Feast of Fools

“Where’d you come from?” she asked. Claire gestured vaguely toward the staircase. “I just came from there.”

“Bathroom,” Claire said. And got a frown, but Eve let it go.

“It’s Michael,” she said. “He’s gone.”

“Gone to work?”

“No, gone. As in, he took off in the middle of the night and didn’t tell me where he was going, and he hasn’t come back. I checked—he’s not at the music store. I’m worried, especially—” Eve’s train of thought switched tracks, and her eyes widened. “Oh my God, are you wearing the same thing you had on yesterday? You’re not doing the walk of shame, are you? Because I totally ca

“No, no, it’s not like that—” Claire felt a hot blush work its way up from her neck to vividly light up her face. “I just—we were talking, and we fell asleep. I swear, we didn’t, um—”

“Yeah, you’d better not have ummed, because if you did, that would be—” Eve struggled not to smile. “That would be bad.”

“I know, I know. But we didn’t. And we aren’t going to until—” Until I can convince him it’s okay. “Whatever. About Michael—what do you want to do?”

“Go ask some questions. Common Grounds is a place to start, much as I hate it; Sam’s probably there, or we can leave a message for him. I heard he’s back out in public again.” Sam was Michael’s grandfather— and a vampire. He’d nearly been staked dead, and it had taken Amelie’s help to save him. But he’d been left weak. Claire was glad to hear that he was better— Sam was, she felt, one of the best of the vampires. One she could trust. “Well? Are we going or what?”

Shane still hadn’t come out of the bathroom. “Five minutes,” Claire said, resigned. No chance of a hot shower, or even clean clothes—the best she had available were cleanish, and not slept in. She might be able to find that last-picked pair of underwear hiding in a drawer. . . .

There was a knock downstairs at the front door. An authoritative, urgent sort of knock. It was still early, and the number of drop-in visitors in Morganville was generally pretty small anyway; Claire dragged the least wrinkled of the two T-shirts over her head, pulled on the fresh underwear and old jeans, and hurried out into the hall still zipping up. Eve was ahead of her, already going down the stairs, and as Claire passed the bathroom, Shane opened the door and stuck his wet head out. “What’s going on?”

“Don’t know!” she shot back, and hurried after Eve.

What was going on was the delivery of an envelope, which Eve had to sign for. As she turned it over, Claire made out the name, neatly written in an antiquely beautiful hand: Mr. Shane Collins. There was even a decorative little flourish underneath his name. The envelope was heavy cream-colored paper. On the back flap there was a gold seal with some kind of shield on it.

Eve lifted it to her nose, sniffed, and raised her eyebrows. “Wow,” she said. “Expensive perfume.”

She waved it in Claire’s direction, and she caught a hint of the dark, musky fragrance—full of promise and danger.

Shane padded downstairs, barefoot and wearing only his jeans except for the towel draped around his neck. He slowed as they both turned toward him. “What?”

Eve held up the envelope. “Mr. Shane Collins.”

He took it from her fingers, frowned at it, and then ripped open the back flap. Inside was a folded card of the same expensive cream paper, with raised black printing. Shane looked at it for a long second, then put it back in the envelope and handed it back to Eve. “Burn it,” he said.

And then he went upstairs.

Eve lost no time digging the card out, and since she did, Claire didn’t feel too guilty about reading over her shoulder.

You have been summoned to attend a masked ball and feast to celebrate the arrival of Elder Bishop, on Saturday the twentieth of October, at the Elders’ Council Hall at the hour of midnight.

You will attend at the invitation of the lady Ysandre, and are required to accompany her at her pleasure.

“Who’s Ysandre?” Eve asked.

Claire was too busy worrying about the phrase at her pleasure.

They located Sam Glass at Common Grounds, sitting and talking with two others Claire didn’t recognize, but Eve clearly did, from the nods they exchanged. Humans, because they were wearing bracelets. They said their good-byes and cleared the chairs for Eve and Claire.

Sam looked a lot like Michael—a little older, maybe, with a slightly wider chin. He had red hair to Michael’s bright gold, but a similar build and height.

That had nearly gotten him killed, not so long ago, when he’d taken a stake meant for Michael. He still looked drawn, Claire thought—tired, too. But his smile was genuine as he nodded his greeting. “Ladies, ” he said. “It’s good to see you. Eve, I didn’t think you’d ever come in here again, not voluntarily. ”

“Believe me, if it wasn’t for you, I wouldn’t,” she said, and tapped dark purple fingernails on the scarred table in agitation. “Do you know where Michael is?”

Sam’s ginger eyebrows rose. “He’s not at work?”

“He left last night, didn’t say where he was going. We haven’t seen him, and he’s not at work. So? Ideas?”

“Nothing good,” Sam said, and sat back in his chair. “Does he have his car?”

“Yeah, as far as I know. Why?”

“GPS. All of our cars are trackable.”

“Wow, good to know in case I ever go into the grand-theft-auto business around here,” Eve said. “Who’s got the supersecret-spy tracking gear, and how do I get my hands on it?”

“You don’t,” Sam said. “I’ll take care of it.”

“Soon?”

“As soon as I can.”

“But I need to find him! What if he’s—” Eve leaned even closer, dropping her voice to a whisper. “What if someone has him?”

“Who?”

“Bishop!”

Sam’s eyes widened, and all over the coffee shop, other heads snapped up. Mostly vampires, Claire thought, who knew the name, or at least knew of it. And who could hear a whisper across a crowded room.

“Quiet,” Sam said. “Eve, stay out of it. It’s nothing for any of you to get involved in. It’s our business.”

“It’s our business, too. The guy was in our house. He threatened us, all of us,” Eve said. “Can’t you find out right now? Because otherwise I’m going to call up Homeland Security and tell them that we’ve got a whole bunch of terrorists skulking around in the dark.”

“You wouldn’t.”

“Oh, I so would. With glee. And I’d tell them to bring ta

Sam shook his head. “Eve—”

Eve slammed her hand down on the table. It sounded like a gunshot, and every head turned in their direction. “I’m not kidding, Sam!”

“Yes, you are,” he said, deliberately quiet. “Because if you were serious, you would be making a threat against people who control the destiny of your next heartbeat, and that would be very, very stupid. Now, say you’ll let me handle this.”

Eve’s dark eyes didn’t blink. “Is this about Bishop? Why is he here? What’s he doing? Why are you so scared of him?”

Sam stood up, and there was something remote and cold about him just then. Something that reminded Claire, very strongly, that he was a vampire first.

“Go home,” he said. “I’ll find Michael. I doubt he’s in any trouble, and I doubt it has anything to do with Bishop.”

Eve stood up, too, and for the first time, Claire saw her as an adult—a woman, facing him on equal terms.

“You’d better be right,” she said softly. “Because if anything happens to Michael, that won’t be the end of it. I swear to that.”

Sam watched them all the way out of the coffee shop. So did everyone else. Some of them looked worried; some looked gleeful. Some looked angry.

But nobody ignored the two of them as they left. Nobody. And that was . . . unsettling.

They got in the car, and Eve started it up without a word. Claire finally ventured a question. “Where are we going?”