Chapter 14
Blair debated between the river and the tub. The river was very likely freezing, and that would be a bitch. But she just couldn’t resign herself to having some servant haul up steaming buckets of water, to pour them into what essentially would be a bigger bucket. Then after she’d bathed, they’d have to repeat the whole deal in reverse.
It was just too weird.
Still, after several hours working with a bunch of men, she needed soap and water.
Was that too much to ask?
“You did very well.” Moira fell into step beside her. “I know this must be frustrating for you, like starting over. And with men who feel, in some ways, they already know as much—if not more—than you. But you did very well. You’ve made a fine start.”
“Most of those guys are in good to excellent shape, and that’s a plus. But the bulk of them still think it’s a game, for the most part. Just don’t believe. That’s a big strike in the minus column.”
“Because they haven’t seen. They know of my mother, but many still believe—need to believe—it was some sort of wild dog. It might be if I hadn’t seen myself what killed her, I could refuse to believe it.”
“It’s easier to refuse. Refusing is one of the reasons Jeremy’s dead now.”
“Aye. That’s why I think people need to see, need to believe. We need to hunt down the ones that killed the queen, the ones that have killed others since that night. We need to bring at least one of them back here.”
“You want to take one alive?”
“I do.” Moira remembered how Cian had once pulled a vampire into the training room, then stood back so the rest of them would have to fight it. And understand it. “It will make a point.”
“Not impossible to refuse what’s in front of your face, but harder.” Blair thought it through quickly. “Okay. I’ll go out tonight.”
“Not alone. Don’t, don’t,” Moira said wearily when Blair started to argue. “You’re used to hunting alone, capable of hunting alone. But you don’t know the land here. They will by now. I’ll go with you.”
“You’ve got a point, and a strong one. But no, you’re not the one for this hunt. I’m not saying you’re not capable either. But you’re not the best when it comes to close-in fighting. It’ll have to be Larkin, and I’ll need Cian.”
In a gesture of annoyance, Moira tugged a blossom from a bush. “Now you have the strong point. I feel I’ve done nothing but matters of state since I’ve come home.”
“You’ve got my sympathy. But I think that kind of thing has to be important, too. Statesmen—women—people—they raise armies. You’ve already taken steps to move people out of what’s going to be a war zone. That’s saving lives, Moira.”
“I know it. I do. But…”
“Who’s going to stir up the general population, fire them up into putting their lives on the line? We’ll train them, Moira. But you’ve got to get them to us.”
“You’re right, I know.”
“I’ll get you a vampire—two if I can manage it. You get me people I can teach to kill one. But right now, I’ve got to wash up. A vamp could smell me a half a mile away.”
“I’ll have a bath readied for you, in your chambers.”
“I was thinking I’d just use the river.”
“Are you mad?” Finally, Moira’s face relaxed into a smile. “The river’s freezing this time of year.”
I t was never comfortable for Moira to speak with Cian. Not just because of what he was, as she’d reconciled herself to that. She thought of it, when she thought of him, as a condition; a kind of disease.
At their first meeting he had saved her life, and since had proven himself again and again.
His kind had murdered her mother, and yet he had fought beside her, had risked his life—or more accurately his existence—in doing so.
No, she couldn’t hold what he was against him.
Still there was something inside her, something she couldn’t quite see clearly, or study, or understand. Whatever it was made her uneasy, even nervy around him.
He knew it, or sensed it, she was sure. For he was so much cooler to her than the others. It was so rare that he would spare her a smile, or an easy word.
After the attack on their way to Geall, he’d swooped her up off the ground. His arms were the arms of a man. Flesh and blood, strong and real.
“Hold on,” he’d said. And that was all.
She’d ridden with him to the castle, and his body had been that of a man. Lean and hard. And her heart had been raging for so many reasons, she’d been afraid to touch him.
What had he said to her then, in that sharp, impatient voice of his?
Oh yes: Get a grip on me before you fall on your ass again. I haven’t bitten you yet, have I?
It had made her embarrassed and ashamed, and grateful he couldn’t see the color flame into her cheeks.
Likely he’d have had something cutting to say about her virginal blushes as well.
Now she had to go to him, to ask him for help. It wasn’t something she would pass off to Blair, or Larkin, certainly not to a servant. It was her duty to face him, to speak the words, ask the boon.
She would ask him to leave the castle, the comfort and safety of it, and go out into a strange land to hunt one of his own.
And he would do it, she knew, already she knew he would do it. Not for her—the request of a princess, the favor of a friend. He would do it for the others. For the whole of it.
She went alone. The women who attended her wouldn’t approve, of course, and would consider the idea of their princess alone in a man’s bedchamber unseemly, even shocking.
Such matters were no longer an issue for Moira. What would her ladies think if they knew she’d once fed him blood when he was wounded?
She imagined they would shriek and hide their faces—those who didn’t swoon away. But they would have to look straight on at such things very soon. Or face much worse.
Her shoulders went tight as she stepped to the door of his chamber. But she knocked briskly, then stood to wait.
When he opened the door, the lights from the corridor washed over his face, and plunged the rest into shadow. She saw the faintest flicker of surprise come and go in his eyes as he studied her.
“Well, look at you. I barely recognized you. Your Highness.”
It reminded her she was wearing a dress, and the gold mitre of her office. And remembering, she felt foolishly exposed.
“There were matters of state to attend to. I’m expected to attire myself appropriately.”
“And fetchingly, too.” He leaned lazily on the door. “Is my presence required?”
“Yes. No.” Why did he forever make her clumsy? “May I come in? I would speak with you.”
“By all means.”
She had to brush against him to step inside. The room was like midnight, she thought. Not a single candle lit, nor the fire, and the drapes were pulled tight at the windows.
“The sun’s gone down.”
“Yes, I know.”
“Would you mind if we had some light?” She picked up the tinderbox, fumbling a bit. “I can’t see so well as you in the dark.” The quick flare of light did quite a bit to calm her jumping stomach. “There’s a chill,” she continued, lighting more candles. “Should I light the fire for you?”
“Suit yourself.”
He said nothing while she knelt in front of the hearth, set the turf. But she knew he watched her, and his watching made her hands feel cold and stiff.
“Are you comfortable here?” she began. “The room isn’t so large or grand as you’re used to.”
“And separate enough from the general population so they can be comfortable.”
Stunned, she turned, kneeling still while the turf caught flame at her back. She didn’t flush. Instead her cheeks went very pale. “Oh, but no, I never meant…”
“It’s no matter.” He picked up a glass he’d obviously poured before she’d come in. And now he drank deliberately of the blood with his eyes on hers. “I imagine your people would be put off by some of my daily habits.”
Distress hitched into her voice. “It was never a concern. The room, it faces north. I thought…I only thought there would be less direct sun, and you’d be more comfortable. I would never insult a guest—a friend. I wouldn’t insult someone who welcomed me into their home when they have come to mine.”
She got quickly to her feet. “I can have your things moved, right away. I—”
He held up a hand. “There’s no need. And I apologize for assuming.” It was rare for him to feel the discomfort of guilt, but he felt it now. “It’s a considerate choice. I shouldn’t have expected less.”
“Why are we…I don’t understand why we seem to be so often at odds.”
“Don’t you?” he murmured. “Well, that’s likely for the best. So, to what do I owe the honor of your presence?”
“You make fun of me,” she said quietly. “You’re so hard when you speak to me.”
She thought he sighed, just a little. “I’m in a mood. I don’t rest well in unfamiliar places.”
“I’m sorry. And I’m here to impose again. I’ve asked Blair to hunt the vampires now in Geall, to bring at least one of them back here. Alive.”
“Contradiction in terms.”
“I don’t know how else to express it,” she snapped. “My people will fight because it’s asked of them. But I can’t ask them to believe—can’t make them believe—what seems impossible. So they need to be shown.”
It would be a good queen, he thought, who didn’t expect to be followed blindly. And see how she stood there now, he noted. So still, so serious, when he knew a war raged inside of her.
“You want me to go with her.”
“I do—she does. I do. God, I am forever stumbling with you. She asked that you and Larkin go with her. She doesn’t want me. She feels, and so do I, that I’m of more use gathering the forces, helping lay the traps she devised.”
“Ruling.”
“I don’t rule yet.”
“Your choice.”
“Aye. For now. I’d be grateful if you would go with her and Larkin, if you can find a way to bring back a prisoner.”
“I’d rather be doing than not. But there’s the matter of knowing where to look.”
“I have a map. I’ve already spoken with my uncle, and know where the attacks—the known attacks—took place. Larkin knows the land of Geall. You can have no better guide. And you know you can have no better companion, in leisure or in battle.”
“I’ve no problem with the boy, or with a hunt.”
“Then as soon as you’re ready, if you’d come to the outer courtyard. I can have someone show you the way.”
“I remember the way.”
“Well. I’ll go see to your mounts and provisions.” She went to the door, but he was there before her—without seeming to have moved at all. She looked up into his face. “Thank you,” she said and slipped quickly out.
Those eyes, he thought as he shut the door behind her. Those long gray eyes could kill a man.
It was lucky he was already dead.
But he could do nothing about the scent she’d left behind her, the scent of woodland glades and cool spring water. Not a bloody thing he could do about that.
“W e’ll be watching.” Glenna laid a hand on Blair’s leg when Blair mounted her horse. “If you get into trouble we’ll know. We’ll do what we can to help.”
“Don’t worry. I’ve got thirteen years of this under my belt.”
Not in Geall, Glenna thought, but she stepped back. “Good hunting.”
They rode through the gates, and turned south.
It was a good night for it, Blair thought. Clear and cool. It would be easier to track them by night when they were active than by day when they would have gone to nest somewhere. In any case, she wouldn’t have Cian, which she considered an advantage, if they hunted by day.
She rode between the two men at an easy trot. “I didn’t want to ask Moira,” she began. “But her mother was the first attack reported.”
“Aye, the queen was the first death we know of.”
“And there were no other attacks that night? No one taken?”
“No.” Larkin shook his head. “Again that we know of.”
“Target-specific then,” Blair mused. “They came for Moira’s mother—we assume. We don’t know how they got in.”
“I’ve thought of it,” Larkin admitted. “Before the queen’s death, there would have been no reason to stop someone from coming in. A wagon of supplies, perhaps, or any reasonable bit of business. They would have been passed through.”
“Plays.” Blair nodded after a moment. “Come in shortly after sundown. Stay in a bolt hole until everyone settles in for the night. Lure the queen outside, kill her.” She glanced at Larkin. “We don’t have more specifics?”
“Moira won’t speak of it, really. I’m not sure she remembers the details of it.”
“Maybe it doesn’t matter—for our purposes. So they kill the queen, then they stay. Maybe they can’t get back through except at specific times. But they don’t rampage,” she pointed out. “A handful of deaths in all these weeks. That’s pretty low profile for the breed.”
“There will have been more,” Cian commented. “Travelers, whores, those not as quickly missed as others. But they’ve been careful, and avoided what we’re doing now. The hunt. I don’t think they’re only hiding from us.”
“Who then?” Larkin glanced over and saw Blair was studying Cian thoughtfully.
“He means Lilith. You think they’re trying to stay off her radar? Why?”
“Because it could be you’re only half right in your theory. Target-specific, yes,” Cian agreed. “But I doubt the target was the queen. It’s Moira who was chosen as a link in the first circle.”
“Moira.” There was alarm in Larkin’s voice as he swiveled in the saddle to look back at the castle growing smaller with distance. “If they tried to kill her once—”
“They’ve tried to kill all of us, more than once,” Cian pointed out. “Without success. She’s as safe as she can be, where she is.”
Blair outlined it in her mind. “You’re thinking Lilith tried an end-run. Take one of us out before she was, essentially, one of us.”
“It’s a possibility, a strong one. Why waste the time and what must have been some effort to send a couple of assassins here? If you’re going to buy in to the whole destiny business,” Cian went on, “it’s Moira and not Moira’s mother who was the threat.”
“They screwed up,” Blair mused. “Took out the wrong target. So it may not be a matter of them not being able to get back, but not wanting to.”
“Lilith isn’t particularly tolerant of mistakes. Having a choice of being tortured and ended by her, or going to ground, snacking on the locals here, which would you do?”
“Door number two,” Blair said. “And if you buy in to the whole destiny business, her first mistake was in turning you all those years ago. You’re a more formidable enemy as a vampire than you might be as a man. No offense.”
“None taken.”
“Then you get Hoyt fired up, and start the whole Morrigan’s Cross thing.”
Thoughtfully, Blair fingered the two crosses she wore around her neck. “You’ve got Glenna connected to Hoyt—maybe, if you want the romantic—destined to find and love each other. And by doing so, exponentially increasing each other’s power. You’ve got Larkin’s connection to Moira, and due to it, his coming with her through the Dance and into Ireland.”
“So makes a nice, tidy circle,” Cian concluded. “Convoluted, but that’s gods for you.”
“She was meant to die. The queen.” Larkin took a steadying breath. “Meant to die in Moira’s place. If Moira comes to this herself, it will hurt her immeasurably.”
“With her clever and questing mind, I’d be surprised if she wasn’t already dealing with it. And dealing with it is what she’ll do,” Cian added. “What other choice is there?”
Larkin let it lie in his heart, on his head as they crossed a field.
“The next attack was here. I’m told the man who farms this land thought wolves had been at his sheep. It was his boy who found him next morning. My father came here himself that day, to see the body, and it was as the queen’s had been.”
Blair shifted in the saddle. “About two miles, due south of the castle. No place to hide around here. Just open fields. But a couple of experienced vamps could cover a couple of miles fairly quickly. They can go in and out of the castle grounds as they’ve had an invite, but…”
“Not a good place to nest,” Cian agreed. “Easy pickings, certainly, but too much exposure. No, it would be caves, or deep forest.”
“Why not a house or cabin?” Larkin suggested. “If they chose with any care, they could find one out of the way, where it’s not as likely someone would come by.”
“Possible,” Cian told him. “But the trouble with a cottage, a building, is daylight attack. Your enemy has one more weapon against you—and only has to pull a covering from a window to win the day.”
“All right then.” Larkin gestured across the field. “The next two attacks reported were just east of here. There’s forest, but the hunting’s good. There are plenty who track deer and rabbit there and might disturb a vampire’s daytime rest.”
“You know that,” Blair told him. “They may not have. They’re strangers here. It’s a good place to start.”
They rode in silence for a time. She could see sheep or cattle lolling in the fields—more easy pickings if a vampire couldn’t take down a human. There were flickers of light she assumed were candles or lanterns in cottages. She could smell the smoke—the rich tang of peat rather than seasoned wood.
She smelled grass and animal dung, a deeper, loamy scent from fields planted and waiting for the coming harvest.
She could smell the horses, and Larkin, and knew how to separate Cian’s scent from others like him.
But when they came to the edge of a wood, she couldn’t be sure.
“Horses have been through here, and not long ago.”
She looked at Larkin with eyebrows raised. “Well, listen to Tonto here.”
“Tracks.” He slid off his horse to study the ground. “Not shoed. Gypsies likely, though I don’t see signs from a wagon, and they travel that way. They’re leading out, in any case.”
“How many?”
“It would be two. Two horses, coming out of the woods here to cross the field.”
“Can you follow them in?” she asked him. “See where they came from?”
“I can.” He mounted. “If they’re on horseback, they could cover considerable distance. It would take the gods’ own luck for us to track them down in one night.”
“We backtrack the riders here, see what we see. The other attacks were east, right? Straight through these woods, out the other side.”
“Aye. Another three miles at most.”
“This would be a good hub.” She looked at Cian as she spoke. “If they have decent shelter in here, it’s a good spot to nest during the day, spread out for food at night.”
“Leaves are still thick this time of year,” he agreed. “And there’d be small game as well if they needed to make do.”
Larkin took the lead, following the trail until the trees thickened to block the light. He dismounted again, tracking now on foot. By signs, Blair assumed she couldn’t see.
Then again, she’d done the majority of her hunting in urban forests and suburban trails. But Larkin moved with the confidence of a man who knew what he was doing, pausing only to crouch down now and then, studying the tracks more carefully.
“Wait,” she said abruptly. “Just wait. You get that?” she asked Cian.
“Blood. It’s not fresh. And death. Older yet.”
“Better get back on your horse, Larkin,” she told him. “I think we’ve got some of the gods’ luck after all. We can track it from here.”
“I can’t smell a thing but the woods.”
“You will,” she murmured, and drew her sword from the sheath on her back as they walked the horses down the path.
The wagon was pulled into the trees, off the path, and sheltered by them. It was a kind of small caravan, Blair thought, covered in the back with its red paint faded and peeling.
And the smell of death seemed to soak it.
“Tinkers,” Larkin told them. And she’d been right, he could smell the death now. “Gypsies who travel the roads selling whatever wares they might make. The wagon’s harnessed for two horses.”
“A good nest,” Blair decided. “Mobile if you need it to be. And you could drive around at night, no one would pay any attention.”
“You could take it right into the village,” Larkin said grimly. “Drive it up to someone’s cottage and ask for hospitality. In the normal course of things, you’d get it.”
He thought of the children who might run outside to see if there would be toys for sale they could beg their parents to buy or trade for. And the thought sickened him even more than the stench.
He dismounted with the others, moved to the rear of the wagon where the doors were tightly shut, and bolted from the outside. They drew weapons. Blair slid the bolt free, tested the door.
When it gave, she nodded to her companions, mentally counted to three, then yanked it open.
The fetid air came first, crawling into the throat, pouring into the eyes. She heard the hungry hum of flies and fought against the need to gag.
It leaped out at her, the thing with the face of a pretty young woman whose eyes were red and mad. The stink rolled off her, where it was matted in her dark hair, streaked over her homespun dress.
Blair pivoted aside so it landed in the brush on its hands and knees, snarling like the animal it had become.
It was Larkin who swung his sword and ended it.
“Oh God, sweet Jesus. She couldn’t have been fourteen.” He wanted to sit, just sit there on the ground while his belly heaved. “They changed her. How many others—”
“Unlikely more,” Cian said, cutting him off. “Then they’d have to compete for food, worry about keeping it under control.”
“She didn’t come through with them,” Larkin insisted. “She wasn’t one of them before. She was Geallian.”
“And young, pretty, female. Food isn’t the only need.”
Blair saw when the full impact of Cian’s words hit Larkin. She saw not just by the shock but the sheer outrage on his face.
“Bastards. Bloody fucking bastards. She was hardly more than a child.”
“And this surprises you because?”
He whirled on Cian, and would, Blair was sure, have vented some of that horror and outrage. Perhaps Cian was giving him a target for it. But there wasn’t time for indulgences.
She simply stepped between them and shoved Larkin back a full three paces. “Close it down,” she ordered him. “Just settle it down.”
“How can I? How can you?”
“Because you can’t bring her back, or the ones that are in there.” She jerked a chin toward the wagon. “So we figure out how to use this to capture the ones who did it.”
Burying her own revulsion, she pulled herself up into the wagon. Into a nightmare.
What must have been the girl’s parents were shoved together under a kind of bunk on one side of the wagon. The man had probably died quickly, as had the younger boy whose body lay under the bunk on the opposite side.
But the woman, they’d have taken more time there. No point in tearing off her clothes if you didn’t intend to play with her first. Her hands were still bound, and what was left of her was covered in bites.
Yes, they’d taken time with her.
She could see no weapons, but one of the bunks was stained with blood fresher than what was staining the other bunk, the floor and the walls. That was where the girl had died, she assumed. And had waked again.
“The woman’s only been dead a couple of days,” Cian said from behind her. “The man and boy longer. A day or more longer.”
“Yeah. Jesus.” She had to get out, had to breathe. She climbed out of the back to draw in air she hoped would clear the smear in her throat, in her lungs.
“They’ll come back for her.” She bent over, bracing her hands on her thighs so the nausea, the dizziness would fade. “Bring her something so she can feed. She was new. Probably only woke tonight.”
“We need to bury them,” Larkin said. “The others. They deserve to be buried.”
“It has to wait. Look, be pissed at me if you have to, but—”
“I’m not. I’m sick in my heart, but I’m not angry with you. Or you,” he said to Cian. “I don’t know why it should be this way inside me. I saw what was in the caves back in Ireland. I know how they kill, how they breed. But knowing they made a monster of that girl only so they could use her between them, it makes my heart sick.”
She didn’t have any words, any real ones, to offer. She wrapped her fingers around his arm, squeezed. “Let’s make them pay for it. They’ll be back before sunrise. Well before if they can find what they’re after quickly enough and get it back. They know she’ll have risen tonight, and need to feed. That’s why they—”
“That’s why they left the bodies inside,” Larkin said when she cut herself off. “So she’d have something until they could bring her fresh blood. I’m not slow-witted, Blair. They left her own family for her to feed on.”
Nodding, she looked back toward the wagon. “So we close up the wagon, and we wait. Will they be able to smell us? The human?”
“Hard to say,” Cian told her. “I don’t know how old they are, how experienced. Enough so Lilith thought they could handle this assignment. Which they bungled. But it’s possible they’ll catch the scent of live blood, even through all this. Then there’s the horses.”
“Okay, I’ve got that covered. Most likely they’ll come back to the wagon from the same direction they left it. We’ll take the horses farther into the woods, downwind. Tether them. All but mine. If I’m walking him when they see me, they’ll figure he came up lame. And they’ll be too happy with their luck of coming across a lone female to think beyond that.”
“So, you think you’re going to be bait,” Larkin began, with a look on his face that warned Blair they were in for a fight about it.
“I’ll just take the horses back while you two argue this out.” Cian took the reins, melted into the trees.
Calm, Blair ordered herself. Reasonable. She should remember it was nice to have someone who actually cared enough to worry about her.
“If they see a man, they’re more likely to attack. A woman, they’re going to want me alive—temporarily. Gives them each a playmate. It’s the most logical way.”
That was the end of her calm and reasonable. “And, here’s what. If your ego has a problem with the fact that if I were out here alone I could still handle two of them, you’ll just have to deal with it.”
“My ego has nothing to do with the matter. It’s just as logical for the three of us to lay back and wait, then move on them as one.”
“No, because if they scent either you or me, we lose the element of surprise. Moira wants them—or at least one of them alive. That’s why we’re out here instead of having a nice glass of wine in front of a roaring fire. If we have to go full scale attack we’ll probably have to kill them both. Surprise gives us a better chance of capture.”
“There are other ways.”
“Probably a dozen of them. But while they may not be back for five hours, they could also be back in five minutes. This will work, Larkin, because it’s simple and it’s basic. Because they wouldn’t expect a woman by herself to be any kind of threat. I want to bag these two as much as you do. Let’s make sure we do.”
Cian slipped back out of the trees. “Have you settled it, then, or will we be debating this much longer?”
“It seems to be settled.” Larkin brushed a hand over Blair’s hair. “I’ve just been wasting my breath.” Then he tipped back her chin. “If you have to speak to them to hold the illusion until we move in, they’ll know you’re not from Geall.”
“Sure you think I can’t manage a bit of an accent.” She slathered on the brogue, and gave him a wide-eyed helpless look. “And give every appearance of being a defenseless female?”
“That’s not altogether bad.” He lowered his lips to hers. “But for myself, I’d never believe the defenseless part of it.”