“They’ve been read in on the deets,” Derek added. “We can talk freely.”
Which hadn’t even occurred to me. My mind had been too busy on other stuff to sweat things like humans without enough info to understand what was going on. “Too much went wrong tonight, guys,” I said. “Angel, I need to see everything you have on camera. And you’ll note that the stuff on the secondary control panel you installed has been integrated into this one, and a bill for the design has been submitted to Raisin. To Ernestine,” I amended. One of the texts had been from the Kid telling me he had found and assimilated the secondary set.
Angel Tit’s eyebrows bunched and he glanced at Derek. “Told you she’d figure it out. Told Leo and Del she’d figure it out. Told all’a y’all she’d figure it out.” Derek grunted and Angel punched some spots on his integrated control screen. Security footage appeared on the overhead video screen. I watched the new men studying the videos as if their lives depended on it. And maybe they did.
The action lasted half an hour, with time not matching up anywhere as we followed from camera to camera, watching as men and women died, as Wrassler was mangled, as trained solders tried to ignore the changing of time and fought back. As the digital feed sputtered and went all blocky at times just as it had before from the presence of the arcenciel. But this time, the arcenciel was on-screen for only some of the occurrences of the pixelating blocks. “What’s causing the interference?” I asked.
Angel swiveled in his chair and grinned at me. “This time it wasn’t caused only by the light-dragon. This time the interference followed the vamp Peregrinus. I did manage to get some clear shots of him. These might explain it.”
I stared at the still shots plucked from the video. The fanghead was moving at vamp speed, and on regular digital camera footage, he would have been a pixel-blur, but on the new cameras, he was fairly clear—dark hair, dark pants, white shirt, leather belt, and boots. Necklace. But the jewelry looked different from the painting in the records room, and also different from the spare, stripped-raw moments when I had seen the vamp in person. Now the necklace looked larger, darker. Different.
“On the clearest one.” I pointed at the shot of my choice. “Can you zoom in and let me see the necklace?” I asked.
“This isn’t TV or the movies, but yeah, I can get in a bit,” Angel said. By his self-satisfied tone I knew he had already done it for himself.
The screen changed and the necklace moved front and center, bigger, but more blurred. On the chain hung the raptor in flight, the same focal he had worn for the painting centuries ago. But now it was joined by a larger, black focal, wired onto the necklace. The focal was vaguely spear-shaped, wider at the top, pointed and clear at the bottom like a jeweled crystal pulled from the earth. Something was inside it. The thing inside trailed down to a point, the same way water runs down glass, all squiggly. I didn’t have to see it again. I knew what I was seeing. I knew why Soul had lost contact with the hatchling, and what the moments meant when he and the light-dragon had been in my presence. Peregrinus had captured the young arcenciel and made it tiny. He was wearing the hatchling in a jeweled crystal, wired onto his necklace with steel wire. And arcenciels were allergic to steel. I narrowed my eyes, letting that thought percolate until I realized that this could be what Bethany had been talking about, but hadn’t understood how to accomplish the act. Peregrinus was riding the dragon . . .
“Depending on the learning curve, I’m guessing the necklace means Peregrinus now has access to some of the arcenciel’s power, and some of her weaknesses too, whatever they are,” I said. And since I had caused the death of Peregrinus’ pals, and then chased him away from killing (or eating or draining or whatever) the chained Joses Bar-Judas, I could guess that he would keep coming after me, as part of finishing whatever he originally came to accomplish. And yeah. He’d be angry.
I checked the current time on the video screen. It was an hour before dawn. I doubted that Peregrinus would be back tonight. To Derek, I said, “Get what you can from the vids. See about making this place secure. Get battery lighting on every hallway and stairwell. Get Leo, Grégoire, and Katie fed on ample human blood and somewhere safe.” I felt the expression that curled my mouth down. “Get them fed on the thing in the basement. Its blood is strong. Peregrinus will be back, probably tonight, which gives us maybe twelve hours. I have to talk to some people. Oh. And please see that the security at the graveyard is turned off. No need to alert or disturb the local LEOs.”
“Yeah,” Derek said, with false complacency. “No need for the local cops to get off their fat butts just to arrest you.”
“They can try.” That got some laughter, which felt like a good note to leave on. I swung out of the room, to find Eli waiting in the hallway, his earbuds in. He’d been listening to the meeting.
“I made the call to Del. Where are we going?” he asked, managing to sound only mildly curious, as if the information wasn’t vital, like how I took my tea, instead of how I was gonna keep us alive. I barked out a laugh and headed for the stairwell and up. “If I don’t tell you, will it kill you?”
“No, but we’ll waste time if I have to beat it out of you. And I might hurt my knuckles,” he added thoughtfully, our feet echoing on the stairs. I shook my head, smelling blood and bowel contents, the stench of fired weapons, and the stronger reek of cleansers in the contained stairwell air. Someone had died here recently. Odds were it was one of Derek’s men.
We left the stairwell and reentered the foyer. I hadn’t seen it since the lights came back on. There were uniformed men and women everywhere, mopping up blood. Men and women with hammers, plywood, and power tools working on making the entry secure. Not that the plywood was going to keep Peregrinus out. No chance.
I stepped into the empty weapons room and checked Wrassler’s Judge back in. No amount of firepower was going to help me where I was going. I picked up a set of keys and gestured to the back of the building.
“We jogging to the next gig too? Or are we stealing one of Leo’s armored SUVs to get wherever we’re going?”
“Borrowing. Not stealing.”
“Pa-tay-toh, pa-tah-toh.”
“Have you seen Brute or Bruiser?” I asked.
“Nope. Kinda worried about both.”
We pulled out of the back security gate, the vehicle smelling like cigarettes and weed. Fast-food wrappers were in the back floorboard, along with empty Red Bull cans and what might have been empty condom packages. I’d be talking to a driver or two: some guards needed to be taught to clean up after themselves; weed might slow reaction time; having sex on the job was stupid in a dozen ways; and smoke was a dead giveaway to any enemy vamp with half a nose. A visual which made me chuff with laughter.
As I pulled up to a light, I said, “We’re heading to the vamp graveyard across the river.”
“I got that part.”
“Yeah, well, the fun part will be me telling Sabina about the Son of Darkness chained in the basement, always assuming she doesn’t already know. And telling her about Peregrinus. And telling her we killed the Devil and Batildis.” Eli grunted ruminatively, so I finished with, “And then comes the not-fun part. Asking Sabina for the sliver of the Blood Cross, to kill Grégoire’s brother.”
“I read your report about the shard. It was taken from the wood of Calvary that the sons of Judas Iscariot used to bring their father back to life. And thereby accidently made the first vamp.” I nodded at his words. “Talking to Sabina sounds like fun,” he said, overly nonchalant.