Strange Brew (27 page)

“Oh, probably not,” Dahlia said. Clifford didn’t seem reassured. “Let me warn you, Clifford, you must have a story to tell, and it has to be a good one, a credible one. This woman is a witch and she can do awful things to men, if her predecessor is any example to go by.”

Clifford brightened. “Hey, I’m a shaman and a Were,” he said proudly. “If she’s a woman—and I know that she is—I can charm her out of her pants.”

The two vampires raised their brows, clearly skeptical.

“Well, maybe it wouldn’t work on you ladies,” Clifford conceded. “But a witch? Piece o’ cake.”

The two vampires exchanged glances. It was true that many young Weres possessed a lot of physical charm. And if their suspicions were correct, the witch had already proved susceptible to that particular brand of charm. They looked at Clifford, and they nodded simultaneously.

The next night, Clifford rang the mansion doorbell just after the sun had gone down. Taffy, who’d been waiting anxiously since the second she’d risen, gaped up at the young man. He now had grayish-white horns sprouting from his forehead. They were about half the size of a longhorn bull’s, and they were sharp-pointed. Dahlia, who’d heard Clifford’s voice and come to greet him, put her hand over her mouth.

“Piece of cake,” Taffy said. She turned away because she was trying not to laugh. Even Dahlia’s lips curved in a quick smile. She preceded Taffy and the Were down the hall to her room. “Please sit down, Clifford,” she said, trying to make her voice as level as ever. “You seem to have acquired a burden.” They passed a yawning male vamp on their way, and his mouth fell open when he took in Clifford’s new head decorations.

The young Were was trying hard not to look as chagrined as he must have felt. “Well, okay, stuff happened. I filmed in several classrooms,” Clifford began, but had to stop and rearrange himself in the chair. The unaccustomed weight of the horns put him off balance unless he sat absolutely straight. “So that part was okay. The school seemed happy that the university film class was making a short feature about children. But after I filmed Kathy’s kids, I hung around while they were on the playground, trying to make a pass at her. I got her address and phone number, so she went along with it, up to a point. But when she realized I was a Were, and she figured out I knew what she was, she felt free to show her real nature. I pushed a little too hard with the sexual innuendo, maybe.” Clifford shrugged, and his horns wobbled. He had to reach up to grab his head to make it balance. “She twiddled around with her fingers and said a few words in some language I didn’t know. I felt okay at first, but by the time I got home, the horns had started growing.”

The two vampires stared at the young Were without saying a word. Then they burst into laughter, and he glared at them while they rocked back and forth.

“Well, we know she’s the real deal now,” Taffy said to Dahlia.

“Yes. Let’s watch Clifford’s film.”

“You’ll find it interesting,” Clifford said, though he wouldn’t elaborate. Payback for the laughter, of course. He passed Dahlia a disc.

Dahlia had a television and a DVD player in her room, and it was the work of a second to start Clifford’s morning project. In a moment they were watching Kathy Aenidis’s third-grade class. The children all looked well scrubbed and neat, which was a surprise to Dahlia, who had kept up with the progress of modern education through the newer vampires.

Taffy said, “They look so tidy.”

“Yeah, the kids in her room did look better than the kids in the adjoining rooms,” Clifford agreed. “Shoelaces tied, clothes clean, shirts tucked in. But you’ll understand why in a minute.”

Kathy Aenidis, also known as the Circe, passed through the rows of desk doing her teacher thing. Her red hair was coming out of its low ponytail, and her glasses were sliding down her nose. Her long skirt came down almost to the socks and Birkenstocks on her feet.

Dahlia shuddered, and Taffy said, “Ewwww.”

While the camera followed the young teacher around her classroom, Kathy patted, corrected, encouraged, and chided. But all the while, her fingers were moving unobtrusively by her side.

“I see,” said Dahlia.

“See what? Aha!” said Taffy a moment later. “There, you see? She’s spelling them as she goes.”

“Their test scores are significantly higher,” Clifford said as his hands shot up yet again to still his wobbling head. “The principal told me so. The whole staff thinks Miss Kathy is the greatest thing since sliced bread.”

“She’s definitely got another side,” Dahlia murmured, her eyes fixed on the image of the plump and sweet Circe, whose fingers flickered constantly as she taught the children arithmetic. “I’ll give her this. The teaching job is good cover. Who would believe a word anyone spoke against her?”

“Oh, we would,” Taffy said. Taffy took things literally.

“I sure as hell would,” Clifford said. “Ladies, what am I gonna do about these horns? If I go to my instructor, he’ll laugh his ass off and make it a dinner story for years. And I haven’t had enough experience to attempt anything like this myself. I might vanish my whole head. These horns are throwing my skull off balance! What do you think? Ideas, please.”

“Cut them off?” Dahlia suggested.

Clifford flinched. “Don’t even say that as a joke,” he said.

“They actually look good on you,” Dahlia said, eyeing Clifford with some appreciation. She felt better than she had since Todd’s death. She’d enlisted the services of exactly the right witch, and she was going to have her vengeance. As for her glimpse into the morals of the Circe, Dahlia wasn’t overly concerned. After this job was done, she wasn’t planning on having dealings with the witch again.

Taffy wasn’t so distracted by dreams of the future as Dahlia. “Come on, Clifford,” she said. “We’ll go see the Ancient Pythoness. She’ll fix you up.”

“If she’s in her right mind today,” Dahlia said quietly while Clifford was busy pulling on his coat and opening his umbrella, the only thing that would halfway conceal his horns.

“I called the Depository,” Taffy whispered back. The Depository was the vampire headquarters for Rhodes, the place where all the secret ceremonial things were kept—and anything or anyone that the vampires wanted to hide or imprison. The Ancient Pythoness, who’d been turned when she was a very old woman, was one of the artifacts who needed to be hidden, for her own good. She was still quite a seer and quite a witch, but her powers were erratic and poorly controlled. Making a magical person a vampire had been a bad idea.

“While you’re there,” Dahlia said, struck by a sudden thought, “ask her if she can see where the current Circe hides her grimoires.”

“They really keep books? Full of spells and stuff?”

“Yes, they do. The current Circe said as much.”

“Oh,” Taffy said. “Well, that’s very interesting. Are you thinking we could steal them and hold them for ransom? And she wouldn’t be able to use the spells, because we’d have them.”

Dahlia tried not to look as exasperated as she felt. “No, Taff, that’s not what I was thinking. Just find out from the AP, and we’ll plan from there.”

Dahlia had thought of a final polish to her plan.

Taffy reported that Clifford had had a great time with the Ancient Pythoness, who was in a chipper mood and propositioned him several times. Clifford easily dodged the AP’s salacious suggestions, charmed her with his health and youth and budding shaman abilities—and his horns—and in the end, obtained everything he’d been told to ask for.

He reported back the next night, happily rid of his unwanted head decorations, to tell Dahlia and Taffy that he’d located the meeting place of the Ripper pack. Dahlia wouldn’t have been surprised if they’d convened in a Starbucks, but it was even worse; they met in a gym called the Fitness Firm.

Taffy made gagging sounds.

“What?” Clifford asked. It was the night before the full moon, and he was antsy and tense. “It looked like a great gym. Boy, those Rippers got some good-looking women, let me tell you!” He let out a happy yip, then looked sideways at Dahlia, embarrassed. “Hey, you’ll never believe who I saw in there with the Rippers, looking really not-so-great in yoga pants!”

“Oh,” Dahlia said, “I think I can guess.”

“Why’d you want to know where the Circe’s spellbooks are hidden?”

“Because we need one.”

“But they’re going to be protected by all kinds of magic,” Clifford said.

“Yes, it is. But the magic will be geared to live people.”

“How can you be sure?” The young Were was doubtful, and Taffy was clearly anxious.

“The original Circe never met a vampire,” Dahlia said. “Her descendant told me so. It stands to reason that the spells to safeguard the grimoires do not protect them from the dead.”

“You’re willing to risk it,” Taffy said. “And I have to thank you, sister, because I’m too frightened.” She looked ashamed. “But I know my husband is the one in danger, and whatever else you tell me to do, I’ll do it well. You’ve never let me down.”

Dahlia did not mind one bit that Taffy had failings. She herself was simply more self-sufficient and ruthless. “Was Bart there?” Dahlia asked Clifford.

“Oh, yeah. He’s our second in command, so he’s supposed to hang with us since he’s a Swiftfoot now. But no, there he was with his old pack acting large and in charge. I saw him doing imitations of our pack members. I mean, I could recognize them, he was so good. The Rippers were laughing their asses off.”

“How could you see that?” Dahlia said. “We told you not to risk getting close.”

“The gym is a big glass cube,” Clifford said reasonably. “It’s the second floor of an office building, and the Fitness Firm is a very highfalutin gym. Between nine and ten every night, it’s open only to select parties. That’s when the Rippers go—”

“Well, how very obliging of them,” Dahlia said, and Taffy began laughing.

“Do you have any idea where the Circe is now?” Taffy asked Clifford when she’d calmed down.

“She’s out with her boyfriend,” Clifford said. “They’re at the movies. You want I should delay them on their way home?”

“Yes, please,” Dahlia said.

She left twenty minutes later, dressed head to toe in a very becoming facsimile of Kate Beckinsale’s skintight outfit in
Underworld
. Dahlia could tell Clifford’s mouth was watering when she strode into the darkness. It perked her up no end.

The Circe had a little house on a cul-de-sac in a bland suburb of Rhodes. As camouflage, it was perfect, and the taxes would be reasonable, too. Dahlia could appreciate the choice, which definitely looked more Kathy Aenidis, Schoolteacher, than Circe, Dread Sorceress.

Kathy’s defenses were formidable, but the Ancient Pythoness had supplied Clifford with a charm, and it seemed to work for a vampire as well as it would have for a werewolf. Dahlia was still uncertain if Kathy would have thought about defending her family records from a dead creature, but at least Dahlia had managed to cross the deck to the back door without being turned into a lizard or impaled on a sliver of bamboo. Dahlia crept close to the door and listened intently. A cat was meowing inside. Whether it was sounding a warning, like some kind of feline burglar alarm, or simply talking to itself, Dahlia couldn’t tell. She was not a pet person.

Just before she was about to pick the lock, Dahlia had second thoughts. Second thoughts were rare for her, and she listened to them when she had them. The door was simply too obvious, too likely to be booby-trapped. In one smooth leap, Dahlia made it up onto the roof. She moved lightly across the shingles, noting that Kathy Aenidis needed to get a roofing crew in pretty soon. To avoid the loose shingles, she lifted herself off the roof and flew to the chimney. Pulling away the screen designed to keep out birds and bugs, Dahlia peered down into the heart of the house. The flue was open, and she could see light. Ooooh, Miss Scary Witch left a night-light on. Dahlia dropped a piece of shingle down the aperture. The piece of shingle exploded in a puff of bright light.

Okay, so the chimney was protected. If the magic would explode a chimney tile, it would certainly deal with Dahlia, too. Time to regroup.

Dahlia floated down to the grass and circled the house. The backyard was fenced in, and Dahlia felt less conspicuous there, so after one circuit she found herself sitting on a large wooden bench in the middle of the Circe’s herb garden. The bench was probably also storage for garden tools; she was sitting on the lid, not a true seat, as she stared at the back wall of the house. With her excellent night vision, she watched bugs enjoying the spring garden. Bugs had short, short lives, especially if they encountered a bug zapper, like the one she saw hanging on Kathy Aenidis’s deck. One flash, and they were gone.

One flash.

In a jiffy she was back up on the roof, looking down into the chimney. She had another piece of tile in her hand, and she tossed it down. Ha! No flash! The Circe’s alarm didn’t automatically reset. It needed to be charged up again, now that it had gone off.

Dahlia looked at the dimly lit brick and had another rare moment’s misgiving. But then she squared her shoulders and plunged into the chimney, twisting her flesh and bones with a fluidity even a shapeshifter might envy. By the time she landed in the fireplace—she was grateful that the house-proud Kathy had cleaned it out after the last fire of winter—she was battered and her black leather suit was scuffed and scraped far beyond its previous pristine smartness.

Dahlia crouched in the semidarkness, listening and looking with all her senses on alert. The only thing living in the house was the cat, whose mewing had gotten quite aggravating. Dahlia emerged from the fireplace and straightened gratefully into her normal shape and size. A clock ticked, the cat kept making noise, and somewhere a faucet dripped. She waited for five minutes, and no other sound intruded.

First, silencing the cat. Dahlia found the animal caged in the basement. Dahlia had taken the precaution of bringing down the box of hard cat food she’d seen in the kitchen, and she poured some into the bowl which protruded out from the cage. The food slid into the inner portion of the bowl, and the cat began eating immediately. It had water in a bottle suspended from the side of the cage. At least the animal was temporarily quiet.