incidents when the vampires had not been as innocent as James had chosen to depict them. But he had reasons for not bringing up every infraction.
He needed Utanapishtim on their side.
And he sensed he might be losing the man.
Then he was distracted by another matter entirely.
His twin sister was near. He felt her, and then he looked up ahead and he knew. He pointed to an abandoned church, which was only a mile or two from where Will and Sarafina’s home had stood. “She’s in there.”
“Is…?” Utanapishtim held up his thumb and forefinger. “Small. What god…live there?”
“None of the gods you knew,” James said. “The people today worship different gods.”
Utanapishtim stared at the church, at its steeple. “Then…why Anu has not…?” He pounded his fist into his open palm. “Struck down it?”
Lucy put a calming hand on his arm. “This land is far from the land of Anu and the Anunaki, Utanapishtim. This is a temple to one of the gods of this land.”
He nodded, clearly mulling that over, as the three of them approached the front door of the abandoned church.
And then it flew open and Brigit flung herself into James’s arms, weeping. Shaking, too, so hard that it frightened him. He closed his arms around her, lifting her off her feet, feeling her pain and bleeding with it.
“It’s okay, it’s okay. I’m here now.”
Sniffling, she pulled away just far enough to meet his eyes. Her face was smeared in black, her clothes scorched, torn and sooty. The skin had peeled off her forearm in one place, and there were angry pink patches on her hands and neck, as well.
“God, I’m so glad to see you.”
“Me, too.” He looked nervously behind them. It was daylight, and there were clearly people after her. “Get back inside. Come on, so I can tend to your wounds.” He set her down, then saw her finally notice his companions, even while stepping aside to let them pass.
“Professor Lucy. I’m surprised you’re still around.” And then she glanced at Utanapishtim, and her eyes seemed to get stuck on him. James watched her take him in from head to toe, saw her noting his odd attire before she seemed unable to look away from his face.
“You…you’re…” She managed to dart a quick glance at James. “Is he…?”
“Ziasudra, otherwise known as Utanapishtim,” James said.
“No shit.” Brigit closed the church door after the three of them went inside, and then she moved closer to the huge man. She lifted a hand to touch his face, though her words were for James. “I can’t believe…you actually did it.”
Utanapishtim let her touch, did not back away, but he held her eyes. “I did not give you permission to touch me, woman.”
She grinned at him. “Feisty, isn’t he?”
“Maybe you shouldn’t talk about him as if he isn’t here, Brigit,” Lucy suggested. “He’s a king, and also sort of your forebearer.”
“True enough.” Brigit lowered her head in the barest mockery of a bow. “Your highness,” she said.
“I do not know…highness.” And then Utanapishtim winced and backed away from her. “You are…pain. I—I tire of…suffering.”
“Come on, Bridge,” James said, leading her to the nearest pew and telling her to lie down. He held his hands over her, vaguely aware of Lucy and Utanapishtim walking farther into the church, looking around curiously. “Tell me what happened while I work,” he told her.
“I drafted a lot of vamps to help me out.”
“The resistance, I know.” His palms weren’t tingling, weren’t glowing. He rubbed them together rapidly, until they grew warm, and tried again.
“The idea was,” Brigit said, “to start giving these mortal vigilantes a taste of their own medicine, but the cowards only attack by day. So what good is a resistance made up of creatures who can only fight by night? Dammit, I need humans, not vampires, and I don’t have any.”
“Where are they now? Your soldiers?”
His hands still weren’t glowing. She sat up, gripping his wrists and turning his hands upward. “Having trouble, bro?”
“I don’t know what’s wrong.”
She shrugged. “We heal rapidly anyway, you and I. Look, it’s already getting better. Give me an hour, I’ll be good as new.”
But James was troubled. And he kept thinking of when Utanapishtim had fallen on the deck of the Nightshade and had held James’s hands to him. He looked up at the man, who was standing nearby, watching them curiously, met his eyes, tried to see any sign of guilt there, not that Utanapishtim would