Jason

A lot of vampires had died thanks to Jemima and Etienne, including the Council, except for Ysanne and Caoimhe. The two remaining Ladies were a force to be reckoned with, but even they couldn't run all five Houses of the UK and Ireland without help.

The surviving vampires of Lamia, Midnight, and Nocte Filii were leaderless, and no one had stepped up to the task of being a Lord or Lady. They'd all lost friends in Etienne and Jemima's power grab, and the shock and grief was too strong for any of them to feel they could lead their Houses in this time of need.

So Ysanne and Caoimhe had reached out to vampire Houses overseas, asking for help, and at first, the other Houses had been only too willing.

Then came the DeSanti scandal, blackening the reputation of vampirekind even more, and suddenly help wasn't quite so forthcoming. A handful of Houses in Europe and Asia immediately withdrew offers of support, while others simply ignored any attempt at contact. Maybe they thought they were protecting themselves, but the backlash that vampires in the UK were currently facing could easily affect them too. They should have been coming together instead of refusing to help.

But however angry Ysanne was with them, she wasn't about to beg for help, not when there were other Houses still willing to give it.

Today, the vampires who had been sent to help from France, Germany, Italy, and America were finally arriving at Belle Morte, where they would stay until tomorrow, for the meeting with the Prime Minister, before travelling to the three Houses that they would be helping to run until everything was cleared up and permanent Lords and Ladies could be appointed.

"Do we know who's coming?" Jason yelled through the bathroom door, showering as fast as he could.

"Nope," Renie shouted back. "But Edmond told me that Katerina Ivanova isn't going to help anymore. Apparently the Russian Houses are seeing a huge amount of backlash, even though they didn't have anything to do with this, and she doesn't think it's safe for any of her vampires to travel."

Jason digested that.

Katerina Ivanova was Lady of Bertmertnyy, one of Russia's most famous Houses, and she had promised to send some of her people to help.

Older vampires could withstand the sun for the time it took to fly from Russia to England, as long as they covered up – but that wasn't the danger Katerina worried about. Vampires weren't indestructible, and with hatred of their kind on the rise, setting foot outside their Houses came with a real risk these days. The Russian vampires would have been a real help, but Jason couldn't blame Katerina for putting the safety of her House first.

Turning off the shower, Jason stepped out of the porcelain tray and dried himself off.

In the bedroom, he could hear hangers clinking, which he took to mean Renie and Roux were choosing his clothes.

Sure enough, the door opened and the girls shoved an outfit at him. "Be quick. We don't want to miss anything," said Roux.

Jason smiled at her excitement. Even though Roux was a vampire herself now, the new famous faces were still bringing out her inner Vladdict.

There was no time to style his hair; he dressed quickly and then hurried out of the bathroom, leaving his towel on the floor.

He was excited, he realised, but not just because new vampires were arriving. He was excited because they represented the help that Belle Morte and the other Houses needed. He wasn't naive enough to think that their arrival would clear up this mess, but they would help and that was a huge step forward. Lately, it had started to feel like Belle Morte was fighting this battle alone, and now reinforcements were finally on their way.

"Ready?" Roux asked, and for just a moment Jason was transported back to a simpler time, before he'd known anything was wrong at Belle Morte, when he was just a starry-eyed donor, making friends with two very special girls.

He pushed the memory away. Maybe things had been simpler back then, but if he'd stayed in ignorance, then he wouldn't have the friendship he had with Renie and Roux and everyone else at Belle Morte.

That was worth everything.

Jason's excitement dimmed the second he stepped out of Belle Morte. Renie and Roux couldn't join him, not while the sun was out, so they hovered in the vestibule while Jason headed to where Ysanne, Edmond, Ludovic, and Seamus were already waiting, on the stone-flagged path that led from the front door.

The noise of the protestors was an ugly roar.

Inside the mansion, Jason had found he could ignore them, although he could still hear them. They were outside the wall that ringed Belle Morte's grounds, so he could pretend they were a world away, rather than practically on the doorstep.

Outside, there could be no pretending.

Jason didn't know how many people were out there – he studiously avoided looking at them – but it sounded like hundreds. Their voices were so ugly, so full of rage. A couple of bottles sailed over the walls and smashed on the ground. Jason flinched, and Edmond and Ludovic automatically moved in front of him, shielding him, even though the missiles were too far away to be a threat.

No one else seemed surprised so Jason assumed this wasn't the first time people had thrown things over the walls. As he looked at the broken glass, glittering under the pale February sunlight, he felt the urge to go back inside the House with his girls. He knew that people were reacting this way – he saw it every day across every corner of the internet – but reading it on a screen and seeing it in the flesh were two very different things.

It was frightening to realise how close the anger and violence was, especially when the House was operating with a skeleton security detail. The grounds weren't as secure as they had once been, so what happened if the death threats circulating online became reality and people started scaling the walls to carry them out? Given the rampant ugliness he'd seen, Jason was afraid that was a genuine possibility.

Since the protest was leaning towards violence, the police should have been there to disperse it, but either no one had called them or they simply hadn't shown up. Jason wasn't sure he wanted to know which it was.

There was still no sign of the new vampires; the House must have been given advanced warning.

"How are they going to get in?" Jason asked, eyeing the iron-wrought gates that barred the way into the grounds.

What if, the minute those opened, the protestors were bold enough to actually flood in?

"Detective Chief Inspector Walsh has arranged for police escort," Ysanne said, not taking her eyes off the gates and the crush of angry people on the other side.

The Lady of Belle Morte was as cool and composed as ever, dressed in a pastel sheath dress and towering heels, her legs and arms bare, impervious to the chilly weather. Her face was a beautiful marble mask, surveying the protesters as impassively as if they weren't even there, and pale sunlight winked off the diamond pendant sitting in the hollow of her throat.

When she was like this, it was almost impossible to remember how strong and fast and deadly she really was, but Jason had seen her fight. He had seen her covered in blood and thicker things. He had seen her rip another vampire's heart right of her chest.

He would never forget that.

It wasn't long before two police cars arrived, and Jason found himself holding his breath, horribly afraid that the protestors would fight back. There was violence in the air, raw and heavy, a fire waiting to be lit. Even a small spark could set it off. 

Jason didn't want anything to go wrong here. He was tired of fighting and violence and blood and death, tired of people hurting each other, tired of hatred and all the damage it caused. But the crowd settled down, realising they'd get themselves arrested otherwise, parting down the middle so the police cars had access to the gates.

Jason let out an unsteady breath.

That edge of violence still thrummed and writhed through the crowd, and he had no doubt they'd be more vocal the second the police left, but it wouldn't spark to life just yet.

Seamus and two other guards strode forward to open the gates.

The police drove through first, followed by two black cars. They all pulled up in front of the House, and the gates closed behind them.

Beyond the iron bars, Jason glimpses camera flashes. Some of them were press, obviously, but were there any legitimate fans among the crowd, hoping to document the occasion, or was everyone else taking pics to post to anti-vampire sites?

It was at once so similar to how donors used to arrive, and so terribly different that it made Jason's heart ache.

It seemed like a hundred years ago that he'd arrived at this House in a limousine, surrounded by other donors, sipping champagne as fans and photographers thronged the car, all eager for a glimpse of Belle Morte's latest additions.

There was no limousine now, just plain black Audis with dark-tinted windows.

Seamus strode over to them, opening each back door in turn.

The first woman stepped out and Jason's jaw dropped. "Holy crap," he whispered.

She was shorter than any other vampire he'd met, and gently rounded, as if she'd enjoyed her food before she was turned. Her hair was dark brown, falling in waves around her shoulders, framing a pretty dimpled face.

A face that Jason knew, even though he'd ever met her.

Adele Desmoulins, the Lady of Du Sang – Frances's most famous vampire House – gazed up at Belle Morte.

Jason had known that Du Sang was sending help, but he'd never imagined the Lady herself would travel to England.

His expertise lay mainly with UK vampires, but as the other new arrivals climbed out of the cars, he found he recognised a couple more faces – Kara Braun from Blutrausch in Germany, and Mateo Bianchi, though he couldn't recall which House the Italian was from.

There were six vampires in total, two for Lamia, Midnight, and Nocte Filii respectively, and all of them wore that total lack of expression vampires did so well. It was impossible to tell if anyone of them were actually happy to be here, or if they were simply obeying the orders of their Lords and Ladies.

Ysanne strode forward, her heels clacking on the ground.

She embraced Adele with a light kiss on each cheek, which made Jason wonder if they'd known each other before vampires had come out of the coffin. She definitely hadn't greeted previous Ladies like that.

"It is good to see you, Ysanne," Adele said.

Her voice was deeper than Jason had expected, and richly accented. Most of Jason's vampire friends were French by birth but had lived in England for so long that they had mostly lost their accents. Not Adele.

"If only it were under better circumstances," Ysanne said.

Kara, tall and solid, with shoulder-length black hair, cleared her throat, looking pointedly at Ysanne.

Ysanne straightened and wiped away the slight smile that Adele had brought to her lips.

"Thank you all for coming. Your assistance in this hour of need is more valuable than you can imagine," she said.

Kara didn't respond. Her eyes flicked over Belle Morte, over Edmond and Ludovic, before finally resting on Jason. Her expression didn't change, but Jason got the distinct impression that she didn't much like what she saw.

He returned her stare without blinking.

After everything he'd seen and been through, it would take more than a haughty stare to intimidate him.

"I'm afraid we do not have the time to commence with any real formality, so if you would all like to come inside, we can get to the heart of things," Ysanne said.

She turned on her heel without waiting for a response, her sheet of blonde hair glimmering in the sun, and strode back into the House.

Jason scuttled in after her, before any of the foreign vampires.

Renie and Roux hovered in the vestibule, their faces expectant.

"They're coming," Jason said, hurrying to stand beside them.

Ysanne paused on her way to the dining hall, which had become the unofficial meeting room. "I expect that you will be joining us?" she said. Her words were addressed to them all, but her eyes were on Jason.

He swallowed. Honestly, he hadn't been sure he'd be allowed to – after all, this was a vampire matter and he wasn't a vampire. "Um . . . yes," he said.

Ysanne nodded and continued walking.

Jason loved the dining hall, with its parquet floor and polished oak walls. He loved the wrought-iron chandelier hanging over the trestle table, each metal arm topped with a glass globe. He loved the way the room used to look in the mornings: the table covered with a white cloth, another table at the far end, groaning under the weight of food. He loved the memories he had of sitting here with the other donors, eating breakfast and basking in the glow of the vampire mansion.

A lot of those donors were dead now, caught in the crossfire of a vampire power struggle, and the others had all gone home to their families. There was no laughter in this room, no white tablecloth, no smells of fresh cut fruit or warm toast.

His eyes went to the windows.

After Etienne finally seized hold of the mansion, Jason's friends had fled, smashing through the windows and the shutters that kept out the sun. There hadn't been time to fix them properly; for now they were boarded up, like scars against the polished beauty of the rest of the room.

Gideon and Isabeau waited at the head of the table, and Jason's heart skipped a beat as he looked at the object of his affections. Gideon was tall and broad-shouldered, his skin as smooth and pale as ivory, blond hair curling around the edges of his ears, his eyes as grey as a winter sky. He dressed simply compared to some vampires, in just black trousers and a white shirt, but that shirt clung to the muscles of his body in a way that made Jason's mouth turn to dust.

Every time he saw the man, it was like the first time all over again, a bolt of electricity straight to the heart.

And straight to the pants.

How the hell did he manage to affect Jason like this, every single time?

Jason had had crushes before, plenty of them, but he'd never met a guy who made him feel like the air was being sucked out of his lungs.

Gideon glanced at him as he came in, but those winter-grey eyes betrayed nothing, and Jason couldn't keep his heart from sinking. If Gideon had been consistently neutral towards him, then Jason might have let go of any hope that there could be something between them, but every now and then Gideon would do something to rekindle that hope.

Like gently lick Jason's throat to seal the bite marks left by another vampire.

Or throw himself in front of Jason to protect him from an attacker.

Little things like that.

The new vampires strode into the room and Jason quickly moved out of the way, sitting in the nearest chair. Ysanne had already taken her usual seat at the head of the table, Edmond at her right hand and Seamus at her left.

The atmosphere was heavy, bleak.

The future of the vampire world hung in the balance, and everyone knew it.