Page 117 of Let Slip the Dogs of War

I suppose he might well be unconcerned.

Footsteps on the stairs. Rook bristles, and I brush the back of my hand against his. We are here for a great favour. As much as we can, we must keep cool heads.

“How long has he been dead?” the new man asks. He is dangerously pale, though his eyes and hair are so dark as to appear black. He pauses on the final step and eyes us with the same suspicion Felix showed at the door.

“No more than three hours.”

“I already asked, Sora,” the blond man says. He is bustling about again, patting his pockets. “Do you know where I put—”

“Here.” Sora holds out a lighter, which the blond takes with a quick grin. He sets to lighting the candle and then wanders off for something else. Sora pauses at the foot of the table. He takes Jamal in with a cool, detached gaze.

“A vampire attacked?” His eyes cut to us. “Not one of you. He was a donor?”

I’m surprised he’s managed to put it together so quickly, although I suspect I should not be. Rook does not jolt like I do. He is still scared, and his fear always manifests as anger.

“Yes,” he bites out, then adds charitably, “He was Crai Vasile’s donor.”

The name does not seem to faze either of the witches, though Sora mulls it over for a moment. He looks between the two of us, then studies Jamal’s face. “Are you certain about this, Florian?”

The blond, Florian, waves a careless hand. He returns with a slim black book, which he sets next to the candle. As lackadaisical as his movements seem, at no point does he so much as brush against Jamal’s skin.

“As certain as I can be. Just need you here in case I go too deep.”

“Longer than an hour is too deep,” Sora replies. “Last time…”

“Was different.” Florian lifts the bowl he put next to Jamal’s hip and looks at me and Rook. “I need some of your blood.”

Rook reacts before I can. My head spins as he spits out, “What?” Florian simply cocks his head to one side and watches us as though he does not quite understand why we would protest.

“We—That—”

“Look, Sora’s right about the length of time. If I go too far into the realm of the dead, then I’ll just end up stuck there, and anything longer than an hour dead is… dicey. Not to mention what you’re dragging a consciousness back to, okay? You know how decomp works. You’re vampires.”

“Fae,” Sora mutters, and Florian waves him off again.

“The only way for this to work is to turn him as I bring him back.”

For a moment, I cannot breathe. Not that I need to, but the thought of that. The idea.

It is the reason Rook and I hesitated when it came to telling Jamal the truth. It is the reason we hesitated in speaking with him more than was necessitated by his own curiosity.

He has always made it clear he did not wish to be turned. I shake my head. “I-I thought…”

The look Florian gives me is pure sympathy. “Look, I get it, okay? But we don’t have time. Every second here is another second he gets further away. Either he stays dead, or he comes back as a vampire, and that’s if it works at all.”

Our chances are slim. Rook tangles his fingers in mine, and his desperation is palpable. We both know what he would choose, but I have accused him of being too impulsive before, especially when it comes to the people he loves.

When it comes to me. When it comes to Jamal.

And would he… I know he was prepared to die, at least in the abstract. He had to know that placing himself between Tamesis and the rest of the donors, even standing shoulder-to-shoulder with others, would only end one way. But when he told us that he had come to the vampire clan for the curiosity of it, and that he shared no desire to be a hungry vampire like the rest of them, that was honest.

Would he have changed his mind in those final moments? If he were here now, would he ask us to save him?

Did he think of us at all before he died?

“Do it,” Rook says, and the steadiness of his voice shocks me out of my reverie. He holds out his hand and Florian leans over to hand him the bowl. “You need blood from both of us?”

Florian shrugs. “Up to you. Figured you might both want to be involved, what with the soulbond and all.”