The Burning (7 page)

Would they let it go? The squire shook himself and peered at her. “She could have been in on it with him.”

“Then why would she have screamed?” the stranger pointed out.

“Coulda been Molly what screamed,” someone in the crowd shouted.

That clinched it for the squire. He whirled on her uncle. “Bring her to the coffee room at the Hammer and Anvil tomorrow at four sharp for questioning. You’ll be held responsible for any crimes she has committed, Brockweir,” he warned. Then he tapped his nose. “Or maybe I should take her into custody while we investigate.”

“Lock ’er up!” the crowd yelled. “She did it!” And, “No one’s safe if she’s loose.”

Ann looked wildly around. They could not lock her up, could they?

Her uncle mustered his resources and drew himself up. “I shall keep her in at night, Fladgate, if you men need to feel safe from a slip of a girl that can’t weigh seven stone.”

“Locks?” Fladgate challenged, glaring at Ann.

“I’ll lock her in the nursery on the fourth floor.” Her uncle coughed and bent over. Ann stretched out a hand. Then he straightened, cradling his left elbow. “Fair?” he gasped.

“Fair,” said the stranger behind her, though it was certainly none of his business. And it was as if that was the last word. The mob turned back, muttering. Fladgate ordered two of them to carry Molly’s body down the hill. Why
hadn’t they suspected the stranger of making up the man who ran away with her? Why did they suspect him of the killing, too?

But she could not stop to speculate. Her uncle was looking paler and grayer by the moment. “Come, Uncle,” Ann said. “You should get home to the fire.”

She turned to throw a thank-you at the stranger, but he was nowhere to be seen. He seemed to have melted into the shadows. The unreality of the evening washed over her, taking her strength with it. Her knees half buckled. But she couldn’t give in to weakness. Uncle Thaddeus had to make it down the hill. She looked around and picked up a branch of elm he could use as a staff. He couldn’t lean on her.

“Here, Uncle,” she whispered. “Let’s go home.” She held out the staff. “Can you make it?” He was gasping still, and his skin looked clammy.

He nodded, clutching his arm to his side. “I can make it back to the carriage. Jennings will drive us round to the house.”

They made their tortuous way down the branch of the path that led to the tavern. Jennings was walking the horses up and down Cheddar’s only street. From inside the tavern raucous voices relived the adventure, well lubricated with ale and brandy.

Jennings gathered Uncle Thaddeus into the carriage and then stood back as Ann climbed up. “Get us home and then go straight for Dr. Denton, Jennings,” she whispered.

The blackness drained away, leaving Stephan farther up the Gorge. There was still time to search tonight. He watched the torches of the mob wind down toward the tavern.

Damn his weakness! He should have lunged for the vampire immediately. It was sheer softness on his part that he hadn’t liked to kill the creature in front of that girl. The only
way to kill a vampire was not pretty. He could have suggested her mind forget the memory afterward. Only it didn’t work sometimes, if the mind was horrified enough. Sometimes the memories came seeping through, destroying sanity. How had he allowed her to influence him? Was it that she was so tiny and ethereal? Her great gray eyes and that halo of white-blonde hair made her look fragile, unable to sustain such a brutal shock.

He shook his head in disgust. What did he care for her sanity? His duty was to eradicate Callan Kilkenny and the vampires he was making. He had shirked his duty. True, he hadn’t wanted to kill them one at a time, but better that than that the one tonight go back and tell his fellows the Harrier was hot on their trail. Would they remove from the area? Would he have to wait until more cases of “influenza” showed up in some other far location?

Still, they had been in this area for some time. Perhaps they were waiting for something, or there was something about this place important to them.

He drew himself up. He’d continue to look here until he was sure they had gone. And no more soft moments, no distractions. He forced himself to think about the struggle if there were many, the blood, his and theirs, the horror of decapitation, the danger to his life and his soul . . . That was his future. He was the Harrier. He belonged to Rubius. His only thought must be to complete his task and get back to Mirso Monastery.

Ann was shaking uncontrollably by the time they reached the wide gravel drive in front of the portico at Maitlands. Her mind reeled from red eyes to drained blood, from staring death to the compelling stranger who had saved her from the mob and disappeared into thin air. Her hand to her throat, she felt the hammering of her heart. Monsters, all the
dangers of so many people who might touch her, the threat of incarceration, death.

It was only her uncle’s unsteady breathing that kept her tethered to reality at all. He was not well. She wanted to touch him, to check his pulse or comfort him. But that wasn’t possible.

The carriage crunched to a halt. Ann threw open the door. “Polsham!”

Polsham hovered on the portico, wringing his hands. “Miss, we were so worried . . .”

“Never mind that now. My uncle is unwell. Help him into the house.” She motioned to Peters, just coming through the great door. “Jennings, away with you. Don’t take no for an answer from Dr. Denton.”

“Just so, miss.” Jennings craned around to see his passenger alight heavily into Polsham’s arms. He snapped the reins and clattered off as Polsham and Peters supported her uncle into the house and laid him on the chaise in the front drawing room.

“His cravat, Polsham, loosen his cravat,” she worried, practically dancing on the pale Aubusson carpet in her anxiety. “It’s his heart. I know it is.”

Indeed, her uncle seemed hardly conscious. His eyelids fluttered and his breathing was ominously shallow.
Dear Lord, if you really do watch over us, please don’t take Uncle Thaddeus
. “Get the smelling salts, Peters.” The footman took off at a run.

A part of her whispered,
What will you do if he dies?
But she pressed that part down. Polsham chafed her uncle’s wrists but it did not seem to be doing a bit of good.
God, how will I forgive myself if he dies?
Her uncle had come out tonight to face a mob on her account. It was her fault he had stressed his heart with anxiety and with climbing hills.

He wouldn’t die. Of course he wouldn’t die. Dr. Denton would save him.

It seemed hours before she heard the crunch of wheels on gravel and heard Jennings hail the house. She rose from kneeling by her uncle’s side and hurried to the door.

“Dr. Denton,” she greeted the spare, elderly man holding a leather valise. He had known her since she was a child and so knew to keep his distance. He was one of the few people in the area that would come to Maitlands. “In here.” She gestured toward the front drawing room.

“Well, Brockweir, what have you been doing with yourself?” Dr. Denton greeted his patient in a jovial tone.

Uncle Thaddeus gave a weary smile. “Denton . . .” he murmured. “Come for last rites?”

“Nonsense, man. A little faintness. We’ll have you right as a trivet in no time.”

Ann watched the doctor listen to her uncle’s heart, ask him to breathe, tap on his chest. There had better be some miracle in that bag of his. He spooned out some tonic. Her uncle made a face as he swallowed it. At last the doctor rose and motioned her into the hall.

“He is gravely ill, Miss Van Helsing. I shall not disguise the truth for you.”

Ann tried to breathe. “Is there nothing we can do for him?”

“Rest, of course. Have your servants carry him up to his own bed. And give him one of these tablets twice a day.” He handed her a paper of pills.

Ann stared at them. Her hand was shaking. The paper rattled. “What are they?”

“A crystallized tincture of foxglove.”

“But that’s poison,” she protested.

“Only in large doses. It stimulates the heart, you see. Fatal for you or me, but just what your uncle needs. Scottish fellow discovered its properties from some gypsy woman.”

Ann watched his wrinkled lips. She heard his words. But she could not quite comprehend. “Will it cure him?”

Dr. Denton smiled. It was a sad smile that, small as it was, refolded the creases in his face. “Nothing will cure him, my dear, except a new heart. It is only a matter of time.”

Ann tried to swallow, but she couldn’t. “How . . . how long does he have?”

“Tonight, a month from now, a year—who knows? The Lord above may, but I do not.”

She gathered herself. “I shall do whatever you say, of course, Dr. Denton.”

“I’ll be back in the morning to check in.” The doctor took his hat and cane from Peters.

“Jennings will take you home, Doctor. Thank you for coming.”

He merely nodded as he shuffled out the door. His shoulders seemed more stooped than when he arrived. It occurred to Ann that he might see his own fate coming on the heels of his old friend’s affliction. There had been much death and much mystery tonight. The world seemed a colder and much more frightening place than it had even this afternoon. And that took a lot, considering her usual relationship with it. She took a breath and turned back to the drawing room. “Polsham, Peters, let’s get my uncle upstairs, and then you two can go to bed.”

She saw him safely disposed in the great bedstead of his room, and sat beside him, determined to keep watch over him. Still, she must have dozed, for she had an impression of dark eyes and broad shoulders that made her gasp and jerk awake. She looked wildly about her, but she was alone except for the still form of her uncle.

Her mind returned as a compass does to true north to the stranger who had braved the townspeople for her tonight. He was compelling. He was a mystery. He was frightening. And she couldn’t help but wonder if she would meet him again in the woods.

Four

Nothing. Stephan had checked the great main cave and several smaller branches but there had been no trace of the vibrations his kind gave off. The ones he sought were young, thus their vibrations would be slow and distinguishable even to humans. Of course, they could be out hunting. But there had been no smell of blood anywhere in the cave, and he could sense even the faintest trace of that.
The blood is the life,
he thought automatically, in the mantra of their kind. The ones he sought were infected with vampire blood by Kilkenny, who was infected by Asharti. They would pay for Asharti’s crimes.

That gave him pause. Were they guilty of her crimes? He clenched his jaw. Of course they were. They were like her, greedy for power, self-involved, taking no responsibility for what they did. Their careless feeding proved as much.

He had to believe that. Because in some way it was his crime they paid for with their lives. He pulled the shutters closed on the windows of his room above the tavern and twitched the heavy draperies meant to keep out cold across
them. The sun would rise soon. He could always feel the sunrise. A few hours’ rest, and he would muffle up and brave the light to see an estate agent. He hoped the nest felt safe enough to stay in the area, or had a compelling reason to do so, even after the vampire who escaped tonight reported Stephan’s presence.

He shed his coat and waistcoat and used a bootjack to remove his boots. He must feed lightly and regularly during the coming days to maintain his strength, and yet not take too much blood from anyone. He didn’t want others to suffer for his needs. That was what he had tried to teach Beatrix and Asharti, as well. He’d been successful with Beatrix at least. One of the tavern girls, perhaps? He’d leave her with a sensuous memory rather than any recollection of her offering to him.

He lay upon the bed in breeches and shirt. His mind drifted to the girl who had lured him from his purpose tonight. Curious. She was so delicate. Yet she had pushed past him to tend to the dying girl. That showed a certain amount of courage. Judging from their accusations, she must be the one the villagers in the tavern had talked about. Were her looks the only reason they called her a witch? True, her eyes looked right through one. He felt she knew things about him that no one should know. Frightening, and yet . . . attractive. His was a life of secrets, burdens almost too horrible to bear. What would it be like to connect to someone again? A woman?