"Witch of mine, they will never agree." Low and lazy, his voice sawed on her patience.

 Chatoya had always been under the impression finding your soulmate involved love and passion and other similarly mushy desires. And while those things had somehow become a part of her life, muted and stealthy creatures bedding down in the corners of her heart, mostly they were overridden by her burning desire to slap him.

He had echoed the same sentiment a dozen times today. Petty revenge was the only thing that kept her from hurling him out the office: she gritted her teeth and tweaked up the spell warming the room another notch. A dab of magic kept cool air swirling about her, while a separate hex snared the day's heat and stoked it to hellish extremes.

 "I don't require their agreement, just their obedience," she snapped back, giving up all attempt to keep hold of her fraying temper.

The setting was formal, and Chatoya was glad of that. A desk separated them, the bureaucratic barrier somehow stouter reassurance than a dozen assassins would have been. Pursang's New York office was just another high-rise building among dozens and if its supernatural workforce had a tendency to send memos by telepathy rather than email, well, at least no one could complain they'd misunderstood.

 It was nearly noon, and the sun slanting through the windows struck Blue Malefici full in the face. It infuriated her that he didn't squint or blink, or do anything except sit there with his hands laced behind his head, watching her with those fathomless eyes, paled by the blasting light. It must have been uncomfortable for him - she had certainly intended it to be - but he hadn't showed a drop of distress.

 He had the look of an unholy harbinger, his sun-struck skin almost blinding in its whiteness, the heat haze softening the edges of his body, but there was nothing able to leach the animation from his voice. Or from the chilly mind that crackled at the other end of the soulmate link.

 "If it's obedience you're after, try a career as a dominatrix," he advised in a rich purr. "The Furies value initiative above compliance."

 "Bullshit," she threw back, striving for disdain. "Vaje and Lance have told me all about their training, and obedience was a large part of it."

 He shrugged. "Very well, if you won't believe that, then believe this - every last one of those screeching little psychotics values death over life, money over compassion, and power over morals. If you want, my witch, tell them your plans, tell them about your wish to make them a fuzzy, loving outpost of the Samaritans, but if I were you, I'd do it from the depths of nuclear bunker."

 "Do you seriously think I'm going to stroll in there and tell them everything I want to do?"

 "Going on previous experience, yes. Your master plans have been woefully inadequate at best."

 Her own stare could have matched the sun's for radioactive dislike. "There speaks the man who failed to re-ignite the Burning Times."

 He flexed his interwoven hands, and his knuckles cracked in jarring accord. "How many times do I have to say it? I'm just not that keen on Armageddon."

 "Vile movie," she agreed dryly, "But I always figured you for a Bruce Willis man."

 His scornful glance just wasn't as effective when diluted by winter sunlight. Chatoya gave him her best fake smile, and carried on, "Regardless, I don't intend to waltz in and destroy everything they've ever known."

 "And what do you intend?" Smooth and sure, the question flicked out like an adder's tongue, testing her defences.

 Too easy, she thought, parrying the question effortlessly. But you'd love to know, wouldn't you, bane of my heart? This game did not play out as you intended, and I am no longer the only one under the sway of this soulmate link, this call to waiting arms.

 "I didn't bring you here to discuss my intentions," she said. "Your advice is all I require. Who do I approach first? Vaje and Lance have given me names, but - call me paranoid - I have this feeling that some of Pursang's members may have had underhanded dealings with Nightfire."

 Something like respect flashed in his expression, negated by the scornful slant of his mouth. "How perceptive of you. Jacqui Trehet alienated as many people as she won, and Vaje hasn't been filling in long enough to pick up on that. As for Lance..."

 "More interested in conning Pursang that protecting it," she murmured. She liked Lance, but anyone who caught the shrewd mind under all that affable charm could see that he was power-hungry.

 "Quite." His eyelids fell, lending a guise of angelic slumber to him. She had to wonder how many people he had deceived with it, gambling that his fetching face would blind people to the devious and delectable fiend beneath. "Very well. I have more to gain from this than to lose."

 Yes, she thought, because you're certain of my failure. Aspen was always the weak link in the Furies, but you had no one to replace him with. Sooner or later, he would have left, fled to his human life and his human love - but with me, you have time to search. To find a third who will not succumb to such paltry things as love and desire and destiny in a dark night. And when I am gone - not by your hand, no, but by some other embittered creature - nor will you be chained by such trifles.

 I wonder, has it ever occurred to you that perhaps you are not weaker for my presence?

 No...no, I think not.

~*~

 Nerine de Villiers looked like the grandmother she'd always wanted. Silvery hair curled daintily around a face seamed with wrinkles, laughter lines prominent around her mouth. Only a certain strength to her face and the vivid blue of her eyes gave away a hint of inhumanity; otherwise, from blue-rinsed top to well-heeled toe, she was the perfect pensioner.

 "Well now dear," she said in a voice as soft as butter, "I've been expecting you. Come on in, won't you?"

 "Thank you," she answered, stepping inside the cosy bungalow.

 "Tea?"

 She blinked. She'd expected a leathered old hag prepared to tear her to shreds. At least, that was the impression she'd had from Blue. "Please."

 "Milk and sugar?"

 "One sugar, lots of milk."

 As Nerine walked away, Chatoya caught the only concrete proof she'd come to the right house: that was a predator's walk, a supple glide that was entirely incongruous on a woman who seemed to be pushing seventy from the wrong side.

 "Take a seat, dear," came the call, a thin bird's voice, just a hint of rustiness in it. Was that real, or just another part of the act? "Make yourself at home."

 Hmm. This was all a little too friendly. Before she crossed the threshold into the lounge, Chatoya sketched a short spell that she had learned from Pursang and sent it whizzing into the room. It returned unaltered: no spells on the room or anything in it, then.

 Curiouser and curiouser. Maybe Blue had lied to her.

 Chatoya was starting to feel decidedly surreal. That really was a rocking chair in the corner, and what looked like half-finished knitting on the other sofa. Chintz and quilting was the theme of the day, and grandchildren that might even be related to Nerine beamed from pictures on the mantelpiece.

 Nerine bustled in carrying a tray. She set it on the coffee table, her crinkled smile firmly in place. "Nothing like a nice cup of tea," she announced, perching herself on the chair opposite Chatoya. "You must be parched after that long drive."

 "It wasn't that long," she demurred, trying to figure out how best to hold the fragile china teacup. She was about to take a sip, and then something tingled on her senses.

 She glanced at Nerine. Not a flicker in her expression, but her eyes were shrewd, younger than the face she wore. It was a look she had seen a hundred times, she realised, on Vaje and Lance and Ross and especially Blue, giving nothing away, displaying only a scientist's remote interest, patient as the grave,.

 The grave. Yes, she was dealing with a Fury here. Chatoya put the teacup back down.

 "Something wrong, dear?"

 "Give me a moment and I'll let you know," she answered, sketching a few more symbols in the air. This spell went into her cup, and with a small puff, her tea disintegrated into smoke, leaving a fine white residue at the bottom.

 Oh no, not so harmless.

 Chatoya looked at it, and realised her heart was thundering. Goddess, how careless she had almost been.

 "I think we both know that isn't sugar," she said quietly.

 Nerine put down her own cup. "Well done, child," she said, and some of the candy-floss softness was gone from her voice. "For an outsider, you're quite quick on the uptake."

 "Quick or dead," she muttered.

 The old woman laughed as if she'd made a joke, a delicate chuckle. "This isn't a job for the weak."

 "And will you try and kill me every time we meet, or will this be a one-off?" Chatoya said coldly. Fear was rapidly changing to cold anger, fizzling at the back of her head.

 "We'll see how the mood takes me," was the complacent answer.

 No. She had to assert control now, or she would face this in every conversation, every encounter. And eventually, because the Furies had been born to the arts of death, she would lose.

 As it was, Chatoya had spent every waking minute immersed in Pursang's vast files of protective spells. She'd learnt more in a month that she'd been able to teach herself in four years, and wore several pieces of jewellery she'd taken from their vaults, all laced with magical defences. Still, it wasn't enough. She didn't want to keep fending them off; she wanted them to work for her, and that meant she needed their respect, any way she could get it.

 With that in mind, she plastered on a smile. "If I wished, Nerine, I could put a binding on you that would prohibit you from harming anyone ever again, even in self-defence. If I must do it to teach you courtesy - something I'm astonished you've managed to get by without for over eight centuries - I will."

 Her heart was hammering harder than ever, and she felt the first touch of sweat at her temples. But she would do exactly as she had threatened. In the back of her mind, Bhari was already whispering how best to cast the spell, offering even nastier versions.

 Nerine pursed her lips. "I should like to see you try, madam."

 If there was one lesson she had learned quickly, it was not to make idle threats. "My pleasure," she said, and allowed the dragonfire to trickle over her hands, flickering like flames.

 The vampire's eyes widened. "Is that-"

 Like this, instructed Bhari, and Chatoya began to weave the fire in her hands as if she played a game of cat's cradle, tying silent commands into each motion as Nerine's face bleached into shock. Over and over, repeating the gestures as the seconds ticked by, turning into minutes.

 She suspected only a combination of disbelief and enthralment kept Nerine still as she wove on. At last she held a slender net of fire between her hands, no larger than a placemat.

 "Dragonfire," breathed the old vampire. "How did you lay your hands on the spell, child? It was locked in the archives long before I joined the Furies."

 "Did you think there was only one copy?" The spell in her hands felt greasy as molten fat and just as slippery. That was the problem with her stolen powers; they always hungered to be used, to do harm, as if the very nature of dragons was built around malice. "Hold still."

 "You've made good your threat. I am convinced of your sincerity." Her voice was still casual, her face a mask of indifference, but Chatoya knew now it was just another facet of a superb act.

 If you would have me be part of the Furies, she thought at a boy who was far away, then you had better understand that I will do it to the best - and worst - of my ability.

 "Unfortunately," she said, "I am not convinced of yours."

 A slow nausea moved in her stomach, but Chatoya knew it had to be done. She needed Nerine's loyalty, and more importantly, she needed the vampire's support and influence.

 Just do it, she told herself, and in one quick movement, she flicked her fingers outward, sending the spell at the vampire. Nerine flinched back, but the magic sank into her without a sound.

 "Don't try to hurt anyone," she advised. "There's only one major command in this spell." And a dozen smaller ones to tie up all the loopholes. Sometimes, spells were rather like legal documents.

 "And what might that be?" said Nerine, the edge of command entirely absent from her voice.

 Chatoya leaned forward, over the cup of tea that could have killed her. "What goes around comes around."

 The sky-blue eyes studied her, almost dazed. Nerine could have been a human woman then, drifting in confusion. "Perhaps you are one of us." Her expression cleared, and the old woman seemed almost amused. "Simple, but nasty. And how long will you leave this spell on me?"

 "We'll see how the mood takes me," she answered, and the tight smile she received held grudging respect.

 One, she thought.

~*~

 She pushed the button, and hoped it was the right place.

 "Hello?" came a male voice, crackling over the cheap intercom.

 "Is this the Keanes?"

 "Who's asking?" She thought she heard a smile under the words. "We're very exclusive in who we admit, dontcha know?"
 
 "Chatoya Irkil."

 "Pursanguia!" Startled, the voice lost some of its cheer. "Come on up. Third floor, number fifteen."

 "They're scamps," Nerine had told her over a cup of tea - this one free of toxic substances. "Petty criminals who can't shake off the pettiness. We found the pair of them when they were pickpockets hustling in Time Square, and they like to keep their hand in. Personally, I'm not sure they're quite right for us, but...they're here now. Fresh from Hades. They'll adapt or they'll die."

 "Why do I want their help, then?" she'd asked, intrigued.

 The vampire had smiled, and there had been genuine amusement in it. "The dear boys are very popular. For thugs, they have soft hearts - anyone who trained with them has been helped by them at some point, which has made them a lot of friends."

 "Isn't that unusual?" she said mildly. "I'm aware most of you get along, but isn't outright friendship a little too maudlin for you big tough assassins?"

 Nerine waggled a finger. In the fortnight Chatoya had spent with her, she'd come to enjoy the old vampire's grandmotherly act. It was oddly comforting. "Now, child. Some of us pride ourselves on our genteel ways. It's only in the past two centuries that the Furies have begun to encourage this...enmity to one another. Apparently rivalry means only the very best survive, though no one seems to realise it means only the killers survive."

 "And isn't that what you're all about?" she said, testing. In truth, contracted killings were a relatively minor part of Pursang's business, yet their recruiting was centred around that aspect of their work.

 "It's what we advertise most keenly. But no, child, we are much more. Once, we were admired and feared. Now we are respected and feared."

 The ruefulness surprised her. "Isn't it the same?"

 "Not at all. Once, the greatest minds came to us to learn and to teach. Heirs of major families would be sent to us for a few months to learn their duty. We were arbiters and judges, if harsh ones. We negotiated disputes and brokered agreements. Now? We'd just chop off the heads of everyone involved and call it an answer." A flush climbed Nerine's face, and there was tightly controlled anger in her voice.

 I didn't know, Chatoya thought, astonished. Is that really what they once were?

 "And no one argues, because we'd do the same to them. Once they wouldn't have argued because they trusted our judgement. We have become cruel, butchers, not executioners. And all we once were is fading, but no one seems to care." Nerine shuddered. "The Maleficis came to the Furies, and changed us."

 "And if I want to make us as we were?" she said softly, touched by the woman's passion.

 She hadn't recognised the expression on Nerine's face at first. It had been hope, creased and ancient, and in it, she had seen how old Nerine was, how long she had kept silent: why she had gone to Blue, who she had probably thought might bring glory to the Furies, but who would only ever take what he found useful, and hope be damned.

 "First, you must prove yourself," the vampire said, but she nodded once. "Then we shall talk, Pursanguia. Now...be careful around the Keane boys. Aspen Martin and Ross have tried to sear the kindness from them. They have very nearly succeeded."

 That sage advice in mind, Chatoya caught the lift to the third floor, number fifteen, and a pair of vampire brothers.

 "Look at this!" said the boy who opened the door, displaying a crooked grin. And a pair of fangs that indicated more paranoia than suggested by his expression. "Hey, Mike! Didja know that our Lady Fury was a looker?"

 Behind him, a short boy with the same grin but subtly different features glanced over the back of the sofa. "Ah, she's too young for you. Besides, she's got magic in her blood."

 "Do you have it in your hands too?" said the boy, standing aside and welcoming her in with a sweeping bow. "I'm Ryan. The layabout's Michael, my baby brother-"

 "Whoa, less of the baby talk!" Michael bounced to his feet, flicking back brown hair from his eyes. He looked like a perfect stereotype: ragged jeans, riding low, equally faded T-shirt, even the obligatory wristbands and piercing. She wondered if it was just a more modern version of Nerine's camouflage. "So, Pursanguia, come to congratulate us on making the grade?"

 She moved to sit on the bumpy sofa. "Something like that."

 Ryan was out of her eye-line. It made the flesh creep on the back of her neck, and she held up a polite hand before Michael opened his mouth again. "Both of you where I can see you."

 Hurt crept into Michael's eyes, grey as rainy days. "Lady, we wouldn't-"

 She glanced round and had only seconds to understand what was happening. Ryan had a sword - a sword! - in his hands, swinging at her-

 Bhari reacted, blasting up from the depths of torpor like lava and dragging power with her: magic ripped out of Chatoya's hands, raw and hot, and dimly, she felt blisters burst on her fingertips.

 Like a whip, green fire lashed around the sword, forming bonds immovable as stone; it split and spread, racing around Ryan's body to shackle him. Dragon fire bubbled up after it, and Ryan's mouth dropped as the green light became stone, atrophying between one breath and the next.

 A blow flung her back into the sofa, and Chatoya was dazed for a moment, Bhari jolted back into fugue. She'd forgotten about Michael.

 Oh god, a voice screamed in her head. Blue couldn't kill me, Nerine couldn't manage it, but I'm about to be murdered by two boys that Nerine said were scamps. Scamps!

 Through blurred vision, she could see a figure looming - reaching for her, he wasn't wasting time with dramatics or weapons...

 She struggled to sit up, but his hands were closing around her throat, and with desperate self-defence, she flooded her own body with Earth, solid as granite - just in time.

 His hands wrenched at her neck. No, he hadn't been going to strangle her: just to snap her spine, and while she had the feeling that turning herself into stone was going to have some fairly serious medical repercussions later, right now, it was all that was keeping her alive. But she could feel her body beginning to slow around her, winding down like a broken record.

 Scare them, she thought, her mind seeming sluggish and ponderous as an elephant's. They're kids, and if Nerine's right, they're not so hardened to the Furies that I can't make them fear me.

 An idea came to her, trickling through like syrup, wicked and sweet. "Have you ever heard of Medusa?" she said, her voice sounding thick and slurred even to her.

 Michael was backing away, looking at her as if she'd - well, turned to stone. "Uh...lady..."

 "Now, now, don't run," she chided, plucking Blue's arch tones from her memory. "I need to see you, after all."

 She used the same spell Bhari had, flicking out her magic and trapping him where he stood. When she was sure the bonds were secure, she released the spells on her own body.

 Pain slammed into her: he might not have broken her neck, but he'd certainly tried, and while the magic could make her skin hard as stone, it couldn't protect her from the force he'd used. Her hands felt raw as meat, and her whole body was full of pins and needles as it picked back up to its normal pace.

 "Pursanguia?" Michael's voice was high, his face pasty with fear.

 "We didn't mean anything by it," said an equally rattled voice from behind her. "Are you going to kill us?"

 She eyed Michael. She felt like inflicting every twinge in her body on him, but something told her that Nerine had been right: these boys weren't quite the born killers prized by the Furies. And maybe that meant they were just what she needed. "Should I?"

 "I'm going to go with no," ventured Michael, giving her a smile as shaky as she felt. "Um. I know we're not that good at the job, or you'd be, um, dead-"

 "Shut up, idiot!" his brother hissed.

 "Carry on," she ordered. In truth, she wanted to hear what he had to say - she wanted to know if she could win their support without having to resort to coercion.

 "-but we're good at learning. And we're good at teaching, too. And we...we've got something no one else has."

 Hmm. Possibly. "Which is...?"

 "A map of Hades."

 A- She stared at him. "It's can't be mapped. It changes."

 The boy shook his head, a touch of wildness to his eyes. "No. What you see changes. It's illusions - lots of illusions, but if you shut your eyes, you can-"

 "Are you going to spill the whole thing to her?" demanded Ryan, a nervy whine in his voice. "It's all we've got to bargain with."

 Wrong, she thought silently. A map of Hades - well, that's useful, but it's not half as useful as all the people you might be able to sway for me. "Perhaps there's something else you can offer me. And perhaps there's something I can offer you."

 A wary look stole over Michael. "This isn't going to be any of the kinky stuff Stormshot was telling us about, is it? 'Cause I thought he was joking, but-"

 Her mind boggled. What had Lance been telling people? "No. Definitely not."

 He sagged in his magical chains. "Thank god." How flattering. "Then...what?"

 She carefully reached for her magic, wincing as a headache started up in her temples. A minute's work released both of them, Ryan's weapon clattering onto the cheap wooden floor.

 They came to sit back down; Ryan slithered onto the sofa with an abashed expression, while Michael was looking almost as cheerful as he had when she'd walked in. Side by side, the family resemblance was obvious, but Ryan's eyes were toffee-brown, and Michael was shorter by a few inches.

 "People like you," she said simply.

 "Not enough to stop trying to kill us," muttered Ryan. "Why'd you think we live together?"

 "To be honest," put in Michael, flashing her the lopsided grin, "we thought you'd come to do it personally."

 Irony, she considered, was always at its finest in situations like this. "I imagine that can't be much fun."

 "You've no idea," said Ryan glumly, staring at his lap. "You spend every moment on tenterhooks. I thought that once we'd been to Hades, they'd realise we were here to stay. But it's actually gotten worse. I mean, look at the door!"

 She craned her neck, cursing silently as pain flared up.

She'd thought she'd manage to secure her house, but that was nothing compared to what the Keane boys had done. Aside from the numerous bolts on the door, spells were etched into the doorframe, a nasty trap was perched above it, and what looked suspiciously like a crossbow was positioned to the side of it, aimed right in the path of any uninvited visitors.

 While she hadn't turned her home into Fort Knox, she'd spent countless hours trying to put bars around her soul, which had to count for something. "Actually, Blue Malefici spent last year trying to kill me, so I understand your situation."

 "And he failed?" Ryan sounded stunned. "The Demon Fury? Seriously? But he's like..."

 "Fallible," she completed. "Honestly."

 "Whoa."

 "So maybe we can help one another," offered Chatoya. "I'll extend my protection to you, in exchange for your support."

 "You really managed to live through Blue Malefici?" Michael spoke up, his eyes lighting up like a child's on Christmas Day.

 Chatoya leaned forward. "Not only did I live through him, I lead Pursang through rite of conquest, which meant clobbering Aspen Martin, and banishing a wraith that even Blue couldn't deal with."

 They swapped thrilled looks. "Now that's protection," Michael said with glee.

 "And what do you want from us?" Ryan, his voice hard. "What exactly does support entail?"

 Helping me fight Kheo Rastaban, she thought, but didn't say it. "You say you're good at teaching? Teach me the etiquette of Pursang, particularly how it treats its initiates.  I want to make changes, and they're the place to start."

 "That's it?"

 She half-smiled. It. As if it were a small task, not a process that would be fought at every step. "And we're going to start taking on assignments."

 Michael blinked. "Just us?"

 "No." The first stage of her plan. "I'll be taking along anyone who's free - and I'll be doing all the work."

 Ryan's teeth flashed in what might have been a smile. "You want everyone to see you kick ass?"

 "Damn right." Chatoya couldn't have fought off a kitten right now, but she wasn't about to tell them that.

  She wanted people to fight her corner. Which meant they had to realise she would fight theirs: she would fight for her Furies, for the responsibilities and the rights that she had taken on. She had no doubt it wasn't going to be fun - it was going to take a good healer to fix today's damage, and a few days of heavy sleep - but if it persuaded even one member of Pursang to follow her willingly, it would be worth every cut and bruise.

 I'm going to play you at your own game, she thought ferociously to her soulmate. And I'm going to win.

 "Well, you started the right way," Michael chirped.

 "No more trying to kill me," she said, wondering how many more people she would have to say it to.

 "If you prove yourself," Ryan said. Some of his confidence was oozing back. "And if you keep your end of the bargain."

 She fixed him with a hard stare. "And if you live to see it."

 He flushed, and she knew she had won a small victory.

 Three, she thought.
 
~*~
 
"You're not what I was expecting," remarked John Smith in a heavy Texan twang.

 They'd already gone past what Chatoya was starting to considered the preliminaries: he greeted her with a gun, and she was only prepared because she'd been forewarned by Vaje. Her array of Pursang's jewellery had done its job, and when he tried to bludgeon her with the end of the shotgun, she'd borrowed Bhari's reflexes and left him with a limp and a black eye.

 However, Chatoya recognised it as a somewhat half-hearted attempt to kill her; Smith's curiosity had outstripped his desire to kill anything that moved.

 "An old-school assassin," had been Vaje's dispassionate description. "But you've got a big advantage. He hated Aspen, and he loathes Malefici and Therese with a fiery passion. He's been with the Furies since the sixteenth century, and he can just about remember the good ol' days. Play on it."

 "What were you expecting?" she said, accepting the shot of what Smith called 'moonshine with extra shine' with trepidation.

 He leaned back, a big bear of a man, his hair and beard thick with grey and his face weathered and beaten to a leathery shine. "You look like I could snap you in two."

 "And as I explained at the door, if you try it again, I'll turn you into a frog and leave you croaking in the pond until I feel better about you." It had been an exaggeration: that particular spell required days of preparation, but Chatoya had the feeling the bear shapeshifter was a snob about other forms. "Besides, doesn't everyone look like you could snap them in two?"

 He gave a great bellowing laugh. "Aye, you're not wrong. All right, what do you want with me?"

 With the advice of Vaje and Nerine, she had actually planned this visit. Chatoya was starting to realise she had to approach these people as each encounter might be her last. "A story."

 "Which one? I've got a million of 'em."

 "Tell me why Pursang's gone wrong."

 He sat up a little straighter. "And why would I think anything's wrong?"

 "I've been talking to Vaje Chusson," she said mildly. "And so have you."

 "Yeah. He likes you, which is why I'm sitting here listening to you. Not many people win Chusson's respect, you know, but I thought you were going to tell me something I wanted to hear, not the other way round."

 "Bear with me," she said, taking a sip of the amber liquid. No need to check this for poison; nothing could survive in that much alcohol.

 It burned all the way down her throat, and she stared at him with watering eyes. He looked right back, then broke into a toothy grin. "All right. You've got guts, I'll give you that."

 He took a deep breath. "Something's been wrong since the first Maleficis came along. Little over two hundred years ago, that was, and they were cold bastards. Brothers, pair of them, and no one knows where they came from or where they'd been before Nightfire picked 'em up. Well, they were born to it, though everyone was surprised when one wound up in Nightfire and one in Pursang. But no one was surprised when they wound up running the Furies. Rite of conquest all the way, and they didn't give no mercy to anyone."

 She blinked. Nerine hadn't mentioned this. "They killed everyone they fought?"

 "And then some. They had this...method. Root to fruit, they called it, pretty name for something nasty. They didn't just kill their opponent: they wiped out his family, too. Why'd you think I changed my name? We all did it. Between them, they must'a done for fifty, sixty people. Some was for position, some was power, but well, a lot of it was just 'cause they liked it."

 "Hang on...couldn't they find out who you were?"

 He snorted. "No chance, girlie. Maybe if they'd got to the top straight away, but they weren't the brightest pair. Not like the current Malefici - so sharp he'll cut himself, the little bleeder. They started low in the ranks, and as they rose, people wised up. We got hold of our families, those of us who still had them, and told them what was happening. Lots of people moving; it was easy then, when Europe had empires all over the place. And the heads of the Furies, well, they saw how it was going, and they burned every record they had on their own members."

 "Are many of you left?" she asked.

 "Not now. There's me, Nerine, two or three others. But the Maleficis did for the rest of them, one way or the other." He cocked a bushy eyebrow at her. "Did you really think I started out as John Smith?"

 She smiled. "Did you start out with that accent too?"

 He said something in another language; German, she thought, but couldn't be sure. Then he said in English, "No. No, I didn't."

 "So what happened after they began to run the Furies?"

 "Nothing and everything. They began to pit us all against each other, and all the research was about death. Weapons, methods, rituals. They brought Hades back into play too, though I still ain't sure if that's a bad thing or not. Never been m'self."

 "I'll let you know," she murmured.

 "You going there?" He huffed. "Mad. Why do you think there's hardly any witches in the Furies? For that matter, ain't many shapeshifters these days. We just don't heal as fast as the vampires, and from what I hear, you don't get through Hades unscathed."

 "I'll survive," she said with more conviction than she felt, the moonshine bolstering her.

 "Huh." He took the tale back up. "Anyway. Under the Maleficis, we stopped trusting each other. Everyone began to work alone. A lot of the friendships had been done for by the moves, and their new policies did for most of the rest. Wasn't so bad when that scrawny Martin monster came into power - but even he had Malefici looking over his shoulder at every turn, so we've had to be careful."

 "We?" she queried, somewhat baffled.

 He eyed her, obviously debating whether to trust her. "Nerine tells me you might bring back the old days."

 "I can't bring them back," she said, deciding honesty was the best way to go with this bluff man. "But I can make the coming days different. Blue Malefici doesn't rule me, and he never will."

 It was a lie. A whopping lie, but Chatoya knew she couldn't have spoken the bald truth: I rule him as he rules me, and the battle we fight will go on until one of us is dead, death and love and desire and loathing all mixed up into one long war.  

 "What d'you want for us?"

 "Something better," she said, putting down the glass. She would share this much of her plan with him, knowing he needed to be convinced. "I want us to be more than murderers. I want people to come to us knowing we will give them the best solution, not the quickest or the bloodiest. I want Pursang to take back its honour, to be more than Blue's puppets. But I need help to do it."

 He looked at her as if he was trying to read the truth in her face. Slowly he nodded. "Then you need those of us who hold to the old ways. Who remember we had honour, not just a big paycheque."

 His voice conjured images; of people, a society within a society, clinging grimly to the few ideals they had amid an atmosphere of distrust and mercenary thrills. "Are there many of you?"

 "No. Me, Chusson, but he's not been with us long, Nerine, thoughI thought she'd given up. Three or four others. Narinda, over in India, Charlie Fitzwilliam in Britain, though he's had to fight Ross at every turn, Dmitri in Czechoslovakia. Oh, and little Michelle in Senegal. A smart witch, but we don't hear from her too often."

 Few, sure enough, but it was a starting point. From such small beginnings, she would bend Pursang to her will, so slowly, so subtly, that hopefully they would never realise until she had done it.

 "Can you get me contact numbers?" she said. "I want a meeting with all of you."

 "To do what?" he asked, alight with enthusiasm.

 Satisfaction rolled through her. She had him convinced. "To talk about what's gone around - and what's going to come around."

 He squinted at her, as if trying to see her from a new angle. "You know," he said, nodding slowly, "I think you might have a shot at this. I mean, you'll probably die a horrible death, but if you don't...maybe. Maybe."

 Four, she thought.

~*~

 It was late that night when she crawled into her hotel bed, smelling faintly of incense and daubed with protective oils. A barrage of spells fortified the room, and a barrage of thoughts assailed her.

 So it had begun, and from such humble beginnings - a cantankerous old vampire, a pair of excitable boys, a pariah who like to roam his land as a grizzly bear - she would mould her army, not merely to shed blood, but to teach and to learn, to shape the thoughts of others with a touch so light as to be unfelt. Some of it would have to be done by force, but she would not be another Malefici, delighting in destruction.

 I will make something of these people she thought, and I will make something to be proud of.

 I can't take their love of death away, but perhaps I can give them a love of life with it.

 Love. They underestimate it, every time. Maybe it's why Blue can never quite understand me, why I mystify him so. It's hard for him to make room for love in his world. He can't put a price on it, he can't slay it, he can't do anything but be baffled by it. None of the Furies of his time can.

 And that's where my advantage lies. That's why they're going to underestimate me every time.

 And she drifted into hazy dreams, her last thought, to that boy many miles distant, but always in her thoughts, kept close by an attraction she could neither explain nor deny, was:

Everything is going to change. And you aren't going to like it.

Lyrics from Bob Dylan's Shelter From The Storm.