Annika Northman: Part Two

Chapter 21: Statement

Twenty minutes later, Eric is sitting in a chair at the center of the bar. Not at a table, just alone. Another chair, empty, is set across from him. The not-soldiers – the officers – arranged it that way, and now they stand around us, faces grim, looking like members of an audience who didn't want to come to the show in the first place. And who dressed extremely weird.

Eric's elbows are on his knees, his hands together, his eyes on the floor. He's too far away from me. I'm sitting on a barstool, which he directed me to, and I'm with Pam – she's leaning against the bar beside me, arms crossed and a foot propped on the rail beneath her – and that's something, sure. But I want to be with Eric. I want it to be okay, like it was when I was little, to crawl into his lap because I'm frightened. When did that stop being okay?

It wouldn't have been okay when you were little, either. Not like this, with people around. With the stakes this high . . .

The EMPLOYEES ONLY door flies open, making me jump. Flanagan re-enters the room and announces, "The downstairs is clean."

"Well," Eric says, "I told you there was nothing." On the surface, his tone is polite and patient. I know him, though, so I can hear the deeper things. The things nowhere near as tame.

"It's been wiped."

"Well, I'm a Virgo. I like to be neat."

Flanagan strides to the chair across from him and grips its back like she's hoping to choke it to death. "Your screeching fang-cushion of a barmaid, who's been glamoured so much she can't even remember her own last name, does know that no one ever goes down there with so much as a mop and a promise. And when I tried to find out what your little porcelain doll over there –" She nods at me – "knows about it, I made the oh-so interesting discovery that she can't be glamoured. A fact you've failed to report to the Authority."

I wring my hands. After she had Eric silvered, Flanagan ordered Ginger and I be brought to the back. She put Ginger in the office and me in my room and spoke to me first. You're the psychic? she asked immediately, and when I said yes, she bent to my level and said, Push back your little finger until it breaks.

It took one second for me to realize that this was a test, that she was trying to glamour me. By the second after, I was wondering if the right thing to do was actually try and obey her. Two seconds, though, is apparently too long of a hesitation when you've supposedly been glamoured to do something. Just like that, Nan Flanagan knew one of my biggest secrets. But it didn't stop her from asking me questions.

. . . . .

"Do you know anything about someone called "the magister"?

"No."

"You don't?"

"No."

"I don't feel like you're cooperating with me, Annika."

"You said to answer the questions. I'm answering the questions."

"You should be careful how you speak to me, little girl. I'm being nice. I don't have to be."

". . . You're two states away from ratification."

"Excuse me?"

"Your bill. It's two states away from ratification, I heard you say that. The AVL wants to improve vampire-human relations. I don't think it would look very good for Nan Flanagan to hurt a human girl."

"You're absolutely right. And if you were the daughter of Dr. and Mrs. Joe America from Apple Pie, USA, I wouldn't dream of laying a finger on you. But you're not. You're the illegal pet of a vampire currently under investigation by the Authority. And considering you couldn't publicize anything I might do to you without shining a spotlight on Mr. Northman, I'm confident that I could break every bone in your body and he would be the first in line to stop you from telling the world. Don't threaten me, kid. You have no leverage."