“Why are we hiding?” I demanded.

Mira turned her head and looked out the window to her left. “It’s for the best. No one gets hurt.”

“And it leaves naturi running free within your domain.”

“I never said that I was happy with the decision!” she snapped, her temper briefly flaring. “I just said that it was for the best.”

“What’s going on? Normally, you would have set the four on fire by now and we’d be merrily on our way,” I pressed.

“‘Merrily on our way,’” she repeated, a grin spreading across her face as she looked back at me. “I don’t recall us ever doing anything merrily. You’ll have to remind me.”

“Drop it! I’m being serious. What’s going on?”

The grin fell off of her full lips and she looked down at the steering wheel. “I can’t start fires.”

I stared dumbfounded at the nightwalker for nearly a minute, my brain seeming to shut down under that unexpected pronouncement. The Fire Starter could no longer start fires. How could such a thing happen? What was going to happen to her and her standing within the domain once the other nightwalkers discovered her ugly little secret? Fire had always been Mira’s edge.

“How did it happen? When? Is it because of what Cynnia did to you? But that can’t be, because you used fire at Machu Picchu and at the conservatory. Is the ability completely gone?” I started, the questions pouring out of me before actual thought seemed to kick in once again.

“I haven’t lost the ability,” she said, sounding painfully defensive. “I could still burn you to a crispy critter if I wanted to, so stop celebrating.” Mira drew in a cleansing breath that she didn’t need and gripped the steering wheel tightly. “I haven’t been feeding enough.”

“I’ve noticed,” I growled. When I let my guard down, the world around me was washed in a red haze when I was with Mira. Her hunger beat at me until I thought I would go mad. I couldn’t imagine how she managed to focus through it.

“I haven’t been feeding enough,” she repeated stiffly, ignoring my interruption. “I don’t have the energy to create and manipulate fire. It would be too exhausting. If I’m pressed and desperate, I could, but it would leave me…”

“Vulnerable,” I finished.

“Yes.”

For a heartbeat, I thought about it. She was weak. She was little more than a normal nightwalker now. She wouldn’t have the power to set me on fire. She wouldn’t have the strength to fight me if I tried to kill her now. The fight would be over in a matter of minutes and the world would at last be rid of one of the most dangerous creatures to ever walk its face.

And yet, in the very next heartbeat, I knew I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t kill Mira. Maybe one day when we were finally standing on opposite sides and not drawn together by some common foe, I would be able to finally strike her down. But not tonight. For now, she was my ally, the one person in this world I had been charged to protect. Not only was she safe from me, but she also needed my help.

Leaning my right elbow on the door, I rested my head in my hand. I honestly couldn’t believe I was about to say this. “Then feed, Mira. We can’t afford to have you weak or possibly distracted. The naturi are running around your domain again and we’ve got something else chewing up young girls.”

“You don’t think this thing is naturi?”

I sighed, somewhat surprised to see that my breath was visible in the cold. I wasn’t ready to tell her. I needed more time to think, to figure out how we could possibly deal with this threat before setting the truth lose into the air. “I don’t know. You said there was a strange smell that you could identify. You’ve been around all the naturi, you know their smells.”

“So maybe the attacker isn’t naturi. Could be lycan or…warlock?”

“Or bori?” I said, mentioning the one creature I knew that she wouldn’t give voice to. The suggestion had to be thrown out there. She had to at least consider it.

“Highly unlikely.”

“And I’m sure you would have said that it was highly unlikely that I would have been affected by the Stain in Peru, but I was,” I said, turning my head to look at her. The spell had awoken the bori that held a part of my soul and the results had nearly been disastrous.

“Are the naturi close?” she demanded, ignoring my comment.

“No. Far end of the city and getting farther away.”

“Good. Then we continue this investigation by trying to find out why the attacker might have chosen Abigail Bradford for his victim when he could have chosen anyone else.” Mira reached for the key and started the car, causing its animal-like rumbling to echo through the empty warehouse.

“Where are we going?” I asked as she slowly backed the car into the street.

“The one place a nightwalker goes to get gossip: the Dark Room.”

I hesitated in the entrance to the Dark Room, my eyes growing accustomed to the low lighting. One thought kept repeating in my head: I shouldn’t be here. The floor was black marble, too closely resembling the throne-room floor of the coven’s headquarters in Venice. The small antechamber was lit overhead by a single lamp that cast down a red glow, while coat-check rooms rested on my left and right.

Mira led the way into the nightclub for the damned, a sway in her hips as if she was already moving to the beat of the music that was throbbing from the main room. We paused on the threshold, our eyes slipping over the gathered crowd. I could sense a somber apprehension emanating from Mira, though it never outwardly showed. I, on the other hand, was fighting back a growing sense of dread. A quick count revealed that more than two dozen nightwalkers filled the club, accompanied by almost as many human companions. A small knot of lycanthropes was clustered at the bar off to my left, trying to maintain a distance from the nightwalkers while still claiming their right to be there.

Why am I here? I sent the thought winging into her brain, not wishing to be overhead by any other vampire.

We’re conducting an investigation. Gregor will provide us with more information about Abigail, she replied, but there was no missing the mocking in her tone.

This meeting could have been held anywhere but here.

Mira simply looked over her shoulder at me, arching one fine red eyebrow.

First Communion, the formal introduction to Barrett, and now the Dark Room. I’m no idiot—What are you up to? I demanded.

Mira’s smile widened as the fingers of her left hand slipped through the fingers of my right hand, allowing her to pull me a few steps into the club. Her touch was cool, while the scent of lilacs wafted to my nose. How else will be you ever understand my world unless you’re a part of it?

I’m not a part of your world, I mentally snapped, but her smile only grew before she turned to look straight ahead again.

It’s a little late for that.

Before I could come up with a reply, Mira released my hand and roughly grabbed the shoulder of a nightwalker who was trying to edge past her.

“Has Knox been here tonight?” she demanded.

“Came and left about an hour ago,” the nightwalker replied, his dark brown gaze jumping back and forth between me and Mira.

With a nod, Mira released the nightwalker. I would have preferred to have Knox and his calming presence at the Dark Room while I was present. I had encountered Mira’s second-in-command only a handful of times, but he seemed to be very rational and levelheaded, something that would be appreciated right now.

Since my arrival, the tension had increased in the crowded nightclub. Many of the nightwalkers had moved from the dance floor to the shadowy confines of the booths that lined the right and back walls of the large room. Only human whispers could be heard as an undercurrent to the hypnotic music that filled the air. The nightwalkers had slipped into telepathic communication for a more private conversation about the nightwalker hunter in their midst.