«I'm not an it,» I told him, staying well out of reach. «I don't know what you think is happening here, but I'm not a threat to you.»
He laughed, a rather strangled sound under the circumstances. «Of course not. I'm too old for a lamia to take an interest. I tracked the one I killed over the bodies of twenty children it used to sustain its abomination of a life. I won't let that happen again.»
I fought down anger and turned to the window, parting the blackout curtain to see a flat, reddish-tan landscape and pale blue sky. Quite a group had gathered around the hole left by the grenade, but no one bothered us. I guess they figured we could take care of ourselves. I turned back to that hate-filled face. «What if you're wrong and I'm not some evil thing? Wouldn't you rather know for sure before killing me?»
«I already know. No human can do what you did. It isn't possible.»
«A few days ago, I would have agreed with you. Now I know different.» I found it hard to meet his eyes. I'd never had anyone look at me with that level of hatred. Tony wanted to kill me, but I was willing to bet that if he ever caught up with me his eyes wouldn't look like that. He viewed me as a royal pain and a way to seal a bargain, not as the incarnation of evil. Even though I knew Pritkin was wrong, I felt guilty, and that made me mad in a way his physical attack hadn't. I wasn't the homicidal lunatic here.
«You said you've hunted these things before. Isn't there some kind of test you use, to make sure you're right? Or do you kill anyone you suspect on sight?»
«There are tests,» Pritkin said through clenched teeth, as if even talking to me was torture. «But your vampire allies wouldn't like them. They involve holy water and crosses.»
I looked at Mircea in astonishment, and he rolled his eyes. What the hell kind of stuff was Pritkin reading? Bram freaking Stoker? Demons might be afraid of holy items, but vamps certainly weren't. Mircea's family crest showed a dragon, the symbol of courage, embracing a cross, a sign of the family's Catholicism. It decorated the wall behind his seat in the Senate, but I guess Pritkin had been too busy glaring at me to notice. I thought about giving him the lecture on vampirism being sort of like lycanthropy, in that it was a metaphysical disease. But I doubted he'd believe that the legends claiming that a demon came to roost in every new vampire had been caused by the hysteria of the Middle Ages. Pritkin seemed to see demons everywhere, whether any were there or not. In fact, the only ones of Hollywood's arsenal of weapons that actually worked on vamps were sunlight—for the younger ones, anyway—stakes and garlic, and the latter only if employed as part of a protection ward. Simply hanging the stuff over a door would have no effect at all—hell, Tony loved it on bruschetta with a little olive oil.
Mircea was no help; he only grinned at me. «And to think, I always believed that my least favorite things were bad wine and poor fashion.» He smiled tolerantly at my expression. «Very well, dulceata. I think we can find a few crosses somewhere. And unless I mistake it, Rafe is keeping several vials of holy water imprisoned as we speak.»
Rafe came forward with his box. It sounded like a bunch of Mexican jumping beans were inside, urgently trying to get out, and all of us looked at it doubtfully. «I don't agree with this,» Tomas spoke up. «I was charged by the Consul to keep Cassie safe. What if he lies, and those things contain acid or explosives? You know we cannot trust him.»
«Never trust a mage,» Rafe agreed, as if quoting something.
«I will test them,» Louis-Cesar said and extracted a vial so quickly that I didn't have a chance to stop him. He didn't pour it over his own flesh as I'd half feared, but held the stoppered vial under Pritkin's nose. «I am about to spill this over your arm. If it is not safe to do so, it would be well if you told me now.»
Pritkin ignored him, his glare still on me, as if he was more worried about what I might do than a roomful of master vamps. He obviously hadn't been around them long enough to understand nuances. Louis-Cesar had said only that they wouldn't kill him—that still left a lot of possibilities wide open. I'd have been worried, but Pritkin was so busy giving me the glower of death that he barely noticed when a few drops of colorless liquid were drizzled over his skin. We all watched as if expecting his arm to start to melt, but nothing happened. Louis-Cesar reached for me, but Tomas grabbed his wrist.
The Frenchman's eyes flashed silver. «Be careful, Tomas,» he said softly. «You are not possessed this time.»
Tomas ignored the warning. «That could be poison—he could have taken the antidote, or be willing to die with her. I will not have her harmed.»