Page 42 of Blood Magic

Chapter Sixteen

“I knew you had an ulterior motive,” I said.

“Just one motive of many.” He sighed. “Ms. Silver, I have no plans to hurt you. And this coven would be much better off with me as its master.”

“I believe you know more than you’re telling me,” I told him.

“Not about the shading,” he said. “There’s a lot we need to learn, but I’m afraid I do not hold the answers. I can only point you toward those who might.”

“I will call the number tomorrow.”

“I would like you not to mention my name,” he said.

I cocked an eyebrow. “I’m not stupid, Bastien.”

I’d seen them in the ground. I knew what these vampires did to each other. I would not mention his name. And even as I was thinking of protecting him, I wondered why I was.

He opened another set of doors which led into a small foyer. Along one wall was a bank of lockers. He opened one and gently pulled out a red feathered mask which he handed to me. “Put this on, Ms. Silver. It will protect your identity.”

“Do you expect me to believe the vampires don’t have cameras all over this place?” I asked, incredulous.

“Of course there are cameras,” he said. “But no one will see a reason to go through them until you are long gone.” He shrugged. “And if you behave, not even then.”

“They won’t smell my…”

“Your wolf? No. They would only catch your scent if you were bleeding, if you had fed them, or if you’d had sex with them. Somehow, I do not believe any of those things will happen here tonight.”

“Or ever,” I said, “except maybe for the bleeding part.”

“You will not do that either,” he murmured, “as long as I am here.”

For a moment I said nothing. “How did you know about my wolf?” I asked, finally, but then, abruptly, I understood. My eyes widened. “Because you tasted me,” I whispered. “The night I pulled you from the ground. You deliberately tasted me, and now…what? You know what’s inside me? You know my scent?” I was horrified. And I was regretful. I should not have gotten so close to a newly freed vampire. I’d known better. “I saved you, and you repaid me by biting me.”

He said nothing, neither denied nor admitted, and he certainly didn’t apologize. At the end of the hallway waited a bouncer in a small room, and he nodded at Bastien when we approached him. He barely glanced at me before shoving open a pair of smaller doors, and then, Bastien took my arm, and he would not let me jerk away. He pulled me into a whole new world.

Not everyone wore a mask. Only the humans. At least that was what I assumed. And there were many of them. Suddenly, I was questioning everything I thought I had known. There were humans in this room. And they knew about the vampires.

“Who are they?” I whispered. “Who are these humans?”

“Law enforcement,” he murmured. “Governmental agencies, hospitals, every occupation, every age, both rich and not so rich. All beautiful,” he said, then added dryly, “To a vampire, all humans are beautiful on the inside.”

“How did I not know this?” I looked around the room, which was similar to the room upstairs only less noisy, darker, and more richly appointed. And as we walked I saw humans willingly feeding vampires. Humans with masks who were completely naked, some wearing only collars, some having sex, with vampires and with each other…

How could I not have known?

“We all keep our secrets, Ms. Silver,” he told me. Maybe there was a little pity in his voice. “You have been out of the supernatural world for a very long time, even if you did not think you were.”

He knew everything about me. Obviously, he knew everything about me. I didn’t know how or why, and it didn’t really matter. It was enough that it was true.

I was dizzy suddenly and overwhelmed with anger, frustration, sadness even. Mostly at and for myself. To say I was confused was an understatement.

I had known nothing. I wondered if Remy had a clue. I wondered if any of the humans down here were people I knew.

“We must eat,” he told me gently. “And we do not all abduct and shade humans, or snatch homeless people and runaways off the streets, the way you might have thought we did. We have networks. We have friends. There are people who crave our bite. Slowly, the world will come to know us. And when they do, it will be people like this who start it. People like this who stand up for us. People like this who champion our cause. It is not as far off as you might think. And the absolute worst thing would be if men like Frederick Axton show the humans that they had reason to kill us. To hunt us. If they fear us, they will hate us. We must take that fear away.”

“You said you didn’t want such a thing to happen,” I said dully.

“I don’t. But if it must, then we should give it the best chance we can.”