Darkyn - Night Lost Part 14

"Why did you stop?"

"Lord Tremayne told me to leave, and then had his black-hearted beast kill my brothers in Dublin." His gaze wandered. "The Lightkeeper exiled me to London, and will tell me nothing now. I am almost useless."

"But you still serve the high lord." Until Lucan came to America, he had served as Richard's chief a.s.sa.s.sin. It would be all too like the high lord's twisted sense of justice to force a Brethren to serve as Lucan's replacement. "Do you kill for him?"

Leary shook his head.

"He knows nothing that will help us." Marcella came to stand behind the priest. "We should release him."

"If he does not serve as a killer or an informant, he has to be a procurer," Michael told him. He caught Leary's drifting attention.

"Do you bring humans to the high lord's castle?"

"Four times a year," Leary said, his voice dreamy. "Twenty fresh ones, every quarter."

Marcella muttered something terse and ugly under her breath.

"Who do you take, Father Leary?" Michael asked.

"Sc.u.m of the streets." He smiled. "Runaways and wh.o.r.es and junkies. The ones no one sees, no one cares for, they are best. No one misses them."

Unseen energy rippled through the air. Overhead, plaster cracked, and a fine white dust rained down from the ceiling. At the same time, a swirl of gray silk came around the sofa.

Michael barely had time to catch Marcella's hand as she reached for Leary's throat.

Phillipe ran into the room. "Madam, no."

"Away from me." Marcella whipped her head to one side, and a marble-topped side table flew at the seneschal and exploded against his chest, knocking him to the floor. "This man is mine."

Michael tightened his grip. "No, Marcella."

"You heard him. He preys on the weak, the hyena." Marcella's dents acerees flashed, fully extended, and bits of plaster fell like tiny hail, salting her black curls. "Let me take him, my lord." The floor rumbled beneath their feet. "Give him to me!"

Michael slapped her. "Arrete."The rain of plaster dust and rumbling abruptly ceased. Marcella pressed a slim hand to her cheek, her eyes wide.

"Je m'excuse," he told her softly.

"Il n'y a pas de quoi." She straightened and gestured toward the laptop. "Jaus has sent the floor plans. I... I must go and pray."

Phillipe got back on his feet and stepped out of Marcella's way as she strode out of the suite.

"You should give her to my master," Leary said, his grin widening. "He likes females, and the ones I bring do not last long. In a week they will be consumed."

Michael knew Richard's changeling condition did not permit him to drink human blood, and no Kyn could consume flesh. "How so?"

"It is the new communion," Leary said, nodding. "To partake of ruined flesh, turn polluted blood into wine. It is fed to those in rapture so that they might know the power and glory of the lord. Sometimes I am permitted to watch."

"Madam was right," Phillipe said, his disgust plain. "He is a jackal."

Leary gave the seneschal a lofty glance. "You will never serve my master."

"No." The thought that Richard was feeding his humans to one another revolted him. "He will not."

Michael continued interrogating Leary, compelling him to tell him about the number of times he had traveled to Dundellan, where in the castle he had been permitted to go, and what he knew of Richard's guards and household staff.

"The high lord uses the dungeon for special things," Leary told him. "Some of the doctors who check the new ones I bring take them there for tests. All of the pa.s.sages are guarded."

The thought of Alexandra being kept in Richard's dungeon made Michael's fury rise like a scarlet wave, engulfing him with new rage. He was barely able to finish questioning Leary and allow him to return to watching the soccer match.

Alexandra. Her name beat, an echo of the lifeblood pulse in his head. I am coming.

Michael found Phillipe standing on the balcony of the master bedroom. Moonlight painted his broad, scarred features with gaunt, pale strokes.

"We will have to take him with us," Michael said. "Are you injured?"

"I have healed." His seneschal absently rubbed the place on his chest where the table had struck him. "Forgive me, master. I did not expect Madam Evareaux to attack me."

"It is her temper and her talent. Cella can do to worked stone what Lucan does to living things," Michael told him. "Anger made her lose control for a moment. It will not happen again."

"She makes a formidable siege weapon." His seneschal looked over the railing down to the street. "Does she truly go to pray?"

"Yes. She makes a pilgrimage to St. Paul's every time she visits London. She still believes that G.o.d will someday reveal his purpose in making us." He looked out into the night, somehow knowing that Alexandra was doing the same. "At least prayer provides comfort to her."

"I have prayed for Alexandra." Phillipe sounded almost ashamed to admit it. "She is truly innocent. Whatever G.o.d has done to us, surely He would not turn His face from her."Michael lit a cigarette and looked out at the revolving lights of the London Eye, the largest observation wheel in the world, built to mark the new millennium. Behind it, Big Ben and the Houses of Parliament seemed like toy models. "Do you remember how pleased my father was when I took my vows?"

His seneschal nodded. "The master thought much of the Templars."

"I did not. After my mother died of plague, I no longer believed in G.o.d. I joined the order only to escape his bitterness." Michael released a thin stream of smoke and watched it curl in the air. "For centuries I thought that was why I had been cursed and made Kyn-because I had worn the cross over a faithless, empty heart. In the beginning I believed that Alexandra had been cursed because she also does not believe."

"There is much that I no longer believe in."

Phillipe said slowly. "I think it is as Alexandra has said. That we lost our human lives to this thing that she calls a pathogen, and that G.o.d has nothing to do with it."

"Whether He exists or not, we are what we are. It does not matter." Nothing did, except taking her back. "Richard will see me dead before he releases her. Should that happen, you will do whatever is necessary to bring her home."

"Of course I will, master-"

Michael faced his seneschal. "When I am gone, when you have her safe, you will make her your sygkenis."

Phillipe opened his mouth, closed it, and then shook his head. "You need not ask this of me. She is yours. You will prevail."

"We did not choose Richard as our high lord because he could be easily taken." His head pounded with a maddening, gnawing craving to destroy something. "None of us is indestructible, and if he takes my head, Alexandra will suffer. You are the only one she trusts, the only one who can take her in hand. You do love her."

"I do," Phillipe said slowly, "but as I would love a sister."

"I must know that she will be safe. If I am dead, there are others who will come for her." He forced the words out. "She will need your strength and protection. I must demand this of you, old friend. Swear to me that you will take her."

A door slamming in the next room interrupted Phillipe's reply. Michael crushed out his cigarette. "Leary."

Out in the sitting room, the television still broadcast the soccer match, but Orson Leary had vanished, as had the keys to the van.

"He will go to Richard," Michael said. "Phillipe, arrange for another car at once."

The outer door to the suite swung open and Marcella strode in carrying Leary under her arm. "Your informant, my lord." She dropped the limp body without ceremony in front of Michael and tossed a ring of keys to Phillipe. "I did not kill him."

"Thank you, Cella."

She gazed down at the unconscious priest. "This time."

Riding to the village on the back of Nicola's motorcycle gave Gabriel some time to think, but the thrill of the air rus.h.i.+ng over his skin and the little b.u.mps and jolts from the road entranced him as much as sitting astride the bike, his body pressed to hers. He kept his hands on her hips, where she had placed them when she had told him to hold on, but he longed to slip them inside her clothing so he could again feel the delicious coolness of her skin. Wanting her-wanting more of her-made him ache from his fangs to his groin.She saves me, he thought, and all I want is to use her for my own pleasures.

Like most country innkeepers, the couple in the village locked the doors of their inn at night, but Nick produced a key and let them in through the back door.

"Up some stairs." She took his hand and slowly led him to her room. "We'll be okay here for the day. Jean isn't nosy, and Adelie makes up the room in the evening."

Her room smelled of fresh-cut flowers, furniture oil, and clean linens. So accustomed was he to the scents of mold and dust and despair that it was if he had been whisked away to another world.

Her world, not his.

"It's nothing fancy." She sounded gruff, almost angry. "I can't afford the five-star places. But it's clean and quiet."

It took a moment to register what she meant. She thought he was offended by her room. "I cannot see it, Nicola, but it feels and smells charming."

"There aren't any c.o.c.kroaches. Here, lie down." She guided him to the small single bed and pulled back the covers. "Whoa, wait. Take off those pants first. They're mud city."

He stripped out of Claudio's damp, dirty trousers. "I must obtain more clothing."

"I can get some tomorrow," she said as she went into an adjoining room. Gabriel gingerly lay back, but it had been so long since he had occupied a real bed that the comfort felt as alien as the smell of the room.

"I have this place in England," Nick said as she came back into the room. From the sounds she made, Gabriel guessed that she was undressing. "It's in the country, nothing special, but it's out of the way and safe. We could go there, lie low for a while. Just until you're stronger."

Gabriel had not considered how utterly dest.i.tute he was. "I will need money and papers to travel."

"I can take care of it," she a.s.sured him. "Do you want me to call any of your friends for you, tell them you're okay?"

"There is no one to call." He took the too-soft feather pillow out from under his head and pushed it aside. "My home is outside Toulouse, in the hills near the border. That is where I must go."

Clothing fell against something made of wood. "Yeah, but shouldn't you let the others-what did you call them, the Kyn?- know you got away from the holy freaks?"

The bitter fact was that this human girl had done more for him than his own kind. "If my life mattered to them, they would not have left me to rot in the hands of my captors."

She said nothing for a long moment, and then asked, "Don't you have any family?"

Gabriel pushed away thoughts of Angelica. "My tresora, Dalente, looks after my estate in Toulouse. He is human, but I have complete faith in his loyalty. He will care for me, and arrange other matters as I need them."

One of her boots. .h.i.t the floor with a small thump. "You mean you guys really do use human servants? Like in all the vampire movies?"

"Our tresori do serve us by guarding us during the daytime and handling our affairs, but they are more like trusted friends."

Dalente would know what had happened to the Kyn in the two years since Gabriel's capture. Perhaps he would have him contact Michael Cyprien. If nothing else, Gabriel could persuade Michael to arrange a safe haven for him in America."We're not that far from Toulouse," Nick said. "I can take you tomorrow night."

If he spent much more time with her, he would not be able to let her go. "I will make my own way, thank you."

"You don't have any money," she informed him, "and even if I bought you a bus or train ticket, I don't think you want to travel that way. Not with all those green scars showing. People will freak out."

"I have Dalente keep cash and papers for me at the house," he said. "He will wire the money to me."

"Which you'd need identification to collect. Easier if I just take you home." Her voice moved closer. "How did they burn you like that?"

"They draped me with rosaries." Absently he brushed a hand over one of the hardened scars on his chest. During the first year of his captivity, the burning pain and open wounds caused by the copper beads had been a particular torment. Yet in time the pain gradually faded, until he felt little more than a drawing, warm sensation on his unmarked skin, and nothing where he had been previously burned.

"But..." Nick's slight weight tugged at the side of the bed as she sat on the edge. "I know crosses don't burn you guys. Why would rosaries do this?"

"They were strung with copper beads soaked in holy water." More knowledge she should not have, but Gabriel found himself abandoning his reservations and explaining the Kyn's sole weakness. "Copper is the only substance that can harm us. It can cut our flesh, poison us, and prolonged contact with it results in burns like these."

She touched his jaw. "Why didn't that copper gag turn your face green?"

"The metal was impure, copper mixed with tin or pot metal." He turned on his side to face her, and had a sudden startling suspicion that she was as naked as he. "I can cover my scars with clothing, and compel a human to drive me home. You need not worry."

"Hey." Nick caught his hand in hers. "Quit trying to get rid of me so fast. I've got wheels, contacts, and I know what you are and what you need. I'll be your tresora until we get to your place."

All of the things he imagined doing to her flashed through his mind, and not one of them fell within the boundaries of tresoran service. This need for her would take his control, and Nicola's life. He also despised the thought of making her play the role of his servant. "It would not be appropriate. I can only cause you harm."

"Well, you can try." She was not upset; she was laughing at him. "I have other ideas."

"That is not what I mean." Gabriel allowed his fingers to trace the fine tendons in the back of her hand. "Claudio will contact the Brethren as soon as he regains consciousness. He will report that I am gone and give them a description of you. Dalente will protect me, but you must leave France as soon as possible."

"I can handle the holy freaks," she countered, flopping down beside him. "Besides, I can see them coming. You can't."

The brush of her body revealed that she had indeed shed all of her garments, and intense curiosity speared him. Were he not so ashamed of using her as he had in the forest, he would be on top of her now, whispering to her as he eased her thighs apart and slid himself into the flower of wet, soft heat between them.

"Nicola, what happened between us..." He didn't know how to tell her that it wasn't enough, that he wanted more of her than she could possibly survive. It would be the same as throwing down a dare. "I should not have put my hands on you."

"Not a problem. You don't have to touch me again." She started to rise. "You'd better get some sleep.""No." Gabriel put an arm around her waist. "I meant, I should not have taken advantage of your kindness as I did."

"You know what, Gabriel?" She leaned close, until her sweet breath heated his mouth. "I'm not that f.u.c.king kind."

"I compelled you-"

"No one"-she rolled on top of him and straddled him, planting her hands on his shoulders-"makes me do anything. No matter how gorgeous and s.e.xy they are, or how great they talk."

She did not understand l'attrait, or the depth of his own yearning. "There are ways I can influence you without even meaning to."

"I do what I want, when I want, with whoever I want. Hey." She sat up, tucking the notch of her s.e.x on top of the half-hard ridge of his. "Maybe I'm the one using you. Did you ever think of that?"

"You make a poor choice. I can be of no use to you." Unless she kept wriggling about.

She bent down and kissed the tip of his nose. "You'd be surprised. I expect my vocabulary to improve two hundred percent by the time we get to Ma.r.s.eilles."