«Oui, I am afraid.»
«Why?»
«There are others here who have tasted the ardeur and are masters. We need to test our theory, ma petite, but I fear we run the risk of having you tied permanently to someone, or they to you.»
«Auggie isn't tied to me.»
«He did not want to leave our side, ma petite. If he does not recover, then he will be as Belle made her victims, hungering for us forever, willing to do anything to be back between us.»
«You sound sad.»
«He was my friend; I did not mean to enslave him as Belle would. I saw her victims give up everything, betray every vow, every trust, for the sake of her body.» He held me tight against him. «It is not a power I ever wished to possess.»
«You hold the ardeur.»
«Oui, but this is a level of the ardeur that only she possesses. We all believed that only Belle Morte could wield it at such a level.»
«You don't want it.»
«I want to be so powerful that no one dares challenge me or our people. But I am afraid of this, and what it will mean.»
His heart was beating too fast against my ear. Had it been beating all along, or had it just started? «Mean, how?»
«There are those in Europe who already fear my growing power. Knowledge that I wielded the ardeur at the same level as Belle Morte might tip the scales in the council's voting. They might vote to kill us all rather than risk me making a power base in America, as strong as Belle once possessed in Europe. Or the other American masters might collude to kill us, for fear that we would become like the tyrants of the European council.»
«How likely is all this?» I asked.
«Possible.»
«How possible?» I asked, suddenly realizing that an accidental pregnancy might not be the worst disaster we could have.
«We must understand these new powers, and quickly, ma petite. We must experiment with a master we trust before I allow you to go to the party tomorrow. We must know what we are dealing with, if we can.»
Raised voices on the other side of the door. Claudia yelling, «You can't just go in there!»
Richard's voice, angry. «Watch me.»
Jean-Claude sighed, and I settled lower in the water. I did not want to fight with Richard tonight. But from the feel of him through the door, we weren't going to have a choice.
Jean-Claude called, «Let him in, Claudia.»
The door opened, but Claudia came first, as if she didn't trust Richard in there with us. His power rode through the door like the heat edge of a forest fire, something that should have choked and killed anything in its path. We'd raised his power level along with ours, and we were about to find out how sorry that was going to make us.
11
CLAUDIA STOOD BETWEEN him and the tub, and because she was about five inches taller, she blocked our view of him. Of some of him. She was the more serious bodybuilder, but he had broader shoulders. His shoulders and what I could glimpse of his lower body let me know he was wearing blue jeans and a red shirt. There was a herd of black in the door, where the other guards waited to figure out what to do. Some of them were werewolves and he was their Ulfric; you don't stand in the way of your king, not and survive.
His power swirled through the room like invisible fire, as if the water should have boiled with it. Then I realized, it wasn't just Richard's power. Claudia had been my bodyguard off and on for months, maybe a year, but until this moment I hadn't really understood how much power was in that tall, muscular body. It was her power, too, burning down the room. She wasn't just physical muscle. The air was hard to breathe, as if it were too hot to pass over my lips, like coffee that you want to blow on before you drink it. I don't know what Richard had done outside, but it had made Claudia drop all her pretenses and show her power, like a preview, or a warning.
Her voice echoed in the room. «No farther, until you prove you've got your shit under control.» Her legs bent, her body going into that partial crouch, legs moving in the space she had between the raised tub and him. It was a fighting stance. Jesus.
«Move!» Richard shouted it, in a voice gone bass with growling. Not good.
Jean-Claude and I exchanged looks. He gave a small shrug. I tried. «Richard.» I had to raise my voice, and say his name three times, before he answered.
«Tell her to move, Anita,» he growled.
«What will you do if she moves?» I asked.
I felt some of that burning power hesitate, grow weaker. His voice was still growly, but less sure of itself. «I don't know.» He said it as if he hadn't thought beyond getting to us. That wasn't like Richard, to have no idea what he planned to do.