"The hour of socialization," Mavra whispered back. She continued up to the top of the stairs, and gently shut the doors leading out. They closed with an ominous boom.

All the lights went out. All but the blue nimbus around my hand, and the faded glory of the two crosses.

"Great," I muttered.

Susan looked frightened, her expression hard and tightly controlled. "What happens now?" she whispered, her eyes sweeping around in the dark.

Laughter, gentle and mocking, quiet, hissing, thick with something wet and bubbling, came from all around us. When it comes to spooky laughter, it's tough to beat vampires. You're going to have to trust me on this one. They know it well.

Something glimmered in the dark, and Thomas and Justine appeared in the glow of the power gathered in my hand. He lifted both hands at once, and said, "Would you mind terribly if I stood with you?"

I glanced at Michael, who frowned. Then at Susan, who was looking at Thomas in all his next-to-naked glory … somewhat intently. I nudged her with my hip and she blinked and looked at me. "Oh. No, not at all. I guess."

Thomas took Justine's hand, and the two of them stood off to my right, where Michael kept a wary eye on them. "Thank you, wizard. I'm afraid I'm not well loved here."

I glanced over at him. There was a mark on his neck, black and angry red, like a brand, in the shape of lovely, feminine lips. I would have thought it lipstick, but I sensed a faint odor of burnt meat in the air.

"What happened to your neck?"

His face paled a few shades. "Your godmother gave me a kiss."

"Damn," I said.

"Well put. Are you ready?"

"Ready for what?"

"For Court to be held. To be given our gifts."

The tenuous hold I had on the power faltered, and I lowered my trembling hand, let go of the tension gently, before I lost control of it. The last light flickered and went out, leaving us in a darkness I wouldn't have believed possible.

And then the darkness was shattered by light-the spotlights again, shining up on the dias, upon the throne there, and Bianca in her flaming dress upon it. Her mouth and throat and the rounded slopes of her breasts were smeared in streaks of fresh blood, her lips stained scarlet as she smiled, down at the darkness, at the dozens of pairs of glowing eyes in it, gazing up at the dias in adoration, or terror, or lust, or all three.

"All rise," I whispered, as soft whispers and moans, rustled up out of the darkness around us, not at all human. "Vampire Court is now in session."

Chapter Twenty-nine