Brigid was on speakerphone. “What?”
“Patterns. We fall back into them, whether we want to or not.”
“Are you talking about you or Tenzin?”
“I don’t know yet.” He stared at Tenzin’s name. “Maybe both.”
“What happened?”
“I’m dangerously close to understanding her point of view.”
“That is dangerous.”
Ben tossed the tennis ball and caught it again. “Is that vampire morality taking over? Am I going to become one of those monsters who justify anything if it gives me what I want?”
“Do you even know what you want?”
“Probably not.” No, that wasn’t right.
He wanted Tenzin. He wanted to grab her, drag her to his trailer, take her blood, and bind her to him so thoroughly that when he breathed in, she breathed out.
“I do know what I want,” he said. “I just don’t know if what I want is good for me.”
25
Tenzin was waiting outside his door at dusk.
Ben buttoned his pants and rubbed a hand through his messy hair as he descended the steps. “Are you saying you actually can’t break into these things?”
She nodded toward the two guards standing a short distance from his trailer. “Not without bloodshed, and that’s one of my New Year’s resolutions.”
“Not killing people?”
“Not killing people unless I have a reason for it that you could justify.”
Ben stopped in his tracks. “Wait. That I could justify?”
“Yes.” She floated toward him. “I like being in a place where I don’t have to hide.” She slowly flipped in the air. “It’s lovely here, don’t you think? Maybe this is how all vampires should live.”
“Yeah, it’s nice.” He glanced at the bonfire, newly lit in the forest clearing. The music was already going—a trio of guitarists were playing a mellow tune near the outdoor kitchen. “Why am I the person who decides if you should kill someone or not? I don’t want that responsibility.”
“I’m not going to call you or anything.” She looked irritated. “I am simply pausing and asking, ‘Would Ben kill this person in these circumstances?’ The answer is usually quite clear.”
“Right.” Ben found that incredibly disturbing. He’d become the unwilling leash on Tenzin’s homicidal tendencies, and he didn’t even know where she was most of the time.
“It’s a good system for the most part, but you can be a little too forgiving at times.” She paused. “Not with me of course. With other people.”
“So we’re talking about forgiveness now?” This felt like a continuation of their argument last night. “Why should I forgive you when you haven’t asked for forgiveness?”
She smiled. “It’s an interesting quandary, isn’t it?”
“It’s a genuine question.” He stopped walking. “Are you sorry for what you did?”
She looked away, then looked back. “What do you think?”
“No.”
“Correct. To be sorry for what I did would mean that I regret that you’re alive, and I will never regret that you’re alive and being a brother to Sadia and a friend to Gavin and a son to Giovanni and Beatrice.”
“I could have been all those things as a human if you hadn’t dragged me to Penglai in the first place.”
“You could have also had all those things as a human if you’d listened to me and not trusted Johari.”
Damn it. He couldn’t argue with that.
He’d beat himself up a thousand times in his own mind, asking why he hadn’t seen the clues or paid attention to Tenzin’s advice. “Well, at least Johari and Saba didn’t manage to throw Zhang and Arosh into another war by stealing the sword.”
“Yes.” Tenzin looked away. “Have you seen Tatyana yet tonight?”
Something pricked at his instincts, but he was tired of self-examination. Confronting Tenzin was exhausting. Once you forced yourself inside her head, she made a frightening amount of sense.
Which just… messed with his mind.
“Radu says Tatyana’s been hanging out near the human cooks.”
“Really?” Tenzin landed on the ground and turned toward the outdoor kitchen. “Wait.” She stopped.
“What?”
Tenzin dropped her voice. “You were going to investigate her using camaraderie.”
“It’s not that mercenary,” Ben said. “I just want to get to know her. She seems like the odd one out in all this.”
“I agree. You should befriend her so she will trust you.”
“Do you have to put it that way?”
“Yes.” She glanced up at Ben. “Someone has to keep you honest.”
“And apparently someone has to keep you from stabbing.” He nudged her toward the tables where blood-wine was already being poured. “Go. I’ll join you later.”
“I smell René.”
Ben stopped and turned. “Just so we’re clear, if you are ever deliberating about killing René DuPont, the answer will always be yes.”
“Why would I need to kill René? He’s harmless.”
“He’s annoying.”
Tenzin shook her head slowly. “You can’t just kill people because they’re annoying, Benjamin.”
“Not people.” He started walking again. “Just René.”
Tatyana might have looked like a lamb in the woods, but she was by far the most openly suspicious vampire he’d ever met.
Her sky-blue eyes narrowed. “Did Oleg send you?”
Ben frowned. “All I said was ‘hello, I’m Ben. I heard you’re from Russia.’”
“You didn’t answer the question.” She was stirring a large pot hung over an open fire. The fire didn’t seem to disturb her.
“Okay.” He spotted the sheen of moisture on the back of her hand. Ah, that’s why she wasn’t afraid of the fire. She was a water vampire. Interesting. “Oleg did not send me.”
“Good.”
The scent of peppers and garlic filled the air, and Tatyana continued to ignore him, speaking to the women in the kitchen with a clearly fluid grasp of the dialect they spoke.
“You’re very good at languages,” Ben said. “I’ve been trying to figure it out.”
“Poshani?”
“Yes.”
Tatyana glanced up. “You’re probably trying to fit it into a Romantic or Slavic paradigm,” she said. “Which would be your mistake. The Poshani language is primarily North Indian with opportunistic borrowing from Hungarian, Turkish, and Farsi.”
Ben grinned. “You’re a language nerd.” His aunt would approve. “How did you get to be a vampire?”
She was clearly confused by his enthusiasm. “None of your business. Do all Americans smile so much?”
“Probably.” He held a hand out. “Can I help?”
She looked at the spoon stirring the deep red stew. “You’re a wind vampire?”