by Gayla Twist
“Aurora,” he whispered, even his voice thrilling me to my core. The next moment we were kissing, and it was ecstasy.
Our embrace went on and on. It had no beginning and it had no end. There was just the two of us and the rest of the world slipped away. I felt like I could spend a thousand years locked in a coffin, as long as I was in Jessie’s arms.
There was the sound of metal scraping metal and Jessie froze. “That’s the door,” he breathed. I nodded. I could hear people entering the room. “Get behind me,” he said, rolling over so that I was beneath him. “We’ve got to come out fighting.”
“This one,” I could distinctly hear a voice say. “They’re in here.”
“Well? What are you waiting for? Open her up.”
There was some jangling of keys and we could hear one being inserted into the lock. Nothing happened. After a bit of swearing, there was an attempt using another key. Still no good.
“Quit fussing about; we don’t have all the time in the world. Just do it the old-fashioned way.”
There was the sound of more cursing and then the sound of a blow. The coffin shook. There was a second and a third blow. The edge of a blade could be seen for a split-second as it sliced through the coffin lid. Somebody wanted to free us and they were willing to do it by the blade of an ax.
Jessie pressed into me, trying to keep us both safe from the sharp blade. The lid of the coffin was becoming splinters before our eyes. With fragments of wood everywhere, there was no way we could come out fighting. We probably wouldn’t die, but even a small scratch, especially from a hard-wood, would cause us agony and our limbs to shrivel.
The wood around the coffin lock was quickly becoming kindling. Jessie wasn’t going to just wait for them to grab us. He squeezed my hand to signal me that he was about to move, then pressed with all of his might against the coffin lid. It burst open and Jessie was free. I leaped up after him, desperately scanning the room for some kind of weapon I could use to fight off whoever had come to terrorize us.
And then I stopped. Jessie stopped. We both just stood there, gob smacked.
There was the deep rumble of someone chuckling; someone who was both delighted and amused. Lord Vagnar stood, surrounded by an entourage of friends and a small battalion of guards.
“You!” I shrieked, spittle flying from my mouth, I was so angry. Snatching up a piece of jagged wood, I went to lunge for the smug bastard.
“Don’t,” Jessie said, grabbing me around the waist. “If he was here in an official capacity, he wouldn’t have had to use the ax.”
“Aurora,” Vagnar said, “it’s always so delightful to see you. And still in that delightful gown.” He took in my tattered finery. I realized that the split Alice had added to the dress was unraveling even more. “I hope we weren’t interrupting anything.”
“Why are you here?” I demanded, pulling viciously at my emerald dress to give me a little more coverage. “Who sent you? Or is this another one of your sick practical jokes?”
“It’s no joke,” he told me. “We’re here to rescue you.”
You could have knocked me over with a feather. “Why?” I stammered.
Lord Vagnar ran a hand down his face. “That’s a very good question,” he said. “And, to be honest with you, I don’t have a very good answer. The best I can tell you is that I had a bad feeling after our little wedding prank. Much to my surprise, I seem to still have a sliver of a conscience left over from my mortal days.”
“What does that mean?” Jessie asked, neither of us moving from where we stood in the middle of the broken coffin. I was still gripping the wood, hardly noticing that my hand was throbbing with pain.
“It means that I couldn’t stop thinking about you star-crossed lovers.” He leaned back on his heels and sighed. “What must it be like to love someone so utterly and completely?”
His question sounded rhetorical, so neither one of us replied.
“I was speaking to Yvette about it – about how fascinating I find you – and she said, ‘Why not help them?’ And I could tell she meant that I should help you for real, not just for a laugh, so that’s what I decided to do.”
Vagnar paused there, waiting for some kind of response, but I couldn’t think of any. Jessie finally said, “Why should we trust you?”
“Oh, you definitely shouldn’t,” he said with a chuckle. “But why not play along? At least for a little while? When my back is turned, you can make your escape.” Something about the phrase amused him. Smirking, he turned to his entourage. “An escape from an escape. How delightful.” His groupies obediently laughed. “But seriously,” he said, turning back to us, the smile immediately dropping from his face. “What other choice do you have?”
Jessie and I exchanged looks. Lord Vagnar was right; what other choice did we have?
“Allow me to help you down,” Vagnar said, holding up a hand to aid me.
Jessie gave a slight nod, so I hopped out of the coffin, avoiding the offer of assistance. “I’ve got it,” I mumbled, feeling both furious and like I was being ungrateful.
“Vanderlind?” Vagnar said, offering his hand to Jessie.
The offer was so ridiculous that my fiancé couldn’t help but crack a small grin. “I’m good,” Jessie assured him.
“That’s what most of the ladies speculate,” he said, winking. A series of titters raced through the crowd.
We all stood there, staring at each other. Jessie raked his fingers through his hair before saying, “What now?”
“Ah, yes.” Vagnar rubbed his hands together. “I have to admit, I was so caught up with the idea of a rescue that I really didn’t plan out the rest.” He surveyed the room. “Hmmm… I suppose we should clean up the place, and then find somewhere for you to hide. Then I’ll do a little research, figure out which one of the Bishops has it out for you. And then… Well, I suppose you’ll have to stand trial.”
I grabbed Jessie’s arm. “No.”
Jessie covered my hand with his. “It’s true,” he said in a low voice. “We can’t hide for eternity. I’ve done nothing wrong.”
“Well…” Vagnar butted in. “That remains to be seen. You have managed to stake quite a few family members. If I was your mother, I would sleep with one eye open.”
I felt Jessie’s muscles tense underneath my hand. Lord Vagnar might have been helping us, but it came at a price.
Vagnar made eye contact with one of his followers. “See that this all gets cleaned up,” he said, waving a hand at the coffin’s debris. “Do your best to conceal that our two lovebirds have flown the coop.”
“How should I do that?” a young man asked.
Vagnar shrugged. “I don’t know; Maybe switch out the coffin. Use your imagination.”
The young vampire gave a small bow. I wondered why he was so eager to do Vagnar’s bidding. But all of his entourage seemed to feel the same way. Even Yvette, who claimed to be so delighted to have me as a friend, thought nothing of stabbing me in the back to please him. At least she’d encouraged him to go back to helping us. I had to be grateful for that.
“I’m trying to think of where to hide the two of you.” Vagnar drew a finger across his lower lip. “A little love nest somewhere, just right for three… I mean, two.”
“Lord Vagnar,” Jessie said, bristling. “If you intend to help us, then we are grateful; but if this is all just another ruse to harangue my fiancée, then we must decline your offer of assistance.”
“You two are delightful!” Vagnar exclaimed, a broad smile lighting up his roguishly handsome face. He looked like a movie star from the Errol Flynn days. “I must make cheap innuendos about your Miss Aurora very frequently, just to give you the opportunity to defend her honor. It warms my long-dead heart.”
His statement left Jessie at a loss for words, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t still angry. I could tell that he was willing to exchange blows with Vagnar to defend my honor, if it came to that. It was very sweet of him, and I loved him for it, but we needed V
agnar, at least for the moment, so I knew I needed to intervene.
“Crass jokes don’t really bother me,” I said, giving Jessie’s arm a squeeze. “After all, up until a couple of weeks ago I was still in high school, so I’m used to them.” I looked Lord Vagnar straight in the eye. “We’re grateful for your help, so please, make all the dirty jokes you want. Just as long as you understand that innuendo is as far as things will ever go between you and me.”
Vagnar’s face grew serious. He gave a small nod. “Understood.” Then, he slapped Jessie on the shoulder and in a louder voice announced to the room, “This rescue party isn’t nearly exciting enough. Let’s make some noise so that the guards come running. Then we’ll have some real fun.”
Chapter 9
Lord Vagnar’s entourage erupted into raucous cheers. “Stop!” Jessie shouted. “Lord Vagnar, this may all be a lark to you, but our lives are at stake.”
“I know, I know,” was the reply. “I’m just trying to add an element of excitement to this dreary jailbreak.”
There was the sound of pounding feet. The building’s security had obviously been alerted that something wasn’t right. I was surprised that the two dozen revelers had made it as far as they did.
“Vagnar,” Jessie said, “where are we? How did you enter this building and how were you planning to escape?”
The lord took a moment to actually be serious. “We’re in a government building; the Hungarian government,” he clarified. “There is some agreement with the Bishops, but it wasn’t the Bishops that threw you in the coffin. Not officially.”
The pounding feet were getting closer.
“How do we get out of here?” I demanded. Vagnar was taking too long.
“Through the sewers, of course.” He pointed to a fancy metal grate bolted to the floor. “Anybody got a screwdriver?”
Jessie dropped to his knees and examined the grate. “We’ll never get through here without tools.”
We were in some type of storage room. There were shelves packed with canned goods and bottles of water. There was a first aid kit, but not a tool kit in sight.
“What happened to that ax?” I asked, scanning the crowd. “The blade should be thin enough to use as a screwdriver.”
The guards were just down the hall. I could smell a cloud of mortal musk.
“There’s no time for that now,” Vagnar said, even as he grabbed the ax from one of his lackey’s hands. “Here.” He handed me the ax. “Go hide in the corner. I’ll deal with the guards.”
There was no time to come up with a better plan. Jessie grabbed my free hand and we scrambled behind a shelf of emergency blankets.
“Nobody move! Get down on the ground!” a voice commanded. The guards were in the room. “Get down, now!”
“Sorry, but I’m in velvet,” Lord Vagnar said. “And you know how it picks up every little speck of dust.”
“I said get on the ground!”
“Yes, and we heard you. But as I mentioned, the velvet.”
“What are you doing here? This area is off limits.” The guards smelled of sweat and adrenaline fueled by fear.
“We came to have a little party,” Vagnar said, as if that was the most obvious thing in the world. “Then we thought we’d empty the coffin and show the Vanderlinds some real justice. But we were too late. The lovebirds seem to have flown the coop.”
“Where the hell are they?” the guard demanded. We heard the sound of the coffin being upended.
“That’s exactly what I was just asking,” Vagnar said, taking on a commiserating tone. “This is no good at all. But let’s not panic; they can’t have gone far. We should spread out and search for them. I’m sure they’re on their way to the roof at this very moment.”
The head of the guards started ordering his men to look for us, breaking down the building by quadrants to search.
“Very good,” Lord Vagnar said, sounding pleased. “I’m impressed with your ability to take command of the situation. And we’ll search down here, for clues as to who help them escape. Treasonous bastards. I’d love to get my hands on them.”
I had to suppress a giggle after that comment. It was difficult to consistently hate Lord Vagnar. He was a horrible person, but also charming. I could never tell what he was going to do next.
The guards scattered in search of us. A few moments after that, Lord Vagnar peeked over the shelving. “Am I interrupting, or would you like to make your escape?”
We scrambled to our feet. “Thank you, Lord Vagnar,” Jessie said, executing a stiff bow.
“Just give me the ax,” he said, extending his hand toward me. “Let’s get this thing open.”
One of the lackeys stepped forward. “I found this,” she said, setting down a metal tool box.
“Good girl,” Vagnar said, patting her head. Then surveying his minions, he added, “Now, who here is going to earn my love by knowing how to use a screwdriver?”
Several vampires dove forward, snatching up the tools and struggling with the grate. “Clear back,” one man commanded. “You don’t know what you’re doing and you’re going to strip the screws.”
“Do as he tells you,” Lord Vagnar said. “He knows what he’s doing.” In an aside to us, he added, “There’s a reason why you should surround yourself with people from every social class.”
The man had the grate off in no time; his undead strength smoothing over any difficulties he might have had turning screws that hadn’t budged in several decades.
Lord Vagnar clapped his hands in delight. “Very good, Wade. You’ll dine at my right hand, this evening.”
Wade would have blushed, if he could. “Thank you, Lord Vagnar.”
Leaning close to Jessie, Vagnar lowered his voice, “Hide for the day the best that you can. Then, next nightfall, return to my castle. No one would think to look for you there. I’ll do a bit of nosing about to find out why a respected member of the undead community was stuck in a box without even a trial.” And then he quickly added, “I mean besides the usual reasons.”
“I’ll go first to make sure it’s safe,” Jessie told me. Stepping into the opening, he slowly floated down beneath the building. “It’s alright, Aurora,” he called up to me. “Come on down.”
I wanted to float down to the sewers as elegantly as my fiancée, but there were too many people watching. I was too embarrassed. I stepped over the edge and plummeted like a stone. Jessie must have anticipated my clumsiness, because he caught me in his arms.
I heard an amused chuckle from overhead. “You never fail to disappoint, my dear,” Lord Vagnar called down to me.
“Come on,” Jessie said, setting me down and then taking my hand. “The guards won’t search the building forever; we need to move.”
“Where are we going?”
He shook his head. “I don’t know. Let’s just cover as much ground as we can. Once we surface, we can figure things out.”
The sewer tunnel was dark and cramped; Jessie had to walk in front of me and we had to hunch down. Fortunately, we could both see perfectly well, even though it was dark as pitch. Making my way through some smelly tunnel was not unfamiliar territory. Even thought I’d been relatively tunnel-free for the first sixteen years of my life, since discovering there were vampires in the world, I seemed to be constantly crawling through some muck, or hiding in some unused drainpipe. Jessie grandfather had even kept some of my friends locked in an underground cell. That was a memory I wished I could forget. I ended up having to stake the psychopath just to stop him from feeding on every teenager in Tiburon, Ohio.
“Jessie, will you promise me something?” I asked as we threaded our way through some patches of disgusting muck.
He paused to look back at me. “Anything.”
“Once we’re clear of all this… drama, let’s never go into another sewer again.”
He suppressed a smile. “There go my plans for our honeymoon.”
I loved him so much it made my heart feel like it could beat again.
“Things are looking pretty unpleasant up ahead,” Jessie said. “How about we try a little flying?”
“Are you kidding?” He’d seen me fly. I could barely walk down the tunnel, let alone levitate. I put my free hand to my cheek, feeling embarrassed by my incompetence. “I think you’re over-estimating my skills.”
Jessie placed his own hand over mine. “I love you so much, sometimes it hurts.” Then he leaned in and kissed me. I felt it all the way down to my toes. “Why don’t we put my skills to the test,” he murmured in my ear.
I nodded, my body throbbing with the need for him.
“This might be a little awkward, so you’re going to have to trust me.”
“There’s no one in the world I trust more,” I told him, leaning in for another kiss.
He reciprocated, of course, but then he gently pushed me back a few inches. “Stop distracting me,” he scolded, his voice husky. “I need to be able to concentrate.”
I reluctantly released him.
“Okay,” Jessie said, “here goes nothing.” And then it was as if he’d laid down on an invisible waterbed. He was floating vertically, like a magician’s assistant in the middle of performing a levitation trick. “Now lie on top of me,” he instructed once he’d managed to steady himself.
“How?” I asked. I felt so awkward.
“Aurora, I’ve never done this before either,” he said, using his firmest voice. “Please just try. I’m sure you can figure something out.”
Hooking my arms around his neck, I stretched out on him, pulling my feet off the ground. The whole thing was so ridiculous that I couldn’t help but giggle.
“Don’t squirm around so much,” Jessie said between gritted teeth. “It’s very distracting.”
“Sorry.” I did my best to keep still.
“Thank you,” he said, once I’d settled. “Now, let’s see what I can do.”
We floated along like we were on a raft, drifting down a lazy river. If it wasn’t for the stench and the fact that some trigger happy mercenaries were after us, it would have been almost romantic. Jessie had his head wrenched around so that he could guide us. I battled the sincere temptation to kiss his neck.