"You're a book lover, I take it?"

I snapped the album shut and stuffed it back into the shelf before I turned. I smiled brightly.

"Somethin' like that," I drawled. My heart thudded and my smile stretched further. I was overdoing it, this appearance of trying to look calm and at-ease, but I was also totally busted being a looky-loo. I found it hard to drag myself away from Freyda's photo albums. Though the flavor of his thoughts didn't sway toward suspicion, my new cowboy friend, Joshua the palace manager, wandered over to me from across the drawing room.

"How goes it all?" he asked.

"Well..." I sighed, lifting my hands helplessly. After receiving Pam's package that morning, I had found myself hiding away from the busyness of the palace in the drawing room. "It's not really. I feel like I'm poking a stick around in the dark, just hoping to find a beehive to rustle up."

He chuckled and his eyes strayed to where I'd placed the album back. "What are those?" he asked.

"You haven't seen them?" I asked innocently. He shook his head in reply. "Maybe you can help me," I responded carefully, and he nodded in an agreeable way. I grabbed the top album and gestured toward the table for him to sit. I sat down beside him and opened the album up to where I was looking. It was the most recent album of photos; somewhere, I guessed, within the last decade judging by the clothes and decor.

"Do you know who this is?" I asked. I pointed to the gorgeous George Clooney-type, Middle Eastern man that appeared in most of the photos with Sigrid and Freyda.

Joshua leaned forward and his smile froze. "Who wants to know?"

"Me. I want to know."

"And this relates to your investigation... how?"

I huffed out a sigh. "Look. It seems to me that Freyda keeps those around her close. You said yourself to me last night that you've been working for her here since you were a teen. As far as I know, she and Sigrid have never parted. So, who is this person? And why haven't I seen him here?" I was pointing to the distinguished looking man, well, vampire, that I'd seen feature heavily across all the albums. "I thought I met everyone within her retinue."

Joshua made a tutting sound before sighing. He checked his watch. "Listen, I don't have much time, but I can give you the cliff notes."

"Yes. Please. Anything." I just had a feeling... something about this individual sent my spidey-sense tingling.

"That is Christof Mirzoyan."

"Okay," I said, waiting for more. Joshua shifted uncomfortably in his seat. "Listen," I said, placing my finger on the picture. "I know you know that someone has stolen a buttload of the Queen's gold. And I can't help but think they knew she is in a precarious financial position without it and that doing so would destabilize her territory. Has she had some dispute with this vampire?"

"The Queen's gold?" Joshua's brow furrowed.

I smirked and crossed my arms. "Don't try that. I might not read your every thought, but I can tell you're lying. I know you know. Everyone around here knows there's big a theft."

He took this better than I expected, finding out that I was a telepath; his brows rose but the reaction I detected from his thoughts didn't indicate he was going to be defensive.

"Alright, fair enough. I do know about Freyda's finances. Most do here. Rumors are rife, even though no one is meant to know. Staff here know about the missing gold, but we're not supposed to know about … the shaky state of everything else. Even Freyda knows the rumors circulate. I guess that's why she's still throwing the party. To show her strength to the other vampires in her retinue, the other monarchs too. Other influential figures in Oklahoma."

"And how does this guy figure in?" I tapped the photo.

"Queen Freyda was turned vampire alongside that guy Christof and Sigrid by a much more powerful vampire in the 1800s. Somewhere in Germany, if memory serves. Christof was a merchant passing through her town at the time. He later became a renowned financier."

"So... he's like her brother? The three of them vampire siblings?"

"Essentially, yes."

Thalia had said that Sigrid and Freyda were from the same lineage. So that lined up.

"And then where is he now?" I stared at the photo in question. The salt and pepper haired man was sitting on a couch, shirt unbuttoned, wine glass full of dark red liquid in one hand. He wasn't smiling, but his eyes were bright and expressive. Or maybe I'd had enough contact with stony-faced vampires that I now looked for clues in their expressions and mannerisms that weren't actually there. I squashed the image of Eric's face from my mind. A flyswat on a pesky blow-fly. Splat.

I turned my attention back to Joshua.

"You have to understand, their relationship was unusual. It's not normal for vampires to stay together for so long. Especially siblings. I believe Christof saw himself as a father figure to the girls. And Sigrid and Freyda were unusually close."

Well, that was news to me. Freyda hadn't even bothered to introduce me and Sigrid to one another. I'd been Sigrid's shadow for the previous two nights, and Freyda had been virtually gone the whole time. It seemed to me they hardly interacted.

"He left about two years back," Joshua finished.

"Okay..." I mulled over that thought. "So, before Eric moved here."

He shook his yeah. "No, as I recall, he was here during marriage negotiations."

"Marriage negotiations were held here?"

"Eric's maker, and another vampire, his son, I think, were staying here at the time, and during that period they brokered and agreement for marriage. It was before Eric had ever arrived on the scene. I'm not sure exactly what happened in the months after, but Christof moved to the Dakota court very shortly after the wedding."

"In what capacity? Is he working there?" I probed Joshua's mind. Swiss cheese.

Dammit. He'd been glamoured.

He shrugged. "That I don't know." He slapped his hands down gently on the table and stood. "Alright. I've gotta get back to it. There's been some issue with the sound guys trying to wire up the stage for the band. I can feel my phone non-stop vibrating in my pocket. Will we see you for the party? Or are you still considering a quiet night in?"

I smiled and told him I wasn't sure. In reality, it didn't look like I'd be solving Freyda's mystery any time soon. I'd resigned myself to the fact I'd likely need to go to the party simply because it might be my only chance to find any clues.

"You should come along... I'll save you a spot on my dance card." He smiled lopsidedly and I found myself smiling back. He was cute. "Maybe we can discuss more over lunch today?" he asked as he checked his watch. "I can probably squeeze in a fifteen-minute break in about an hour?"

I laughed. "Very smooth. Okay. I'll grab us something from the kitchen and meet you in the gardens out back?"

I stared at the closed study door for a while after Joshua left. He was handsome, sure, but that I couldn't afford to invest too much interest in him. God forbid. I couldn't imagine the horror of falling for someone who worked for my ex's new wife. Or anyone that worked for vampires. I had more pressing matters at hand. Despite that fact, my mind wandered back to my old beau Quinn. That ill-fated and fleeting relationship had carried with it a bundle of baggage, primarily thanks to his issues with vampires. It was a hard lesson, that was for sure.

I sighed and turned my gaze toward the painting of Eric and Freyda. This trip was my final and very last foray into the world of vampires. I was too different now. I was older. In a different headspace. So, no, my interest in Joshua was purely professional. I closed the album and returned it to its place on the shelf. It was purely professional in the sense that he was hiding something, whether he knew it or not and I was going to work him until I found out what. I had the sense that some broad forces were at work here, and whatever they were, they were important and involved with the missing gold.

I had the distinct sensation that I was holding a handful of odd pieces to a puzzle... I just couldn't see exactly what the picture was.

•───── ─────•

The gardens weren't as sunny as my foray the previous day. A cool breeze had kicked up, and the sky above loomed dreary and gray. I sat waiting on a concrete bench beside a large flowering camellia until goose pimples formed. I started wishing I'd worn a warmer layer.

I checked my watch and resigned myself to the fact I'd been stood up. I grabbed the loaded lunch plates and trekked back to the kitchen. I was cut off by a palace staff member, a young two-natured guy, with a mop of dark hair and stressed look on his face. "Mr. McMann is caught up doing something, he can't make it to lunch. He sent me to apologize."

I broached the kid's thoughts and caught an image of Joshua arguing on the phone with someone and saw a half the stage set up in the ballroom behind him. The image was fleeting and the kid was already thinking about the next item on his ever-expanding list of things to do. I knew very well how stressful big events could be. I was glad it wasn't me. I'd tried my hand organizing a few events at Merlotte's. It wasn't a walk in the park. Unlike the next task on my list.

"That's fine," I said with a shrug. "These things happen."

He offered to take the lunch plates back to the kitchen which I thanked him for, but not before pinching a muffin from my plate. I turned back toward the garden and continued my walk from the previous day.

My feet carried me past the fine landscaping, past a large duck pond and beyond, where I paused for a minute to sit inside the gazebo to eat my muffin, looking down past the long grasses to the forest that seemed to demarcate the back border of the Queen's property. Deep in the forest, trees obscured what appeared to be a body of water. Another pond, or maybe a river.

I closed my eyes after I finished and breathed deeply, sending out mental feelers. Now I knew about it, I could sense the ward on the edge of the palace property; I could feel the magic. Smell it. Taste it. Slightly sour. As a kid, I'd once licked a battery on a dare (thanks Jason), and it was a little like that. Yesterday, I'd been content only to go this far and had not even considered venturing further. Was that the ward at work?

I didn't have Bubba on my arm today to help me breach the ward like he had that night of the witch war. Instead, I simply stood and marched nose first through the long grasses, my tennis shoes quickly growing damp at the toes. I entered the tree line and spotted a small structure standing deeper through the trees. There was a body of water some distance past it. Not a pond, a narrow river. I ignored the small hut-like structure and forced myself to the banks of the river. I paused and leaned against a tree, catching my breath. The effort of making it this far was taxing, like walking against a heavy current trying to propel me the other way. The river, from what I could see, was long and narrow, but stagnant and murky in color. The surface rippled under the stiff breeze. I was kind of like a moat. Maybe it was a moat? Without alligators, of course.

I turned to look over my shoulder. I should get back, I thought. I wanted to go back. I probably had something important to do back at the palace. There were new staff there readying for the party, more people coming and going. Surely my answer lay there. I could read them. I had work to do, after all. I felt the undeniable pull to return. Ah! I gave my mind a firm shake. This was the ward! I breathed deeply, trying to throw off the feeling. Yes, it had to be the ward. The urge to leave crawled like ice through my limbs. The damned thing was affecting my brain.

Ducks further down the little river called, and I watched them skim across the water. I should investigate. I was here, after all. I took a deep fortifying breath and then forced myself to move step-by-step alongside the river, closer toward the hut, squashing down the overwhelming sensations to leave. The trunks of the pine trees around the hut were as dark as bitter chocolate and the color matched the dark pine of the cabin. It barely stood out against the landscape. A little old, a little dilapidated, the shingles on the hut roof were mossy and had seen better days.

I drew a ragged breath, cursing my shaking legs. C'mon… Another step, Sookie. It was like I was being dragged by an undertow. Each step a concerted effort. I walked further and clung to a broad pine tree. I looked back toward the palace. Maybe Joshua needed my help sorting out whatever problem he was stuck with? Maybe he was trying to find out something to help me?

My breath came in gasps, I was stuck in the riptide of the ward trying not to be dragged away.

My phone began buzzing in my pocket. I answered before realizing I had retreated more than a dozen steps backward toward the palace.

"Sook?"

"Hey, Sam," I panted out. I wiped my face. My brow was damp.

"What's wrong?"

"Nothin'…" I gritted the word between my teeth and forced myself to walk back to the tree where I'd been standing and then took a few steps more. "What's up?"

"Just checking in." He cleared his throat uncomfortably. "I know we didn't exactly part on good terms the other day. I wanted to check everything was goin' okay."

I focused on his words and not on the unbearable repelling power of the ward and forced myself to move closer to the hut. "All going well, Sam." I drew a deep breath. "And you know why I'm doing this…"

We'd had an almighty blow out over the phone before I left for Oklahoma. Sam thought I was coming back because… Because well, I didn't know exactly why. Maybe because of Eric? Because I couldn't help but get involved? Maybe he was even jealous. What a waste of energy. Nearly two years too late on that account for him. I'd hardly been Sam's to begin with and then I wasn't at all. And it was all his fault too.

We'd been dating for a couple months, and things had been going swell, when it had emerged that during his full moon runs he hadn't been exactly exclusive to me when he took animal form. Apparently, the draw to fornicate with others was too much in animal form. What utter garbage. The woman in question, Josie, was yet another scary werewolf. She reminded me a hell of a lot of Janna-Lynn, and quickly she became his girlfriend when we broke it off.

Or maybe Sam just felt guilty that he couldn't financially invest any more into The Dogwood than he already had and felt bad that I was forced to work this job in order to keep it afloat in its infancy. Still didn't mean he had any right to be mad at me for coming here.

"I know, Sook. I know why you're doing this." He sounded tired. "They treatin' you right, at least?"

"Fine enough," I managed, getting three steps closer. "How's Merlotte's?"

Sam began updating me on the issues with the plumbing in the ladies' bathroom, which (surprise, surprise) was on the fritz again. I'd probably need to divert some of the cash I'd earn from this week toward that too, not just toward The Dogwood. Merlotte's bathroom woes were just what I needed to hear, though. I distracted myself enough to make it to the entrance of the little hut.

The metallic tang in the air was so strong, my hair felt like it was standing straight on end, and my ears were ringing. The air felt charged, ready to crackle. The hut itself was small, more like a shanty than a cabin. The door was bolted shut by an ancient, rusted iron latch with a much newer looking padlock. I brushed my fingers against the padlock and yelped.

"What's wrong?" Sam yelled in alarm.

"Son of a gun!" I cried, shaking my hand out. "Mother-fudging padlock burned me!"

"Burned you? What's going on?"

"Look, I can't talk right now." I sucked my fingertips and examined them. They were blistering. What on earth? Another call started beeping through on my cell. "Barring some crisis, I'll talk to you when I get back, Sam."

I clicked off the call answered the new one.

"Sookie?" It was Joshua. "You need to get back here. I think I might have found someone who has some answers for you."

My legs didn't wait to be told, I was already two dozen steps closer to the sprawling mansion and closing in fast.

•───── ─────•

"You are more useful than you appear," Freyda said, looking pleased. I grimaced, her words eerily reminiscent of something Andre, the right-hand vampire for Louisiana's late-Queen had once said to me. Freyda, stepped toward the donor, her dainty stilettos clacking on the concrete floor. She lifted his chin by a single finger. The donor was terrified. His eyes were wide and glassy, his knees jittering up and down.

She shushed him and a heartbeat later he was under her thrall. "There, there," she crooned. "Tell me everything you know…"

And there was the rub. Poor Dylan knew nothing. When I had got back to the palace, Joshua met me on the back steps and had taken me to… well, I don't know what else to call it other than an interrogation room.

I can't imagine it would be used for anything else. Four walls, no windows, handcuffs, one end attached by a chain to the wall and the other end to Dylan, who was also tied to a single aluminum chair.

Joshua had shucked the affable cowboy routine and let the were-branded anger come out to play. It sure took the shine off my new friend— like dropping a newly minted penny into a muddy puddle. Seeing this other side to Joshua effectively lumped him into the pile of every other nasty supe I'd ever had the misfortune of meeting.

But, sure enough with a bit of roughing up, the story emerged from donor. Turned out one of the donors snitched on him after she happened to be going through his belongings and found… Whaddya know? A gold bar. And would you believe it? Dylan knew not a thing about it, only that it was his.

In the present, I watched Freyda as she walked around Dylan in a slow circle, going through the same questions that Joshua and I had more or less asked him, though with a lot less Werewolfy-violence. Who gave you the gold bar? Why? When did you get it? Are there more? Do you know where they are? On and on the questions went. Freyda stopped pacing and looked at me expectantly. She wasn't as dressed up tonight as she was the previous nights I'd seen her. She looked, well, not casual exactly but less done up. Her hair was loose. Dressed in all black like… like she was trying too hard to appear badass.

"It's just a big old wall of static there," I explained to Freyda. "He's glamoured. But strangely. With most glamour there's a bit of blurry edges, you know; where they get confused. This isn't like that. It's clean cut. It seems very well done." This wasn't Swiss cheese brain. It was smooth blank hole. But that was the funny thing about it, I went on to explain to her. Because of the nature of the glamour, I could get my mind around it. Like those fancy partitions people get dressed behind in old black and white movies. I could just step right around it.

And behind it? There lay the regular kind of glamour, though it felt as if it had been done shoddily. "When you ask him questions, I can read the answers from him behind there… He was given the gold, but by who, I don't know. He has information about the missing gold, but I can't tell you what. It just blanked from his memory."

"We are being set up," Sigrid snarled. "Taunted." She blurred up to Dylan and grabbed him by the neck, slamming him, chair and all, against the wall of the stark room. His handcuffed arm tugged at an unnatural angle. She bored her gaze into his, not the gentle thrall of glamour that Freyda exerted; this was a mind-fuck, pardon the French. He moaned. "Tell us what you know!" she said, her growl echoing off the walls.

"Nothing, nothing!" he cried. I felt the fuzzy, Swiss cheese of the glamour edifying. Sigrid was trying to undo what was done to him by glamouring over it all and removing it in one fell swoop, like pulling off a wax strip, but to no avail.

"It would seem he's right," Freyda said with a final nod, looking on. She snapped her fingers and Sigrid released her hold on Dylan—mentally and physically. I flinched has he fell to the floor with a clatter, along with the chair he was tied to. A dark patch of urine rapidly expanded on his trousers. "Joshua. Take the donor to the gallery. We have no use for him now. Let the perpetrators think we've found our culprit."

Dylan who had been whimpering, now began crying openly—sobbing—and I swallowed back my horror and disgust as I got a front seat view of exactly what "the gallery" was from the combined thoughts of Joshua and Dylan.

My God, two years away from this life, and how quickly I forgot what it meant to be near vampires.

"Is this wise?" I quietly asked Sigrid.

"Quiet," she snapped, shooting me a look that could freeze an erupting volcano. Dylan was dragged across the floor, kicking and crying desperately.

The gallery was an area, I guessed somewhere within the palace, a series of rooms where prisoners were strung up, literally chained by their hands and feet to the walls. A piece of sick, performance art. I pulled the next piece of info straight from Joshua's mind—Freyda liked to walk visiting vampire dignitaries through the gallery, past all the strung-up prisoners, a short detour on the way to her formal office. She did so proudly.

I didn't give a hoot what Sigrid thought. Or Freyda. Or anyone. "You can't do that to him!" I shouted after Joshua, but he barely paused. Freyda snapped her attention toward me.

"What is it exactly that you think I cannot do?" she said, her tone as sharp as a dagger. "He is in my employ. A royal attendant. He is mine to do with as I like."

"It's cruel. What purpose does it serve hanging him up? He's been set up. He's not culpable."

"I'm not paying you to comment on the punishments I mete out."

"No, but don't pretend you don't know about the clause in my contract for dealing with human perpetrators!" It was the same clause I'd used verbally when I worked for Sophie, worked with Eric, and with all other vamps.

"I'm perfectly aware of it, Miss Stackhouse, and he may be human, but he is most certainly not a perpetrator. As you very kindly explained, he was given the gold and glamoured into the doing so. He is merely a patsy. As such, I will not be involving the authorities, human or otherwise. Your clause," she said, sneering out the word, "remains intact."

I gritted my teeth. Damn it to hell! I'd bet my right hand she'd worked out that loophole before she'd even signed the damn contract. "That's not the spirit with which that clause was made. I don't want humans harmed at all."

She tittered, her head dipping slightly with amusement. "Oh yes, you are delightfully human, aren't you?" She said it like it was a handicap. I bit my tongue fiercely, fighting back a torrent of words. Lord help me, I wanted to throttle her in that moment. I'd show her human! I opened my mouth to object again, but Freyda lifted a palm to silence me. "Enough." She began speaking with Sigrid, "I expect a full report once you've examined the gold bar. I have preparations to make for Friday night." She turned back to me. "And I expect your full assistance, Miss Stackhouse, and nothing less."

I narrowed my eyes at her, and she smiled back at me falsely. Sweet, with a hint of fang. I looked back over my shoulder and Thalia stared at me, indifferent.

"Eric spoke highly of your talents," Freyda finished. "I expect you to prove it."

I looked back at her sharply. I said nothing, and though my hands ached with the need to clench into fists, I didn't so much as twitch. But if my eyes could shoot stakes, Freyda would be nothin' but a pile of ash. And Eric would be next on the list.