I glanced at Ben. She sounds like she’s telling the truth.

I agree. There is genuine shock in her voice. She could be faking it, but I suspect not.

“Well, then, I guess this phone call was unnecessary. Except . . . this is all a bit strange to me, too, but it’s nice to talk to you. I had no idea until a few days ago that I had an older sister.”

“You said you were in Germany—where, exactly?”

I gave her the name of the town. “I’m staying at the GothFaire with my . . . er . . . boyfriend.”

Ben sighed into my mind. You’re going to have to marry me.

I am?

Yes. The term “boyfriend” is starting to irritate me. Husband, while not nearly as binding as Dark One, at least sounds a bit more formal.

I laughed. Look, I just finally wrapped my mind around the whole Joining thing. Let’s not rush anything else.

Petra was silent for a few seconds, then said, “Lucy is going to kill me, but there’s no help for that. I’m going to go out to help you find Miranda.”

“You are?” I realized how rude that sounded and hurried to smooth over the faux pas. “We’d love to have your help, of course, not to mention have the chance to meet you, but . . . oh, man, this is my day for sounding like a lunatic. Petra, what exactly are you?”

“What am I?” she repeated.

“Yes. Our mother is a witch. She’s very well respected in Wiccan circles. I wondered if you inherited any of her skills.”

She gave a short little bark of laughter. “No, I have my own set of skills. My family—my adopted family, I should say—are necromancers. I’m a fourth-class necromancer, which in case you aren’t familiar with the classifications of necromancy, means I am able to raise deceased animals as liches.”

I sighed with relief. “I’m so glad you’re not normal.”

She laughed in a way that made me think I would like her, promised we would have a long conversation when she got here, and hung up.

I made a couple of quick calls after that, then finally turned to Ben. “Now what? We’ve exhausted every avenue—Loki is innocent of involvement with Mom, Petra doesn’t know anything about her, and Peter says she’s still not back.”

“We will return to the GothFaire,” he answered, glancing at a text message that burbled at him when I handed him back his phone. “Imogen says the watch wish to see us, and . . .” He frowned.

“What is it?” I asked.

“David sent me a message saying he was following a trail, but didn’t say what or whose. Damn.”

“What do we do about Loki?” I asked, suddenly feeling exhausted and overwhelmed. “I’m supposed to banish him, and I have no idea how to do that, or even if the Vikingahärta will let me. It seems to be a bit wonky right now.”

You are tired, Beloved. You need food and rest.

What I need is lots of steamy vampire lovin’, I corrected him.

That, too.

“It seems to me that Loki is the least of your worries right now,” Mikaela said, holding a package of ramen soup and a soggy potato covered with scraggly eyes. “My biggest concern is what I’m going to feed you. This is all your plague of locusts left.”

I laughed, and after a bit of polite wrangling over who would foot the bill (Ben won), we agreed to go into the nearest town and replenish our energy at an Italian bistro.

Three hours later the sun had set and Ben and I arrived back at the GothFaire to find it in full swing.

“You know, I could have rented a car and driven Eirik and his men back here, rather than making them take the train,” I told Ben as I took his hand to avoid being separated from him in the crowd of Faire-goers. “It seems kind of ungrateful to just shove train tickets in their hands when they were sent out to help me.”

“After what it cost me to feed them, the word ‘ungrateful’ can hardly apply,” he said drily. “I reiterate what I said before: They are not living with us. I couldn’t afford their upkeep.”

I laughed and squeezed his hand, feeling a rush of joy despite my worries. “Do you think the watch is going to be difficult?”

“I don’t know, but I think we’re about to find out.”

I looked in the direction he nodded. Three men in long dark coats and with grim looks about their eyes were bearing down on us. Oy. Anything I should avoid mentioning to them?

It’s never wise to lie to the watch, Francesca.

I didn’t mean lie so much as perhaps sticking strictly to the questions asked and not offering any other information.

That has frequently been my modus operandi.

So I’ve noticed. I greeted the watch members as they stopped before us, one of them speaking rapidly in French to Ben. At their request, we followed them to Naomi’s trailer, and spent the next forty minutes explaining how it was we had come across the body of Luis.

“I take it that it is your contention,” said the tallest and grimmest of the three men to Ben, “that the death was due to a therion attack?”

“It bears all the signs of being such,” Ben said, nodding to where Luis’s covered body lay. “If those weren’t claw marks on his chest, then I do not know much about therions.”

“Indeed,” said the watch man smoothly, giving Ben a curious look. “I find it surprising that a Dark One is so conversant with therion lifestyles.”

“As I explained, my blood brother is the leader of his pride. Naturally, I have learned some things from him.”

“Naturally,” the man said, his lips compressed as he turned to me. “And you have nothing else to add to your statement?”

“Nothing. I do, however, have a question for you.”

Not one single flicker of emotion crossed his face. “We are the watch, demoiselle. We do not answer questions; we ask them.”

“I’m going to go ahead and ask nonetheless. My mother has been missing for almost a week. She works here, at the GothFaire, and no one has seen her since she went to Heidelberg for a long weekend. How do I file an official missing persons report with you watch guys?”

“You do not. We ‘watch guys’ ”—he made a face as he spoke the two words—“do not investigate missing persons. There are other resources available to members of the L’au-dela for that.”

“But what if she’s mixed up in Luis’s murder?” I asked, waving a hand toward the door to Naomi’s bedroom.

One of his eyebrows rose a fraction of an inch. “Do you have reason to believe that? If so, you have withheld that information.”

“No,” I admitted. “I don’t have a reason other than it’s a pretty big coincidence that my mother should go off with some guy no one knows anything about right before a mysterious lich comes sniffing around the Faire, and a dead shape-shifter is found in the trailer of a woman who has ties to my mother’s ex-lover.”

The man turned a stony look on me. “You will explain this ex-lover and his ties to the woman named Naomi.”

Oh, dear. He looks pissed.

I cautioned you about involving them too much, Ben said, putting an arm around me as we sat on Naomi’s small couch and explained about de Marco and my mother. Now you will have them poking into everything.

Yes, but they might be able to help find Mom.

True.

After another fifty minutes, it became apparent that the watch wasn’t, however, going to do anything.

“We will keep our eyes open, as the mortals say, for signs of your mother, but there is insufficient evidence to convince us of her involvement with the death we are investigating,” was the watch’s final pronouncement.

“They are not very smart,” Imogen said shortly after we were released and had gone to her tent to tell her we were back. “Those watch! They asked me all sorts of impertinent questions about Benedikt’s involvement with the therions, as if he had something to do with the death. It was ridiculous, and I told that marble-faced creature that. Yes? Both of you? Excellent!”

Ben and I moved aside as Imogen smiled at a couple who had come to have their rune stones read.

What did the watch guy mean when he said there were other resources open to members of the L’au-dela? I asked as we fought our way through the dense crowd of people, stopping briefly to check that Mom’s stand hadn’t been tampered with. Since I’d sold most of her stock, there wasn’t much of value left in it, but I didn’t want her coming back to a trashed stand.

A little pain squeezed my heart at the thought that she might not be coming back.

We will find her, Francesca, Ben said, pulling me into his arms as he stood at the side of the stand. He kissed my temple, then my eyes, and just like that the hunger was on him, pouring out of him to wrap itself around me.

Goddess! I clutched his shoulders as I planted my mouth on his, suddenly needing him more than anything. I don’t think I can make it all the way to Mom’s trailer.

Beloved, you must not. I won’t be able to resist you. Ben moaned as I moved my hand between our bodies, stroking him in a way intended to inflame his passion even higher.

You don’t need to. The booth is empty. . . .

Ben twisted to jerk aside the canvas strapped to one of the wood struts. I ignored the sound of rending canvas, my mouth still glued to his as he moved us into the dark confines of the booth. The noise and lights and dense pack of humanity flowed around our little hidden paradise, which was a good thing, because if anyone had bothered to lift that torn side of the booth, he would have been given an eyeful.

Feed from me! Love me! Now! I demanded, my fingers desperately trying to undo both his belt and his zipper, while at the same time trying to get out of my own jeans.

Ben, with a snarl, ripped my pants off, just ripped them right off my body. I stood for a moment, astonished by the fact that he could do so without hurting me, but as the warm, close air of the closed booth caressed my naked flesh, other, more primal thoughts claimed my mind.

I need you right now, I moaned, trying to help him get out of his pants. This second! You’re not fast enough!