by Arden, Alys
What the hell is going on? Gabe and Niccolò are my friends. They are French Quarter rats, like me… those snobs can’t have them. The entire freaking world is upside down!
An angelic blonde draped herself on Niccolò’s lap. I bit down on the lime slice, sending a squirt of sour down my throat. Face squirming, I set my empty glass down on a table out of fear I might crush it.
Ugh… Why do I care who sits on his lap?
The woman whispered something into his ear. From my angle it was impossible to tell his reaction, but he certainly wasn’t pushing her off. Without anything to occupy my hands, all I could do was stare in frustration.
Wait, I know that woman. From Ren’s tour. Jealousy drew me closer, like a lame stalker.
The woman brushed her glowing locks from her face and laughed.
The singer bellowed out another jazzy number.
Another tap on my shoulder distracted me. The clown was back. This time I gladly accepted one of the drinks, just to have a prop. I slipped a few dollars into his flower-filled jacket pocket and turned back to the woman, whose arm had slid around Niccolò’s shoulder. She drew the hood of her cloak forward to further conceal her whispers, and then her silhouette in the candlelight stirred my memory again.
Is she the woman who was following me?
I suddenly realized that everyone near was looking my way and smiling, as if waiting for me to do something. I turned my head: the clown had been miming a thank you for the tip, and I had been oblivious. I made a little curtsey, but it wasn’t enough. He egged me on to play with him – the black paint on his stark white face amplified his silent emoting. I tried to shoo him away, but he wasn’t having it. I quickly sucked down the drink, nearly choking on what I’d thought would be gin but definitely wasn’t. I put it back on his tray, coughing, but he just spun it, offering me another.
I shook my head, fire coursing down my throat. What the hell was that stuff? Rubbing alcohol?
He set the tray down along with my glass and extended a gloved hand. Little by little, the room seemed to shut down and then even the pianist stopped playing. The entire room hushed in delight, giving the mime permission to pull me into his silent world.
As the clown began a slow-motion spin, there was a loud clunk of a bottle landing heavily on the bar. I was afraid to look, but something told me the sound was the shock of my father.
Mid-twirl, I saw Isaac jump from his barstool in surprise, and a glimpse of my father behind the bar, clutching a bottle of booze, looking distressed. It wasn’t clear who was more busted: me for being dressed like a prostitute in an illegally operating bar after curfew, or him for operating said bar and lying to me about it.
The crowd began to clap slowly.
Clap.
Clap.
Beats synching, I felt like the slaps were pulling my heart from my chest.
The claps sped up, as did the twirls. He brought my arm over his head, forcing me to turn him. The crowd cheered wildly, and the piano started up again. He spun us faster and faster.
“Bravissima, bella!”Gabe yelled, standing with his glass raised. Niccolò turned to see the source of the commotion.
I planted my feet, jerking my partner to a stop.
All of the sounds in the room seemed to fade away: Gabriel, the music, the whistling. I was only vaguely aware that the mime was now raising my hand for applause, or that Isaac was walking towards me. The only thing I could focus on was the boy holding the blonde girl – he wasn’t Niccolò.
He was Émile.
I am losing my mind.
Am I drunk? Had he come to New Orleans to see me? This is not possible.
I blinked. But there he was, still staring straight at me. Smiling.
Behind him, Annabelle glared. I hated her for bringing me here. My father moved from behind the bar. This was all his fault. How could he not tell me about this place?
The mime took a bow while the crowd clapped with drunken glee. For the second bow, he bent my body downwards to join him. They whistled louder. As we came up, I let out an uncontrollable gasp – and every flame in the room extinguished.
The sudden blackout caused immediate pandemonium. Squeals came from every direction. This is my chance to get the hell out.
Focus, Adele. You know this place.
“Adele!” my father shouted over the crowd.
I pushed my way to the door. Tiny flickers of light started to appear as people struck matches. Faster. With my eye on the handle, the door swung open long before I got to it, and then it slammed behind me.
The sounds of mayhem softening brought an immediate relief, but I didn’t slow down. I yelled goodbye to Troy and bounced down the stairs and out of the courtyard. The sense of claustrophobia started to ease, but still I didn’t stop running.
On the post-curfew street, I realized my ears were ringing. I sucked in the fresh air and felt the alcohol coursing through my system – my fingers tingled like they were on fire.
Maybe it’s the alcohol…I took the corner too sharp to see anyone coming from the other direction. Or maybe it’s just… me—
“Dammit!” I yelled. My arm jerked in my shoulder socket as, once again, someone kept me from hitting the ground.
“We really should stop meeting like this, bella,” Niccolò said, holding me steady and smiling at me with one eyebrow cocked. “Not that I mind it.”
I was still too shocked by the evening’s antics to engage in any kind of witty repartee.
“That’s an interesting outfit,” he joked as his eyes wandered, lingering in confusion.
I did not laugh. I did not even budge.
“What’s wrong, Adele?”
I felt like I was going to implode. This wasnothow I had imagined our next encounter.
“Are you hurt?” His usual serious face was back. “Why were you running?” He rubbed my shaking shoulders – his hands were barely warmer than my arms, but the friction helped. I could smell alcohol on his breath, but that wasn’t the reason he was trouble, and I knew it.
Hearing Isaac shouting my name made me suddenly alert.
I flinched only for a millisecond, but that was all Niccolò needed. He grabbed my hand, and we started running. I didn’t know where to, and I didn’t care. Whether I was conscious of it or not, I knew exactly what I was doing. I knew exactly who he was, or rather what he was. And it was precisely that moment I decided I was okay with it.
For better or worse, I dove down the rabbit hole.
Chapter 26 Monster vs. Myth
Isaac’s shouts faded as we sped through the narrow streets.
I had no idea where we were going, but I was overwhelmingly eager to be there with Niccolò. To conceal our escape route, I began flicking out the gas lantern flames as we ran, hoping Nicco wouldn’t notice – but his fingers locked tighter around mine. The gesture was tiny, but I could feel his excitement. And his strength.
I struggled to keep pace; he wasn’t even breathing heavily.
Blue eyes flashed in my head. Dead,blue eyes.
Regardless, I didn’t stop Niccolò from pulling me along. I pushed myself to run faster. I wanted to get far away from everyone. Everyone who was hiding things from me. Everyone who thought I was blind to everything going on.
We turned onto Pirate's Alley and ran into the courtyard of St. Anthony’s Garden, through the gigantic shadow cast by the Jesus statue. The plastic popped against my bare skin as we ran straight through the yellow caution tape. My brain fired off warnings about breaking into the cathedral, but my heart unlocked the back door just before Niccolò touched the handle. He never let go of my hand.
That unmistakable church feeling crept over me as soon as we stepped inside – a mixture of guilt, as if I’d been busted doing bad things, and a total serenity: both wrapped into one. It kind of freaked me out.
Other than the moonlight shining through the stained-glass windows and a bright red emergency exit sign, the church was completely dark. This didn’t seem to be a problem f
or Niccolò, who navigated quickly through the towers of melted candles and the basins of long-dried-up holy water.
We raced up the stairs, past the choir loft, and through the mezzanine that ran the length of the vast space. I had been inside the historical landmark countless times, but now all sense of familiarity was absorbed by the darkness. The emptiness. Now it was just us and our footsteps echoing back down from the domed ceilings that separated us from the stars.
I squeezed his hand as we entered a pitch-black hallway. All I could see was a trail of glow tape spiraling up the staircase. He pulled me in front of him, and I slowly made my way up the glow-taped steps, dragging my hand along the stone wall as we ascended.
Each board creaked in pain under my weight.
His hands brushed my waist. I began to take the steps faster, confident that he wouldn’t let me fall. My leg muscles burned with exhaustion, but I refused to slow down in front of him.
I made the final turn and halted abruptly at a dead end: a small arched window shed a little moonlight on a small wooden door. It was sealed with a giant iron padlock.
My heart thumped as the metal tempted my fingers. Don’t do anything stupid, Adele. He would surely notice.
Before I could think any more about it, he stepped around me, turning to face me from the tiny top stair and blocking my view of the door. Strain flashed across his face, and then there was a loud clank as the metal arch of the lock landed at his feet. I didn’t have to see it to know that the base was in his hand. Was he trying to hide his strength so he still had the element of surprise, or was he, like me, simply not ready to reveal himself?
Ignoring the thought, I stepped past him through the little door into the bell tower. The slats in the eight long windows had been blown out, and the flooding moonlight seemed almost bright after the pitch-black staircase. I went straight to a window, collapsed against the stone wall and looked out over the rooftops, discreetly trying to catch my breath. This was certainly the highest point in the French Quarter.
I turned back to Niccolò. His eyes lit up with rapt attention as he watched me.
Other than the drop, there was only one way down, and Niccolò Medici was still standing in front of that exit, biting his lower lip.
* * *
“What are we doing here?” the cross-breeze gave my voice a slight shake.
“You’re upset about something. I have an idea to make you feel better,” he said, circling behind me.
“Unlikely.” My thoughts spiraled back to what was possibly the worst night of my life.
He gently nudged me to the center of the tower, underneath the enormous church bell. It was intricately rigged to several other bells hanging above it, but it dwarfed them in size. I looked up into the giant brass dome. The clapper was bigger than my head. Niccolò’s chest brushed my shoulders, and I suddenly felt small next to him. My pulse began to climb as my fingers warmed.
He swept both of my braids to the left side of my neck. “On the count of three, I want you to scream as loud as you can.”
“What?”
As his mouth came closer to my ear, my brain no longer fired warning signs but “I told you sos.”
“One…,” he whispered, sending chills down my neck.
“Two…”
“Three!”
He jumped up and jerked the thick rope down.
Before I heard even the slightest noise, his hands swooped back around and cupped my ears. The clapper hit the brass rim right before the shriek left my lips. The gong easily masked the sound of my scream, and I miraculously couldn’t hear anything under the protection of his hands.
Rather than the deafening sound of metal hitting metal, I heard a distant ping that didn’t at all match the resonate vibrations beneath our feet. It was exhilarating, screaming at the top of my lungs, high above the silent city. My throat became raw, and my knees started to buckle. His hands never left my ears as he followed my slow slump to the ground.
By the time the chiming stopped, I was hunched into a ball on the cold floor, exhausted. It was hard to breathe with him cocooned over my back, but I liked the way his weight felt atop me.
For a few moments, he just let me be, and then he hooked my waist and drew me to my feet.
“Do you feel better?” he asked, still pressed against my back.
As I exhaled, a droplet slipped from my right eye.
“Yeah, actually,” I whispered, turning around.
“Bene.”He wiped the wet trail away with his knuckle.
The wind tingled against the light sweat brought on by the unexpected run, making my teeth chatter. He removed his jacket but, instead of handing it to me, dropped it to the floor and began unbuttoning his red flannel shirt.
“What… what are you doing?”
His expression contorted into a smirk. “Don’t worry, your virtues are safe with me.”
Blood flushed my cheeks as his black V-neck was revealed underneath.
“I can’t take your jacket and your shirt. The wind is pretty fierce up here.”
“Don’t worry about me.” He draped the flannel over my shoulders.
“Fine. I don’t think lumberjack is really your thing, anyway.”
“Oh, really? Scusami, bella,but you are in no position to be doling out fashion advice.” A slight laugh slipped through his lips. “But you’re right. It looks better on you.”
I glanced down at my ensemble and became mortified all over again.
He gently lifted my chin so my gaze was back on him. “Stop worrying. It’s very Seattle circa 1992.” The statement was very matter-of-fact, as if he’d been BFFs with Kurt Cobain. Unconvinced my outfit had achieved Courtney Love status, I buttoned up the shirt for maximum coverage and turned to the nearest window.
Even in the darkness, the view was magnificent, high above the streets that held over three centuries of mysteries. I made room so we could both fit into the tight frame. Anxiety rushed through me. Despite not knowing his real intentions, despite not really knowing him, I didn’t want to leave.
I slunk down under the window’s stone ledge and wrapped his jacket around my bare legs. He slid down next to me, and we both just sat in silence in the cone-roofed tower.
The quiet was peaceful while my mind was empty, but little by little recent memories infiltrated my head, and I began to feel like a player in a game of Who’s Going to Talk First. I wanted to play it cool, but more than that I wanted to know how many years of history he had seen unfold in this city.
“Niccolò—”
“You can call me Nicco. It sounds funny when you try to say my name.”
“Oh.” I blushed, repeating his name in my head, trying to figure out what was funny about the way I pronounced it.
“Nicco, have you found your family yet?”
Clearly not expecting the question, he hesitated, masterfully hiding his surprise, but the way his eyes examined my face for some kind of underlying hint gave him away. I gave him nothing.
“I have, actually.”
“Oh, good.”
“It has been a very disturbing process…”
“Oh, really, how so?”
“Well, I am sure you can imagine…” He seemed to choose his next words very carefully. “They are quite traumatized, having been trapped and abandoned in an attic for so long. They were very malnourished.”
The slight smirk that followed led me to believe we were no longer talking about victims of the Storm, but we continued to speak obtusely, neither confirming nor denying my suspicions.
“So, does this mean you’re all going back to Italy?”
“They are not well enough to travel, yet.” He sounded sincerely concerned for them, but there was a slight fleck of excitement in his demeanor – he knew that I was inferring something else.
“But then?” I pushed, daring him to answer.
He looked straight in my eyes. “We’ll see…” And then he relaxed back into the wall. “Like you mentioned the day we met, there is somet
hing very special about this city.” His attention went back out the window to the stars, ending the conversation. I tumbled deeper down the rabbit hole.
“Did Adeline ever tell her father you called?”
That was the moment everything changed.
His jaw jolted, and a hushed snort forced out of his nose. I had his attention. I had no idea what to do next, but the standing hairs on my arms told me to proceed with caution.
“What did you say?” he asked, one hand strategically placed over his mouth.
I stood. His eyes lit up like an animal ready to pounce.
My words were sweet, careful not to come across as mocking. “Did Adeline ever tell her father that you called? Monsieur Cartier?”
Pain rippled through my shoulders and down my spine as my back made sudden contact with the stone floor. His head hung directly over mine, his breathing heavier with each inhale. I froze underneath him, as his cool green eyes assaulted me, terrified I had pushed him too far.
Despite beginning to tremble, I held out, waiting for an answer.
He kept his mouth clamped shut.
After another breath, he pushed himself up into a crouched position over my lap. Attempting to appear assertive, I sat up and looked him in the eye. Again, he nonchalantly moved his hand to his jaw as he asked, “Do you trust me, Adele?”
It was a perplexing question, but I knew he was serious because he had used my real name rather than the endearing Italian nickname. Every shred of my physical being burned like fire, urging me to scream no, but instead I whispered, “Yes.”
“Never trust a vampire, Adele!” he yelled, slamming my shoulders back to the ground. A second surge of pain ripped down my torso, but my attention clung to his words. The one word I had been waiting to hear.
Vampire.
* * *
His breath was cool on my burning face – breath that his existence probably didn’t depend on. His mouth hung open somewhere in between a hiss and a growl, revealing the evidence that he, up until this point, had gone through such great lengths to hide.