The Bleeding Dusk (29 page)

“Now that your curiosity is assuaged,” he murmured, “can we get on with our task?”

And with that he pushed away from the wall, away from her, and, presenting her with his back, crouched to pick up the forgotten shard. He had it up and in his pocket before Victoria had quite caught her breath or thought to demand the splinter back.

Her fingers trembled and her knees were wobbly—and by God, she was nearly panting— but she propelled herself away from the wall before he could turn to see the dazed look on her face.

But she needn't have worried; he barely glanced at her before making that sharp Max gesture that told her to follow him. “We've wasted enough time. It's getting close to sunset,” he tossed over his shoulder as he started off again along the stone wall.

The same stone wall of which there were now little bits of mortar wedged beneath her fingernails.

+ Sixteen +

In Which Lady Melly's Courtship Takes on a New Twist

The Conte Regalado
, or Alberto, as he'd insisted she call him, was the most charming man Lady Melisande Grantworth had had the pleasure to meet. Or be courted by.

And she was indeed being courted by the bald but dapper Italian count.

The first time she'd met him, when he found her and Winnie and Nilly in the depths of that spooky old villa, he'd been gallant and gracious—and even though he hadn't actually taken them to find the treasure and had disappeared most inexplicably, he'd still been intriguing and kind.

And well turned. Indeed, perfectly groomed, with his small, trimmed black mustache and the briefest of beards. His clothing was expensive and fashionable, he wasn't too tall, and best of all, he had a lovely accent.

Then, of course, there was the day following the treasure hunt at the Villa Palombara, when, instead of calling on her, he'd only sent flowers…that had had her sniffing in disdain. The men in London had done the same; even Jellington had thought to woo her interests by plying her with flowers and jewels and the like.

But Lady Melly desired much more than cold fripperies and greenery that would die after a day or two in a vase. She wanted companionship, and wit, and above all, a man who worshiped her.

“He should be here any moment.” Nilly squealed, her pale face flushed with excitement. She was peering out the window of Melly's dressing room from between lacy curtains, watching the street below for a sign of the
conte's
barouche as her friend was putting the final touches on her toilette.

“I cannot imagine where he is going to take you on such a horrific afternoon. Why, there isn't a sunbeam to be seen, and the air is positively gray with rain,” Winnie said disdainfully from her chair in the corner. “Your hair will be droopy, and those bonnet feathers! They'll be plastered to your head before you climb into his carriage.”

“The Conte Regalado offered to drive me to see the Colosseum, and perhaps to Janiculum Hill. I am certain, though we might be a bit chilly, that we shan't be wet at all.”

“The
conte?
I thought you were to call him
Alberrrrto.”
Winnie sniffed, but a smile hovered about her lips.

“Alberto, then.” But Melly smiled at the mirror, admiring her dimples as well as the slight pink to her cheeks.

“He's here!”

Winnie hauled herself to her feet and lumbered to the window. “Indeed, he is, dressed as though he were going to the theater. Well, I hope you shall return before supper tonight so that we can hear all of the details before bedtime.”

“And I,” said Melly, flouncing toward the door as if she were once again a young debutante, “hope I don't.” She paused to look back at them. “After all,I am a widow, we aren't in London, and he is very handsome. Perhaps we shall take an extended drive.”

Nilly squealed again, but this time with disappointment. “Don't frighten him away, Melly!”

Winnie laughed. “The poor man hasn't a chance with our Melly on his trail,” she said fondly, watching her oldest and dearest friend sweep down the stairs with more energy than she herself had ever possessed. “I only hope this turns out better than the last matchmaking she did—with Victoria and Rockley.”

Nilly nodded. “But of course it will.”

The two ladies were beginning to make their way down the stairs to the parlor when Victoria's maid—the one with the unfortunate bushy orange hair—appeared.

“Excuse me, madam. Your Grace,” she said, bobbing a curtsy.

Startled that she should have spoken to them, the two women swiveled their heads in unison.

“Yes?” asked Winnie in her duchess voice, pausing on the stairs, one hand clutching the handrail.

“I don' mean to interrupt,” said the maid with a bit less deference than Winnie would have expected. “But…did ye say that Lady Melly was going with a
conte
?”
Regalado's title came out sounding like “con-tayy,” but Winnie knew what the bold-faced girl meant.

“Yes.” Again the imperious duchess tone.

“Oh, dear…the Conte Reg'lado?”

“Yes!” Winnie was becoming impatient. “If you have something to say, spit it out. I cannot stand here all the day long. It's nearly time for tea.”

“Oh…Your Grace…Lady Melly is in grave danger.” The maid's eyes were sparkling blue, and her round cheeks were flushed pink.

“Why, what do you mean?” Nilly spoke at last in a soft little sort of gasp.

“The Contay Reg'lado…why, we must help my lady!” As if suddenly galvanized into action, she whirled, starting down the hall in the opposite direction.

Lady Winnie's imperative voice stopped her. “Young miss, I daresay you'd best not run off without telling us exactly of what you're speaking!”

“Beggin' yer pardon, Your Grace, but milady's in great danger, an' we have to help her,” she said over her shoulder, then opened the door to Victoria's bedchamber and dressing room. She disappeared inside, disregarding the other women.

“Danger? From what?” Winnie didn't want to believe the little maid, but when she came back out of Victoria's bedchamber holding something that looked like a wooden stake, her heart nearly stopped.

“What are you doing with that?” asked Nilly faintly.

The maid was slipping on a large silver cross. “I'm goin' vampire huntin'.”

 

+ + +

Zavier waited in the heavy afternoon drizzle, a hat he would normally disdain tipped low over his face to keep the rain from getting in his eyes. The chankin and wet didn't bother him at all; growing up in the Highlands, he'd had enough of it so that he'd become immune. The hat, something with a curling brim a London numpty would wear to protect his sensitive skin, served another purpose altogether: to keep his face from being seen.

He wasn't certain how long he'd have to wait. Despite the miserable weather, his worst discomfort came from the memories that plagued him, since he had nothing to do but think about things as he stood there, tucked into a nook between two narrow plastered buildings.

The carnage was bad enough…the image of Mansur sprawled on the brown grass, drenched in his dark blood, made Zavier's own blood churn and his stomach swish as though he were drunk from too much whiskey.

A
waste, A fagging bloody waste.

And a betrayal.

Victoria wasn't seeing clearly. She couldn't be. She wasn't weak like that, and Zavier wasn't about to watch her tumble further. Aye, she'd hurt him; he could accept that, though it still burned his gut. But he couldn't accept that it had been with the arse-dicht Vioget. The boughin' bastard who couldn't dirty his hands enough to fight with his kin. Unbelievably, apparently, he was a Gardella too, from somewhere back in the ages of his family. They all were.

How could he have turned his back on them?

The arse-dicht and Victoria had been locked away for too long in the same small chamber where Vioget had been held during the battle outside Santo Quirinus. They'd been in there so long it made Zavier's fingers tighten into one another, his short, blunt nails creasing his leathery palms.

He didn't want to think about the boseying that was going on in there. But he couldn't help it.

It made his head spin as if he were rubbered.

So he took himself outside and waited in the rain, and hoped for it to help make him a bit steadier.

But the anger built inside, simmered, sometimes roaring into his ears as he remembered the deaths last night, the intimacy and the expression he saw on her face when she was with Vioget. The Venator betrayer.

He didn't believe Wayren when she said he wasn't the cause of the attack. How else could it have happened?

It was well nigh onto noon when Zavier sighted his quarry. He waited until he walked past, head foolishly bent against the rain so he didn't notice when Zavier slipped from the corner of a building to follow.

Fool.

Perhaps it was best that he'd stayed away from the Venators if he was that careless.

Zavier stayed in the distance behind him, considering his options. He knew little about Vioget, but what he did know was enough to identify the influence behind the bastard and his defection: the legendary Beauregard.

Zavier's hand searched the depths of his pocket, fumbling for the stake there. It was just about time the vampire met his own damnation. He'd be pleased to help him. And whoever else dared get in his way.

 

+ + +

“Where is the key?” Max asked as Victoria approached. Her skirts were drenched to her knees and so were her shoes. She should have found a pair of boots to wear before leaving the Consilium, but it was too late now.

They had reached the stone wall on which the Door of Alchemy stood, after traipsing quickly through the tangled gardens with Max in the lead. He'd seemed to be in a great hurry to get here, and Victoria, who couldn't quite tell where the sun was because of the clouds, didn't argue. She was still more than a bit unsteady from the kiss they'd shared.

Although
shared
wasn't exactly the word to describe the experience.
Received,
perhaps. Became immersed in. Was surprised by. Nearly lost her balance because of. Had her entire—

“Victoria.”

She snapped her attention back to the matter at hand, realizing he'd asked a second time. “It's here.” She had to shrug out of her heavy man's coat in order to get to the armband, which was pushed up under the long sleeve of her simple gown.

Max watched as she pulled off the wide silver armband and then bent it at the small hinge that divided its two halves. When the bracelet opened, the key was there on the inside of the cuff, fitted into a small nook.

Victoria thumbed it out and handed it to Max, who kept looking darkly at the sky. “Let's hurry,” he said, taking the tablike key and pushing the scrubby bushes away from the door.

He knelt as Victoria had done a week ago, when she'd come with Ylito and Wayren, and scratched away the moss and dirt so the small metal tab would fit into its place.

As he worked, Victoria examined the other two keyholes—one had been filled before, and the other she hadn't examined until now. She could see only the back edges of the flat little keys—for, once slipped into the narrow openings, the thin metal rectangles fit into place and couldn't be removed until the door was opened.

“Ah.” Max pulled to his feet and glanced at her. “Shall we?”

He grasped the round stone disk in the center of the door and began to turn it. When the circle actually moved in a clockwise direction, Victoria found herself holding her breath. She couldn't quite believe the door would actually open.

There was a dull clunk, and Max glanced at her with a sharp nod. And then the door rolled to the side.

To her surprise he stepped back and let her enter first. Doing so, Victoria walked directly into a screen of cobwebs. Hiding an automatic shudder as she pushed away the stickiness, she brushed furiously at her arms and hair to make certain none of the spiders were crawling on her.

“You're afraid of spiders?” Max said, amusement coloring his voice.

“I'm not afraid…Ugh!” She barely held back a shriek as one danced across her hand and she whipped it to the floor. “I don't like them. They're like little vampires, sucking blood. And they have too many legs.”

Once she'd cleaned herself off she stepped completely through the door and stood inside a dark chamber that smelled of age and damp. But she needn't have feared, for just at the edge of the doorway was a sconce. Below it was a small tin kettle and a little table with flint and a coil of very old thread to start a flame.

There was oil in the kettle, and she lifted it off its hook, pouring some onto the dry, brittle sconce. Max stepped in to help light a small piece of tinder, and only moments after the door was opened they had a blazing torch.

“Let's close the door,” she said. The back of her neck wasn't chilled, but it was best to take no chances. She had no idea how long they would be here.

The stone door rumbled back into its place, and Max said, “Bring the light here. I think we can remove the keys from the inside.”

She did, angling it over his shoulder as he bent toward the inside of the middle of the door. A few quick movements, the dull scrape of stone on stone, followed by a small grunt, and he produced the little silver key they had just slipped into its place on the outside of the door.

“Clever…so that one cannot get locked inside,” he said. She held the light and he removed the other two keys—one in gold and one in bronze—and slipped them into his pocket.

Then he stood and they were facing each other in the small circle of light dancing around the dusty chamber.

“Let me have the shard,” she said, resisting the urge to step away even as her lungs constricted.

“Didn't you learn anything from last time?”

Victoria bristled, drawing herself back to argue, but he reached out, captured her left wrist, and said, “Look.”