the party, still going on above. It didn’t surprise me that Hassani’s chambers were soundproofed: when you lived among hundreds of beings with supernatural hearing, it was probably a requirement. But it made for a faintly eerie ambiance: the dim, almost dark room, allowing us to appreciate the spectacle outside; the vivid colors flowing over the furniture and splashing our faces; the dark silhouette of the consul, his back to the light show, his face in shadow.
A strange ripple went across my skin, like a moving wave of goosebumps. I suddenly wasn’t sure that I wanted to hear what he had to say, after all. But it was too late; he’d already begun to speak.
“I have become a bit of a history buff, as you see,” he said, gesturing back at the outer room. “It was always an interest, but it became something of an obsession over the years as I searched to find some chink in my former master’s armor.”
“Your master? You mean—” I paused wondering how to phrase it politely. I gave up. “That thing downstairs made you, too?”
“No.” He shook his head, a brief jerky movement unlike his usual elegance. It wasn’t quite a shudder, but it told me how much he liked that idea. “It’s ironic, in fact. His blood flows through the veins of every consul on Earth save two: the Chinese Empress and me.”
“Yet you called him master,” Louis-Cesare pointed out.
Hassani nodded. “It was an unusual situation, I admit. The consul before me was a despicable man who started life as a Canaanite mercenary in the Amarna period by the name of Dalilu. He ingratiated himself with Setep-en-Ra by his willingness to do literally anything his pharaoh asked. I will . . . spare you the details.”
“Thank you,” I said fervently.
“I hated him for his depredations, his dissolute behavior, and the harshness of his rule. It was only once I took his place that I realized: he had never really ruled at all.”
“Setep-en-Ra did,” Louis-Cesare guessed.
Hassani inclined his head. “Of course. As he always had. He had followed the trade routes west to Rome, and taken the consulate there, as well. But to him, that wasn’t abdicating a throne, but simply adding another land to the ranks of his worshippers. The “consul” he left behind was merely his deputy, ruling in his stead while he was away. He considered himself to be the rightful ruler of the world, you see; he simply hadn’t officially claimed the more far flung lands as yet.”
“Some of those lands might have had something to say about that,” Louis-Cesare said dryly.
“Indeed.” Hassani looked thoughtful. “Although whether they would have triumphed, had it come to a contest, is an open question. I think he was a bit mad, even then, but madmen often succeed. They take chances that saner ones will not.”
“They get themselves assassinated, too,” I pointed out.
I should know; I’d killed a few.
“Sometimes,” Hassani agreed, “although it was not so easy, in his case. Many tried before anyone succeeded, and even then, had he been in his right mind, had he not underestimated his opponents, had your father not been there, to assist at just the right moment . . . he might rule still.”
“But he doesn’t. So, what were you saying about Dorina?”
Hassani glanced sharply at me, probably because that had been less than diplomatic. But I couldn’t wait anymore. I didn’t see what any of this had to do with her, and it had been almost a day since she was taken. I wanted to chase something; I wanted to kill something. Not sit here looking at pretty colors and talking ancient history!
Fortunately, he was too well mannered to point out my rudeness.
“Do you know of my master’s power?” he said instead.
“No,” I lied. Most vamps liked to keep that kind of thing under wraps, in case they needed to use it in a duel, and that was especially true of consuls.
He smiled slightly, as if he knew I was lying. “I see truly,” he said, “and clearer than most. As with many masters, I can also see through the eyes of my Children—and share it.”
And I guessed my impatience might have annoyed him, after all. Because that was all the warning I received before I was suddenly back there, dumped abruptly into the crazy streets of the Khan-el-Khalili, with multicolored lamps swinging, people screaming, and shops exploding. Only this time, I was watching myself from afar. And jumping over the gap in between buildings, trying