Cameo and the Highwayman (Trilogy of Shadows Book 2)

by McCullough-White, Dawn

Opal’s expression behind Kyrian’s back was priceless, but Cameo did not smile.

  “You think your grandfather sent you on a mission to save me—”

  “Not exactly.”

  “I think one of those assassins hit you in the head a little too hard.”

  “Why? Because I can see him?”

  She stood and unbuttoned her cape, throwing it onto the settee forcefully.

  “I’m crazy now?” Kyrian thumped his chest frustrated with her, “I’m crazy? When I know you see things, too?”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Cameo moved to the decanter, hoping to wash away anything she had been thinking with a few more glasses of brandy.

  “You saw me heal Opal. Wasn’t that real?”

  She glanced up at him. There was the shape of a man standing next to him, formed by what appeared to be moving heat.

  “You see him, too!”

  She broke the glass in her hand suddenly. Her face was a mask of sudden rage. “Shut up!”

  Kyrian and Opal watched her anxiously. Opal glanced down into the brandy he’d been drinking as if it made him suddenly sad, and Kyrian sat speechless.

  Cameo left the room, disturbed by the expressions on her friends’ faces.

  Kyrian watched her go, then turned around to face Opal.

  The dandy traced the rim of the glass with a finger.

  “Should I go talk to her?” Kyrian asked after a few moments of intense stillness.

  “No.” Opal set down the brandy and pulled Kyrian down into one settee as he stood up. “I will.”

  * * * * *

  Cameo’s slender form was a silhouette against the glass doors at the end of the hallway. It was the only light in the exquisite passage.

  She heard the distinct click as the latch was replaced and the door opened and shut almost silently. Then the sound of footfalls, a man’s boots on the velvet carpet.

  “Hello, Opal.”

  He stopped five feet from her, “Are you staying tonight?”

  She turned around, her hair captured by the whiteness of the light.

  “Are you all right?”

  She glanced down at her hand, then back up at him. “It didn’t even break through the leather.”

  He looked down at her hand and took several more steps toward her.

  “I don’t want to discuss it.”

  Opal tilted his head to one side and smiled, but his smile was sad. “You don’t have to disclose anything. I’m still your friend.”

  She studied him for a moment. “Yes, I’m staying tonight.”

  Several shadows of men raced down the hall away from her, but Opal couldn’t see them.

  Opal slid one of his hands into hers.

  Cameo glanced down at the appendage at the end of her arm; it felt suddenly alien with Opal’s weight pulling her arm down, then she met his thoughtful smile. The snow started to fall outside; it settled gently onto the snow-covered ground and fell into the harbor, lost forever, melting into the sea.

  She looked out over the water.

  “Your eyes are the color of the Azez,” Opal pointed at the water with the snow falling into it, “just as it is now,” and he smiled thoughtfully.

  Cameo raised an eyebrow and half smirked.

  “Skeptical as always, my dear?” he mused. “Well, it doesn’t matter.” He smoothed his hair, catching a glimpse of himself in the windowpane.

  “I shouldn’t have scared Kyrian like that.”

  “He’s all right,” Opal said soberly.

  “I don’t know what he expects of me.” She leaned back against the wall, her black leather garments creaking. “Does he really think my soul could be saved by anyone, let alone a child?”

  Opal chuckled, “Yes. Why is your soul so special? What about mine?”

  She squeezed his hand. “Perhaps you are too far gone.”

  He grinned at her and glanced down at their entwined fingers, and then looked back up into her eyes more seriously. “You have no idea.”

  “Maybe you’ll tell me someday.” She let his hand drop and looked back out at the snow.

  A pained look crossed Black Opal’s face as he processed that idea, remembering the past, but Cameo never saw it. “You want to reveal all of my secrets?” he joked. “But without a bit of mystery, my charm will simply fall away.”

  She rolled her eyes, “Oh, I doubt that. I find it hard to believe that a bit of honesty will make you less charming.”

  He touched his face, irritated by the smallpox scars. “And just why can’t your soul be saved?”

  She laughed suddenly. “Well, for starters, I suspect I’m probably damned. I’ll bet that trumps anything you can muster. No matter how many little hearts you’ve broken in your time.”

  “Hmm....” Opal breathed. “That and the murder of Prince Leon of course.”

  “Oh, I know you didn’t do that because I did.”

  “What?”

  “Sorry, Opal.”

  “You let us all take the blame for that....”

  “Yes, I did.” She pushed herself into a more comfortable position against the wall, at ease with herself. “The wanted posters had already been printed. Do you really think the old king would have believed me if I had said you had nothing to do with it?”

  “No. I do wish you had told me earlier.”

  “Well, I’m telling you now.”

  “Apparently so.” Opal chewed on his lower lip for a moment, “Why didn’t you just own up to it before?”

  She shrugged and folded her arms. “Oh, what difference does that make?”

  “None, I guess.... A bit of honesty won’t make you any less charming to me, though.”

  “Ah. Well, because I didn’t want you to leave.”

  Opal perked up. “Why not?”

  “I had been alone a long time. My Master kills off the people in my life one by one, so I haven’t had any friends in my life for a long time. To spare myself the pain of losing people.” She shrugged, “To spare lives.”

  “But you didn’t want me to leave?” He was suddenly feeling a surge of pure happiness filling his being. Hope.

  “No, I wanted you and Bel around.”

  Opal tried to push away the sadness that came just by hearing Bel’s name mentioned. Haffef had seen to it that Bel had been killed already. Black Opal knew he would be next, possibly even the next time they met up with him.

  “Bel as well .... Why us?” was all he mustered up.

  She hesitated because it seemed so cold, so arbitrary and not what he wanted to hear. “You’re fun.”

  His heart sank.

  She watched the expression on his face fall into sadness. “I, um.... Well, you aren’t like anyone I’ve ever met before. Fun sounds so, nothing, and that’s not exactly what I mean.”

  “Well I am fun,” he smiled a false smile.

  “And very interesting.”

  “Obviously,” he glanced over at her half-heartedly.

  “Opal, if I didn’t enjoy being around you, I wouldn’t be.”

  “Please stop now. I know I’m fantastic. You don’t have to keep going on about it.”

  She watched him for a moment.

  By habit, he pulled out a small mirror and examined his appearance. Liking what he saw, he replaced it and found her staring at him. “What?”

  “I don’t mean to hurt you.”

  He grinned at her. “I have no idea what you’re going on about.”

  “You’re like a—”

  “Please don’t say that.”

  She smiled thoughtfully at him. “I’m not sure what you think I’m going to say.”

  The highwayman looked into her eyes, then he bit his lip as he looked back at her. “I suspect it wasn’t a hero to me.”

  She laughed. “No.” Her eyes lingered on him, intrigued. Opal seemed ill at ease. “That jacket looks… nice on you.”

  He glanced down at it. “Thank you. It is rather smart, isn’t it? I—” Opal lifted his hazel eye to h
er uncertainly. “Why are you toying with my emotions?”

  “I’m not sure what you mean.”

  “Like a brother. Isn’t that what you were going to say?”

  “I don’t remember now.” She ran her fingers absently over the wallpaper.

  “I suspect forgetfulness comes with age.”

  Cameo met his gaze, half amused and half displeased.

  “Or so I’ve heard,” he smiled serenely. “So what are your plans for Villoise? Are you going to search for… that item soon?”

  “My sister’s body? What’s left of it,” she said bitterly. “I sent someone to look for it.”

  “Oh, who?” He was genuinely intrigued.

  “Thralls.”

  Opal’s eye widened. “I beg your pardon?”

  “My thralls.”

  “By thralls do you mean, servants?”

  “Slaves, yes. Just as I am a slave to my Master, I also have thralls that must do my bidding.” She readjusted the cameo at her throat. “See, I really do have a more difficult soul to save than you, my friend.”

  The highwayman was astonished.

  “Kyrian will certainly earn his place in the priesthood if he can put me back together again,” she chuckled.

  “Who are these thralls? I’ve never seen them before, have I?”

  “Doubtful,” she said darkly.

  “But you’ve sent them on ahead to find what Haffef wants? So that means you’ll be at The Lakestar a while?”

  Cameo was sometimes amazed at how easy it was for Black Opal to accept unpleasant situations if it seemed to him that he would benefit in some way. This was apparently one of those cases. He had no idea that she had some supernatural force that she controlled, some sort of shadow-men that did her bidding. And she actually had one attached to Opal, of which he knew nothing. Opal just breezed past all this potential information and moved on to what really interested him: when would he get what he wanted? All of this crossed her mind as she stared at him, in near disbelief. However, he was fun, that much was true. She didn’t have to think dark thoughts when she was around him, and that was nice.

  “It really depends on when they find something.”

  A smile warmed his face. “Well then, most likely. I mean, how fast can a man search, especially in this weather?” He patted her arm, as if in reassurance, probably reassuring himself that she’d be staying more than reassuring her of anything.

  Cameo looked down at his grip on her then back up at his face and raised an eyebrow.

  “It’s simply terrible, this weather in Villoise, don’t you agree?”

  “The cold doesn’t affect me the way it does you.”

  “Oh no?” He recalled that he’d given up his duster to keep her warm one night outside the Temple of the Moon, and he met her eyes. She seemed to be amused by revealing that piece of information to him as well, but Opal just waved away that notion.

  He began to walk back down the hall, still holding her upper arm. “It’s getting dark. Don’t you think we should consider having dinner? Something lovely, perhaps a nice roast, glazed onions, with wine and extra bread, and we can sit before a roaring fire.”

  She allowed him to lead her down the hall. Just listening to him plan out the evening was cozy, and it made her smile a bit.

  “I don’t think of you as a brother.”

  “Of course not,” he said haughtily. “You didn’t really think I believed that. Dinner my dear? Or would you like to continue a conversation in that dusty hallway for the next few hours?”

  She smirked a dark little smile, “Lead on.”

  Chapter Two

  HER EYES WERE WHITISH, corpse-like, caught in the sliver of moon through a tall window overlooking the Azez, and she searched Opal’s face with those dead eyes… a zombie’s eyes.

  He had finally fallen asleep after midnight. He had fought it, but lounging in the canopy bed, his head resting against a silk pillow that threatened to engulf him, he eventually succumbed to slumber. He hadn’t bothered to remove anything but his boots.

  Kyrian was asleep on one of the fainting couches at the other end of the room.

  The room was so quiet. The fire had gone out, and a plume of smoke slipped up and out the chimney, wispy, like a ghost. The room was mostly dark, lit only by the moon, so where the light did fall it caught everything in a gray light. Like Opal’s face.

  In his finery, he looked like a romantic painting. The bellowing sleeves, the lightness of his ruffled shirt, and a lone ribbon that dangled down off the mattress. His face was pale in the moonlight.

  At the doorway she saw her thralls, the shadow-men whom she had sent to find Ivy’s bones, the treasure that her Master had sent her to seek. They were back, and she couldn’t dally. That could only anger Haffef, and the only time she had done that, she had very nearly died. They stood at the doorway awaiting her next move.

  She had hoped they wouldn’t be back so soon.

  Cameo slid from the chair she’d been perched on and knelt down silently beside the bed. She removed an empty wine glass from Opal’s hand and set it on the floor.

  “Opal,” she uttered, gently brushing a lock of hair off his face.

  He stirred, but there was no reply.

  She turned and motioned the shadows on ahead of her then, without further pause, swept out the door with the speed of something supernatural.

  * * * * *

  The shadows, which moved as men, seen only by Cameo, were at times solid, at times wispy. She raced down the stairs of the Lakestar after them. The old inn felt almost as it had years ago during the revolution, as if it were caught in time by the horror and sorrow, emotions so strongly felt at that point in time. The place was a bit eerie at night, and she could feel it. It was empty of all but she and her ghostly allies, moving fast through the darkness of the place, and out the large front door.

  Ahead of her, one of the shadows was nothing more than a torso bobbing along, as if jogging, and the other shade had vanished entirely. Where the second one had been she could suddenly see the palace of the Belfours. Is that were Ivy’s bones were hidden away? In the palace? At Cammarth? Nothing seemed more unlikely. Last she knew, the bones were in the possession of another vampire. Why would they be hidden in the palace?

  She darted past the darkened shops. The black water of the Azez slapped against the rocky breakwater at the port. Everyone else was inside, tucked in their beds, warm against the elements, all but her. The wind whipped up around her, and she pulled her cape close to her body for a moment. Cameo had one single image etched in her mind: the white palace of the Belfour family. Her shadow was sending her that one picture, one part of the palace, a window.

  Then it vanished.

  She stopped in mid-step.

  The shadow that she had been following, the torso, also stopped. It was only a few feet ahead of her on the road. They had been moving north, on Kings Road. She was very near the palace now. She could almost make out the shape of its rooftops in the distance.

  “Move on,” she said as she approached the shade.

  It faded away.

  The wind kicked up and sent snow spinning around the ground in a whirlwind; there was only the sound of snow blowing against snow, and her hair snapping against her face in a sudden fury.

  Then she saw silver eyes.

  She felt her breath leave her lungs. It was the other vampire.

  The snow whipped against his body, which was draped in a dark wool suit, but he seemed untouched by it’s cold. It was Edel. Besides her own Master, he was the only other vampire she had ever run into. In addition to being painfully handsome, he was also several times more powerful than she. He could kill her at his leisure, if he wished. She had hoped to be able to find Ivy’s bones when Edel wasn’t around, perhaps going to his home, waiting outside his window and climbing in during the morning.

  “Were you really planning on climbing into my sitting room window?”

  “Yes.”

  He smiled and tilted
his head to one side, examining her for a moment. “The master sent you after me?”

  She wanted to run away but found she could not break from his eyes.

  “I’m afraid I can’t let you do that,” he said, reading her mind.

  She went for her dagger, but his hand was on hers as she touched the hilt.

  He looked down at her as if he were acknowledging the a silly whim of a child. “You aren’t serious?”

  Her breathing quickened now. She expected to be murdered and left lying dead in the snow. She made an attempt to break from his grasp.

  This moved his hand slightly.

  Edel snatched the dagger from her belt and threw it into the snow. “That’s enough of that nonsense.” He let go of her hand and took a step back. “Just what did you plan to accomplish anyhow?”

  “My freedom was really what I was hoping for,” she hissed.

  “I believe you, Cameo.” There was a sudden zealous fervor that seemed to move through him; it was something that she hadn’t noticed during their last meeting. “And you are.”

  “What?” she asked, raising an eyebrow. “What do you mean? Haffef is still my Master. I will never be free of him,” she scoffed.

  “Oh, I know that’s what you think now, as it was when I was first here, in Shandow, without him. But here you are free. You’ll never be forced to be slave to him again.”

  The vampire was suddenly animated, and Cameo watched him warily as he moved around her. She wondered where in the snow her dagger was exactly, and how she could get to the palace window that her shadows had directed her to so she could take back her sister’s remains to Haffef, and then she wondered if Edel would notice if she walked away.

  “I would notice,” he said calmly.

  She looked up at him nervously.

  “You really don’t understand what I’m saying at all.”

  Cameo thought of her suite at the Lakestar and regretted ever leaving it. Thought of Opal talking about everything they would do over the next few days: explore the village of Villoise. He felt he knew it well, though she couldn’t imagine in all of her years that he could’ve known his way around Shandow as well as she.

  She refocused on Edel’s eyes. He was staring down at her.

  “My palace is much nicer than the Lakestar.”