I'd refused to go to the seethe without Stefan. Stubborn, I might be, but not stupid. I wouldn't invite her to my house either—it's much easier to invite evil in than it is to keep it out afterwards. I wasn't even certain how you uninvited a vampire, beyond knowing that it was possible. So I'd suggested Uncle Mike's as a neutral meeting place.
I'd expected it to be less crowded since it was a work night. Apparently Uncle Mike's clientele wasn't worried about getting up in the morning like I had to.
I opened the door and noise poured out like water over a dam. Caught by the sheer volume of sound, I hesitated—then a firm hand caught my breastbone and pushed me, sending me stumbling back outside. The door swung shut, leaving me alone in the parking lot with my assailant.
I took a second step back, putting space between us, wishing I'd brought a gun. Then I took a good look and relaxed. He was dressed in a lincoln green tunic and hose, looking not unlike one of Robin Hood's Merry Men, the uniform of Uncle Mike's staff.
He looked about sixteen, tall and thin with just a faint shadow of hair about his mouth that might be a moustache in a few years. His features were ordinary, neither too big nor too small, but not neatly arranged enough to be overtly attractive.
He made a little gesture at me and I smelled the sharp astringent scent of fae magic. Then he turned on his heel and started back to the door. He was a bouncer. Damn it all, this was the second time today someone tried to throw me out of someplace.
"I'm not human." I told him impatiently, following behind him. "Uncle Mike doesn't mind me coming here." Not that Uncle Mike had taken much notice of me.
The boy hissed and turned to face me, anger darkening his features. He held his hands up between us and cupped them. This time the smell of magic was as strong as ammonia, clearing my sinuses. I gave a choked cough at the unexpected strength of the scent.
I don't know what he intended to do to me because the door behind him opened again and Uncle Mike himself came out.
"Hsst now, Fergus, you'll not be wanting to do that, do ya hear me? Put that out. Of all the… You know better than that." Ireland lay thick as honey on his tongue and his voice
Uncle Mike looked like a tavern owner ought to. As if he'd reached into my mind and pulled out all the tavern owners in all the books and movies and stories I'd ever experienced, and then distilled them to produce the perfect caricature. His face was pleasing, but more charismatic than handsome. He was average in height with wide shoulders, thick arms, and short-fingered, powerful hands. His hair was reddish brown, but there were no freckles on his tanned face. His eyes, I knew, though the night robbed them of their color, were bright hazel and he turned their power on his hapless employee.
"Now, then, Fergus, you make yourself useful and tell Biddy she's to guard the door for the rest of the night. Then you are to go to Cook and tell him I want you to stay busy until you remember that killing customers isn't good for business."
"Yes, sir." Thoroughly cowed, the bouncer scuttled through the door and disappeared inside. I might have felt sorry for him, if it hadn't been for the "killing customers" part.
"Now then," Uncle Mike said, turning to me. "You'll have to excuse my help. That demon is raising all sorts of havoc for us here, keeping tempers at a killing edge as you have seen. I'm thinkin' that it might not be the best night for one of your kind to join us in revelry."
It was more polite than a death curse perhaps, but even more effective at keeping me out. Damn it.
I swallowed my growl and tried to keep my voice as polite as his. "If I am not welcome, would you have someone find Marsilia and tell her to meet me out here?"
His face went blank with surprise. "And what are you doing meeting the Vampire queen? You play in waters much too deep to swim in for long, little girl."
I think it was the "little girl" that did it. Or maybe it was the shift in wind that brought the smell of garbage, wolf, and blood to my nose as well as the distinct scent that was Warren's alone—reminding me that he had been dumped here, bleeding and dying only hours ago.
"Maybe if the fae would stir their asses once in a while, I could stay in shallow water," I said, all attempts at politeness gone. "I know the old stories. I know you have power, damn it all. Why are you all just sitting around and watching the sorcerer kill people?" I was trying not to include Stefan among the dead, but part of me was already in mourning—it added a reckless edge to my tongue. "I suppose if you are afraid it might put you ‘on a killing edge,' it makes better sense to wait it out." Warren could have done that, too. Then he'd be safe at home instead of bleeding in Adam's guest bedroom. "Especially since it is a vampire matter. The people who die along the way are merely effluvia and nothing to be concerned about."
He smiled, just a little, and it flamed my temper higher.
"Fine, smile away. I suppose you've killed your share. Well, this affects you, too. The humans aren't stupid, they know this is something out of the ordinary, something evil—and the only people they know who might do this are yours."
He was grinning now, but he held up a staying hand. "Sorry, love. It's just the image. One doesn't think of mechanics using words like effluvia, does one?"
I stared at him. Maybe there was something about being old, and I suspected Uncle Mike was very old, that gave him a different perspective, but…
"I'm sorry," I said, and even I could hear that my voice was thick with rage. "I'll try to keep to commonly used, very small words when discussing something that has a body count of what…" I tried to add it up in my head, though I was foiled somewhat because I didn't know how many people had died while Daniel had been under the sorcerer's control. "Fifteen?"
The smile left his face altogether, and he stopped looking like a tavern owner. "More like forty, I think, though I doubt not there are more we've yet to find. Not all of them here in the three cities, either. Demons deal in death and rot. Nothing to smile at, nor to let pass. My apologies," he bowed, a jerky motion that was over so quickly I couldn't be absolutely certain I'd really seen it. "I was amused as much at myself as at your use of the language. Even after all this time, I keep forgetting that heroes can be found in unlikely places and persons—like mechanics who can turn into coyotes." He stared at me a minute and a sly smile slid into his eyes, nothing like the expressions he usually had on his face.
"So, as you have the right, being a hero about to throw yourself on a grenade for the rest of us, I'll tell you why we're not bestirring ourselves against it." He nodded his head toward the tavern. "We fae are holding to survival by our fingertips, Mercedes Thompson. We are dying faster than we are reproducing, even counting our half bloods. It started the first time a human forged a cold-iron blade, but bullet lead kills us just as quickly as steel ever did—gremlins like Siebold Adelbertsmiter being the exception among us."
He paused, but I waited. I knew all of this, as did anyone who cared to turn on the TV or read a newspaper.
"There are beings of power here," he said. "Beings who would scare the human population into launching a genocidal wave that would wipe every fae off the face of the earth if they knew of them. If the sorcerer turns its attention to us, makes one of us kill humans in front of cameras—which it can do—there will be no more fae."