“Too true.” Terry reached out for the blood wine that Luisa offered him. It was an older batch, but still not unpleasant. He saw Guillermo’s eyes widen at the strangely dark port. “If anything were to happen to us, the power vacuum would be felt in far more than just England, wouldn’t it?”
Guillermo said, “It is for that reason I have come. To both beg your pardon for my lady’s actions and ask for your help. Leonor has become an unreliable ally and leader. There are rumors she has lost control of the Portuguese coast. Her allies in the Spanish court are divided and her power has waned. She is obviously becoming rash to make decisions such as the one to attack you and your lovely wife.”
Idiot. Could he have been more obvious? Guillermo was definitely not working for Leonor. So who...
“It’s horrible,” Gemma said, “to be faced with these dilemmas. To be forced to part allegiance with those you thought you could trust.”
“Sad indeed.” Terry patted Gemma’s knee as he caught Luisa’s eye. She was moving toward the door of the library. “But a choice between your own survival and that of someone you once considered a friend is really no choice at all.”
“Survival,” Guillermo said, his fangs dropping a little, “must always come first. Do I have your support, Señor Ramsay?”
“Let’s not be hasty.” He sipped his blood wine and linked his fingers with Gemma’s. “I need to know what your current situation is, Guillermo.”
“I have no desire to remain under the aegis of a waning leader,” he said. “I have been cultivating my own allies for some time.”
Well, isn’t that interesting?
“Is that so?” Gemma latched onto his statement. “So were those your allies in England with you? Or Leonor’s?”
“I may have suggested a few additions to the initial trade party,” Guillermo said with a twisted smile. “Leonor was happy to hear my suggestions.”
“Surely a sign of her growing weakness,” Gemma added with a look of regret. “To not realize how such a large trade party would be viewed.”
Terry said, “We were suspicious as soon as we met you.”
“I had hoped to put you on your guard.”
Terry grinned. “I just bet you did.”
Guillermo cocked his head. “To warn you, of course. I hoped to cultivate an alliance between us. I knew Leonor did not value your relationship as she should. And then I heard of the ordered attack on the Conquest. After knowing that she would send others to kill you in such a manner... I simply cannot, in good conscience, remain at her side.”
“So you’re coming to us for protection?”
“I’m coming to offer you an alternative.”
And now we get to the heart of it. Terry took another sip of wine. Stale. Yes, the newer batch was much better. “Do tell, Guillermo. What kind of alternative could you offer my wife and I? Yourself? How many allies do you bring with you? You’re a trade envoy. A second lieutenant, if my information is correct.”
“It is not only myself that I bring. I do have allies of my own, Señor Ramsay.”
He leaned back in the chaise, the picture of relaxation as Gemma lounged against him. “What kind of allies?”
“Those who think ahead. Who look to the future. Too long have our kind been in the shadows, Señor. We are the gods of old. We should be kings over humanity, not hiding away, content to play by their rules.”
“Why should we have much to do with them at all?” Gemma asked. “They’re our food source. We have little to do with them unless we must.”
Terry tried not to snort when he imagined the look on Wilhelmina’s face if she heard Gemma just then. He imagined the secretary would stake her employer herself.
“The human world encroaches into our own more every decade. Technology will force us to deal with them eventually. My allies are those who wish to harness humans and put them in their rightful place. Why should we be the ones hiding?”
It was the same imperialistic mumbo-jumbo his sire warned him about two hundred years before. Terry tried not to sigh. There would always be those of their kind who saw humans, not as a related species, but as an inferior one. It was hard not to, at times. But Terry was young enough to remember what it had been to be human, and he purposefully kept close enough to mortals to remind himself. So did Gemma, whether she realized it or not.
Those of their kind who remained mixed with the mortal world were better survivors. More adaptable. They could function and hide and prosper in ways the more segregated could not. Further, humanity was growing stronger every day. To him, that meant adaptation. Evolution. To others? It meant biting back. Annoying, really.
“My allies foresee a time when humanity is ruled by us, as they should be. Then we will control them and their technology, not the other way round. As I said, they think ahead.”
“It sounds as if they think backward, if you’d ask my opinion.”
Guillermo’s eyes flashed. “If that is your opinion, Señor—”
“It is both our opinion,” Gemma said. “Do you think us so fickle that we would part ways with an ally who has remained in favor for far longer than you have lived?”
“She ordered an attack on you. She does not trust you.” Amnis crackled in the room as the water vampire began to lose control.
“No, she didn’t.” Terry set down his drink. “You did.”