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Thief-of-kits Die

Ignoring the , I raced up the stairs and into the apartment I disabled a man with a knife, a chef by the smell of his clothes, bonked him on the head with the pommel of my vamp-killer, and left him unconscious at the entry

The apartment was opulent in red and white, lots of white marble, white-painted wood, lots of red fabric The color of blood seeure I breathed the place in, scenting It reeked of human blood donors, multiple vamps, pain, and sex I raced from room to room, soing froanized on shelves There was a drain here too There was no indication in the apartment&039;s scents that the kits or Bliss had ever been here I abandoned it for the third floor

This was a private place, one huge roos

The place reeked of the Daled I knehat they wanted now, I knehat they were trying to do, and the knowledge h surely that was only ht with a table to seat twelve; a larger living space was ahead, with lots of leather Two sleeping areas were just beyond, each with king-sized bedson dead things By the smell, this was a e apart a small but ornate bathrooain the decor involved a lot ofup the roof - but the color scheme was black and red, with black marble and deep scarlet fabrics I stopped and turned, scenting with

No humans, Beast murmuredNo human blood They do not feed here

"Or they don&039;t feed on huhtened, hard and sharp

I walked to the beds and lifted a pillow to me Bliss&039;s scent wafted out Bliss and sex

The Da off witches Fury-fear spiraled up in elina? I cliue and nose with ascaggh ing sound Relief shuddered through ed here But what I did s below had been in the beds of the Da Bettina, Rousseau Clan master I lifted a pillow and breathed in her scent, the stink of her sweat It was laced with fear She had not been here willingly

She had wanted to escape theone to visit when she asked

"Princess?"

I twisted on one knee and saw Derek at the door

"We&039;re ready to take the heads of the rogues on the cots"

"Belay that Until we find the kids, these particular rogue vaet a pass If we kill theelina and Little Evan alive"

He nodded his head, but it was resigned "Fine We can use theo

"One ained

"Baldy just disabled one of my men and took off Sixty seconds andany pretense of human speed, I raced from the bed and sla and banging as I passed They faced the s, all of them dark wood, carved with curlicues and flowers and leaves, dragons and gargoyles, faces out of legend and nightmare Vamp scent roiled out of each until the next to last And from it witch scent rose, fresh and potent and powerful

I paused, hands clenching on my weapons "They were here The children" There was a mattress on the floor of the ar chains

And a doll A black-haired doll with yellow eyes, like ie

Icy fear sliced through un and picked up the doll The scent of Angie&039;s fear and the salt of her tears were ripe in the doll&039;s clothes But there was no scent of blood I thanked God for small favors as I closed the door and secured the doll inside o

How did they get by us?"

I looked at the last two arhtly I yanked one out and saitch circle and pentagram And vampires And children And lots of blood "Derek? Get a couple of s - "as many as you can" He started to refuse but I passed hi His mouth twisted down, hard, and he spoke into his headset

The last armoire wasn&039;t an armoire When I pulled the door, a black space yawed open, a narrow stair leading down into darker night The smell of sex, witch, and vamp led down I re I hadn&039;t seen a door but one could be hidden there easily enough "Derek?" When he looked at un out, braced across his body, I said, "They went this way It leads down Look for a passageway through the garage or a door to the outside I&039; the stairs"

Derek cursed with atwo et them into the van I started down the stairs

Beast, already close to the surface, shoved her way into ertips as if claws pushed through Pelt roiled just underto be free My eyes adjusted to the lack of light I can see well in murky dark, but my vision is no match for vamp eyes, which can see in total dark I found the stairs by feel, the treads deeper than normal with maybe a twelve-inch drop per riser My steps were slow and careful,in air

According to the scent o, but no echo of sound remained except for my feet on the treads They were hollow like wood, not quite seway smelled old beneath the reek of vao, rice, and cotton And lots of huo

Maybe it was an original passageway frohteen hundreds, or earlier, and had been remodeled into the back of the arht and sharp, though I&039; iination, mixed with the fear in the s chains and little else, the scents of melanin froradation A slave ship captain had used this passageway to test out his cargo before he sold them I kneith certainty and an impotent fury burned in me, the fury of a people who had served in slavery, much like the i hopeless captivity The fury of Beast, feral and untah my skin I nearly ht up short on the next three that had lower risers, as if the stair risers had been sized to create discoe, , reaching out, testing the air The echoes dulled, shortened, and I kneas at the bottoht I reached out and found a leverlike handle Pushed down on it A door opened Three ed the door

I scented Derek and raised my hands "Just me," I said, my voiced clotted with fury and failure "Just me"

"We never saw this door in the shadows If they caone,"

Derek said

Over his head, the ht of the three-day-full moon The three days most usually associated with the dark arts, with the e of weres, with Beast&039;s sex drive If the Damours intended to sacrifice the kits and Bliss, they&039;d do it during the fullthe fading scents of vaone I had no idea where their captors had gone to find safety Once again I was back to square one I took a breath that hurtmy eyes I was nearly out of tielina Everhart, the eldest of the witch sisters, and Big Evan, Molly&039;s still-in-the-closet sorcerer husband And s Molly

She raced toazewith contained fury, pro retribution for the loss of his children I hadn&039;t been very good to Evan; I had placed his wife in danger otten him killed once, and now allowed his children to be stolen The fact that I hadn&039;t been present when they were taken had little relevance in his mind Or in mine either, if I was honest

"You don&039;t have to worry about how to kill et your children back, I&039;ll be dead trying"

"Better be," he ruelina, who didn&039;t knoas a skinwalker, looked back and forth between us in confused consternation, then took solace in food and tea, as was her wont She dished up a hearty stew from a pot on the stove, scooped a round of brown rice in the center, placed small salad bowls at each plate, and dumped buttery biscuits from a steel tray into a basket Comfort foods "Sit Eat," she commanded I peeled Molly out of my arms and passed her to Evan, who looked as if he was ready to rip her away froun harness and laid it across the kitchen cabinet, but other than that, I remained fully armed

I sat, picked up my dinner spoon by feel, and dipped it into the stew and rice

"Tell me," Evan said I put down my spoon and blinked at my tears

"No She eats first," Mol said sharply "Look at her She&039;s about to drop"

I lifted my spoon and shoveled in the stew Intellectually, I kneas good, but it could have been ashes for all I cared I atethe salad, I took four biscuits and placed them on the bread plate, dumped honey and butter on them, and applied the spoon to thehtas tears rolled downat all They atching hed and pushed away the e at any of the in hand, and started talking I told the tale All of it except the parts about Beast; I took credit for her contributions and for once she didn&039;t seeelina told about the witch coven she had visited They had clai about the attack on my house, but there were inconsistencies in the story they told, and Evangelina could tell they were keeping things back Also, only three members met with her, when there were supposed to be five adult elina would ever use such a ter, a knock sounded and Rick opened the side door I&039;d heard his Kow-bike and kneas coelina dished hi into the food; halted with ood" He looked at Evangelina "You cook this?" When she nodded, he looked at me and said, "No offense, but our date&039;s off I have to marry her" My tears had dried and I twitched a strained shten an impossibly dark situation, and I appreciated that Not that it would work He went back to the stew, dipping a biscuit into it and sopping up the juice He also changed the subject

"I got news fro the witch and vampire files" Too involved with the meal, Rick didn&039;t notice the intense interest of the three witches at the table I was pretty sure he knew Molly was a witch, but not the others

"That witch vamp Renee and her husband were once - when they all were human - the owners of the clan&039;s blood-rinned at my reaction "Bettina was sold by Tristan Damours in 1770 to a vamp madame named Bethany who shipped her to New Orleans and put her to work as a sex slave in the Quarter Bettina had a gift for satisfying customers and she and Bethany ran a successful business"

Bethany had owned slaves? I shookabout the rift between Bethany and Sabina during the Civil War If it hadn&039;t been about slaves

"Later she got sick - I talked to a nurse I know and he thinks it sounds like the clap

Bettina was turned at Bethany&039;s request to save her life" Rick pulled papers froes, opening them to expose a photo of Bettina, decked out in the clothes of a soiled dove, a corset, pantaloons, and a shawl

"Bethany didn&039;t turn her?" Evangelina asked

"No She&039;s out-clan, and no out-clan can turn a hu the chained years, so they can&039;t turn anyone No protection And at the time, the info of the Rousseau curse of insanity was still a secret When he was asked, the Rousseau reed to turn her and adopt her into his clan"

He turned a page and pointed to a line written in a flowery cursive script "Bettina was set free by accident, here in New Orleans - no one says what kind of accident - when she was still rogue She went hunting for the Damours to kill them She failed When Bettina became blood-master of her clan, she had power over Renee and tried to kill the long-chained Damours Renee stopped her No record of how"

He stuffed half a flaky biscuit into his h it "Bettina is our way in We need to talk to her If we can find her"

I felt a vibration and opened my cell It was Derek Lee "Yeah?"

"I&039;ive et?"

"All of theot out of there? Cops?" I didn&039;t look at Rick, but he was looking at aze as he ate