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Chapter Forty-seven

"TAKE OFF HIS mask," I said, but the voice held an echo of a different voice

"If you see my face I will be forced to kill you all," he said

I laughed, and the laughterwith cool, da to die tonight, Pantalone Your mask can come off now, or after your corpse lies stretched at uess it really doesn&039;tin the scent of rain and jasmine

He struck at reat dark beast that rose froape Micah and Nathaniel pulled h it looked like a shadow, it hitfrom everywhere, but Marmee was already there The shadoolf spilled intointo the snow With the touch of his power came a , so that he thought he heard voices on the wind He&039;d found a cave, buried in the snow Shelter, he thought Then he&039;d heard the growl, low and too close So else had taken shelter froht of his fire A wolittered in the firelight He had sht I felt his body run hot and spill bone and muscle and flesh from human to wolf But a wolf like none that still walked today She had turned into a huge striped cat, the color of a lion, but striped like a tiger, bigger than both She&039;d nearly killed him, but when pain and injury had turned him back to human, she&039;d fed on him She fed on him for three days until the storether, to hunt

I came back to the here and now and found that Wicked and Truth had pierced his heart and neck with their swords He cursed them, and writhed, but he wasn&039;t dead I knew, I just knew that swords would not kill him He was old blood Blood when vampire and shapeshifter could be one, back before the blood weakened We could take his head and heart and burn the pieces separately, but didn&039;t I want answers? Yes, I did

I sat back up with Micah and Nathaniel&039;s help "Your actions could get the entire Harlequin disbanded; don&039;t you care?"

"Kill me, if you can, but I will not answer questions froht otherwise "Fredo," I called

The slender knife-wielding h knives to pin him to the floor?"

"We can pin hi on the knives, they won&039;t hold him"

"Then pin him with your bodies, I don&039;t care how I need to touch him"

"Why?"

"Does it ht, yes," he said

I looked up into his dark eyes I saw pain there I answered that pain "The darkness canto kill hietting volunteers to hold the vampire down There were a lot of volunteers

Jean-Claude ca him into place "I feel her all around you, ma petite"

"Yeah," I said, but I wasn&039;t looking at hi vampire

"Look at me" He touched my chin and turned ht him, but I didn&039;t seeht in your eyes that I do not know"

I half-saw, out of the corner of ure foruely like she had in ure But this was no dreaain frouard over Coluround, but no one was happy

Pantalone hiuards to wrestle hiure spoke, and the smell of jasmine and rain was in her voice, or on the wind, or the as her voice I wasn&039;t sure which "Did you think my laere superstitions, Jean-Claude? You were supposed to kill her when you knehat she was Now it is too late"

"Too late for what?" he said, and he wrapped his arainst his body, and we both looked up as htmare damn near materialized in front of us

"She&039;s a necromancer, Jean-Claude, she controls the dead, all the dead Don&039;t you understand yet? Some of the Harlequin think I woke because I want to steal her body, ride her as the Traveller rides other vaift once, to travel from body to body, but that is not why I woke"

"Why did you wake?" he whispered

"She attracts the dead, Jean-Claude, all the dead She called me from ht after a thousand years of night Her warmth and life called to my death Even I cannot resist her Do you understand now?"

"You are so not under ave a low, dry chuckle "Legend says that necroend does not say is that the dead give necros, because they draw us like moths to the flame, except with vampires and necromancers it is a question who is flame and who is moth Beware, Jean-Claude, that she does not burn you up Beware, necrorave"

"Your law," Pantalone yelled, "your law says she ure turned toward the struggling pile of people "Do not dare speak to ave you a piece of myself, that is whatto vampires that dwell closer tovampires for council members You are neutral You take no sides That is what makes the Harlequin!" Her voice rose as she spoke until the wind held not just rain but the proave you What you used to make these pale imitations of my Columbine and her Giovanni These are not my Harlequin"

"Columbine died I had to uide me"

"Then the mask should have been retired, and the naan to walk toward theed hite pearls

Jean-Claude called, "Do not look upon her face For fear of sanity and life do not meet her eyes, any of you"

"I am not the Traveller, to need to steal bodies to walk I did need flesh once, but I am the darkness made flesh, Pantalone I a the necroain It is too late for that"

It was Jake who knelt besideyour energy to manifest, Anita You have to shut her down before she&039;s solid here You do not want her in America in flesh and bone"

I looked at him, and I knew "You&039;re one of them"

Jake nodded

"You saved ma petite, when you could have let her die in the bathroom at the Circus," Jean-Claude said

"The Mother was always going to wake again, nothing would prevent that So her Proveher"

"I don&039;t know"

"She&039;s feeding on your anger, your rage"

"I don&039;t kno to stop that"

"If she feeds on Pantalone, one of the oldest of us, she h power to be perure was standing at his feet The guards were looking atI could think of: "Get away frouards hesitated, but ure and moved a discreet distance

"Anita," Jake said, "help us"

I turned to Jean-Claude and said, "Help er"

The black figure was spreading into what looked like a piece of the night sky, like so cloak of stars and darkness Pantalone shrieked, as if whatever he saw in that piece of darkness was so terrible to behold

"Hurry," I said

Jean-Claude raised the ardeur, in a breath, in the feel of his mouth on mine He raised the ardeur and stripped away my sorrow in a rush of skin and hands I hadn&039;t fed the ardeur in over twelve hours I was suddenly starving

Marh me, and a sharp pain laced one in a rush of fear and pain I turned, and Jean-Claude caught ainst his velvet jacket "She is fading, ma petite"

Her voice came in a rush of rain and wind "I knoho your et it"

When I could no longer sainst my skin like some invisible presence, I asked Jake, "How do I keep her fro in to see me?"

"There&039;s a charave him a look

"People used to think she was a deht she was, one huo, and it works"

"Is it a holy syic, not faith"

"Isn&039;t all ic faith?" I asked

"No, soic"

The concept was too hard for ot one of those charet one for you We should be safe for the rest of tonight"

"I hope those aren&039;t famous last words," I said

"What do we do with them, Anita?" Truth asked

I looked at Jake "He broke your laws more than mine"

"Kill hiue We suspected one of us was being paid as an assassin, but we didn&039;t knoho Then Pantalone volunteered to come check out Malcolm&039;s church It was just a visit, and a report back to the council He usually only takes killing jobs, so ere suspicious If Columbine had won Jean-Claude&039;s lands, it would have been Pantalone who ruled here We are allowed to leave the service of the Mother now, because she sleeps Once she wakes, all that are in her service will be trapped there"

"So you came to spy," I said

"And to help keep you alive"

"Thanks for that" I glanced back toward Remus&039;s body "I wish everybody were still alive"

"I&039;ood man"

I turned back to Wicked and Truth "Did you guys wade into the dark and cut off his hand without being able to see anything?"

"Yes," Wicked said

"Of course," Truth said

"Then take his head"

Pantalone, with aarm, stabbed, shot, moved in a black blur Truth was his own dark blur, his sword so fast it looked like lightning He took hi him this tilittered outward and the head went spinning It wasn&039;t just impressive It was lovely in a macabre sort of way