Night's Honor
Page 25

At the end of some days she could barely climb up the stairs to crawl into bed. At least severe exhaustion had stopped the nightmares with Malphas, because as soon as her head hit the pillow each night, she slept like the dead.
As for Malphas, despite being an all-Powerful Djinn, either he was completely out of touch with how a mere human might be able to hide, or retrieving her hadn’t become that important to him—yet.
At the end of January, she had received her first stipend for a thousand dollars. When Raoul summoned her into his office, which was located off one end of the gym, and he handed her the receipt, she stared at the number for a while, too shocked to say anything.
Everything she needed had already been bought and paid for. She had even been given new clothes for training, along with three pairs of excellent running shoes. The stipend was just for discretionary spending.
Raoul asked, “Do you want the money deposited into a bank account?”
She shook her head numbly. If it went into one of her accounts, she wouldn’t be able to touch it. Worse, the account activity might attract attention.
“Very well,” he said after a few moments. “Until you decide what to do with it, I’ll keep a running total of what you’re owed.”
“Actually, could I have it on a prepaid Visa card?” she asked. At least then she would have the money readily at hand, in case something untoward happened and she had to leave. “I might want to order some books, or maybe a portable stereo for my room.”
“Of course. I’ll get one ordered for you.”
The card arrived at the end of that week, and Raoul gave it to her one night after supper.
She didn’t order anything. Instead, she tucked the card away in her underwear drawer. If the position fell through, that anonymous Visa card was her lifeline away from the estate. She intended on collecting as many of them as she could get. Even if she lasted only as long as the trial period, when the year was up, she would have twelve thousand dollars to help her relocate somewhere else.
She liked the shooting range. It was the only time during the day that she could stop straining her whole body, all except for her arms and shoulders. Even then, sometimes those ached so much it was all she could do to aim two-handed with a small Glock 17 that weighed less than two pounds. She also discovered she was good at target practice, and she liked the work with the handguns, although she struggled with the larger automatic weapons.
Throughout her training, people drifted in and out of her lessons, some joining her for the morning run while others participated in other activities, until gradually she grew acquainted with the other eleven inhabitants of the estate.
There was Raoul, of course, the polite sadist who was clearly the acknowledged manager in Xavier’s absence. Raoul’s deputy was Diego, who was responsible for all the vehicles and for maintaining the indoor pool. There were also Angelica and her assistant, Enrique; Jordan and his assistant, Peter; and Marc, Jeremy, Aaron, Scott and Brian, the five she had been cloistered with until Melisande and Justine had left the estate.
Angelica, the only other female, was a reticent, gray-haired woman of Hispanic descent with a rounded form that was nevertheless toned with muscle. Tess wanted to ask her why there were so few women on the estate, but there never seemed to be a good time to talk with her.
To a person, they were all uniformly friendly toward her and also a bit distant, and she was under no illusions whatsoever. She didn’t fit in, and probably, as far as they were concerned, she wouldn’t truly belong until at least after her trial year was over.
That was okay. She had never really fit in anywhere, certainly not in any of her foster families. She didn’t need to fit in or belong. She just needed to survive.
Midafternoons, right around the time when she could hardly walk anymore, it was time for the other lessons—Elder Races history, politics and inter-demesne conflicts. Memorizing the different races and their predilections, strengths and weakness. Information about each Councillor on the Elder tribunal. The power structures in each demesne, along with the heads and their heirs.
After supper came the lessons in etiquette. The ideal attendant was the invisible one who anticipated her patron’s needs and fulfilled them without needing to be asked.
One never spoke until one was spoken to. Always serve drinks from the left, food—for those visitors who partook of food—from the right. The dagger set at the top of every supper plate was symbolic (of what, she hadn’t yet figured out, and no one had told her); no one ever used them, or if they did, it was considered gauche and the height of rudeness.
An attendant might disregard any request or order from another Vampyre (or anyone else, for that matter) outside of the house, but if that Vampyre was a guest in her patron’s house, then as an extension of her patron’s hospitality, she must do everything in her power to make that visiting Vampyre (or other creature) feel at home.
Out of the entire six weeks of training, that was the one time she balked.
She said, “You’ve got to be kidding me. Everything.”
Raoul said, “Everything that your patron would wish you to do, you should do.”
“Oh, come on.” She gestured with a stranger’s arm that was slim, tanned and rippling with toned muscle. Between the insane amount of training and truly excellent nutrition, the entire landscape of her body was changing dramatically. “Sex. Blood. Anything?”
He gave her a severe look. “What do you think Xavier would want for you to do?”
She hesitated, as she remembered the talk she’d had with Xavier in his study.
I will never bite you without your permission. I will never take anything from you that you do not want to give.
Feeling only slightly chastened, she muttered, “You’re saying he wouldn’t want us to give in to another Vampyre’s demand for sex or blood, but would the other Vampyre know that? What if they didn’t care and pushed for it anyway?”
“That would be a most extreme mistake on their part,” said Raoul, his face stern. “If any guest tries to press you to do something you don’t want to do, you must tell me or Xavier immediately.”
She watched him narrowly. “But what about what happens in other Vampyre households?”
Raoul lifted a shoulder in a very Gallic shrug. “To each house, its own rules.”
“That sounds almost like a motto.”
“It’s an ancient saying and lies at the root of Vampyre diplomacy. Old Vampyres are not only Powerful and opinionated, but they have lived through huge societal changes. What is normal for them may not be so in modern society.”