Hot tears from years of bottled-up anger streamed down her face. But when Carlos stepped forward, she leveled her blade at him and he stood very, very still.
"I have always been more than what people see, and dead or alive that still holds true!" She moved in a slow semicircle before the group, the tip of her blade bouncing from the energy running the length of her arm, down the blood groves, and arcing a current at the end of it. "I am a female master. I am the night itself to you whores. I am my own woman, equal to any master in this f**king room, and I won't tolerate disrespect."
With that she flipped the Isis blade so the point was to the floor and rammed it into the polished stone beneath the rug. She glanced up at Carlos, and then at her clothes with disdain, and instantly changed into a T-shirt and a pair of fatigues and combat boots. "I refuse to ride in the choppers and be a spectator. I want a Jeep, a driver, and a helluva serious load of ammo."
"Councilman Rivera," McGuire said slowly, not moving from his wife's side. "It's too dangerous - "
Before he could finish the sentence, Damali was standing in front of McGuire. "Why are you talking to him? He doesn't run me, I choose to be with him. So you speak the f**k to me when I ask you a question. I am so tired of the paternalistic bullshit, McGuire, I will rip your punk heart out myself - and I'm supposed to come to your room? Pullease."
The other masters stared at McGuire, their gazes slowly raking him, then Damali, before settling upon Carlos.
"If the lady isn't pleased with your choice, Councilman," Master Amin said, his eyes devouring Damali, "perhaps she would feel less agitated if you sent her to me?"
McGuire cast a nervous glance at Damali. "You're not reconsid - "
"Get me a damned hunt car. Now!" she shouted, anger pulsing through her. "This is not open for discussion!"
"Mr. Councilman," the Transylvanian master said, his voice serious, his eyes watery as he sniffed hard and wiped his nose with the back of his hand. "She must place a wager, if - "
Suddenly Tetrosky's head jerked back as though he'd been slapped. The sound of a hard strike echoed throughout the room, and the circle widened, each couple moving back as Damali walked forward, brushing past Carlos.
Her eyes narrowed and from a place of unknowing, words gathered, formed, translated, and were issued forth in a language she'd never been taught.
I told you to address me directly. Damali placed her hands on her hips. Tetrosky rubbed his jaw, his eyes on her as he shunted his wife aside, eyes glowing red, fangs now dripping saliva. I have something to wager. If anyone's gonna bet my ass, it's me, not him! she said, pointing back toward Carlos. You man enough? Winner takes all. London, if I win; first night after the hunt with me alone in your lair, if you win.
"You've taught her Dananu?" Tetrosky murmured, awe in his voice, his eyes riveted on Damali.
"She's a master," Carlos said quietly, pride lacing his comment. "She picked it up on her own."
Tetrosky walked forward, reached into his breast pocket, and pulled out a thin scroll of parchment. He held the wager document for a moment, his eyes raking Damali as he took a liberal inhale, unrolled it with flair and caused a pop to echo through the room, and pressed his crest ring to his own wrist vein until it bled into the insignia.
Staring at Damali, he then stamped the document hard, leaving his bloody seal. The document sizzled where he'd left his mark, then the seal bubbled, raised, and dried to a consistency of cooled wax. With desire emanating from him like a slow strobe, he extended the document to her, hands trembling, his storm-gray eyes never leaving hers.
When Damali snatched the ancient stationery from him and pulled her Isis dagger from her hip pocket, the Transylvanian master visibly shuddered. She slowly slit her palm with the baby Isis, dipped her insignia ring of Carlos's territory in her blood and stamped his paper hard, and thrust it back to him. Tetrosky dropped to his knees, leaned his head back, and opened his arms, closing his eyes. "Slit my throat and take London..."
Damali narrowed her eyes. "Gladly. Later."
"Promise me... if I win." His voice was gravelly, thick and hoarse.
"Yeah, whateva. I'll cut your heart out in there if you keep f**king with me." Damali gave his wife Kiersten a triumphant glance as she walked away from the Transylvanian and he stood slowly with his wife's help. But she waited, somehow knowing that she needed a parchment, too, to make it legit. And as soon as she thought it, a stripe of fire opened in thin air before her, and a duplicate scroll vomited from it like a Hell-sent fax.
Damali shook her head as she reached for the parchment, ripping it away from the sulfur slit, which immediately closed once the agreement was removed. She read it over carefully as she walked. Slimy, cheating bastards to the very end - like she wasn't smart enough to know that if it wasn't in writing, the agreement didn't exist. Hell always had a contract.
"Am I in the game, boys, or what?" She went up to the African diplomat and raked him with a hot gaze until his wife moved from his side, her eyes blazing with fury. "You in? Madagascar for a night? I like the beach."
"Madagascar, Ghana, Senegal, the Middle Passage routes... Name it." He wiped the sweat off his brow with the back of his forearm and sniffed hard. He came toward her in a slow, seductive lope, held her gaze with a sensual aura thickening the air around her, and slowly dragged a cut the length of his palm with a fang. He let the blood ooze into the cup of his hand, first staring at it and then slowly bringing his gaze up to hold hers, and dipped his ring in it. "Any time, Huntress," he murmured, his voice husky. "My territory is very large. Trust me."
Damali nodded and stamped his parchment. "Size matters," she said, her eyes roving him. "If they told you different, brother, they lied."
"I'll put South Africa on the table, too," he said, moving closer to her.
"That's a fair trade, since there's never been a female master topside in your existence. If I lose, then I'll have to make it worth your while for the sizeable territory wagered." She gave him a sly smile. "Put it in writing, motherfucker." Then she glanced at McGuire as her copy spit from scorched air. "Don't worry, I haven't given your night away, but you'll have to earn it the old-fashioned way, no side deals - say, the Outback?"
He glanced at Carlos nervously. "The Outback?"
"Maybe you didn't hear the woman," Carlos said calmly. "She told you to talk to her. This is her negotiation, not mine. I traded for Tasmania and Indonesia. Apparently, the territory I'd bet wasn't mine wholesale as majority owner. My bad. I'll throw in the Hawaiian Islands, and a coupla Caribbean ones instead."
McGuire nodded. "The Outback... worth every square inch of her."