Page 66 of Blood from the Marrow
“Lib, call Diego and tell him I want the blood delivered tonight.” She looked at Bernice and then the others. “We’re going to have quite a few guests.”
When Librada hesitated, her attention fixed on the woman who’d threatened to kill her, Elena straightened. Without a word, she boomednow. She would have to show her uneasy trust first. Openly wrestling with her instinct to protect Elena, Librada begrudgingly obeyed and left.
“Well, darlin’,” Cordelia said, crossing her legs when they’d all agreed to the three questions Elena would ask. “Let’s get on with it.” She flashed her fangs when she grinned. “I’m parched.”
Elena moved closer to Cordelia, the cold sensation of a dozen sets of eyes on her back. Of fangs exposed and primed to strike. The others had lined up in a semi-circle behind Elena. She had no doubt that her ending would be swift if she violated their consent.
“You don’t have performance anxiety, do you?” Cordelia looked up at Elena, blue eyes gleaming like she couldn’t wait to submit. She opened her mind to Elena without resistance.
“Have you, at any time, acted or intended to act on Sayah’s behalf or share information that could aid her efforts, directly or indirectly?” Elena asked the first carefully worded question. She hoped it would root out anyone under Sayah’s influence—past, present or future. She couldn’t be sure how long Sayah had been planning. How much time she’d had to arrange sophisticated moves far in advance.
“Not once,” Cordelia replied, voice steady under compulsion. “That she-devil drained my favorite human during my bicentennial gala and I’ve hated her ever since.” She sighed. “Jimmy tasted like sunshine.”
Elena glanced over her shoulder, making sure the others knew Cordelia had expanded of her own accord. She met Bernice’s gaze when she was mid eye-roll.
“Do you harbor any intent or design to undermine me, my cartel, or my allies for personal gain, or to seize power for yourself or anyone else?” Elena asked the second question aimed at detecting plans to use Elena to take down Sayah, just to turn around and stab her in the back.
“No,” she replied casually. “I’m perfectly happy where I am.”
“Are you, for any reason, acting as a spy, informant, or agent for another cartel, group, or individual seeking to harm me or our efforts against Sayah?”
Cordelia’s brows rose like she was thinking about the contours of the question. Silence stretched, growing tangible and sour until she replied, “Absolutely not. I’m loyal to you, Elena.” She held her gaze, serious for once. “I don’t have an ounce of ill-will toward you.”
Elena dropped her hold on Cordelia’s mind. Doing the exercise a dozen more times with so many powerful vampires was going to be exhausting. She doubted anyone else would open so easily. Instincts were so hard to fight.
“See? Nothing to worry about.” Cordelia stood, energy back to blinding. “Now, who’s next?”
The loyalty tests went faster than Elena expected. While she was met with more instinctual resistance, no one else editorialized their answers. Over and over, three questions met with three short negative responses. Bernice had been the hardest to put under compulsion, but she’d acquiesced and denied any sympathies for Sayah.
When Elena was as sure as she’d ever be that the vampires gathered around her were loyal, she told them exactly what happened at Sayah’s estate. There was no need for anyone to know about the Aglion details. Leaving them with themisconception that Marisol was a witch was enough. The only vampire among them who even associated with witches was Bernice, given that New Orleans was heavy with the craft.
“Why, Elena, you sly fox.” Cordelia grinned. “I should’ve guessed you’d have something slithering under that sleeve. I’ve never quite understood your affinity for witches, but I’ve never met one so useful. Glory, I really didn’t believe it.” She sipped the blood Librada had brought for her. “And there is an entire coven of them?” Her eyes sparkled with interest. “Are they here?”
“I’ve never heard of witches who do anything like that,” Bernice said, dark eyes examining. “And you say they will fight for you?” Her gaze sharpened. “Why?”
Elena wasn’t going to explain the history, sordid or familial. “I will take all the valuable, trustworthy allies I can get.” Her tone said the topic was closed. They’d only given her the barest peek into their minds. She would not divulge more than absolutely necessary. “Sayah has had me on the back foot the entire time, and I will shatter that momentum with every barbed weapon in my arsenal.” Heat rose in her body as she started to believe her own conviction. “She is going to regret the morning she went to bed with insurrection on her mind.”
Her energy was infectious. She watched it ripple over the others like a pebble dropped in a pond. A disturbance that changed the energy. That destroyed the stagnant water. It wasn’t a tidal wave, but even a tsunami only started as a rumble in the ground.
It was near sundown when they filed out of the ballroom. Bernice lingered, following Elena when they were the only two left.
“There are a lot of unknowns here,” Bernice said, attention straight ahead and voice low. “Sayah doesn’t need to tear us apart, Elena. She just needs one crack. And cracks tend to spread.”
Elena nodded. “Would you take a different position? If it were you she’d targeted?”
Bernice stopped and looked at her, dark eyes burning with her answer.
“Alliances are fragile things, but war has made stranger bedfellows,” Elena replied.
“Yes, I look forward to seeing who’s in your bed these days.” Bernice made a sound in her throat. “I bet a lot of asses are going to be jumping off fences here soon, Elena,” she said, meaning the undeclared cartels. “Now that you’ve put your foot on the battlefield.”
The imagery of blood-soaked soil made Elena already regret the pointlessness of it all. No matter who won, they were going to decimate themselves.
“Any one you trust?” Elena asked.
“Nope.”
Chapter Twenty-Seven
