“She’s about your age. Long, dark hair, dark eyes,” he said, as if reciting a grocery list. “She’s arrogant, stubborn, and short-tempered.”

I snorted and started walking again. “You’ve just described most nightwalkers.”

Danaus fell into step beside me, while Valerio and Stefan followed close on my heels. Only Danaus’s footsteps crunched in the snow. We nightwalkers had lived too many years of moving like a summer breeze across an endless field to make noise now. There was no question where we were headed. There was a large concentration of nightwalkers up ahead, and it didn’t take much to sense their energy floating in the air.

“What is this place?” Danaus asked as we turned a corner and started to walk up the circular drive of a large neo-Baroque building. Outside, a large statue threw down a massive shadow as if it were guarding the place. Several large domes rose up in the night, while the gray stone front was marked by tall columns and enormous windows that reflected back the light that shone off the snow.

“It’s the Széchenyi Baths,” I replied.

“A Turkish bath?” Danaus said, obviously surprised. I understood why. Most of the time when we were meeting up with a powerful nightwalker, they preferred to hold court in a dark, human-crowded nightclub where food and sex were easy to find.

“Not a true Turkish bath, though there are still some in the city” Valerio said. “This one wasn’t discovered and rebuilt until the early twentieth century.”

“And when was the last time you were here?” I asked, arching one brow as I looked at him over my shoulder.

“More than three centuries ago, as you may recall,” he said, sliding me a sly smile that brought a blush to my cheeks. But then most of our memories would stain my cheeks red. “As to how I knew about Széchenyi, I had some time to read while I was waiting for your arrival.” To my shock, the nightwalker pulled a small travel guide out of his pocket and flashed it to me before returning it to his pocket.

“Always prepared for any eventuality,” I mocked, then turned my attention to the small grouping of nightwalkers that stood by the front doors. The welcoming committee didn’t look as if they were ready to let us pass into their private club, fellow nightwalkers or not.

As we drew close to the front doors, the three nightwalkers fanned out, blocking our entrance. Their hushed conversation stopped and they adopted a variety of bored and uninviting looks. It was all I could do to not giggle. The oldest of them wasn’t more than three centuries old. Hell, their combined ages couldn’t equal Stefan’s age, or probably even Valerio’s, not that the nightwalker would admit to it. They didn’t stand a chance in being able to stop us on their best night. I completed a quick scan of the entire exterior of the bathhouse and the entryway as well. They were the only ones guarding the place.

Are there no old nightwalkers within the city beyond Odelia? I inquired of Stefan. These three could barely stop a determined human if they wanted to. Why put something so young on guard duty unless there was no one you were truly guarding it against except humans?

Not many, from what I had been able to gather, he replied. I could sense his distaste for the private communication, but he at least understood that this was not the type of conversation one had with the help.

Seems odd for a city so old. From my experience, old cities attracted old nightwalkers. They had old hiding places, old traditions, and old languages they were able to cling to.

Odelia may have cleaned house in order to solidify her power within the city.

It was a distinct possibility and was not totally unheard of. Removing any nightwalker that was relatively close to your age removed any potential competition in the region for your dominance. But in truth, it was odd for such an old city to be in the hands of one so relatively young. Budapest should have been in the hands of an Ancient at the very least. I was beginning to wonder if I was potentially cleaning house so Macaire could move in. To my knowledge, the Elder preferred to linger in Rome, never traveling too far from the coven seat in Venice.

“What business do you have here?” asked the eldest of the nightwalkers in Hungarian as we finally stopped before them.

“We’re here to enjoy a midnight swim,” I replied easily in Italian. My Hungarian was still too rough, and traditionally, Italian announced to any nightwalker that you were from the coven. Unfortunately, this pronouncement didn’t go over as I expected. The three nightwalkers looked at each other in confusion, clearly unable to understand what I had just said to them. In fact, I was stunned speechless when Valerio finally had to repeat what I had said in Hungarian.

This is wrong, I said, directing my thoughts to both Valerio and Stefan. They are all more than a century old. Should they have not all appeared before the coven already? At the very least, the oldest should have been brought before the Elders. Has the tradition stopped here in Europe?

No, Valerio replied, his tone betraying some concern. All nightwalkers eventually appeared before the coven. All nightwalkers first learned Italian by pleading for their lives in that elegant language.

“He cannot enter,” the oldest of the three declared, pinning Danaus with a dark gaze. “Only magic users are permitted inside.”

“What must he do to prove that he’s a magic user?” Valerio inquired before I could argue. I was already growing weary of this trio, but then I was just another spoiled nightwalker long used to getting her way.

“He must cast a powerful spell of some sort on one of us,” one of the nightwalkers said with a disbelieving smirk.

“Fine,” I snapped in Hungarian. “Danaus, kill that one.” I pointed to the one who had spoken. He simply smiled at Danaus and me. For a moment I almost pitied him because he couldn’t sense the energy that circled around the hunter, but my pity for him dissipated before it could fully form.

I can’t do it, Mira, Danaus whispered in my mind, stunning me. I looked over at him, struggling to keep my mouth from falling open. This nonsense from a creature that seemed to chomp at the bit every time I tried to restrain him from killing a nightwalker?

What are you talking about? Boil his blood. Gaizka won’t benefit from that bit of magic, I argued.

It’s not that. I’ve never killed a nightwalker that didn’t attack me first.

You must. If you don’t, we’ll have to leave you behind, and then all three of them are going to attack you. When the hunter continued to frown at me, I finally relented. All right, boil his blood until he begs for mercy. You don’t have to kill him.

Satisfied with that arrangement, which shocked me more than I cared to think about, Danaus raised his hand toward the nightwalker I had indicated. Around me, I could feel his power swelling in the air, warming me like the summer sun breaking through the clouds. The smile slid off the lips of the young nightwalker and he looked down at his bare hands. The skin undulated as if something were crawling beneath the surface. With a whimper, he threw off his long coat as he ran out into the snow. His long fingernails tore at the bare flesh on his arms, revealing blood that popped and hissed as it boiled just beneath his skin. He released a bloodcurdling scream as he dropped to his knees and plunged both arms into the calf-deep snow, trying to cool the heat that was steadily building within his body, but it wasn’t enough.

Closing my eyes, I reached out for the stream of energy flowing between Danaus and the nightwalker. I gathered up my own powers and merged them with the stream, giving the spell a little boost without directly controlling Danaus. The nightwalker shrieked, his body twisting and contorting at odd angles before he finally flopped back into the snow, silent and dead. We had completely melted his organs, destroying his heart.