The big doors swung open with the hiss of hydraulics and we stepped through to Edward’s private lair. The doors sighed closed behind us and I heard a faint click and a rattle in the Grey like the sound of insect wings. The bloody glow of the wards seeped though the walls into the room beyond and brushed over us like the touch of carnivorous vines. Then came the smell, the stomach-twisting psychic odor of vampires.

Edward entered the room through a door on the far side, bringing the heat and roil of his particular aura closer. Most of the bloodsucking fraternity seemed to exude a glamour of sexual attraction—prey attractor, I supposed, since if anyone could really see and smell them as I could, they’d never get close enough to get a bite in—and Edward’s was thick enough to gag on. I eased half a step back without thinking. It had been a while since I’d had to deal face-to-face with the Prince of the City. I’d forgotten how hard it was to be in his presence.

He strolled up to me, his eyes, hooded from recent sleep—or feeding—were directed straight to mine as if Goodall didn’t exist. Even freshly risen, he looked like a film star from Hollywood’s golden age: dark haired, sloe eyed, and far too handsome for anyone’s good. The spoiler was that he was short for a modern man—about five foot seven or so. He reached for my hand and caught it, stroking the palm with his fingertips. I wanted to shudder but didn’t.

“My dear Harper. Good of you to come.”

“As if I had a lot of choice.”

He raised his eyebrows in question. “You are under no compulsion.” He glanced at Goodall. “Is she? You’ve not got a gun to her back, have you, Bryce?”

“No, sir. Not that I think it would make a difference with this lady.”

“Indeed. She’d tear your arm off and feed it to you if you offended her. Wouldn’t you, my dear?”

I narrowed my eyes. “What do you want, Edward? Your secretary said it was urgent, not just an excuse to mess with me.”

He sighed. “Blunt as always. Yes, all right. It is urgent. Bryson, you may go.”

“I’d rather he didn’t,” I said.

“This one time, I’m afraid you have no choice,” Edward replied, dropping my hand and lowering the temperature in the room with his scowl. “Much as I trust Mr. Goodall’s discretion, this is not a discussion for his ears. Only yours. Stay or go as you choose, but choose now. I’m very busy.”

I glanced at Bryson Goodall, who didn’t move a muscle, not even to shift his eyes, which he kept fixed on his boss. The energy of his aura had expanded when Edward came near, and now it rippled in a dark blue corona shot with yellow lines and coils. There was something very odd going on between him and Edward, whose own red-and-black energy haze reached out toward Goodall’s like the tongue of a snake.

“Why should I assume I’m safe with you, Edward?” I asked.

He closed his eyes as if he were too exhausted to bear it. When he opened them, they were darker than ever and infinitely tired. “If I wanted you dead, Ms. Blaine, you’d never have exited my plane alive.”

“That’s not a comfort with you.”

He laughed. “True.” Then he turned to Goodall. “Bryson, I believe Ms. Blaine will be staying, after all. Please retire until I call for you again.”

Goodall gave a curt nod and left us alone, the door opening before him automatically.

“Neat trick,” I said, watching the doors.

“Rather. It wasn’t easy having them installed. The panels are ancient and powerful. I’m afraid I lost a few people getting it done.”

So they were dark artifacts—objects that had been imbued with or accrued magical residue and, with it, power. That might explain the darkness of the spells around them. The wrong kind of magician would lust after them more than he would all the virgins of heaven.

I let Edward take my hand again and lead me deeper into his sanctum, resisting the urge to recoil from the hot/cold sensation that rushed up my arm at his touch. We went through a door and into a chamber—you couldn’t call it a room—decorated in dark green. All the better to conceal the blood, I thought, for this looked like a small board room and I imagined that any business done here carried the direst consequences for someone. A large black table dominated the center of the room with hard chairs ranged around it and audiovisual equipment hanging from the ceiling. Off to the side were several groupings of more comfortable chairs—no doubt for private conferences.

Edward led me to one of these and slid with his usual elegant bonelessness into one of the seats. There was already a drinks tray on the table between the chairs. I sat more carefully. He poured amber liquid into glasses and I didn’t pick mine up.

“It’s quite safe,” he said, sipping at his own drink. “It’s a rather rare whiskey and very nearly eighty years old. I wouldn’t insult such a distillation with anything that would harm you.”

“I’d rather know why you were in such a rush to see me.”

“You really can be stubborn.”

“It’s one of my best traits, I think.”

“Do me and my whiskey the honor of taking a sip, and we’ll get down to business. Please.”

Well. he wasn’t going to kill me, and we’d long ago established that I’d be no use to him undead, either, so I took the risk and drank. It was, without doubt, the smoothest, mellowest whiskey I’d ever tasted in my life—not that I’m an expert. Once in my mouth, it went places and did things whiskey ought not to be allowed to get up to, and my fingertips tingled from the warmth of it. I could feel a flush on my face. Barrel strength. I narrowed my eyes at Edward.

“Don’t,” he said. “Appreciate it as it is. I’m not trying to get you drunk and take advantage of you.”

“You won’t.” I put my glass down. “It is very good, but before the whiskey steals my sense, tell me what you want from me.”

“I need you to go to London on my behalf.”

“You could send Goodall. He’s obviously in your good graces, competent, and aware of what you are as well as who.”

“Mr. Goodall is only recently installed in his position, and anyway, he can’t be allowed too far from my side yet—even if he wasn’t known to be my employee. He won’t do. I need someone horribly clever and not openly my friend. Which certainly fits you.”

“I’m hardly thought to be your enemy, either.”

He stood up, agitated. “You are a neutral party. They may think they can sway you, suborn you. I know they won’t succeed.” He started pacing on a short track across the space in front of the two chairs we occupied.

“Who? Who is this ‘they’?”

“The London cabal. Possibly with the help of other factions and agitators, certainly with the help of my enemies there and here. You have seen us fractured and fighting here, but I assure you, Seattle is a tranquil sea of unity compared to the Old World.”

I snorted, but Edward shook his head.

“It’s the truth. I handled Seattle poorly—as you demonstrated—because I had grown used to the habits of England and its divisions and factionalism. They were an irritation but a constant in England that one simply accepted because the population is old and the territories and hatreds well-established. They could not be changed, only worked around. I have been trying to change that here. But it has not made my enemies into friends. I suspect my troubles on both sides of the pond are orchestrated by a single source, but among my unfortunately numerous enemies and evil-wishers, I don’t know who it is. It’s the sort of trouble old enemies stir up—people who’ve known you long enough to think they know your weaknesses.”

“If these problems are connected, then why are you ignoring the destruction of vampires in the underground?”

His eyes narrowed. “Your friend is not in my best graces over that. ”

“He says he didn’t do it.”

“I’m aware of that. And of who did. There is much going on of which you are not aware, and I cannot simply do as I like. Still, I’m not best pleased to have lost one of my own. But I can address that myself. And I will, but that will require my attention here. I cannot go to London on this other matter. You can.”