Lynn Viehl - [Darkyn 08 - Lords of the Darkyn 01] (5 page)

When the bell rings, the dog feeds.

Running downstairs, she had to dodge around several startled sisters, and kept silent as they called out their concern to her. From the convent she went to the stables, where the three horses they owned were placidly enjoying their morning feed. She took out the quickest, Georges, whom she used to pull the vegetable cart when they took their herbs to market. The gelding didn’t object to being saddled, although he seemed puzzled when Simone yanked up her skirts to mount him.

“Come, Geo.” She walked him out of the barn to the back of the yard, where a footpath led back into the hills. Three miles away, protected by fences and private-property signs, and nearly hidden among acres of ancient hundred-foot-tall plane trees, lay her destination: Château Niege. Her father’s house, her childhood home.

The prison she would never escape.

Chapter 2

A

s he deftly avoided yet another crater, Korvel decided the waitress at La Théière Verte had sent him down the worst road in southern France. Already half-caked in mud, the Audi had lost a hubcap and gained a crack in its windshield, thanks to gravel shed from an overloaded construction lorry. Twice the gendarmes had stopped him for speeding. Now the road’s condition had deteriorated to the point where he was obliged to slalom back and forth between the grassy shoulders to spare his tires.

When his mobile rang, Korvel pulled off onto the side of the road before he answered it. “Yes.”

“Captain.” Static crackled across the line but failed to drown out the unsettling power of Richard Tremayne’s voice. “Have you arrived at your destination?”

He glanced at the GPS. “Not as yet, my lord. I should reach it before dawn.” He hesitated before he asked, “Has something changed?”

“I have just received a report from our Italian associates,” Richard said, referring to the
tresoran
council, which was based in Italy. The council, which governed all the
tresori
who served the Darkyn as their human servants, would contact the high lord only in the event of a real emergency. “Our competitors have organized the means with which they intend to acquire the property in question.”

Korvel’s jaw set. Whoever had taken interest in the scroll would be making a direct attempt to steal it. “When do they make their bid?”

“Our friends believe they will try within the next several hours.” The high lord’s voice grew sharper. “Upon your arrival, you must secure the property at once.”

What had been an annoying errand might now result in an unwanted confrontation—one Korvel was hardly prepared for. “Are there any of our associates in the immediate area?”

“Our friends have family there,” Richard said. “They will instruct them to meet you and provide whatever assistance you need.”

“I would rather they not, my lord.” Although the
tresori
had been serving the Kyn for many generations, and were trained from birth to become operatives with a variety of skills, Korvel disliked depending on them. For all their loyalty they were still mortal. In a fight he preferred to have his own kind watching his back. He thought for a moment. “Could you call on Gabriel and his lady to meet me, perhaps?”

Richard’s tone grew disgusted. “I would, if I knew where the devil they are.”

Two of the finest trackers among the Darkyn, Gabriel Seran and Nicola Jefferson had been devoting all their time to rescuing and relocating Kyn who had been targeted by their enemies. Nicola, who had been attacked and accidentally made Darkyn by Richard’s former wife, Elizabeth, had later found and saved Gabriel from a horrible and slow death. The two had bonded, and while Nicola remained fiercely devoted to her lover, she had little love for the Darkyn, and showed no respect for Richard whatsoever.

The high lord’s voice faded in and out. “You will report…me as…you have…the property.”

“Yes, my lord.” The connection lost, he switched off the mobile and frowned.

Something is wrong,
Korvel thought as he drove back onto the road.

The scroll Richard had sent him to retrieve had once been the subject of much speculation among the Kyn, primarily because it was said that only the high lord knew what it contained and where it was located. Korvel had believed the same, until Richard himself had informed him to the contrary.

“I entrusted it to an old friend,” the high lord said. “He kept it in the family.”

Of course, the usual wild rumors about the artifact abounded, but only among the Darkyn. The passage of the centuries had slowly scoured away the scroll’s existence from the memory of the mortal world, at least until the human scholars and scientists had discovered a mention of it, written in an ancient text unearthed from the rubbish left behind in the bowels of an abandoned English monastery.

One of Korvel’s responsibilities was to monitor all news reports regarding the Knights Templar, which often contained information Richard found useful. The high lord also exercised his authority to bury any story that could lead to exposure of the Kyn and their interests, in particular anything that could be used by their enemies to identify any immortal or locate their strongholds.

The mention of the scroll had been confined to a few speculative lines by a medieval scholar who had proposed that it contained descriptions and possibly maps to treasures hidden by the Templars just before their arrest and the disbanding of the order in the early fourteenth century. Kyn memory did not deteriorate with age, so Korvel considered the scholar’s presumptions nothing more than the greedy hopes of yet another treasure hunter.

After listening to his report, Richard had dismissed the story. “Had I a shilling for every treasure we are said to have buried,” the high lord said, “I could buy controlling interest in Microsoft and IKEA.”

Korvel printed and filed away the AP report, and forgot it until three nights past, when Richard had summoned him and insisted he go to France to personally retrieve the scroll.

“Helada is the guardian of the scroll, but apparently he has disappeared,” the high lord said. “The treasure cannot be left unattended, so you will bring it to me.”

“My lord, we have a number of trusted couriers in Paris who in the past have served us as reliable transporters,” Korvel said, perplexed that the high lord would have him leave Í Árd island to perform such a menial task. “Permit me to contact one of them, and I will—”

“You will do as I tell you, Captain,” Richard told him flatly. “When you reach France, you are to travel alone and only by land. Once you are in possession of the scroll, you are to return directly to the island in the same fashion. That is all.”

With all his heart Korvel wanted to know his master’s reasons for such odd and specific instructions, but the high lord did not take kindly to being questioned, even by those he most trusted. “As you command, my lord.” He bowed low and turned to leave.

“Korvel.” Richard waited until he faced him again before he said, “The Scroll of Falkonera is a priceless treasure, forged from solid gold. That is not why our enemies are trying to steal it.”

He waited, but his master offered nothing more, so he had to choose his next words carefully. “Then perhaps I should know what value it has to them, my lord, that I may properly safeguard it.”

Richard inclined his head. “The scroll contains the writings of an alchemist of the first century, one who discovered the formula that bestowed immortality on a mortal. To protect the secret, the smith who forged it also placed a curse upon the scroll. Any unworthy human who touches it will die an agonizing death.”

Most of the alchemists who had lived during Korvel’s human lifetime had been practiced charlatans; most had wrapped themselves in secrecy and mystique to make their doubtful art seem more legitimate. “You do not believe in curses, my lord.”

“All that concerns me is how the scroll may be used against us,” Richard said. “Under no circumstances are you to permit it to fall into the hands of any mortal, friend or enemy. Is that understood?”

Korvel nodded and bowed again before leaving to make the arrangements for his journey, which now was coming to an abrupt end, thanks to a tractor-trailer that effectively blocked the entire road.

After he pulled over for the second time, Korvel parked the Audi and climbed out to inspect the disabled vehicle. Although crates of loudly squawking chickens and geese crowded the open-sided back of the trailer, the cab proved to be empty.

Once he had searched in vain for the keys, Korvel glanced over at the horizon. The hot orange crescent of sun blazed in the east; he slid on a pair of sunglasses designed to block most of its rays that would otherwise irritate his light-sensitive eyes. He could do nothing about the dawn or the weariness it inflicted on him except bear it. Fortunately a check of the GPS, which had decided to function again, showed him to be less than a mile from the château.

He had brought only one case with him for his garments, which he would not need until he returned to Paris. His two-handed broadsword and the other weapons he always traveled with lay inside the boot. He had not anticipated arriving at the château on foot; nor did he know whether he would encounter anyone along the way. Arming himself was second nature, but the sight of his sword would definitely alarm the resident mortals, and might result in alerting the enemy to his presence. He settled on taking just two daggers with forearm sheaths, which the sleeves of his coat completely concealed, before he started off toward the château.

Once Korvel squeezed past the back end of the trailer, he saw the road branch off in two directions, one toward the distant blur of Garbia and the other curving around into the heavily wooded hills. Small but plainly lettered signs that read Propriété Privée had been nailed to the trunks of the outermost trees. By the time he had walked half a kilometer the road virtually disappeared from sight, obscured by massive silver-trunked trees with twisting, riotous branches that formed an effective natural barrier.

Korvel smelled wood smoke tinged with the sweet-tea scent of sycamore, but the leafy canopy barred his view of the sky, so he couldn’t see from which direction it came. He stopped and listened for several minutes, intent on discovering the source of the smoke, but heard and smelled nothing out of the ordinary. The local farmers would have lit their fireplaces, he decided, to dispense some of the morning chill from their homes. With the high price of heating oil and coal, and France’s perpetually dismal economy, it made sense that they would burn wood.

He knew why every little thing was setting him on edge. He had entered territory unfamiliar to him—a strategic disadvantage he always attempted to avoid. While the Darkyn no longer actively occupied southern France, centuries of respecting the boundaries between immortal strongholds had become a matter of form for his kind. Thus traveling into strange lands made every Kyn warrior uneasy. That, and without his sword Korvel felt almost naked. But he knew he could bespell any mortal who saw him before they could expose his presence—

The smell of hot, sweet, smoky tea grew stronger, distracting him from his thoughts, and he realized a faint opaque haze was now visible in the air. A lightning strike might have set some of the woods ablaze, but then the birds and the other creatures inhabiting it would be making a racket. All he heard was birdsong and the flutter of leaves in a breeze.

A breeze that felt a few degrees warmer than it had by the main road.

Korvel eyed the nearest sturdy tree, measuring the width of its branches before he went to it and jumped up to catch the lowest bough. He boosted himself up easily and began to climb in search of a better vantage point. Forty feet from the ground the branches began to thin, and another ten feet higher a gap from a broken limb afforded him a view of the surrounding hills.

Frost had begun to kill the grazing grasses, leaving behind wide, irregular brown patches on the gentle slopes like some giant’s muddy, erratic footprints. From his position he could see a stretch of road leading up to a high stone wall and iron gates; beyond them shrubbery and shorter trees masked the grounds around a large structure with a tiered roof of gray slate shingles. Steady streams of white smoke poured from the slate roof’s three chimneys.

It had to be Château Niege. It seemed Helada’s mortal servants also disliked the cold October mornings.

Feeling once more like a fool, Korvel stepped off the branch and dropped to the ground. Once he had the scroll, he would go to the nearest city and take his rest there until nightfall. Then, when he rose, he would find a willing female and feed. Perhaps he would fuck her, too, and relieve his other, long-denied needs. Sex had never been a particular pleasure for him, not when he could have any woman just by willing it, but he had let too much time pass. He could no longer remember the last time he’d taken a female to his bed.

He knew he had not touched any female in an intimate fashion since his master had abducted Alexandra Keller and put the American doctor in Korvel’s care. Another painful indicator that it was high time he dispensed with the last dregs of his idiotic adolescent obsession.

Korvel picked up his pace and in a few minutes arrived at the gates of the château. The guardhouse stood empty, and the gates had been opened. Fresh tire marks left twin tracks in the dirt before disappearing on the concrete slab of the drive.

The unmistakable reek of mortal blood made Korvel halt and draw in the smoke-fogged air. A trace of the wet-scarlet bloom came from inside the gates, but a stronger source was much closer. He shrugged out of his coat, letting it drop to the ground as he spun around to face whatever had crept up behind him.

Two mortals dressed in military fatigues and black cloth masks stood silently watching him. Both held combat blades in their hands and carried handheld radios. The automatic weapons slung over their shoulders had not been fired, but the dark red spatter on their uniforms was still wet.

Korvel felt a crowding sensation as more men emerged from the tree cover and spread out, encircling him. Their efficient movements and effortless formation testified to their training and experience; this ambush was not their first. A whirring, mechanical sound brushed against his ears as the only avenue of escape they had left him, the open gates behind his back, began to close.