The Trelayne Inheritance

by Colleen Shannon

  Angel saw someone, some thing, tall but cloaked, grab him from behind.

  Immediately the siren whispering in her mind went quiet. Angel set the glass down, shaking. Fear made her move abortively for the door, but she stopped. Max had come here to protect her. She knew that as certainly as she knew she couldn’t trust him.

  Vampire or not, he needed her help.

  But he didn’t…Even as she lifted a heavy figurine and tried to circle around behind the cloaked figure, Max’s nails grew into long, disgusting claws and dug deeply into the hands choking him. The cloaked figure gave an unearthly screech and backed off. Max whirled and jabbed with the stake that had suddenly appeared in his hand.

  But he touched air. The cloak floated harmlessly to the floor. A column of mist grew.

  For an instant, the stench was so strong Angel had to cover her nose with both hands.

  Then the mist trailed toward the door, growing thinner, finer…and it was gone.

  Only then did she realize the smell of death remained.

  And Max was the only one left in the room.

  He tossed the stake away in frustration, turning toward her.

  With the mist went some of Angel’s strength. She was a scientist, but the odd events of this night had no rational explanation.

  Two unnatural beings had invaded her mind, using her as a bartering card. As to why she, of unusually strong mind, had not been able to fight them off, well, of that she’d have to wonder later. For now, she knew only the urge to flee. Max stood quietly, staring at her.

  His eyes glowed redly, too.

  If she’d needed further proof of who and what he was, just as the unseen presence had warned, here it was. She was so drawn to this enticing, enigmatic man who could get inside her head as she’d almost let him inside her body because he was a vampire.

  She sidled for the door. One minute he was in front of her, the next he was against her, pressing her back into the sideboard. So quickly, so artfully, did he move.

  He held her just as artfully, no claws in evidence now as he lifted her chin with a warm, seemingly normal masculine hand. “I came here at considerable risk to myself. Why this sudden coldness toward me?”

  “You’ll excuse me if I don’t know my proper crypt etiquette, but I don’t number many vampires amongst my acquaintance.” She tried to ease away, but he caressed her throat now. She shivered, hating herself for liking the silken stroke of his hands. His eyes glowed at her redly, but she was growing increasingly accustomed to the gloom, and here, even here, perhaps most of all in this place that still smelled faintly of death, he shone with starfire.

  The dichotomy of his golden vibrance, that bright smile, contrasted so with the reddish eyes and claws that more befitted the legends of his kind. Which were harbingers of his true nature? She still didn’t know which of the two strange figures who’d battled for control of her was good, which was evil.

  The other presence had only spoken to her. It made no threatening moves. Whereas Maximillian only had to touch her to set her heart to racing. Like now.

  “How do you know I’m a vampire? Do I look like one?” That bright smile deepened.

  She felt his sensual tug at her very womb. “No, but you feel like one. And nothing else can explain the way you move without sound, leave no footprints, the glow of your eyes--”

  “Your eyes glow, too.” He swung her about, holding her framed against him to force her to look into the mirror.

  Indeed they did. Almost as brightly as his. To block the sight, she closed her eyes, her mind reeling with more possibilities than her shocked sensibilities could take. There was some easy explanation for that odd reddish tint. A lack of pigmentation, perhaps, that gave her albino tendencies. Her skin was very fair.

  “Very fair, indeed, in every sense of the word. But that can’t account for your ability to see in the dark.”

  She jerked away from him. “Would you stay out of my head?”

  “Why? It’s getting crowded in there, since you seem to be of two minds yourself. How fortunate that I like crowds.”

  She wanted to hit him until she saw the quirk at the corner of his luscious mouth. Her own mouth relaxed slightly.

  A fingertip brushed her lips, barely grazing, side to side. “Ah, you look so much better when you smile.” His mouth lowered to brush the same path until her lips tingled with his starfire. “And the taste of your smile is addictive.”

  She opened her mouth to him, unable to deny the dark allure of this bright, impossible to understand…but he wasn’t a man. Not really. But ah, of all the nightly gifts he gave, kissing was the best. Then his light little nibbles trailed from her lips, down her chin, where his tongue explored the small indentation there, to the soft, scented hollow of her throat. His tongue dipped there, too, as if she were not only honey, but verdure, surcease, hope for happiness.

  The crazy thoughts spun, windmill-like, in her brain. And then she felt the brush of his teeth against the side of her neck. He shuddered, a small breath warming the place where his lips and teeth nibbled. Then, with a groan that seemed to come from sundered depths where he let now woman reach, he crushed her to him, kissing her wildly, passionately, with a need that seemed more desperately human than vampire seductive.

  As he deepened the kiss, a faint sound came from the corridor.

  He was instantly alert. “Stay here.” He seemed to float more than walk to the door.

  She’d never been a good one for orders. She waited, heard only a fainter rustling sound, what sounded like a low moan, then dead silence. She had to know what was happening. She crept to the door after him, surprised at how soundless her own feet were on the cold stone floor. Odd. Her slippers had hard soles.

  When she reached the door, she stopped, gripping the jamb with both hands. She saw the body with her mind, smelled it with her nostrils, before she took a literal grip on reality and forced herself to look down at the tunnel floor. The tunnel floor dotted with dark splotches of blood.

  Fresh blood.

  Max knelt over the figure. The poor thing still had oozing holes torn, two each side of the long, previously flawless neck. Holes torn so violently blood spurted from the jugular. It still oozed sluggishly. Max stared down, his expression peculiar, obviously so intent on the girl before him that he’d momentarily forgotten the one he left in the sitting room. Then he started to bend toward the feeble flow. In that instant, she saw fangs.

  Gasping, Angel leaped over both of them with a strength and agility that startled her and ran as if her life depended upon it.

  As it probably did. If not for that poor girl on the floor, it could’ve been her.

  Max snapped to when he felt her jump over him. He sprang up to follow her, realizing she’d seen his brief battle with temptation. And misunderstood. Exactly as the killer intended when planting its latest victim in the tunnel.

  How did the Beefsteak Killer know how much his enemy hungered to taste of human blood? Warm human blood. Just once….

  Shame burned through Max as he looked down at the poor unfortunate girl. She looked as innocent and lovely as the rest. Alexander was quite choosy, as usual. Max covered the girl with a quilt from over the settee, closed her staring eyes, and then sought fresh air.

  When he emerged, torchlight almost blinded him. But his eyes adjusted quickly. He was shocked to see quite a gathering. Several burly farmworkers, a village smithy. And Gustav, the head groom from the Blythe estate, a surly fellow Max had never trusted. Even the local parish priest. The priest held a huge silver crucifix high, as if the feeble silver glow could protect all of them.

  And, in the distance, he just made out Alexander escorting Angel away into a carriage. The horses galloped off, leaving Max alone to face the mob.

  But it wouldn’t be the first time. It also wouldn’t be the last time Alexander used his own people in his war against the Trelaynes.

  The crucifix trembled slightly. Max’s lip curled. He bowed, one hand in his waistcoat. “A welco
ming party? Just for me? How kind.” His sally only earned even grimmer looks.

  The Blythe groom sneered. “We found her scarf against a tree, one shoe outside the steps where you did your foul deed. You’re going in, your lordship. We’ll have no more of these killings once you’re behind bars.”

  A dilemma, Max decided. Something else doubtless thrust upon him by the Beefsteak Killer. Max looked at the red scarf, the small shoe. If he hadn’t been so concerned about Angel upon his arrival, in the normal way of things he would have noticed their convenient trail. He’d noticed nothing but Angel’s footsteps…

  “And how, pray tell, do you know there’s a victim, much less that I’m a killer?”

  The words were scarce out of his mouth before two men struggled up from the gaping hole in the catafalque, carrying the dead girl.

  “We was warned,” said the smithy, his beefy arms folded over his broad chest. Max had always somewhat admired the fellow. He had a come through me, not around me look to him that few wore before the Earl of Trelayne.

  “And if I told you I merely stumbled upon her, quite literally?”

  The smithy spat his response. “And bathed in her blood, belike?”

  Max looked down at his clothes. The flow of blood had stopped more slowly than he’d realized. “Nevertheless, I killed no one.” Not tonight. “But I shall be happy to live down to your lurid expectations. Who’s first?” Max leaped forward in a huge bound, whipping the stakes from his cloak.

  The dare had the effect he hoped. The priest almost dropped the crucifix. The torches trembled. Even the smithy backed a step. Only Gustav stayed firm, and for a brief instant, Max could have sworn the head groom bared fangs.

  Max took full advantage. One more bound took him behind a huge tree. There, he climbed, soundlessly, his nails claws, into the branches.

  By the time the villagers clustered at the base of the tree, casting torchlight up to peer into the branches, Maximillian, Earl of Trelayne, flapped far above their heads on soundless wings.

  But he left frightened whispers and resentful mutterings behind him.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Unable to sleep, Angel paced, her night robe flowing behind her. She had to know what happened to Max. She’d been shocked to see the gathering too, had pointed automatically when Gustav asked if she knew if anyone had been killed.

  “And the Earl of Trelayne? Was he there, too?” Gustav had asked.

  Angel froze, finally thinking clearly again. That was an odd question for him to ask, unless…unless someone sent him.

  Telling him first Max would be there.

  Thinking back, Angel realized how quickly Alexander appeared, sweeping her into his carriage without a question or, come to think of it, a great deal of concern. He patted her shoulder on the brief journey to the Hall, seeming to take no offense when she shrank away. She longed to confront him with what Shelly had told her, but if tonight had taught her anything, it was to bide her time and her tongue.

  If Alexander were truly her enemy, far better he thought she still considered him a kindly uncle. But that didn’t prevent her from trying to find out what was going on.

  She cocked her head and listened. She’d never ventured out of her quarters in the wee hours before, even when she occasionally heard an odd noise. But she’d never been so restless before. Frightened, curious, oddly exhilarated all at once. The danger she’d experienced tonight had strangely enlivened her and stirred up her blood.

  She’d come here for adventure, hadn’t she?

  If nothing else, she wanted to see inside that lab in the basement her uncle refused to let her enter. She threw off her night robe and rail and dressed.

  As soon as he was out of sight of the others, Gustav threw off his heavy coat and overpants to reveal his fine serge wool jacket and matching pants. This distasteful role of subservient thrust upon him was a necessary charade, but that didn’t mean he had to relish it. And it certainly didn’t mean he had to wear the mean clothes and mean manners for the coming meeting with his peers.

  He’d led the villagers to the earl and done his best to stir them up. Far better, as the others agreed, that they use weak humans to put a bloody period to the last of the tenacious Earls of Trelayne. And it might have worked, if Trelayne had turned to run as expected, falling into the net the villagers had spread for him. Instead, the youngest vampire in the area outsmarted even him. He bounded forward, and then disappeared into a tree.

  Gustav glanced at his watch. One of the morning.

  And the piper to pay. They wouldn’t be happy with him. If they even let him into their sacred conference of blooded brothers.

  He’d have to grovel. But that was part of the charade, too….

  The downstairs was darker than Angel expected. Every rustle made her start. But the whisper of fabric was merely curtains flapping in the breeze. Why were the windows open?

  A slight scraping sound made her gasp, but then she realized her own foot had brushed against a chair, bumping it gently over the parquet floor. She stopped, for once thankful for her good night vision, for it was apparent she was the only one stirring in the side hall that led to the stairs into the basement. She clutched the chair back, wondering where her bravado went.

  Right out the window, along with her loyalty to kith and kin. For a moment, she seriously considered going back to her room, but then she stiffened.

  She had nothing to feel guilty about. Sir Alexander was her uncle and he’d used her as a pawn since the day she arrived here. Perhaps he had reason. Perhaps the oh so handsome, oh so bold and bright Earl of Trelayne was the true perpetrator not only of the deaths but of the machinations that twiddled her own strings.

  But whatever the battle between them, and whatever the outcome of her own role in it, one irrefutable fact made her put one foot in front of another again.

  She needed, no, she wanted, to get into that basement laboratory.

  There lay hard physical evidence of what Alexander truly studied. It was the only truth about her mysterious relatives Angel trusted.

  Taking a deep breath, she set foot on the first step leading into the basement.

  Only then did she see the eerie glow.

  Almost, she turned and ran back to her room, but she heard not a whisper of sound and assumed that perhaps someone had left a lantern burning. Even if Alexander were working this late, she could make some excuse, say she’d been unable to sleep and had come in search of him to ask questions of her mother.

  He was her uncle, wasn’t he? He should comfort her.

  She walked rapidly down the steps.

  For the forth time in as many minutes, Max gagged on the disgusting, cold blood he was trying to consume. No matter how he tried–he stared at his fireplace, where his own blood-spattered garments burned–he couldn’t forget the silky texture and warm feel of that poor girl’s blood.

  For over a century he’d kept to his vows as a Watch Bearer. He’d not once partaken of living human blood, though he had on occasion been reduced to robbing from experimental laboratories where doctors experimented feverishly. They were trying to deduce why some humans could safely pass their blood on to others, and other individuals who seemed even healthier could not.

  But he’d tried to avoid that necessity because the taste was different to sheep, or cow, or pig or goat. It was silky smooth and sweet. Like clotted cream on the tongue.

  Angel….What did she taste like?

  The image of that long throat thrown back for his delectation jabbed at his temples like one of his own stakes. Shame at his rare weakness gave him strength enough to gag down his meal. Then he lay back, exhausted, on the bed that rested on the earth of his forbears.

  That part of the vampire myth was true. Every vampire had to rest upon the earth of its birth periodically or weaken. Which meant if he could find where the Beefsteak Killer rested, he could at least force the vampire into flight, or to the stash where it kept its second coffin. One thing Max was sure of: the Beefsteak Kil
ler was the same legendary vampire the Watch Bearers had been pursuing for five hundred years.

  It was the only one known with a slanted tooth. It had first appeared in the historical accounts–myths, really–when it preyed upon the fair young daughter of a Crusader who’d taken his family to Constantinople with him.

  The creature was likely an unholy product of the East, with its exotic wiles and exotic ways. Where could it keep its coffins? Not in the mausoleum, for Max was reasonably certain he’d been over every inch of that.

  He’d also searched the Blythe estate during those wild parties. He’d found nothing, not even in that pathetic excuse for a science lab in the basement.

  Max sat up abruptly. Angel…walking toward the lab.

  Now, at this very moment.

  Damn the girl, this was twice in one night he’d have to rescue her! For all the good it did him in her esteem. He’d seen the way she let Alexander whisk her off, leaving him to face the mob alone. But he was used to that.

  He wasn’t used to having his willpower so tested. Having a feeling that matched the cold lump of blood in his stomach that he was going to regret this night, Max leaped out of bed and went to the window, his bat wings already forming.

  Angel was relieved when she saw the brace of candles someone had left burning on a small table outside the laboratory. The feeble light felt brilliant after her eyes had so well adjusted to the dark She was about to turn her attention to the strange locks on the laboratory door when she heard voices.

  She cocked her head, trying to deduce the source. Definitely not the laboratory. She trailed the sound more easily as the voices grew more heated. She found herself winding through a darkened corridor until she finally faced–a blank wall. Or what seemed to be a blank wall.

  She felt for cracks and crevices as she listened with all her might to what she sensed was a clandestine meeting that would help illuminate the mysteries going on around the estate. At first only a faint hum was evident…