“All of it?” asked a shocked male voice. “You want to cut down the whole forest?”

“No worries, what we’ll build here will be much better than this pile of ugly wood,” another voice said, female this time.

“That’s great but… Are you sure you want to cut all of it? I mean… all the way to Glennallen?” the man said reluctantly. I still didn’t see them but they were getting closer.

“Yes, Riah will meet us halfway, don't worry,” the woman said, happy, almost excited. Riah… Why did the name sound familiar?

“Still…” The man sighed and I finally saw them. Two silhouettes walking by the trees. I guessed they were vampires, judging by the somewhat unnatural movements of their bodies. After dying, vampires forgot how to move like humans and faking it got them only so far. “What about the humans? The government? What will we say?”

“We own miles and miles of the forest and the other I’m sure we can buy,” the woman said with ease, not sounding bothered at all.

“And what about the wolves…? We would have to go through their territory.” That made me stop dead, dread creeping up my spine.

“Oh, don’t worry about them, by the looks of it their own problems will get them killed before we even have to deal with them.” The woman laughed and I had to resist the temptation to jump out the window and rip her apart.

“Easy big boy…” Daniel whispered, his breath on my neck making me shiver. Then it was suddenly gone and Daniel was moving swiftly and soundlessly through the darkness. I followed him just as silently. We quietly got down and out of the factory, keeping to the shadows.

“What…” I wanted to ask but one look from Daniel stopped me. Quietly we walked all the way back to the hotel, locking the door as we got inside.

“I don’t know the details.” He shook his head without me even asking anything. “All I know is that Baltazar and Riah are planning to merge the city of Glennallen with Silver Springs and make a big city full of prey out of it.”

“Riah… I know that name, why do I know it?” I asked. It was going through my head since I heard it.

“The last time you were here, about eleven years ago, there was a little… incident in the French Night Court,” he reminded me. The second he said that it all came back to me…

France was the state of vampires, the biggest and oldest clans lived there. The Masters of each big clan there made the Night Court, it was something of a government for the vampire world. Eleven years ago half the Night Court was murdered by a group of vampire outcasts with Riah, a beautiful and deadly female vampire, in their lead. It was a big thing, the whole vampire world was shaken. Werewolves didn’t get involved in this, but someone who could kill half the most powerful and oldest vampires awoke healthy respect even in the packs.

“Baltazar wants to work with Riah? Won’t the Night Courts come here then? To kill her?” I frowned, seriously not wanting the Night Court anywhere near Silver Springs.

“Please.” He scoffed. “They’re scared shitless of her, she has been living in New Orleans for the whole decade and they haven’t done anything about it.”

“So why come here from New Orleans? The north is not exactly the favorite place of your kind.” There were no big cities around here, there just wasn’t enough prey.

“I guess they think they can build a big city and rule all of the north from here.” He shrugged. “Your guess is as good as mine.”

Damn… This was bad. But that was a problem for the future, right now I needed to find the Mercenaries. “The woman didn’t sound like she thought the Mercenaries were Baltazar’s.” I pointed out.

“She is a Walker, but not exactly the highest-ranking one. Baltazar wouldn’t just give away information to anybody. So she knows as much as I do about that,” he said stretching on the couch.

I looked at him, his shirt rode up as he arched his back showing his flat stomach. He smiled at me and winked. I frowned. No matter how much I thought about it I couldn’t figure out a single reason why he would tell me all of this.

“What?” he asked when I just kept looking at him.

“That sounds like a lot of important information you just leaked out to the enemy,” I said.

He smiled and moved closer to me. “Would you believe it if I told you I did it out of the goodness of my heart?” he suggested with an innocent expression, his hand on my chest once again.

“What heart?” I asked in confusion. Daniel laughed and I couldn’t help but smile a bit too.

“Yeah okay, that’s fair. To be honest, I have a feeling, that having the infamous Ghealach son owe me, will be quite useful in the future,” he said ominously. His tone made cold claws of dread run down my spine. “But of course if you would like to pay me in a different way, right now.” He bit his lower lip, going up on his toes so he could kiss me. I stopped him though with a hand covering his mouth.

“Not a chance.” I smiled at him, shooing him to the door.

“Ugh, you’re no fun,” he accused me, as he got out of the door. He stopped in the hall though, turning back at me with a complicated expression. “You know… I don’t think that Baltazar had anything to do with the hit on Bran. Believe it or not, Bran was loved by more than just wolves.” And he walked away, leaving me absolutely stunned.