by Lorelei Bell
“The offering could be anyone. We could use the woman we snatched in the portal a few days ago,” Garrison argued bitterly.
“That was a mistake. I didn't want her,” Phineas said. “I wanted the Keeper. Not the ugly old toad with red hair!”
Zofia nearly drew in a noisy breath. He had to be speaking of Lolly, and now she knew exactly who had opened the Portal up in her backyard, and why—and it hadn't been Saint Germain at all. Thing was, he took the wrong woman. They had Lolly somewhere inside their hideaway. This was becoming an eye-opener every moment she stayed hidden.
“It's because she's his wife, don't you see?” Keeler said into the span of silence, trying to mollify the other.
“Shut up!” Phineas spat at Keeler. Keeler merely chuckled, knowing he'd gotten under his skin. “Apep would not want some old woman to take to himself. If we offer her, he'll become angry. He might even kill us all for doing so. We need someone who is young enough, and beautiful.”
“And married to Dorian,” Keeler sneered.
Zofia felt her skin crawl, and wished she had not overheard this conversation at all. But it at least answered why that Portal had opened up in her backyard, and that they did have Lolly—somewhere—and she was still alive—not that it bothered her one way or another. (Well, it would, eventually.) And she knew their plan—or some of it—of why they wanted to abduct her, and that Myron was part of it.
“You have your reasons for doing this, I have mine, Keeler,” Phineas growled and that seemed to settle things.
“What should we do about Saint Germain?” Garrison asked, changing the subject.
“Perhaps we should post pone Saint Germain's re-entry back to this world,” Phineas said, glancing back at Garrison. “Did you see where he went this time?”
“Only to Switzerland, First World,” he said.
“Whatever he could be doing there, I can't imagine.” Phineas stepped across and then behind the huge organ, disappearing behind the hulking thing. Zofia now came to understand that the organ was the Portal machine, and they knew how it worked, and how to use it themselves. Obviously, Saint Germain didn't know they knew about it, nor that they were able to come and go inside his castle at will. She really had to straighten him out on this. But how she would do so without getting herself into trouble, she didn't know.
She was then reminded why she was here. She was supposed to report she'd found the machine. She was supposed to dismantle it, if at all possible. But surely, not while Saint Germain was actually using it! She could wait at some opportune time, when he wasn't using it, and come back down here and—her deep thoughts were interrupted by some odd sound which filled the room all at once. An abrupt sound that came down in pitch, like someone let the air out of a humongous bagpipe. Zofia peered down and saw all the lights across the keyboards, counsel, and monitors wink off. The organ was disabled by something that Phineas had done in the back.
“I think Saint Germain will like it better on modern day Earth,” Phineas said as he sauntered back around the organ.
The three wizards laughed, and so did Cagliostro. Off to the side, Myron was slouched against one of the organ pipes, his coat open, one leg hooked over the other, looking thoroughly bored.
The four men turned away, and stepped into the gloom, Cagliostro's walking stick tapping as he went.
Zofia's gaze rose to where Myron had stood. He too was gone. Vanished. Vampires could turn into bats, she remembered, and instinctively eyed the lofty areas of the vast room. She didn't see any swift bat winging and darting about, and so she had to assume he had his own way out of there.
She waited at least five minutes before she moved. Once she was certain everyone had gone, she moved from her spot. Certain that whatever they had done to the Portal machine would permanently disable Saint Germain from returning. He was stuck wherever it was he'd gone.
Galvanized into action she found her way down a set of spiral stairs and rushed toward the organ, hysterically looking for how they had disabled it. She was supposed to have disabled it herself, according to Stephen's edict, and here she was trying to turn the thing back on.
“What are you doing!” The new voice startled Zofia. She spun around.
Up on the catwalk stood Jacques glaring accusingly down at her.
Chapter 28
“Jacques! Help me!” Zofia cried.
“Get away from zat!” Jacques shouted angrily. His steps echoed above her as he rushed across the catwalk, the same way that Zofia had come down the spiral staircase. “What 'ave you done?” His face was bunched up and red with anger.
“Help me find a way to make it come back on!” Zofia implored him, choosing to ignore that he was angry at her—and really, he needed to focus on what was more important here. Saint Germain was stuck on First World!
“You should not be 'ere!” He bristled, fists on hips, making a feeble attempt at looking like an over-grown pixy.
“I know that, but—”
“I will tell Saint Germain you 'ave come 'ere where you do not belong, and turned off his Teleport Machine,” Jacques threatened.
“But I didn't do it!” she protested. “It was those men!”
“What men? I do not see any men.”
“They were here, I swear. Three of them, and they'd used this-this Teleport Machine as you call it, and brought someone else here.”
“You are lying!” he interrupted, squinting at her as he leaned forward and pointed a finger at her. She noticed his knuckles seemed overly large for his hands. In fact his hands were oddly disproportioned to his small frame, she thought. Why was she zeroing on everyone's hands now?
“No. No. I'm telling you the truth, Jacques. Why would I lie to you? For what reason would I have to lie?”
“Because I 'ave found you where you should not be, into Saint Germain's belongings. 'Ow did you find your way down 'ere?” His voice had become shrill and it hurt her ears.
“I didn't find my way down here,” she yelled back. “I was brought down here. A Portal opened and suddenly I was in that tunnel that led to this place.”
“Likely story,” he sneered. She stared back into his eyes. She noticed they were more of a whiskey color than light brown. However, the dilated pupils almost obliterated their color at the moment.
“But it's true. And one of the men was the very same one who stole into my room and tried to abduct me,” she said.
He was still squinting at her. “That story is beginning to be filled with 'oles,” he said, with a flourish of fingers.
She glared at him. This was neither the place nor time to try and win an argument with Jacques, who was very convinced she was here for ulterior reasons. He probably didn't tell Saint Germain as yet about his theories because he wasn't sure about them himself.
“I'm not lying!” She turned and thrust her hand toward the organ. “See? It isn't lit up. I don't know what they did to it, but they made it stop working.”
Jacques turned reluctantly away from her and moved for the organ to study it.
“We have to turn it back on, Saint Germain has gone somewhere and he won't be able to come back if we don't do something!” She thrust her hands up in frustration.
Jacques moved around the organ, much like the rogue wizard had. Mumbling Arpiesian as he disappeared behind the organ, his words slightly muffled. “Ah!” Jacques shouted sharply. Suddenly something happened. All at once there came a rumbling and hissing noise from the organ, lights flickered back on. The rumbling evened out until there came a voluminous humming that vibrated into her chest it was so deep.
“Voilà!” Jacques exclaimed as he strode out from behind the machine, a smile in place, brushing his hands together as though he'd done some sort of dirty work.
“What did you do?” she asked, genuinely perplexed.
“I plug eet back in.” He gave an indifferent shrug, as though it were child's play to figure it out.
She gave him an excuse-the-hell-out-of-me look. As if she knew how the dumb thing w
orked. Now she did, thank you very much, Mr. Irritating Arpiesian wolfman. If she'd had a few moments to figure this out, she would have come across it, eventually. It wasn't like he were overly intelligent in figuring it out, because he'd probably knew all along what the problem was. It was some sort of huge plug, like on her dryer back on Earth.
Jacques grasped her arm and jerked her back toward the steps.
“Ouch! Let go of me!” She yanked her arm away from him and they stood glaring at one another.
“I knew zat you 'ave not been very 'onist with us. Now, I 'ave ze proof!”
“You can tell Franz whatever you want. I don't care,” she said, folding her arms and cocking her hip.
“No?” Jacques said, thrusting out his lip aggressively. “We shall see, madam.”
“You'll tell him about the men, too.”
“What men? I did not see any men,” he said.
She rolled her eyes. “I told you about them!”
“'Ow would anyone be able to enter Saint Germain's castle?”
“They're wizards able to Evanish in and out of here, and any other place, whenever they want.”
“Myron was with them,” she went on.
“Myron?”
“The vampire, Myron,” she explained, rolling her eyes. “Saint Germain knows about him.”
“So do I,” he said, looking down in thought, hand to chin. For the first time she thought he might believe her. “Why would 'e be with them?”
“He's part of the whole plot to abduct me,” she said.
“Abduct you!” He threw back his head and guffawed. “Why would zey want you?” He said it with such disgust she felt like the unwanted child, all of a sudden.
“I-I don't know,” she said, not really wanting to explain what they were plotting for her. “I only know that they are planning something. Some sort of ritual having to do with some sort of god named—uh! I can't remember the name. Ape-something.”
“An ape god?” He quizzed. “I've never 'eard of an ape god.” He gave a little grunt of skepticism.
“Not an ape god!” She let go a frustrated gasp. “It was part of his name. Ape-something.”
“Ape-god. It matters not. You should not be 'ere. You must come back up to the castle, and go straight to your room where you shall remain until Saint Germain returns.”
“Fine,” she said, giving up on trying to reason with the man.
Neither of them spoke the rest of the way up the stairs and catwalk, and it was totally silent as he lead her through the secret passageway. Once they stepped back into the library, Jacques moved her into the center of the room. Zofia turned around to find Jacques closing the secret door. She now knew that this was the secret way—through one of the bookcases, next to the fireplace. But where the secret release was, she didn't know. It could be in the bookcase itself, or somewhere nearby. It didn't matter, she would be able to open it by magic.
Jacques stood in front of the fireplace, staring at her. “You will now go to your room, I think, madame,” he said and then stalked toward her, waving his hands at her like he were shooing chickens.
She didn't like the idea of staying in her room all day, but on the other hand, working on mending old, musty books was the less attractive of the two, she concluded. She didn't argue with Jacques as he escorted her silently back to her quarters. Once they arrived at her door, she turned to him. “I'll want to speak to Saint Germain as soon as he returns,” she said.
“After I 'ave spoke to 'im myself,” he said with a sniff.
She restrained herself from curling her lip at him. She actually wanted to slap that smug look of his face. “Fine.”
Jacques opened the door for her, and held it open until she stepped inside. Only the fireplace glowed at the moment. No lamps were lit, and the interior was dark. It was somewhat disconcerting, at first. She turned to say something, but Jacques shut the door on her, leaving her in the gloom.
“Hey! Wait!” She turned back into the room and incanted, “Luminos!” Several lights blinked on, illuminating the comfortable interior to her.
Behind her, she heard a definite click of the lock.
“You're locking me in here?” she cried with disbelief.
His laughter audible through the door, faded to nothing.
With a huff of indignation, she pointed a finger at the lock. “Twizzle!” The lock disengaged, and she opened the door, peered around the central atrium. The water trickled into the little pond. There was no other sound.
Jacques was gone. Good!
Zofia stuck her tongue out in the direction she assumed he'd taken. She closed and relocked the door magically. Twirling about, she stepped down into the room and shrieked when a dark, talk form of a man stepped from out of the void.
Chapter 29
“That was rather cheeky of you,” the man said evenly.
“Dorian!” she said on a stifled gasp, hardly believing her eyes. “What are you doing here?” She demanded, heart thumping wildly against her breast.
“I might ask you the same,” he said in his usual coolish way. His face sported a few days growth of beard, she noticed. She'd never seen him like this before. Unshaven, hair longer than she could remember him allowing it to grow, and more unruly. He looked sexy in a bad-boy sort of way. He wore a black button-down Chino shirt, open three buttons, and black cargo pants tucked into black lace-up combat boots. She had no idea there were Army surplus stores on Euphoria (there wasn't, of course). He smelled slightly of ozone, and of warm, male scent. Not the musky scent he gave off as a vampire—which she'd found incredibly alluring. Right now, however, nothing would get her to soften up on him. He was a cur for leaving her like he had.
“How did you get in?” she demanded, cocking a hip, and planting a fist on it. “Through the chimney like a Ghogal?”
“Please,” he scoffed. “I think not. I came by Portal.”
“Portal,” she repeated, feeling a chill climb up her spine. There were plenty of those around. “You mean by mistake?”
“No,” he said, moving away in an easy, casual gate, eyes scanning everything, including the bed, but not going near it. “A Portable Portal, in fact.”
“Portable Portal,” she repeated. She was beginning to sound like a mimic bird.
Stopping, he dug down into his pocket and extracted a small disk-shaped object that looked somewhat like a man's gold pocket watch and held it out to show her. “I won't open it, but it's in here.”
“A Portable Portal is in there?” she asked, pointing at the gold disk in his palm until he returned it to one of his many pants pockets.
“They're illegal, of course,” he tacked on, strolling through the room. He stopped and peered at a lamp, then touched it. The light blinked off. Zofia's mouth had fallen open. Saint Germain had touch lamps here?
“Of course. That's why you have one,” she said, bitterly, hoping he would ignore the fact there was electricity here.
“Because I'm a Knight. Yes.” He stepped up into the cubby/sitting area, looked around it and then turned to throw her a slightly annoyed frown. “And you're here because—?”
“I'm here as a Knight, just as you—”
He made a scoffing, snorting sound. “Right. Doing what? Aggravating the payed help?” He took the steps out of the sitting room, and moved cat-like through the rest of the room until he arrived before the door. Trying the door, he found it locked. He turned away from it, seemingly satisfied they would not be walked in on.
“I'm spying on Saint Germain,” she explained in a low voice.
Striding past her, he now moved for the bed. “Really?” he said, fingering the material of the canopy, and then returned her stare. “Get anywhere with that?”
“Yes, actually.” She crossed her arms, still in her mutinous stance, one foot slightly forward, hip cocked. “You and I need to talk.”
He moved again, and strode to the fireplace and held his hands out to warm them. “Yes. We do,” he breathed; it was neither a sigh, nor a
grunt, but somewhere in between. Stooping, he took up the fireplace poker and jabbed at the charcoaled logs inside the grate. Orange sparks shot up under his attack releasing a high wheeze. Logs disintegrated, and fell in on themselves with a hiss and harsh sliding sound. “We seemed to have been in the middle of a party when we tried to talk the last time.” He turned to glare at her before kneeling at the firewood bin. She watched as he fed the fresh split logs into the fire. The fire snapped and popped as they flamed. Standing, his lean form became back-lit in amber. Why was it that men liked to attack the fireplace when angry or upset? Well, better the logs than her, she supposed. She recalled the anger seething from him at the inductee party, when he'd learned that she had gone to The Place of No Return to get Elton's soul back. Or was it because Stephen had her on his arm? It could have been everything, actually.
Arms crossed, Dorian faced her, waiting. She noticed his wand, tucked neatly into its sheath, swayed slightly with his movements. “I'll start, then. So, you tell everyone before you tell me that you were attacked by a demon?”
“Don't you dare bend this your way! I tried to tell you about it all that day. You know that.”
“The Four gave their okay, and Stephen made you an Inductee, so now everyone is happy. You should be happy as well. I've given you your freedom.”
Zofia squeezed her eyes against her anger. A throbbing began at her temples. Or, maybe it had merely gotten worse since her stint down below. “How did this jump from my being unable to tell you something, to you letting me go—not only that, but you gave Stephen permission to bed me—how dare you!”
“I thought it was best that way,” he said, indifferently. “Would you rather I drew up divorce papers and have them served?”
“NO!” Then she thought about it. “I don't know!” She turned away biting off angry, bitter words that she would rather not say just now. She couldn't believe this was really happening. She thought he'd given her to Stephen that day because of his anger over the demon. She thought by now he would have cooled down and come to his senses. But his words and body language said it all. He was serious about letting her go.