prefer the night because it is easier to hunt. Many come out only in darkness, and the longer they live nocturnally, the more the sun affects them. Some, the very young or very old, can be weakened to the strength of a mere man at the sun’s full height at noon.”
I lifted an eyebrow. “That’s how Bram Stoker’s Dracula is.”
Solomon nodded. “Yes, he had some details right. Whether they were guesses or an actual vampire gave him the information, nobody knows.”
“What about beheading?”
“Only with an enchanted blade. With such a blade, you can slice a vampire into pieces, the only way you can kill one. You must burn all the pieces, however, or the vampire will put himself back together.”
My stomach rolled at the thought. “And you said silver hurts?”
“It weakens, but it does not necessarily kill. Silver affects all Daemoni to a certain degree.”
“So are you affected by silver now? After becoming Amadis?”
“No. That is the strange thing about the metal. Many believe the Angels enchanted silver in the Earth’s beginnings to protect people against evil. Some believe silver is an element brought to us from the Otherworld. But that may just be a story . . . fiction.”
I lifted an eyebrow. “Fiction? There seems to be truth in much fiction.”
Solomon chuckled again. “Yes, there does, doesn’t there? The best stories—and the best lies—are woven around the truth. It is up to us to discover which is which.”
Chapter 9
“Well, Alexis,” Charlotte said a week later, pressing her palm to her forehead as she studied her clipboard, “the discs are out, you’re not bad with knives, but your swordsmanship skills are quite lacking.”
I grimaced, feeling as though I’d been given a big, fat F. The coronation ceremony was only a few days away and afterward, Char would be back out in the field. She’d pretty much come as far as she could with me, and I’d disappointed her. “Sorry. I can’t get comfortable with the sword. Tristan says to make it one with me, but I just don’t feel it. It apparently has no interest in me being one with it.”
Char chuckled and waved her hand in dismissal. “No worries. It takes years to become an excellent swordsman. Besides, swords are impractical in the Norman world anyway. They can be cloaked, of course, but they’re cumbersome when you’re mainstreaming.” Her hand darted into her cleavage and, in a snap, she produced a long-bladed, double-edged knife. She grinned at my surprise. “Which is why I prefer daggers.” She handed it to me. “Let’s see what you can do with this. Tristan?”
Tristan selected his favorite weapon—himself. With all the talk he’d given me about not completely relying on my powers, and about needing to be able to fight in all kinds of situations and with whatever tools I had, he used nothing but the gifts he’d been given. Of course, he’d had centuries of training and could paralyze someone in an instant, making weapons virtually pointless, although new ones were being made for him, “to be prepared for anything,” as he put it.
The only way to evade his power was to be behind him, but he was so alert and so fast, it was nearly impossible to be behind him long enough to make a difference. I was the only one who’d been able to take him on and match his power, although he’d still nearly won. In fact, it hadn’t really been me who beat him that day. It had been the Amadis power boosted by a miracle.
In training, however, my Amadis power was useless, having only a positive effect on other Amadis, and I hadn’t been allowed to use my electrical power except a few times when Charlotte tested me. She needed to see what I could do and then see how it had strengthened over time, but that was it. So practicing with the dagger with Tristan meant using only my speed and agility.
The dagger felt more natural in either of my hands than any other weapon we’d tried. I easily danced around Tristan with it, twisting and turning without tripping myself up as I had done with the sword. Right when Tristan lunged at me, I did a spin and a hop and landed on his back, the dagger at his throat.
“Perfect!” Charlotte said with a laugh. “The dagger it is. And the beauty of the dagger, Alexis, is we can have yours made to take your powers, both the electricity and the Amadis. Whatever you want to