Here, those lights are a variety of colors, rather than the boring streetlights of the human world. We soon roar up in front of a lovely old hotel, with a massive, well lit bar below.
Ström hops off his bike as Bjorn and I follow, and valets move in. We take our fly-bags, but I know from the intense warding energy around this place that the entire hotel is for dragons. Like most modern Twilight Realm cities, many Lineages live here, rather than just the ones who dominate the area. But this fancy 1800s hotel hastroublewritten all over it.
As we head inside, and I feel the most intense magical wards I’ve ever experienced wash over me.
“What the fuck was that?” I ask Ström, as I shiver from head to heels in my black motorcycle leathers. Just one touch of those wards has left the heebie-jeebies crawling all over me.
I’m suddenly not excited to be here, whereverhereis.
“Containment and concealment wards.” Ström strolls confidently through the high-Victorian style foyer, groups of chaises and potted palms everywhere. Though the clientele are dressed to the nines in Twilight Realm high-money style, a seedy energy radiates through this place.
I realize now it’s a den of gangsters and thieves, as Ström strides right up to the desk, giving the woman there his most charming, devil-may-care smile. Before she can welcome him, a concierge rushes around the desk to us from where he was occupied at his station.
Beaming, as he furiously pumps Ström’s hand.
“HerreAxel Larsen!Dejligtto see you again at theForgyldt Bur, the Gilded Cage!”
Both Bjorn’s and my eyebrows go up. Not only has Ström got a false persona here in Danish territory, but he’s also taken a Danish Blood Dragon name to go with it. As Ström grips the man’s hand, laughing in an uproar, he grins like a devil.
Answering the man in a perfect Danish accent to his English—no trace of Swedish left.
“HerreEmil Beck, you old rascal! What trouble have you been getting into while I was away?” Ström grins like a brigand as he slaps the man’s back.
“Too much, and not enough, I’m afraid.” The man is jolly, but there’s an edge to it now as he looks Bjorn and me up and down. “I have not had the pleasure of meeting your companions,HerreLarsen. If you would indulge me?”
I feel like it’s some sort of test to pass this man’s scrutiny and beadmitted to this place. Ström is in his good graces—though I feel a fell wind sweep between me and Bjorn.
Evaluating us, asHerreBeck wonders if we’re trusted enough to be let into this hotel.
“HerreEmil Beck, may I introduce my traveling companions—Annika Johansson and Anders Karlsson.”
“Swedes!” Emil Beck sucks his teeth before glancing around his clientele, idling in the vast foyer. I note how they keep close attention on us, despite everyone else mingling through the beautiful nighttime lobby. He looks back at us. “Well, I suppose they shall do no harm, as long as you vouch for them.”
“I do. To my blood and bones, I do,” Ström says casually now.
Though his look could core diamonds, as he stares Emil Beck down.
The man goes silent. His gaze flicks at us, and I see true iron in him now, as he regards us. “It’s like that, is it?”
“You better believe it,” Ström says coldly, as he continues to stare the man down.
“Well.” Emil Beck smoothes his hands down his shiny black tux, then palms them over his slicked-back black hair. He beams at us then, his eyes clearing. “Come! We have the top-floor suite already made up for you,HerreLarsen, just like always. Blood and Bone friends of yours shall be true friends of this establishment. For we are all about the business of Blood and Bone here. Aren’t we… drakaina of both temperaments, who amasses many drakes?”
And suddenly, I know this man is an ally to Bloodwalkers, as he gives me a wink. With a wave at his personnel to man the long desk, he guides us up the nearest flight of ornately gilded stairs, motioning a small army of porters forward to get our things.
We’re shown up to the hotel’s sixth floor, though there are no elevators to take us there. When Emil Beck opens the gilded double doors of the suite at the very top, we’re rewarded by the most incredible view of old town Copenhagen.
Glass, crystal, gold, and marble, everywhere I look.
20
SEARCH
Morning finds us moving quickly through our gilded top-floor hotel suite in Copenhagen. Though the hospitality here at the Gilded Cage has been top-notch, just as good as the Red Letter Hotel Paris, Bjorn, Ström, and I don’t luxuriate in all the amenities.
We’re on a mission today as we have some hasty sex, eat an even hastier breakfast, then zip up into our modern motorcycle leathers. All of us are wearing black today, so we’re less conspicuous, though Ström often favors tawny leathers. But our mission today has a clandestine element; we’re off to investigate the cliffside ocean site Ström recalls from his vision of the thief woman and our enemy Bone Mage.
Which he remembers now, is right next to an old warehouse—our only clue about where these thieves are.
