Blood Lines

THIRTY-ONE

SHE wasn't in Chicago anymore. She wasn't in her own body anymore.

The disorientation was short but severe. It was like closing both eyes, then opening all four of them. Like having the axis of your body shift while gravity took up hip-hop.

It was like riding. Exactly like riding. Long-unused reflexes took over, lining her up properly with the new body as he/she/they strode up the street.

Big. That was her first clear thought. This was the biggest son of a bitch she'd ever ridden. She guessed that her/their eyes were about ten feet off the ground, but it was the sheer massiveness of him she felt most keenly.

Out of his peripheral vision she saw houses on either side of him/them—houses in red, gold, pale gray, seen through eyes that processed color differently. Where were they? She turned her/their head—or tried to. The muscles didn't answer.

Panic hit—real, yet oddly distant and quick to evaporate.

Because he didn't feel it, she realized, and without a bodily response, her emotions thinned. His body responded to his feelings, though. She knew what he felt.

Eager. Hungry.

And if she felt him and he didn't feel her—if his muscles wouldn't answer to her—she was purely a passenger, not a rider, which shouldn't be possible, but she was here. She had to get out, get back to herself. Mentally she shouted words that should have sent her back.

Nothing. Those words were meant to be spoken, and this throat, these lips wouldn't respond to her. But intent—she had that, and some knowledge. Desperately she tried to wrench herself out. Nothing happened.

Trapped. She was trapped.

Part of her felt as if she were panting from fear and effort. Part of her—no, it was the demon who felt that lick of excitement as he observed the houses around him, watching with a sense no human has. Demons called it uther. Cynna thought of it as their life sense, for that's what it picked up. The demon sensed the lives around him—most clearly the one in the shrubbery, thin but tasty; more dimly because of walls and distance, the thicker lives inside those homes…

He couldn't eat them. Wouldn't. She reminded herself of that. Demons ate almost anything living, except humans. They consumed something of the life along with the flesh, and souls drove them mad. That's what they believed, or remembered—demon memory being enough to drive a human crazy, because they also ate each other and retained something of the consumed within their own consciousness…

Oh, God. Had she been eaten? Was that why she couldn't make the body respond, or escape back to her own body?

This time the fear was so great it swallowed her, embodied or not. She sank into it, into a vortex of fear and flailing—

And the demon stopped. And spoke. "Cynna. Be still. You can't get out until I release you, and you must pay attention. You'll want to take control from me. You can't, but you won't even be able to try unless you know the body. Pay attention."

The demon's voice was an impossibly deep bass. It sounded… vexed. That yanked her out of her panic long enough for her to start thinking again.

It hadn't been the demon who spoke to her, but Jiri. Jiri who rode, Jiri who'd made her a passenger. She'd been forced into his body, but she hadn't been consumed.

And Jiri was right, damn her eyes and every other stinking part of her. Cynna had to pay attention. If she were to have any chance of gaining control of the demon… and she didn't need all of his body. The throat and mouth, that's what she needed, to speak the words of release. But she had to learn his body first, know how to operate it. He was too different from any she'd ridden back in her bad old days.

They traveled another block, with Cynna paying close attention to his/her center of gravity, the kinesthetic knowledge of his/their muscles as they strode silently down the street. The peculiar colors of demon vision were a distraction; the area looked familiar, yet so distorted in the glimpses she caught that she couldn't place it. He was a safety-conscious demon, watching out for cars, avoiding those that cruised by—the drivers never saw him, of course, but dogs barked frantically as they passed, not looking closely at the houses.

What she glimpsed, what she heard, said city. And familiar. She'd been down this street, or one much like it.

He was older than any demon she'd ever ridden. Older by far. The mass told her that, an indescribable sense of heaviness, density… he'd been eating lives a long, long time. Old meant strong, powerful—that scared her enough that it took a second for her to catch on to the pronoun she'd automatically been using. He?

Yes, she realized as massive legs carried him/her/them along the cold pavement. Definitely this one was male. Though most of the demons she'd ridden in her misspent youth had been hermaphrodites, she'd hitched on an incubus once, so she knew: male felt different. It wasn't just the lack of breasts, or the sensation of an extra organ at the crotch—the younger demons came equipped with both kinds of genitals. And strength damn sure wasn't a sex-based characteristic, not with a demon.

But male felt different.

He stopped. He was looking at one house, a house she knew, even painted as it was in the lilac and beige of demon vision.

Washington. They were in Washington, D.C., and he/she/they were looking at Rule's house.

RULE hadn't taken his eyes off Brady. The man had obviously expected Victor's announcement, which gave weight to the "slide Brady in quickly" theory. But what did he hope to achieve by holding Rule here at gunpoint?

"Brady." Lily raised her voice. "Unless you're planning to shoot all three of us, you'd better put that up. I'm a cop. I don't take it well when someone draws on me."

"Draws what?" Brady's eyebrows flew up in a parody of innocent confusion. "I didn't draw anything. Did I?" He looked around, grinning.

Most of those nearest were melting back, leaving a small open space between them—except for a knot of about ten clustered around Brady.

"Been collecting a pack, Brady?" Cullen made sure that sounded like the insult it was.

Rule took the smooth, deadly slide into combat mode, where wolf and man melded. His thoughts were crisp, his goals clear: keep the others alive, kill Brady. "He has backup," he observed dispassionately, "and the others, even the ones who hate him, won't act. Not during the naming."

"I can take his toy away from him," Benedict said. "Little boys shouldn't be allowed to play with guns."

"Best if none of you move at all," Brady said. "Don't wave to a friend or scratch your nose. I might mistake it for a threat."

Rule switched to subvocal, pitching so low only Benedict and maybe Cullen could hear: Give me a second to get in front of Lily. If he gets a shot off—

Lily seemed to be reading his mind. She edged back—and with his peripheral vision he saw her reach inside her jacket.

"Uh, uh, uh!" Brady sighted down on Rule's forehead. "Unless you want to see how well your sweetie heals brain tissue."

Benedict considered that, gave a tiny shake of his head. He'd get you before I could stop him. We need him distracted for a second. Seabourne—

"Leidolf." Victor's voice rose over the clamor, addressing his clan. "If you wish to hear, be silent."

Cullen's voice, barely audible even to Rule: I can't throw fire without a gesture.

Victor cried out, "I name Alex Thibodaux as Lu Nuncio."

A many-throated roar rose from the crowd. Rule noted it without looking away from Brady—who, damn it, wasn't distracted. So this, too, he'd expected—but it made no sense. Thibodaux didn't carry the blood, couldn't hold the mantle, so unless Victor had lost his mind—

"Leidolf!" Victor shouted. "Silence! Alex is to be your new Lu Nuncio—not your heir."

What the hell—?

"I break with tradition, yes," Victor was saying. "But there is precedent. The heir does not have to be Lu Nuncio. I consulted our Rhej and my councilors. Etorri has no Lu Nuncio—"

"We are not Etorri!" someone shouted. Others began chanting, "Leidolf! Leidolf!" Still others shouted names: Reese. Thomas. Max. Phillip.

No one called out Brady's name. Why was he so damned smug?

Victor had to shout to be heard. "Twice Leidolf has separated the positions—when the blood had grown thin and there was no suitable heir strong enough to act as Lu Nuncio. It was temporary! Temporary," he repeated., his voice dropping as they quieted. "The blood has grown thin, Leidolf. And I am dying."

This time, he got silence. "You need a Lu Nuncio you trust. I give you Alex. If I still live after six months, I will call you here to invest the heir as Lu Nuncio. If not… you will need a Rho and a Lu Nuncio."

They listened now, intent and unmoving. Rule knew what they were thinking as clearly as if he'd been suddenly gifted with telepathy: that Victor meant to name Brady heir and hoped to make him more palatable by denying him the Lu Nuncio's authority.

If so, Victor's strategy had already failed. This was not the silence of assent, but that of a thousand hunters uncertain of their prey.

"We have several who may be able to carry the mantle," Victor went on. "I know—it grieves me, but I know—some of you do not want to see it go to my son. My only living son." His voice caught briefly. "So I bring to you another tradition. Though we have not followed it for many years, it is an ancient and honorable path. Rather than naming my heir, I will loose the mantle and let it choose."

That brought a buzzing of whispers and subvocalization. Leidolf was shocked, but this way, while very old indeed, was understandable to them. Though who would have thought Victor could surrender control to such a degree?

All at once Rule knew. His mind didn't leap from fact to fact, connecting them; he simply knew what Victor meant to do. Calmly he said to Benedict, Get Lily out of here. Now.

"Forget it," she said. "I'm not going anywhere."

His head swung toward her. "You heard me?"

"Of course I…" Her eyes widened. "Uh—you weren't talking out loud, were you?"

"Let those of the blood," Victor called, "all those of the blood, for two and three generations back, come forward!"

"That would be us," Brady said, grinning like a cat about to torment the mouse in its paws. "Cousin."

@ Ll LEI had not been born patient, but she'd had sufficient lessons in patience that she understood waiting. Best to ignore it. Having done what was necessary, she now paid attention to the present, and the things that mattered.

Such as winning. Toby looked very much like his father when he frowned that way. "You did well," she assured him. "You do not enjoy losing, but you played well. You may take the mah-jongg set upstairs now, to my room."

He grimaced, but obediently he began to gather the tiles, though he slid her the kind of look she used to see on her own son's face… and still did, at times. "At my house we have a rule that the winner puts the game up."

She didn't allow her mouth to smile, but knew her eyes were. She compensated by lifting both brows. "You are not in your house now, I believe."

He grinned but didn't argue. A good boy, she thought as he sprinted for the stairs. Spirited enough to push a little, to test, as the young should. Strong enough within himself that he didn't have to push.

"I almost had you," Steven Timms said. He leaned forward, careful of his cast, which was supported by a sling. "If I'd drawn—"

"Very little is won on 'if.' You held on to the red dragon too long."

Timms scowled. Like most men, he disliked being corrected. Li Qin said something soothing, so he turned to her and began telling her things she already knew about the game they'd just played. Not stupid things—simply unnecessary. Li Lei stopped listening.

Steven Timms had come to play mah-jongg every day after the beautiful Cullen left. True, she had told him to return; mah-jongg was better with four. But that was her reason. He thought he was protecting them, and he wanted his new friend to return and appreciate this.

On the surface, it was an odd bond. She had wondered if

Timms were a man lover who had conceived a passion for the beautiful Cullen but soon decided he was simply lonely. He was one of those who are very bright, but people blind.

Not in an evil way. True, he liked to shoot things—he was very boring on the subject—but he was not what Lily called a stone killer. He simply did not understand how to behave. He couldn't fathom the rules, how to be close to others instead of pushing them away.

She had read somewhere that doctors had a name for this problem. Doctors always felt better once they'd named things; it was an obsession with them. Li Lei couldn't recall the name, and didn't care. Neither did Timms interest her greatly, but Cullen Seabourne did, and he—

An orange blur skidded into the kitchen, claws scrabbling for purchase on the wooden floor. Dirty Harry raced to the back door and yowled, demanding that it open. His bristled fur made him look like a tattered marigold.

Li Lei sprang to her feet. "We are about to be attacked. Harry thinks the demon is out front. I trust his judgment. Li Qin, go with him. Tell the other guard to come in now, then get help. Telephone the police."

Timms shoved his chair back and stood, closing his hand around Li Qin's arm. "Wait a minute. You can't think that cat knows—"

"A great deal more than you," Li Lei snapped. Or her, in this instance. Cats were uncannily sensitive to demons. "Go. And hurry," she said to Li Qin, and removed Timms's hand.

That startled him, of course. He had no idea of her strength. "Go upstairs and make sure Toby hides," she told him. "I'll—"

"Calm down, calm down. If you think something's wrong, I'll check—though I think our werewolf guards would hear or smell a problem before I could see it." He gave her what he no doubt thought was a soothing smile and pulled his big gun from its holster, which he'd hung on the back of his chair.

"Do as you're told. Toby will not want to hide, but he must." She drew hard on the energy in her gut. Fast. This one must be fast. Harry feared very little—not Rule Turner, German shepherds, or wolves. Not even her. For him to flee meant that what was coming was bad, very bad.

Heat slapped through her body, vicious in its greed. She spoke the rest with difficulty. "You may come down and shoot things after the boy is hidden, but do not shoot me. I am going to Change."

"Change what?"

But she already was. And even as her cells burst and her body slid into otherness, she heard gunfire out front.

To his credit, Timms didn't drop his gun—or fire it—when the Change finished and ten feet of tiger stood before him. Nor did he stand staring for more than a second when she leaped out of the kitchen, heading for the foot of the stairs. She took her position there, to guard the boy. A moment later, Timms raced past. He was halfway up the stairs when the guard out front screamed.

Seconds later, the front door splintered.

If there had been a moment she could have acted, Lily had missed it. She had no time to play Monday-morning quarterback over any possible missed opportunities, though, as she, Benedict, Cullen, and Rule were marched through the crowd, courtesy of one gun held by a madman and a dozen thugs.

Lupus thugs. Her heartbeat was going crazy. "This is crazy," she muttered. "What do they hope to accomplish? I'm arresting all of them. They have to know I'll do that." Unless they planned to kill her—right after they killed Rule.

"They believe the clan will speak as one," Benedict said calmly, "to discount your testimony."

Rule's damned brother was always calm. He'd charged a dozen gang members with guns—calmly. After putting her forcibly out of the line of fire. "But why are they doing this? They don't want Rule to be heir."

"They don't think he will be." Cullen's abbreviated gesture indicated the clan members parting for them as they headed toward the center of the field. "They think this is Brady's little joke on Nokolai, a way to humiliate Rule."

Lily caught the glance Rule gave Cullen. The two of them knew or guessed more than they were saying. "It isn't a joke, but it doesn't make sense, either. Rule can't be Leidolf heir. He's Nokolai heir."

"Technically," Benedict said, speaking very low but not sub-vocalizing, "it's legal for him to be both. One of his ancestors carried the Leidolf founder's blood, and he's ad littera clan."

"But why would Brady do this?"

"He wants to kill me," Rule said, as calm as his blasted brother.

"Brady and Victor," Cullen said viciously. "Victor's behind this. We won't stop this without crisping the son of a—"

"No," Rule said sharply. "Victor must live a bit longer. Death shock in such a crowd would send too many over the edge. You'd never get Lily out alive."

Lily stopped moving. "Rule." She reached for him. "You are not getting me out without—"

"Hush." He wrapped his arms around her, holding her close, pressing kisses into her hair, which covered any movement of his lips as he said. You can hear me?

She nodded.

The mantle. Victor isn't going to allow it to choose. He'll try to force the heir's portion on me, which would be… bad. Murder, most likely, but done in a way Nokolai couldn't claim as murder. But the mate bond is active. The last time this happened, I also gained. If your immunity to magic stretches to cover me, he won't be able to force the mantle on me.

"Move along, now." Brady was all good cheer, but the thug at his side gave the two of them a rough shove.

Rule spun, growling.

"Be nice to the lady, Merrick," Brady said, gun raised to point at Lily's forehead. "Or I'll have to shoot her."

"You're dead, you know," Cullen said.

"Me?" He laughed. "Oh, no, I don't think I'm the walking dead man here."

HE/SHE/THEY studied the house. A life burned brightly in the car parked in front; no driver was visible, but the guard couldn't hide from the demon's tither sense. The lives inside the house were visible in the same way, their presence muffled by walls and distance, but the demon saw them well enough for Cynna to count.

Five lives were in that house. Five people she cared about.

He/she lumbered toward the car, though. Not the house. Cynna screamed inside, trying desperately to seize just one bit of the demon, make a noise, something! But he/they reached the parked car, then reached inside in an indescribable way, bringing more of their mass into this realm.

He/they punched through the car window.

The guard reacted fast. He had his rifle ready and he fired point-blank. The bullets hit, too—three of them—hot stings that annoyed the demon as they reached inside and seized the man's shoulder. He screamed, which excited them. They dragged him out through a window too small for his body. The blood excited them even more.

THE last few people parted in front of them, and Lily saw Victor Frey for the first time. He looked like hell.

Cynna had described him as dapper and academic, looking about seventy. She saw a military martinet, not an academic—a very old martinet. He sat in an armchair, incongruous in its floral print on the winter-dead grass. He sat very erect, but his skin sagged in the runneled folds of very old age. How he'd summoned enough wind to outshout his clan earlier, she couldn't imagine.

Behind him stood ten well-armed lupi. Four of them immediately surrounded Benedict; though they kept a healthy distance, the rifles they trained at his head would keep even him from acting. Two flanked Cullen, guns drawn.

The Rhej stood beside Victor in her white robe, her face impassive. On his other side stood a man who must have been related to her—same eyes and skin tone, plus the proportions between their chins and mouths matched.

"Alex," Benedict said. "Did he tell you that he'd name Brady heir if you didn't agree to be Lu Nuncio?"

Victor turned cold eyes on him. "Nokolai is not welcome here. Be quiet or be muzzled."

"Nokolai," Rule said dryly, "was brought here at gunpoint. Is this normal for those who guest with Leidolf ?"

"But you aren't—entirely—Nokolai today, are you?" The twitch of those pale, desiccated lips was probably meant for a smile. "Today you are Leidolf as well. And by blood and my sister's great folly, you are also my great-nephew. How could we leave you out?" He gestured at the others as he raised his voice again. "Our candidates are assembled."

Seven other men stood in front of their Rho. They were giving Rule the kind of looks a butcher might give a mongrel that's eyeing his roasts… or that a wolf might give another wolf intruding on its territory.

A single wisp of magic, feathery light, tingled across Lily's face. A sorceri, she realized. Cullen had said there was a node in the central field. They often leaked a bit. She tried and failed to think of some way to take advantage of that.

She still had one weapon. A SIG Sauer wasn't proof against a thousand lupi, but she need only train it on one. "You must be Victor Frey," she said, stepping forward. "I'm Lily Yu with the FBI's Magical Crimes Division. You're in a lot of—"

"Stop her," Victor said.

Whatever the mate bond had done for her hearing, it hadn't granted her lupus speed. She got her gun out, but it clattered uselessly to the ground when two guards grabbed her, one on each arm.

Rule jolted but didn't move. "You're putting hands on a Chosen," he said softly, and looked at the Rhej.

"She won't be hurt," the woman said. Though her face remained impassive, trouble edged her voice. "Will she, Victor?"

"Of course not. But she can't be allowed to shoot me." He pushed to his feet and stood stick-straight, but it cost him. She saw the tremor in his hand, the way his face tightened. Yet he found that carrying voice again. "The candidates will kneel."

The seven who'd given Rule such unfriendly looks dropped to their knees. So did Brady, she saw when she twisted in her captors' grip to check.

Rule didn't.

Victor smiled. It made his face a gargoyle's mask of wrinkles. "You will," he said softly, "before we are through." He closed his eyes and said something in Latin. He spoke the words three times.

Lily waited, her heart trying to knock its way through her chest. They were gambling everything on the mate bond, the capricious, do-what-it-wants bond she'd never understood, much less controlled. "Lady," she whispered, "if you're around, if you're in charge of any of this, help him. Help him."

The Rho held out his hands, palms forward as if he were pushing something. He swayed. One of the kneeling men made a small sound, maybe of astonishment. Another toppled over in a silent heap.

And Rule… like the Rho, he swayed. His eyes were wide, unseeing, his hands limp at his sides.

And the power wind blew in.