I stood there and waited for the pain in my shoulders to die down enough for me to feel how many pins and needles were burning through my hands. I flexed them, trying to rush the process, because I’d woken up alone. No one was actually hurting me yet, or even guarding me. Good. First, I needed to be able to feel my hands, because it’s hard to fight if you can’t. As far as I could see there was no electricity in the room; in fact, there were unlit torches in wall sconces, which meant there were no cameras, no way for them to watch me until they came into the room. Better.

   I kept flexing my hands and trying to rotate my shoulders to see if anything was damaged from hanging however long I’d been there. The daylight meant that either it was only a little later the same day, or it was the next day. If the first, then I’d only been out for a couple of hours tops. If the second, then I was lucky I could move my arms, or feel my hands at all. It would also mean that whatever had happened in Dublin that night was over and I’d missed it all. That scared me, tightening my stomach, making me wonder if everyone I cared about was all right. Then I realized I was being stupid. I didn’t need a phone to call home.

   I reached out to Nathaniel first and there was nothing, just a blankness, which scared me even more. I took a deep breath, let it out slowly, got myself calmer and reached out for Dev . . . and nothing. I tried Jean-Claude, and again, nothing. It wasn’t that everyone here in Ireland had died in some horrible vampire debacle; something was preventing me from contacting anyone psychically. I’d had a human witch that was able to do that once, so the fact that the Wicked Bitch of Ireland would have someone powerful enough to do it shouldn’t have surprised me.

   There was one opening in the room, a rough doorway that seemed to have stairs beyond it that went up; other than that I didn’t see any other doors. Unless there was a door at the top of those stairs to keep me prisoner, they were pretty confident they didn’t need a door to hold me. I looked at the manacles on my wrists, because that was what they were; they didn’t lock with keys but with a metal piece that slid through a hole. If I could have gotten one hand close enough to the other I could have undone them, but the chains were too widely spaced for that. I looked at the chains themselves. They were big links, like the size of a log chain, so they were big and meant for holding things a lot heavier than me. They weren’t fastened to the stone ceiling but went through holes in the ceiling, which meant if someone was at the top of the room above me they’d see the chains move and know I was awake. I’d been so busy looking for modern things, I hadn’t thought that old-school would work just fine.

   I listened for movement that might let me know that they were coming to check on all that chain movement like a fish on a bobber, but it was quiet. I realized I could hear the sea. Dublin was a coastal city, so that shouldn’t have surprised me, but somehow I thought of the room in the dream and the fact that the windows had looked out over the sea. It was as if the room in the dream were more real to me than Dublin and that one glimpse of the Irish Sea. I had a second to wonder if this was still a part of that dream, and then I smelled the damp and the mustiness of the room. I breathed deeper and could smell the saltier freshness of the sea air. You couldn’t smell things when you were dreaming. I hugged that fact to myself, because it helped me not worry about the whole dream-versus-reality thing. I’d treat it as real until I knew I was wrong.

   I heard voices on the stairs. I debated on pretending to still be unconscious, but I’d just gotten the feeling back in all my extremities, and besides, no one coming through the doorway would be human. They’d be able to tell if I was asleep just by my breathing and heart rate. There was really no sense in pretending, so I was standing, waiting, when Hamish came through the doorway, but he wasn’t with Rodrigo anymore. The man with him was tall, dark, and not handsome. He wasn’t ugly, but he wasn’t pretty either. It was like he had several great features, but they didn’t all belong on the same face at the same time.

   He was definitely not handsome, but something about the way he carried himself as he entered the room made you want to look at him. There was an energy to him that made Hamish easy to overlook, which would have been a mistake, because the flashiest person in the room isn’t always the most dangerous.

   I caught a glimpse of white behind the second man, and it was the Wicked Bitch herself in person at last. She was wearing the same dress she’d worn in the dream, but it wasn’t the shining perfection it had been. The dress had dirt on the hem from the rough stone floor, or maybe she’d gone for a stroll outside. She was still beautiful and sort of exotic, for lack of a better word, but it wasn’t heavenly light and fireworks in the real world.

   The two men took up posts on either side of her, but a little in front, so they were between her and me. I wasn’t sure if they were afraid I’d hurt her, or she’d hurt me, but they were definitely placed so they could keep us apart if need be. Interesting.

   “Anita Blake, we meet at last.”

   “I was thinking almost the same thing, though I don’t know what name you prefer,” I said.

   “M’Lady will do.”

   “You called me by my Christian name and surname. Seems like using a nickname would be too informal after that.” I didn’t want to call her M’Lady. Maybe just stubbornness on my part, but I didn’t want to use the name she forced people to use.

   “You are very calm for someone who awoke in chains,” she said, searching my face for some hint of what I was really thinking.

   I tried to shrug but mainly made the chains rattle. “Not being calm won’t change anything.”

   “Such possession of self is rare.”

   “Thank you,” I said.

   “I hope you do not mind the change of clothes, but your others had become quite . . . disheveled.”

   “I appreciate your thoughtfulness,” I said. I’d shared enough of Damian’s memories to know that being nice to her was my best chance at not getting hurt. It might also make her more talkative, and I needed more information. Where was I? What day was it?

   She watched me with those pale blue eyes that she’d worked so hard to make bluer in our shared dream. “There is no fear in you now. Perhaps I have been too generous and should have hung you up nude.”

   “I said Thank you.”

   She frowned.

   “Allow me, mistress,” the second man said.

   “Not yet, Keegan.” She walked closer until she was only about two feet in front of me. I could have kicked her, but I didn’t see what it would gain me. They hadn’t hurt me yet; if I hurt them first that would probably change.

   “As my mistress wills,” he said, but his face showed a sour disappointment. Whatever he had offered, he enjoyed doing, and I would probably not enjoy it at all.

   “The first time I touched your energy through our shared vampire, you were nearly helpless before my terror. Now you stand before me and there is no fear in you. How can this be?”