Dawn Thompson (21 page)

Joss dragged his fingers through his hair as if he thought the motion would keep his brain from bursting. “Continue to search for Miss Applegate,” he said. “I shall lend Otis a hand. If you find her, keep her here and stay with her until I return.”

He didn’t wait for a reply. Streaking through the master apartments he went first to the toile suite, though he knew he wouldn’t find Milosh there. It was the Gypsy in wolf form in that sledge; he would stake all upon it.
That being the case, the man must have had a reason, so his search for the enigmatic vampire hunter stopped there. He wouldn’t find him in those rooms, or in the secret tunnel below, or anywhere in the Abbey proper, come to that.

Tearing down the back stairs like a madman, Joss burst out into the fresh falling snow and narrowed his eyes, scanning the tor in all directions. Dawn had broken, but one would scarcely know it for the dark, brooding clouds, as dusky as smoke, hugging the horizon, and spewing out fresh snow. He could barely see the tracks the sledge runners had made, or the footprints and wolf prints all around, though the whole of it smacked of calamity and made his blood run cold. Could Cora’s footprints be among them? There weren’t any other footprints anywhere else in sight.

There was no time to lose. It was impossible on foot, and he trudged off into the wind toward the stable to saddle a horse. If she was in that sledge . . .
No!
He wouldn’t think about that. He had to find her, and as mad as it was, explain something that he had no understanding of himself.

He had nearly finished saddling Titus when Otis rode in leading the two spent sledge horses, their sleek, snow-dusted hides rippling, their broad chests heaving.

“Where is the sledge?” Joss hollered over the animals’ complaints.

“I dunno, sir,” said the stabler, winded himself. “I had ta chase these two beasts clear ta Carlisle, they was that afeared. I didn’t see no sign o’ the sledge. I’m goin’ back out soon as I settle these two down. Poor old Bates is probably lyin’ in a ditch somewhere. If we don’t find him quick, he’ll be a snowdrift till the spring thaw.”

“Did you see any wolv—dogs in your travels? There are wild ones about.”

“No, sir, I did not, but I heard them plain enough, and gunshots, too. The only animal I seen was the big white one with a silver stripe down its back, and a big bushy tail, what was runnin’ around in that sledge when I come out with the key to the vault. It was passing strange, sir, that’s what it was. It was almost as if it was tryin’ ta get inta that coffin, the way it was whinin’ and scratchin’ and digging at that coffin lid.”

Joss swung himself up in the saddle. “They obviously broke free of the sledge,” he said. “You didn’t see the point where that occurred?”

“I seen a few dents in the smooth snow halfway down the tor, but the new snowfall was fast coverin’ ’em.” He shrugged. “I decided ta go after the horses first, since I could still see their tracks. Bates is dead after all, he ain’t goin’ nowhere. I’m a stabler, sir. Live horseflesh comes above cadavers in my book. I figured I’d best catch up ta these two before they run themselves ta death.”

“Did you see . . . anyone walking about?”

“In
this,
sir? I should say not! They’d be daft!”

“My . . . houseguest, Miss Cora Applegate has gone missing,” Joss said, halfway through the stable toward the doors Otis had left flung wide. “The only footprints—jumbled though they were—led to that sledge,” he called over his shoulder. “Are you sure you didn’t see anything?”

The stabler froze slack jawed in his tracks. “I wasn’t lookin’ fer a lady,” he said. “My eyes was on that animal. It had the tarp all twisted off the coffin, and I—”

“See to those horses and continue your search,” Joss
shouted, riding out into the snow. “If you find Miss Applegate, have her back to the Abbey at once and see that Parker attends her until I return.”

The stabler said something more, but Joss didn’t hear. He could make better time in wolf form, but distant gunshots scotched that idea. Besides, if he found Cora, he could hardly carry her back to the Abbey stark naked and afoot. Relentlessly driving the horse beneath him through impossible drifts, he leaned his hatless head into the wind, for he’d left in too great a hurry to fetch his beaver, and pressed on, following what remained of the trail the sledge runners had carved in the snow.

Cora awoke to the sensation of being dragged. Her eyes fluttered open, narrowed against the fresh snow falling into them, and saw the image of the great white wolf of earlier now backing her up the tor. Its great teeth were sunken into the hem of her chinchilla-trimmed wrapper. Its iridescent, red-rimmed eyes were trained upon her, their hypnotic stare both calming and frightening as it hauled her along up the steep grade. White breath was puffing from its flared nostrils, and it made a guttural complaint neither threatening nor trustworthy, but rather something more akin to evidence of its labor. Somehow, she didn’t fear the beast anymore, though it had to be the same creature that had danced on the coffin earlier and nearly torn the lid off.

How strong it was! The cords in its sturdy legs stood out, and its barrel chest was flexing steadily. All at once, the hackles on the ridge of its silver-tipped back and great white neck ruff stood on end. It dropped her mantle and raised its snout, sniffing the snow-filled air. Why did that motion freeze her stock-still? It was like a
dream. It must be a vision conjured from her ordeal with the wolf in the sledge—or so she thought until the animal’s silent snarl became a bared-fang growl that hit her like cannon fire. It turned in time to be broadsided hard by another wolf that took it down, and the two began rolling, connected tooth and jowl in the snow.

Free of the white wolf’s hypnotic glare, as though a tether had been severed, Cora scrambled to her feet and ran back down the tor, slip-sliding in her haste on the icy crust beneath the deceptive new blanket. Glancing behind, she glimpsed the white wolf streaked with blood, snapping the neck of the other wolf which now hung limp as a rag in its great jaws. She screamed as it continued to chomp. Was it trying to sever the creature’s head? It was! She screamed again as it shook the limp, dead carcass, whipping it back and forth, severing sinew, bone, and flesh until it succeeded.

The beast seemed to have forgotten her, and she bounded on, helter-skelter, scrambling over the drifts, falling and struggling upright, running blind through the snow until a portly figure rose up in her path and seized her arms, shaking her to a standstill.

A troop of screams spilled from her throat as recognition set in. It was her father—but if what Joss had said was true, he was
vampir,
and she fought with all her strength to break free of his grasp.

Her strength was flagging so severely that she could not break his hold, which wrenched yet another scream from her dry throat. This was not the father she knew. His eyes were glazed in the same iridescent, red-rimmed manner as the wolves’ eyes were, and his breath stank—not befouled with brandy and stale tobacco as it usually was. Now, it was fetid with the metallic stench of state blood, recalling the smell of the butcher’s stall at the
end of a hot day in the public market. Cora gagged at the recollection.

“Here you are, daughter,” he said, his voice clipped and monotone. “You must come with me now. The others await. We must continue our journey.”

Cora stared at him, at the vacant eyes, the pale skin veined with blue like tributaries on a map, and at the lethargy. He seemed almost to slur his words like a man in his cups, and when he walked he dragged his feet. She broke free of his hold, and she did so none too gently.

“I am not going anywhere with you!” she snapped.

Shoving him aside, she ran, glancing back over her shoulder at the sound of guttural growling. To her horror, the white wolf, whose fur was slimed with blood, had impacted her father and taken him down in the snow, just as it had the other wolf minutes before. Screaming at the top of her voice, Cora found her eyes riveted to the nightmare taking place before her. She failed to see the horse and rider coming on at breakneck speed, the horse’s hooves flinging clouds of snow in all directions, until the thunder of its approach moved the earth beneath her feet, reverberating through the soles of her morocco leather ankle boots.

The rider’s thunderous command rode the wind. “Not in front of her!” he shouted.

Was he speaking to the wolf? There was no one else about, and the animal responded, freezing in place, though it did not let its quarry go. Its huge paw pads were planted in the center of her father’s chest, bared fangs dripping blood inches from his throat.

Cora gasped, and gasped again. The rider was Joss, and he scooped her up kicking and screaming, turned his mount, and plunged through the drifts back toward
the Abbey, with her flung on her belly in front of his saddle.

He hadn’t hurt her, just knocked the wind out of her. She was afraid to struggle in her precarious position for fear of falling off the horse’s rippling back. It was already complaining over the added burden. Unfortunately, her vantage gave her a clear view of the bloodied snow, and of what once was the gray wolf that had attacked the white as they passed by. She blinked to clear her vision. She could scarcely believe her eyes. The wolf was gone, and in its place lay a naked man. It was the imposter coachman who had twice tried to corrupt her. His head was severed.

Veils of snow churned up by the horse’s hooves rose to meet her, stinging her face, narrowing her eyes. Who was that screaming? It couldn’t be her, though her mouth was open. Then the light was snuffed out by glaring white pinpoints starring her narrowed vision, and she saw no more.

Forgive me.
Milosh’s voice whispered in Joss’s mind as the white wolf padded along beside him through the empty corridors.
I am so accustomed to doing . . . what I do, it has become second nature to me.

Joss heaved a sigh and spoke as Milosh had done, in mind-speak.
I couldn’t let you destroy it before her very eyes. She still views it as her father. I am hoping that before the sun sets upon this day we can convince her we are her best hope for survival.

They had reached the yellow suite, and Joss stepped inside and tore a sheet off the bed.

What do you do?
Milosh queried.

What is needed here are drastic measures,
Joss said.
Humor me awhile. Unless I miss my guess, she saw my fangs and that is what made her run. If that is so, she will never take my word for anything now. I am hoping she will take yours.

The wolf leaked a piercing whine that smacked of skepticism, and they began walking again.

High-pitched voices filtering along the hallway met their ears long before the master suite came into view. Joss squared his posture, and snapped the sheet in his hand.
Steady on,
he said.
Just humor me
.

“You cannot keep me here against my will!” Cora was screaming. “I will only run again.”

“The master would skin me alive if I allowed you to go back out in that,” came Parker’s thin voice. It was plain he had grown hoarse from arguing with her. “Please, miss, you will bring the others, and we don’t want to cause poor Grace any more upsetment.”

“Poor Grace, eh?” Cora shouted. Joss winced, as some object shattered noisily. The girl had a penchant for breakage. He could only hope she had been kinder on Parker than she had been to him. Judging from the racket within, it didn’t bode well.

Again, the wolf’s whine captured Joss’s attention.
I’m hoping your appearing will give pause enough for us to carry out our little demonstration,
he said to the wolf, as he gripped the master chamber door handle.

Our demonstration, is it?
Milosh responded mentally.
This is your idea, young whelp. You are your father’s son, I’ll give you that. Do not fault me when it backfires in that handsome face of yours.

Joss threw the door wide to find Cora, a porcelain tray above her head, the shattered remains of the wash basin it was about to join at her feet. The sight of the blood-streaked white wolf at his side froze her momentarily, just long enough for Joss to dismiss the valet, who had gone paste white.

“Leave us, Parker,” he said.

“Y-y-yes, sir,” said the valet, whose popping eyes were
also trained upon the wolf. Giving it a wide berth, he skittered past, bumping into the woodwork in his haste to flee. Joss shut the door and faced Cora.

“Keep that beast away from me!” she cried. “What? Have you brought it here to savage me the way it savaged my father? You—”

“Your father is dead, Cora,” Joss said. “He died in the coach with the others. This noble animal killed the vampire your father became after death—the vampire that would have made you into one as soon as look at you.”

“That is preposterous!”

“Have you forgotten Lyda so soon?”

“No! Come no closer,” she cried. “Keep that animal back, or I will crown it with this priceless antique!” She brandished the tray.

Milosh growled.
This one would benefit from a proper spanking,
he said.

I have tried that,
Joss returned.
It will take something more, believe me.
He unfurled the sheet and threw it over the wolf’s back.
Quickly, man—change! Her aim is faultless. I have the scars to prove it.

On your own head be it.
Milosh said. Surging forward in a silver streak of displaced energy, he expanded to his full height, quickly draping the sheet like a toga about his nakedness.

Cora screamed, backpedaled toward the bed and sank down on the edge, clutching her porcelain tray as if it were a lifeline. Joss would have laughed at the slack-jawed expression on her beautiful face if the situation weren’t so grave.

“W-w-what have I just seen here?” she stammered.

“You have seen more proof that what I say is truth,” said Joss, turning to the Gypsy. “Milosh, may I present Miss Cora Applegate. Cora, this is Milosh, my other
houseguest, and a living legend from Moldovia. He is
vampir
turned vampire hunter . . . as my mother and father are. It was he who saved them from the bloodlust with an ancient Persian ritual of the blood moon, which has also spared him from the feeding frenzy.”