this guy was loud but not dangerous, and actually in more danger than the rest of them, somehow. Still, that didn’t make dealing with him any more pleasant. “Or stalking, or whatever else anybody’s been saying about me.”

“I don’t know what they’ve been saying about you,” Jude said, as calmly as possible. “Because I don’t know who you are. What are you doing here?”

“None of your business!” he shot back, and Jude barely suppressed an eyeroll. All of this was starting to feel like an almost impressively huge waste of time.

But while the noisy stranger was focused on Jude with remarkable single-mindedness, Eva had slipped to one side with the trowel and glass jar, hiding behind the nearest stone spire. Good, Jude thought. He’d distract the ‘guardian’ of the circle, and she’d get what they came for. They’d always been good at staying on the same page.

“A better question is, what the hell are you doing here?” said guardian demanded.

“I… I was…”

Jude stopped whatever unconvincing thing he’d been about to say. Now he realized what was bothering him, besides the obvious. It was what Eva had told him just before the night his life had changed forever. That weird evening had started as a weird morning—some punk fitting this description had thrown a balled-up burger wrapper at Eva’s face, apparently out of nowhere, and set off a chain of events that led to somebody else—somebody cute and fangy—crashing through his window. The rest was history.

He folded his arms and glared, nonspecific annoyance narrowing to a focused point. “You threw garbage at my friend.”

“Your friend was probably garbage. Now get out of my circle.” The young man glared, but still didn’t manage to look threatening. He just looked like hell, filthy and starving. But, although his eyes were glassy and sunken, they were steady and clear.

“Your circle?” Jude repeated incredulously.

“That’s what I said.” He didn’t look nearly as convinced as he was clearly attempting to sound. “These rocks are mine, and you’re trespassing!”

“What’s your name?” Jude blurted as Eva crept into the middle of the stone circle, and their opponent seemed about to turn just enough to catch her in the corner of his eye. The question made him turn back to Jude, who let out a furtive sigh of relief.

“Sangui—fuck you. My name’s fuck you, and get away from me. And my rocks.” He eyed Jude suspiciously, but still made no effort to move away.

“Sang-wi…” Jude rolled the syllables over his tongue.

The sounds were unusual for English, but still familiar in the same way his own name was, but from even further back. Latin was a relic from a time that sometimes seemed like someone else’s life, but one that he’d still never forget. He knew this name, the way he’d known every terrifying thing the name ‘Cruce’ implied. Words like these were as automatic as his hand tracing the sign of the cross, ingrained, forever written on his brain the way the accompanying images forever marked the insides of his eyelids.

“Sanguine?”

It was an educated guess, and by the way the young man’s eyes—bright blue with whites standing out all around—flicked up to his face and locked on his own, Jude was sure he’d guessed right. He didn’t answer, but he didn’t run away either.

“That’s an interesting name.” Jude said, taking in the knotted mess of red hair, filthy jeans, and grimy shirt with torn sleeves that wouldn’t be nearly enough as the temperature dropped after sundown. “You don’t hear Latin much anymore.”

Sanguine didn’t answer, and he didn’t move. It was like he’d been frozen in place, as completely as if Jude had pulled a gun on him. Like he couldn’t move even if he wanted to. The name certainly conjured up images of holiness and unholy creatures. The vampires they’d encountered so far did seem to like that aesthetic.

“Did you pick that name for yourself?” Jude asked, realizing there could be another explanation, just as familiar but far less ominous. “I, uh… I kind of know something about that. I’m Jude.”

“I know,” Sanguine said. Behind him, Eva had crouched down, carefully unscrewed the top of the jar, and now drove her trowel into the dirt as silently as possible.

“Really?” Jude blinked. He’d started out as just trying to distract Sanguine while Eva absconded with their treasure, but now he was genuinely curious. “How?”

“I—I like the mall, okay? And you’re at the mall. So why is that weird, why shouldn’t I know your—what?!” Sanguine yelped, jerking back out of arm’s reach as Jude raised a hand. It looked very much like he expected to be struck.

“You’re bleeding,” Jude said quietly, pointing but not touching; Sanguine shrank back anyway, slapping one hand to his neck where a thin trickle of blood ran down from below his jutting jaw. If alarm bells hadn’t been going off in Jude’s head before—which they had, always—they especially were now, loud and clear and extremely urgent.

“This? This is nothing, this is fine—and once again, fuck you.” Sanguine’s tone was still caustic and biting, but his eyes were scared. Jude realized they’d really never been anything but.

As Sanguine reached up to his bloody neck, his filthy sleeve had slipped enough to expose his wrist and underside of his forearm, which was peppered with puncture wound scars, and some much too recent to have scarred over yet at all. Letting out a faint, strangled noise, he pulled his hand away from his neck—his fingers now slick with red—and yanked his sleeve back down, hiding the injuries from view.

“Are those fine too?” Jude asked with growing actual concern. Tension tightened his stomach, mixed anxiety and excitement. Certainty. This was confirmation. Not a good confirmation, exactly, but it was always better to know what he was dealing with. When had vampires become a preferable enemy to unknowns?

“I—it’s—” Sanguine stammered, going paler, even under the layer of dirt on his face. He backed up one shaky step, then another.

Behind him, Eva must have collected as much dirt as she thought they needed, because she quietly got up and hustled to the edge of the circles again, slipping behind another stone. That was it, they were done, they could go—except no, Jude realized. No, they couldn’t.

“Listen,” Jude said urgently, and Sanguine’s eyes fixed on him. “Listen to me. I know what I’m looking at. I know what you’ve been through—”

“No, you really don’t!” Sanguine hissed, and now there was an edge of desperation in his voice. “You can actually run, so run! Do you know how lucky you are to have that chance? Not everybody has it!”

Sanguine was panting like he’d just sprinted an uncomfortable distance. Whatever color had once been in his thin cheeks disappeared. But he still wasn’t bolting, so Jude tried one more time.

“If you’re in some kind of trouble, you can—”

“Ha!” Sanguine scoffed, a harsh bark that sounded like it hurt his already raspy throat. It seemed to jar him back into motion, dissipating whatever strange spell had fallen over him to root him to the ground and shake him into silence. “I can talk to you, is that what you were gonna say? You want me to tell you all my worries? Cause cops are our friends, right, even fake cops? Fuck you.”

“I’m not a—never mind.” It didn’t matter how much he’d hated his job, or that he’d just quit, he’d still worn the uniform and that spoke for itself. Especially to scared, obviously-homeless and abused young people who had every reason to fear anyone who wore one.

“Right, that’s why I said fake cop,” Sanguine said with a curl of his chapped lips, but his nervous eyes darted away, obviously looking for escape routes. “Now stay away from me, and stay away from this place,” he said at last, but his voice held none of its previous fire, and none of its strength. Jude wasn’t sure if he sounded more scared or tired. “I’m warning you. I don’t want you to get—just fucking stay away. It’s better that way. For everyone.”

“Not for you. I know you’re dealing with vampires,” Jude blurted again, handling his desperation by laying everything out on the table. No sense holding back now. Sanguine was watching him carefully again, with no hostility or scorn. There was, however, light in his eyes that just barely began to resemble fragile, tentative hope. “I know you’re under one’s control, or something like it. I know a few, good and bad, and we helped some friends of mine escape that life. They’re safe now. I think we can help you too.”

“No,” Sanguine said, but Jude hadn’t missed his hesitation. He slowly shook his head as he stepped backwards. “No, you have no idea wh—aaaagh!”

Sanguine lurched backwards, scream ringing through the quiet clearing. Eva had almost, almost made it silently back to Jude, but then come out from around exactly the wrong stone. Before she or Jude could react, Sanguine collided with her, jumping as if electrified, windmilling and obviously about to fall over completely.

“Gotcha,” she said as she caught him with one arm, using the other one to fling the jar full of precious dirt at Jude, who just barely managed to catch it instead of letting it crash to the ground and render this entire exercise pointless.

“Get off me!” Sanguine snarled, immediately pulling away from her and putting his forearms between the two of them and his head, giving Jude an even better view of the unmistakable bite marks.

“You’re welcome,” Eva grumbled, backing off and sticking her hands in her pockets. “And Jude’s telling the truth, you know. Fake cop or not, he really does want to help you… for some reason. So I guess I do too.”

Sanguine stared at them, unblinking, for a few seconds. He held so still Jude wasn’t sure if he was breathing. Jude watched that same light—an openness that made him look painfully young—linger in his eyes. Then, devastatingly quickly, he watched it disappear.

“You can’t,” Sanguine whispered.

Even as all traces of hope faded from his face, his lips curled up in a smile much different from his usual sneer. It was the kind of smiling mask you wore when you laughed to keep from crying, with eyes that had looked into the future and seen no way out, no hope left in the whole world, and nothing left to smile about at all. Brittle. Hollow. Jude thought of Milo’s practiced retail smile, and Eva’s patient corporate voice. He also thought it might be the saddest thing he’d ever seen.

“Believe me… there is nothing you can do.”

This time, when he turned, Jude said nothing to stop him. Neither did Eva. Sanguine took one step, then another, and soon he was running like he was being chased by the hounds of Hell, or some other horror Jude had known existed, but had been so unprepared to see with his own eyes. Soon he was gone, but the blood and grievous scars on Sanguine’s arm stayed horribly clear in his head the way Latin words forever lived on his tongue.

“Well, that was fun,” Eva groused, once they were alone again. “At least I got the dirt. You’re welcome.”

“Did you see his arms? And neck?” Jude asked, still watching the trees into which Sanguine had disappeared.

“What? No, I was paying more attention to what we came here for,” Eva said, still sounding cranky and flustered. “What was it, track marks?”

“Why, would that make it any better?” Jude said, unintentionally bitterly, but standing by his tone after the words were out. “Would he deserve our help less if they were?”

“No, but it’d be an explanation,” she said evenly, looking him directly in the eye. “And I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I like it better than the alternative, because addiction is at least a known evil, not… what we’re dealing with every night, with no instruction manual. So what do you think it was?”

Jude hesitated, then spoke quietly. “Looked like bites.”

Eva’s eyebrows crept up toward her hairline. “Like bite-bites, or…?”

Jude thought for another second. Everything had happened so fast, maybe he had been mistaken. Maybe the scars and blood had a purely mundane reason. Occam’s Razor said it was vampires, but really, nothing the kid had said or done couldn’t be explained by simple desperation and late-stage Capitalism.

“I don’t know,” he said at last, thoughts still somewhere other than the stone circle. He just didn’t know where—where could anyone living on the streets or under a vampire’s thumb go? Did such a safe place exist? “I’d need a better look.”

“I doubt he’ll give you much of a chance. I know it’s hard to accept, but you can’t help someone who doesn’t want it. Might as well try to let it go,” Eva said, turning to leave, then stopping, letting out a short exclamation of surprise. “Hey! Look at this!”

“What?” Jude asked, shaking himself all the way out of his reverie and looking over to see her carefully peeling one of the pieces of paper off the stones.

“Look. Have you seen this boy?” she held out the flyer, and Jude could see now that it was a missing poster, this one with the picture and name legible.

He had indeed seen the boy in the picture, though now with the addition of gray skin, even pointier ears, and just-as-pointed teeth. Still, there was no mistaking the hair, or the happy, round-cheeked smile and laugh he could practically hear in his head. There was a phone number at the bottom, and in thick block letters: CALL NATALIE.

Jude took the paper from her as his head spun. He recognized the name, and he would recognize the boy in the picture anywhere, but seeing him like this was wrong, surreal. Once again, he felt as if all this was a particularly stressful dream.

“It’s Pixie.”

 

 

With the afternoon turning into evening and their work together done, Jude and Eva went their separate ways to continue the work apart. Sunset Towers might not be the fanciest place around, but it was a warm, bright place to escape everything that came with nightfall.

Eva was also grateful for Letizia’s door opening automatically at her approach, already exhausted as she stepped over the threshold with the jar of dirt that had been so troublesome to obtain.

Inside, Letizia didn’t look up, seeming completely absorbed in preparing for her spell. That preparation apparently involved reading passages from very old books then double- and triple-checking them against her own nearly-illegibly scrawled notes. Eva sank down onto a chair, set the jar on the floor, and took the opportunity to relax. Everything would start back up soon enough.

Nails and Maestra had emerged from their room, but it didn’t look like they were helping much. Both girls seemed a lot more interested in looking all around Letizia’s apartment, marveling over couches and the microwave that had probably never been used.

“Put those back,” Letizia said finally, tearing her eyes away from the latest book and looking over at the girls, who were still busily poking through the apartment. Nails had found a shiny crystal pendulum on a gold chain, and Maestra held a brightly painted Venetian mask in front of her face. “A pair of magpies, the both of you.”

“Sorry,” Maestra said, returning the mask carefully to its place. “It’s just that everything feels new, you know? Like I know we live here, but everything’s clearer now, even normal stuff just feels so exciting!”

“That’s it, exactly,” Nails agreed. “It’s like everything else was some kind of hazy dream-type thing, and now we’re awake, and I swear colors look brighter, and stuff tastes better, everything’s amazing and I can’t stop messing with everything! I’m not even sorry, it’s just too cool!”

“Yes, that’ll last for a while most likely,” Letizia said, not bothering to hide her smile anymore. “The thrill of being freed from a bad sire really is like a fog lifting. The world is new, and I don’t blame you for falling in love with it. Just perhaps do that elsewhere.”

“Kinda sounds like you’re trying to get rid of us,” Nails muttered, but didn’t look bothered at the thought.

“I am trying to keep you at a safe distance while I work powerful magic, yes,” Letizia confirmed. “And you need to rest. You going and having a lovely evening works out nicely for all of us.”

“Okay,” Maestra said, though she didn’t look entirely convinced. “But we’re here if you need us.”

“I know. But right now, all you two need to worry about is getting re-acquainted with your wild, enchanting, real lives. Remember who you are and what you want, and the things you’ve forgotten will come back in time. If they don’t, consider them better off lost.”

“You’re really not gonna tell us what the spell you’re casting is for?” Nails didn’t bother to hide her disappointed frown. “We’re not kids, you know, I know we’re gonna look seventeen forever, but we’re old enough to yell at whippersnappers to get off our lawns—”

“Go,” Letizia said firmly, but without any real edge. She smiled a bit instead and the understated, wry expression made her look more like herself than Eva had yet seen today. “Explore, jog your memories—engage in some petty vandalism, or whatever kids are doing for fun these days. Just remember to document it! And don’t go near the circle!”

“We weren’t gonna,” Nails said, and Eva didn’t come close to believing her.

“I mean it,” Letizia said. “That place is dangerous, and I know you’ll want to see the place Cruce met his well-deserved end, but you have no business being there now. Go celebrate somewhere else.”

The girls exchanged a look. One minute, they were looking at each other with growing smiles. The next, they were gone—and two bats flapped wildly away, disappearing in a flurry of wings.

“I’m never going to get used to that,” she said, but Letizia didn’t reply. When Eva looked over, she saw her friend absorbed in a new task—laying an empty mirror frame on the floor, as well as a pile of shining glass shards.

“Trying to undo seven years of bad luck?” Eva asked, moving to get a better look. She could swear that mirror hadn’t been there a second ago.

“Try a hundred and fifty,” Letizia answered, sounding distant, though the corner of her mouth curled up in a wry expression.

She started carefully picking up and placing the broken mirror shards into the frame, and somehow they fit together so well and closely that the cracks between them were barely visible. It was almost as if the mirror was fusing into one piece of glass as she filled in the pieces like a puzzle.

Letizia held something else in one hand, first close to her chest, then holding it up so she could look at it. Something about her face and the delicate way she balanced the object was reverent, like she was holding something sacred, a treasure beyond compare. Her lips moved rapidly, but Eva couldn’t hear what she was saying, and doubted she was saying it to anyone in this room.

Eva took a cautious step closer until she could see better what it was the Witch held with so much awe. It didn’t look like anything especially valuable to her; it was an oblong, straight shape, like a branch—or a bone. A small bone, maybe part of a finger, worn smooth over time and perhaps much more handling. As the strange realization hit home, Eva had another one; on the floor beside Letizia was a small pile of what could only be more bones, which, like the mirror, definitely hadn’t been there before. Delicate bits like fingers, curved shapes like ribs, and a round-edged chunk that looked almost like…

“Can I ask what the bones are for?” Eva managed to keep her tone relatively conversational and free of anxiety—which didn’t at all reflect how she was actually feeling. Was that part of a hip bone? A pelvis? It looked shattered, but the pieces might fit together like a puzzle, like the shards of shattered mirror. “Actually, I am asking. What are the bones for?”

“They’ll help the mirror—closer to ‘window’ by the time I’m done—find what I seek,” Letizia said, and she sounded more grounded and confident now. Maybe her presence really was helping in more ways than it seemed. “These pieces are… connected, to the stone circle, and the energy I need. A point of contact. I’ve been looking for them for a long time, and I’ve collected a lot. Except for their skull,” she murmured, and it sounded more like an afterthought to herself than talking to Eva.

“Those are human bones, aren’t they?” Eva asked, not sure she’d quite understood any of those words, at least not in that order.

Somehow, even being acquainted with vampires and witches, all that had seemed separate from actual death, true mortality. More brutal and realistic than a Halloween story, but not one that carried the weight of life and death. Jude had seen more of this, she thought, down in the caves under the mall, the viscerally frightening reality of their strange new world. Until now, Eva had been mostly spared.

“Yes,” Letizia said, a little dreamily. “They’ll act like a magnet. They and the stone circle share the same frequency; they still hold the imprint of the circle’s magic. These pieces will be crucial when it comes to tapping into the circle and siphoning off the energy released. It’ll stop the ritual from going as planned.”

“Ritual…?” Eva said nervously, feeling a bit disoriented; the floor beneath her was no longer as steady as it had been, as solid.

“Wicked Gold is busy preparing for his own spell right now too. A race between us, I suppose, until the opportune time. The next full moon. And a sacrifice. Not yours, or anyone else’s here,” Letizia said quickly, but it still didn’t do much to quell Eva’s alarm. “And not mine.”

“Then whose…?” Eva let the question hang, as if by leaving it unfinished she could somehow secure a less-terrifying answer.

“It’s what he was trying to do with Cruce and failed. For several reasons, his timing only one of them,” Letizia explained, blatantly sidestepping the question. She spoke matter-of-factly, like she was describing a rival employee’s work habits. “He must not have had all the details before, but now, I have the feeling that he’s going to take the opportunity to get rid of another of his enemies. Two birds, one stone, you know. And I’m more than happy to let my enemies destroy one another, which is why I’m not rushing to stop him from performing this ritual at all. But, failing that, he has no shortage of brainwashed humans at his disposal. Surely one of them will be willing.”

“If he’s controlling them, it doesn’t sound like they have much of a choice.” Eva suppressed a shiver.

“Maybe not, but that’s the core of the spell. The sacrifice has to be willing, or else it means nothing. Coercion has no power here. The only power comes from consent and personal intention.”

“‘Wiling’ sounds like an extremely relative term here,” Eva said, voice hardening. “You don’t need a magic spell to coerce someone into doing things they don’t want. Someone sacrificing themself for this guy—even if they think they’re doing it of their own free will, nah, no, it doesn’t work that way.”

“I’ve thought of that as well,” Letizia said. “And I agree. The circle agrees—it would not accept anything but true, wholehearted consent.”

“You know that for a fact?” Eva asked, suddenly feeling a bit lightheaded, and planting her feet more firmly on the floor to keep her brain from floating away entirely.

“I do,” Letizia said quickly, then hesitated. “I know the witch who cast the initial spell to empower the stones. They would never have done otherwise.”

“I still don’t like this.” Eva shook her head. “Even if he gets a totally willing sacrifice, that doesn’t mean it’s right.”

“I know,” Letizia said. “I’ve thought of that as well. And I don’t know exactly how he’s going to accomplish this. But that’s not the biggest question, or the most important part of this. The real goal is the ritual itself, the magic. I want to save Wicked Gold’s victims just as much as you do—maybe more, since I’ve seen so intimately what he’s capable of. But I want to keep a very dangerous power out of his hands even more. It’s a terrible thing, but there it is. Believe me, I would not be considering this if there were any other way.”

“Does anybody else know about this?” Eva asked with a half-deadpan, half-searching look. “You definitely left this whole possibility-of-sacrifice thing out of the explanation earlier.”

“No. I haven’t told the others, not even Jasper. They’re good people, but they can be a bit… sentimental, I think, when it comes to the harder things that must be done.”

“I can’t imagine them objecting to stopping an evil human sacrifice ritual,” Eva pointed out. “If anything, they’d probably fight even harder to stop it and save the poor shmucks.”

“That is exactly my concern,” Letizia said, sounding thoughtful. “When, however awful, that isn’t the bigger point. We may not be able to save everyone involved, but I still need to stop Wicked Gold’s magic, and enact my own. Failing at that, even to save others, is unacceptable. Yes, I will if the chance arises, I promise. But the cost of failure here—of Wicked Gold obtaining the power he seeks—would be much too high. Which is why things like sentimentality have little place in a witch’s hard decisions. You seem to understand the practical, even if it is… unpleasant. You seem to understand me.” Letizia looked up at her, and now she just looked tired, and a little sad. “Which isn’t always a good thing. For some things, you’d be better off far away.”

“Hey,” Eva said, trying to shake off her worries and slight queasiness, and project a braver front than she felt. Which wasn’t that brave at all, but much more a strange combination of feeling honored and terrified. “I meant it when I said I was here for the long haul. I’m not dropping and bolting now just because it’s getting real.”

Letizia smiled at her, just a bit, and seemed about to say something else, but just then, another chime rang through the air—not the dreaded tones of her cell phone, but like the sound of a real tiny bell, though its source remained unseen.

“Ah,” Letizia said, raising one hand into midair and mimed pinching something between her finger and thumb. “One moment, Eva.”

She pulled her invisible cloth, and the air that followed in its wake shimmered, and then it was as if she’d pulled back a small curtain to reveal somebody from the chest up like a video call, just with no screen to go with it. Someone all in black, with long purple hair and artfully applied eyeliner. Eva stared at her young acquaintance with undisguised curiosity, and they gave her a friendly nod, the kind they gave her every morning when they passed by each other with coffee.

“Hello, little one,” Letizia said with a genuinely fond-looking smile.

“Yes, I’m here,” Milo said, looking a bit anxious, but earnest. “Do you need me to come over? I figured you may call on me to help, at some point. It’s a major spell.”

“Witches gotta stick together,” Eva said, echoing the words that had started all this off. “I guess I shouldn’t be surprised by now.”

“I do kind of look the part,” Milo said with a little smile.

“And you’re just here because you want to help? That’s all?” Eva watched as their eyes flicked momentarily down and away.

“Mostly,” Milo admitted. “Although I’d be lying if I said I had no personal interest in making sure Letizia’s spell is successful. But you don’t have to do anything extra for me, and I won’t cause any trouble. I just… needed to make sure everything goes off safely.”

“If you won’t take their word for it, take mine,” Letizia said, giving Eva a steady look. “I’m glad they’re here.”

“Really, what can I do to help?” Milo asked, looking eager and anxious at the same time.

“Right now?” Letizia cast a glance back over the bones and mirror, pausing for a moment in which Eva could practically hear the gears turning in her head. “You can go find the girls.”

“Oh,” Milo said with a surprised-looking blink. “And bring them back to you?”

“No. Take them out to lunch. Or catching frogs, or riding skateboards indoors, or whatever your generation finds fun nowadays. I believe there was talk of some petty vandalism.”

“Okay,” Milo said, understanding dawning over their face. “The rumor mill said they were Cruce’s thralls. If that’s true, they must be feeling a bit—”

“Exactly,” Letizia said with a quick nod. “They need someone to answer their questions, fill them in on things that may have fallen out of their heads, let them know they’re not alone. Be their friend. I’d do it, but I’m afraid this ritual business has taken up all my attention.” She sounded bitter about that, and now Milo’s face showed understanding instead of confusion.

“I know what you mean,” they said, nodding back. “And I’ll do my best. Thank you for trusting me with them.”

“Of course. I told them not to go to the stones, so that’s where you’ll find them. Be careful, and make sure they are too. That circle is going to be a very unstable place for the next few days.”

“Yes it is,” Milo said, and Eva wasn’t sure if she’d imagined the look of worry that flashed across their face. “I’ll make sure they stay safe.” They hesitated, and now the anxiety on their face was undeniable. “But… you’ll tell me, if you hear anything about…?”

“You have my word.”

Letizia kept her steady gaze on the younger witch until Milo’s image had faded, and the apartment was quiet.

“Anything about what?” Eva had to ask. “They seemed pretty shaken up about something.”

Letizia sighed and rubbed her temples as if she had an oncoming headache. “Nothing that should pose a danger to you or any of our other friends. Believe me, you’re happier not knowing. I would be too.”

Although not remotely satisfied by that answer, Eva let the matter drop. For now. Between the bones, the sacrifice, and everything else going on right now, she had no trouble believing that there were some things she’d just rather not know.

 

 

“Is this the place?” Jude asked, trying and failing to keep the incredulity out of his voice. “It’s… It kind of looks…”

“Like a total dump,” Pixie supplied helpfully.

“You said it, not me.”

“Oh, it totally is.” Pixie gave the shabby-looking building a nod like the one you might give an old acquaintance after noticing them across the street. “Which isn’t all that big a change, really. It was always a dump when we lived here before. I still think this is the place to find rose-tinted happiness, though. Just check the sign.”

Jude eyed the faded, cracked walls and sunken-looking ceiling. Even in the dark, the nearby streetlights were enough to illuminate the shiny edges of broken windows, the weed-overgrown parking lot, and the water-stained, burnt-out sign reading The Rose Dawn Motel. He thought of his own apartment complex, the Sunset Towers, and wondered if the same person had named them, someone with a penchant for wistful titles but not much of a flair for architecture. In any case, he’d never felt more fortunate to live in his own mediocre but functional and clean building.

“And when you say ’we’ lived here, you mean…”

“Me and Jeff,” Pixie said, voice only a little tight, as he headed toward the steps leading up to the second-floor wraparound balcony. “This was the first real place we stayed that wasn’t couch-hopping or crashing in an abandoned building. Which this wasn’t back then, at least. It’s—it was the first place that ever really felt like home. Never thought I’d miss it.” He gave a short, unhappy chuckle that didn’t sound like it should come from him. “Bet it didn’t miss me.”

“Someone misses you,” Jude said, or more like blurted, as he followed Pixie.

He hadn’t quite meant to say it, but from the way Pixie looked up at him in surprise, he was glad that he had. The accident might turn out to shake Pixie out of his reverie. Jude didn’t like the look on Pixie’s face, distant and sad and regretful. Maybe a little ashamed. It had no place on Pixie’s face, and those awful, heavy feelings had no place in his heart.

“I found—actually Eva found something at the stone circle I wanted to tell you about,” Jude said. “A missing person poster, with you on it. Your picture, and your name.”

“What did it say, just ‘Pixie?’” he asked after a hesitation Jude just barely caught. “Did it say who’s looking?”

“The poster said ‘Natalie,’ and I remembered the name from when we talked to Milo. There was a phone number, but I haven’t called it, I wanted to tell you and let you decide. I thought it might be a trap of some kind and didn’t want to risk it.”

“It—it did?” Pixie repeated, eyes widening as they locked onto Jude’s.

“Yeah. Are you ready to tell me about her now?” Jude asked, realizing not for the first time that he really knew nothing about Pixie’s old life. His first life, the one he’d actually been alive to live.

“Well, uh, you know I was in a band, right?” Pixie said after just a moment’s hesitation, sounding a little faint, but the slightest smile pulled at the corner of his mouth.

“You’d mentioned it a couple times. Was she…” Jude trailed off, catching a glimpse of the stylized pink text on the black T-shirt Pixie wore under his hoodie, and the obvious pride with which Pixie wore it. He remembered Pixie’s guitar and its sticker emblazoned with words in similar grungy font reading, somewhat ironically, THIS BASS KILLS FASCISTS. “Chaos Chainsaw?”

“Hell yeah!” Pixie grinned despite the atmosphere of tension and gloom. “Me and Natalie and Jeff. Her on the drums, Jeff on the bass, me on the guitar. Trying to break into the indie punk scene, playing underground shows—sometimes literally underground. Working on a demo. It was rough, but fun, and we were… happy. Until Jeff—until he was gone. Like he just vanished into thin air. Natalie and I made all these posters when he disappeared, stuck them up everywhere, but nobody ever called. Including him. So I guess she did the same thing for me, and I guess the same thing happened: nothing. I should really find her, let her know I’m okay at least. But some people I just can’t… it’s not like telling Milo about me. She doesn’t know about vampires—I don’t think. I’d probably just scare her. And I already feel bad, not telling her or anyone else I’m still here, but it’s like, every day I stay gone, I feel worse about it, and that makes it harder to even think about talking to her again.”

“She’d still probably like to know her friend’s all right,” Jude said, but noticed Pixie’s hesitation. “She might be upset for a while, but I have to think she’d be a lot more relieved and happy in the long run. But it’s obviously up to you. I can’t make you tell anyone, but at least someone cared enough to put them up. Maybe she could even give you a new T-shirt,” Jude suggested, only half-joking. “That one’s falling apart.”

“The rips are intentional. It’s called distressed style, Jude.” Pixie’s little return-joke and half-smile were, like he’d been himself, short-lived. “So, anyway, we’re here for rose-tinted happiness, right?”

“That’s right,” Jude said. “Though this seems like a strange place to find it.”

Pixie stopped outside one of the motel room doors. Jude didn’t see a number, and he noticed that the door was slightly ajar and hanging off its hinges, maybe from disrepair and rough weather, or being forced open and broken. Or maybe both. “Yeah, I know. But it used to be a pretty happy place, believe it or not. Now… now, not so much.”

With that, Pixie pushed the door open easily and stepped inside, footsteps crunching as he stepped on broken glass from the nearby shattered window. Jude followed him, carefully stepping around the worst of the glass and debris—old leaves and some paper trash that had blown in from outside, along with some questionable stains. The room was mostly empty, even if standard motel tables and chairs had obviously once been here. There was a bed frame, but it had been stripped of everything, mattress included. Even if nobody had thought this particular room was worth crashing in, it had been thoroughly cleaned out. ‘Clean’ being a very relative term, Jude thought, eyeballing the most questionable stain yet.

“What are we looking for?” Jude asked grimly, with the unspoken implication that the sooner they found it, the sooner they could leave this awful place.

“This really old metal lunchbox we found with KISS on it. You know, the really old band?” Pixie said, stepping further inside the room and kicking some debris out of the way.

“Yes, I know who KISS is,” Jude said, proud that he finally could say something like this with confidence and prove that, despite his name, he wasn’t actually the patron saint of lost causes. KISS was—largely due to Jude’s general dislike—one of the only band names he actually knew (besides the Beatles; as always, screw the Beatles), and he almost made some weak joke about Pixie, an ageless vampire making him feel old. “I don’t see anything like that in here.”

“Nah, you wouldn’t! We had a secret hiding place. Let’s see, if I’m remembering right—which I totally am, because there’s no way I could forget—there was like a little secret compartment in the closet wall, like maybe one of those motel-room safe things used to be there, but there never was one when we were here,” he said, heading over to the sliding doors and crouching down as he opened them. There were still hangers inside the closet, but the kind that were bolted to the bar. Pixie started to feel around inside, until he let out a triumphant “Aha! Yeah, here we go!”

As Jude watched, Pixie swiped away some dust, which looked more like an actual layer of grime, and pulled at a small hidden latch. He pulled and the inner closet wall came open, revealing a small, dark space into which Pixie reached with much more eagerness than Jude would have.

Pixie felt around inside and finally pulled something out: a metal lunchbox, color faded and starting to rust, but less dusty than Jude would have expected for being inside a wall for over two years.

“Look! Look, here it is!” Pixie practically squealed, sounding delighted, holding it up so Jude could see KISS themselves, faded and smeared with grime. Jude might as well have been looking at aliens, but they were aliens he felt an immediate fondness for, simply because they made Pixie smile like that.

He went to work at opening the lunchbox, whose lid seemed to stick a bit with age and maybe rust. Finally, the sticking point gave, and Pixie opened it eagerly. Jude knelt down to join him, peering into the lunchbox at—nothing. Only dust.

Pixie leaned back but didn’t stand up, staring at the empty lunchbox with a perplexed, uncomprehending look on his face, as if there were no world in which it would make sense.

“Everything’s gone,” he said, sounding confused.

Jude waited, unsure what to say. Slowly, the confusion dropped off Pixie’s face, replaced by—nothing, really. His face went blank. Which would have been strange enough for him and all his animated expressiveness, even without the oddly hollow look in his eyes. For the first time since Jude had known him, he looked almost… dead.

“I’m sorry,” Jude said at last. He knew saying that meant nothing, it didn’t help—but he didn’t know what would. Helplessness was the most frustrating and strangely lonely feeling. There was nothing he could do, Pixie was dealing with too many sources of pain Jude couldn’t reach or even understand, and all he felt for sure was that this raised a barrier between them, a distance he didn’t know how to cross. In these moments, it was like they were in the same room, but miles apart.

“It’s fine,” Pixie mumbled, though it clearly wasn’t. “I guess I should’ve known someone would find it. Nothing’s really safe out here.”

“What was inside?” Jude asked, peering into the small metal box as well, though it was unlikely Pixie would have missed something with his superior vampire night vision.

“It was kind of a time capsule type thing,” Pixie mumbled, looking like he wanted to sink down to the floor and curl into a sad ball, but apparently this particular floor was too dirty even for him. “Jeff swore this thing had to be all vintage-collectible valuable, but we liked it too much to sell.”

“It does look like it could be valuable,” Jude said. “That’s what’s odd to me here. Why would someone find it, take the stuff inside, but leave the box?”

“I dunno,” Pixie said with a shrug, staring at the empty closet and even emptier hiding spot, but not seeming to really see it. Jude’s heart sank a little more with every passing moment.

“What was inside?” he asked again. Maybe if he could keep Pixie talking, he could keep him from sinking into somewhere too deep for Jude to reach.

“Flyers from our old Chaos Chainsaw shows. I think Jeff put his old harmonica in here too. And his favorite shirt, this dorky tie-die looking thing that said ‘Always Summer’ or ‘Summer Forever’ or something on it. I was gonna use that thing. Seemed perfect for the spell. I really thought this was going to be the thing that would help put Wicked Gold in his place.”

He looked sadder than Jude could remember him seeing. Not scared, not anxious, just absolutely defeated and exhausted. Jude wondered how long he’d felt like this, with so much pain and weariness beneath his bright surface. Had Pixie ever not felt like this?

“Sometimes I think I’m never getting away from him.”

Jude paused, not entirely sure they were on the same page, but wanting to keep up with wherever Pixie needed to go. “You’re not talking about Wicked Gold, are you?”

“No,” Pixie said quietly, almost a whisper. “Jeff. It always comes back to him, he’s on my mind so much, and I’m sorry, I’m really sorry, that’s not fair to you, but it does, I can’t stop thinking about him.”

“There’s nothing wrong with that,” Jude said, and meant it, even as he felt a little cold inside. “I know how it feels to lose someone and not be able to get them out of your head, no matter what you do.”

Pixie almost smiled. “Figured you would.”

“Tell me what’s on your mind. If you want to.”

“I do want to, it’s just hard to think about, or get to make sense,” Pixie said, and the confused look was back, the bafflement he’d had upon opening the lunchbox to find it empty. “But I keep going back to the night he disappeared, and—I knew he was dead a long time ago. He had to be, he’d never just shove off without at least saying goodbye. But nobody ever found a body and for a while I told myself that meant he might be alive, but not anymore. Now I’m starting to think, what if he didn’t just die? What if he’s out there somewhere—with fangs? Which isn’t fun, sure, but he’d still be somewhere! And I can’t think that, starting to hope like that is so dangerous. He’s dead, I know he is. But there are a lot of ways to go, and... vampires, man. You saw what Cruce did to me, he was a fucking vicious monster.” His eyes dropped to his hands, gray skin, white scars, small claws painted black. “But I guess, now so am I.”

“No,” Jude said forcefully. “No you’re not. You might as well be from different planets. Cruce was a monster, but not you—and he’s gone. He can’t hurt anyone anymore, and we won’t let his boss hurt anyone else either. Especially not you. He is never touching you again.”

Pixie’s smile looked weak and not at all convinced, but it was there. “I really hope you’re right. Just… don’t give up on me, okay?”

“Never,” Jude said, more softly now. Had Pixie heard Felix say those words exactly? Did he know how Jude’s heart had ached to hear them then, as it did now? “I know exactly how you feel. When I—when we lost Felix, it was like our entire world collapsed.”

“Thanks, but… it’s not exactly the same,” Pixie said, smile dropping away and voice coming out dull. Dead. “You got your boy back. I didn’t get mine back. And you had some answers even if they weren’t the ones you wanted, you saw him die, I didn’t even get that much. Just a whole lot of not knowing, and wondering, and no way to move on. We’re not the same.”

Jude felt like he’d been punched in the stomach. Something about that knocked every bit of wind out of him, and he stared at Pixie, mouth working but unable to make any sound come out at all. And he wasn’t the only one in shock—Pixie’s eyes widened, a hand going to his mouth, and a look of horror spreading across his face.

“I’m sorry,” Pixie said in a shaken whisper. He stared at Jude as if he’d accidentally stabbed him, and would now do anything to take back the blade. “Jude, I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean…”

Pixie cut himself off by stepping forward and reaching up to touch Jude’s face, bringing him into a kiss Jude only had to lean down slightly to return, which he did without hesitation. Even here, in this desolate place full of memories he could feel like cold water, even if he couldn’t guess at them, Pixie’s kiss was a wonderful, welcome thing.

They hadn’t done this for a long time, Jude thought as he leaned in and shut his eyes. He’d tried so hard to forget their first kiss, and the possibility of any others. But Pixie wouldn’t let him, and by now Jude was sure it was on purpose—with his sweet face, his bright eyes and easy smile, his perfect, round belly, all of him made of soft curves, the only sharp thing about him his tiny little fangs. The way that, even now, he loved life in ways Jude could hardly imagine, so freely and with such unreserved joy. Pixie was so alive even without a heartbeat, more alive than Jude felt sometimes.

He’d chased these thoughts deliberately away, because every delight he took in Pixie’s entire existence made him feel guilty. What right did Jude have, when Pixie himself was so sad and obviously hurting? Jude could never do something that would make his burden remotely worse.

But yes, oh yes, he thought, while he still remembered words, and anything else besides Pixie existed. This was what was missing, what he’d been missing sorely.

“Jude,” Pixie said in a low, slightly throaty voice, pulling back just enough to let Jude catch his breath. Lucky vampires, he thought dizzily, they could kiss forever and not have to worry about little things like breathing. “Do you want me to touch you?”

“We are touching,” Jude said, puzzled, eyebrows coming together. Pixie’s hands were still cupping the sides of his face, slipping into his hair, and his own had slipped into place to mirror them automatically.

“No, Jude, no,” Pixie said with a little laugh that sounded more sad than amused. Something close to a sob, but without the wet crack to it. Heavy with fatigue, as if Pixie didn’t even have the energy to cry. “I’ve seen the way you’ve been looking at me lately. You want to get closer, but you’re holding yourself back. You don’t have to do that. I think… you’re the one who wants to touch me.”

Jude’s brain ground to a halt. His mouth fell open, then closed, then open again; he felt like a hooked fish yanked up onto dry land, breathless and just as helpless. “Touch…?”

Pixie didn’t answer in words. Instead, he took Jude’s hands in both of his, and guided them to his round hips, placing one there, sliding the other down to his thigh. Jude’s mouth fell open and his stomach jerked in surprise, and for just a moment, nothing existed except for the perfect, full heat that filled the palms of his hands and seemed to radiate through his entire body, a fluttering in his solar plexus.

He’d imagined this many times, what it would be like to touch Pixie like this, and other intimate places, feel his warm, fat, beautiful body move under Jude’s hands, hearing him sigh and whine in a good way—but that had always seemed so abstract. So distant, an idea rather than something that could be true. Even when they’d kissed, even knowing that they had something between the two of them, and even wanting there to be nothing—space, clothing—between the two of them at all, Jude had never actually expected it to happen. There was just too much going on and too much healing to be done before he could even consider touching much of anything besides Pixie’s fragile heart.

But here they were. Jude’s head swam, and the warmth inside him grew until he couldn’t feel the night’s chill at all, his hands tightened their grip without his instruction, gently squeezing Pixie’s wonderfully soft flesh and starting to move automatically, feeling, wanting to feel more, feel everything.

Then, feeling a thrill of both excitement and shock, Jude looked back up to Pixie’s face, just to see, just to make sure—and found Pixie not looking back at him. He was staring at the ground again, eyes dull with the same unsettling blankness he’d had after seeing the empty box. Suddenly Jude felt just as hollow inside.

“No, wait,” Jude said, yanking his hands back and taking an involuntary step away as reality crashed back onto him like a tidal wave that soaked him to the bone and doused any fire that had barely begun to spark. His heart pounded, and adrenaline surged through his veins with an almost-painful sting, but not for the reasons he’d anticipated when he’d imagined his hands on Pixie’s skin. Not like this. This was all wrong. “Stop. Stop, what are you—what are we doing?”

“I’m sorry,” Pixie stammered, pulling his own hands back like Jude was a hot stove, and he’d just now registered the burn.

Pixie’s eyes were wide, pupils narrowed to slits, and although vampires didn’t really sweat or turn pale or red the way humans did, his gray face looked waxy and drawn, somehow closer to death.

Along with everything else, that hit Jude hard. Pixie wasn’t alive, not like he was, but even death hadn’t been enough to free him from whatever terror coursed through him now.

“I thought—I was just trying to—I thought that’s what you wanted!” Pixie stammered.

Jude’s brain skipped again. Complete freeze, mind and body; static snow filling his head, he held perfectly still as if someone had hit ‘pause’ on the playback of his life. Still, he was sharply aware of everything around him, including the fact that he’d stopped breathing. He made himself breathe, then speak, finding both acts uncomfortably difficult.

“You thought I wanted that? Why would I—I mean, not that I don’t—it’s not—why?” His voice rose in both volume and pitch, and Jude tried frantically to get a grip on himself and his words. He was floundering as badly as Pixie, and if neither of them could form a coherent sentence, they’d never get anywhere. “But why now? Here?”

“I don’t know, I’m sorry, I don’t know,” Pixie said, words falling out in the jumbled rapid-fire of someone waking from a bad dream, or trying to, only to find the nightmare had become reality. “It’s just that you’ve done so much for me, and I haven’t done anything for you except be a total leech, and I keep talking about Jeff, and holy shit can I stop talking to you about my ex-boyfriend for two seconds? It’s not fair to you, it’s not fair to anyone the way I’ve been acting like a sad-sack drain on everyone, and I just thought I should try to pay you back somehow but even that was the wrong thing, and I can’t do anything right and I just—I don’t know what to—”

“Pixie,” Jude cut in, and Pixie didn’t exactly gasp, as vampires didn’t need to, but he did give a startled little jump, as if Jude had shouted. Jude opened his arms wide, the kind of gesture to show one was unarmed and coming in peace, and one that would hopefully remove all ambiguity of his intentions. “Can I touch you now?”

Despite his waterfall of words a second earlier, Pixie couldn’t seem to speak now. Instead he nodded, stepping into Jude’s arms which immediately wrapped around him.

“I’m sorry, I’m so sorry,” Pixie whimpered, trembling in Jude’s grasp and pressing close against his chest, but seeming grounded enough now to form words again. Each one hurt to hear, though, and Jude couldn’t decide which condition he hated more, Pixie speechless with panic or Pixie crying and spilling his guts and generally falling apart with only Jude to hold him together. “I just thought I should—I have to pay you back somehow for crashing into your life and ruining everything! Please don’t be mad!”

“I’m not mad at you,” Jude said, tone much more level than he felt. “And you didn’t ruin my life, but even if you had, that’s not the way to fix it! You don’t owe me anything, especially not that! Even if I wanted it, you wouldn’t,” he added as a quick, important afterthought. “Even if I were entirely allosexual, and had everything figured out and knew what I wanted for sure, you wouldn’t owe—”

“Oh God,” Pixie whispered, pulling back enough so that Jude could see an entirely new panic dawning on his face. “Oh God that’s right, you’re freaking ace, oh no, I just saw you and thought—looking, the way that men—when men look at me like that, it means they want—”

“Stop,” Jude shushed him, a hand on Pixie’s neck, which seemed to both ground and calm him at least a little. “Yes, I am, but you… weren’t wrong, either. I think ‘demisexual’ is the word? Demi-aro. You’re right, I don’t want any of that, from almost anyone in the world. But I do want to kiss you, and—and I don’t even know what else. Which makes all of this that much more confusing, I don’t know how to handle any of this, but I know it’s not the time. Not with everything that’s going on, and you in the headspace you’re in. Or me either. That’s why I’ve been holding back. Anything else would be a mistake.”

“Okay,” Pixie said, burying his face in Jude’s chest again and clutching at his shirt. It was going to wrinkle, Jude noted dimly, but that certainty was matched only by the extent to which he didn’t care, not now. “I’m… I’m so…”

He trailed off, but there was no doubt about what he’d been trying to say. Jude was sorry too. Pixie’s shoulders heaved with every sob, and Jude could do nothing more than hold him as he cried, chin resting on the top of Pixie’s pink head. He didn’t know what else there was to do. Pixie clung to him like a drowning man with the last life preserver, but Jude was struggling himself. Helpless—that most-hated of feelings—and fighting panic of his own, Jude forced himself to keep breathing steadily, take it moment by moment, and just get through until they were both back on solid ground.

“I shouldn’t have come back here,” Pixie whispered, after the worst of his breakdown had subsided, at least outwardly. “I’m so sorry. I know I keep saying that but I am.”

“It’s all right,” Jude said, instead of what he wanted to. Telling Pixie to stop apologizing would be like telling himself to stop overanalyzing and obsessing over details and uncertainty. It would do nothing but make both of them feel bad when he failed. “I’m glad you told me.”

“Thanks,” Pixie mumbled, pulling back from Jude and wiping a forearm across his face. He’d left several damp spots on Jude’s shirt, but Jude was far past worrying about that by now. “Can we go home now?”

“Yes,” Jude said with a rush of relief. This, at least, he could do. “Let’s go. Do you want to—?”

Before he’d finished the question, Pixie was gone, replaced by a fuzzy pink bat clinging to his hand. Jude carefully gathered the little creature up and stroked its head with one finger—somehow even its tiny bat face looked sad.

Jude tucked him into his regular inside jacket pocket, stepped around the broken glass, and headed out the door. Even if the memories weren’t his own, he could feel the weight of what Pixie had left behind, hopefully lessened by the fact that this time, they were leaving together.

 

 

Sanguine looked terribly out of place, standing in the center of the opulent living room and trying not to drip blood onto the carpet.

Wicked Gold enjoyed the finer things in life and death, and Sanguine was hardly ever allowed into rooms with anything nice in them, except on special occasions, which he never tended to enjoy. Now he stood awkwardly, bruised and filthy, and clearly trying to take up as little space as possible. Both to avoid sullying the baroque-looking, creamy white sofa and rosewood coffee table that probably cost more than he’d ever seen in his life, and out of deeply-ingrained habit. It never paid to provide the vampire with a reason to strike. As if he ever needed one.

The vampire himself wasn’t at home. He liked to go out after he’d had his fill with Sanguine – to do what, he didn’t know or want to know. It could be nothing good.

The air was now free of screams or the tang of blood. But before Sanguine stood Owen, surveying the young man’s bloodied face and torn clothes. He was impeccably dressed in a suit that looked exactly the same as the one he’d worn at the circle the previous night. He must either own multiple identical suits, or have them fastidiously cleaned on a daily basis. This, at least, he and his vampiric rival had in common.

“Yes, I can fix this,” Owen said, sounding detached but certain. “If your master comes home to you still a mess, he may raise a fuss, and he’s hard enough to work with as it is.”

Sanguine said nothing, but his shoulders dropped a little as obvious relief overtook him. Owen reached out to move some matted hair away from his raw, not-quite-scabbed neck, and Sanguine flinched

“Why do you make him treat you like this?” Owen asked, then swatted Sanguine’s shoulder to make him hold still. Not enough to hurt an uninjured person, but from the wince it elicited, it was obvious Sanguine wasn’t one. Sighing, he placed his fingertips between the spots of dried blood on Sanguine’s forehead, murmured a few arcane words under his breath, and began a simple regeneration spell. “Hold still. Your lord will quickly lose patience with a broken doll.”

“I don’t make him do shit,” Sanguine muttered, but did as he was told. “If I could control anything, do you think I’d make him beat me to a pulp whenever he feels like it?”

“No, I suppose you’d just free yourself again,” Owen said, tone disapproving, but healing magic steady. “You and that other little traitor never seemed to have a problem abandoning your sacred duty. Why not now?”

“You could have come with us, you know.” Sanguine fixed him with an unblinking gaze. “The invitation was open. Still is, even after all the shit you’ve pulled—and you can thank Milo for that, not me. If it was up to me, we’d be done with you forever. But you don’t really need us traitors, do you? You’re a witch, so just witch yourself out.”

“I serve the Lady. But even if I didn’t, my only magical gift is to heal mortals,” Owen said bitterly, and removed his hand from Sanguine’s head. “Which is not generally… harmonious with my desires, or where I could be of best use. Speaking of, how does that feel?”

“Better,” Sanguine said, sitting up straighter and tilting his head experimentally. “Thanks. But screw thinking about ‘best use.’ They only have one use for us in mind, and they’ll use you until you beg for death.”

Owen didn’t answer. His face revealed nothing, but that didn’t stop Sanguine from zeroing in.

“It bothers you, doesn’t it?” Sanguine continued, taking one step closer to Owen’s limit. He’d reach it soon, he knew, but until then he had some words. “You can’t throw fireballs or turn people to stone, only healing, and healing bloodbags like me at that. Having to rely on your big bad Queen for protection, and even having to work for Wicked Gold.”

“I do not work for—”

“Whatever. Must just eat you up inside, watching that miserable bastard, itching to set the world on fire so her Majesty will give you a second look. Must really stick in your craw that she’ll never love you the way she loved Mil—”

“Shut up,” Owen said, but not in the fiery tone Sanguine had come to expect from him. He sounded more tired than anything.

“No thanks,” Sanguine scoffed, pleased to feel that it didn’t hurt to do so. “I don’t answer to you—I answer to the guy who hates you way more than I ever could. So you can go ahead and take your little superiority complex, tie it up with a pretty, pretty bow, and blow it out your ass.”

Owen withdrew his hands and his magic, leaving Sanguine healed but colder than he had been before he’d begun. He’d never particularly wanted Owen’s hands on him, but it had been so long since he’d felt another human’s touch, one that didn’t inflict pain. Losing that small point of contact was still enough to leave him feeling bereft and empty.

“Oh, yes, you really pulled one over on me,” Owen said with a roll of his eyes, but nothing more pointed. “You’re living it up. I’m so envious.”

Sanguine started to say something, then stopped, eyeing Owen with a sharp, keen gaze that hadn’t dulled at all even after years of torture and abuse. He hit on the realization and turned it over in his mind carefully, like flexing a newly-healed limb. “You really are, aren’t you?”

“I’m what?” Owen asked, though it was clear he didn’t actually care about the answer. He glanced pointedly at his watch. “Your master will soon return. I trust you’re sufficiently healed, and done ruminating?”

“Actually, my arm could use some attention too,” Sanguine said, reaching out with a wince. “And…” he traced a finger down the scar running down the left side of his face, the one that had barely missed his eye. The one that never failed to bring a look of distaste to Wicked Gold’s face, and that Sanguine could never quite hide with his stringy, matted hair. “Anything you can do about this? He hates it.”

“Mm.” Owen placed a hand on his once-dislocated arm. The pressure only carried a small flare of pain, and slowly Sanguine’s clenched muscles began to relax. “Afraid I’m not the best at erasing old scars. And I thought your liege delighted in leaving his mark on you. Why’s that one any different?”

“Because he didn’t give it to me. But back to what I was saying.” A smile started to spread across Sanguine’s thin face. “You’re totally jealous of me, the lowly bloodbag. Because at least I have his attention.”

“I believe it’s obvious that I have that in spades,” Owen countered. “I bother him, as well I should. He knows I’m watching and reporting his activities regularly to my Lady, and he can’t stand being overseen. The more he pretends to the contrary, the more I know he’s worth my Lady’s suspicion.”

“That’s not the kind of attention you want, though.” Sanguine’s smile grew into something bordering on scandalous. “You’re in so deep, you want every vampire’s approval, even his. You want him to look at you with something other than a pissed-off fuck-off. Basically, you wish you were me.”

“I do not.” Owen tightened his grip on Sanguine’s arm a fraction, maybe simply to keep him still, maybe some kind of dominance instinct.

“Sure—just be careful what you wish for,” Sanguine said, eyeing Owen with a shrewd expression. “Even thralls have it easier than me. Most of the poor fucks are so checked out they don’t even know what’s going on. Like good little drones serving the Queen.”

“Thralls are not drones, and neither are we,” Owen declared, passion rising in his voice at last, as Sanguine knew it would. There it was; something more than his lazy disgust. This came from poisonous love, twice as strong and even more dangerous. “We are believers. Servants of angels. Descendants of greatness, and disciples of even more magnificence. The greatest honor a human can receive!”

Now he squeezed too hard, and Sanguine hissed in pain, pulling his arm away. He didn’t know if it was an accident or a message, and now he didn’t particularly care. “It’s not an honor if you don’t ask for it!”

“We are meant to serve them, and by doing so, rule all else.” The Queen’s chosen consort spoke it like law, like stating a universal truth like gravity or death.

“We aren’t meant to do anything,” Sanguine snapped back. “And they aren’t meant to rule. Nobody’s meant to suffer like this, and nobody’s meant to inflict that kind of pain.”

“We are better than other mortals in every way,” Owen spat, gray eyes flashing in fury almost as brightly as the vampires he worshipped. “Even you are better, despite your best efforts. You are one of the chosen. You are blessed. You’ll never be just another piece of human garbage, no matter how you act like one.”

“Oh, get off your high horse and enjoy the dumpster.” Sanguine let out a throat-scratching laugh. It felt like he’d forgotten how. “I’m a piece of mortal human garbage, and so are you. Despite your best efforts.”

“Not for long,” Owen said. “Not if everything keeps going the way it has been. I’m so close to being rewarded for my loyalty I can taste it.”

Sanguine suppressed a shudder. “Bet that’s not all you wanna taste.”

“Don’t worry,” Owen snorted. “Once I have my fangs, and once your treacherous master is brought to heel, I’ll be gone from your miserable life forever. I’ll seek out feasts and pleasures far finer than anything you could offer. I’ll never lower myself to your company again.”

Sanguine looked almost sad. He rotated his shoulder, and found that he could, fully and without pain. “Huh. And where’ll that leave me?”

“Not free, of course, but the next best thing. The mercy of a quick death instead of a slow one.”

Sanguine pondered that, then sighed. “I guess that is about as good as it gets.”

Owen didn’t answer, and this time Sanguine did not break the quiet. Unfortunately, the calm wasn’t to last.

“Sanguine, I’m home!” called a jocular voice. Wicked Gold didn’t always announce his presence before simply appearing from thin air, but when he did, it was usually loud and sitcom-flashy.

Sanguine held perfectly still and waited, head bowed. Owen took his hands away and took one smooth step backwards as the vampire strode into his personal kingdom, pointed smile flashing as brightly as his mirror-shine gold shoes.

“Well, someone’s looking better than the last time I saw him,” Wicked Gold said, casting a sharp gaze over Sanguine’s newly healed skin, then over to Owen. “You’ve got some s’plaining to do. Have you two made friends after all?”

“I wouldn’t go that far,” Owen deadpanned, then took a step backwards to lean against the wall, pointedly excusing himself from further interaction.

“So,” Wicked Gold said in a conversational tone, turning his undivided attention to Sanguine. “I didn’t give you much time to use your mouth for talking before—you followed the Witch like I asked you to?” It sounded like a question but wasn’t; obviously there was only one answer.

“Yes, Lord,” Sanguine said, visibly shaking, even if his voice didn’t. But even with his injuries healed, the circles under his eyes were still much too dark and deep, he was just as dangerously thin, and he kept glancing over his shoulder with the same well-founded paranoia.

Wicked Gold circled him, as he had Cruce in his last moments. “And?”

“And she went to the rocks. Like you thought. I tried to see what she was doing, but she disappeared—so I stayed there,” he continued, looking away and speaking more quickly as Wicked Gold’s expression hardened. “And then a couple of her friends showed up. They got some dirt. Like some actual dirt, they dug it up from the ground in the circle, I don’t know why. I tried to stop them, but I—but they got away. I’m sorry!”

“That is irritating. But not a disaster. In fact, that might work out quite nicely, actually.” Wicked Gold looked oddly pleased. He had many smiles, but the one that came from genuine satisfaction and pleasure was one of his worst. “What else?”

“Nothing,” Sanguine said quickly, and continued speaking technical truths. “They left. Then I left.”

“Nothing else happened? No more arguments, no interlopers, no complications?”

“No, Lord,” Sanguine said. “Nothing more.”

Wicked Gold looked at him expectantly, but he didn’t continue. Sanguine wasn’t allowed many methods of resistance. Silence was one of the only shreds of power he had left, and sometimes it was enough.

Then, abruptly, the vampire turned away and faced Owen instead, while Sanguine quickly scuttled over to one corner and sat down on the polished hardwood floor, knees pulled up to his chest. “I do apologize for playing such a poor host. I hope you haven’t been bored.”

“I was told to work with you and keep my Lady up to speed,” Owen said, impassive as ever. “My entertainment isn’t a concern.”

“Oh, of course. Transparency and everything. I hope I’ve been as accommodating as you require. So far, I’ve adhered loyally to the agreement between your lovely Lady and myself—I crack the puzzle of the stone circle and collect the first wave of the energy they contain, and she gets all residuals after that. My ‘lump sum’ versus her ‘royalties,’ so to speak.”

“Yes, we’ve established this,” Owen said. “What is your point?”

“Point is, the moment of collection is much closer than it was last time,” Wicked Gold said, voice hardening and dropping out of his charismatic default lilt. “And it’s shaping up to be quite a lump sum indeed. You see, I’ve found a witch—the very Witch I was looking for, actually—and she’s quite a doozy. Or, I should say, he found her.” He waved a hand at Sanguine, who curled up around himself a little tighter. “Credit where credit’s due.”

“Good,” Owen said with a noncommittal shrug. “She’ll be glad to hear the plan is on schedule, finally.”

“You don’t sound very excited,” Wicked Gold observed.

“The only reason I care about any of this is because she does.” He spoke in a near-monotone, as if it were something he’d memorized. “It’s her project. I don’t care about anything you do, for any reason, so don’t feel obligated to keep me posted.”

“You’re a rude thing, but you’re loyal to a fault. You had the opportunity to escape, and you turned me down.”

“I would never abandon my Lady.”

“Impertinent and loyal, a winning combination,” Wicked Gold chuckled. “I like that—but only in my own people. And only then to a point. It can easily get tiring.”

Owen gave him a slow, unimpressed blink. Wicked Gold’s own eyes widened at the impertinence, then narrowed in fury, and finally, he smiled, all casualness and light.

“And besides that, you’re jealous,” the vampire continued pleasantly. “You’re jealous of the Witch for her power, for living her own life when you’re tethered hereby your own envy and avarice. You’re jealous of your Queen for her glory. And you’re jealous of me. You always have been, and you always will be. Hell, you’re even jealous of him—”

He pointed to Sanguine, who had yet to move. But the battered human had raised his head from his knees to watch, and now gave Owen a deadpan, very deliberate look, and tiny shrugging nod.

“I am not—” Owen started, frustration finally cutting through his daze, but Wicked Gold didn’t seem to notice, or care if he did.

“—For having my attention. And you hate me! You really, really hate me. And even still, you’d rather feed my appetites than see a servant pick up the scraps. A crown prince, lusting after the place of an undeserving blood-bag. Isn’t that pathetic? See, Sanguine, no matter who you are, there’s always someone who has it worse. For someone who’s supposed to worship and respect my kind, Owen, you’ve got an awfully funny way of showing it. And a dangerous one.”

“I don’t serve ‘your kind,’” Owen sneered, even as he straightened and his heart began to pound faster and harder, surely audible to Wicked Gold’s heightened senses. It was almost as if, despite his contempt for this vampire in particular, he was programmed to snap to attention whenever any of them fixed him with a displeased eye. “I serve my Lady, Ombra Dolce, she who possesses a higher grace and glory than you could ever hope to touch. She is a Queen. You are a conniving parasite. You might as well be a different species.”

“You really do have some nerve, speaking to me like this,” Wicked Gold observed with apparent surprise and something bordering on respect. “What if I sliced your throat open right here? Or drained you dry, or—oh, did any of the fun things I could think up if you give me half a second?”

Owen gave him another calm, slow, poker-faced blink. “Try it. See what happens when the Lady sees you’ve killed her favorite. It’ll take you a much, much longer time to die than I.”

Wicked Gold stared back at him, gleaming eyes hooded and dangerous. Then he broke into a bright grin, then a boisterous laugh, spreading his hands wide in a conciliatory gesture. “Well, all right then! What can I say? She’s always had an ace in the hole, and I guess in this case, that’s you. I should’ve known better, really.”

Owen’s voice was a combination of long-suffering patience and barely-concealed bile. “I’ll be sure to send her your regards.” Without waiting for a reply, he turned on his heel and left.

Wicked Gold waited until the door was closed and Owen’s footsteps retreated. Then he sank down onto the luxurious sofa and stretched his legs out, not bothering to remove his gold-tipped shoes before resting them on the glossy-finished table. Sanguine kept an eye out for scratches, ready to ask permission to buff them away should any appear.

“Ugh, that boy is such a headache,” he sighed. “Him and his Lady. Sometimes I think they’re doing nothing but purposely trying to get under my skin. Sanguine?” he called.

“Yes, Lord?” The human started, scrambling to his feet and hurrying over, only to kneel again at Wicked Gold’s feet, knees hitting the hard floor.

“No, no, get up here,” the vampire said with a wave of his hand. “I need a drink.”

“Yes, Lord.” Tone no longer questioning, but appropriately deferent, Sanguine rose to his feet again and sat gingerly on the very edge of the sofa. He was painfully aware of his own grunginess in contrast to the pristine surroundings. Wicked Gold usually had him shower before feeding; he must really be in need. But sometimes, Sanguine thought, drinking from him while he was this dirty might be a kind of personal rebellion for the otherwise uncompromisingly-tidy vampire. A sinful indulgence, a naughtiness that made every drop that much sweeter.

Wicked Gold rolled up his sleeves and removed his suit jacket, partially unbuttoning his fine linen shirt and pushing the collar away from what may become a potential splash zone. He didn’t enjoy blood-stained clothing, vampire or not.

Sanguine dutifully pulled his long, matted hair aside, exposing the scarred and bruised skin of his neck and shoulder.

“You really should cut this mess,” Wicked Gold muttered, catching a stray tangle of dirty red and tucking it behind the human’s ear.

“Yes, Lord,” Sanguine said again, but with no promise behind it. It was a ritual by now, a kind of game—if he actually cut his hair, Wicked Gold would be displeased, disappointed, dangerous. Unless he himself did it personally, he just didn’t like change.

Wicked Gold leaned in closer, mouth opening in a smile, fangs out. He turned his head to trace Sanguine’s neck just a few inches away, and took in a long breath through flaring nostrils, slow and deep. Vampires didn’t need to breathe, no, but that didn’t mean they didn’t enjoy their sharpened sense of smell, as useful for pleasure as detecting prey. Sanguine held perfectly still, and let himself slip away from this room, this moment, somewhere else, somewhere sunny. The vampire would still be here when he came back.

But it wasn’t fangs that sank into his neck. A clawed hand closed around it, shoving Sanguine away but not letting go, instead tightening, cutting off his surprised yelp.

“You little liar,” Wicked Gold snapped. “Really? Really, Sanguine?”

“Lord?” Sanguine gasped, eyes wide and terrified, every muscle locked and tense.

“You said you never got close enough to the Witch to touch,” the vampire snarled with a gold-tinted flare of his eyes, all good nature in his face and voice gone, as if it had never been.

“I didn’t!” Sanguine cried.

“Then why do I smell her on you?!”

“I don’t know! I haven’t seen her since this morning, and she didn’t even touch me!”

The vampire reached out to place a single claw tip on his bony chest, the motion and pinprick pain recalling when he’d sliced through Sanguine’s hoodie. The plain shirt he wore now was even thinner, even more easily shredded.

“And who did you say was at the circle doing the Witch’s bidding?”

“The mall cop,” Sanguine jittered out. “I think his name’s Jude. And the lady who runs the place, Eva. She… caught me. Just for a second. I got away.”

“So it’s a human who smells of witch,” Wicked Gold mused. “Is she a witch herself? No, surely not. Letizia should know better than to get close to any others, not after what I did to her last witch friend. But she’s never been the most cautious of girls, and witches leave trace magic on everything they love…”

Wicked Gold gave Sanguine a flippant wave as he turned away and rose to his feet, rolling his sleeves back down and re-donning his suit jacket.

“Get yourself cleaned up. You’ve been filthy long enough—long enough to learn your lesson, I’m sure. I’m still very disappointed in you for your behavior at the circle. An unwilling sacrifice? I’m hurt. I expected more loyalty from my favorite.”

“Yes, Lord.” His eyes were downcast and tone flat as he began to obediently remove his grime-encrusted shirt. He showed no self-consciousness or hesitation to bare his skin before the vampire; that was one of the first things Wicked Gold tended to remove from any humans in his employ.

“But to get my hands on the Witch? I might actually need bait to get the bait I need,” Wicked Gold mused as Sanguine neatly folded his ruined shirt and decided against laying it on the expensive table. “Sanguine, hold on a moment.”

“Lord?”

Wicked Gold was looking at him with an awful smile on his face. Not satisfaction, but anticipation. He put both hands on Sanguine’s shoulders, and from the outside it looked like an affectionate gesture—except for how hard he was pressing down.

“I changed my mind. Kneel.”

He did, closing his eyes in anticipation. But instead of baring his fangs, the vampire took Sanguine’s head in one hand—and in one swift movement, slammed it into the nearest wall.