The Dark Arts of Blood by Freda Warrington

already under way, even while he kept tinkering with the script. He would not let anyone forget the Three Tells of legend, the sleepers who would one day awaken to save his homeland. His stories would inform everyone that behind every folk story, every traditional carnival – such as the
Fasnacht
procession, with its raucous music and grotesque costumes – there lay a hidden purpose.
    To drive out demons.
    From the corner of his eye he noticed a woman beside him.
    His heart leapt with shock. Dark skin, a simple olive-green dress… she stood there, silent, watching the film with him. Could she hear his racing heartbeat, scent his fear?
    He wondered how many vampires he’d brushed past in the street and never even known. Perhaps dozens. You couldn’t be sure of anyone.
    His own
sikin
was still in his pocket. Recalling how she’d recoiled last time, he took out the knife and held it ready. Only then did he dare look round at her. She appeared real, solid, even though she’d come out of thin air.
    “Don’t try to use the
sikin
against me,” she said softly in French. “My name is Fadiya. Those knives are mine, Herr Reiniger.”
    “So you said before.” He answered in German. “I do not tolerate degenerate languages in my house.”
    “As you choose,” she said, switching. “I speak three German dialects, French, English, Arabic, Spanish and Italian. And I do not appreciate you looking at me as if I crawled out of a pit.”
    He couldn’t identify the lilt of her accent. She might be from any country of North Africa or the Middle East.
    “How do you know my name?”
    “I’ve been watching you for a while.”
    Anger rose in him like bile. “And how did you know the
sakakin
were here?”
    “I sensed them from a long way off. I heard them… groaning. Strange. One on its own, I would not have noticed. But several together give out a sort of vibration that calls to me.”
    Godric had strong nerves, but her presence made sweat ooze from his neck, cast a literal chill over him.
    “Nonsense. They were my father’s, and now they belong to me. What do you want, demoness?”
    “Your father stole them. He looted them from their hiding place. I want them back.”
    “And I told you last night that you can’t have them,” he said, straightening to his full six-foot-two and tightening his grip on the dagger. He knew that a male vampire could sweep a human aside or crush his throat with one hand. Perhaps a female could too – but he was pleased to note that she feared the object she claimed to own.
    “How can you own something that was buried in the desert for centuries?” he said thinly. “If they’re yours, why are you afraid of them?”
    “Guns are no less lethal to their owners,” she replied. “You don’t even understand what they are.”
    That was half-true, but Godric had documents left by his father. He knew the knives contained strange properties. Although he hesitated to use the term “supernatural”, it was hard to define them as otherwise.
    It crossed his mind that she might be able to find the
sikin
Bruno had lost. But his pride would not let him admit that he’d mislaid it.
    He was certain that this unwelcome
strigoi
had nothing to teach him.
    He stopped the projector. The screen went dark.
    “I know you are a vampire, yet you clearly have no power over me. You tried to attack me and couldn’t. So, if the knives protect me from you, they must be mine by default. If I knew a banishing ritual, you’d be gone by now. You would be dust.”
    “The word you want is
afrit
,” she said, “or
ghūl
, though neither really fits. I would prefer no label at all. We seem to have reached stalemate, Herr Reiniger. You’re right, the
sakakin
have given you power and I cannot get past you to take them. Yet you cannot banish me.”
    “Can’t I?” said Godric, icily furious.
    “There is nothing you can do to make me leave this place.”
    He raised the knife, drawing silver runes on the air, but she only