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Gillian was looking like she agreed with that sentiment, and Kit decided that some appeasement was needed. He wished that Mircea had been allowed to come, as he could have probably charmed the dragon itself. But Kit wasn’t Mircea, and charm was not his forte.

He decided to go with the truth.

“Forgive me, I did not mean to disturb your pet,” he told Estrilda, struggling back to his feet. “I am on a mission for the Vampire Council, and only wish to talk—”

“That’s what they all say,” Leta growled. “Right up until they get their fangs into you!”

“As this Gideon did to you?” Kit guessed.

“Not to me!” She spun abruptly away.

“Her sister,” the Abraham man said gruffly. “She was twelve. He liked ‘em young.”

“He was a monster!” Leta said shakily. “As they all are!”

Kit frowned, not understanding. “You mean, he killed her? That is forbidden—”

“As if your kind knows any rules!”

“But we do. And the Senate enforces them harshly.”

She turned back to glare at Kit, and her gray eyes were flooded. “Tell that to Lettie!”

Kit frowned harder and abruptly became gorier, as his blood pressure increased along with his anger, forcing more crimson to spurt out of his veins. He cursed, and concentrated on healing, but didn’t take his eyes off the girl in case she had another stake. And for a different reason.

“Where is this Gideon?” he said abruptly. “Tell me where I may find him—”

“So that you can reward him?”

“So that I can kill him.” It was flat. “The old days of masters doing as they like are gone. Our Lady fought a war to see to that, and to bring the community under control. Which she now has. She will be . . . displeased . . . that someone has thought to challenge her. She may also pay you recompense for your loss—”

“I don’t want your money,” Leta snarled, getting into Kit’s face. And showing him that she was younger even than he’d thought. Sixteen, perhaps? Possibly less.

And yet she was fearless, as the young often are, before the world pummels that out of them. Kit searched her furious eyes, and felt some compassion stir in him. He’d been in and out of trouble at her age, brawling, counterfeiting—to help his family’s poor finances—and being arrested for attacking a man with a staff and dagger.

If he hadn’t managed to get a scholarship to a local school, and then another to Cambridge, he might well have ended up like one of this group, surviving by his wits in preference to making a so-called honest living and half starving like his father.

“I had a sister,” he told Leta, after a moment. “A number of them, in fact. But one, named Jane, was my favorite. I loved her well.”

“Had?” the Abraham man said. “She is no more?”

“No. She died at the age of thirteen—”

“Of a vampire’s bite?” Leta challenged.

“In childbirth. She was married at twelve and passed the following year. Mother begged father not to do it, not to give her away so young, but it meant one less mouth to feed.” Kit felt his jaw tighten.

Leta blinked at him, as if caught off guard, but she quickly rallied. A sneer came over her face. “Why would money be a concern to one who wears velvet?”

Kit fought to keep his temper, never his strong suit. “My father was a shoemaker,” he said tersely. “We lived in Canterbury, right across the street from the cathedral. As a child, I used to see the wealthy arriving to view the place where Thomas Becket died, and marveled at their clothing. I swore that I, too, would wear such things someday.

“I started working for Her Majesty’s government whilst on a scholarship to Cambridge, and one of the first things I did with the money I earned was to buy an outfit like this.” He looked down at the tattered rags that his clothes had been turned into. “That and all the expensive food and drink that I could stomach. I thought I had arrived.”

“You sound like you hadn’t,” the Abraham man interjected. “If I was wearing velvets and sipping Madeira, I’d think otherwise!”

Kit glanced at him. “You know how the world works better than that. I was a charity case, and only able to study because someone took pity on me. I was a nobody, and the son of a nobody. They never let me forget it.”

The big man’s eyes narrowed. “Yet you said you worked for the queen?”