“Sarah Zellaby,” I said, and quoted her own words back at her: “‘Verity’s little adopted cousin with the big blue eyes and the clear antifreeze for blood.’ Does that ring any bells?”
Kitty’s eyes widened, a response I didn’t have to be good with faces to understand. “You’re a cuckoo.”
“Yes, but I’m a good cuckoo, I swear, and we’ve met before like a dozen times. You usually remember me. I’m sorry, I’m so freaked out that I’m broadcasting.” I tried to focus on building a mental wall between us. It was harder than normal. Stress was making everything slippery.
Kitty’s suspicion slowly gave way to recognition. “Sarah?”
“Yes,” I said, and smiled a little, hopefully. “Sorry for the whammy, I didn’t know it was going to be that bad.”
“Just try to keep it under wraps while we’re inside,” she said, lowering her hand. “I don’t want you starting a riot.”
It was a lot more likely that I’d start a new branch of the “everybody protect Sarah” club, but I didn’t say anything. I just stepped past Kitty. She closed and locked the door behind me. I waited for her to finish, and we walked together down the canvas-draped corridor to the main room where, by the sounds of things, there was quite a party going on. The mental noise hit a second after the audible noise did: at least two or three dozen people, almost as many different species, and all of them doing their best not to panic.
I gasped. I couldn’t help myself. The wall I’d built to keep from broadcasting to Kitty was good, but it was nowhere near good enough to withstand the assault waiting at the end of the hall.
“Are you okay?” asked Kitty.
“What?” I hadn’t even realized that I wasn’t walking anymore. My legs had stopped moving without conscious command, taking themselves out of the equation while I did the complicated mental math of self-protection. I needed better walls, bigger walls, walls that could keep me from becoming so overwhelmed that I whammied everyone in the room just to keep them from hurting me.
“Are you okay?” repeated Kitty. “You look like you’re about to throw up.”
I was considering it. “I’ll be fine,” I said. “There’s just a lot of focused anxiety in here.” And it was all about my cousin, or at least about the people who had her; that, coupled with my having met everyone in the Freakshow at one point or another, explained the severity of my reaction. “Give me a second.”
“Those are in pretty short supply, cuckoo girl,” said Kitty . . . but she waited with me while I got myself under control, and I was grateful for that. It’s easier to build a telepathic wall when you have someone nearby you can build it against, and Kitty was a lot less angry than some of the people in the main room. Once I was sure I wouldn’t fall apart, I nodded, and Kitty led the rest of the way into the Freakshow.
The room looked strange, seen during the daylight. The lights were turned up to full, exposing the scuffs on the floor and the well-repaired tears in the upholstery. I could see scars on the ceiling where the old stripper poles had been removed. On the whole, though, the décor stood up pretty well to being visible—probably because it was designed by Kitty, and Kitty, like all bogeymen, could see perfectly well in the dark. She might be willing to live with a little wear and tear, but who wants to own a club they can’t be proud of?
I wasn’t surprised by the number of people who were turned toward the door, waiting for us; I’d already detected their presence, and my head still throbbed a little from the shock of it. I was, however, gratified. They could have run. They could have hidden themselves away and let Verity take whatever punishment the Covenant wanted to dish out. Instead, when the call for help was sounded, they came. Sure, some of them were probably like Istas, who would take any excuse to hurt things without getting in trouble for it, but I didn’t care. They came. That was enough for me.
Kitty clapped her hands, walking ahead and leaving me standing in the doorway. “Okay, people. Nothing to see here, and we have a rescue mission to mount.” She looked to Dominic. “That’s your cue, Covenant boy. Impress us with your willingness to sell out your former allies.”
“Think you could’ve made that sound any worse, Kitty?” asked Ryan.
“Oh, trust me, I could still make it sound worse,” said Kitty. “I have a gift.”
Dominic listened in silence, his posture impassive and unyielding. I was pretty sure his expression was meant to match. Internally, he was a different story, broadcasting anxiety and remorse so loudly that it was leaking through my shielding. I took a breath, focusing on shoring up the walls between me and the rest of the room a little bit better.
“Before we go any further with this, and yes, knowing that we have very little time, I need to be sure you understand that I did not make the decision to come to you lightly,” said Dominic. There was a slight quiver to his voice. Anyone who didn’t know him would probably miss it. I couldn’t stop hearing it. “I was raised to believe that almost everyone in this room was a soulless monster, and that the humans among you were traitors to their species. I was misled, and I allowed it, because it was all I knew. I’m sorry.”
Muttering greeted the first part of his statement, replaced by silence and a general feeling of surprise as he continued. I stepped out of the doorway, moving to stand next to Kitty.
“I was willing to let the Covenant come and go unhindered, helping Verity protect you and your families until the danger had passed. Unfortunately, that ceased to be an option when they took her. I understand that I am asking you to challenge an organization that wants nothing more than your extinction. I have nowhere else to turn, and Verity has no other options.”
“Will they kill her?” asked Carol. She wasn’t wearing her wig, and the snakes atop her head hissed and writhed in response to her agitation.
“Sadly, no,” said Dominic.
Ryan took a step toward him, seeming to get almost a foot taller in the process. My eyes weren’t deceiving me; the therianthrope was growing. Never a good sign. “What did you say?” he growled.
“If they were going to kill her, we could create a gas leak in the building and blow them all to Kingdom Come,” said Dominic. If having a shift-primed tanuki menacing him was a problem, he wasn’t letting it show. “Since they’re not going to kill her any time soon, we have to come up with a solution that doesn’t include killing her ourselves.”
“Oh,” said Ryan suspiciously. He didn’t shrink back down to his original size. I guess some things take time.
“As I was saying: no, the Covenant will not kill her. It would be, if you will forgive me an unpleasant turn of phrase, wasteful. Verity Price represents something they have not had in generations. She is a source of information about her family, and about the cryptids of North America. They will break her, through whatever means necessary, and then they will drain her dry.” Dominic shook his head. “I love her. I do. But believe me when I say that the Covenant of St. George is extremely good at breaking people. She will do her best to withstand them, and I believe she’ll be able to hold out much longer than many people could. In the end, she’ll break. In the end, everyone breaks.”
“So what do we do?” asked Angel.
“The Covenant is using a dockside warehouse as their temporary headquarters while here in town. Their hotel rooms have already been abandoned; presumably all three of them have moved into the warehouse to supervise their prisoner, and to fortify their defenses against me.” Now Dominic’s voice turned even grimmer. “I didn’t tell them Verity existed; I vanished when she was taken.”
“And our family has a history of converting Covenant agents to our way of thinking,” I said. “They’ve probably already decided that Dominic is no longer on the right side.”
“This is true,” said Dominic. “In their eyes, I am as much of a monster as any of you, if not more. After all, I saw the light, and turned it aside.”