see what this has witnessed, not where he is or where he will be.”
“Let me ask you this.” Alfonzo leaned his arms on the table as he talked. “Can you identify one soul from another?”
“Of course.”
“Then if you were to see the memories of whomever owned that jewel and found yourself in a room with him, could you identify who it was?”
She blinked. She laughed and leaned back, watching Alfonzo with renewed respect. He was better at cards than she had given him credit for. “Clever. Very clever. Yes, I could.” She turned the brooch over. Nothing was etched on the back. “You want me to play bloodhound and sniff out the King of the Vampires.”
Alfonzo smiled. “Exactly. We will keep you far away from danger. You will never see a battle. We only need you to lead us to him.”
“I expect this will be exceedingly dangerous, even with your assurances.” She ran her thumb over the ruby of the brooch. “I have not seen the things that howl in the darkness…but anything that has the magic to turn the moon to blood would make mincemeat of me in less than a heartbeat’s span of time.”
“We can protect you,” Eddie insisted. “We promise.”
She smiled sadly. “I believe you mean your words. I do not doubt your intentions. But I have seen enough tragedy and witnessed enough horror through the minds of others to know that intentions do not beget reality.”
“I won’t mislead you, Miss Parker,” Alfonzo added grimly. “You are correct. We have come here to save this city, not to spare our own lives. We are prepared to pay the ultimate price to save the lives of the innocents who call this place home. You must be willing to do the same.”
“Well.” She placed the brooch back on the table and took off the glove of her right hand. “Let me see this King of Terrors for myself, and perhaps that may convince me.”
Picking up the brooch in her gloved hand, she paused. Taking a deep breath, she readied herself. She did not know what waited for her in the ruby’s dark depths, but she knew it was not going to be pleasant. She dropped it into her bare palm.
It was a throne room.
That was an assumption, to be fair, but she could think of little else for which a room such as this could possibly be used. The ceiling soared overhead easily a hundred feet, disappearing into the darkness of the dimly lit space, giving it the illusion that it could go on forever. Gothic archways with their austere finials rose from the corbels of columns and stabbed like jagged claws at the shadows.
From the heads of large, carved gargoyles dangled burning cauldrons on thick iron chains. The monsters were grotesque, resembling the art of Hieronymus Bosch, and were equally disgusting in the way the chains were mounted—impaled through the lower jaw, upper, or both, or wrapped around the maw, or through the eye sockets of their skulls. They screamed in silent torture.
And there, at the end of the corridor, was a throne. It sat up on a row of long stairs that were carpeted in deep crimson fabric that matched swaths of fabric that hung in the wings.
The throne was equally as horrifying as the gargoyles. It was a twisted monument of monsters and their prey, creatures with claws and wings and horns writhing around bodies of humans caught in terror and death.
Whoever had designed a place like this had one singular goal. They had one simple message.
Fear me.
And Maxine could not deny that it worked. This place carried a sense of death and danger. She knew the carpet was stained red from more than dye. This was a place of suffering.
But it was only a dream.
It was a memory, caught in the jeweled broach she held. It could not hurt her. This was merely imprinted on the stone. But the one thing she knew—simply knew without question—was that this room belonged to the man who had owned the gem. Even without the hunters having told her it had belonged to a king, the nature of the two were one and the same.
Red satin and black velvet. Fang and claw. Death and blood mingled with the scent of roses. She walked up the carpet toward the throne, gaping at its magnitude. The flickering shadows of the firelight made the figures seem to dance and come to life. There was a strange, artful beauty to it. They had