2263 A.D. It bothered the hell out of Cáel that Nayara was sitting in the big old-fashioned wing chair in the corner of her office, her feet curled up under her, withdrawn from the discussion at hand. But there was nothing he could do about it right now. There was thirteen of them standing, sitting or sprawled on the floor of the office. An emergency session of the senior members of the Agency—and friends, for Dionne was there and he had been included even though he had tried to leave. Ryan had roughly shoved him back into the room with an annoyed sound. Surprisingly, so was Mariana. Cáel had checked with Ryan and asked Kieren to sit in, as well. From the Agency, Ryan had assembled Brenden, Demyan, Rob, Christian, Natalia, Justin and Ophelia, who was still wearing French Empire court clothing from a recent trip to that time, although she took off the enormous wig with a sigh of relief and scratched at her real hair beneath. Ryan slapped his hand on the table top to get silence. “Everyone here is either vampire, or has been thoroughly vetted and cleared by two agencies.
