T W E N T Y - F O U R

 I was a thing of glass in human form, brittle and broken, crushed by a flood of memory. There wasn't a deluge of visions, just the one. We set our own traps. We drop into them blind — but knowing. Mine had no lost kittens, no malignant grandmas (God, they never really die, do they? They never go away). Most of the time, my brain waves skipped over this mental-souvenir like a needle on a bad record. Sure, I felt tiny atoms of recognition if I heard about it, if it came up in some obscure way, but the information registered as if I was hearing a story about someone else. Like seeing something terrible on the news, I felt bad but couldn't figure out how it related to me.

I had never guessed that Angelo knew what Allen Frank had in store for me that night he sent me uptown. But it didn't take me long to get it once I slunk back home the next day. Took me a long time to get there because I was scared. Because I didn't know what Angelo would do when I told him about Allen and I knew I had to tell him because there wasn't any way I was going back there. It made me scared for Angelo, because I didn't know what he would try to do when he found out. Allen was big and strong, rotten with money and power, and Angelo was nothing except my brother.

But then I came in the door and, like a flash, I clued into how it really was. Hint number one was Angelo didn't ask me anything, no "What went down at Allen's? How did it go?" Hint two was he didn't look at me. He looked around me, he looked in my direction but not at me.

Hint number three was, Angelo was nice to me. That cinched it. Ange had my favorite foods out on the table for breakfast and there was the new Stones album for me. Wow. He hurried around the apartment with all the energy and sincerity of a game show host, except I was an obstinate contender. Uncooperative. I stood at the table, staring down at a congealed triangle of tomato sauce, cheese and bread and said, "I'm not going back there."

Angelo pretended he didn't hear me and kept on doing some stupid thing. That made me mad, grown-up mad. But that was okay. It was right to be angry, it was right to talk back.

"I said, I'm not going back there."

That was loud so he couldn't ignore it and he didn't. Angelo looked at me, suspicion clouding up his face. Was I going to cause trouble?

"You're upset," he said, stammering a little. Then he pasted a smile back on his lips. "I can dig it. But it'll be okay."

I started shaking at that. The last thing it was, the LAST thing it was ever going to be was "okay!"

"Look," Angelo said, "you're a guy. It's not such a big deal. You'll be all right. But I don't think ... you know, I don't think we should talk about it."

"You son of a bitch."

Angelo frowned. "Don't talk to me like that."

"Bastard."

"Hey!"

Started off with all the childish obscenities I knew and worked my way up. I'd lived among colorful people, I knew some colorful words. Snarled out all I could think of. When Angelo made his first move at me, I met him head on. My rage was big enough to carry me, I should have been able to wipe him out with one fist full of it.

I wanted to hit him, I wanted to hurt him — but all I did was piss him off. It was our worst fight ever. Next thing was, Angelo was raging at me, spitting out his own brand of venom — I was worthless, never gave a shit about anybody except myself — the basic routine. But Angelo's opinion didn't matter so much anymore and the words lost a lot of their sting. Then Angelo ripped the extension cord off the stereo and whipped most of the skin off my legs. Then I passed out and Angelo stopped being mad, got scared and called Allen Frank for help. I woke up back at Allen's place with Allen himself taking care of me. That's how I came to live there.

This was my bad time, my worst time — my Moment of Truth and Vision. And I knew — bad things like that didn't just happen, not to good kids. There had to be something major wrong with me.

Mercifully, my brain aborted that whole scene and only left me with the afterbirth. I blocked it out, phased it away. I didn't want to remember so bad that I couldn't remember. Still, every now and again, I would get the nightmare. I would be caught up in it, trapped in Angelo's meanness and me fighting to get away, a hopeless struggle that never stopped. Just ... faded a little. Sometimes.

But all of a sudden this time, just as Angelo starts flailing away with the cord, the apartment door crashes open and this Cowboy rushes in. He's a very scary-looking guy, startling, and our action zips to a stop at the sight of him. Then he is across the room in two big steps and got Angelo up by the shirt and starts dusting the room with him. Part of me is feeling relieved and even happy to see this take place. A very big part of me is jubilant when Angelo takes a final header out the window, many, many floors below, but an equally big part of me is thinking that I am a shit for sure for feeling so glad about that. So when the Cowboy starts moving in my direction, I am pretty certain I am going to be the next one taking flight because that is what I deserve.

Except the Cowboy is all different now and trying to put a lid on the mad (although not too successfully). I would like to leave and start calculating how to do that but the Cowboy is between me and the door. I am sitting on the floor and my back is up against the wall in every possible way. I can kind of slide from side to side but I can't go back anymore. I can't go on either.

"Don't you know me?" he is asking. "Don't you remember who I am?"

For another scary second I wonder if he's from Allen's party the night before and I start studying Angelo's exit with genuine interest.

The Cowboy stops moving closer and just stands there with his hands stretched out at his sides, breathing hard and sweating.

"Don't you know me?" he says again and I see his blue eyes are just this side of tearing-up and it does not strike me as phony, which is like a kick in the teeth shock-wise, because the only reason he could be sad like that is for me because Angelo never lays a finger on him during the whole altercation.

I figured that out.

I remembered him.

Surprise kept me grounded for a moment, then I was up and running to Rick, so glad to see him. Didn't question what he was doing in my nightmare-memory, didn't question why he appeared as an adult while I was still a child, I was just glad. I held onto him, wrapped my pint-sized bod around him and Rick held me back. As soon as he touched me, I could tell — he knew about me. He knew everything and, boy, was he pissed. Except — not at me.

In this place, I could allow myself the relief of tears and I did, couldn't have held them back if I tried. Rick's face was rough, warm and wet against my cheek. He smelled like sweat, cigar smoke and drugstore aftershave. Some little prideful kid-part of me was thinking how I was too big for this kind of thing but the other half wallowed in it.

"It's all right," Rick said. "It's all over. He won't hurt you anymore."

"I was bad."

Was that my voice?

"You're not bad," he said, pushing my face into the hollow between his head and shoulder. "It wasn't your fault. You didn't do anything wrong."

"They hurt me."

"I know." Rick held me tighter. "If you'd been my brother, it wouldn't have happened. I'd have taken care of you. If you'd been my brother, I'd have killed the son of a bitch."

I drew back a little to stare at him, suspicious, wary, puzzled.

"You needed to hear that," Rick said.

He was right. I did. Then my head was on his shoulder again and his hand was petting the back of my kid-sized skull and he was telling me, "You're no monster. You're just a stupid vampire."

Who was feeding from the great vein of his throat, just like Rick fed from mine. Talk about your major league bombshells, that one rocked me solid coming back to the real world. Still, it was how Rick had reached me. When I'd retreated, presumably for good, he had plunged in and pulled me out in the only way he could think how. He'd ripped open my memory, chased down the boogies and pitched them out.

Rick's warmth and strength burned its way down my throat, the most exclusive and exquisite liquor known to Fae. I burned him back with grief and rage, fear and pain — the need for comfort, the need for love. The yearning for simple affection has nothing simple about it. It's basic to all we are. We need to love and we must be loved in return. Or there is nothing.

All the secrets dissolved between Rick and me, although there were things I would've preferred to have remained hidden. Could tell he felt the same. Hell, Rick was less used to this kind of sharing, this too-intimate mind-touch, and had less protection against it than me. He didn't like it, but he didn't shy away from it either. Rick was as much a healer of the soul as he was the body. He cared so much! My knowing embarrassed him and that surprised me. How sad he should be ashamed of that. Still, I could see/feel all the numbing milestones of his past that had tried to build a tomb around his soul. I saw how he'd tried to shut everything out, all feeling, all caring. But in the end, those rocks hadn't buried him, only hidden. Outrage at what one man could and would do to the other protected him. Rick's rage was purifying. Anger didn't kill him, it kept him alive. It kept him going when there was nothing else to go for.

Regardless, whatever happened now, we were bonded to it together, stronger than parent and child, stronger than lovers, much more than brothers.

A third party joined us, Absinthe, who bared her flesh to my sharp caress. She gave more than she took which was the way of her, like her lover. Archie ... his loss was a shared wound between us and Rick echoed our sorrow. Yet while Rick's soul sought justice and warrior-danced on the edge of fury, Absinthe longed for change. Not the sort that transformed mortal to Fae but the kind that turned madness and want to something else.

Her essence merged with mine even as her hands fixed onto my skull. Cautiously, almost courteously, she approached the mangled borders of my mind seeking entry to Tasia's locked rooms.

<There will be pain> she promised, sadly.

<Do it> I sent back and tried to relax the barriers, tried to open up as she had done for me that time. It wasn't easy. Even knowing it was necessary didn't help. Everything that was me fought against it.

She wasn't kidding about the pain. Rick held onto me from behind, lightly at first, comforting and familiar. Then restraining when I would have pulled away. Absinthe locked onto Tasia's barricades and wouldn't let go either, not even when I started to fight her. My blocks weren't all Tasia's doing, there were secrets of my own making still lurking within, but there was no way the Madame could tell the difference. It was all or nothing now.

It felt as if panes of glass were sliding around inside my skull, bisecting and trisecting, on and on until the broken down parts ground and spiraled against each other. Then Absinthe turned a final key wedged in an isolated, crystalline bolt and the door splintered. It shattered open with a brilliant, blinding cascade of images and sensations.

It was almost too much. There was blood in my mouth afterwards that didn't belong to Absinthe or Rick. At the last, I did tear away from them. I actually rose up between them and levered myself away before dropping back down to the floor some distance apart.

I laid there for a while, just content to be still. When I finally moved again, I was surprised (and relieved) to discover all my body parts were with me. Functioning, too, apparently. I dragged up to my knees and sat back on my heels. My head did not tumble off my shoulders when I let it fall back. The absence of physical hurt is an ecstasy all its own and I stared up at the chapel's domed ceiling and basked in the luxury that not every atom of my being was screaming at once.

Above me, through the stained glass panels, the Lady Moon sang her come-hithers, louder and more intimately than I had ever heard them before. Below, Gaea rumbled, laughing for me, a proud parent. My head was a jumble of memories and half-formed knowledge. Strangers' faces appeared within my mind's eye, not all of them unpleasant, but I didn't really know them or their surrounding situations. There were other memories, early street and family scenes, bobbing to the surface with the stench and visual shock/revulsion of long dead floaters. I could have spent the next decade trying to sort it all out. Shoved the visions to the back instead — all of them. Time was a premium we didn't have.

Discovered the others were watching and waiting when I looked their way again.

"You all right, maestro?" Rick asked, concerned. "Everything in one piece?"

"Yes. And you?" My voice was as unfamiliar and unnerving as that childish other I'd heard so recently, the pitch deeper, smoother, more resonant. Somehow I suspected this sound would be permanent.

Rick nodded and blinked a bit, staring at me, startled by the change, too. I sensed him trying to analyze all that he'd just ingested. "I feel great," he said, suspiciously, fingering the closing wound on his throat.

I unwrapped the bandage from my hand and threw it aside. Didn't need or want a cover-up anymore. Linda had become very alert. Snake's fury had transformed to a speculative passivity. Absinthe was quite still, carved from the stone of flesh.

"What do you want to do now?" Rick continued, uncertain.

"We thank our host for his hospitality."

"Are you sure you want to do that?" He sounded — and looked — surprised.

We were still open to each other, Rick and I, and I could feel his need to strike back at David as strong as I could hear the echo of his mortal heart, which was not quite so mortal now. Still, he would have walked away if I asked him to, just picked up and left with me.

They will do whatever I ask. Suddenly, I knew that — didn't know how or why, just that they would follow wherever I led. Even Snake.

But what I said was, "I don't have any choice." And looked at Absinthe. "Do I?"

She shook her head. No.

"There's always choice." Rick tried a protest, refusing to abandon options. "What do you want, Tony?"

"I want Snake human again. I want Archie and Linda alive. I want my dog and I want my hand back the way it was. Barring that, I'll take David's head on a pike."

"You think you can beat him now?"

"No." I laughed. "Get real. But the bastard's got to pay somehow. Maybe I can slow him down. You drank my blood and came into my head to bring me back, Mallock. But you went looking for the chance to Change, too. Looking for your chance to come back once David did you in. If you want to go, it's okay. Maybe I can buy you a decent head start and you'll still get your chance at him later. Although I don't know if your odds will improve. If he isn't stopped now, he's going to get worse. With Tasia by his side, two Regents working together, they'll be unbeatable. You will Change when you die, Rick. You drank too much. You can't stop it."

"I'm not running," Rick said. "I owe him."

"Okay then."

"What are you grinning about?"

"I don't know. Really." I smothered another burst of laughter and wondered what the hell Absinthe had done to my head. Kept hearing music, a faint thread of melody, like something you'd catch from a party going on in another room — all the way upstairs on another floor. It didn't scare me but I didn't feel it was appropriate. It wasn't the right time for songs.

"Are you going to be able to move in that?" I asked Snake who was still decked out in her party get-up. We both knew her choices had become less than limited now. For her, there was no possibility of leaving. We were joined by spirit, heart and blood, literally, until our unnatural ends. Was this what Nari had foreseen in her life-in-death visions? I hoped she hadn't. Not if she loved her granddaughter.

Snake didn't answer me, just moved towards the back of the room, searching. From that short distance it was impossible to describe how she was different from her own Before. She was still whip-graceful, as fluid as the lash, and moved with all the self-trust of her particular strengths and abilities. David and his twins might have beaten her — badly — but they hadn't broken her. Yet, Snake was different. What had been Ayame in her was gone forever and there was nothing I could do to make it better.

She quickly located the remains of her jacket and jeans. Stripped out of David's gladrags and into her old, familiar gear — what was left of it. The stains and tears set my teeth on edge, curled my hands into fists. Yeah. I wanted a piece of David. Bad.

Rick tried his hand at the door but it wouldn't budge. He resorted to glaring at it as if that would do the trick. It didn't.

"Terrific," he snapped. "So how do we get out of here?"

"Well, I think you...." I glanced at Absinthe, hesitant. She inclined her head in the barest nod but it was all the encouragement I needed.

I stretched my hand towards the door — not a fist — open-palmed, loose. Pictured the need and commanded:

~ Open ~

Both doors swung in, slowly, simultaneously and bared the hallway before us.

"Damn. Check it out. It works." That was me babbling away, as astonished as anyone else except Absinthe. But my next thought was that I wished Archie were here to see it, too, and that took the glow off.

Absinthe must have guessed some of what I was thinking because she started to speak up. But I turned away from her and said, "Let's go."

I didn't mean or want to be rude to her. I was just past talking.

We took off into the hall, me and Rick at the head with Snake and Absinthe close behind. Linda kept up as best she could. She'd fallen into an unusual, cognitive silence which made me hope she wasn't as helpless as she seemed.

We moved through the maze of halls, retracing our earlier progress, walking across rotted Oriental and Persian rugs, brushing aside the dust and debris from web-slung chandeliers whose crystal had darkened from time and neglect. In some spots, the wood floor under the rugs was spongy beneath our feet. David had a thing for art. There was a lot of it hanging on the walls although he hadn't taken care of it. As a matter of fact, the paintings looked as though he had deliberately let them decay along with the rest of the furnishings. It was sad because the plantation had been a beauty once.

A new mystery unfolded as we made our way back to the main hall. We didn't see anyone, not a soul — mortal, Fae or Blood. The candles burned, fireplaces flickered. The remains of the festivities were still laid out. It seemed the others were vacating these rooms as we entered but their departure was total. It was a safe bet that David had additional amusements in store.

"They're here," Rick said when we came to a stop in the front room. "I know they're here. All of them."

I nodded, slowly circling the room from the center, eying all corners but there was nothing. Above the roaring fire, David's portrait sneered down at us, the only piece in the place still in primo condition. The artist had captured him perfectly from the glow of his lush, white-yellow locks, to the curve and texture of his fingers that grasped a massive, ornate cane. He wore old clothing, his usual dress, but the style was such that it could have passed on the street even now. David posed before an open window, a midnight, moonlit scene — which was suddenly, strikingly familiar to me. Staring out that wide, painted view, I recognized the grounds at Winter's Garden. It was quite a different garden from the one I'd known with Tasia. There were more statues, more trees and more fertile land.

"We discussed the situation as any family would," David had said. "The carnage was incredible."

I could only guess the Gemelo's last confrontation had come about at Winter's Garden on that little island in Greece. No wonder the natives sustained such history — and distance — about the place. In the end, David had stolen Tasia's image and preserved it. Why? As a souvenir, a trophy? I couldn't say. The only absolute truth I could hold onto about David Gemelo was that he was mad. Powerful, yes, but his dementia was the big problem. To the average eye, the super-unbalanced act at random, but they all have a logic of their own.

I was still chewing on that and more when we heard the front door open. That's the way of it, isn't it? Doors open and the games begin. Others enter our lives unasked, unbidden. They always leave something of themselves behind when they go whether you want it or not. A lot of times they end up tearing off great chunks of you in the process.

It was Tasia who entered into the room and in that first, blood-stopping instant, as soon as I caught sight of her, it was as if nothing had changed between us. When she walked towards me, I felt as though the other half of my soul was stepping up to take me home.

She wore a dress of crushed black velvet so fine and soft it felt like kitten's fur. The neck fell away from her slim, white shoulders and the sleeves merged into tight velvet mitts that emphasized her long, pale fingers. She wore a wide brimmed hat and a veil that hid nothing, only provoked the viewer into looking closer. It was impossible not to get caught up in that web of beauty. Once again, I was stunned by how young she looked — and how old. With her eclectic dress, by the glow of the firelight, she could have passed for a tall child playing at dress-up. When she removed the veil and hat to lay them on a nearby table, I would have blushed if that were still possible. Her movements were so intimate and graceful, all the more intoxicating because she didn't think a thing about it. Tasia could suggest and reveal more in such a gesture than a string of strippers at the Body Shop on fleet payday.

The first thing she did was come to me and hold my ruined hand in both of hers.

"He took your music," she whispered, softly — stricken.

But I said, "No," because I still had my music in my head and in my heart. No one could take that away. I was determined not to fall into any of the old snares and took my hand from hers, although part of me screamed when I did that.

"You're still angry," she grieved.

"Angry?" The word was acid in my mouth. "Don't be dim with me, Tasia. People have been hurt. People have died. What I'm hearing is, you set me up for it. Is that true?"

"Yes. In a way."

"Why?"

"The world is so much smaller now." She looked wretched and small herself and, despite everything, it was hard not to try to comfort her.

"Maybe," I agreed, keeping myself distant. I couldn't afford to get too close. "But what's that got to do with it?"

Tasia smiled at me like the moon shining full on the Aegean. "I knew you were the one the minute Errol brought you to me," she said. "There had been others. I'd sought them out — those that fit the description. But you ... you were the one. You found me."

I scowled. "You looked up those others and had them killed. All those red haired, green eyed mortals. Your people did that, at your order."

"Yes."

"Because of a curse? That one king bullshit?"

"Yes." Tasia looked at Absinthe and her eyes sparked defiantly when she did. "Tony's right. It is a curse, the burden of kings and queens. When you are responsible for so many, there is nothing left for yourself. No escape. Yes — I had them killed. I did not want to find you. I did not want to love you."

Tasia crossed her arms, holding onto herself. Nervous, she ran her palms over velvet-clad flesh. Then stopped and was still the second she caught herself at it.

"But I needed you." Tasia peered at me, searching for my understanding and support with her jade-tomb eyes. "After all those years of madness ... Touraine, Esteban, Estienne — all of them. Is it any wonder that I welcomed you, loved you? You became as necessary to me as earth and blood but, even still, I never thought to need you so much. Do you believe me?"

"I don't know." I hesitated. Then shook my head, trying for truth more than denial. "I know I still love you, Tasia. I don't know why I should."

"I don't know why either." There was a stark, bleak sound in her voice that was new to me. "But there it is, for both of us. Our love is both curse and blessing. To answer your question from before, yes, I sent you to Danny Miller so that he would take your life. It was the last chance — that he would destroy you, finish you before it could begin. But you were strong, you survived him. I knew then, this was to be. I cared for you and kept you safe. As queen, I knew I could make the others accept you, foreign born Blood. And I did."

She boasted like a clever child who had gotten away with the candy and the cookie jar.

"Care for me?" I felt sick. "You lied to me. Kept me in the dark when everyone else knew what was going on. And you did things to my head to keep me from using my gifts so you could control me."

"So I could protect you and help you. You would have done anything for me, Tony. You would have gone against David the moment I told you, the moment I asked. Yes — you had the power to do it, you could have fought him right away, but he would have killed you. He would have destroyed you."

"Bullshit, Tasia! That's crap and you know it." I paced the square of threadbare rug. "Could you see me streaking off to fight your brother because of some stupid fairy tale? You were the one hot to groom me for king. You kept on about all that consort crap, not me." Laughter staggered out of my mouth, angry and bitter. "I figured you'd wake up to that after a while. I didn't want the job."

"I never wanted to be queen either. I never wanted to rule anything."

"Right. I guess that's why you're here sucking up to David now."

For an instant, Tasia stared at me, surprised. Then she frowned and drew back.

"What are you doing here if it isn't to protect your position?" I stormed on. "The bottom line of this mess is, you couldn't hurt your brother. No matter what he did, you had to protect him. You had to help him. Now you've screwed up, backed the wrong horse and you've got to make peace with him over it." My lungs worked like I'd run five miles. "I belong to you. I know that. You can do anything you like to me. But that's as far as it goes. You never had to hurt anyone else. I won't let you hurt anyone else!"

"You're wrong," she insisted. "Prophesies and curses be damned. Understand me — all that mattered to me was stopping David. Staying away from David. It never mattered what happened to the new king before. But I do care for you."

"Aw ... don't lie to me. Don't lie to yourself." The acid taste gave way to something more savage.

"You have no right to speak to me like this. How do you know how I feel?"

Could have laughed. Didn't. "That's just it, love. I should know everything about you," I said. "That's the way it works with Blood-love, right? That's what you promised. No more pain, no more hurting. I would never be alone again. But you lied about everything."

"I felt everything." Hers was the face of beauty ravaged, tragic. Her voice was a symphony of regret and pain. "We are linked, you and I. All you suffered — I felt that. From your death at Danny's hands to David's torments. Even when those you held dear were hurt and pained you, I knew that, too. There were times when I felt it should have killed me. I am here now because of our link. How can you say I planned all that to serve my own ends?"

"Because you did."

There was so much more I wanted to tell her — Because you had to. Because he was your brother, your family. I had a crazy brother once. I know — but those words locked in my throat like grief. I began to wonder, at what point had Tasia stopped growing? At what point had circumstance closed her away with a child's mind and fears? No wonder we had called to each other, right from the start, both of us bleeding children. Now I was tearing into her soul with meat hooks and, despite everything, it was breaking my heart.

My sad child queen glared at me balefully. There should have been tears. Tears of anger, tears of pain.

"You don't understand," she gasped, with the hitch of absolute misery in her throat. "You don't care about me at all. I'm always alone. Always. All these others ... they bleed me dry. I have to care for all of them but —"

Tasia cut herself off, retreating into an agony of silent torment. She had tried so hard and everything was going so badly. She wasn't lying about meaning for the best. She genuinely believed she was doing all the right things. Not so long ago, I would have swallowed all her reasons and been satisfied, but we weren't operating with the same plan anymore.

Still, my first impulse was to forget about ripping into David, grab up Tasia and the rest and run. Speed of Light. All that jazz. But a thickening in the air froze us all in place. There was a quick rush of brimstone and swamp gas that caused all the flame in the room to color and flare. A tiny inferno roared out of the fireplace and gushed across the room like a river of flame. I shoved Rick out of the way. A pocket of gas exploded just over our heads, angry thunder, and singed the side of his face and neck. Linda cowered on the floor across from us. Near her, Snake crouched low in a defensive posture and her blades were in her hands. Absinthe was pressed back against the wall. The flames had torn a huge half circle in her skirt before they'd extinguished.

David materialized, stepping out of his portrait above the mantle, and leapt down to the floor. "Cheap thrills," he boasted. "Don't you love it?"

I sent a little bullet of thought up just over his head. The ancient chandelier trembled and plummeted. David had to move quick to avoid it.

I said, "Sure."

"Crude." David stepped elegantly around the broken glass and torched rug. "Well, you can't please everyone. Hell knows I've tried to be accommodating. I've tried to entertain you. I brought your brother back. Dredged up those past cinema glories for you to share with your friends. Chatted with one of your old girlfriends just to get a clue as to how to make you happy. She wasn't very helpful."

"You killed Linda," I said.

"Technically, Dietrich took a more active role in that. But, yes, I did my part in bringing the girl over," David admitted. "Did I err? I thought you'd be pleased."

"You abuse your position," Absinthe said with icy rage. "You abuse your authority and power."

"Milady Absinthe," David purred. "That's what it's for."

He turned his back on us and stepped towards Tasia. We had been dismissed. Tasia stood near the arch of the doorway, holding onto herself again, oblivious to the rest of us, watching him approach.

"My dear ... my dear," David crooned in an ecstasy of welcome. He stretched his fingers towards her, compelled to touch her. "It has been so long."

"I am here," Tasia said, flat.

"You couldn't stay away."

"No. You saw to that, didn't you?"

"Please," he whispered, coaxing. "The legend has served its purpose. We can deal with all that later. It is for the best that we two are together again."

There was only an instant of it but I caught it, strong. A glimpse of agonized resignation on Tasia's face before the Queen mask went up again and David blocked my view of her. I must have started towards her because Rick caught my shoulder and held me still, cautioning.

It was Tasia who moved — away from David, evading his timid caress the way she'd duck some lice-infested wraith. "I didn't come here for you," she snapped.

"You came," he sighed, as resigned as she. "That's enough."

"Is it?" Tasia paced away from him, brittle with rage. David followed, trying to close the gap between them.

"You must always have your own way. This just sport to you, isn't it?" she hissed. "You swore all those years ago you would make me come to you and now you have. God damn you."

"Natasia —"

"Do not touch me." She was standing on the edge of hysteria, whirling away from him as he pressed closer. And closer. "I didn't come for you. Never think it. I came for him."

David shook his head fiercely, partly because he didn't want to believe that. Mostly because he did.

Painful laughter burst from her mouth without even the ghost of mirth. Her hands became claws on her arms. "The world is so much smaller now. It should have been safe with you over here," she gasped out. "All that water to keep you back. Nothing here but animals and savages for you to work your mischief. It should have been safe."

I couldn't stand it. Pulled away from Rick and ran towards her. There was something really wrong here, more than I wanted to guess.

Furious, David blocked me, thrusting out his cane. The grip gouged the plaster with a spray of grit and dust. I grabbed the wood and tore it out of the wall, snarling. Shoved it and David out of my way. He stumbled back and I caught Tasia close to me. She was so stiff, she couldn't unbend enough to hold me back, just shivered in my arms. She closed her eyes and burrowed in under my chin.

"I came for you," she whispered, insisting. "It hurt so. He hurt you. I had to come."

Wanted to tell her it was all right, that I understood. But then David seized Tasia and tore her away from me. He flailed at my head with his cane, wild with rage and spite. I held my arms over my face, ducked down and tried to get past the blows to get at him. A knot of wood struck the side of my face and ripped across my cheek. I almost passed out — staggered back, dazed. Felt/saw David gearing up for a final blow. Began my next move and sidestepped away.

He'd anticipated that. Amazed, I watched the point end of his cane rush towards me, driving straight and true for my heart and spine. Then Tasia was in my arms again, holding on — tight! — her fingers digging into my shoulders. Her teeth were clenched shut but jubilation was raw and singing in her eyes.

He couldn't stop. David's cane pierced her back, drove through her spine, exited through her pinning her to me. The screams came from him and me in a torrent of shock, grief and pain. Tasia did not scream, she smiled. Her eyes were bright with triumph.

<You will never have your way again ...> Her soft voice laughed out its last melody. <... not with me, Father>

She died. She went away. Not through rot and decay, she didn't break down into ash and stinking waste. She was my Queen to the last, transforming into a body of frosted glass. I tried to hold her, I wanted to hold her forever, preserved and protected in my arms, but the pain made me tremble. I couldn't keep the hurt inside and she crumbled, shivering into a rain of broken glass and slashed velvet that gathered at my feet.

David began to howl. He threw his head back and flung out his arms, grasping the air as if he'd force back the spirit that had taken final flight between us. There was nothing of humanity in that sound at all. Nothing animal. It was the voice of rage and defeated lust. It stunned me out of my immediate torment and gave birth to something new. Tasia's secret blazed between us. Yes, yes — of course she'd understood me right from the start and cared for me the way she so longed to be cared for herself — by locking the secrets away. Perhaps the Blood gifts had been sacrificed by circumstance. I would never know now.

Regardless, Tasia had made herself into a true Queen in order to protect her people from the menace she knew too well. What had it cost her to face her own horror, one-on-one, hunting David down? Confronting him? Exiling him? She had never been able to finish him. I could just imagine the lines he'd pitched at her to cover his deeds, to legitimize his actions. He would have told her that she'd tempted and provoked him, that he had been powerless to resist her. He would have told her that she belonged to him, that he had the right to her flesh and her soul, he being her father. No matter what David's excuse had been, he had made her believe it. Shame and guilt had kept her silent behind her crown. No wonder it had been so hard to bear.

But this wasn't her shame. It wasn't her guilt. And he had no right! Blood ran down my ribs and soaked into my clothes unnoticed. I watched David's facade drop away as he raved, another hideous revelation. His handsome portrait veneer dissolved like acid thrown on painted canvas and we all saw the true face that had hidden behind the mask.

The stink was awful. All those centuries of corruption, ingesting the "living blood" had left their mark on him. David's body was a series of livid, open sores and boiling suppurations. His eyes were diseased, yellow slits that all but disappeared under brows of rot. Vermin crawled over his skin, things lived in and off of him. This was IT — my horror from the woods, a thousand poisons twisted into some kind of flesh. The adepts who'd mastered him all those years back, those Fae and mortal necromancers who had contained him at last, had imprisoned the contagion in his body. David was the Black Death living — and it lived off of his own undead, undying self. No wonder he chose to dwell within his portrait. He needed a reminder of his human appearance.

Other vermin began squirming and slithering out of the walls and woodwork, too, summoned by their master's cry. Rick and Snake moved in beside me, closing ranks. Absinthe held ground with her back to the wall. But the horde kept back, even Marlene and Dietrich. David's diseased flesh mutated as we watched, coalescing into something else, a storybook alien, growing in mass. His dragon was taking shape out of David's toxic bulk. Those yellow orbs were bigger and brighter now, malignant with hate, completely crazed but fixed with purpose. Me. His hands became taloned claws and, when he made the first move, slashing out at me, it was with the speed of lightning ripping through water. I threw myself back from the first thrust of his charge. He didn't miss totally. The tips of his claws made bloody ribbons of my chest. When he slashed out again, I ducked down and grabbed up his cane. Clubbed him with it and heard him roar with pain and surprise.

We circled each other, wary. Eager. It was like a dance, like a performance, instead of a fight. Our anxious, curiously silent audience emphasized that point. Then I stopped watching the others and concentrated on striking back. Mostly, I just ducked out of the way. There was a awful fascination in watching him finish his transformation, a movement and rhythm about it that was almost hypnotic.

I heard that music again. Loud. A neat vibrating chime of Oriental strings backed by a primitive pulse — throbbing. Found I had more success following the beat instead of tuning it out. It kept me out of David's reach. Gemelo was a dark dragon, a beast of deep red scales edged in tarnished silver. Another pair of yellow eyes opened along his chest, another at his shoulders. A second mouth gaped and drooled along his ribs. He raised himself to his full height, bursting through the ceiling, and howling out again. I locked eyes for one, quick moment with Rick who was ducking plaster and wood across the room and knew his expression of wonder and fear was reflected on my own face.

"Do something!" he yelled.

"Like what?" I yelled back.

I was way open to suggestions. This was crazy — this was impossible! All I could think was, He's going to win! He'll kill us all! That made me feel sick. It wasn't fair. It wasn't right.

But the first thing you learn is "fair" and "right" don't matter in a fight. All that matters is who wins and David had figured that one out long ago.

The dragon's tail snaked up, wrapping itself around my leg and then I was hanging upside down, staring into a fanged and dripping maw. Sports had never been my strong point, but I was slugging David's cane against that snout and head for all I was worth. This was it. I knew I was gone — yet if I was going to go, I wanted to take as much of him with me as I could. Started yelling stuff, too. Bashed him again and again. Gouged his eye with the splintered end and struck home with that one. It must have hurt him bad because he howled and reared back — and slung me away from him. I landed hard, mad and hurting, and that was when I began to feel change coming over me as well — in a big way.

I'd never transformed before, had no idea what it would be like. Discovered it didn't hurt. Felt like stretching, like lifting something heavy and releasing it to soar free. First thing I noticed was my hands and arms — the skin toughening up and scaling in white iridescents, like mother of pearl. The knuckles across the back of my hands enlarged and elongated, the fingers lengthened and my nails became thick, white talons. Something silky brushed my shoulders, pouring down my arms and chest. My hair was growing, a mane-like cascade of flame that writhed and danced with power of its own. Everyone, everything was getting shorter, the room was growing smaller except I knew that wasn't right. They weren't shrinking — I was getting bigger.

This was not your standard bat or wolf transformation, I was absolutely positive of it. Snake was gaping, too, now — standing right beside Rick, and staring at me with something other than hate in her eyes.

But David was determined to finish me off before I could complete my evolution. He dived at me, lips rolled back over double rows of sharp, spiked teeth. My hair lashed out, wrapped itself around his throat and held him away. Then I roared back at him — and I heard the song of the dragon once again. A different dragon. Me. David slashed at me, buried his claws deep in my shoulder and my roar went louder.

So did his. From the floor, Linda had moved against him. She'd grabbed up the splintered cane and drove it into his balls. David wrenched himself away from me and turned on her. Snatched her up in his jaws and shook her, furious, the way a dog shakes a small kill. He bit all the way through her. She came away in pieces, flung out in bloody halves across the room.

But Linda had given me time to finish, to find my feet. I charged at David, ready for him, when he turned towards me. Clubbed him with my own taloned fists and tore off some hunks. Soared into him again and again, letting my dragon's music take over. David lunged back. Our long, serpentine limbs entwined in the illusion of dancers, of lovers. We smashed into another wall and broke it down. The impact drove us apart.

We burst out onto the porch and down to the ground. Faced each other, hissing, snarling. Swamp bog oozed beneath my feet, slippery and wet, welling up between my toes. David and I circled 'round and 'round — up and down, teeth, claws slashing and flashing. Here were the real monsters and I knew just what kind.

Not Tasia's brother but her father ... her father! The one who should have protected her, who should have loved her and taken care of her, he was the monster. There was no worse betrayal, no soul's contagion more obscene. He had chased his daughter down through the centuries, turning her triumphs into waste, her very existence into undying, unending Hell. No escape — that's what Tasia said. Had he brought her over to begin with? Yes. Exhibiting her as his Queen instead of his child. And when she gathered enough strength to drive him off, he would not quit his obsession. When she had refused him, he had laid countries to waste, destroyed all those civilizations he had professed to love so much.

Tasia couldn't tell me, not even me! She'd kept her secret until the last. The spikes of fate can be kind as well as cruel. We'd been brought together and known pleasure in that. That she loved me, I couldn't doubt that anymore. Driven, tormented, she'd done the best she could. But she'd fucked up. Died and left me behind, the Queen's Champion, fated to hold and use those gifts she'd lavished on me, the power I'd tried so hard to deny. It was her blood that boiled in my heart, her life that gave me my own.

Tasia should have seen it, how I killed him. The fighting didn't actually last very long. Fighting never does, it only seems to go on forever while you're in the middle of it — while you're wondering who's going to live. And who won't. I watched the end rise up in David's eyes the minute we burst out onto the Earth. Swamp or desert, plain or mountain, this was my land and he had no damn business on it. Defeat became despair, despair degenerated into fear. Then pleading.

I killed him while he bleated out his regrets about what he'd done to me, spilling them into my head like that would made a difference. Like that could change anything.

I reminded him, that wasted piece of shit. Asked him -- how many times had his daughter begged him to stop? Once had been too often. Felt his surprise rise up over that. David couldn't hide his shock that I'd make maggot meat of him for something like that. Bastard.

In the end, I was glad I killed David Gemelo. Wasn't sorry at all. I'd done the right thing.

But Tasia should have been there to see it. Gaea, I wish she had.

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