Magda and I gawked at him.

“You’re kidding,” she said. “An undead army? Like of zombies?”

“Liches, from what I understand,” Rick answered.

I blinked at Magda. She blinked back, saying, “This is so . . . so . . .”

“Hollywood bizarre,” I finished for her.

“Like a B-movie scriptwriter gone insane,” she agreed.

“Regardless,” I said, giving myself a mental shake to remove the Night of the Living Dead images from my brain and focus on more important things. It was easier said than done. “Well, hell. I’ve forgotten my point.”

“Vampires are good; Brotherhood is crazy,” Magda said absently. “What exactly is a lich, do you know?”

I ignored her attempt to sidetrack me. “The point is that you have no real reason for believing that vampires are the evil undead deserving of merciless slaughter, and I for one refuse to be a part of any such organization.”

“But you are a part of it,” Janice pointed out.

“Only until I can find someone to give the Zorya stone to.”

“You were a part of the incidents in Iceland,” Rick said, frowning. “You were involved in all those deaths.”

“I told you, there were only a couple of people killed, and they attacked us-”

“The vampires wiped out the entire Icelandic branch!” Janice interrupted. “There were at least fourteen people altogether that your friends slaughtered.”

I stared in openmouthed surprise for a moment before saying, “They’re not all dead! Two were held by the Icelandic police, although the Zenith is now dead, and it wasn’t a vampire who shot her. The others are in the custody of the vamps, but they’re not dead, either.”

“How do you know?” she asked, and for a moment, I was speechless.

I looked at Magda. “Christian wouldn’t kill the reapers, would he?”

She looked somewhat doubtful. “I don’t think he would. Not without cause. Did he say anything to you about what would happen to them?”