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He stroked his hand down her hair the way he did to comfort her. Sang his song for her in their merged mind. You know it matters. I need this information. You know him better than anyone. I think you know him better than he knows himself. He has a vision of who he is. He has made that illusion in his mind his reality, but it is falling apart because you are not there to keep it real for him. I need your honest assessment of him, sívamet.

Again, there was a long silence. He had the impression of extreme anxiety. Of her chewing on her lower lip. Her fingernail. He heard Julija whispering softly to her. Elisabeta assuring her she was fine. He waited her out, knowing she was working up her courage.

Sergey’s brothers were very good at thinking far into the future. They planned every battle in minute detail. He reacted to everything they said and did, and they knew it. The only memories I have from my childhood were memories of our friendship. I did not know if he planted them, but I doubt that he did. They followed too closely to the way his brothers treated him. He would come to the house and sit on the porch. I would talk to him and soothe him after they were particularly ugly to him. He was already approaching a point where he was losing his emotions, but their barbs still struck. I was very young, not more than sixteen. A child, but I could bring peace to him. I felt bad for him.

Ferro understood why Sergey had made his plan to take Elisabeta with him once he realized his brothers were going to voluntarily turn vampire. They would expect him to choose their way. If he didn’t, they would kill him. In his mind, he had no choice, so he plotted to take the one person he knew could make him feel better and subject her to the life he was terrified to lead with the brothers he feared.

I had forgotten that Sergey did not always understand what they were doing. I was very afraid at first. He kept me away from them. One day, they came unexpectedly and he had to hide me. He was almost euphoric that they had no idea I was there. They talked openly in front of him—and me. He made me repeat everything they had said. I caught all of their inflections and hand movements, every nuance. Every detail. I could tell when any of them was misleading him or one of the others.

Ferro held himself very still at her innocent revelations. Sergey wasn’t the genius. Elisabeta was. Sergey’s brothers had laid out their plans and strategies far in advance and set things in motion. Those plans were most likely already in play, with or without Sergey, but Sergey wasn’t going to plan the meticulous battles that his brothers were able to, not without a general like Elisabeta.

How is it that Sergey ended up with slivers of Xavier and his brother, Vadim, and yet he is nowhere near their intelligence? How did he become the last brother standing?

Ferro was in the mountains now, flanked by Sandu and Gary. Benedek and Petru had come in from the east, careful not to move against the wind or disturb any of the owls or insects in the trees, all most likely servants and watchers for Sergey.