Must Love Hellhounds

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    This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the authors’ imaginations or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.
     
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    PRINTING HISTORY
Berkley trade paperback edition / September 2009
     
    Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
     
    Harris, Charlaine.
Must love hellhounds / Charlaine Harris, Nalini Singh, Ilona Andrews, Meljean Brook.—Berkley
trade paperback ed.
p. cm.
    eISBN : 978-1-101-14007-9
    1. Hell—Fiction. 2. Vampires—Fiction. I. Singh, Nalini. II. Andrews, Ilona. III. Brook,
Meljean. IV. Title.
PS3558.A6427M87 2009
813’.54—dc22
2009018735
     

     
     

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The Britlingens Go to Hell

    Charlaine Harris

Batanya and Clovache were cleaning their armor in one of the courtyards of the Britlingen Collective, which sits atop a hill in the ancient city of Spauling. It was a fine summer day, and they sat on benches that they’d positioned to catch the sun.
    “I’m as pale as a pooka belly,” Clovache said.
    “Not quite,” Batanya said, after looking at Clovache rather seriously. Batanya was the older of the two; she was twenty-eight to Clovache’s twenty-four. Batanya was pale, too, since she spent most of her time in armor of one kind or another, but that didn’t bother Batanya.
    “Oh, thank you. Not quite ,” Clovache said, imitating Batanya’s husky voice. It was a pretty bad imitation. Batanya smiled. She and Clovache had worked together for five years, and there wasn’t much they didn’t know about each other. They had both done most of their growing up within the Collective walls.
    “You are a bit like a pooka, though. Your hair is the same color as the back fur, and you like the night life better than the daylight. But I’m sure you wouldn’t taste as good deep-fried.”
    Clovache stretched out a foot to kick Batanya, very lightly. “We’ll go out to eat later,” she said. “How about Pooka Palace?”
    Batanya nodded. “Unless Trovis is there. If he’s in the place, I’m leaving.”
    The two women worked in a friendly silence for a few minutes. They were polishing what they called their “liquid armor,” the most popular single item of body defense in the Britlingen’s huge collection. Liquid armor wasn’t really liquid. It resembled a wet suit more than anything, but it was considerably easier to don. There was a keypad the size of a credit card on the chest. It allowed for communication with anyone else wearing a similar suit, and it had a personal sequence programmed into it that allowed only one wearer to use the armor. The material would toughen when the sequence was pressed in, to allow the wearer to be almost invulnerable; without this procedure,