Rip and Blair walked back to RVS HQ in silence. When she stole a glance at him, he turned and caught her eye.

She said, “Thank you.”

“For what?”

“For . . . staying here. With me. I know it must be hard to . . . not go home.”

He grinned at her.

“This is home.”

She slipped her hand through his arm as they approached the steps to the main building. When they walked in the front door, the receptionist waved them over.

“Sir Ripley, Lady Blair. You have a guest requesting an audience with you and the Ladies Verez. He is waiting in Room 114.”

Rip’s eyebrows shot up.

“Who is it?”

“Jan Antoni Kaminski. He is part of the Hungarian Royal Court Chancellery in Vienna. But he is here under the auspices of the Ministry of the Imperial and Royal Household and Foreign Affairs for the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy.”

Rip blinked, wondering how the young woman managed to keep straight all the titles and affectations of visiting nobles from across Europe. She stared back with a straight face, as if the knowledge of such arcane errata was perfectly normal.

He said, “Thank you. We’ll head that way.”

The couple made their way down the building’s main hallway, a wide and ornate corridor with several meeting rooms branching off it, all designed to impress visiting dignitaries and other VIPs.

Rip opened the door to Room 114, and a richly attired man turned around to stare at him.

Kaminski wore a sharp dark suit, tailored differently from the Umbrian style. Rip guessed it was probably Italian. His dark hair swept back from his forehead, perfectly aligned and oiled down. Again, not an Umbrian fashion, at least at the moment. His beard also looked oiled, and his mustache curled out perfectly on either side of his face.

Sitting at the table, looking particularly glum, the Verez sisters perked up slightly when Rip and Blair walked in.

The man stuck out his hand and spoke fluent English, albeit with a slight accent.

“Sir Ripley Coulter? I am Jan Kaminski, a plenipotentiary for the Dual Monarchy.”

Rip shook his hand and said, “This is my wife, Blair. I take it you are here as part of the Ministry of the Imperial and Royal Household and Foreign Affairs?”

The curls on Kaminski’s mustache quirked upwards.

“Why, yes. Yes, I am.”

“I too, as you are probably aware, am something of a foreigner here. So please don’t be offended when I ask . . . how does a Pole like yourself rise to be a ‘plenipotentiary for the Dual Monarchy?’ “

Kaminski’s face brightened as his smile grew even wider. Rather than being offended, he immediately warmed to the topic.

“You are aware, then, of the Polish-speaking provinces state of alignment? Currently, they are divided between three powers. The Dual Empire has the south, the Russian Empire holds the east, and the Prussian Empire controls the west. I must say, our people in the Dual Monarchy are treated best amongst the great powers. But of course, I’m biased.”

He turned and smiled back at the sisters. They returned a wan smile to him without a trace of enthusiasm.

“Subjects in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth are treated equally under the Dual Monarchy. We are perhaps the most tolerant of all the great powers, with multiple ethnicities and even religions, all within our borders. This is something to which the Princesses Verez can certainly attest.”

He paused, looking toward the sisters again, as if waiting for them to agree.

Hilda said, “Oh, yes. Emperor Joseph is quite tolerant of his many subjects.”

This at least sounded sincere, Rip thought. The sisters seemed to bear no ill will toward the Emperor. He noted the way they looked at Kaminski, though.

“And in fact right now,” Kaminski continued, “our current minister and my superior, is in fact Polish as well. Count Agenor Goluchowski.”

“Interesting. I presume you are here to address something involving Hilda and Liza?”

Rip nodded to the sisters.

Kamiński’s eyes widened, and his tone changed.

“I am indeed here regarding Princess Hilda and Princess Liza.”

Rip shrugged. He pulled out a chair for Blair to sit in. Then he walked around to the head of the table and took a seat himself, leaving Kaminski standing alone.

The silence stretched out. Rip decided to wait. He had read somewhere a thing two or two about negotiations. Silence is uncomfortable for most people. In a negotiation, the first one to break it typically displays weakness. So he stared back quietly at Kaminski with an expressionless face.

The man sighed and sat down himself. He steepled his fingers, resting elbows on the table.

“Sir Coulter . . . you are aware of who these ladies are?”

“If you are asking, am I aware they are vampires, then yes.”

Another long silence stretched out as Kaminski seemed to be weighing some internal decision. Rip waited patiently. The sisters sat quietly.

Blair seemed to be getting hot. She pulled a fan out of her interspatial wallet and began trying to cool down with it. But she held her irritation in check and ignored everyone else in the room as she fanned herself.

At last Kaminski appeared to have made up his mind. He smiled again at Rip, the curly corners of his mustache twirling up.

“Sir Coulter, I am going to tell you a story. It started in Wallachia, long ago . . .”