Demon Mistress Read online

Page 12

 

  “They only need to manifest wounds until they gain control,” Vanzir said. “I’ll bet you anything these two are still under attack. The demons are still here. ”

  I whirled around to Chase. “If the demons are here, why aren’t the alarms sounding?”

  Smoky spoke up. “Want to make a bet it’s because the demons are on one of the astral realms? They have to be. If they were on the physical plane, we’d know it—one way or another. ” He turned to Chase. “Are your magical sensors regulated to alert you to astral presences?”

  Chase blanched. “I don’t know; nobody ever suggested it, and I sure as hell wouldn’t have thought of it. The OIA installed them when we set up the unit. When they were disrupted during the vampire fiasco, the OIA couldn’t reset them, so I had to ask a couple of my men from Otherworld to work on them. I’m not sure what they did to fix the system. ”

  “Crap. You can bet they’re not geared toward astral intruders,” I said. “The victim downstairs said the demon ate away the silver cord that bound him to his body. That cord, for humans and Fae, exists within the astral realms. So yeah, the demons are still here, on the astral plane, feeding on them. Shit, shit, shit. ” I bit my lip. What the hell were we going to do now?

  “Can we attack them? Can you?” Chase glanced at the silent men, his face taking on a pensive expression.

  “Not without knowing what kind of demon they are,” I said. “The danger’s pretty damned high, and fighting on the astral realm isn’t exactly a cakewalk. Neither is getting there. ”

  “So, we have to figure out what kind of demons we’re dealing with, how they got loose in the city, and what the fuck to do about them,” Chase said. “Preferably before anybody else gets killed. ”

  Just then, Delilah’s cell phone rang. She moved off to the side to answer the call.

  Chase glanced at her, then turned to me. “By the way, I looked up the girl you asked about—the elf. She did file a report with the police, but it was a couple of years ago. Said some guy was following her. I remember assigning an officer to go talk to the man in question, but nothing much happened. The guy denied it, said it was coincidence, that he’d just happened to be in the same area as she was. Since Sabele never called in again, we just closed the case. ”

  “Let me guess. Harold Young. ”

  “Yeah, Harold Young. How did you know that? He was a freshman at the UW. I can give you his last known address. If I remember right, he’s the youngest son of some local millionaire. ” His gaze darted to his watch. “Now, you mentioned you had some information on the Clockwork Club and Claudette? Might as well tell me while we’re waiting for Delilah. ”

  “The Clockwork Club is an old-money vampire club, almost impossible to get into if you don’t know someone already in it. Apparently, the club’s been in existence since the 1700s, so it’s just now emerging into the light. From what I can tell, there aren’t any horrendous rituals or rites that go on there; they just keep to themselves, like most exclusive clubs. ”

  Delilah flipped her phone shut. “What are we talking about?”

  “The Clockwork Club,” I said. “Chase is hunting for a vampire who disappeared not long ago. She belonged to an exclusive vampire club, has been in the closet, is still married, and suddenly vanished. No signs point to suicide or to her husband staking her. ”

  “So any chance you can get through the doors to ask them about Claudette?” Chase asked.

  I pressed my lips together and shrugged. “I can try. My source hooked me up with the name of a member who happens to really like the Fae. I’ll see if I can spring myself an invitation to a social night there, but I can’t promise anything. ”

  “Tim called,” Delilah said. “He found our boy, Harish. I have the address right here. ” She held up her notebook. “It’s still early enough. What say we pay a visit and see if Sabele married him and is off somewhere, making babies?”

  “Sounds good,” I said. “Come on, let’s roll. ”

  CHAPTER 10

  Smoky and Vanzir opted out of our jaunt to visit Harish, so it was just Camille, Delilah, and me. We wound through the streets, heading over toward the area in which Siobhan, our selkie friend, lived. The Fae had taken over the north side of Discovery Park in the past year, buying up land there, renting houses and condos. I had the suspicion that the big boom in the past few months was due to the Fae Queens reestablishing their domain. All of a sudden, neighborhoods surrounding parks, lakes, and wetland areas had taken on a decidedly “Faerie Land” feel to them.

  As we drove through Discovery Park, the trees graced both sides of the road, overshadowing us and blocking the view. The park was a friendly one. Delilah and Camille often came here to walk and think and talk to the nature devas. I missed that, but since I’d been turned into a vampire, the nature spirits weren’t comfortable around me, and I didn’t like making them wary. So I chose to keep myself aloof unless they came out to play on their own. So many humans mixed up the Fae, elves, and nature devas, lumping us all together, even though we were three distinct races.

  Nature devas were part Fae, part plant, and they lived only to serve their species. Blackberry devas were huge and crept across the land, gobbling up space even as did their thickets. Tree devas could be a thousand years old, and while they weren’t exactly the Ents of Tolkien’s world, they did shepherd their charges and keep watch over what the two-and fourleggeds did within the boundaries of their woodlands. Flower sprites were often perky, almost chatty, except for a select few like the bluebell spirits, who could be deadly if you intruded on their land.

  Camille turned left off Fortieth onto Lawtonwood Road, then followed it until we hit Cramer Street, where we made another left. A few blocks down, and we pulled up in front of a large house. Camille turned off the ignition.

  I glanced at the house. The lights were blazing. “Shall we?”

  “Lead on,” Camille said. “You and Iris discovered Sabele’s trunk. Did you bring her necklace and the lock of hair?”

  I nodded, patting my pocket. For some reason, I’d taken to carrying her locket in a little box with me. I’d grown concerned over the elf and couldn’t pinpoint why. “What about her diary? I don’t suppose you have that with you?”

  She shook her head. “No, but I’ve got a pretty good memory. I know what to ask. ”

  The path leading to the house was cobblestone. The yard was neatly tended, almost to the point of where it felt too tidy. I glanced around, looking for any sign of disorder, any sign of the wildness that a lot of Fae households possessed. Our own yard was a profusion of plants and grasses and mossy patches, but Harish apparently either hired a gardener or he was obsessive about keeping things neat.

  The house was the same way. The siding sparkled with a suspicious lack of dirt for being in an area that only had sixty-some clear days a year, with the rest overcast and—often—drizzly or pouring. Everything looked perfect. I knocked on the door as Camille and Delilah flanked my sides.

  After a moment, the door opened a crack, and a lithe young man peered out. He was an elf, all right, but he was an elf who wore glasses and who had apparently decided that the Miami Vice costumers had it right. He looked like a pretty boy, a platinum blond version of Don Johnson. He gave us the once-over and opened the door a bit wider.

  “Yes, may I help you?” Neutral tone. Not friendly, not unfriendly.

  “Are you Harish?”

  “Yes,” he said, the door edging open a few more inches. “What do you want?”

  “We’re looking for Sabele Olahava,” I said slowly. “We thought you might know where she is. ”

  That stopped him cold. The bored affectation washed off his face; the expression behind it was stark and bleak.

  “She’s not here,” he said, starting to close the door.

  “Wait—please. We need to know where she is. Can you just give us ten minutes?” Delilah stepped up, at her most winsome. <
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  Harish looked at her for a moment, then let out a long sigh. “Very well. But I’m not inviting you in—not with her along,” he said, pointing to me. “I’ll come out on the porch and sit with you. ”

  “How rude—” Delilah started to say, but I touched her arm and shook my head. He was just protecting his home, and he had every right to be concerned.

  “He’s right,” I said. “It’s so not a good idea to invite strange vampires into your house—not at all. ” I turned back to him. “Fair enough. Shall we sit on the porch?”

  We settled on the covered porch, with Delilah still glaring at him, but I wasn’t offended. Harish would take a great chance by inviting me into his house, and he knew it. I knew it. If it made him uncomfortable, then he had every right to keep me outside. It would have been the same if I’d opened the door to some big bruiser I didn’t know.

  “I’m Menolly D’Artigo, and these are my sisters, Camille and Delilah. ”

  After we sat down, he let out another sigh and leaned back against the railing, pushing the cuffed sleeves of his summer blazer up his arms. “Why are you asking about Sabele?”

  “She used to tend bar at the Wayfarer. I’m the new owner. I took over when Jocko was murdered. ” I kept my gaze fixed on him.

  His eyebrow jumped a little. “I haven’t thought of that bar in a while. Since Sabele disappeared, I can’t bring myself to go past it. ”

  “Disappeared?” Camille leaned in. “When? We thought she might be here, married to you. ”

  His expression did jump then. “Married? Why the hell would you think that? We were engaged, but apparently she couldn’t stomach the thought of marrying me. She left in the night without saying good-bye. I spent a year mourning, then a year wondering what I did wrong. This past year I’ve finally managed to shove her rejection out of my mind, and now here you are, dredging it up again. ”

  I glanced at Camille, who was watching him closely. Our glamour didn’t work on elves the same way it worked on FBHs, so we couldn’t compel him to tell the truth, but elves weren’t all that good at lying, either. They fudged the truth just fine, and obfuscated facts they didn’t want you to know. But lying—it wasn’t really inherent within their nature.

  “Her diary said you were engaged,” Camille said. “She was very much in love with you, according to what she wrote. ”

  Harish paled, and for the first time, emotion broke through the composed facade he’d erected. “Diary?” His voice fell to a whisper. “You found her diary? Sabele never let anyone touch that journal. She’d never leave it behind. ”

  “That’s what we were thinking,” I said, slowly withdrawing the box with the locket and curl of hair from my pocket. I opened it and handed it to him. “Do you recognize this?”

  As the elf slowly lifted the locket by its chain, his expression went from worried to broken. “I gave her this the week before she vanished. It was an engagement gift. And the hair—it’s her mother’s. She’d never, ever let this out of her possession. Her mother died shortly after she first came over Earthside. Her father sent her a lock of her mother’s hair, since she couldn’t go home for the funeral rites. ”

  “You really thought she would leave without telling you?” I asked, hating to pry. But something had happened, and I wanted to get to the bottom of it. “Why would she do that? You were engaged. ”

  “Yes,” he said quietly, fingering the locket. “We were planning a big wedding back in Elqaneve. When I gave her the locket, she put my picture in it and said she’d treasure it always,” he said, his voice catching. In the light shimmering down from the sconce by the door, I could see that his eyes were a pale blue, and they shone with tears. “Then, not long after that, she disappeared. ”

  “But you tried to find her?” Delilah leaned forward, her voice breathless. She had recently discovered the Brontë sisters, when Camille had cajoled her into reading Jane Eyre and Wuthering Heights, and that sparked off a flurry of old tragic love stories. Lately, romance movies had replaced Jerry Springer every Friday night.

  “Of course I tried,” he said. “What did you think? That I just chalked it up to Oops, lost my fiancée and moved on without scouring the city for her? Don’t add insult to my pain, please. ”

  “Sorry,” Delilah murmured.

  Harish shrugged. “No, I’m sorry. I still miss her, to be honest. I say I’m over her, I say that after three years I’ve chalked it up to fate, but . . . the truth is, I miss her every day. And every day I wonder if she’s off living a wonderful life somewhere. Even though I’m still bitter, I hope that she’s happy. ”

  “Tell us what happened,” I said gently.

  With a sigh, he said, “The last time I saw her, we had a little spat—nothing major but enough that Sabele stormed out after dinner. She was like that—high-tempered. I loved it about her, usually. Anyway, I felt bad about it, and the next morning, I called to apologize. She wasn’t home, so I left a message saying I was sorry and asking if she would please come over that night. She called back after I left for work and said she’d be here by ten P. M. ”

  “And she never showed up?” Camille bit her lip and glanced at me. This wasn’t easy on him—that much we could tell. He really did look haunted.

  Harish shook his head. “No. I called the bar, but they said she’d left for the evening. I had no reason to disbelieve them. Later, when she still didn’t show up, I went over to the bar and walked home by the path she usually took to my house. But there was no sign of her. ”