Immortal With A Kiss Part 9

"They do. The great lords do, certainly. That is why they take the great risk to make the strigoii vii. When a person becomes the living vampire, he retains his personality and all which made him unique. The strigoii vii are aware, thinking, even feeling beings. They are vampire, make no mistake, but in the aspect of their intellect and emotions they are human. Thus, when they die, their pa.s.sage to the undead, the truly undead, is gentle, expected, antic.i.p.ated, and they become sentient beings. They desire to form bonds, to connect and live with at least one comrade, usually their creator. After all, what creature, alive or undead, would wish to face eternity without the comforts of others like themselves?"

Sebastian seemed to be having a difficult time ingesting all of this. He shook his head as if confused. "If all this is so, and they yearn for the company of one another so badly, then why are there not whole cities of these fiends?"

Father Luke laughed, a low, vicious sound. "Ah, you forget their downfall, Sebastian: they are evil. You have only to consider what sort of person consents to the three bites. The weak, those without conscience, those who are already evil, the worst of humanity, by and large. And so they take their proclivities with them into their revenant life. Therefore, they are flawed, antisocial, unable to trust and be trusted, and so they are fated to create an unstable society filled with betrayal and strife, with constant feuding and chaos among their ranks."

"Well, that is a relief." Sebastian let out a breath. "It is good to know they have such a fatal weakness. Did you know all of this, Emma?"

"I knew some of these facts, but my time at the archive had not permitted me to delve into the matter to this much degree. I admit, Father Luke, your conclusions about the inherently doomed world of the undead are illuminating, as well as heartening. But I have to wonder how it applies to our situation here at Blackbriar?"

He chuckled, the sound like a low rumble of thunder. "Ah, yes. I did digress, didn't I?" It was plain to see he was tiring. He even wavered, causing Sebastian to bolt to his feet and say, "You are going to exhaust yourself. Go on back to bed now. We will continue this discussion later."

"I am not returning to that bed," Father Luke said, and lowered himself into the seat Sebastian had vacated.

I was surprised Sebastian did not insist, for I could tell he was still concerned. "Very well. You may stay at the table if you do not exert yourself."

A snort from the priest preceded his very mildly spoken "Why, thank you."

Sebastian rolled his eyes.

"As we mentioned, the making of a new strigoii vii is of great impact in the vampire world for precisely the reasons you noted, Emma. Naturally, word of such a deed spreads quickly. There is, as noted, potential danger to all vampires from a future foe in the form of any child born to that living vampire. I need not go into great explanation on how the revenant world hates and fears the Dhampir. So all know of the strigoii vii. All know of any children from them."

Understanding dawned. I saw the same understanding come into Sebastian's eyes as he turned to stare at me in amazement. "But he did not know about you," he said.

That was right. Yes. I never realized the import of that fact before. "Neither did Marius, not until he and I met face to face," I added.

Sebastian looked from Father Luke back to me. "So that means . . . ? What? We could have a.s.sumed all along they didn't know about you, Emma, or else they would have killed you long ago."

I shook my head. "My understanding is that it is not easy to kill my kind. Even as children, the gifts we possess are formidable and arise instinctively in the presence of a vampire. That is what eventually happened to me in Avebury. But the important thing from this is to understand that if the vampire world is not aware of me, then that must mean . . ." I was suddenly overcome, my heart pounding as the words choked in my throat.

"What?" Sebastian demanded impatiently.

I swallowed, cleared the lump, and said, "It means my mother's existence is also unknown to them."

"She was made by a pariah," Father Luke stated, fatigue making his voice light and soft.

"A pariah," I repeated. "An outlaw vampire?"

Father Luke gave Sebastian and me a grave look, and said, "All pariahs are marked for destruction by the terrible Dragon Prince, the Dracula."

"After Marius discovered what I was," I said slowly, comprehension dawning, "the word would have spread-about me, and about my mother. Yet, this vampire knows nothing of Laura or me."

"More questions, and no more answers," Sebastian said soberly.

I sighed. "Very well, let us drop the subject for now. Sebastian, I will miss supper tonight when I return to school. Would you mind getting some cold meats for a quick meal here before I leave? I would do it myself, but I am attempting to avoid Mrs. Danby. You know how she disapproves of our meeting privately in your rooms."

Rolling his eyes, he sighed heavily in exasperation. "I am your cousin and he is a priest-what impropriety is there in that? Lud, that woman is a trial. Meddlesome baggage, she is." He headed for the door, still heated. "If it were not for her cooking, I would pitch a tent in the field behind the stable before I'd stay in this inn."

When the door closed, I angled an a.s.sessing look at Father Luke. "Your knowledge of vampires-of the entire revenant world-has grown considerably. I'll wager you did not study at one of the archives, so how did you learn so fast?"

His hands, set on the table, clenched into white-knuckled fists and his mouth contorted with shame. "I set out to find answers when I left you at Avebury. I was . . . Well, you and I spoke at the church, after it was over. You know what frame my mind was in at that time." His eyes narrowed, squinting into two fine lines. "I wanted answers. The Church refused to give them to me, so I decided to find my own.

"The lower-order fiends seek their society in the h.e.l.ls of great cities where the unfortunate and refuse of humanity mingle in unimaginable conditions. There they are free to feed off those who will never be missed. I found them easily enough."

"What do you know of the Dracula?"

"Ah, that. He is quite a mysterious figure." He shook his head. "I am afraid I must disappoint you for I know no more than what I have already said. Which is nothing but a name."

"I was not able to find out more than that in my research. Even the archive contains little. Marius undoubtedly had a connection to him, but I was never able to discover it." A thought dawned on me and I looked at him in amazement. "You said you talked to vampires? How in the world did you manage that?"

"Brutal methods, I am afraid." His tone was flat, unapologetic. "Remember, I was dealing with lower orders, not the more evolved. I simply tortured them until they told me what I wished to know."

"Tortured them?" I must have sounded shocked, for he laughed.

"You forget, I am still a priest," he told me. "I have powers, too."

I thought for a moment, then dared to ask, "Are you still a priest?"

The question caught him off guard. He took a moment to answer. "I love G.o.d. But the Church? I hate the ignorance and the power-mongering. I do not trust the part of it that is comprised of men-fallible, flawed men who are as subject to avarice and pride as the rest of us. But . . ." He paused, and seemed to realize something. "I cannot let it go. If you knew what it had meant to me, once . . ." He shook his head, as if ridding himself of this reflection as a dog might shed droplets of water. "It saved me. Not just my life, either, Emma. No, I am not leaving the priesthood. It is who I am. But I am not staying, not as I was. I am in my own little limbo, a purgatory of uncertainty."

He leaned in. His gaze was keen. "You said once that we were friends. I did not believe it then, but I came here because I knew you'd been right. After everything else failed me, you did not. We are friends. And friends should tell each other the truth." He smiled, and his smile was so warm and genuine, my heart wrenched. Here was the ghost of the man I'd known still alive inside the broken sh.e.l.l. "I can get my vestments if you like. I recall you found solace in the sacrament of Penance, though you are not Catholic."

I laughed, easier now. "No, no vestments, father. It is nothing to cause concern. It is just-about the strigoii vii being willing. I knew, of course, that this is the typical way a person is transformed, but what of others, who had not submitted willingly to the bite?"

"You speak of Mr. Fox."

I started, aghast at his knowledge of Valerian's condition. "You know?"

"It was not a difficult deduction to make. But never mind about him, this is not what is on your mind, I can tell by your reaction. What was it you came to know?"

I took a moment to compose myself. "My mother had to agree, did she not? She became strigoii vii and that means she had to give her consent."

"Oh, Emma," he said, his face contorting into a wince. "I am sorry. I did not realize."

"I think she changed her mind later, but when I spoke to my father's friend who was there during that period of her supposed 'madness,' he told me of a woman who wanted my father and sought to make my mother jealous. This happened at the onset of her illness. In a weak moment, she could have been seduced and said yes to the vampire in her desolation. I had not thought of it before, you see, about her being willing. But now I . . ." The words dammed up in my throat.

His hand, still strong, closed over mine. Its heat was as comforting as a blazing fire on winter's coldest day. "You must believe you will find your answers. In time."

"But what if . . ." What if they are horrible truths that I must face? What if my mother was not tragic, not reluctant, but one of the weak, evil ones Father Luke had spoken of ? What if she had gladly traded her humanity for the chance to live forever?

Sebastian stomped into the room just then, muttering a tirade of epithets against the innkeeper. "I nearly had to wrestle the tray out of her hand! Stubborn woman," he raged.

The tirade was the perfect cure for my sadness. I made a fuss over the a.s.sorted meats, a fine loaf of crusty bread, and a carafe of Mrs. Danby's homemade wine. Father Luke rose, intent on retuning to the bed, but I scolded him soundly and he stayed, eating under my supervision while Sebastian gloated. "We shall gang up against you, you brute," he said with satisfaction. "You will be snapping tree trunks like twigs in no time."

It was a moment of such pleasantness-the three of us together sharing a modest repast-and it meant much to restore my spirit. When we finished eating, Sebastian took me down to the courtyard, intent on following me back to Blackbriar on horseback alongside the trap I'd borrowed to ensure my safety.

"That is ridiculous," I told him. "I have my bag with me. Should I come under attack, I would be worried about you. I can handle myself, Sebastian, as long as I am prepared."

These were courageous words. I did not mean them. I wished I did, and so hoped by putting on a brave face I might fool him. Maybe myself, as well.

"I will take you halfway, then. I want to take this chance to speak with you away from Father Luke. I do not wish him to know this-G.o.d knows what he will get into that thick skull of his to do-but there is another family gone missing in the village. A woman and her young child. The man is under suspicion, of course."

"You think that he has harmed them?"

"No, I think the vampire had them for its supper," he quipped sharply. "And that poor man will swing for it unless we intervene."

I shook my head. "No, Sebastian. I can take on nothing else. I am doing my best as it is, and it is not enough. It is not-"

"Emma, Emma-I did not mean for you to worry about this. I will see to it, as much can be done. I wanted you to know, that is all. You are, after all, our de facto leader."

I swallowed at that. It was a daunting t.i.tle, and yet I knew it was true. "I am a wreck. Forgive my snapping at you."

He took me all the way to the edge of Blackbriar lands and I rode the rest of the way by myself. Upon arriving at the school stables, I made quick work of getting the horse brushed and safely into its stall without disturbing the groom. That done, I slipped unseen into the building. I met up with no one as I crept upstairs, but just as I was about to enter my bedchamber, a small shadow lurking in the hallway startled me.

"My G.o.d, Eustacia!" I exclaimed as I recognized her. My hand withdrew from the bag I had slung over my shoulder, where it had already closed about a sharpened stake.

The girl was wide-eyed and wan as she stepped into the light cast by the wall sconces. Her appearance alarmed me. "What is it?" I demanded. "Is something wrong? Is someone hurt?"

"I was afraid you had been . . . The girls said she would come to you. Mrs. Andrews, you are in danger!"

I took a step toward her, but that was the wrong move. She s.h.i.+ed away, and I realized she was here on a thread of courage that might snap at any moment. "Do you mean Margaret? Vanessa? Did they threaten me?"

"She did," Eustacia said.

"Who, darling?" I urged. I almost reached out my arms to give her comfort, but constrained myself.

She began to cry silently, fast-moving tears streaming down her cheeks. I could see the struggle within her. She wanted so badly to tell me, but her terror would not let her. "We are all alone," I promised in a whisper. "And I will never speak of what you tell me to anyone. I vow it. Who said they would harm me, Eustacia?"

She shook her head, backing away. I did move then, suddenly so as to surprise her. I grasped her by the shoulders, my voice steady. "Who is this she?"

"I do not know!" she wailed. She struggled in my hands, but I clamped down, gripping her cruelly.

"Tell me," I commanded. But I knew, even before she hissed the name through trembling lips.

"They call her the Cyprian Queen!"

My hands went numb. Eustacia slipped away as I stood stunned in the dimly lit hall.

That night, I dreamed of my mother. She was pale as snow, her lips livid crimson, her eyes black and flat and devoid of expression or intelligence. She leaned over me, her mouth gaping into a lurid smile. I wanted to scream, but in the dream, the sound choked me, closing, tightening in my throat until I could not breathe.

I saw the elongated teeth, gleaming like Diana's moon on a velvet midnight sky. Light glinted off them, as it does on fine steel, and a small scarlet tongue darted out in antic.i.p.ation.

"No. Stop."

My words came out slowly, painfully. I was unable to call out, even to beg for my life.

Then she changed. Her face became the one I knew, the image of the portrait I'd studied as a child. It was a soft face, pretty in repose. Uncle Peter had told me she could dazzle an entire room. I had no memories of her, save one sad one of her weeping that had come to me only recently, so I had had to imagine those features animated. Here, in my dream, I saw the rosebud mouth curve into a soft smile. The eyes, no longer dead, s.h.i.+ned down at me with love.

I reached for her. But she began to fade away, as if pulled by some unseen force. The farther away she got, the more she struggled to return to me. A shadow fell between us, and I looked up at a towering figure, large, muscular, broad, with something of a bully's face and a pugilist's physique.

He smiled at me, as if we shared a secret. I saw, then, two men behind him, wearing metal-plated armor fas.h.i.+oned into breastplates and short skirts. Sandals bound their feet. One carried a spear, the other a sword. There were chains in one's hand, and they led to the large man's wrists and ankles.

With two fingers, he traced the shape of a cross in the air, first one long down stroke, then the cross stroke, but this latter he did at the lower end: it was the inverted cross, the sign of the devil, of black magic. Of witchcraft.

I awoke, breathless and drenched in sweat. Leaping out of bed, I checked the windows and my door. The fine line of salt I'd drizzled on the sill to seal it was unbroken. I lit the candle and inspected the room, listening intently for the scuttling sound of rats. When I was certain I was safe, that it had been nothing but a dream, I crawled back into my bed. I was exhausted. I needed sleep. I curled up tight under the coverlet, clutching my crucifix in one hand and a vial of holy water in the other.

Chapter Eleven.

I was no longer going to be denied or thwarted; I would have the story of my mother today. This was my resolve when I awoke, and I hurried to breakfast, found Eloise Boniface and told her in no uncertain terms that I must speak with her without delay. I led her, rather mystified, away from her toast and coffee and pulled her into the salon.

"I know you remembered something about my mother," I said without preamble. "I would like not to wait any longer for you to tell me what it is."

"Dear Emma, please do not be so disconcerted. The event I recollected was of no import, really. I simply thought you might find it interesting."

There was trepidation in her tone and on her face and I realized how I must have come off. Given my state of mind-after yesterday's discussion and my restless night-my lack of tact was not surprising. I tempered myself. "I am having dreams, you see. I thought if we talked, it might help put to rest some of the wild imaginings that have come over me."

It was not exactly a lie. Not the truth, either-not completely. But it worked. Eloise's expression changed from one of mild alarm to compa.s.sion. "Poor dear. I should never have said anything in the first place."

"You mentioned an accident. What happened?"

"Laura had a bad fall, you see. Your mother was a dreadful horsewoman, did you know?"

Unexpectedly, I laughed. "No, I did not, but as it happens, so am I."

Eloise smiled. "Yes, well, despite Laura's lack of skill, she liked to be alone, so she would ride during her free time, to get away, you know. Alistair was the son of the hired man here and he worked with his father. He was infatuated with your mother, though no one knew it, not even Laura, I'll wager. But it turned out to be fortuitous one day when she was out alone, for she was thrown from her horse and seriously injured. She probably would have died, but Alistair had followed her, you see, and seen the fall. He took her to his mother, who was a local woman, good with herbs. And though people called her a witch and other dreadful names-you know how they whisper about odd folk-Winifred was kindness itself-"

"Winifred?" I exclaimed, remembering at once the upside-down tombstone in the wall of the Rood and Cup. But no, I corrected myself. Surely that had to have been placed long before this Winifred lived, and died, for the events being spoken of had taken place a mere score and ten years ago and the hearth wall at the inn was far older than that.

"Yes, that was her name. She was well known for being a healer. If you had the headache or an attack of bile, she was the one who would mix you something and make you feel right. So that was why Alistair took her there, and the headmistress at the time allowed it, as it was sensible to have her tend Laura."

"Did my mother fall in love with him as well?" I asked.

"Heavens, no, dear, for all he tried, and his mother, too, when she saw how her son doted on Laura. I cannot fault your mother. Forgive me for putting it this crudely, but he was unsightly. He was so tall, and wretchedly thin, and he forever had this very dour expression. Now, I believe Laura was fond of Alistair, but not in the same fas.h.i.+on as he was of her. He was something of a self-taught man, and they shared a pa.s.sion for the cla.s.sical literatures. I believe she thought of him as a friend but nothing more."

"But she regarded him well?"

"Oh, yes. I recollect she was quite enthused about him when she returned to school. She spoke of how well-read he was, how he had educated himself in the library of the Suddington residence, for his father and he maintained the property when the family was away, as they often were for long periods of time. Oh, your mother was very impressed with Alistair's knowledge of mythology, history, and literature. She liked him quite well and for a time after she returned to the school, they spent a great deal of time together due to their shared interest in these subjects. Then it all came to a head when he gave her that necklace. It was a wretched, ugly thing, not the sort of thing any Christian woman would wear. Imagine, a thing like that with that terrifying dragon on it-"

I started. "A dragon?"

"He had stolen it, and we all knew it, and where he had gotten it."