“Gareth,” she said, her breath misting the air. “Am I disturbing you?”
“Of course not.” He glanced over his shoulder at her, eyeing the camera and tripod in her hands.
Adele saw the pile of paper on the ancient desk across the room. She silently chided herself for interrupting him at work. Sitting atop the ream was his heavy leather gunbelt with twin pistols. “I just don’t want to interrupt you if you’re trying to make progress before we leave for Bruges tomorrow.”
“No. I’m not making much progress as Gareth.” He sat up, placing his feet heavily on the floor. With a tug on his rifleman’s tunic, he said, “Perhaps the other fellow will have more luck.”
Adele laughed nervously. “I wouldn’t mind reading what you’ve written. At some point.”
“Shouldn’t take you long.” Gareth raised his hand toward the papers. “Have a look.”
Adele went to his desk, barely containing her excitement. She had flown reams of stationary up from Equatoria along with the finest pens and inks, which were scattered across the desk. She flipped through the stack of paper. Sheet after sheet of blank white met her eyes. Her brow furrowed. “I can’t find what you wrote. These are blank.”
“Oh sorry. Look next to the empty pages.”
Beside the pile of stationery was a single sheet of paper. Adele picked it up and flipped it over. There were several lines written in Gareth’s natural, spidery hand: I am Gareth, son of Dmitri. I was born south of Kiliwhimin in the Great Glen of Scotland. My father taught me to hunt humans and drink their blood. That is what I am. I am a monster.
Adele stared at the page. Her face flushed with shock. She couldn’t find any words to reply.
Gareth took the paper from her and looked at it with a nod of mock satisfaction. He set it down on the desk. “It says everything, don’t you think? Is it long enough to be a book?”
“Gareth,” Adele forced herself to speak calmly, “we decided that you would write this book to explain to humans that vampires aren’t what they think. To show them your humanity.”
“It turns out I have none.”
She put her hand to her head.
“Adele, don’t worry about my foolishness. You have so much to do. Compared to that, this is exactly what it looks like, a pile of nothing.” He thumbed through the stack of blank paper. “This was a ludicrous idea in any case. The price is too high.”
Adele regarded him with confusion. “What price?”
“Surely you’ve considered that this book will have ramifications that will ripple across the world. Everything would change. You are Adele the First, Empress of Equatoria. You fought hard to achieve that. Do you think you could continue in that role once our relationship is known? Your people will have both our heads on stakes.”
Adele stared at him evenly, as if she had already accepted that complication. “I’ll accept whatever happens.”
“I won’t.”
“This book means a great deal. To both of us. To both our kinds. The future can only—”
“The future is only what we find in Bruges. After that, we’ll have to see what it is.” Gareth jutted his chin across the room, eager to change the conversation. “I see you brought your camera.”
Adele understood his weak ploy, but was content to move on for the moment. “I have one more undeveloped piece of film until the next supply ship from Equatoria and I was hoping you’d let me take our picture. Finally.”
“What do you mean finally? You have a box full of pictures of me. And there are thousands of pictures of the two of us.” Gareth shuffled more papers aside on the desk to reveal several cheap paperback novels. They were in pristine condition because Gareth valued books, any books, above all else. Adele recognized these potboilers from the penny dreadful presses in far-off Equatoria. They all featured the great freedom fighter of the north, the Greyfriar. Each book sported a garishly colored cover with the cloaked swordsman killing vampires with blade or gun, his face swathed in his trademark scarf to hide his mysterious identity from the world and instead of his actual mirrored glasses, the artistic Greyfriar wore more adventurous goggles. Swords Against the Bloody North. Carpathian Hellscape. The Crypts Open Tonight.
He pawed through the books and held one up. “Here! This one has both of us. Two Against the Legions of Hell.” The cover was a full-color painting of the Greyfriar. He was tall and muscular, which was easy to see because his shirt had been torn away. He had an exquisitely chiseled chest and abdomen, and his arms were corded and thick with veins. His rough hands clutched a sword and pistol. He stood in the snow wearing abnormally snug trousers. His face was partially shrouded with a scarf, but his eyes shone hard and fierce, and his long dark hair flew in the wind. Crouched next to the Greyfriar was a ferocious buxom wench in a state of undress. Her heaving bosom was barely contained in some sort of tiny metallic cups. She clutched the Greyfriar’s muscular thigh as if it would save her from drowning.
Adele smirked. “That woman is supposed to be me?”
“I assume so. She seems . . . capable.”
Adele stared at the picture for a long moment, eyes lingering on the dynamic figure of the Greyfriar. “I may need a copy of this one when we get to Alexandria.” She set the distracting cover face down on the desk. “And you know what I mean. Yes, there are thousands of pictures of me and Greyfriar. Some even look like me. But I want one with Gareth.” She pressed her hand next to his on the stack of blank paper. “That’s the whole point of this exercise, isn’t it?”
She returned to the door where she had leaned the tripod. She set up the camera near the door and spent a moment framing the desk in the dark. She pulled a long flexible trigger cable from her pocket and screwed one end into the camera. As she was making final adjustments, a large grey cat appeared. He curled about her legs and leapt onto the table to inspect the strange new contraption, rubbing his chin along the side of the camera. She swore that Pet could sniff out something new in mere seconds. Adele shoved the cat to the floor and repositioned the camera. She took the trigger cable and dragged the other end to the desk. She positioned the lanterns to provide enough light for a moody exposure.
Adele grabbed Gareth’s arm and pulled him next to her. “Stand here and we’ll have a real picture together.” She poised her thumb over the button.
He continued to watch her.
“Don’t look at me,” she chided. “Look at the camera. And smile.” Adele gave a wide grin.
Gareth turned back to the camera, attempting to please Adele.
“Hold that smile because it’s dark and I have to leave the shutter open for a minute.” She thumbed the trigger and the lens clattered open. After a long moment, it closed. She exhaled. “There. That wasn’t hard.”
“It seemed stressful for you.”
Adele went back to the camera. She worked a switch to open a door on the rear of the box and removed a metal plate. She hummed idly, waiting for the picture to develop. Gareth watched her while leaning against the desk. After a minute, she opened the hinged plate and pulled out the still-damp paper photograph. She studied it with a critical huff. In the photo, Gareth towered over Adele. She was well lit, unfortunately, but he was nearly in shadow. Gareth’s eyes glowed unnaturally and his smile appeared more like a menacing snarl of a predator. Adele abruptly tore the picture in half.
Gareth watched the pieces flutter to the floor. “What are you doing?”
“It was horrible. I looked like death warmed over. We’ll take another one when I have more film. I’d prefer a photo where I look human.”
“Isn’t it more important that I look human?” Gareth laughed oddly. “But I can only manage that when I wear a mask.”
CHAPTER 6
In the days of King Louis XIV, the palace of Versailles had hosted a man who considered himself the most powerful man on Earth. Now it did again, in the long gallery called the Hall of Mirrors that ran the length of an upper floor in the rear of the main palace. The mirrors were long since smas
hed, and shards lay cracked on the floor. Sunlight streamed in the vast windows where a man stood overseeing the grounds below.
Nearby, a small clutch of vampires waited for him to do whatever it was he was doing. Waiting on a human was unusual behavior for their kind. It was particularly odd given they were the elite of their clan, the rulers of Paris since the days of the Great Killing over a century ago.
The queen of the Paris clan, Caterina, shuffled her feet with annoyance. She glanced at her eldest son who stood at a noticeable distance. Honore was the heir to the clan. As such, he bore the title of Dauphin, which vampires had appropriated with gleeful mockery of the humans who had come before them. Honore preferred to be closer to another figure, a slender willowy female who was pale and blond where Caterina was dark and commanding. He exchanged whispers with the female, eliciting intimate nods and quiet replies seemingly meant to exclude the queen. Having her son ignore her created a sense of indignation in Caterina that was uncommon.
“Lady Hallow,” Caterina said with growing disdain, “how long will we wait here?”
The human at the window dared to glare at the queen, annoyed by her loud voice and the interruption of his reverie. He was tall and old, with a long white beard. He wore a fine suit of clothes with a long white coat. His dark and piercing eyes held none of the usual fear when regarding vampires. It disturbed the queen.
Hallow replied evenly, “The Witchfinder must prepare, Your Majesty.”
The queen shook her head and looked out the window. Once an open promenade sectioned off by topiary, the vast grounds were now overgrown and ragged. Hints of carefully planned walkways remained. Clumps of ivy revealed where statues lay hidden around fetid pools. Among the riotous foliage humans stood, perhaps a hundred of them, spread across the decrepit grounds of the palace. They shifted from foot to foot, nervous or bored. Vampires drifted in the air overhead, watching the herd to insure none moved too much or tried to run away.
Caterina also saw flecks of color dotting the wild landscape. Crystals. Throughout the entire day, the human—the Witchfinder—had spent hours positioning the stones just so. Carrying some sort of weird hand-drawn maps and scurrying about the overgrown paving stones, he would peer around with some sort of brass device. He consulted the device’s needles and numbers, and then would set a crystal on the ground. He continued in that manner for hour after exhausting hour. The herd of humans had wondered at the man who moved between them without speaking. Caterina with her son and Lady Hallow had stood watching from the windows before growing intolerably uninterested.
Finally, the Witchfinder had joined the three vampires in the palace, where he began the equally tiresome activity of replicating a smaller version of the same pattern of crystals in the Hall of Mirrors. He paid little attention to the vampires as he went about his business. His calm demeanor couldn’t hide the scent of excitement that Caterina could smell on him. The Witchfinder grew more eager by the second as he built the complex crystal pattern on the floor around him.
Finally, overcome by boredom, Caterina asked, “So this man came from London?”
“Yes,” Honore replied with annoyance, his normal state of being. “He was in the service of Prince Cesare, as was Lady Hallow. Now they are in my service.”
Lady Hallow’s pale blue eyes flicked with amusement.
Caterina smiled cynically at her son. “Prince Cesare? He’s dead now. Perhaps we should look beyond his former servants for our saviors.”
Honore snarled, “Cesare is dead because he was betrayed by his own brother! By your old friend, Gareth. The great traitor.”
Lady Hallow regarded Caterina as if the queen was a misinformed child. At the same time she put a soft hand on Honore’s arm. “Your Majesty, Prince Cesare was brilliant. Perhaps the most brilliant mind I have ever known. He knew that a war with the humans could be disastrous. But when he tried to forestall it, his efforts were blocked by Prince Gareth. Then with war forced on him, Cesare conceived unique ways to win, yes, including using humans to serve him. And again, it was Gareth who ruined those plans. You and I have both known Gareth for a long time, Your Majesty. And we both know he is mad. It is because of his insanity that the human armies could be outside Paris this spring. Therefore, I have brought the last of Cesare’s weapons to save you. We must hold the line here.” She looked at Honore. “And we will.”
Caterina wanted to respond sarcastically. The queen knew that Hallow had, in fact, been Gareth’s lover more than a century ago before turning her allegiance to his brother, Cesare. Now Hallow was shifting her allegiance to yet another prince.
Honore brushed Hallow’s pale cheek with his strong fingers. When he turned to his mother, he didn’t see Hallow scowl in distaste at his touch. The Dauphin said, “The Equatorians are coming. There’s no doubt. Do you think King Lothaire could do anything about it?”
Caterina snapped, “Don’t disrespect your king.”
“Where is he? We arranged this demonstration, and he isn’t here.”
“I came,” Caterina retorted in defiance, “in his stead.”
The Dauphin sneered. “With the children, no doubt. He spends more time in the nursery than I ever did.”
“He is still your father.”
“So you say. He’s soft and weak. His failure to our people makes me sick. Cesare always said father was worthless, just like Gareth, and he could cost our people the war. But once I destroy the Equatorians, I will be the face of the Paris clan. I will take our power around the world to put the humans back in their place. I am Cesare’s heir, not Lothaire’s.”
Caterina fought to control herself. “You do realize that your hero, Cesare, lost everything. His clan is dead.” She pointed at Hallow. “Except for a few refugees who were lucky enough to be outside Britain when the fire came, and who now come looking to rule another clan with an army of homeless mercenaries to displace our own packs.” Caterina looked at the vampires who floated over the helpless humans outside. She knew these were all gathered from the clans of southern France and the Balkans that had been smashed by the Equatorian armies. They owed allegiance to Lady Hallow alone. “But no matter what refuse Hallow brings us, the Equatorians have the Death Bringer. What do we have against that?”
Honore’s visage went red with anger. “We have me, mother. I am the war chief now. Father’s old relics from the Great Killing have been set aside and I am in charge. Lady Hallow is my right arm, and she has brought the Witchfinder.”
The Witchfinder himself paid no attention to the bickering vampires as he knelt to place a crystal on the floor. He stared through his brass sextant before nodding to himself in satisfaction.
Honore reached inside his shirt and pulled out a blue crystal on a chain. “He can stop the Death Bringer. We have sent forces back into Britain wearing these.”
Caterina stared at the object. “Is that true? We have set foot in Britain?”
Lady Hallow pressed Honore’s hand down, slipping the talisman back into his shirt. “We certainly saw them reach the island, where none of our people have gone since that night the Death Bringer killed everyone.”
“Even so,” the queen retorted, “is your human going to make those stones for every living vampire?”
“No, I’m not,” came the voice of the bearded man as he finally turned to the trio of vampires. He came forward, stepping carefully through the complex pattern of crystals he had arranged on the floor. “Those talismans are merely tests of my theory on how the empress exploits the power of the Earth, what we scientists call geomancy. I had made one of those baubles for Prince Cesare because he was afraid of the empress, rightfully so it appears.” The Witchfinder chuckled. “In any case, those talismans are minor applications of my grand theory. What you will see here today is another application. This will win the war for you. In terms of the empress, I’m not too concerned about her. She can be dispatched with a bullet or a knife. Cesare almost succeeded in that. In any case, once I win the war for you, I will move on to more i
nteresting theoretical work.”
Hallow cleared her throat and glared with menace. “Your theories won’t help you if we don’t defeat the humans first, Goronwy.”
“Yes, ma’am.” The Witchfinder nodded with unexpected deference to the pale female. Then he held a green crystal between his thumb and forefinger. “If you will look out the windows, you will see the first step on that road.”
Caterina felt Honore and Hallow join her. They watched the scattered crowd of humans standing restlessly or squatting with fatigue. The cold sun sinking below the distant tree line illuminated the scene with a sad light.
The Witchfinder found a spot on the floor and set the green crystal into the larger pattern. He made one final check with his brass instrument before letting it fall to his side on its leather strap. He gently moved the crystal a quarter inch clockwise.
Outside in the winter shadows, hundreds of humans screamed. They flailed and tried to run, but few made it more than a couple of steps. They dropped to the ground, screeching, wide-eyed, fingers grasping at nothing. One after another, they fell writhing, then went still. In a few seconds, hundreds of humans were dead.
Caterina stared in disbelief. It didn’t seem real, but she knew it was. She had sensed the terror in the herd and she smelled the death wafting through the shattered windows before her. Next to her, Honore had lost the pretense of a hardened warrior. He grasped the edge of the window in shock. His face was a mask of incredulity.
Lady Hallow laughed.
Caterina watched the last of the spasms play out below her. She had certainly seen death before, and on a large scale, but never without violence and bloodshed. This was stunning in both its suddenness and in its mystery. The Witchfinder had merely set a crystal on the floor and hundreds of humans died. He hadn’t laid a hand on them. There were no weapons. She backed away from the window, disturbed by the unnatural field of death below her.
The Geomancer Page 4