Anathema (Causal Enchantment, #1) (44 page)

I hesitated, not knowing how to answer. “I’m
still in shock, I think. There’s been a few big … surprises of
late,” I said, eyeing him as I poked the mysterious–looking stew
with my fork. I had no appetite.

“
Okay, go ahead,” he prompted,
smirking.

“
Why British?” I finally
asked.

He chuckled, thoroughly amused.

A heavy wooden side door burst open then, and
one of the yetis stepped through, bringing an icy gust of wind and
a dusting of snow in with him. I shivered responsively.

“
Cold?” Leo asked. He flicked his
hand toward the rustic stone fireplace across from us, and flames
instantly erupted among the logs.

I frowned. It wasn’t a gas fireplace. There
were no remote controls that could do that.

Leo winked at me.

Realization hit me. I gasped. “You were the
voice I heard chanting with Sofie,” I whispered, my eyes bulging.
“You’re a witch?”

“
I prefer warlock or sorcerer. I’m
not in the least bit feminine,” Leo answered casually.

“
How …” I croaked, my voice barely
audible.

“
Oh, there’ll be plenty of time to
get into the ‘hows’ while we’re exiled here; tonight is not the
time for that. I may have been pretending to be the perfect
gentleman’s man but I wasn’t faking being old. These bones of mine
need a good rest after the exertion of transporting us here.
Especially those four horses.” He nodded in Max’s
direction.

I looked at Max with narrowed eyes. “Did you
know?” Max found that question funny for some reason, making that
odd half grunt, half snort that was supposed to be laughter.
He
knew!
I scowled at him. “Do Viggo and Mortimer
know?”

“
No, no, no … They
didn’t
.”
Leo shook his head. “They do now, though. Our Sofie—she’s a cunning
one. She surreptitiously planted me in their service about fifteen
years ago.”

“
You pretended to be a British
butler for fifteen years?” I said incredulously.

Leo took a seat by the fireplace and pulled out
a pipe. “Viggo is particular about his butlers. They have to be
‘authentic.’ It was the only way.”

“
I thought your kind despised
vampires,” I murmured, recalling Sofie referring to witches and
vampires as the Montagues and the Capulets.

“
That’s true. But my allegiance will
always be with Sofie.” He smiled mysteriously, reminiscing fondly
about something.

“
How” was about to leave my mouth
again but he waved it off before I could utter a sound. “Another
time, please,” he said, puffing on his pipe, now lit.

I nodded, biting my bottom lip in frustration.
“Can I at least ask where we are?”

He bellowed laughter. “You can ask a thousand
times and I won’t tell you.”

My eyes narrowed. I glanced at Max.

“
And he won’t tell you either,” Leo
warned, eyeing my guard dog. “So don’t pester him to
death.”

“
I could order him. I’m his master,”
I responded haughtily.

“
And he’ll ignore you, on grounds
that he is protecting you best by leaving you in the dark,” Leo
answered, equally smug.

It’s true,
I heard Max say.
I’ve
learned the loopholes.

I sighed. What was the point of being a master
if my subordinate was keeping secrets and obeying only when
convenient? Another set of pressing questions popped into my head.
“Do you know what happened back there? Is Sofie alive? Are my
friends alive?”

“
Sofie is still alive. We are linked
through magic. I would have felt it, otherwise. As for the others,
all I can say is that Sofie successfully wired the building with
Merth. No vampire is getting in or out of there.”

“
So they’re all going to live in
there?” I asked, screwing my face up as I pictured over a hundred
vampires—most of them likely homicidal, blood–crazed maniacs right
now—touring around the place.

“
Yup! One big, bloodsucking kibbutz.
That is, if they don’t all kill each other.” He quickly added as my
eyes widened in fear, “Don’t worry, I’m sure they’ll all be full of
love and joy, now that they have human blood again.” I noted the
sarcasm in his voice. “Besides, they have enough blood in there to
supply the whole lot of them for a few months, and Sofie can get
more. They
should
be able to manage.”

I nodded. “So how long am I a prisoner here?”
My eyes roamed the dimly lit, rustic room. Though much simpler in
taste than Viggo and Mortimer’s place, my second prison appeared
equally comfortable.

Leo sighed. “I’m not sure how many years it
will be yet. It all depends on Sofie.”

“
Years?” I shrieked.

“
Calm down,” he said, patting the
air. “Let me explain. You see, we’re in quite the pickle now. If
Sofie and I hadn’t brought you here, I can guarantee that you would
already be dead. If not by the hands of Mortimer and Viggo—they’re
proficient in getting what they want—then by the fangs of a hundred
or so vampires you inadvertently brought back with you. They’re not
stable right now. Not even your friends. You saw that, firsthand.”
He paused to puff on his pipe again.

I shuddered as the vision of Caden’s veiny red
eyes flashed through my mind.

“
It would be like covering yourself
in pink frosting and sitting down with a group of three–year–olds,”
he added.

“
I still don’t understand what
happened,” I muttered. “There were only supposed to be nineteen and
that was because I had no other choice! The pendant told me they
had to be touching the statue and then …” My voice drifted off as
understanding dawned. I gasped. “They’ve all touched the statue at
some point! They didn’t have to be touching it right at that
moment, though. I misunderstood!”

“
Not surprising. Those spells are
tricky buggers to figure out,” Leo muttered around the pipe in his
mouth. “You were likely too excited to distinguish the details of
the pendant’s hints. Your biggest worry right now is Mortimer and
Viggo. They’ll stop at nothing to free Veronique. They don’t have
all the details but they do know they need that pendant. By now
they’ll likely have figured out the rest. But they’re not your only
worry. This Rachel character … Believe me, she won’t forget about
you. Killing you is about as important to her as human blood.
Revenge—it’s an ugly thing for these creatures. From what Sofie has
told me, you did a number on her.” Leo chuckled.

“
You don’t know the half of it,” I
grumbled, realizing my deal with Mage to leave her behind hadn’t
won me any brownie points. “I hope Sofie kills her.” I silently
prayed that she had thrown Rachel into that massive pyre that
erupted around the statue. Otherwise Caden would never be safe with
her around.

Leo took another long draw on his pipe. “Listen
to you—vampire–slayer.” He chuckled through a swirl of smoke. “And
then let’s not forget about the elusive Ursula, whom we can’t track
because she’s hopping through human host bodies like she’s riding a
public transit system. You are the ultimate means of torturing
Sofie, a goal that drives her entire existence.

“
So you see, as much as you would
like to go see Sofie and these friends of yours—I’m sure this Caden
fellow would be pleasant under different circumstances—it’s simply
not an option. And as much as we would all like to see you happy,
seeing you alive is more important. We will remain here until Sofie
has figured out a way to get that blasted necklace off your neck
safely, and no amount of begging and pleading will do you any good.
So don’t bother, kiddo.”

I swallowed. This imprisonment was even worse
than before. At least before, I could escape every night to see
Caden. Now, in this winter abyss, I had no means of contact, no way
of making sure they were okay, nothing to remind me of them except
my memories and a stack of four–by–sixes. “When my friends get over
this whole blood–crazed thing … can they come here?”

Leo got up and strolled over to place his hand
on my shoulder. He squeezed lightly. “It’s not something that
happens overnight, Evangeline. You know that by now. We’re not sure
how well they’ll adjust. They could be like baby vampires and,
well, they usually spend the first twenty or so years lurking in
shadows before they have some level of control.”

“
So what are you saying? I can’t see
them for the next twenty years? I’ll be … old! You may as well have
let Mortimer and Viggo kill me!” I cried. A new flood of tears
overwhelmed me.

“
No, no, I’m not saying that at all.
Don’t get all wound up,” Leo shushed me. “But … do you even want to
see them after Caden tried … after that?” his voice had turned
gentle.

“
I … I don’t know,” I answered
truthfully. “No, wait! Of course. It wasn’t his fault! He had
warned me.”

“
Evangeline!” Leo shook his head in
exasperation, but then began chuckling. “I see what Sofie meant …”
he said to himself. “You’ve changed, but you haven’t changed …” He
dropped his hand. “Your friends will come looking for you when the
time is right and Mortimer and Viggo can’t track them. We just hope
that, when they do find you, they can control themselves. Otherwise
the dogs and I will have to kill them, no question about
it.”

I looked down at my stew, then set my fork down
and pushed the plate away. I buried my face in my arms. Leo’s hand
settled on my head, patting me gently. It was a small comfort, but
he was trying. I turned and looked up at the old man, my appointed
guardian, wiping away tears. “What am I supposed to do,
Leo?”

He smiled. That smile, at least, I recognized
as his. “Trust us.”

“
F
orgive
me,” I whispered, knowing my words never reached her ears. She was
already gone. Safe. Safely away from this deadly atrium. Safe from
Mortimer and Viggo. Safe from me.

Now for damage control …

I scanned the crowd of a hundred–odd depraved
vampires, their eyes wild with varying degrees of bewilderment and
crazed bloodlust after the briefest scent of a human. There! Four
familiar faces; the four who needed to survive. Relief washed over
me.
Thank God for those pictures.

I closed my eyes, searching for the one last
thread of energy I needed to cast another spell.
Ah …
I
grasped a miniscule, glowing purple helix coil, much like a DNA
strand, floating beside my heart, and yanked with my mental hand.
It immediately shot up to my fingertips. Armed with magic, I raised
my hand toward Veronique’s tomb within the brightly burning pyre.
With a thought, embers leaped out to soar toward my fingertips as
if magnetized.

And then I struck.

The sparks shot from my fingers and erupted
into six foot–high circles of flame, forming a formidable barrier
of protection around Evangeline’s friends—large enough not to
ignite them but tight enough to keep them from leaping out and
making a run for it.

“
Sofie?” Mortimer hollered
uncertainly.

I turned toward him. His face a mask of shock,
he stood next to Viggo, both frozen like ice sculptures, both
struggling to grasp the events of the past ten seconds. I knew that
confusion would quickly give way to understanding, and retaliation
would follow.

I’ll deal with them later.
For my
sister’s sake, they needed to survive. And for my sake, in an
indirect fashion. With another flick of my hand, three flaming
circles formed—one around each of them and the last around myself.
There. That should hold them until I’m
finished.

Now, elimination.

From the corner of my eye, I caught the
telltale silvery white hair and hideous features of a mutant. I
shuddered, finding their very existence repulsive but worse,
knowing the Merth–laced building couldn’t confine them. The last
thing we needed were those monsters running loose in New York,
especially with the People’s Sentinel watching us.

Flames shot out from my fingertips and struck
the hideous creature, igniting his body as if it were made from
tissue paper. His one short scream—the shrill sound of death—echoed
through the atrium, sending a chill down my spine. I didn’t let it
distract me from my focus, though. Spotting two more mutants, I
quickly dispatched them as well.

Heads started to turn as the screams attracted
the attention of the other vampires. Soon enough, they’d figure out
the fate I had in store for them. Then I’d have mass hysteria and
vampires hiding in every nook and cranny in this place. I didn’t
have time to hunt them all down individually.

Fiery sparks flew freely from my fingertips,
landing on any vampire in sight. Within seconds, dozens of flaming
bodies were thrashing on the ground, scorching the leaves and
petals of the atrium’s plants and engulfing any vampires caught too
near. But I knew there were more vampires out there in Viggo’s
urban jungle, out of my view.

There was only one thing left to do. I had to
torch the entire atrium, then hope I could control the fire enough
that the entire building didn’t go up in flames. Inhaling deeply,
reconciled to the plan, I raised both hands.