Vampire in Atlantis

extraordinarily large donations back to a certain vampire primator. Thank you.”
    “I’m not Primator. I quit,” he said tersely. Tired of explaining that one.
    “You think somebody else could do that job better?” Reisen demanded. “Poseidon’s balls, man, Atlantis needs allies in high places.”
    “Yes, and everything I do or have ever done should be predicated on what Atlantis needs, of course,” Daniel drawled. “Especially since it was Atlantean soldiers who dragged Serai away from me when I lay dying on the ground all those millennia ago. Atlantean mages and priests who decided to imprison her, so she could serve as brood mare to your royal studs in some distant future. Oh, yeah. Whatever Atlantis wants, I’m all over that.”
    Reisen’s eyes flashed emerald fire, and he rose halfway out of his seat before he reconsidered and sat back down heavily. “Well. I’d be a liar or a fool if I tried to pretend that my goals have never collided with those of the powers that be in Atlantis. But the world needs good men to do good things, or it will be overrun with evil before too much longer.”
    Melody, who’d sat silently watching them during the exchange, her eyes enormous, suddenly glared at Reisen and elbowed him in the side. “Hey! Good men and good women , thank you very much. Now maybe we could make with the friendship and figure out our day.”
    She pointed to Daniel before he could speak. “You. If you’re going to be hiking at all, and I bet you are, if they’re skulking around trying to hide this gem you talked about, you’ll need gear and provisions. I’ll get someone to bring it to you.”
    Daniel inclined his head in thanks.
    “You,” she said, turning to Reisen, who seemed to be trying hard not to smile as the small human female put them both in their respective places. “I know you want to help Serai. But I need you, too. Can we compromise? You help me today and tonight, and then we’ll both find Daniel and Serai and help them. Both objectives met, and Melody doesn’t get killed while trying to rob a bank all by herself.”
    “I will not let anything happen to you,” Reisen said, his eyes flashing again.
    Daniel thought about the arrogance in the warrior’s voice, and a realization came to him. “Is it Lord Reisen, by any chance?”
    Reisen nodded, though bitterness was evident in the hard lines of his face. “It was. Reisen of Mycenae. But I thought I knew a better path for Atlantis, and my error cost me everything.”
    “You attempted a coup, or so I heard,” Daniel said.
    “Conlan had been gone, prisoner to your evil goddess Anubisa, for seven long years. I thought he was dead, and Atlantis deserved real leadership, not a group of shell-shocked warriors waiting for a dead prince to return,” Reisen said, each word falling like a chunk of granite to the table.
    “But he was alive,” Daniel said, stating the obvious, realizing how much it must have cost the warrior to realize he’d been wrong.
    “He was alive,” Reisen agreed. “And so a coup became treachery, and I lost a hand in the process. No less than I deserve, or so most of Atlantis thinks.”
    “Then they suck. I’m sure you did what you thought was best,” Melody said hotly. “What else can any of us do, especially in these crazy times? I’m one of the worst cyber criminals in the world, probably, and do you think I ever envisioned a life of crime? No, no, and no. But what I do is crucial to the rebel cause, and a little threat like a life sentence in Alcatraz isn’t going to stop me.”
    “I don’t think they use Alcatraz to house prisoners anymore. It’s a tourist attraction now,” Daniel pointed out, trying to help the obviously distraught woman.
    She rolled her eyes. “ So missing the point, dude. Anyway, we need to go. Like, now. Our meet with the woman from the bank is coming up soon. We’ll be in touch as soon as we can.”
    She dug around in her ever-present backpack for a while and then handed him a small phone. “Untraceable, disposable cell. Not much use in the canyons, of course, but my number is programmed in.”
    “I can contact Serai on the Atlantean shared mental pathway, if that is possible between us,” Reisen said, and Daniel quashed a momentary pang of jealousy at the idea. Of course her fellow Atlanteans would be able to communicate with her in ways that Daniel never could. It was perfectly reasonable.
    It was his own problem that “perfectly reasonable” was