One With the Night (10 page)

What was he saying? He didn’t believe in love, either. She had been used more blatantly than most. He knew about being used. And he had had his way with women in his younger days. He hadn’t forced them. They were more than willing to spread their legs for a comely lad and they got their pleasure of him. But he hadn’t cared much about them. Now, whether love existed or not, it wasn’t possible for him. The kind of use he had experienced at Asharti’s hand erased all possibility of tender feelings. And he had responded to Asharti’s lust. He could no longer pretend he didn’t know just how base a man’s inclinations were.

He flipped through the notebook. The writing got shaky. He peered at it. Ahhh. The time she’d been infected. Sparse notes … how ill she was … no entry for nearly two weeks. And this one … it was splotched with … what? Her tears?

Papa told me tonight that the infection appears to be permanent. I have a parasite in my system now, and the only way to keep it at bay is to drink (a large splotch here that ran the ink) human blood. Indeed only Papa’s infecting donor blood with Mr. Rufford’s tainted sample has made enough to keep me alive to this point. My saliva has properties in common with South American bats. He didn’t like to tell me. But at that point I knew. I have become vampire. I will never be the same again.

Poor lass. He knew how she felt at that horrible realization. Only she had no one to tell her even what it meant. At least he had the society of other vampires made by Asharti, freed by her death and on the run in the desert of North Africa, adrift without her personality to drive them. Jane Blundell had nothing, no one. He paged ahead.

I shall strive to think of it as a disease. I cannot help but think myself star-crossed or ill-fated to have caught it. But I cannot believe it makes me the stuff of nightmares, unless I allow it to do so. Are not lepers vilified for their condition and exiled from human companionship? Surely, their disease is a trial, but I will not believe it is a judgment on them. Nor is my disease a judgment on me. I will find a way to go on. I will find a way to turn my fate into a force of good.

Callan found himself hoping that Blundell found the cure as much for the girl as for himself. He should not have mocked her for calling it a disease. That was her way of dealing with her tragedy. She had courage. More than he had, perhaps. And for that very reason, he hoped she might be spared as many horrors as possible.

He heard footsteps on the stairs. He snapped the book shut and braced himself.

But it was only Blundell. “Well, boy, are you ready for a day of testing?”

“You’re up early, Doctor,” Callan said in relief.

“Strike while the iron is hot, so they say,” the doctor replied, looking around and rubbing his hands. “Can you make it up to the laboratory in the daylight?”

Callan nodded. “I’ll wrap myself in a blanket.” It would be painful. But he was eager to get on with it. Death or redemption was at hand.

*   *   *

“Sit.” Blundell gestured to a stool that might once have belonged to a milkmaid churning butter. “I’ll just heat up my mixture.” He turned to the forest of glassware and lit a lamp set under a flask filled with a vaguely green liquid.

Callan sat and tried to quiet his mind. “What’s in it?”

“No, no. I won’t tell you that. It might prejudice your reaction.”

More likely Blundell thought he’d refuse to drink it. The green liquid began to bubble in its flask almost immediately.

“Excellent,” the doctor muttered. He removed the vial and poured the liquid into a thick pottery cup, blowing on it to cool it. “Now spread out that blanket on the floor over there. I don’t want you near the glass, in case of thrashing.”

Thrashing? Callan swallowed. He stood and spread out the blanket as instructed.

“I’d tie you up, but I can’t think what would hold you, as strong as you are. Still, you’d better take off your clothes before you lie down.”

“Ye want me ta strip?”

“Well, in case you soil yourself, you won’t want to ruin your clothing.”

Callan set his mouth and took off his clothing while Blundell pulled out a leather book. Blundell handed the cup to Callan, then dipped his pen in an inkstand. Callan laid his length along the blanket. Excitement warred with fear in his belly. He propped himself on one elbow and, allowing himself only a pause to suck in a breath, he upended the beaker and gulped the bitter liquid.

The burning in his chest as the liquid made its way down his gullet made him drop the beaker with a gasp. It shattered, spraying glass. He curled over as the first wrenching spasms hit.

“What are you feeling?” Blundell barked.

“Twisting … twisting in my gut,” he gasped. “Burning.” He broke out in a sweat.

“That’s the strychnine.” Blundell scribbled furiously.

“Strychnine? Man, ha’ ye … lost yer … mind?” Callan was finding it difficult to breathe.

“The poison must be strong to kill the creature. I distilled this from rat poison.”

Callan writhed and cradled his belly with both arms, groaning. “Ye’ve killed me, man.”

“There’s always that danger, of course.” Blundell peered at him. “But I added other ingredients to mitigate the effect, as well.”

Callan couldn’t respond. He twisted his body, groaning and straining against the pain. He was afraid he’d die in the next thirty seconds and then afraid he wouldn’t. He dared not call to his Companion. He didn’t want it to save him, or itself. Still, he felt it rise inside him. The pain went on, though, on and on. It seemed as though his intestines were being drawn out and hacked about. He strained against the pain. He could feel the veins standing out in his temples, his neck. He was about to burst. And then the room went slowly red.

With a kind of silent whoosh, the pain ramped down to manageable. Callan collapsed, barely conscious. The red film drained away from his eyes. Blundell was kneeling over him, saying something. The old man’s figure was blurry, as though seen through water. Blundell pulled up Callan’s eyelids and peered into his eyes. He … he was asking a question. Callan didn’t care. The pain receded further. Or was it Callan who receded? Everything receded until all he could see was a tiny dot of light in the blackness. And then only blackness.

*   *   *

Someone was making noise. Clinking. The clinking echoed dreadfully and made his head throb. He wanted the noise to stop. He opened his mouth to shout at whoever was making the noise, but only a faint moan issued forth. That was strange.

He cracked open his eyelids. Blurry light resolved itself into a lamp. The flame was reflected everywhere. The clinking stopped. A figure blocked out the refracted light.

“Are you all right, man?” the voice boomed. It made him shut his eyes again.

Wait! That was Blundell’s voice. And Callan lay on a blanket on the floor with another thrown over him. Glass flasks and tubes were refracting the light.

“Am I cured?” he croaked, trying to get up on one elbow. Hands pushed him down.

“I’m afraid not.” The voice sounded more normal.

With a supreme effort, he made it up on his right elbow. “How d’ye know?” The doctor was wrong. He had to be wrong! All that pain
must
have killed his Companion, and he was definitely still alive. His aching head told him so.

“Empirical evidence, my boy.” Blundell took a small knife, grabbed Callan’s left wrist and cut his forearm. A single sear of pain seemed unimportant compared to what he had just endured. A cut. No more. What evidence was that? And then the cut slowly sealed itself.

Callan’s shoulders sagged.

Blundell patted his bare shoulder. “That was only the first trial. I never really thought it would work. But studying the reaction of your body was extremely useful. The poison seems to take its normal course. Then the parasite raised its power, and neutralized the poison. Was there still some pain at that point?”

“Aye,” he muttered. “Though no’ sa bad as at first.”

“The intestines were still damaged, I expect. It no doubt took some time for the parasite to regenerate the lacerated tissue.”

“Nae doubt,” Callan said, trying to achieve wry.

“How do you feel now?”

“Tired.”

“Don’t worry, boy. I have some ideas. We’ll keep at it until we find the right formula.”

Callan found that prospect daunting.

“Rest now,” Blundell instructed. “We’ll get you back to the house before Jane wakes.”

Callan fell back onto the blanket.

God help him.

But he had no hope of that.

*   *   *

Jane woke in the late afternoon to sounds of movement in the house. They came from the kitchen below. She could hear men’s voices. Papa and Mr. Kilkenny.

“I need some herbs gathered tonight. Are you up to it?” her father was saying.

“Aye. But I dinnae know much about plants.”

Jane jumped out of bed and began to dress as quickly as she could.

“Jane knows her plants,” her father said.

“Then she can go.”

“I’ll not have her wandering about alone with those creatures about.” Didn’t he know that she and Kilkenny were “those creatures,” too? “You’ll have to go with her.”

“Th’ point of me staying was ta protect ye and yer laboratory.”

Jane pulled on her shoes and dragged a brush ruthlessly through her hair. She had no time to dress it. She would not be talked of as though she were some dreadful obligation.

“Jane is my only reason for finding a cure.” Her father’s voice was hard. “If anything happens to her, I warn you, I shouldn’t feel obligated to continue.”

Jane hurried down the stairs.

“Verra well.” Kilkenny sounded tired. “I’ll go with her. I’ll rig up a whistle. Ye blow it, if ye need me.”

“I doubt you could get here fast enough to do any good, Mr. Kilkenny,” Jane said, pushing through the kitchen door. They were sitting at the long table. Her father had a cup of tea, and Kilkenny a tankard of ale. She was struck immediately by how haggard Kilkenny looked. His hair was a tangle of dark curls, his shirt was stained with sweat, and there were faint circles under his eyes. His fight with the vampire must have taken more out of him than he let on. There was a half-empty bottle of blood on the chopping block. Her father must have gotten it in the daylight. That should have refreshed Kilkenny.

“I’ll get here, as long as we’re nae farther than five miles,” he said grimly.

How? He was hiding something again. However would she get him to answer all her questions? The man was stubborn: a very unattractive trait. “I’m more than capable of getting whatever you need, Papa. Haven’t I walked all over these hills and valleys?”

“Carns and glens, if ye dinnae want ta sound foreign.”

Maddening man! “I have no desire to blend in with the locals,” she said with some asperity. “As soon as Papa finds the cure, we will be shut of this dreary place.”

Kilkenny chuffed a scornful laugh. “I would no’ be packing just yet.”

“Well, then, I should think it important to get Papa whatever he needs.” She turned to her father. “I don’t need any help from this … person, Papa. What shall I search out?”

Her father stood. “I’ll not tell you Jane, unless you give me your solemn word that you won’t stir from the yard without Kilkenny. I can’t be worrying about you. It distracts me.”

Her father would never believe any objection Jane might make to Kilkenny’s company on account of propriety in light of the way she had always railed against the restrictions placed on females. Jane sighed. Walking the hillsides alone with Mr. Kilkenny would be difficult for more reasons than she could count. “Very well, Papa.”

He slapped the table with both palms, rising. “Excellent. I think …
Amanita virosa
and
Amanita phalloides
. Either or both. As many as you can find.”

That made Jane open her eyes. Those were probably the most poisonous mushrooms in the British Isles. She forced a smile. It wouldn’t do to let Mr. Kilkenny know about that. Why make him fearful of the cure he wanted so badly? She nodded to her father. “Let’s see. They need damp but acid soil, and they grow in the leaves under trees. Perhaps by the river or … up at the Falls of Divach?”

“I’d try the falls. The moisture in the air would make a good environment for
Amanitas
. And can you find me some
Atropa belladonna
?”

Deadly nightshade? What dreadful concoction was he brewing? She nodded. “First thing after dinner, then,” Jane said shortly, glancing to Mr. Kilkenny to dare him to protest. He only lifted his brows.

“I’ll take dinner in my room, my dear. It’s been quite a day.” Her father sighed and rose.

She stood on tiptoe to kiss his forehead. “I’ll bring it in directly.”

She tied on an apron and bent to check the pot of hare stew she had left simmering all day on the coals as her father headed upstairs. She could feel Kilkenny behind her. She stirred it. Good, it hadn’t stuck to the bottom. It had parsnips and carrots in it. With some roasted potatoes that would make a fine meal. She went down into the root cellar, relieved to escape Kilkenny’s eyes. When she came up with an apron full of potatoes, he was sipping his ale, considering.

“Where did a lass like ye learn housekeeping?”

“Oh, it’s a question now, is it? You who don’t answer anything want answers?” She lifted her brows, mocking.

He looked down at his tankard. He seemed embarrassed or ashamed. As well he should. She had already answered questions about how she was made vampire. But had he? He had not. And what of the scars on his body? He kept himself a mystery. All she had wanted yesterday were the facts related to being a vampire. But there were more than facts involved, weren’t there now? There might be suffering and doubt. Suddenly she thought she might want to know about Mr. Kilkenny’s feelings and experience as much as she wanted the bare facts about vampirism.

In truth, she was going about this all the wrong way. Instead of antagonizing him, she should draw him out about himself; let him get to know her in return. Then he’d feel comfortable enough to tell her anything she wanted to know.