Page 15 of The Hawk and the Nightingale

“I’ll order a few sacks of garlic from the market, and send someone over to Saint Clement’s for some holy water. Think we can use the bar’s toothpicks for stakes?”

“I don’t know if stakes work in real life the same way they do on film,” Hawk replied, remembering how Amalie had walked toward him in the sunlight with no ill effects. Then he recalled her telling him that when she was a younger vampire, the sun had burned her quite badly, and she couldn’t go out during the day for several years. She had also mentioned that Marek’s forces we made up of mostly younger vampires. Hawk looked toward the ceiling at the array of stage lights, and asked, “Peter, how bright do these lights get?”

“They’ll light up the place like high noon on a cloudless day,” Peter replied. “We only turn them up all the way at the end of the night, to clear the place out. They’re so powerful they make the main stage hot enough to fry eggs on the floor.”

Hawk cocked an eyebrow. “Think they can get hot enough to fry a vampire?”

Peter grinned. “You bet, boss.”

Chapter Eleven

Amalie - Prague, Present Day

Amalie blinked herself awake, and felt a momentary surge of dread. The sterile room she was in and the hard cot beneath her reminded her of a hospital; if she’d ended up in a human emergency ward again, she would probably need to upend her life and leave Prague for the next hundred years. She liked her life here, and she liked what she and Iveta had rescued from the ashes of their former existence as Marek’s playthings.

Just as Amalie was about to descend into panic, she saw a flyer taped to the wall about an upcoming event at the Moravian Ballroom. She remembered what had happened after the explosion, and smiled.

Hawk had brought her and Iveta to his club.

Despite the fact that her home was gone and her dearest friend lay unconscious beside her, Amalie was filled with happiness. It had been a long time since she’d known someone she could count on the way she trusted Hawk, and she liked the feeling. In fact, the last time an ally had presented themselves to her it had been Iveta herself, back in the early days when they first plotted to escape Marek. Amalie reached across the cot and grasped Iveta’s hand, remembering the servant her cruel husband had assigned to her as a punishment. Little had Marek known that once Iveta was by her side, Amalie would be his downfall.

Chapter Twelve

Amalie - Marek's Camp, Before

“I don’t need a handmaiden,” Amalie hissed.

“I disagree, songstress. Since you cannot help but cause trouble wherever you go, I’ve assigned someone to watch over you,” Marek said. Amalie had been caught giving the human cattle clean water and blankets again, and no act of kindness went unpunished in the warlord’s camp. “She will be your shadow, and she will report to me on everything you do.”

With that, Marek’s men flung a filthy human girl into her room, and shut and locked the door behind them. Amalie helped the girl to her feet, and asked her what her name was.

“Iveta,” she ground out. “And the bastard lied. I will do nothing to help him. Kill me if you want, but a vampire will never rule me.”

“I am also a vampire,” Amalie said, “but I hate Marek, as well. All he does is ruin things.”

Iveta regarded Amalie, and asked, “Did he ruin you?”

“Yes,” Amalie whispered. “In many, many ways.”

Iveta lifted her chin, and Amalie saw resolve dancing in her eyes. “Will you help me escape?”

“Only if I can come with you.” With that declaration, Amalie and Iveta were beholden to one another.

From that day onward, Amalie became the ideal woman in Marek’s eyes. She ceased arguing with him, and whenever he summoned her she arrived quickly and without complaint. His advisors praised him for the iron control he exhibited over his woman, and they complimented both her singing voice and her lovely form. While Amalie distracted Marek and his guards, Iveta quietly befriended the castle’s servants. Within a few months, they knew exactly who supported Marek, and who hated him almost as much as they did.

“How can you bear being near him for so long?” Iveta asked her one morning. Amalie had spent the entire night standing next to Marek’s throne, either singing or otherwise acting as an ornament. “At least he didn’t take you to bed.”

“That’s the only thing I enjoy about him.” Marek was a terrible ruler, but an excellent lover. “If only he cared for his people the way he cares for those he sleeps with, he would be the sort of king bards sung about for centuries after he’s gone.”

“Why don’t you rule?”

Amalie paused, and glanced at Iveta. “There is no way that would ever happen.”

“Why not?” Iveta pressed. “All of Marek’s people adore you, and they despise him! We’ve spent all of this time planning how to get away from him, but what if he’s the one who needs to go?”

“I don’t know,” Amalie said, shaking her head. “Marek calls himself a warlord, but it’s his mother, Varushka, that holds the true power. She’s the clan’s ruler, not him.”

“Then she is the one we need to usurp.”

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