He shuddered against me, arms hugging me close. I could tell he was ready for sacrifice without looking, but I had to glance down anyway. He was ready. I pulled free of him, gently. "You're ready to go back to the vamps, Seth. I think you're ready to make a sacrifice." I made myself look him in the eyes.
He bent and kissed my forehead, gently. "Thank you."
"You're welcome."
We walked back to the vamps hand in hand. But it wasn't the vampires that made me uncomfortable as we crossed the room. It was the humans, Bernardo looked like he was reconsidering my status as untouchable Madonna. Olaf had an almost hungry look on his face. It was closer to the way werewolves looked at you on the night of full moon than the way a man looks at a woman. Edward had a slight frown between his eyes, which for him meant he was bothered by something. The vampires looked about like I'd expected. Itzpapalotl looked serious, as if she hadn't known I could call the power up on purpose. It's why they'd apologized for dragging me up on stage earlier.
I gave Seth over to Chualtalocal like a father handing the bride to the groom. Then I moved back to stand by Edward. He looked at me, as if he was the one trying to read me for a change, and failing. It was almost worth it, if I could confuse Edward.
"Did you enjoy yourself, my cat?" the goddess asked.
"Yes, holy mistress, I did."
"Are you ready to make sacrifice?"
"Yes, holy mistress."
"Then do so." She looked past him to me, as if she didn't like what she saw. Something about what I'd done with Seth had disturbed her. Had she expected me to take him off in the corner and just do him by hand like a fluffer in a porno movie? Had the fact that I'd used power as well as mild sex disturbed her? Or had she seen something I hadn't, or understood something I did not? No way of knowing short of asking, and admitting that kind of ignorance to master vamps is a good way to get killed. So no questions about magic, just eventually, hopefully about the case.
Seth picked up the small silver blade again. He cradled his flesh in his hand and set the tip of the blade against himself. I caught Bernardo turning back towards the door. The blade tip bit into flesh, and I looked away. I think we all did, except for Olaf. It might have startled him the first time, but he was over the shock. Blood was being spilled, flesh being cut. Olaf couldn't miss that.
He watched the cutting, but then I caught him turning away out of the corner of my eye, and I had to look. I had to see what was bad enough for Olaf not to be able to stomach it.
The vampire had gone to his knees. I guess maybe I'd expected him to just lick the blood off, but he wasn't. He was sucking at it the way that Diego had sucked at Seth's ears, except this wasn't an ear. The vampire had covered almost every inch of Seth with its mouth. Seth's eyes were closed, and there was a look of concentration on his face.
I looked away again and found myself meeting the dead eyes of the four fallen nuns. Those empty, angry faces were almost harder to stare at than a vampire going down on someone. I literally turned my back on all of them and found that Olaf had done the same thing. He was hugging himself and staring at nothing. His discomfort rose off of him in almost visible waves. Even with his back turned, the sounds carried. I wished for the ringing in my cars to get worse.
Soft, sucking sounds, wet sounds, the sound of flesh in flesh, and the sharp intake of breath that was probably Seth. His breath came in three fast pants, and he spoke, "Please, holy mistress, I am not sure of my control tonight."
"You know the punishment," she said. "Surely, that is incentive enough to hold yourself in check."
I glanced back then and found that Seth was staring back over his shoulder at the four women in the corner. When he turned back, he looked scared. The vampire was still feeding, sucking, throat swallowing. Surely, the wound had healed by now, unless they'd made a second wound while I was being embarrassed and not looking.
Seth dug his fingernails into the palms of his hands. His hands paled with the force of squeezing nails into his own flesh. He threw his head back suddenly, breath coming fast, faster, fastest. The vampire pulled off of him, leaving him hard and still intact. "The wound has closed."
Chualtalocal stood and went back to his mistress. The moment there was room, Seth collapsed to his knees, opening his hands slowly as if they hurt There were bloody half-moons where his nails had bitten into his palms. But it had worked. Any distraction to keep him out of the clutches of the goddess's pet freaks.
"I offer you hospitality, to you and your friends. You may have Seth if you like and finish him as his body seems to so badly need."
I suddenly knew what she meant by hospitality. Somehow I didn't think that was Aztec culture, though if I remembered correctly, hadn't some of the Aztecs sent Cortez and his men women along with food and gold? Maybe this wasn't any different. But I didn't want to mess with it.
"Dawn is coming. I can feel it pressing against the darkness like a weight about to tear the night apart."
She turned her head to one side and seemed to think, or maybe she was sensing the night, the air, something. "Yes," she said, "I feel it, too."
"Then if it isn't too large an insult, can we skip the hospitality for tonight and get to the murders?"
"Only if you give me your word that you will return and taste our hospitality before you go back to Saint Louis."
I glanced at Edward. He shrugged. I guess it was up to me. What else was new when it came to monster? "I don't agree to having sex with your people, but I'll agree to a return visit."
"You seemed to like Seth. I would offer you Cesar, who your power seemed to like even more, but he does not make sacrifice, nor does he act as hospitality. It is his price for letting us come so near killing him twice a month."
"You mean because he lets you nearly tear his heart out twice a month, he doesn't have to make sacrifice or all the other stuff?"
"That is what I mean."
It made me think better of ol' Cesar. I'd seen his show, and now I'd seen some of the behind the scenes stuff, and I had to say that it was a close call which was worse. Letting someone cut your chest open and touch your still beating heart, or letting vamps suck blood off of tender body parts and be offered for sex to strangers. No, come to think of it, I'd have rather had my chest cut open, as long as I knew I'd heal completely every time.
"It's not that Seth isn't lovely to look at. I'm sure it would be a pleasure to be with him, but I don't do casual sex. Thanks for thinking of me though. I know the police spoke with you."
"They did. I do not think they learned anything of value from me."
"Maybe they didn't ask the right questions," I said.
"And what are the right questions?"
I was about to do something that the police wouldn't like at all. I was about to tell the monsters, someone they had suspected at one point of being the murderer, details of the crime. But she needed specific details or how was she to recognize the marks of some Aztec bogeyman? I knew how the cops had done it. They'd been so general, it was almost useless to show up. I understood why they did it that way. Once I opened my mouth and let out details to Itzpapalotl, then she was contaminated. They'd never be able to slip her up in an interrogation, because she got the secret details from me.
What I knew and the police couldn't was that they'd never interrogate the truth out of her. She was the kind of vamp that could sit in a dark room and watch the colors on the inside of her own eyeballs and be content. The only thing they could threaten her with was the death penalty, and if she was behind the murders, it was already a death penalty. One of the downfalls to a swift and certain punishment was that it took a lot of the give and play out of an interrogation. Once someone knows they are going to be executed, you can't bargain with them.