of turbot, and held it out to her right, over seemingly empty space. A couple of licking noises later, the turbot had disappeared from the fork.
“How can such a creature as a lifeleech exist?” Granuaile asked.
Leif grimaced. “I am uncertain. My only information derives directly from him and may be suspect. But to hear him tell it, he was an accident of alchemy—a byproduct of a sixteenth-century search for the philosopher’s stone. He represented a form of success, of course, but he drained to death the alchemist who created him, in the first few minutes of his newfound power. He is unique, which I suppose is a minor blessing, as there will be no others. Of more concern to us is that he is entirely in the confidence of Theophilus.”
I noticed that Leif had subtly cast this as an “us vs. them” scenario, when in fact he was with them. Or, if that was not entirely accurate, he was certainly not with us.
“Huh. How’d that happen?”
“I do not know. I am not in confidence with either of them. I am also unsure of Herr Drasche’s motivation regarding your pursuit and murder. He could not harbor an old antipathy for Druids, since he was born long after all Druids had disappeared from the earth save you—and he only heard of your existence recently. But it may simply be an issue of loyalty for him. His relationship with Theophilus has depths I cannot fathom.”
“Well, how about the obvious?” Granuaile asked. “Are they lovers?”
Leif blinked. “Oh. Well. I hadn’t considered that. Perhaps.”
“Aha!” Granuaile said, pointing at him, her face lit with victory. “So that means vampires
do
have balls! Ever since the last time we saw you in Thessalonika, I’ve been wondering about that!”
Leif flinched as if Granuaile had slapped him. “You have?”
I grinned, because I knew what she was up to. Leif had a peculiar squeamishness about vampire biology and refused to discuss it. If she could cause enough discomfort, he might decide to leave.
“Well, yeah,” she said, pressing the attack, “I mean, you’re basically animated dead tissue, right, so why would any system from your human life still work if it’s superfluous to the act of predation and converting blood to energy? I mean, I’m sure you’d have a vestigial sack dangling there, but there’s no reason to suppose your nuts would still be churning out babymakers and testosterone like a regular dude’s if that’s not going to get you a night’s supply of blood. But if Theophilus is sharing his sweet cadaver love with Werner, then I guess I was
dead
wrong about that, eh? Did you see what I did there? Hey! Where are you going?”
“Excuse me,” Leif called over his shoulder, suddenly in a hurry to exit the restaurant. He was already halfway to the door.
I laughed. “I told him to get out and he ignored me, but bring up his pop rocks and he can’t wait to leave. Good call.” I gave her a fist bump.
“Thanks. I hope I didn’t pounce too early.”
“Oh. We never got an answer, did we?” I doubted I’d ever learn the truth about vampires.
“No, but we got an incentive to get out of here. I don’t want to walk into an ambush outside, and I’m not anxious to confront something called an arcane lifeleech.”
“Neither am I, but we can’t go yet. We don’t have any money to pay for this fabulous food we’re not eating.”
Granuaile said, “We’ll feed you, Oberon, but in depressingly human-sized bites.”
The waiter stopped by to make sure everything wassatisfactory, seeing that my monkfish remained undisturbed.
“Très délicieux,”
I told him. He removed himself from our sight, only to be replaced by a large man in a black beret with hyper-aggressive muttonchops. They were imperial expansionist chops, threatening to leap from his face onto mine and colonize it for the glory of a fill-in-the-blank god and monarch.
“Monsieur O’Sullivan?” he growled.
“Oui.”
He reached into his pocket and withdrew a large roll of euros. He dropped it onto the table and hauled his muttonchops away before they could execute an airdrop and establish a beachhead on my jaw. Apparently that was all the welcome I would receive from the local pack.
“Hmm,” I said. “Taciturn.”
“Aloof,” Granuaile said.
“He was also in a hurry to leave, and that was a hint in itself. Let’s go.”
“Yes, let’s.”
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