Chapter 301: The Face of a Mistake II
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He forced the lesser vampire to pivot, then slammed a shoulder into him and finally landed something cleaner to the ribs.
The impact thudded.
The lesser vampire gave ground by half a step.
Raka followed aggressively, sensing the opening, and managed to drive two more strikes into the body before the thing in front of him adapted and returned the favor with horrifying economy.
A hand caught his forearm.
Another seized the collar of his coat.
Then the lesser vampire drove his forehead into Raka’s face.
That created the sound Crack!
The hall reacted all at once with a shared intake of breath.
Raka reeled.
And the lesser vampire finally stopped pulling his blows quite so much.
The next punch landed under the eye.
The next on the mouth.
The next across the opposite cheek.
No wasted motion. No wildness. No trying to impress the watching men. Just one hard measured strike after another until Raka’s head snapped to the side, then back, then sideways again.
By the time he finally managed to create distance with a vicious kick to the knee and a shove to the chest, one eye was swelling badly and the skin around the other had already darkened.
The lesser vampire stood there, breathing only a little harder than before.
Raka was breathing hard enough now that the room could hear it.
That mattered.
It mattered to his men even more.
No one moved.
No one interfered.
Because now everyone understood what would happen to the first idiot who jumped in unasked. Raka would kill him himself if the stranger did not do it first.
The vice leader straightened slowly.
One eye was already narrowing under swelling.
Blood at the lip.
The beginning of a spectacular blackening around one side of his face.
He looked meaner for it.
Also more tired.
The lesser vampire spoke for the first time since the fight truly began.
"If I were from Iron House," he said, voice calm and cold, "you would have died."
The sentence landed harder than another punch might have.
Raka said nothing.
Not because he had no answer.
Because he believed him.
That was the ugly part.
The stranger had hit him hard enough to prove superiority, but not hard enough to finish what was clearly within reach. He had opportunities. Raka knew exactly where they were because he had felt them pass close by his own throat and organs. If the man had wanted him dead, there were at least three moments in the fight where the hall would now be dealing with a corpse instead of pride.
Raka stood there, one side of his face swelling into a future disaster, and let the truth settle.
Not Iron House.
Not revenge.
Not the wrong kind, anyway.
He spat blood to the side again and said, rougher now, "Talk."
That one word changed the room.
The men around the circle relaxed by less than an inch, but it was enough to matter. Weapons lowered. Shoulders eased. The stupid fifteen looked relieved in the pathetic way men did when they realized they might not be blamed for summoning death into the room.
The lesser vampire did not look triumphant.
Raka respected that more than swagger.
He reached into his sleeve and produced the Dawn token again.
This time, when he held it out, no one laughed.
Raka took it.
Turned it once in his fingers.
Then looked up at him through the swelling and bruising.
"Say it again."
The lesser vampire answered without decoration. "Sekhmet sent me."
Raka stared one second longer.
Then handed the token back.
"What did he say?"
The room remained quiet enough to hear the blood dripping from one of the drunks’ split knuckles somewhere off to the side.
The lesser vampire said, "He told me to find you. He told me to tell you he wants to see you in the morning."
Raka’s good eye narrowed.
"And the rest."
"He told me you serve him."
A few men in the room shifted uncomfortably at the bluntness of that.
Raka did not.
Perhaps because after the fight, hearing it stated plainly felt less insulting and more inevitable.
The lesser vampire continued. "He told me to say that you are to take care of me for the night. Then I am to return with you in the morning."
That nearly got a reaction from the men at the wall.
Not because it was absurd.
Because it sounded exactly like the sort of command Sekhmet would give. Too casual on the surface. Too absolute underneath.
Raka wiped his mouth with the back of one hand and let the new shape of the situation arrange itself in his mind.
The token was real.
The stranger fought too well for Iron House.
The restraint in the fight was real.
And if Sekhmet had wanted a bodyguard dead, he would not have sent someone here with his own token and a direct order. He would have used other methods.
The misunderstanding had grown because his own drunks had gone looking for revenge and found it.
Annoying.
Very annoying.
He looked at the fifteen. "All of you are idiots."
They did not defend themselves.
Smart.
Raka turned back to the lesser vampire. "Name."
The man hesitated for the first time. Not because he wanted to conceal. Because he had none worth using now that mattered more than the blood above it.
"I was not given one for this."
Raka actually respected that answer.
Good enough.
He let out a slow breath and touched one side of his face. The swelling was already rising under his fingers. Wonderful. By morning he would look like he had tried to fight a wall and lost the argument.
He looked at the stranger again and said, "Then tonight you stay here."
The lesser vampire inclined his head once. "That is the order."
Raka almost laughed at how bad that sounded in his own mouth.
"Do not make me regret it."
"I did not ask for your trust."
Good answer.