Greyfriar.
He clutched an iron balcony, leaning off into space, his cloak fluttering in the wind. Adele knew he could see her clearly given his amazing eyesight. She let out one breath of relief. He raised his arm and waved to her. It was done. For better or worse. She nodded, as if to the soldiers, but he would've known it was to him.
And then he was gone into the shadows.
“They'll never find Aden,” Gareth said, tugging the scarf from his face. “He's at the bottom of the sea.”
Adele sat quietly staring at a tray of sweets without appetite. She stroked her grey cat, Pet, a gift from Gareth and a remembrance of their time together in Edinburgh.
General Anhalt poured coffee for Adele and then himself. Gareth paced thoughtfully along the far wall. The door to her private chambers was locked against the constant parade of servants, and Captain Shirazi was posted in the corridor to ensure privacy.
Gareth asked, “What do you intend to do with Montrose? Kill him as he wishes?”
Adele laughed bitterly. “I don't know. Kill one man without trial. Leave another alive who wants to die.”
Gareth said, “Don't waste your sympathy on either of them, Adele. Aden was your enemy. Montrose is Undead. He would do anything Cesare told him.”
Anhalt stared out the window at the blurry lights of distant airships in the night. “They seem completely human. Difficult to tell them from real human beings.”
“They are real human beings,” Adele replied with a tired smile. “That's how Aden brought them in, as part of the humanitarian refugee relocation from the front.”
“Of course. I only meant…civilized human beings. It seems rather complex planning for vampires.”
Gareth laughed as he slapped his gloves against his thigh. “Why do you continue to underestimate us? After Adele's kidnapping? After Gibraltar? After the attack on Marseilles? And after your own near disaster at Grenoble? Even with your superior weapons, your inability to see us for what we are could be your undoing.”
“Thank you,” Anhalt said frostily, “for the lecture on your kind.”
Adele studied the ripples in her coffee cup and took a deep breath, loathing what was coming next. “I need to talk about Mamoru.”
Gareth and Anhalt halted their pacing out of respect for her obvious dilemma.
“It is painfully clear to me,” Adele began with a strong voice that still quavered beneath, “that Mamoru cannot bring himself to accept my situation. I have overlooked his lack of forthrightness over the years, but I don't have that leisure any longer.”
“With due respect, Your Majesty,” Anhalt said, “he's always been a shady character. I believe he has manipulated you, and the court, to pursue his private agenda. You need not labor to convince us.”
“I need to convince myself. I believed in him.”
Gareth's voice was cold. “There comes a time when we must face the future, no matter how dire. Youth is gone forever, and those ideals must be sacrificed, when necessary, to greater causes. Mamoru is party to every secret you have, large and small. If you no longer trust him, you must deal with him.”
She looked up sharply at the unmasked face of the vampire prince. “What do you mean, deal with him?”
He stared at her in silence.
Adele got a chill and heard echoes of Mamoru's ravings about Gareth's sinister schemes: It orchestrated the attack on Alexandria, murdered your father, ruined the American coalition, and steers us on a losing war! Now Gareth was suggesting she eliminate Mamoru. “Dear God. I feel sick. He has committed no crime.”
“Then why are you holding him?” Gareth asked.
“You know why.”
“My point exactly. You already know what must be done.”
Adele swung her feet to the floor and bent over in anguish.
General Anhalt moved to her side, but remained rigid and military. “Your Majesty, do you trust Mamoru to do your bidding?”
She took a deep, shuddering breath. “No.”
“Do you believe that he will use his privileged information for his own purposes, whatever they may be?”
“Yes.”
“Do you believe that if the secret of the Greyfriar ever became known, it could shatter your reign?”
“Yes.”
The sirdar said, “There is your answer, Your Majesty.”
The empress looked up at the general and whispered hoarsely, “He's Mamoru. I can't kill him.”
“Very well, but…”
“But I can never let him go. Can I?”
“No,” Anhalt said. “You cannot.”
ADELE HAD BEEN studying reports for hours, but not really seeing them. She was preoccupied with difficult thoughts of Lord Aden's fate and Mamoru's future. Greyfriar stood at the window of her private office, watching the dark skies outside, nearly motionless for more than an hour. He suffered no remorse for killing Aden, so he must have been contemplating his coming actions in the north. Or perhaps he was simply silent out of respect for Adele's discomfort. It was difficult to know.