Dead Man Rising

"Ma'am?" the driver asked, almost respectfully. His voice crackled over the intercom.

I came back to myself with a completely uncharacteristic sigh. "I'll be out in a few hours. You'll be here?"

"I've been contracted the entire night," the staticky voice said. "Yours until sunup, Miz Valentine. Do you want to get out now?"

Great. I've got a comedian for a driver. I sighed again. "All right. No time like the present."

He hopped out, then the doorhatch clicked and fwished aside. The white-jacketed driver offered me his hand, and I took it, careful to place no weight on it as I stepped out of the hoverlimo, my boots grinding slightly on wet pavement. I smelled night and human excitement, and a dash of something dry and powerful over the top—I wished again I could shut down my nose.

Laseflashes popped. They were taking pictures. I blinked, settling the cloak on my shoulders, shaking the folds of material free. The papers, tucked in a pocket I'd thoughtfully sewn into the skirt, rustled slightly. I set my chin, nodded to the driver—a short, pimple-faced young boy squeezed into a white and black uniform with gold braid—and set off down the red carpet. Behind me, the driver's footsteps echoed, then I heard the whine of hover-cells as the limo lifted up to float in a slow pattern, joining the other hoverlimos and personal hovers already threading through the parking level above the House of Pain.

"Hey, Valentine! Valentine!" Some enterprising soul called my name. I didn't acknowledge it. Soon all of them were yelling, trying to catch my attention. I strode down the carpet, head high, feeling the weight of my hair and the stilettos caught in the twist, I hate this.

If Japhrimel had been with me, he would have walked with his head up, his hands clasped behind his back, utterly unmoved by the human hubbub. Jace might have gri

But me, I couldn't imitate any of them. I strode toward the lion's den with no time to waste.

The things by the door were indeed werecain, hulking bipeds covered with fur, halfway between human and huntform. I'd taken the required classes in paranormal anatomy at Rigger Hall and beyond, at the Academy, but it was odd to see them up close. In the old days they might have worn clothing or stayed in human form. Now all they wore were ruffs of hair around their genitals. I didn't look.

Instead, I held up the invitation, and dropped the outer edge of my shields. Power blurred, stroking against the building's cold blueblack glow. A radioactive wellspring of Power from Saint City's deep black heart bathed this place. It had been here for centuries, the crackling energy of paranormals gathered in one place seeping into the concrete brick and stone. A heartbeat of music thudded out through the walls.

The werecain said nothing. One of them jerked his chin, motioning me inside. Flashbulbs popped.

I wanted to curl my right hand around my swordhilt. I also wished my left shoulder didn't buzz and burn as if red-hot iron was held just above my skin. Anger curled through my stomach, a welcome thread of familiar heat. I would be damned if I would be treated like a second-class citizen to be hustled into this goddamn place, even if I was human.

I measured both werecain with a slow, steady gaze. I could take them. I could take them both. I could gut them. I've got a sword again.

Then I remembered I wasn't just human anymore, but I still didn't back down, holding eye contact and playing the dominance game. It would be a bad start to act weak here at the door.

Finally, one of them gave me a jerky half-bow. "Come on in, lady." His voice, shaped by lips and tongue and teeth no longer human, sounded thick and grumbling. "Welcome to the House of Pain."

I gave them a nod and swept past, my head held high. Who am I? I would have never done that, before.

Chapter Fourteen

Inside, a migraine-attack of red and blue lights throbbed, and the music was a slow haunting melody over a pounding bass beat. Nothing I recognized. There was a time when I would have known, back when I used to go dancing with Jace, his spiky aura closing me off from the backwash of crowd-feeling. Inside the House, there was no tang of humans or human desperation, no sweet knifeblade of human desire or straining sex in dark corners; there were no ghostflits riding the edges of the crowd's heat. No blur of alcohol, no swirls of synth-hash cigarette smoke either.

Instead, Power rode the air in swirls and eddies, a lazy bath of energy that made me shiver slighly, my lips parting, my entire body stroked and teased in a hundred different ways. If I'd known—

No wonder they don't let humans in here. A psion could get addicted to this, they could have a whole community of Feeders in here. The overcharge of carnivorous Power in here would addict a human psion faster than Chill would hook a junkie, and they would keep coming back for more—or looking for the same charge out on the streets, draining anyone they could to feel the crackling feedback of Power. I was lucky to be safe behind a demon's shielding, closed off from the dozing, razor-toothed buzzing that could swallow me whole. Good thing I'd left Jace at home, too.

The place was warehouse-sized, and full of bright glittering eyes and long hair, beautiful pale faces, and the massive shapes of werecain. I saw a gaggle of swanhilds in one corner, their feathered ruffs standing erect around their heads, and a group of something I recognized as kobolding in another, downing tankards of beer. Each time one of the squat gray-ski

Long floating sheets of material hung from the ceiling. I glanced up, wished I hadn't, and glanced back down. Cages on the ceiling, I thought incoherently, swallowing. I couldn't afford to gray out from shock now. If Japhrimel had been here—

Stop thinking about that. The image of a lean saturnine face and piercing green eyes rose in front of me, I shoved it down. Set off across the cement floor. A few steps in, slick stone reverberated under my feet. They'd paved the whole place in marble. The sound bounced and echoed. I shook my head slightly, wishing once again I could shut my ears off, or turn the volume dial down just a little.

The area that vibrated most intensely with power was a booth done in red velvet, facing the bar. I skirted the dance floor, trying not to notice the infrequent pattering drops from the cages overhead, or the bright, inhuman eyes peering at me. The Nichtvren didn't act as if they noticed my presence, but I sensed a few of them trailing me. They dressed in silks and velvets, some of them in ultrahip modern pleather and spiked hair, gelglitter sparkling on pale cheeks. One of them, a tall man in bottle-green velvet with fountaining lace at the cuffs, smiled widely at me, showing his fangs. My right hand curled into a fist. I considered stopping, reaching for my sword—but my legs had already carried me toward the booth, as if set on automatic.

This was dangerous. I couldn't afford to lose focus now.

I blinked slowly, the pain in my shoulder spiking, then easing a little. I could tap into the Power here and blow the whole goddamn place down, if I wanted to. Without even the slightest hesitation or hint of backlash. Now was not the time to be glad that Japhrimel had altered me, but… I still felt glad. A little. In a weird, heart-thumping kind of way. Playing with the big boys now, Da

I stopped in front of the booth. Two men that looked almost human, both with a glaze of Power and the musty, deliciously wicked smell of Nichtvren on them, stood on either side. One of them eyed my swordhilt and opened his mouth to say something. I fixed him with a hot glare.