Blood Deep (20 page)

She did not want to think the horses had sensed something evil about her.

Her lungs were burning.

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Miranda stopped to suck in breath, but what she saw stole that breath away.

Fog hung over the village, but it was like no fog Miranda had ever seen before. At the bottom it was a normal grayish white, but higher in the sky it appeared to be red. It was like the eerie look of the sky when Zayan and Lukos had stopped her carriage the day before.

From this vantage, high above the village, Miranda could see the mist was centered on the village, and it swirled around with the cluster of buildings in its vortex.

Had the vampires brought this eerie red mist? She remembered Zayan fighting a creature that had come out of it. And a mist the same deep blood-red color had swept around both her and Zayan in the castle.

Was it dangerous? Was it going to hurt the people below?

With her hand on her heaving chest, Miranda started off at a run again.

10

Wolf

The tall, thin, hawkish innkeeper’s gaze swept haughtily over her. Miranda knew he saw disheveled hair messily drawn back in a bun, a pelisse that was only half-fastened, and splatters of mud all over her skirts. She took a deep breath, then launched into her story.

Mounting disbelief came to the man’s eyes, and his brows rose as quickly as her hopes plummeted.

“You were attacked on the road by vampires?” he snapped.

“Vampires who have taken control of Lord Blackthorne’s castle and have sucked the blood from a young boy.” He shook his head. “You’re either mad or drunk, lass, and I’ve no use for either in my fine establishment. Be off with ye.”

“It’s the truth,” Miranda stated hotly. “If you’d send men to the castle, you would soon find that out.” Her stomach was twisting in knots. She couldn’t just desert the servants of the castle. She had to find some way to get them help.

But she saw the innkeeper edging along his desk, toward an opening that would lead him to her. What would he do if he thought her mad? Throw her out? Or lock her up?

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It was hard enough to betray the vampires, without having to fight the people she was trying to protect to do it.

She’d taken an unsteady step back, when a woman appeared behind the man. She’d come out of room behind the desk and hurried forward. The woman had a plump, red-cheeked face and tightly curled, iron-gray hair. “Hush, Harry,” she admonished. “Now, who might you be, lass. Have you had a bad fright, then?”

A fright? The woman bustled around the counter, a kindly smile on her lips. “What’s all this talk of vampires? There’s no such thing, my love. Oh, there were foolish tales around here dozens of years ago, but no truth in them. Rumors and stories invented by wicked people to persecute others. Why don’t you sit quietly, love, and have a cup of tea.”

Miranda understood. The woman thought she was mad, too, and hoped to calm her to find out where she belonged. She nodded her head and dutifully followed the woman to a private parlor. But what she hadn’t counted on was the woman locking the door as she left for the tea, imprisoning her inside.

Blast. And even as she thought the word, the lock glowed with an unearthly red glow. A fierce creaking sound came.

With a crack, the lock broke and the door swung wide.

For a few heartbeats, Miranda didn’t move. She stared at the twisted metal of the lock. Had she—?

Two maids passed by the opening and Miranda ducked behind a faded wing chair.

“The gentleman in room six,” one maid said softly to the other, “it’s his lordship. I caught a glimpse as he opened his door, and I know it was Blackthorne.”

The servants stopped in front of the door, then stepped into the doorway to speak, assuming the room was empty. The second girl shook her head. “He wouldn’t stay here—”

“He might if he’s tupping one of the barmaids.”

“The man in room six is named Casselman—”

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“Aye, the man of the castle. He’s not using his proper name.

I think he’s doing dark things in his room. Things he has to keep a secret. There’s rumors he does witchcraft, you know.”

“I heard a tale that he drinks the blood of young maidens.”

“Oh, aye, I expect he makes them bleed. But from breaking their maidenheads, I’m certain.”

With that, the two girls scurried away.

Miranda stood. Her hands trembled. Was Blackthorne, the man she had thought she loved, the mysterious inhabitant of room six?

After what she had seen in the castle dungeons, she could not just let him hurt innocent women in his room.

Something had to be done.

A naked man stood at the window, running his fingers through his collar-length coal-black hair. Beside him, a lamp threw light on the tight curve of his derriere, the hollows at his haunches, and the small of his back. He was chuckling to himself, and with his other hand, he tapped a riding crop against his solid thigh.

He was a beautiful man, almost as gorgeous as Zayan and Lukos. But was he Blackthorne? From her view of his naked rump, Miranda had no idea.

A soft sigh fluttered to her. Her heart made a sudden lump into her throat and Miranda looked to the bed. Two women slept on it. The covers had been drawn back, but one woman clutched the edge of a white sheet. She lay on her back with her large breasts half-exposed. She snored lightly. The other was curled up in a ball, and long, dirty-blond hair streamed out around her.

What made Miranda stare was the pictures drawn on their bodies in . . . in some kind of paint. Pentagrams and strange symbols and exquisitely rendered letters that looked like the sort found on old manuscripts.

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“Put the tray on the sideboard, lass,” said the man at the window.

Miranda froze with her hand on the doorknob. She’d stealthily opened the door when she’d found it unlocked. Not sneakily enough, it appeared.

The blonde who had been curled up stretched and uttered a groan. “Aren’t ye coming back to bed, milord? Won’t ye untie my hands?”

Shocked, Miranda realized the woman’s hands and ankles were bound with white rope.

Then she saw it. The long scar that snaked down his right side, the puckered lines illuminated by the light. It was deep and ugly. The skin had not knit well, and it made a trough along this perfect, strong body.

This
must
be Blackthorne. He had described himself once in a letter to her. Hair that looked like he’d been dragged through a sooty chimney, he’d written—dark as coal, but it tended to stick up in odd places. Eyes that had been likened to the color of a mud puddle.

She had fallen in love with him over that teasing description.

And it hadn’t really been true—he was breathtakingly handsome.

But he had also shared his bed with two tavern wenches the night before. The night when he had not been at home and his servants would not divulge where he’d went.

He turned to face her, obviously surprised she had not come in. His smile widened to a leer. “Interested in joining the fun, pet?” He reached down to his privy part and her gaze streaked down with his hand. He fondled his shaft without a sign of embarrassment.

Stunned, Miranda stumbled back. She’d seen the accoutrements of his dungeon, had overheard the maids, and she didn’t know why she was so startled.

She gathered her skirts and ran down the hallway. She BLOOD DEEP / 167

reached the stair, her momentum almost carried her headfirst down it, but she grasped the banister and raced down. Why was she running like she was being pursued by the devil?

At the bottom of the stair, she stopped. It didn’t matter what he had been doing with those women. His castle had been taken over by vampires, and he had the right to know. She was the one who had led Lukos and Zayan to his home. She was obligated to face him and tell him.

But cowardice struck. She couldn’t go up now. Not when he was naked, after he’d leered at her. Not so soon after she’d realized all the tender thoughts he’d penned in his letters to her had to be so much twaddle.

“The first coach arrived, Mr. Lorimer,” a woman’s voice announced. Miranda recognized the strong, hearty voice of the plump woman who had approached her kindly. But now the voice sounded strained and filled with fear. “And it seems that this odd, wretched fog is only here, around our village. The day is fine and clear everywhere else. Even in Haring-on-the-Marsh, which is only a mile to the north.”

The innkeeper grunted. They were both in a parlor that led off from the stair. Miranda could see them, so she retreated in case they could also see her.

“We’re in a valley, Mrs. Lorimer,” he answered. “All the inclement weather pools here, as well you know.”

“Then explain why three wee mites have died last night—

since this foul fog settled upon us. It’s witchcraft, mark my words. It’s something evil and demonic.”

“How is this fog responsible for three children’s deaths?”

Lorimer barked. “Unless they were lost in it.”

“They weren’t. They just . . . died.”

Miranda took the risk of peeking in the room. Muttering something about gothic novels and not enough work, Mr.

Lorimer left the room through a door in the back.

The vampires had brought this fog to the village—Miranda 168 /
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was certain of that. What if it was some evil form of their magic that stole children’s lives or their souls? She had seen a red mist around the boy she had saved. And Aunt Eugenia had told her that some members of the Royal Society believed vampires actually fed on souls not blood. Blood was the way to release the soul.

It was still morning, not even eleven. Miranda hurried into the room and the innkeeper’s plump wife stared up in surprise.

“Now where did you go, dear? I was looking for you.”

No convincing lie popped into Miranda’s head, so she blurted the truth, “I sought Lord Blackthorne to warn him of the danger in his home, but—”

“You went to his room?” Red suffused Mrs. Lorimer’s face.

Her eyes narrowed and the kindly smile vanished. “Dear heaven, what did you say to him?”

“Nothing. He was not alone.” Miranda drew herself up. “He had two women in his bed. Women who work here, I assume—”

“No, he has them brought to him.” The woman’s gaze averted downward.

“I left him—and overhead you, Mrs. Lorimer. I want to know which children died last night. I believe I can help them.”

Tears glistened. “You can’t. They are all dead.”

“Where are they? I must get to them as quickly as I can.

There might still be time.”

“I am not going to tell you. Their mothers are grieving, and I’m not going to unleash a mad woman on them. In fact—”

Mrs. Lorimer yanked the bellpull hard three times. “You should be taken to the magistrate. He’ll find out where you belong.”

Heavy footsteps approached. Some burly servant was no doubt on his way to answer his mistress’s summons. Jerking up her hems, Miranda raced out the door at the back of the room, the one Mr. Lorimer had used. She was plunged into the servants’ part of the house, near the kitchens. She ran through there, jostling the kitchen maids, darting around the tables. The BLOOD DEEP / 169

door to the back gardens was open, the faint reddish light like a beacon.

Someone grabbed at her, but the sleeve of her pelisse tore and she pulled away. She rushed out of the house.

The fog had settled so heavily she could see only a few feet in front of her. She could barely make out the bulk of the white-painted inn beside her. But enough so she could follow it to the front street. Once there, she ran for the next building.

Without stopping to see if she was being pursued, Miranda darted inside. A bell tinkled above her head. The cheery aroma of baking bread greeted her, and she retreated to the corner near the counter.

The proprietess came out, wiping her hands on a linen cloth.

“May I help you, madam?”

Such sweet, normal smells surrounded her that Miranda wanted to sink to the floor and close her eyes. But she stuttered an order for sticky buns. As the woman carried out her request, she sidled to the end of the counter. If someone burst in looking for her, she could escape around the counter and through the back of the shop.

“This fog is growing heavy,” she began conversationally.

She’d learned it did not work to blurt out the truth. “And I heard that it is responsible for the tragic deaths of some children. . . .”

“Oh, I don’t know about that,” the woman broke in. “There’s some that think the fogs that roll in here portend tragedy. And there were three wee children who passed on last night. One of the boys had been poorly since his birth. The smithy’s son. And there was another girl and a wee one who had just taken his first steps.”

Miranda felt sick with grief. She questioned the woman until she found out the names of the families the children belonged to. The smallest of the mites had passed away at dawn. While she’d never tried to save anyone who had not died right in front 170 /
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of her—except the boy this morning, and she had heard his dying scream—she didn’t know how her power worked. She might still be able to save the children. Time might have nothing to do with whether her magic worked.

After one night with Zayan and Lukos, she felt, oddly, more comfortable with her power. She did not feel so freakish or as frightened of it.

Armed with a basic direction of the cottage in which the smithy’s son lived, Miranda hurried out, her buns ignored on the counter. The woman shouted, but she plunged into the fog and vanished.

Or rather, everything seemed to vanish around her. After walking only a few feet from the bakery, she could see nothing but the swirling red mist. Where it touched her skin, the fog was clammy and cold. She rushed on with resolute steps for another yard, then stopped.

Damnation, she really could not see a thing. She felt almost nauseous because she couldn’t tell which way was up or down.

Sometimes the reddish mist would swirl, leaving a small opening she could see through, and she’d take a step. But it would thicken almost at once, leaving her blind. Then she did a foolish thing. She turned in a circle. She was sure it was a complete circle—