Immanuel's Veins (5 page)

“Stay back, Toma. He's been begging me all night.”

Stefan only chuckled. Alek knew as well as I that even if he thrust his blade into the Russian's throat now, the man would have plenty of time to reciprocate before they both collapsed in blood.

“What have you done, you beast?” Kesia cried.

“I kissed your daughter, madam. Clearly she was overwhelmed by the pleasure and fainted. I assure you, she will awake and beg for more.”

The room was deathly silent.

“It is your own honor you have put into question,” Stefan said to Alek. Now a smile had joined his soft voice and warning bells shook in my head. “But we don't need to kill each other over a woman neither of us really knows. Sister?”

Sofia, who was evidently Stefan's sister, stepped toward the two men locked beneath the chandelier. She left her friends, but I could swear her eyes never left me.

Could the others see this? Was Lucine watching the alluring gaze of this woman piercing my head?

Stefan flipped his wrist and his long blade sailed toward Sofia in a blur. He lifted both hands in a sign of truce and stepped back.

Sofia caught the sword by the handle as if it were an apple she'd casually tossed to herself. Using only slight movement, she sent it back to one of the others, who snatched it from the air.

“Why don't you try Sofia? She likes big strong warrior types,” Stefan said.

I had rarely seen Alek at a loss for words, but he hesitated. His eyes spun to Sofia, who was walking around him as she trailed her fingernails along the back of his shoulders.

“I have no interest in her,” Alek said. “The woman you attacked is on the floor. She's under my protection and you will go back to hell before I let you leave this place.”

“Hell? Wouldn't that be a rush to the head?” Sofia was coming around Alek again, but her eyes were even now on me, unless I had lost my mind. She kissed Alek's ear.

“I say play his game, Stefan,” she said. “I'm much more interested in the other one. The one named Toma.”

Sofia left his side and headed toward me.

“Is she alive?” Alek demanded of Kesia.

“She breathes, yes. It's her lip.”

“Her lip?”

“Her lip's been bitten.”

“You bit her lip and she fainted—you expect us to believe this?” Alek snarled at the Russian.

Stefan shrugged. “She'll tell you the same when she wakes.”

“Yet there she lies on the floor. How
dare
you enter this house as a guest and even touch a woman? Go back to your whores in Russia! Your kind aren't welcome in the Cantemir estate.”

Sofia had crossed the floor and stood beside me, as if I had claimed her. Lucine on my left, this black-clad seductress on my right. I stood like a trapped deer.

“Be very careful, Toma,” Sofia whispered.

She was warning me?

Alek tossed his sword onto the marble floor, where it clattered to a rest. The brows above Stefan's eyes arched.

“He disarms. Impressive. A noble warrior indeed.”

“I'll take nobility and shove it down your throat. Leave! This is my last warning.”

“Or?”

“Or you will lie dead.”

“You'll slice my head off with your fingernails?”

This could not end well. But stepping in would only undermine the group's impression of Alek's judgment, so I held my ground.

“Do not underestimate me.”

“My mind exactly. Now you've challenged my honor by accusing me of biting off a woman's lip! I am incensed.”

“Leave!” Alek thundered.

You see, I knew that tone in his voice. Alek was not the kind who played games with his sword or knives. Only with his lips and tongue, and only then with women. This dense Russian named Stefan was not hearing his death call. I almost stepped in then, knowing about Alek's throwing blades.

“Then what say we defend our honor in a way that isn't as pathetic or boring as a duel to the death or all that nonsense?”

Alek said nothing “So you fear me.”

“I fear only your ignorance. And I have no desire to make a mess on this floor the very first night of my arrival.”

Stefan stepped back a few paces, spread his arms wide, and addressed the ring of observers watching.

“Who is interested in seeing me kill”—Alek was already moving, while the man's eyes were on his audience—“this insolent—”

A blade Alek had dropped from his right sleeve darted across the room like a dagger shot from a cannon. The man was as good as dead.

But as the knife neared his throat, Stefan moved with such speed as I had never seen. His right hand snapped up and clamped around the razor-sharp blade. I could hear the edge slicing through the flesh of his palm.

The room gasped. My hand was on the butt of the pistol strapped to the side of my chest.

Stefan stood still for half a beat, glaring back at Alek with dark eyes, and then in three bounds he was there by Alek's side, the same blade now pressed against my friend's neck.

Slicing already.

I lurched forward.

“Enough, Stefan!”

Alek's attacker froze at the sound of the voice, which had come from the doorway. A warm waft of air swirled around the long black coat of a man standing in the open door. Flames in the fireplace bowed away from the wind that the guest had brought with him. He stood with his arms at his sides, staring at Stefan.

All eyes shifted to this man whom I had not seen before, dressed in black like the others. But he stood taller and carried himself with an air of absolute authority. The tail of his suit fell well below the backs of his knees; his slacks covered black boots rimmed in silver; his sleeves were hemmed with red lace, butting into white gloves; his collar ran high behind his neck, framing a head of black hair.

The door blew shut behind him.

“Step away.”

I knew without looking that Stefan would obey. I could judge most leaders' power by their voices.

For an extended moment the room seemed to be held in the embrace of the man's power, as if time had once again slowed. I could hear my heart in my chest, the blood rushing through my veins.

A soft groan broke the moment.

“Natasha?” Kesia cried.

“What's . . .” Natasha sat up and looked around, dazed. She blinked. “What on earth is this?”

“Are you well, my dear?”

Natasha stood, gaining her footing quickly. “Of course I'm well, Mother. What's this about? Where's . . .”

She saw Stefan, who'd backed away from Alek, and her eyes lingered on him. But it was Alek who stepped in and took her arm. The blood was still on her lip and she touched it with her tongue.

“Madam, please.” Alek dabbed her lip with a handkerchief. “Are you sure you're fine?”

“
Fine
is not a term we can use to inquire of such a beautiful woman.” The late-arrived Russian walked forward and presented himself first to the mother, Kesia. He took her hand and kissed it.

“Forgive the intrusion into your home, madam. These men and women have presented you with a terrible impression of our estate. I am the master of the Castle Castile, a humble guest in your Moldavia. Vlad van Valerik, at your command. Please, call me Vlad, for I am a commoner in your house.”

Kesia eyed him, undecided, then faced Natasha, whose eyes were on Valerik. “Natasha—”

“I'm perfectly fine, Mother. Please, we were only having a little fun. Is a woman never allowed to faint with all of this dancing, wine, and heat? It was all perfectly harmless and sweet.”

But I could see by the way Stefan was watching Alek that what may have begun sweet had turned bitter.

Kesia turned back to Valerik. “Then I accept your apology. And you are welcome in my home. We aren't averse to a little fun, but please, keep a leash on the pit bulls.”

I liked Kesia less for welcoming Valerik into her home but better for the crack of her verbal whip.

Valerik smiled. “Well said.”

The room was brighter, and I saw that some of the candles I thought had been extinguished were still lit.

“Would you like me to punish him?” he asked.

Kesia glanced at Stefan, who looked to be struggling between his allegiance to Valerik and his anger at having been humiliated by Alek, though he'd succeeded in laying a small cut along Alek's neck.

So what was driving the dark rage I saw in his eyes?

“What did you have in mind?”

Valerik clearly hadn't expected her response. He stepped over to Natasha, brushed her cut lip with his thumb. “Such a delicate flower. You, my lady, are an exquisite creature who must provoke the dying wish of any man and half the women in this world. We must not judge Stefan too harshly.”

“No,” she said.

He lowered his arms, clasped his hands behind his back, then walked slowly in a small circle, eyeing the guests. “But some punishment would be appropriate. I wouldn't want my neighbors to think that I am not a fair man. There are a handful of us in the Castle Castile and we are only a few noblemen and women who have escaped Russia for the summer, like you. It's a beautiful land, this Moldavia, and there must be order.”

They hung on his words. As, I must admit, did I.

“An eye for an eye, yes?” he said. His eyes came around the room, dark but glistening in the light. They stopped at Lucine. And they seemed to drink her.

When they shifted to me, I felt deep anger, not for the way he looked at me but because he'd looked at Lucine that way.

“Stefan has taken from the one sister. Invited or not, it no longer matters. It would only be fair for the other sister to take from Stefan. You're twins?”

They were not identical twins, but the similarities were plain enough and the twins were well known. But I didn't want this Russian to speak to Lucine. For any reason.

“Yes,” Lucine said.

“Would you like to take Stefan for a night and do what you like with him? You could thrash him or force him to bake you a cake or use him for his more natural talents, which go without saying. Assuming your mother likes the idea.”

Kesia blushed but smiled.

“You could even make him your mother's slave for the night. If any take from a Cantemir, they will give back, no?”

I was outraged! I hated Stefan for what he might do in this ridiculous punishment. How could Kesia not throw these men out on their tails?

Because snakes are not easily thrown, Toma
.

“But you don't understand, kind sir,” Lucine said. “I have no interest in a thug like Stefan. His kind are repulsive to me and I would speak for my mother as well. I wouldn't even want him to wash my floors.”

The crow's lips slowly twisted with delight. “I'm sure he could change your mind. He's very talented.”

“You heard the lady.” Alek spoke evenly. “Take your leave, please. Before you yourself become Stefan.”

For a beat nothing happened. It wasn't a wise threat, all things considered, but I might have made it myself if Alek hadn't.

Then Stefan was moving with inordinate speed to defend his master's honor. But his knife was on the floor and he had to stoop for it.

I pulled my pistol without thought, and I shot Stefan through his head as he started for Alek.

The man dropped like a stone, dead at Natasha's feet. The detonation shook the chandelier and echoed through the chamber. Blood spread from the wound in Stefan's head.

I cocked my weapon up, so that the muzzle pointed at the ceiling, still smoking.

“Or we could do that,” Vlad van Valerik said.

“No man threatens the authority of the empress,” I said. “Am I understood?”

“Indeed,” said the crow. He faced the lady Kesia, who had gone white, and he dipped his head. “I'm so sorry, madam. But Toma Nicolescu was right. I might have shot him myself if I'd brought a pistol and seen Stefan's foolishness. My only regret is this mess on your floor now.”

From behind me I heard Sofia's husky whisper. “Very nice shot, Toma.”

Valerik looked past me and nodded at her. She brushed my elbow as she passed me. “I'm impressed,” she muttered.

One of the other Russians picked up Stefan's body in his arms and led the others from the room, leaving a red trail on the white marble floor.

“I'm mortified, madam,” Valerik said, shifting his look from the thread of blood back to Kesia. “My debt to you is now double. I will do anything to reconcile this unruly fool's indiscretion in your home.”

He bowed, arms spread, one foot leading the other.

“Now I must go and teach some lessons.”

He walked to the door, then turned back and faced Lucine. “He is a thug. A beautiful thug, perhaps, but a monster through and through.”

And then Vlad van Valerik and his clan were gone.

FOUR

T
wo days had passed since Mother's ball, and it was still the talk of the aristocracy. Having the ball turned on its head with the slaying of a man in defense of honor had immortalized the Summer Ball of Delights.

The name Vlad van Valerik was on the lips of them all. And even more, the name of the one who'd casually drawn a pistol and shot the offender dead in the head, and from a distance of twenty paces no less. Toma Nicolescu. The quiet, tall war hero who had killed a thousand men in battle, a rumor Lucine no longer doubted.

“I can hardly keep my mind off him,” Natasha said, balancing on the fountain wall in her wet white slippers. She dipped her left foot into the water, then reached her right foot behind and splashed it too. She stepped along the stone wall with sopping feet, leaving perfect dark stains.

Lucine hopped up behind her, following with both arms stretched out to keep her balance. She wouldn't dip her feet, however.

“You can't keep your mind off which one?”

“The Russian, naturally.”

Lucine pulled up short, swaying dangerously before regaining control. “The Russian? The duke?”