Descent Into Dust (34 page)
He paused at the threshold, giving me a strange look over a wide, square shoulder. “You did well, Emma. Quite the general today. You…seem different.”
“Valerian, we must talk. Will you not stay?”
“I think it best if we concentrate on the night of Saint George’s Eve. Everything depends on our preparedness, and it is a good idea to keep our minds sharp. Uncluttered.”
He paused, then spoke carefully. “But there is one thing I would ask you, and then we can forget all else and concentrate on the task ahead. I knew when I spoke of my past that you would see me differently. It is unavoidable.” His jaw tightened. “But I must know if you still intend to keep your vow to do what I asked of you.”
I jerked my chin up to meet his gaze straight on. “Indeed,” I replied. “I shall honor our bond.”
“Tomorrow, I shall bring Father Luke,” he said, and left me.
I stared after him, feeling unsettled. I wished there was some way I could explain my actions to him. I knew he mistook my reasons for not confiding where I had gone and why. If there had been time, I would have tried to make him understand. As it was, we would leave much unsaid.
The next morning the rains came, pouring out of the sky like a great bucket drenching the land with biblical vengeance.
“Will spring ever arrive?” Sebastian declared as he pulled off a sodden cape and shook it out at the threshold to my sitting room. “I have never seen a more miserable season.”
“I believe that Marius has in mind to put the area under wraps and bog us down in mud,” I said, taking his cape and draping it by the fire while he fussed over the soaked cuffs of his trousers. “Did you bring it?”
He nodded, pulling out a package from inside his coat and handing it to me on his way to the mirror. Upon seeing his reflection, he uttered a tormented exclamation, his hands flying frantically to arrange his damp locks.
I’d asked him to meet me here after giving him special instructions. He had agreed to fetch the things I requested, without teasing me. That was when I knew how terrified he was. And despite his complaints about the rain, there was a hardness in his eyes that his foolery could not divert.
“How is Henrietta today? Have you seen her?”
“She is with her maid. Roger, however, is taking up with her. He is fascinated by her knowing chess, and they play in the afternoons.”
“Then she is well?”
“She seems well,” he said, but something in his tone did not convince me.
“Sebastian,” I said with careful consideration, “what are you not telling me?”
He turned his back on the mirror, his gaze touching mine before sliding away. “She is not herself. She smiles, she croons to her doll—not Victoria, mind. I have not seen that doll of late. When Miss Harris disappeared, she hardly reacted at all. You do not know what it does to me to see the child as she is. She has lost her brightness, Emma. Even Roger and Mary have noticed.”
I went to him and placed my hand on his arm. “She will be restored soon. It is why I have come back, why we are risking everything. We shall see to it, Sebastian.”
He grasped my fingers fiercely, showing his emotions in a rare display. “Yes,” he said with heat. “Yes, we shall.”
“I have some things I need for you to secret in the nursery. I will not be able to bring them with me, they are too unwieldy.”
I placed five long stakes in his arms. They still had the bark on them; only the tips showed the white of newly exposed wood where they’d been hewn to a vicious point. “Put these in her room if you are able. Make certain you tell me where they are. And do not lose them. I have gone far to get them.”
“You wish me to keep them secret from Mr. Fox?”
I ignored his penetrating look. “It does not matter once we are in the room, but up until tomorrow night, yes, keep this and the other tasks to yourself.”
He nodded. I turned from him and unwrapped the package he’d brought. It was a pouch, the sort of large reticule that no one of fashion would ever be caught dead with but the kind of utilitarian carry bag we used to tote around sketchbooks and charcoal sticks or latest sewing project. “Yes. This is perfect. Where did you find it?”
“That is Mary’s. I suppose she’s quite forgotten she had it, and so much the better for her. What an atrocity.”
“She used to be quite practical. I hope you weren’t spied going through her closet.”
“Well,” he replied drolly, with a wave of his hand, “I was never worried. I am quite good at sneaking about, you know, and quite proud of it. It felt so deliciously naughty, and I do so love that feeling.”
I laughed. It felt good to laugh, and I appreciated his mischief. At least, I hoped it was mischief.
He watched as I carefully placed a large vial with rust-colored liquid in the bag. My crucifix, pilfered from Saint Michael in the Fields, followed. Then I drew out an oilcloth containing the hawthorn twig with Marius’s blood.
“What is that?” Sebastian asked.
“You best not know.”
“A secret weapon, eh? I suppose I should not mention this to anyone either.”
I smiled at him, appreciating his easy confidence in me. “I would be most obliged.”
He took his leave and I sat with my thoughts for a while before luncheon. Afterward, I had time before Sebastian and Valerian were to assemble again in my rooms. The innkeeper let me use a steady old mare, and I rode out to The Sanctuary. I looked at the tree. I felt no fear, no excitement. I was steady. Then I rode to Dulwich Manor, staying behind the tree line of the park. I wondered what Alyssa was doing, whether she and Mary had sewn anything for the baby. To my surprise, I missed my sister. I wondered what Roger thought of me, if he’d tempered his disgust as time passed.
All I’d ever wanted when I was a child was to be ordinary,
not the daughter of a madwoman. I’d wanted to be accepted, to have a family who loved me. I nearly achieved it, fleetingly. But they were all in there, content, unaware of what would come tonight. And I, once again, remained outside.
How strange that I didn’t feel saddened by the thought. There were far more important things on earth than chatting cozily by a fire. I suddenly knew I’d rather be here, preparing to face a nightmare, than in there with them placing tiny stitches in soft cotton and helping Alyssa dream up names. Mine might be a lonely existence, but my blood thrummed and my eyesight was keen and each and every sense alerted me to a scent in the air, the step of a hare in the underbrush, the slight temperature change in the breeze as it flew across the back of my neck. I felt incredibly alive, every nerve dancing in anticipation, and yet calm, too.
I had done everything I could to prepare. Let Marius come.
I
t was the Eve of Saint George and once the sun grew heavy and sank to the horizon, we began our incursion into Dulwich Manor. Sebastian made certain all the necessary doors were left open, and it was nothing to slip inside. Valerian, Father Luke, and I were to go in separately and at different times, moving through the evening shadows of the old house, using the back stairs to the third-floor nursery rooms where Sebastian waited to show us to an empty room situated under the attics.
I was second to arrive. Valerian was already in place, with his shadowed features set in a fierce countenance. He seemed cold at first, making me nervous. I had anticipated he was likely to be still angry at my having left him without an explanation of
where I was going and why. Perhaps there was something desperate in the look I sent back to him, for he appeared to relent. He took my hands briefly. The gesture was perfectly proper, but it felt intimate as his eyes softened only a little as they locked mine. I was deeply glad for his presence—and for his silence as he nodded and released my hands. In our own way, we understood one another perfectly.
Father Luke was next. He had never seemed larger, a classical god dressed in black cleric’s costume. His massive chest and shoulders strained the cloth of his plain jacket, and his face was pale above the Roman collar. His hair was a bit wild from the elements, and it made him seem less civilized, more the warrior.
“Nasty weather,” he murmured as he entered. He said nothing more, but took the loop of beads that hung at his waist and retired to the corner to pray.
In a short while, Sebastian arrived to transfer us to the nursery. “I will bring you, one at a time, into the schoolroom, which is empty. When we’ve made it in there without being detected, I will stand guard and you may go on into Henrietta’s room.” He directed Valerian to follow him first. Father Luke remained in prayer. When Sebastian returned, he tapped the priest on his shoulder. “Come,” he urged, leaving me alone in the room.
I gripped Mary’s pouch which Sebastian had stolen for me, steeling myself against the sudden surge of nerves. Now that the hour was upon me, I found I was afraid. Terribly, terribly afraid. I tried to comfort myself with silent platitudes, but my soul would not quit its quaking at the thought of facing Marius again. I cringed at the recollection of how the foul touch of his mind had left me feeling polluted. Defiled. Nausea rose like a wave, and a terrible thought came to me. Could he have that power over me again?
Panic gripped me as racing thoughts darted in and out of my mind. I was Dhampir, and, after all, the word itself meant “little vampire.” I was touched by the same force that had made me. My gifts were sourced from the same place as his. It was in the blood, our blood.
There is something of the vampire in you.
He had tricked me before, caught me completely unawares. He was far too clever for me to know exactly what he was capable of, and what he might do.
My hand closed over the pouch, and I thought of his blood, dried and rusty on the tip of the slender switch of holy hawthorn. He’d left his blood behind. I knew he could never have meant to do so. He’d made a great error then.
Maybe he was not so invincible.
And as I thought of it, I began to think about what Valerian had told me of the magic of vampire blood. Acting quickly on an impulse, I unwrapped it from its oilcloth, a startling idea having seized hold of my cognitions. If a vampire could increase its invincibility by consuming the blood of another being, would not I as a Dhampir have the same power? Could this inoculate me against the intrusion of his will? Could it give me some advantage, some power, to drink of his blood?
I heard Sebastian’s step in the hall, and in that moment, I acted. I closed my eyes, opened my mouth, and touched the bloodied tip to my tongue. Immediately, my eyes flew open. I snatched away the stick, violently repulsed by what I’d done. Had I just made a dreadful mistake? Had I only polluted myself, ruined myself?
Sebastian opened the door. I folded the oilcloth over the switch and dropped it in my bag. “We are ready for you,” he said.
The oil lamp threw a wild shadow up the wall as he turned, illuminating the lintel over the entrance to the nurseries. I’d noticed the Latin inscription there before, but seeing it again was like a blow.
Aut vincere aut mori.
Either to conquer or to die.
It was nearly ten o’clock. We had no idea when Marius might arrive, but it stood to reason that he would wait until deeper into the night. His past sojourns to Henrietta had been in the dead hours when darkness and the sleep of the house’s inhabitants aided his stealthy incursions.
We had no light with us, but I could see well enough as we moved quietly into the little room. I was getting good at sneaking about in the dark, I reflected. Father Luke stood by the window, Valerian by the door leading to Miss Harris’s old room. I took my post by the schoolroom door.
On the little bed, Henrietta’s covers were tousled, as if she slept fitfully. Then my breath caught, and I peered closer. A cold wash of fear rushed through me as I saw Henrietta’s bed was empty.
“She’s not here!” The sound of my voice in the stillness had the effect of an explosion. For a moment, we all froze, and then Valerian struck a match. Candle glow swelled to an orb of light as he bent to the bed, confirming that Henrietta was not within. The sharp sting of his curse hit the air. “He’s taken her. We are too late.”
Father Luke fell into step with me as Valerian led us from the room. “Where are you going?” the priest demanded.
“Can you not guess?” Valerian threw behind him, not slowing for an instant.
The priest understood. At once, he spun on his heel and fled through the nursery and into the hall, no longer concerned
with stealth or taking care not to be heard. The sound of their footsteps on the wooden stairs thundered, rolling through the house to the far corners. Mary and Roger, Alyssa, Alan—they all would hear the disturbance. But quiet and anonymity were luxuries we could no longer afford.
I was about to set flight after, but I remembered the stakes I’d had Sebastian hide in the room for me. Turning back, I scrabbled under the bed to draw out the five crudely crafted implements of destruction. I had to move fast to catch up with the others and could only manage one stake in each hand. I hated to do it, but I had to leave the other three behind.
In the stables, Father Luke was already astride while Sebastian and Fox were fetching mounts for themselves. Father Luke held the reins masterfully, his mount a large, powerful creature. It skirted sideways under his direction and he held his hand down to me. “There is no time to saddle two horses. Come with me. Mr. Fox will follow.”
I lost no time. Transferring the stake in my left hand to my right, I gave him my freed hand. He grasped it and hauled me up as easily as a sack of grain.
I was barely seated when he kicked his horse forward. I clasped him tightly, swallowing my innate terror of horses. We rode hard, the sound of heavy hooves thundering in my ears as we raced madly toward The Sanctuary.
T
he plain where the head of the Great Stone Serpent had once lain was bathed in a soft moon glow that filtered down through the misty air. It somehow suffused the light, magnified it, so that the eerie effect was sulfurous and thick. Father Luke dismounted, pulling me down as soon as his feet hit solid ground, and we turned together to face the emptiness.