hadn’t enjoyed his experience of being teleported.
“Hello, everyone,” Mencheres said.
I was glad that he was here despite our complicated history. Among other things, I’d once been tasked to arrest Mencheres in my official capacity as Law Guardian, and Mencheres had once nearly ripped my head off when he thought I was a danger to Ian. Still, Mencheres was almost as old as I was, so we shared many of the same memories of the ancient Middle East. We also shared the same vampire sire, the same bronzed-sand skin color, and we both had powers that made others fear us.
His obsidian gaze flicked to me, and he nodded. Then, he looked at Ian, who smiled despite tensing ever so slightly.
“Hallo yourself, Mencheres,” Ian said. “See? I’m safe and sound, just as I promised.”
“Yes, but if all was well, we wouldn’t be here,” Mencheres said while nodding to Bones, Spade, Cat, and Denise. Spade had cleared out the rest of his house, giving his servants the night off. The last one had just left minutes before Ashael returned.
“Let’s get to why we’re here,” Ian said, and filled them in about Phanes, Morana, and Ruaumoko. He left out how Phanes had tricked me into thinking I was rescuing my father when I was aiding in their prison escape, and also left out how me using my power had weakened an untold number of veils between this world and the netherworld.
The omission felt like a hole that the truth was being buried in, and I couldn’t bury it and ask for their help at the same time.
“I opened the veil that Phanes used as an exit to break Morana and Ruaumoko out,” I said, to Ian’s instant groan of, “Can’t bloody help yourself, can you?”
“They need to know,” I insisted to Ian. “I had no idea what Phanes was up to,” I said to the rest of them. “I thought he came into the netherworld with me to curry favor with my father, and to break our engagement.”
“Engagement?” Cat repeated in disbelief.
“Yes, my father set it up before I was born, and only he can break it, but back to the point. Phanes nearly killed us, and while we were saving ourselves, he broke out the two gods.”
“What an asshole,” Denise said in a flat tone.
“Couldn’t agree more,” Ian said, giving me a look that said, Done spilling your guts? Or do you have more?
I held up my middle finger at him.
He grinned. “Promises, promises. Now, these gods might have powers we haven’t faced before, but they are not unbeatable,” Ian summarized to our audience. “Long ago, vampires and ghouls banded together and defeated Phanes, Morana, and Ruaumoko when they ruled parts of this world. If they did it, we can, too.”
Silence followed. I didn’t know whether everyone was still processing the information, or if they were just thinking of all the different ways that we were probably fucked.
“So . . . different gods really exist,” Cat finally said. “All that time I spent praying to one feels like a waste now.”
Ashael smiled. “Of course it wasn’t. There are many other worlds outside of this plane of existence. Every so often, beings from those worlds break through into ours. ‘Gods’ is what we call them since compared to us, they are. Still, they didn’t create this world or any of the others. Something far beyond them did. So, keep praying; beings like Phanes, Morana, and Ruaumoko are no threat to your faith or anyone else’s. They’re only a threat to your life.”
Cat laughed. “Oddly enough, I find that comforting. Who knew a demon could make me feel better about my faith?”
Ashael grinned with enough charm to make Bones bristle. “I am a man of many, many talents.”
Bones gave Ashael a look that said, Don’t even think about it. Then, he said, “Yes, well, we might all need to pray, because getting vampires and ghouls to suddenly forgo their enmity and join forces is near impossible.”
He wasn’t wrong. Our races had been in conflict since their creation, when our side claimed that Cain was the first vampire, after God cursed him to drink blood in retaliation for killing Abel, and ghouls claimed that Cain was the first ghoul, because he’d eaten his brother after he killed him.
I didn’t know who was right. That was well before my time. I only knew that vampires and ghouls had vacillated between a wary peace and the occasional mass slaughter ever since.
“We have a plan B if ghouls refuse