Genevieve Undead Part 14

Wearily, Ravaglioli descended from his perch. He'd been hurt himself during the duel, and was bleeding into his clothes. He couldn't get up the energy to hawk enough phlegm to spit on his slain opponent.

Genevieve looked at him, not needing to restate her complaint. He already knew this family feuding was pointless, but couldn't stop fighting any more than she could stop peacemaking. That was the way of Udolpho.

Why did the blood seeping from his shallow headwound excite her so? She could smell it, taste it. It glistened as it trickled. She felt a thirst she didn't understand.

A forked spear of lightning struck the ground beyond the windows, filling the library with a painful flash. The thunder sounded instantly, shaking the whole edifice of Udolpho.

She supported Ravaglioli, helping him to a couch, and sitting him down. He would need sleep.

Later, she would have to give a full report to Vathek, and he would take it up with Old Melmoth. The will, a much-discussed secret between the patriarch and his lawyer, might have to be altered. The will, the main topic of conversation in the halls of Udolpho, was always being altered, unknown clauses being added, taken out, restored, subst.i.tuted, reworded or rethought. n.o.body but Melmoth and Vathek knew what was in the will, but everyone thought they could guess She walked to the window, and looked out into the night. The library was the heart of the southern wing of Udolpho, a mansion built like a vast cross on its plateau, and from its windows there was a view of the slopes which descended towards the plains. When the weather was clear, admittedly a rare occasion, you could see as far as Miragliano and the sea. Now there was only a spectacular cloudscape, and a fascinating pattern of rain splatters. One of the sickly trees by the ruined Chapel of Manaan had been struck by the lightning blast, and was burning like a lamp, a tattered flame amid the dark, fighting las.h.i.+ng sheets of rainwater. Its flickering light made the stones of the chapel seem to dance, animated, Vathek would have claimed, by the souls of the victims Smarra's pirate father had sent to the bottom of the Tilean sea.

A hand fell on her shoulder, and she was spun around.

'Fire,' Pintaldi said through his twisted throat. 'Pretty fire'

Pintaldi had a fascination with fire. It often got him into trouble. His head still hung at the wrong angle, and his shoulder was caked with dried blood.

'Fire'

Gently, with strong hands, she took his head and s.h.i.+fted it, setting it properly on his neck. He stood up straight, and experimented with nods. He was put back together again. Pintaldi did not thank her. His eyes were fixed on the burning tree. There were flecks of foam on the ends of his moustache. She turned away from his gaze, and watched with him as the fire was crushed by the storm.

'It's like a struggling soul,' Pintaldi said, 'at the mercy of the G.o.ds.'

The flames were wiped off the tree, and it stood, steaming, its branches twisted black and dead.

'Its defeat is inevitable, but while it burns, it burns bright. That should be a lesson for us.'

Pintaldi kissed her, the taste of his blood biting into her tongue, and then staggered back, breaking the contact. Sometimes, he was her lover. Sometimes, her sworn enemy. It was hard to keep track. The variations had something to do with the will, she was sure.

He was gone. Beyond the window, the storm attacked ferociously, tearing at the stones of Udolpho. The house was colder than ice tonight.

IV.

The novice's robe was heavy with chilled water, and Kloszowski missed the warmth and security of his heap of dead people. He was lost in the forests. By the ache in his legs and knees, he could tell he'd been climbing upwards. The ground beneath was sloping more sharply, water running in hasty rivulets around his feet. If there were men-at-arms out searching for him, he couldn't hear them over the din of the weather. He would have pitied anyone trying to get through this storm on horseback in armour, and guessed Zeluco's men would have given up by now. Not that that was much consolation.

Lightning struck, imprinting the black and white image of the forests on his eyes. The trees around here were all twisted and tangled, as if lumps of warpstone in the earth, seeds of Chaos sprouting amid the other roots, were turning the forestry into a nightmare distortion. With each javelin of lightning, certain trees seemed to leap forwards, sharp-twigged branches reaching out like multi-elbowed arms. He told himself not to be superst.i.tious, and tugged at his borrowed hood. Freezing water trickled down the back of his neck.

Underfoot, soft ground was a sea of mud. Soon, there'd be little difference between the forest and the marshes to the south. He was wading, and the novice's boots were too loose, already filled with a soft, cold mush of mud that settled a chill into his toebones. If he stopped, he would be drowned where he stood.

He fought onwards, the rain as tough an obstacle as the ever-changing wind. His robes flapped like the ragged wings of a dying raven. The symbol of Morr picked out on his chest was very apt. He must look like death.

Finding shelter was his only priority. None of the trees offered any cover against rain and wind. His knees were on the point of giving out and his exposed hands were wrinkled like those of a drowned sailor who'd been in the water long enough for the fish to eat his eyes. It could be that, with another irony, he'd escaped from the dungeons of Zeluco only to perish of his freedom, not murdered by the malice of the duce but impersonally snuffed by uncaring elements.

The ground was sloping upwards, and there were slow waterfalls of mud streaming around. Surely there must be a hunting lodge somewhere, or a woodsman's hut. Even a cave would be welcome.

Up ahead, Kloszowski imagined he saw a light.

He felt a surge of strength in his legs and shouldered his way through the rain, pus.h.i.+ng towards the glow. He hadn't been wrong, there was a light. Somehow, it wasn't rea.s.suring. A pale blue luminescence, it was constant, distorted only by the curtains of rain hanging between Kloszowski and it.

He pulled himself up over a bank that had been reinforced with stone and logs, and found himself on the remains of a road. He could see the light clearly now. It was a blue ball, hovering a few feet above the ground like a small, weak sun. And beneath it was an overturned carriage.

A horse, its neck broken, was mangled between the traces, legs sticking out in the wrong direction. There was a liveried coachman sprawled face-down in the mud, not moving, a fallen tree across his back.

Kloszowski ran, boots slapping the pebble-and-hard-earth surface of the road. At least the coach would offer some shelter.

He didn't like to look at the blue light, and tried to keep his eyes away from it. In its centre, the blue became a tinted white, and there were thick smudges, changes in the consistency of the glow, that reminded him of a face.

There was a screeching in with the wind. Someone was crying out. The carriage was on its side, rain streaming in through one of the open windows. There were people inside, arguing. Blue flames fell like little raindrops, and evaporated against side of the vehicle. He reached the carriage, and saw himself bathed in the blue light. It didn't radiate any heat.

'h.e.l.lo there,' he shouted. 'Friend, friend.'

He climbed up, and looked through the open window.

There was a puff and a fizz from inside, and a woman shouted.

'You idiot, I told you it wouldn't work if the powder got wet.'

Kloszowski tried to pull himself in, but the carriage was overbalanced. He heard a wheel snapping as the vehicle righted itself, and jumped back so it wouldn't break his legs. The people inside were dumped on the floor, and sounded shaken up.

'Back, monster,' a man said.

Kloszowski could see a shaking pistol pointed at him. Its flashpan and barrel were black with soot and still smoking. It wouldn't fire again. He pulled open the door, and forced himself in, slapping the firearm away.

Inside, it was wet but at least the rain wasn't whipping his face. It sounded like a thousand drum beats on the wooden roof of the coach.

There were two pa.s.sengers, the man with the pistol and a young woman. He was past middle age and had once been sleek and corpulent, and she was in her twenties and probably attractive.

Her face was lovely, and she had a ma.s.s of coppery gold ringlets.

They must have been expensively dressed when they set out on their journey. Now, they were as wet, muddy and bedraggled as the meanest peasant. Nature was as great a leveller as the revolution. The pa.s.sengers were obviously afraid of him, and shrank together, clutching each other.

'What manner of fiend are you?' the man asked.

'I'm not a fiend,' Kloszowski said. 'I'm just lost in the rain.'

'He's a cleric, Ysidro,' said the woman.

'Thank the G.o.ds,' the man said. 'We're saved. Exorcise these daemons and I'll see you're richly rewarded.'

Kloszowski decided not to tell them his robes were borrowed. He'd seen the light outside, but no daemons.

'This is Ysidro d'Amato,' said the woman, 'from Miragliano. And I'm Antonia.'

'Aleksandr,' Kloszowski said.

Antonia was less scared than d'Amato and better able to deal with the situation. He knew straight away that she wasn't a parasite.

'We were travelling when this storm blew up,' she said. 'Suddenly, there was this burst of lightning, and the coach turned over'

'Daemons,' gasped d'Amato. 'There were daemons and monsters, all after my after'

He shut up. He didn't want to say what he thought the daemons were after. When the man was dried off and tidied up, Kloszowski imagined he wouldn't much like Ysidro d'Amato. The name was familiar, and he believed he'd heard it during his stay in Miragliano.

'There's a house ahead,' Antonia told him. 'We saw it through the trees before it got dark. We were trying to get there, to get out of the storm.'

Lightning struck, near. Kloszowski's teeth were rattled by the thunderclap. The blue ball had grown, and was all around the coach. Its light was almost soothing and made him want to sleep. He fought the impulse. Who knew what might happen if he were to close his eyes.

'We'd better make a dash for it,' he said. 'We can't stay out the storm here. It's dangerous.'

D'Amato hugged a valise to his chest like a pillow and wouldn't budge.

'He's right, Ysidro,' said Antonia. 'This light is doing things to us. We must go on. It's only a few hundred yards. There'll be people, a fire, food, wine'

She was coaxing him as if he were a child. He didn't want to leave his carriage. The wind pulled the door open, slamming it against the side of the coach, and rain came in as if thrown from buckets. The face in the light was very definite now, with a long nose and chasms for eyes.

'Let's go.'

Kloszowski tugged Antonia, and they broke out of the carriage.

'But Ysidro'

'He can stay if he wants.'

He pulled the woman away from the broken coach, and she didn't struggle much. Before they'd gone ten steps, d'Amato stuck his head out of the door and emerged at a run, valise still in a tight embrace.

He was a fat man, not light on his feet, but he splashed enthusiastically as he staggered, and both Kloszowski and Antonia were able to catch him before he fell. He shook free of them, trying to keep them away from his valise. It was obviously a favourite toy.

'It's this way,' said Antonia, pointing. The road was rising slightly, and curving. Kloszowski couldn't see anything in the wet darkness.

'It's a huge place,' she said. 'We saw it from miles away.'

D'Amato was standing transfixed, looking into the empty eyes of the blue face. Antonia pulled at his elbow, turning him round. He shook his head, and she slapped him. Hard. He woke up, and began to walk with them.

Together, they struggled into the darkness. Kloszowski wanted to look back, but didn't. He felt he would never be warm again.

It was impossible to see clearly, but the firm road beneath their feet was as good a path as any.

'They can't have it,' d'Amato was muttering. 'It's mine, mine'

There was cold water between Kloszowski's eyes and eyelids, and ice forming inside his skull.

'Look,' Antonia said.

There was a wall along the side of the road, partly carved from the mountainside, partly built from great stone blocks. Now, they were standing by a set of huge ironwork gates, rusted and sagging. They could easily get through between the railings. Beyond was the outline of a huge house, and there were faint lights.

Kloszowski stood back, and looked up at the gates. This must be a substantial estate. A family of the parasite cla.s.ses would live here, sucking the lifeblood from the peasantry, grinding their bootheels into the faces of the ma.s.ses.

In the scrollwork at the top of the gates, a word was picked out. It was the name of the estate, and probably the name of the family.

UDOLPHO.

Kloszowski had never heard of it.

V.

Word of the duel had reached Schedoni, Ravaglioli's father-in-law and Old Melmoth's son, and his disapproval hung over the dinner table like marsh gas. The old man, reputedly a notorious libertine in his nearly-a-century ago youth, sat at the head of the table, still waiting to inherit a position as head of the household from his bedridden father.

At his side was the empty chair and place always maintained for his wife Mathilda, an invalid whom Genevieve had never seen, and beside them were the two outsiders upon whom the family most depended, Vathek the lawyer and Dr. Valdemar, the physician.

Both had lived at Udolpho forever, and both had gained the family look, long faces and deep-set eyes. Valdemar was bald but for three cultivated strands pasted across his s.h.i.+ning scalp, while Vathek was so thickly-haired that his eyes seemed to peer from a black ball of fur. At separate times, it had been rumoured that Vathek or Valdemar were either Schedoni's long-lost brother MontoniPintaldi's alleged grandfatheror the result of an adulterous or incestuous union contracted by Schedoni in his wild days. None of the rumours had ever been proved or disproved.

Vathek and Valdemar hated each other with a fervour that went beyond any emotion Genevieve could conceive of nurturing, and each was convinced the other constantly plotted his death. The currently favoured means of murder was poison, and neither had touched food of whose provenance they were even remotely uncertain for some weeks. The lawyer and the doctor stared at each other over full plates of meat and potatoes, each silently daring the other to take a perhaps contaminated mouthful. Vathek was charged with the custodians.h.i.+p of the will, but it was Dr. Valdemar's duty to keep Old Melmoth alive long enough for it to be finished and signed.

Old Melmoth, who still held court in his master bedroom, was well over a hundred and twenty, and preserved long past his expected death by Dr. Valdemar, who had travelled many years ago in Cathay, l.u.s.tria and the Dark Lands, in search of the magical ingredients necessary for the prolongation of life. He was a blasphemer and a sorcerer, her aunt said. But Old Melmoth was still alive, chuckling over each new intrigue in the unfolding saga of his family.

At the other end of the table, Ravaglioli sat opposite Pintaldi, pouring himself a generous goblet of wine while his wife Flaminea glared disapproval at him. She was the last remaining adherent of Claes Glinka's long-discredited Moral Crusade, and disapproved of most earthly pleasures. The family had to have someone to criticise its morals, and Flaminea had elected herself, taking every opportunity to preach d.a.m.nation. A few months ago, she'd taken a hammer to the indecent sculptures of the Hanging Gardens, and destroyed, in the name of modesty, many priceless and irreplaceable works of ancient art. After that, the will, apparently, had been severely rewritten against her interests and her crusade had relaxed minutely. Ravaglioli, who had long since ceased to share his wife's rooms, made an exaggerated display of drinking, slos.h.i.+ng the wine around in his mouth and sighing with satisfaction as a mouthful slipped down his throat. Aunt Flaminea snorted her disdain, and carved her meat into tiny pieces with deft, cruel cuts of her serrated eating knife.

Genevieve was seated next to the empty chair that had been Flamineo's. He had been her father, and Flaminea's brother, before his still-unexplained death. On her other hand was a throne-like piece of furniture, decorated with intricate carvings of which Flaminea definitely did not approve, occupied by her father's fleshly uncle, Ambrosio, a monk of Ra.n.a.ld who'd been expelled from the Order of the Trickster G.o.d for an excess of vices. She edged her chair towards her late father's place, specifically to keep her unprotected knee and thigh out of range of Ambrosio's creeping fingers.

Ten feet away, across the table, were the beautiful twins, Young Melmoth and Flora. Pintaldi's ten-year-old offspring by a woman of dubious humanity, their ears were slightly pointed. Their curls fell on thin, delicate shoulders. The twins rarely spoke, save to each other. They had finished eating, and were sitting quietly, unnervingly blinking in a synchronized pattern.

The dinner party was completed by Christabel, Ravaglioli and Flaminea's daughter, as dark as Genevieve was fair, who was at Ambrosio's other side, her fork ready to deal with any exploratory graspings. She'd been educated in the Empire, at the academy in Nuln, and was recently returned to Udolpho, scandalising her mother with the habits she appeared to have acquired during her time away from the family estates. Once, after a dispute about the owners.h.i.+p of a bonnet, Christabel had ominously told Genevieve that she had taken a course under Valancourt, the master swordsman, and would be only too pleased to give a demonstration of her carving skills. Genevieve knew also that her cousin was a devotee of weirdroot, and often sought escape from the cold, stark walls of Udolpho in juicedreams. Just now, she was eating languidly, her hands not quite co-ordinated, and Genevieve suspected she'd been chewing the root earlier.

Genevieve looked up and down the table. It was hard to keep track of her family, to remember their relations.h.i.+ps to her and to each other. Sometimes, they changed, and a relation she believed to be her uncle would turn out to be her cousin, or a cousin would become a niece. It was all to do with codicils to the will, which changed everything.

Beyond the tall windows, lightning forked.

Odo Zschokke, the chief steward, served as head-butler, supervising the three maidsLily, Mira and Tanjaas they brought course after course to the table. Zschokke was seven feet tall, with broad shoulders only now bowed by years. He had been the captain of the Udolpho guard during the last major family war, when Old Melmoth's now-dead necromancer brother Otranto had raised daemons and the dead in an onslaught upon the estates.

Zschokke had sustained wounds from a Slaanes.h.i.+ daemon's claw that carved three deep grooves diagonally across his face, twisting his nose, tearing his lips and making his eyes seem to stare through the dead skin bars of a cage-mask. His voice had been torn from him, but he was still a capable man, and Old Melmoth trusted him more even than Vathek and Valdemar. No one doubted that Zschokke stood to benefit from the will.