State of Grace (Resurrection) (13 page)

Viktor gave him a sharp look
, then relaxed imperceptibly, and nodded slowly.

‘She disappeared as I was feeding,
and then appeared again a short time later,’ Roman added. ‘And now she is here.’ He gestured around the room, before continuing, ‘My senses tell met this is the same woman, but that cannot be. How could that be possible? Yet it is Eryres.’

‘Eryres,’ I repeated. That was the only part of the conversation that made any sense to me, and I didn’t understand that word either.
To say I was confused...

‘It means eagle in Briti
sh,’ Viktor explained absently, reading my mind (but not literally, I hoped, because what was happening was weird enough without adding telepathy to the mix).

‘Ah.’ Understanding coursed through me, and I touched my right hip. ‘I have a tat
too of an eagle,’ I said, and then amended it to ‘a picture of an eagle. Here.’ I pointed to it.

Viktor looked askance at Roman, who shrugged. ‘F
lying,’ he clarified. ‘It is… beautiful.’

In normal circumstances I might have pulled the waistband of my jeans down a fraction to display my ink, but these were not normal circumstances.
For one thing, I was wearing a floor length dress, so I would have to pull it up around my waist, and for another, I had no underwear on. One man had managed to cop an eyeful tonight, and I wasn’t prepared to make it two. And to top it all off, I appeared to be in another time and place, with a pair of decidedly strange men, whom I didn’t trust not to turn a quick peek into something definitely more substantial. The fear that had retreated to the back of my mind swam to the surface again, as I recognised just how much danger I could be in.

‘I think
you asked the wrong question,’ Roman said. ‘The question we should ask is not
who
is she, rather,
what
is she.’

‘Ah.’ Viktor knew exactly what Roman meant, and he gave that brief little nod again.

‘She smells and tastes human. There is nothing else she can be. Although, now…’ Roman tailed off.

‘Now
what
?’

‘I cannot be sure, but
–’  He hesitated. ‘She does not smell as she first did. I am not certain, but I swear her blood carries the scent and taste of us.’

‘Impossible! There is either one or the other, not both
. And her blood smells all human to me.’ Viktor was dismissive. ‘There is, perhaps, another explanation. She could be something else entirely. Something as long-lived as our kind, which would explain her appearances hundreds of years apart.’

It was Roman’s turn to
disbelieve. ‘There is nothing else,’ he stated, shortly.

‘You don’t know that for sure.
’ Viktor raised a hand before Roman could carry on. ‘There have always been rumours, folk tales, stories told to children. We are one such, and yet we exist. Why should not others?’

‘You have walked this earth much longer than I,
trawled the depths of humankind, and you have never met others. There are just humans and us. No fairies, no pixies, no werewolves. Just us.’

‘I still say you cannot be certain. I know that you, like I,
have scented things that are not human or animal.’

‘That can be explained, I am sure.
We would have discovered evidence before now. One of our kind would have,’ Roman insisted.

‘Why? Why would we? Why would any of us?
If there
are
other races of men, then they are wise to avoid us. We would not be able to resist hunting them. If they exist, then by necessity, they must hide from us, and from mankind, the same as we must hide the truth of our existence from humans. Bah! We have talked of this many times. I cannot make you change your opinion.’

Both men ceased talking and, as one, their attention focused on me, as I was trying to sit unobtrusively on my cushions, listening to a conversation that made
absolutely no sense. Yes, I could understand the individual words, but all meaning was lost when they strung those words together in a sentence. They were talking rubbish: two grown men discussing pixies, for God’s sake. And they were serious. And now they were looking intently at me. I quailed before them. They appeared to be capable of eating me up for breakfast and be picking my bones from between their teeth before I had a chance to scream.

‘What
are
you?’ Roman asked, his dark, almost black, eyes bored into mine, and I felt as though I were drowning in them for the second time that night. With a massive effort I dragged gaze away and tried to concentrate on the question.

‘
What? Um, I’m a pilot,’ I managed to blurt out through numb lips.

There was a moment of shocked silence then ‘Pah!’ That
was from Viktor. ‘You lie.’

If menace was radiation
, then the Geiger counter had shot way beyond the safe level. The bitter taste of terror flooded my mouth, and my throat was suddenly desert-dry. The two men were much too close, although neither had moved a muscle and were sitting exactly as they had been before.

‘It’s true,’ I whispered.
I was so scared I thought my bladder might give way, and the prospect of that small humiliation made me indignant. ‘Why would you think I am lying?’ I demanded, breaking through the panic. ‘Don’t you believe a woman is capable of flying a plane? If there is one thing I can’t stomach is that some men think women should be at home making bread and babies!’

This was a pet hate of mine, and an attitude I had come across on several occasions
since I had become a pilot. Granted, not many men still thought that, but there were enough left to make my blood boil; the ones who assumed that all men were pilots and made crass comments when a female voice addressed the crew and passengers. It looked like I had just met two more. My temper was overcoming my terror and it may not have been the wisest thing, but I clutched at it gratefully. Anything was better than this debilitating fear, the kind of fear you had when you are a child hiding under your duvet, rigid with terror at the unknown monsters that you simply knew lurked in the shadows of your night-darkened bedroom.

‘Women are not pilots.’ Viktor stated this as if it were a gospel truth
, or one of the laws of physics.

‘Yes, they are!’ I was equally as emphatic. ‘I ought to know – I am one. Find me a plane and I will prove it to you.’

The men exchanged a glance. ‘A plane? What is that?’ Roman asked.

I sighed. I might have k
nown. I hadn’t seen a car, or any motorised vehicle of any kind, so why would planes exist in this world of mine. Still, I had to answer.

‘A plane is what I use to fly. You sit in it and it takes you into the sky.’

‘Is she witch or mad?’ Roman turned to Viktor. ‘She truly believes this tale.’

‘
Neither I think, and yes, she does believe what she is saying.’

The two of them were inspecting me like they would a butterfly staked out by a collector, and I couldn’t tear my eyes away from them
: their impassivity scared me; they were as emotionless as a pair of robots.

Roman finally let expression seep into his face
. ‘I told her she would not be harmed here,’ he said.

‘W
hy did you remove her from the castle?’ Viktor asked. ‘Surely it would have been safer for her to remain there, for more reasons than one.’

‘She does not belong there.
She does not speak like them, does not know how to act, and,’ he hesitated, ‘when she appears to me she is naked.’

Viktor
’s eyes widened a fraction, remembering my performance getting into the saddle, and said, ‘No clothes?’

‘No clothes.’

‘Not once?’

‘No.’

‘So where did she…?’

‘She didn’t. I did. From Lady Siby
l.’

‘My lady will not take kindly to you stealing her gowns,’ Viktor observed, a smirk developing around his mouth.

‘No,’ Roman said, annoyed. ‘She will not.’

I felt lik
e an observer in a tennis match, my head swivelling from one to the other. For no apparent reason the temperature in the room appeared to drop. I felt icy cold, and fear once more had me in its grip. Roman must have felt the changed atmosphere, too.

‘I told her she would not be harmed here,’ R
oman stated again. The fact he felt the need to repeat this scared me even further.

‘I would not touch what is yours unless you invite me to, as you well know,’ Viktor replied in a huffy tone.

I bridled slightly at this
, his meaning clear. ‘I am not his. Hell, we barely know each other!’

Viktor’s interest quickened. ‘No?’ he asked, casually. ‘But he has tasted you, has he not?’
he glanced at Roman, who shrugged eloquently.

‘I’m not sure what you…’ I began
, but then, all at once, I
did
know what he meant, and I remembered the feel of Roman’s breath on my skin and my fingers crept up to touch the healing puncture wounds underneath my ear.

Viktor hissed
and I jumped violently: it was such a savage, unexpected sound. Roman growled deep in his throat and the threat of violence sang in the air, making the tiny hairs all over my body stand up. I tingled with a sickening surge of adrenalin, and my heart pounded so loudly I felt sure they could hear it. It seems they did. Their heads swivelled towards me as one, like wolves scenting blood, or more accurately like the two raptors in Jurassic Park, the ones the children hid from in the kitchen.

Roman’s eyes darkened even further, but it was Viktor who I sensed was the more dangerous. His eyes glowed with a blackness that
drew me in, sucking at my soul, and as I was caught in his hypnotic gaze a feeling of drugged calm stole over me and I struggled to remember why I was scared of him, and could think of no earthly reason. He exuded tranquillity and something else, something more animal and basic in its composition, and immediately my pulse slowed, then quickened again as a powerful wave of desire slammed in to me. He wanted me, and, dear God, I felt an answering surge in me, too powerful to control. I whimpered with longing, desperate for him to touch me, the heat between my legs generating a slick dampness.

Without warning, and too fast to see, Roman
cannoned into Viktor, hurling him into the wall. With lightning speed Viktor whirled and sank into a crouch, one hand raised, palm outwards. Roman’s attack ceased as quickly as it had begun, and the two men eyed each other warily. The tension slowly leaked out of the room, and I breathed again. The strange desire had vanished leaving an aftertaste of disgust and bewilderment. I wasn’t sure what had just happened, but I knew I didn’t like it, whatever my deceitful body had been telling me at the time.

Viktor broke contact first, and turned to look at me. ‘She is
right: she is not yours. You drank from her, but you did not enthral her. That is dangerous. You know better than to leave unfinished business.’