Great, just great. Zane was standing even farther behind the wolves. He didn't look any worse for wear, either, but he also looked lost, like the lone teetotaler at a wine tasting.
"Was I supposed to stop him?" he asked.
I shook my head. "No, Zane. Not you." I spared a glance at Richard, wondering why he'd just let everyone stand around. Asher I understood. Asking for help was a sign of weakness.
"Remove the jacket, or I'll remove it for you," Colin said.
"Colin, you've made your point." The woman's voice was surprisingly deep, a rich, smoky alto.
Colin patted her hand, smiled, but his words weren't gentle. "I will tell you when my point has been made, Nikki." He moved away from her then, dismissed her, and the pain of that dismissal showed.
For a moment, anger flared in those dark eyes, and I felt her power. Her power, not his. She was a witch or a psychic or something I had no word for. Human in the same way I was human: barely.
The anger vanished behind that dark, stoic face, but I knew what I'd seen. She didn't love him, nor he her. But she was his human servant, bound for all eternity, for better or worse.
"You want to see what's under the jacket," I said, "come over here and help me out of it. It'd be the gentlemanly thing to do."
"Anita," Richard said.
I patted his arm. "It's okay, Richard. Chill."
The look on his face was enough. He didn't trust me to behave. Funny, in our own ways, neither of us trusted the other.
I looked at Asher. We shared no marks. We couldn't read each other's thoughts. But we didn't need to. We were getting our butts kicked because the werewolves weren't helping us.
I looked over at the eight werewolves that were local. Verne sat on the bench with his wolves poised around him. Two of them were in full wolf form, except they were the size of ponies, bigger than any normal grey wolf. Verne was still in his T-shirt and jeans. No one had dressed up but us. Even the other vampires were just in suits and dresses.
I'd never seen this many vampires dressed so ... ordinarily. Most of them had a sense of style, or at least theater. They put on a good show. Of course, in the presence of the bone-draped tree who needed a better show? Of course, the lupanar was supposed to be our showplace, not Colin's. Again, I wondered if we could trust Verne as far as Richard thought we could.
I walked a little into the center of the triangle made by the three benches. I waited for Colin to join me.
He just stood there next to the black-eyed vamp, smiling. "Now why would I waste the energy to walk even a few yards when I can undress you from here?"
I smiled and I made it mocking. "Scared to get too close?"
"I admit you are a delicate little thing, but appearances are often deceiving. I have used this youthful face of mine more than once to fool the unwary. I am not the unwary, Anita Blake." He extended a pale hand, and I felt the power thrill over my skin before it slashed through the front of the velvet top. The cross spilled out of the velvet like a captive star set free. The cross flared white and I was careful to look sideways from it. It burned like magnesium, so bright it was almost painful. Crosses glow around vamps, but they don't glow like small supernovas unless you are in serious trouble. I'd never had one glow like this when I wasn't afraid yet. I'd always assumed the cross reacted to my level of fear like a holy mood ring. Tonight, for the first time, I realized that it may have been my faith that enabled it to glow, but once the faith was in place, something else took over. Not my will, but thine.
Colin's vampires reacted just as they were supposed to. They cowered, throwing their arms or their jackets or in one case, a skirt, in front of their eyes. Hiding from the light.
Except for Colin and the black-eyed vamp. Why was I not surprised that those two were old enough and powerful enough to face the cross? They weren't happy about it. They were protecting their eyes, squinting against the light, but they weren't cowering.
"Slash me again, fang-boy, see what else falls out."
He did what I asked. I really hadn't thought he'd try. He slashed at me through the air, but the power fell away like water parting around a rock.
"If you want to hurt me, Colin, you're going to have to get up close and personal."
"I could have Nikki rip it from your throat."
"I thought you were hot shit, Colin. Or is that just when you have young men tied up and helpless? Is that what you need to feel like a big bad vampire? Someone tied up and helpless, or is it young men that does it for you?"
Colin said one word: "Barnaby."
The black-eyed vampire moved in front of Colin, closer to the cross. But he stopped, unable to come closer. Then, over the glow of the cross, I watched Barnaby's face begin to rot. That smooth flesh sloughed away, sliding in wet gobbets of flesh down his face, until tendons glistened wetly and bone showed as his nose collapsed, showing his face like a skull covered by rotted things.
He limped towards me, one hand held out, and it reminded me of Damian's hands earlier in the night. The flesh bursting in a stinking wave of blackness. Except there was no smell. The last vamp I'd seen who could rot at will had also been able to control the smell, like a magical deodorant.
If it had been a fight, I'd have drawn a gun and blown him away before he took the cross, but this was a contest of wills more than anything. If he was vampire enough to touch my cross, then I had to be brave enough to let him do it. I hoped he didn't press it between our bodies. I'd had one vampire do that, and a second degree burn on my breast wasn't my idea of fun.