Kiss the Dead (42 page)

“I’ve heard the rumors,” Dolph said.

“They are not rumors. They are fact.”

I sat there, trying to be very still, trying not to show in any movement, or lack of it, or facial expression that Weiskopf might know things that weren’t in the news and that I might not want my fellow police officers to know.

“The fact that Jean-Claude tolerated the Church of Eternal Life, and did not insist they all take oath to him, gave us great hope.”

I fought not to relax, because he could have said
blood-oathed
, and I really didn’t want to go into details on that with Dolph. He might know, but he might not understand, what it meant for a vampire to take oath to the Master of the City.

“But then, Jean-Claude did demand it, and we lost hope.”

“So, you decided to try to kill him,” I said.

“No,” Weiskopf said, and he looked serious, and shocked. “No, we never advocated violence. On my honor, and the honor of my master, we never encouraged anyone to do violence to anyone. We were most aggrieved to see the dead police officers on the news.”

“You chose vampires that looked like children, or the elderly,” I said. “You meant to appeal to the media.”

“We suggested that we show the media that vampires are not all beautiful and sexy like your vampires. We wanted to show that vampires are truly people in many shapes and sizes, so yes, we chose a group, but we never meant for them to be used in such a vile way.”

“Your master, Benjamin, was their master; he had control of them while they did this vile shit.”

“No, my master is not theirs. We have purposefully not tried to control any other vampires except through speech and the persuasion that any normal human could use.”

“Bullshit,” I said.

He let me see that flash of anger again. “I have given you my word of honor.”

“He’s a master vampire, and they didn’t belong to any other master; it means that a powerful enough vampire exerts more control over them than any human ever will.”

“Only if the master wills it so, and my Benjamin has been most careful for centuries to control no one but himself.”

“Vampires are all about the food chain, the hierarchy; everyone owes allegiance to someone. Your master didn’t just spring into being, he came from a bloodline of some vampire, so he owes allegiance to that line, and whoever created him.”

“His master was killed by one of the long-ago vampire hunters, the predecessor of you, the Executioner. We were told that if the master of our bloodline died, then we would die with him, but we woke the next night. It had been a lie to keep us from attacking the head of our order.”

“I only know one line that had its head wiped out, and only two vampires that survived it.”

“Your Wicked and Truth, yes, they survived as my master survived,
but our bloodline sprang into being and fled into the wilderness. He did not want to be part of the hierarchy of blood and depravity, but of course, by being a master and acquiring followers he began to value the growing power over his own good intentions, and they were good intentions once. He meant us to live as holy a life as the cursed could.”

He was talking of some unknown bloodline that had basically tried to run a monastery in some isolated area. “A vampire monastery?” I made it a question, but couldn’t keep the disbelief out of my voice entirely.

“Exactly; as much as the head of my master’s bloodline could make it. He was devout, so his very faith made holy objects work around him; it was most distressing to all of us.”

I fought not to show surprise, because he was basically saying the vampire had not lost his faith, and his very faith had made holy objects flare around him. I tried to wrap my head around the idea of a vampire that made holy objects work against him, due to his own faith. It was just too weird.

“You may think what you will, Anita Blake, but I am telling the truth.”

“Were you there, or is this just what Benjamin tells you?” I asked.

Weiskopf looked at me, very serious eye contact now. “You know as well as I do how complete the memories can be between master and servant. I know the truth, whether this body was present for the events, or the other body was alone for the making of certain memories. We were there. We saw the truth.”

I didn’t like the way he kept saying
we
; it was creeping me out. Was that what would have happened to Jean-Claude and me if we weren’t so very careful about all the psychic connections between us? I thought about the months of learning curve when Richard, Jean-Claude, and I had all intruded on each other emotionally, sensorily, and in dreams. If we hadn’t done anything to fight that… I remembered moments when I hadn’t been sure whose body I was in, and who was seeing what. Yeah, if we hadn’t set up rules of psychic etiquette, it could have made us into one mind with three bodies, or that was what Richard and I were afraid
of. I wasn’t sure if it scared Jean-Claude or not, only that it scared the hell out of me. To the point that I’d run for the hills for six months at a time, and left them both alone physically, emotionally, and as tight as I could shield psychically.

I sat there and listened to Weiskopf say
we
, and knew he meant it. They were a
we
, no longer an
I
. My skin ran cold with the thought of it.

“What has frightened you?” Weiskopf asked.

Fuck, I wasn’t doing a very good poker face. Double fuck. I tried to rally and distract him. “So, some long-ago vampire hunter hunted the head of Benjamin’s line down and killed him. Killing the master never kills all the little vampires, Mr. Weiskopf. It never has, not a single time, when I’ve done my job.”

He studied me. “But they were small masters, the creator of a bloodline, the fountain of blood, the Fontaine de sangre; slaying that vampire is supposed to kill everyone descended from them. But it was a lie to keep us from rebelling against our creators. It was a lie, because we woke the next night. We, alone, woke.”

“Benjamin was strong enough to make his own heart beat, simple as that,” I said.

“No,” Weiskopf said, and he leaned toward me over the table. “No, it’s not that simple.”

“Then why didn’t the other vampires wake that next night? If it was all a lie, they should have all woken up,” I said.

“The vampire hunter killed many of them. He murdered them in their caskets, their caves.”

“Had they murdered people in the surrounding area?”

He nodded. “Our master had grown depraved with power. You cannot seek to control other vampires without it leading to corruption of your very mind and soul. So we sought to control no one but ourselves.”

“And how did that work for you?” I asked.

“We were drawn to make followers, but we resisted. We traveled, always, so that we did not come to the attention of any other master. We
did not want to fight for a territory, and we didn’t want to be forced to bend our knee to any other vampire. We wanted only to be left alone.”

“You had followers. They killed two police officers. One of them was about to kill his pregnant ex-wife when we stopped him.”

“Killed him, you mean,” Weiskopf said.

I nodded. “Fine, yes, killed him, but if it was him or a pregnant woman who’d done nothing wrong besides leaving her abusive ex-husband, I’d make the same choice again.”

“As would we,” Weiskopf said. “Saving the woman and the unborn child was the right thing to do.”

I couldn’t help but frown at him. “Glad you see that.”

“Don’t be so surprised, Anita Blake. We believe in violence to save the innocent. We are not complete pacifists.”

“Good to know,” I said.

“We had followers in the way of any human leader, but we did not make them bow to us. We did not make them take an oath to us. We were very careful to use only words.”

I shook my head. “Weiskopf, a master vampire exerts control over lesser vampires just by being near them; it’s like some kind of preternatural pheromone.”

“You lie,” he said, and he sounded so sure.

“Don’t you understand, that’s how a Master of the City knows another master is in his territory. They sense it.”

“But your Jean-Claude did not sense us.”

I tried to think of a safe way to reply to that. “Which means your Benjamin is very old, and very powerful. Let’s say that he truly is trying not to exert control over other vampires. Let’s say he honestly believes that he is just talking to them, just telling them that they deserve to be free of any master.”

“That is all we want, for us, and for them. Freedom from eons of dictatorial rule, is that so awful a goal?”

“No,” I said, and I believed it. “No, Weiskopf, it’s a good ideal, it’s a great ideal.”

It was his turn to look surprised. “I did not expect you to agree.”

“I’m just full of surprises,” I said.

“I should have known you would be, Anita Blake.”

“Anita,” I said, “just Anita.”

“Being friendly will not fool me,” he said.

“I’m just tired of hearing you say Anita Blake. I feel like I’m in trouble with a teacher at school.”

He smiled and nodded. “I understand; very well, Anita, and thank you for letting me use your given name.”

“You’re welcome. So, you and your master decided to try to free the little vampires from the control of the master vampires?”

“Exactly.”

“I believe that vampires are people, Weiskopf, or I wouldn’t be dating them; I wouldn’t be in love with one, or two.”

“Then how can you continue to execute them?”

I sighed, and felt my shoulders slump. I made myself sit up straight again. “I’ve actually been having a little crisis of conscience for a while.”

Dolph stirred beside me, a minute involuntary movement. I fought not to glance at him, but to pay attention to the man in front of me.

“So you believe you murder them?”

“Sometimes,” I said.

“All the time,” he said.

I shook my head. “I’ve seen vampires do horrible things. I’ve walked through rooms so thick with the blood of their victims that the carpet squished underfoot and the room smelled like raw hamburger.”

He flinched at that.

“I don’t believe killing the animals that did that was murder.”

He looked down at his hands on the table, then back up at me. “I can see that. Just as the one who tried to kill his wife, Bores, was in the wrong and had to be stopped.”

“Yes,” I said.

“Would you kill a human who had done awful things?”

“I have,” I said.

Weiskopf glanced up at Dolph. “Do your fellow officers know that?”

I nodded. “Sometimes the bad guys aren’t all vampires. I’ve helped the police hunt down and execute them, too.”

He narrowed his eyes at me, so cynical. “Humans have more rights; you can’t just kill them.”

“Do you consider shapeshifters human?” I asked.

“The law gives them the right to trial, unless the warrant has been issued for their deaths. Once the death warrant has been issued, they are as much a pariah of human society as a vampire.”

“So, is Benjamin trying to free the wereanimals from their pack leaders?”

He looked startled for a moment, as if the thought had never occurred to him.

I smiled, but knew it wasn’t pleasant. “All the old vamps think the shapeshifters are lesser beings. You think of them as animals, not people.”

He truly looked disturbed. He opened his mouth, closed it, and then said, “I cannot dispute your accusation. It did not occur to us to try to free them of their oppression, because they are animals, and animals need discipline, a leash of sorts to keep them from running amok and slaughtering the innocent.”

“Vampires need the same thing,” I said.

He shook his head. “That is not true.”

“Bullshit,” I said, “the newly risen can be just as animalistic as any first-time shapeshifter.” I pulled my shirt collar to one side to expose the collarbone scar.

“That was no vampire,” he said.

“You have my word of honor on that.” I slipped out of my jacket, and since I’d had to give up all my weapons to enter the interrogation room, I could show off the scars really well, no sheaths to hide them. I showed him the bend of my elbow where the same vampire that did my collarbone had torn at my arm like a terrier with a rat.

“You have a cross-shaped burn scar.”

“Yeah, some human Renfields thought it would be funny to brand me with it.”

“And the scar that pulls the skin so it’s crooked, what made that?”

“A witch that had shape-changed.”

“Not a shapeshifter?” he asked.

“No, it was a witch that used magic to steal the animal of a real lycanthrope.”

“I was there for that one,” Dolph said. “Anita helped save one of my officers.”

It had been Zerbrowski with his guts spilling out. I’d held them in with my hands while uniforms refused to help, because they thought the witch was a real lycanthrope and they might catch it. I’d held pressure on his wound, and screamed at them that they were fucking cowards, but Dolph and I had gotten Zerbrowski out of there alive. I’d been the one who held Katie when she fainted at the hospital. There were reasons that Zerbrowski and I partnered, and that Katie made sure I and my sweeties were invited to the barbecues and dinners. She wasn’t comfy with the vampires visiting, but she let my furry sweeties come visit. She’d made sure the other cops knew that if they couldn’t deal with it, they could leave. Katie seemed so soft, but there was steel under that silk, and she’d used it to defend me and Nathaniel and Micah at the last summer cookout. I loved Katie for that day.

“The vampire that tore at you, he was the newly risen?”

“No,” I said.

He shook his head. “No vampire that had been undead for any length of time would do that, unless it was one of the revenants, those poor things that are little better than ghouls.”

“The vampire that did this to me was over a hundred years old, and no revenant. He chose to hurt me like this; he wanted to make me suffer.”

“Why?” he asked.

“That’s something he’d have to answer,” I said.

“Is he alive to answer it?”

“No,” I said.

“There are bad vampires, as there are bad people, I suppose,” he said.