Page 73 of Smoke & Ashes
Sofia gave me a perplexed look, but at least half-nodded. “I think so.”
“Then how about this”—I turned to Yelena—“and before you make your decision remember the alternative is that Taraeats you here and nowand not in the fun sexy way.”
Although she was in human form, Tara gave a distinctly wolfish growl.
“Here’s what I’m thinking. You swear before Apollo that you won’t hurt any of us, and that you’ll do whatever it is Tara feels you need to do to make you worthnot killing,and then we all walk away from here with all our bits intact. Sound good?”
“It sounds,”—Yelena hesitated, eyeing each of us with a calculating precision—“acceptable.”
“Tara? This work for you?”
She nodded, then stalked forward and looked Yelena in the eye. “Give me the pelt.”
Doing her best to put distance between herself and the angry werewolf, Yelena removed the wolf-skin, which Tara folded reverently and laid to one side.
“Swear by the sun-god,” Tara said, “that you will come with me at once from this place to Safernoc Hall, there to face my judgement. Swear that you will offer no harm to me, to mine, or to any under our protection for so long as you are animate, and that you shall never again serve the interests of the King of Shadows, the Queen of Winter.”
Being a vampire, Yelena was dead pale already, but she grew paler. “I cannot, not that. I have served the King for centuries, were I to betray him I would suffer unimaginable horrors.”
“Worse,” Tara tilted her head to one side, “than what I can do to you? You strike me as a survivor, Yelena. Survive.”
Yelena lowered her eyes, which I was taking for a yes. There were even chances of this being a trick, because at the end of the day she was a fucking undead monster. I genuinely wasn’t certain how much she cared about hurting Sofia—or me for that matter—now we were out of Patrick’s life and he was so obviously hostile to us, but she’d definitely be looking for an out on the whole “give myself up to werewolf justice” thing. Then again, Tara seemed to think it would work, and she knew way more about this stuff than I did. Very, very reluctantly, I allowed Sofia to shuffle forward.
She stared at Yelena with perfectly understandable hesitation. “How do I do this?”
“Search me. You’re the one with the god in your head.”
“I don’t think he’s in my head but, okay. Kneel, I guess?”
As it happened, Yelena was already kneeling, but she turned with that ostentatious fluidity of movement that vampires had when regular folks would look awkward and shuffly. She bowed her head in what I hoped was a sincere gesture of submission.
“Right, well, then … do you promise not to try to murder us ever again?”
“Yes,” I could practically hear her rolling her eyes.
“Or to hurt us at all. Us or Tara’s werewolf pack? Or any of Patrick’s … umm … future girlfriends?”
“I shall never abandon Elaine,” Patrick insisted.
Yelena sighed. “I do so swear.”
“And everything Tara said? Going to Safernoc and giving up working for the King of Shadows the Queen of Winter, all of those things?”
“Yes,” Yelena’s tone was growing more and more irritable. “I swear to all of those things too. You know there was a time when seeresses had alotmore dignity than this.”
Nothing much happened for about two and a half seconds, then the room was bathed in a gentle sunlight. “Then your word shall be your bond.” Sofia’s voice had gone airy and distant, herself but not herself. “And should you break your oath, your heart shall shatter, your eyes fail, your skin blister with agony, and your mind be shadowed by clouds. Now rise.”
Belatedly, I wondered if Yelena had expected that to work. Perhaps I was projecting but she looked ever so slightly surprised as she rose to her feet. I had to admit to a certain amount of, whaddyacallit, schadenfreude—not only because it was nice to see bad things happen to somebody who’d tried to kill you quite as often as Yelena had tried to kill me, but also because it was kind of refreshing forsomebody elseto be the one making little-understood bargains with unexpectedly powerful supernatural entities.
“Honestly, I still don’t feel all that safe,” offered Flick.
Smiling, Yelena ran the tip of her tongue across her too-white vampire teeth. “Wise, child.”
I shrugged. “Actually, I reckon we’re good. If you’re smart”—my gaze flicked to Yelena a moment—“and however much I might dislike you, I don’t think you’re not smart, you’ll realise that you’ve flat-out betrayed basically everybody. Which means your best bet probablyisSafernoc. At least if they kill you they won’t take a century to do it.”
Yelena’s expression was pure venom, but there wasn’t a lot she could do now. At least, I hoped there wasn’t a lot she could do. I never quite knew how this sort of magic worked. Still, she left without much more complaint and Tara left with her. However strong an oath before Apollo was, there was no way she’d let Yelena out of her sight until the pack had determined how to deal with her.
I hoped we’d made the right call. I certainlylikedTara’s style of leadership more than I liked the dowager’s but it had blown up in her face once or twice already, for mostly me-related reasons, and if it didn’t pan out better this time she’d probably be totally fucked. And then what would happen?
