Page 276 of Dragon Slayer

Liam sat back, looking smug. “The Greeks in Istanbul have a legend. They believe – well, some of them do – that Constantine Dragases wasn’t killed when the Conqueror sacked the city. That he went into hiding, inside a secret vault. And that in Rome’s greatest hour of need, he shall rise again, immortal, the last Roman emperor come to slay the dragon.”

“You stole that from the old Arthurian legend, didn’t you?” Fulk said.

Liam chuckled. “Uncanny, isn’t it? But I swear that it’s true. History has a funny way of overlapping like that.”

“So, what, Constantine was a vampire?”

“Oh, no. Quite human, and very dead. But the legend points to my larger theory: that the secret lies beyond the original city of Rome. It’s more a representative thing. Three immortals in a working relationship: the triumvirate. The triumvirate of Rome. The three Romes.”

“So you’re saying…” Talbot started, leaning forward.

“I’m saying, doctor, that we need three very strong vampires, and their Familiars to take this bastard out. And I haven’t met the boy, but Alexei Romanov is related, by blood, to the last emperor of Constantinople. I think that means something.”

“And so you think…” Every gaze shifted toward Kolya Dyomin, who stood unflinching, still, against the wall. “That we can get to him through Nikita Baskin,” Talbot said.

“I think,” Liam said, “that if Baskin finds out we have one of his dearly departed brethren in the flesh, he’ll become much more cooperative.”

Fulk…couldn’t disagree with his logic.

“Now,” Liam went on, “someone please explain how you managed to lose my daughter.”

~*~

“You look well, sister.”

They’d been alone in the study for nearly ten minutes, and they were the first words Lily had spoken.

Annabel set her book aside; she’d only been pretending to read it anyway.

Her sister stood in front of the fire, firelight dancing up her smooth white arms. She dressed like an eccentric; Beneath the cloak she’d draped over the arm of a chair, her dress was simple, but finely made. It brushed the floor at its flared hem, and was cinched tight at the waist. A walking dress for a lady born well before their own original time.

She looked at Annabel with a small, fond smile, her gaze melancholy.

She smelled like a toasted marshmallow, and Anna fought not to scrunch up her nose. “No, I don’t.” She dropped her feet off the arm of the chair, chunky soles of her boots thumping onto the rug.

Lily’s smile widened a fraction, patronizing in an innocent sort of way. “The house looks–”

“Do you really wanna make small talk?”

“We don’t have to, if you don’t want to.”

Anna stifled a growl. Her hands wanted to – to do something, so she gripped the arms of the chair. Hard. Felt the leather give beneath fingertips that seemed more like claws. “Don’t do that.”

“Do what?”

“Act all innocent! Like – like we–” She forced herself to stop, and took a deep breath. “Lily,” she said with more control, “we haven’t spoken to each other in decades. How can you act like nothing ever happened?”

Lily sighed. As with all her gestures, it was delicate, feminine. Appropriate. “Isn’t it better to be civil than to wallow in the past?”

Annabel got to her feet without meaning to. Her wolf strained inside her, wanting out, wanting to trade this fragile human skin for something that looked as ferocious as she felt. “Protecting myself isn’t wallowing. And our past? That wasn’t a couple of schoolgirl arguments. Don’t you dare act like I’m supposed to get over that.”

“Anna, we’re sisters.”

“So? When did that ever matter to you?”

“Always.”

She did growl this time. “Then why did you choose that creep over your own family?”

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