Realm of Shadows (Vampire Alliance)

by Heather Graham

  “Dig carefully!” Professor Dubois admonished.

  Carefully! They could barely see.

  “Carefully, carefully!” Dubois repeated.

  The man was distraught. But then, to Jean-Luc, Dubois always appeared on the edge of a frenzy, as if his explorations in the crypt were world-shattering and his findings would change the shape of the globe.

  Down in the ground, in the area of deconsecrated ruins of the old St. Michel recently rediscovered foundations, the workmen were tired. Jean-Luc Beauvoir stared at the professor with his thick glasses and wild gray hair and bit his lip to keep silent. He and the American, Brent Malone, had been working tirelessly for hours, slowly, slowly digging away the age-old rot around the coffins. Professor Dubois was expecting an incredible archeological find. He was certain he was going to unearth not only the dead, but worldwide recognition, honors and awards, and naturally, the fortune to be made from the book he would write, and the lectures and speeches he would give. The professor gave little thought to the fact that most learned men thought he was a raving lunatic, or that he had bought his way into the excavation either by bribery or by making a large donation to the current St. Michel. Little money had been left to pay for the highly trained archeological staff Dubois had wanted, and so the professor constantly shouted orders and ridicule at the two-man team of laborers he had managed to obtain, and forced them to keep working once the afternoon began to wane toward evening. The American seemed able to silence the professor with a single stare from his strange, gold-tinted hazel eyes, but the professor would merely start all over again.

  The St. Michel now standing in the little village just outside Paris dated back to the sixteenth century; the crypt in the old ruins they now worked so laboriously to probe and restore predated the new church by three or four hundred years. The work was treacherous, but they had shored up the area enough to allow tourists to pay extra francs to come and view the dig in process. Now, to add to the aggravation of the professor leaning over their shoulders, directing the tedious and backbreaking labor, there were the curious stopping to ask questions every other minute. The Americans were easy to ignore; he pretended he spoke no English. The French were more annoying because the professor would pause to speak with them, then shout at his laborers again that they were working far too roughly; they might damage coffins that had survived for centuries.

  Jean-Luc stared over at Brent and rolled his eyes as a young woman began a conversation with the professor. Not just a young woman. A beautiful one, with a smooth cultured voice and a knowledge of the area, and the church. American. Her accent was definitely American. And though her words were curious and knowledgeable, there was also a friendly charm to the very sound of her voice. It was not lost on the professor. The old man was not without a lascivious nature; he would hold the young woman to balance her over the opening so that she could see better, and so that he could get his bony hands on her young flesh.

  Brent didn’t seem to catch Jean-Luc’s look. He was distracted, not noting the young woman talking to the professor, either. He was studying the area in which they worked, which connected to the underbelly of the new church through a maze of vaults and corridors, many of which had housed the bones of the noble dead. This area, some distance from the new foundations, was different in its style and decor. Typical Gothic arches created both support and architectural features, but the walls and crypts were decorated with a strange combination of the customary and bizarre. Large crosses, in various metals, surrounded the grave sites, but were joined by myriad demons and gargoyles.

  In the pit where they now dug, they had just come to an obstruction. He knew it, and the American knew it. As the professor chatted with the young woman in French, Brent at last gave Jean-Luc his undivided attention. He gave a little shake of his head, indicating that they should not tell the professor just what point they had reached.

  Jean-Luc grinned. The American was smart. The corpse they were about to exhume might be laden with precious jewels and adorned in gold. Let the professor have his accolades. They would take the riches.

  But the American frowned, and Jean-Luc frowned as well. What was Brent planning?

  The young woman was lingering, speaking with the professor, but watching the American as he worked in the crypt. Why not? Jean-Luc thought with a shrug. The woman was young. Tall, sleek, elegantly, sensually built with full curves and a slim waist. She had long, sandy hair, and wickedly long legs. Large, luminous eyes, and a perfectly fashioned face. Smooth flesh. Professor Dubois was as wrinkled as a prune and as wild looking as an electrocuted Pekinese. The American worker was a tall man, wiry and powerful with an easy grace of movement and finely honed muscles that seemed to swell and tighten each time he used a tool. His features marked him as somewhere between twenty-five and thirty-five, while his eyes were that strange green-gold color and his hair, neatly long, almost to his shoulders, frequently tied, was a dark sable. Rich, probably tempting to a young woman. The world didn’t change. Women might marry a man with intelligence and riches, but when it came to a man with whom to find pleasure, they tended to hunt out a man with physical power. Animal instinct. The American, however, still wasn’t giving the electric beauty of his countrywoman much notice. He was pretending to dig deeper now, but making no real moves to disclose whatever treasure they might have come upon.

  Jean-Luc had simply paused; now he wondered if it was the American, or the grave, to which the young lady was giving her sharp attention while casually making conversation with the professor.

  “Professor,” Brent said suddenly and impatiently, interrupting the conversation and leaning on his shovel.

  “What is it?” Dubois demanded.

  The American looked at his watch. “It’s late. We have to begin again in the morning.”

  “Not so late. We shouldn’t stop. I have studied the old records. We must be nearly upon the grave.”

  “And if you are upon the grave you seek, you’ll want experts in here to move the final layers of dirt and sand, and you will not get the professionals you will need at this time. As of now, we have nothing here, nothing to bring in grave robbers by night. If we start again by morning, you will have ample time to do your discovery justice. It is nearly seven. We have already worked hours overtime. The church is closed. We must get this young lady out, and shut down for the evening.”

  “Oh, I have overstayed!” the young woman exclaimed. “I simply find it all so fascinating. Forgive me.”

  “Forgive you? Not at all, my dear,” Dubois said, drawing Jean-Luc’s greater attention to the woman. She wore jeans and a sweater and handsome black loafers, now covered with the dust from this realm of the dead. Simple clothing, but worn very well, hugging the form that had so drawn the professor’s interest. Her hair was a sandy blond, long, but drawn back in a smooth, sleek ponytail that heightened the fine sculpture of her features. Her eyes, deepened by the murky light and shadow, appeared to be almost turquoise, the color of the sea off the French coast. They were never going to get the professor to let this morsel go . . . Jean-Luc could almost understand the old man’s desire to hold on to something so simple as conversation, just as long as he could.

  “Shall I see our guest out?” Brent asked bluntly. He stared coolly at the woman. “She needs to be out.”

  “Yes, of course, she must be seen safely out, but you must finish up. I will see the young lady out,” Dubois said. “My dear, if you will?”

  “Oh, please, don’t worry, I can make my way,” she said pleasantly. “I am simply so intrigued. I’ll be back, if I may?”

  “Please, you are so very welcome, Miss . . .” Dubois said.

  “Marceau. Genevieve Marceau, Professor. And thank you, you’ve been so kind.”

  “A French name. But you’re an American.”

  “Of French descent. And I’m familiar with such vaults—”

  “But still! Alors! You must not go alone. The flooring is tricky. And despite the lights . . . well, it gets late, a
nd though we are underground, it seems even darker once the night has come.”

  “I am absolutely fine. I will see you then, Professor. Thank you so very much.”

  She shook the professor’s hand. The professor was loath to let go of her hand. She managed to retrieve her fingers, and repeated, “I’m fine. Please!” She started out then, quickly, determined to exit on her own. The professor looked after her for a long while. When she was gone at last he stared with narrowed eyes at the American. “Make sure that the tomb is secured when you leave. Totally secured.”

  “Of course.”

  The professor glanced at this watch. “You’re right. I must make calls ... find the right people. And you! Jean-Luc! Keep your heavy hand off the work from now on. You hack away as if you were plowing weed-strewn fields. This is great work going on here.”

  Without another word, the professor turned and started from the tomb.

  Brent looked at Jean-Luc. “I have to open this tomb tonight,” he said quietly.

  “Yes, yes, of course. We have done the work. The professor will take everything; we are nothing to him but muscle. He is like a slave driver. But what will we do? If we rob the tomb, he will know. The government will be called in.”

  “No, no, pay attention to me,” Brent said impatiently. “We will open it carefully, and reseal it.”

  “And rob it first, of course.”

  “No.”

  “But—”

  “There will be a trinket, something you can take. But we are not robbing the tomb.”

  “Then . . .”

  “There will be a reward for you, and Dubois will never know. All right? Help me with the last of the dirt. Quickly.”

  The dirt was easy to shift, but the sarcophagus was covered by a huge stone slab.

  “We will never shift this,” Jean-Luc muttered.

  “Take the side.”

  Jean-Luc hefted his huge frame against the slab, grunting and groaning, sweat immediately popping out on his brow. The American set to the task with him. The stone shifted and Brent shouted that they must be careful; they didn’t want it crashing to the floor and breaking. The stone settled. They could see the coffin itself.

  It was black. Crosses abounded over and around it. Brent immediately set to work removing them. Jean-Luc joined in. “There is strange writing on the coffin. Look, how odd, I cannot make it out completely, but the words speak of the devil while the coffin is covered in signs of the Lord! Sacrebleu! How very strange!”

  Brent had picked up a crowbar.

  “I don’t think it will work. It appears as if the coffin has somehow been sealed with some kind of adherent ... like a soldering.”

  “I will open it.”

  Brent shoved the crowbar against the coffin. The creaking sound it gave out caused even such a man as Jean-Luc to feel a prickle of fear at his nape. The silence that followed the creaking was deep and complete.

  So deep, in fact, that they were both startled to hear a sound . . . a furtive, rustling sound, coming from the exit to the vault. One of the portable lamps suddenly burned to an end; in the wall sconce at their side, there was a popping sound, and the area went dark. And still, they could hear something ... footsteps, stealthy, careful, coming from the exit to the vault.

  “It’s the woman, surely,” Brent said, and swore impatiently. “I’ll get rid of her. Touch nothing, nothing, do you hear me, nothing, while I am gone, Jean-Luc, on pain of death. I mean it.”

  “Of course! Never. I swear that I will not,” Jean-Luc said, and crossed himself. But as he watched the American silently disappear into shadows that seemed to close around him, he felt the birth of resentment in his soul. The American wanted to rob the tomb without getting caught. Good, sane concept. But the American wanted the finest riches in the coffin to be for himself.

  The lid had been pried open; it was surprising that the American had managed it so easily. A sumo wrestler might have struggled with such a task.

  Jean-Luc looked toward the stygian darkness of the exit vaults. Brent was not returning, yet.

  He edged his away around the coffin to the side where his work partner had stood. He could not resist. He lifted the lid of the coffin, hearing again the blood-chilling creaking as the hinges, hundreds of years old, gave way. He steeled himself against the ghastly look of the ancient dead; he had become quite accustomed to skulls; to open jaws that appeared to have been captured in a victim’s last scream against death. Decayed flesh, withered flesh, gray and moldy, fragments of clothes, boots, with bits of bone poking through . . . this would be nothing new.

  Yet he gasped as he stared into the tomb. There was no scent of decay, not even the musty smell that came when centuries had passed since death. There was no bone to be seen. What he stared upon was . . .

  Eyes.

  Eyes wide open, black as pitch, but open. Staring, staring straight into Jean-Luc’s own. As if the corpse had never died but slept, and waited . . .

  And then . . .

  The corpse moved.

  Jean-Luc let out a shrill, bloodcurdling scream that might have wakened the dead not only in Paris, but in all of France . . .

  Darkness, wavering light, filled the tomb as the lamps suddenly swung. The black of the grave, the white of the flickering light . . .

  The brilliant crimson of blood . . .

  All filled the tomb.

  Standing in the vault, about to accost their unwelcome visitor, Brent heard the scream.

  And he swore, damning himself. And damning her.

  “My God!” she cried.

  The woman had been returning to the vault. Sliding along the vaults with their smell of rot and decay, she had been returning to the site of the dig. Why? Who the hell was she? What was she doing . . . at this site, here, and now?

  She forgot to hide as they heard Jean-Luc’s scream tear through the corridors of the vault like the haunted shrieking of the damned.

  And so she cried out herself. Cried out, and . . .

  She saw Brent, saw his eyes . . .

  Her scream echoed Jean-Luc’s.

  She turned to run.

  Too late . . .

  Oh, yes, by God.

  Far too late . . .

  Tara had never heard anything quite like the sound that still seemed to echo within the walls of the crypt.

  She had felt a strange sense of the ages while going down into the underground ruins, and she had felt a sadness for all the lives gone by, and even a bit of awe for lives lived so very long ago, and the intense history of mankind. She hadn’t felt entirely comfortable with the mausoleums and graves of the dead, but she hadn’t been afraid. Not even in the darkness and the gloom.

  Then she heard the scream.

  The shadowy light in the bowels of the earth gave life to the savage grins and leers of gargoyles, grotesques, and angels alike.

  Sound seemed to rise from the dead.

  The walls to grow closer, darker.

  And there, ahead of her, as frozen by the sound as she, stood the American.

  And the look on his face as he stared at her, in that split second when they were both paralyzed by the echoes that seemed to rise from hell, from the shrieks that still seemed to fill the hellish world of the dead in which they stood, transfixed her.

  He stood some distance away, and she knew that he had come after her, somehow aware that she hadn’t left the tomb, that she had an agenda of her own.

  He was some distance down the corridor, where the tombs had been laid out as shelves. The shadows had grown darker as the work lighting had dimmed, as lamps had shattered. She couldn’t possibly see his face, not really, he was just a silhouette there, and yet one filled with menace. And she was certain that he was staring at her with fury, and with a vengeance that seemed to make the hair at her nape rise. Seconds, flew by, seconds, and yet in that time, she could feel his tension, as if it were an ancient wind, roiling down the length of the tunnel toward her. He would come after her, he wanted to kill her, do to he
r what she had heard in that bloodcurdling scream, still seeming to echo against stone and concrete.

  But he didn’t come toward her.

  He turned, racing back toward the sound of the scream, as if hell had come bursting through the earth below the crypt, and if he could stop exploding fires that had risen from hell.

  And yet she knew. He had seen her face. And every single line and nuance of her countenance had been embedded in his memory.

  He would still come after her.

  She turned and ran. As fast as he had run back toward hell, she ran away from it. Down the corridors that had been home to centuries of the dead.

  Down through the darkness. Desperate, almost blinded by fear. The stairs to the new church at last loomed before her. She flew up them, barely aware of her feet touching the steps. She arose near the doors at the rear, raced across a length of marble and threw herself against the doors that would lead back into the sanity of the French night.

  The doors were locked.

  Brent felt as if he had been physically torn in two. And in the minuscule span of time during which he had heard the scream and stared at the woman down the corridor, eons of thought had passed through his mind.

  He’d been the biggest fool in the world to leave Jean-Luc alone with the coffin.

  But he had known that the woman remained in the crypts, and he knew he must get her out. He hadn’t even been certain that he had been right about the tomb. He had taken on the job of digging just as a precaution. Because of a vague legend that had circulated hundreds of years ago, a nightmare story told by schoolgirls and boys around the fire on a cold winter night.

  And yet . . .

  He should have known.

  Despite her loafers, the woman could run. She had been far ahead of him. And she had run like a cougar, and he knew, even as he raced back to the tomb, his heart sinking, that she had taken off again, and she was sure to be trouble.