Words And Meanings
by Bonnie Rutledge
(copyright 2001)Chapter Thirteen Leaving the passageway, they cut briskly through a set of rooms filled with men and women working industriously at looms, then turned right, traveling another covered walkway, following it as it led down a new set of stairs. During their journey, Lucrece reached up to touch tentatively at her face. "There's no chance my nose will heal crooked, is there?""Dunno," Screed replied blithely. "Nev-a' 'ad me snout compromised by h'an H'enforcer, but that one 'ardly gave ya tha' face-squashin' 'e got, so Aye wouldn' fret. Wot's h'a bump h'onna muzzle, long h'as yer h'in one piece? H'enforcers," he scoffed. "Don' see nothin' diff'rent h'about h'em compared ta h'any h'other vampy."
"I think they must be hardier," Lucrece insisted as she adjusted her satchel over her shoulder. "I stabbed him in the stomach, and he reacted like a mortal treats a mosquito. Humiliating ... " She stopped short. "My rapier! I left it behind!"
"Don' need h'it," Screed dismissed. "Poking ta death hardly works h'on h'inny vampires, lessen h'it's wood 'n hearts. Ya gotta serve h'a dish o' tha' serious damage, Sunshine."
"Right," Lucrece said, absently misinterpreting the nickname as she continued descending the steps. "Sunlight is effective, and bludgeoning their heads off with bricks is a strong deterrent, at the very least. We can assume the standards of stakes, fire and straightforward decapitation work just as well." She snapped her fingers. "That's what I need. Instead of a dueling sword, I need a broadsword, something to hack with."
"Hoo, kill h'a couple H'enforcers, 'n look 'oo turns feisty!"
"Four Enforcers still comb Lyon searching for us," Lucrece reminded him. "I am only considering our defense."
"Tha' city hall, that's bound ta 'ave h'an h'armory," Screed suggested, adding greedily, "Probably ditto ta more gold."
"I have a feeling their armory will lean along the lines of cannonballs and muskets," she said, then rubbed at her mouth. "I wouldn't mind sinking my teeth into a bureaucrat, though." Lucrece nodded. "If Hôtel de Ville is our destination, we'll have to travel the last leg of the journey underground."
Screed raised his eyebrows. "Nev-a' been h'in h'a sewer 'afore."
"Neither have I," Lucrece assured him. "No doubt they have rats."
"Gettin' chased by H'enforcers h'is turnin' h'out roight h'up ol' Screed's alley!"
They turned left, walking along a dark pathway that lined the inn Screed had used during his stay in Lyon. He held out an arm, blocking Lucrece's path as his face twitched.
"What is it?" she asked.
He held for a moment. "Gettin' h'a feelin' familiar-like..."
Lucrece released a small cry. "Across the street. Two more Enforcers."
Screed frowned at the two men in black hovering in the shadowed alley off the other side of the sunlit cobbles. "No, Aye was thinkin' more like h'it could be. . ." He broke off with an annoyed curse. "They've marked h'us! Time ta vanish 'afore they find h'a way ta cross!"
Screed and Lucrece ran around the back of the inn. "Got h'any bricks h'on ya, Sunshine?"
"No, but ... " She dug in her heavy pockets as they moved, searching for something specific. Finding it, Lucrece unearthed a small mirror, its back encrusted with pearls. She flipped it over and frowned at the glass.
Screed scowled over his shoulder at her preoccupation. "Wot? Ya nose fixed straight, h'already!"
"That's not what I was thinking," Lucrece countered, showing him the mirrored side. "It's broken. That can't be a good omen, however a broken mirror should work even better for what I have in mind." She passed the item to Screed as they diverted down a junction in the alley. "Can you get the pieces out of the frame?" She resumed digging in her pockets.
"Wot h'are ya huntin' fer now?"
"Magnifying lens. I remember picking one up in my bedroom along with a book Vachon must have been reading," she said distractedly.
"Since when does V-Man read?" Screed commented absentmindedly as he pried at the glass while running.
"Since ... " she trailed off, then shrugged. "I don't know. That's not important." Lucrece issued a triumphant sound, producing the magnifying lens, still intact. "I have a plan. Sneaky-wenchy, you would call it."
"Les' 'ear h'it, then. Don' be bashful. Cough h'up tha' party-ticklers."
She did, outlining her idea as Screed snorted his approval. They detoured inside a home, causing the inhabitants to shriek in alarm when they smashed a wooden stool and clipped off its legs. Leaving through the back, they found themselves in another shaded traboule, an open courtyard filled with strong sun in the block beyond. Lucrece slipped between two posts, heading toward the light. Her heavy jacket and leather gloves shielded her hands and arms, so she reached into the brightness and used the magnifying lens to focus a stream of sunlight, angling that beam with the mirror so that it reflected toward the traboule exit.
When the second pair of Enforcers erupted from the building, this shaft of sunlight struck the first one in the face, blinding him with scorching accuracy. The second Enforcer jumped out of the way, dodging down the walkway and shielding himself around the corner. Lucrece adjusted the angle of her mirror, flashing it in the direction where Screed had hidden. He had another piece of the silvered glass, shifting it in his hand until the ray of sun struck the second Enforcer in the back of the head. The Enforcer instinctively turned to discover the source of the burn and immediately suffered the same blinding blast to his eyes.
Screed shoved the piece of glass into his rucksack and approached the nearest sightless vampire. Brandishing one of the oaken chair legs, he buried it decisively in the Enforcer's heart. Screed then moved to the other, staking him with a second piece of wood.
Lucrece clapped at their success as she withdrew her gloved hand from the sunlight and moved deeper into the shadows. "Well done!"
Screed preened as he joined her. "Really don' see wot makes these H'enforcers so special. Maybe h'it's jes' h'a name ta set h'em h'apart."
"Like a title?" Lucrece wondered as she tucked the magnifying glass back into her pocket. "I suppose that's possible."
Screed's nodding slowed, then he pointed with perplexity. "'Cept ... Get h'a lookit that. One o' h'em's twitchin' h'even h'after Aye pierced 'im h'in tha' pumper!"
Random twitching wasn't the extent of it. Screed and Lucrece's eyes widened as the Enforcers climbed to their feet, unfazed by the fragments of wood jutting from their hearts, and began to move toward them.
Screed snapped into action first, grabbing Lucrece's hand and pulling her along behind him. "Not h'a dawdle-time, Sunshine!"
They ran through a small jeweler's shop, Screed only offering a covetous grunt as they passed the sparkling wares. Shifting direction, they climbed to the second level, intruded upon two more homes before they scrambled down to the ground floor again, the revived Enforcers close on their heels.
"They are chasing us!" Lucrece shouted. "You staked them, and they are still chasing us! That is not normal!"
"Muchas un-normal! Ya think that's wot makes H'enforcers h'all special? They're h'a lot o' bastards wot can't be staked?"
Lucrece appeared distinctly sick at the suggestion. "What if sunlight is the only thing that truly destroys them?"
"Can't be!" Screed called in return. "Chin h'up! Thinks positive! Ha!" He veered a sharp left, disappearing through another shop doorway.
Lucrece started. "No! That's a dead end!"
Screed's arm reappeared through the entrance and jerked her inside. "Roight-n-tight. H'it's h'a blacksmith's," he countered, tossing a bloodthirsty smile at an axe mounted on one wall. "H'anybody fer hackin'?"
The tradesman protested as Screed tore the gleaming weapon down from its mounting, descending on him with a flame-lit bar of iron and shouts of thievery. Lucrece grasped the mortal's arm from behind, confiscating the poker as she snarled and ripped into his throat.
Screed strode toward the entrance, chopping as he moved. The first Enforcer that crashed through the door barreled straight into the axe-blade. It cleaved through his neck in one blow, shooting the vampire's head across the shop to rebound off of a display of horseshoes.
Recovering from the recoil of the hit, it took time for Screed to reassume his swinging for another blow. The second Enforcer focused his attention on the armed carouche, shifting out of range as he pulled the stake he'd been carrying in his chest free.
Lucrece withdrew her fangs from the blacksmith, the man's blood dripping from her chin as she yelled, "Screed! Duck!"
He dove to the floor, giving Lucrece an open target. She missiled the hot poker at the Enforcer, the stoked end catching him in the shoulder. He gave a cry of pain, but the wound didn't knock him off of his feet. Instead, he turned glowing eyes toward Lucrece, repaying her attack by aiming the wooden stake at her instead.
Lucrece shielded herself with the unconscious mortal. The shard of wood sliced between the ribs of the blacksmith's right torso, piercing a lung. The mortal began to wheeze, struggling as pain pushed him into consciousness and he fought to breathe. Lucrece immediately clasped his head between her hands and snapped his neck.
Screed struck at the second Enforcer from the floor as soon as the stake left his grip, hacking at the bone above the other vampire's knee and shearing his leg in two. The Enforcer fell to the ground, shocked off balance by the amputation. Screed rose to a stand, swiping the loose leg off the floor and tossing it toward Lucrece, who dropped the blacksmith's corpse to catch it.
Screed scowled as he twisted the cooling iron bar from the Enforcer's shoulder and tossed it aside. As the fallen vampire attempted to seize the axe from his grip, Screed jerked the bladed weapon out of his reach, then swung a second chop at one of the Enforcer's flailing arms. "Wot did we conclude h'about pokin' vamps ta death, Missy?" Screed lectured as he picked up the second severed appendage by the hand.
Lucrece smiled weakly, answering over the raging shouts of protest from the Enforcer for Screed to spare him. "It doesn't work?" She glanced around the shop, her interest pausing at the open grate where the blacksmith had nursed the fire used in his trade. She tossed the Enforcer's leg on top of the blaze, adding an acrid flavor to the smoke filling the room.
Lucrece held up her hands, giving Screed the all clear to throw her the next cleaved body part. He lobbed her the Enforcer's arm, and it, too, joined the fire pile. "You have to admit, though," she commented as Screed next took the Enforcer's left arm below the elbow amid a frenzy of snarling screams, "he didn't seem to like the hot iron. While it did not kill him, it certainly counted as helpful aggravation." Catching the leftover hand when Screed pitched it through the air, Lucrece cringed at the Enforcer's continuing cries of agony. "Can you make him quiet, please?" she pleaded as she added the third appendage to the fire. "I don't like other people's shrieking. It's unsettling."
Screed shrugged. "Since ya said 'please' ... " He reared the axe again, finally taking this Enforcer's head.
Silence reigned.
"Much better. Thank you." Lucrece searched her jacket and pulled out a handkerchief. Dipping it in the bucket of water resting by the shop's anvil, she proceeded to scrub the blood from her face and hands. She soaked the fabric and wrung it dry, then offered the square to Screed.
"Don' mind h'iffen Aye do," he said, accepting the handkerchief. He set to using the fine linen to clean off the axe blade. "Rather than skip h'around tha' surface 'til tha' last pair o' tha' gloom squad chases h'us down, les' give those sewers ya men-shinned h'a shot."
"Very well. We find a way below the city, then we walk underground to Hôtel de Ville."
"Mebbe we should dump wot's left o' tha' bodies while we're h'at h'it. Don' like leavin' tha' place h'in need o' h'a scrub 'n polish. H'anyone sees tha' smithy, tha' mortals'll fuss 'n rabble fresh."
They tossed the remains of the two Enforcers into one of the quiet, sun-bleached courtyards set like gleaming jewels amidst the dark, winding traboules and covered alleys that lined the buildings of Lyon. The dead blacksmith found a resting place once they located an alley grate nearby that led underneath the market streets. They left him at the entrance of the subterranean tunnel, lying facedown in several inches of murky water.
"'Ow much farther do we wobble?" Screed asked after a while. He plucked up one of the promised sewer rats as it skittered by and sank his fangs into it for a snack, while Lucrece tried to avoid watching. "Tha' squeakers h'are handy, but they got h'a stink ta h'em. Boat bait's better wit' tha' h'extra salt."
"I believe everything down here has a stink to it," Lucrece said, her nose wrinkling as she sniffed her coat sleeve. "Including me."
"Wouldn' be so bad, mindja, h'iffen ya cleaned h'up h'a corner, swabbed h'it 'n ditched tha' muck. Good place ta keep h'a low profile when busies h'are pokin' noses h'after h'a mate. Cheap rent 'n free food - tha's wot ol' Screed likes h'in h'an accommodation," he declared, saluting her with his drained rat.
Lucrece was prepared to lower her living standards, but not to the level of choosing a squat with rodent access. Screed's enthusiasm still generated a mild smile in her. "I agree these tunnels under the city are clandestinely circumspect, perhaps too much so." She stopped walking and heaved a sigh. "I believe I am lost. All of these passages look alike."
Screed threw his empty rat into the sludge underfoot and peered up disapprovingly at the stone ceiling. "Can't follow tha' sky h'or tha' whiff o' tha' water neither." He gave a carefree shrug. "Reckon we'll get tha' hang o' tellin' one slimy passy from h'another wit' practice."
"I'm not inclined to remain down here long enough to improve with practice," Lucrece declared. "The major buildings, like city hall, will no doubt have access straight to these sewers on their lower floors, perhaps a room outlet with a door, even. All we can do is wander and take the first one we find. I'm filthy, and I want to change clothes, and as long as we roam the sewers, that is not going to happen. With any luck, we'll stumble across Hôtel de Ville. If not, we should accept any place with dry floors and chairs."
"Don' 'ave h'a problem wit' that."
But Screed did have a problem with the first outlet they found. It was a short flight of rough stairs that led to a dark room. The walls at either side sported empty braziers bolted between two sets of long recessed shelves. All but one of the carved shelves housed a shrouded form.
"H'it's h'a crypt." Screed issued a curse as Lucrece kept moving despite his conclusion. The next open doorway was decorated unappetizingly with a cross. He watched in annoyance as she traipsed underneath it without demonstrating a care. "Ya know wot this h'is h'attached ta, don'cha? H'a bleedin' church, that's wot!"
"Excellent," Lucrece said calmly. "That makes it even less likely that the last pair of Enforcers will look for us here."
"An' fer good reason, wot h'as tha' undead don' 'ang h'out where tha' Father, Son 'n 'Oly Spirit set h'up shop!"
"That's what you're worried about?" Lucrece arched an eyebrow, clearly unconcerned about any conflict with their heavenly hosts. "True, there will be dangerous icons that we have to avoid, but, Screed, my father was a Pope, and my brother, a Cardinal. For a brief period, I, myself, had Regency over the Vatican. Believe me, just because a building is a church or a cathedral, that doesn't mean the place has God in it. Just because a man wears a tonsure, that doesn't make him virtuous."
Screed rubbed at his own closely-shaved head. "Aye give ya that, but this place's bound ta 'ave priests runnin' h'about." He scowled. "Aye'll get me h'a rash h'iffen they hover wantin' ta save h'us h'or somethin'."
"Lucky for us," Lucrece countered blithely, "priests are even more susceptible to bribes than you."
Screed's scowl deepened. "Wot? Bribe h'em from me cut? Aye'd rather waste h'em!"
Until they reached the vestry of Saint Jean's, the two whispered argumentatively into a compromise. They neither killed nor bribed the monks and priests of the cathedral, but overpowered them, forming a neat little row of nine pairs of terrified eyes peeping over their gags, while the mortals' wrists and ankles were bound together with strips cut from their own vestments.
Lucrece used the confessional as a changing room, trading her sewage-stained garments for one of the dresses in her satchel. She emerged with an ivory comb in one hand, addressing the tangles that sailing and combat had added to her hair. Settling at the end of one of the pews, she surveyed their captive clergymen merrily. "If I didn't know better, I'd say we've put the fear of something into them."
"An' h'it took h'all o' ten minutes," Screed complained from where he was prodding at the oval face of a large, ornate astronomical clock that stood in one corner. Its hour and minute hands were molded from gold, and the top of the timepiece featured an intricate automaton structure that included a three-tiered tower protected by two small model guards. Screed, naturally, commenced prying away the gold hands. The clock seemed to protest his fiddling, soundly ringing in the nine o'clock hour, making him cover his ears to dampen the chiming.
Screed stepped away from the clock but continued complaining once its racket ended. "Stinkin' borin', starin' h'at padres 'n crucifixes h'all day. Aye need me h'a distraction." A greedy light entered his eyes. "Wouldn' be h'in'trested h'in h'a game o' dice, would ya?"
Lucrece paused mid-stroke, thoughtfully musing the idea. "I don't know. I've never played before."
Screed interpreted this ambivalence as a 'yes.' He jumped over the pew and pulled her down from the bench to settle on the smooth stone floor opposite him. "H'it's like touchin' ya nose wit' ya tongue - h'anybody can do h'it!"
Lucrece was curiously awed. "You can touch your nose with your tongue?"
"H'iffen Aye squish me nose wit' me finger, Aye can."
Lucrece rolled her eyes, less impressed. "Anyone can do that!"
"That's wot Aye toldja! Dice h'is h'easy," he said sternly, "but ya got ta pay h'a smack o' h'attention. Listen tha' first time. Two steps: place ya bet, then roll tha' bones."
"We've gone over this before," she said impatiently. "I don't have anything to wager, and you don't have anything that I want to win."
"Give h'it h'a try!" Screed groaned. "Aye'll go cat-toe-tonic h'iffen there's no fun ta pass tha' day. Aye'll h'even be chair-hittable." He nodded gestured toward the row of tied-up priests. "You can h'use tha' parsons' toes h'as ya kitty. Ten h'apiece, that's ninety - h'a swell pot ta start."
"All right," Lucrece allowed. "I will wager the parsons' toes, but not against the treasure you've collected."
"Come h'on - Winnin' h'a little gold nev-a' 'urt h'anybody." Screed ostracized the merest suggestion that it could.
Lucrece shook her head with finality. "No. For every roll I win, you have to tell me a story ... A story about Vachon."
"Phhew!" Screed hooted, then nodded frankly in agreement. "Words h'instead o' gold? You, Sunshine, h'are h'a first-class sucker!"
"Perhaps, but I will be entertained. I shudder to imagine what practical use you might have for an almighty toe collection."
* * * * * * * * * * * * * So they spent the day hiding out in the Saint Jean Cathedral. Apparently, Lucrece had natural talent: the priests kept their feet intact."And Screed had to pay up and tell her all your secrets?"
I don't think that he did. I don't know for sure; I didn't ask for a list, and Screed didn't volunteer one. I guess I never thought it mattered. None of it matters if he's dead tomorrow. None of it.
Chapter Fourteen We ran into a storm as we neared Lyon. Bourbon and I, we wanted to get back to D'Asile, but we had no urgency beyond our own impatience to push us. Call us lazy or stupid, but we thought rain was a good reason to sit out of the game for a while.We found a shack, the type of place shepherds hang in when they've rotated their flock to the local field. Someone got lucky, for it was empty, and the roof only had a couple of leaks. Bourbon complained about every single drip at length, as if I was the one who had put them there. Since that was his attitude, I began to pick up objects the shepherd had left behind - a cup, a knife, a polishing stone - and throw them at the cracks in the thatch. The drizzle of rainwater would halt for a second, then resume falling in fuller force through the now-enlarged hole. Sure, the shepherd wouldn't thank me when he eventually found the place uninhabitable without a workload of patching, but from my point of view, it was worth it to watch Bourbon grow more and more pissed. The third time he told me to 'Stop it!' like some petulant kid who'd had his sand castle busted, I cracked up laughing. I couldn't help it.
While I laughed at his expense, I knew he had two options: he'd either hit me, or he'd leave in a huff. Call me twisted, but I was kind of disappointed that he went for the latter. I felt a little sorry for the guy - he'd been itching for a fight while we rescued Thérèse, but he hadn't seen any action. Since I'd kept my word to Lucrece and kept him from openly nipping at any of the big, bad dogs, I felt the least I could do was give the Frenchman the opportunity to punch me and get it out of his system. It was typical contrariness on Bourbon's part to not take me up on my magnanimous offer.
We returned to flying in the rain, but the storm had moved along enough that our path had cleared. As we approached D'Asile, I don't know which one of us noticed first that something was wrong. We didn't smell smoke in the air; the rain had taken care of that, washing the breeze into something that smelled clean, with only a hint of gray.
We couldn't miss the damage. Vast areas that had been covered by green lawn and flowers when I left were replaced with black ground. The pruned trees now looked like brittle skeletons ready to blow away with the next gust of wind.
D'Asile was still standing, but during the night, it had been soundly whipped. It didn't seem so much like a haven anymore as a stone coffin. The windows were gone. Scorch marks spread in a dark, tendriled halo from each opening, screaming echoes of the fire which had created them. Fresh wisps of smoke now fought their way into the air, struggling to exist in the damp wind. The castle had obviously raved with an inferno for hours until the rain doused the party.
"Lucrece!" It was Bourbon who yelled. He's the one who thought to do that. I just stood and stared, listening as he bellowed her name over again. No answer came.
What had happened since we'd left earlier that evening? We didn't know. I didn't like the way my imagination turned. First instinct, pure instinct, I thought whatever had gone down in the night, I had walked away from it for some windmill tilting bullshit. I'd crashed Bourbon's mission of rescue and scored trouble with Thomas and Francesca, all to help some mortal whose appearance I could barely recall, much less gave a damn about, in exchange for what? So that I could come back triumphant, only to find my love's home ravaged and death in the echoes of a Frenchman's voice?
No. No, I didn't remember making that deal. The decision to never see Lucrece again had been bravado in a passionate moment, the kind of melodrama that results in the bad Spanish poetry I hate. But after passionate moments, second thoughts come. I'd had second thoughts. She was supposed to be here, sitting in her castle, waiting and alone. I had imagined I would stride in, conquistador, set upon taking what I wanted from her kingdom. My second thoughts commanded to take her with me come hell or high water. Apparently, hell had other ideas.
"Lucrece!" Bourbon called again.
I started, snapping out of a daze into which I hadn't realized I'd sunk. At some point, I'd moved onto the terrace and through the gutted threshold once blocked by doors of wood and glass. I kicked an ember from the wreckage into a standing puddle and watched as it hissed and faded into dead, black silence. D'Asile felt empty, robbed of any beauty it had claimed until only a pervasive bleakness remained. That sense of desolation burnt me as badly as if the place still roared in a gulf of fire.
"Whatever happened," I said quietly, "she's not here anymore."
Bourbon brushed by me, sneering, "You don't know that."
I seized his upper arm in a vise, preventing him from venturing further inside on a search. "Let me rephrase that: if there's anything of her here to find, I don't want to know."
He stared at me, his expression angry, his eyes searching for grounds to issue a denial. I saw his mind clawing for arguments. I saw him give up. He looked away, his gaze settling on the charcoal landscape painted on the walls, and said in a low voice, "What do we do?"
"Does it matter?" I said, then shook my head, taking the careless phrase back. "We go to town. We find out what happened."
"And if there's no word in town?"
"We go somewhere where there is."
That was the plan. We were going to find answers. We felt robbed, and neither Bourbon nor I had any concept of losing gracefully. The Frenchman simmered with a need for revenge. I simply itched to fight something, to break some enemy down to eclipse the experience of something broken in me. Pain, grief - the fear of them scratched at me, and I refused to let it win. We were going to Lyon to draw blood, and the prospect filled us with purpose.
If we'd had cautious or self-preserving intentions, we would have skulked into town. Instead, we practically strutted back to the inn, commandeering one of the few tables with stares that promised we would love for someone to argue with us about it. The tavern hosted a paltry fraction of the usuals, but then, it was the early hours of the morning, nearing sunrise. Those present whispered amongst themselves, shooting threatening looks at Bourbon and me. I experienced déjà vu, superimposing the mortals' sun-worn faces with the pale austerity of the vampires at Lucrece's banquet. They bustled as though more than one carouche had just waltzed into their tidy little world, stinking up the place. I caught a swift, murderous glare from one of them from across the room, and I had to smile in anticipation of a kill. I willed the man to come over, get into my face and make something of it. Damn, he looked away quickly. Four of them sat there, circled in their own little conclave, but they only appeared full of talk - empty talk that would never bring any satisfaction to my restlessness.
The desire for a fight shifted within me. A random brawl wouldn't quench my restlessness this time. I wanted Lucrece, or I wanted the people responsible for whatever had happened to her. Anything else was a waste of energy.
A woman moved to slip past our table, but she wandered too close. I recognized her as the coarse one looking for my patronage almost two weeks earlier. I caught her before she moved out of range, pulling her roughly down to sit on the bench beside me. Ignoring the handful of townsmen motioning angrily amongst themselves - as if they were organizing what to do about it, but never got over that hill - I said in a casual voice, "My friend and I could use some company ... Talking company. Are you free?"
She opened her mouth to answer, from her expression, with a dissent. "I - "
But I didn't care what her opinion was. I was interested in facts. I wanted information. I cut off her excuse. "Sounds like that's settled, and she's proven she can talk." The woman jerked, trying to bolt off of the bench, but I held her fast. "No," I warned her, probably sounding ready to kill. "You go when we say you go."
She swallowed, stubbornness seeping into her eyes as she darted sharp glances between Bourbon's and my unrelenting stares. "I know you're from D'Asile," she said rebelliously, then nodded at the other people in the tavern who watched our every move. "They know it, too. If I were you, I wouldn't waste time talking, when they might decide to join in the fight any minute and go after your heads."
"What fight would dare go after my head?" Bourbon demanded venomously. From his point of view, he'd done the people of this town a favor by cleaning out Lucrece's dungeon.
"The news has spread through town," she said. "Dozens that were missing now lay sick and dying in their homes. The people want revenge. Javier Dumarchais is dead, and everyone knows the Lady of D'Asile is responsible." Her face flared with rebellion. "You thought no one would care about their missing family members? You thought the men Dumarchais owed money to would lie down with empty bellies so a rich bitch could grow fat off their blood?" She spat at the table in disgust.
The woman acted as though she thought she knew the whole story, as if, because the number of the men in the room outnumbered us, she had protection. She had no idea how near she was to disaster, how close Bourbon and I were to throwing her down and tearing her apart. Did she think mortals were the only ones with families? Could she really believe that peasants were the only ones destruction could scald into a frenzy? We were starving dogs, one kick short of breaking loose and mauling whoever got into our path.
"We know what happened at D'Asile," I clipped, keeping my teeth close together lest I give in to the temptation to bite and brawl, then ask the questions later. These mortals were weak. If they had any strength to them, they would have marched off self-righteously with the rest of the mob. No, these were spectators. It would be nothing to snap them and toss them out of our way. Bourbon and I weren't in the mood for cheap blood. We wanted to draw blood that had a price. "They torched the castle. What happened to the lady?"
The woman looked petulant, but some caution crept into her, as though she was starting to sense how dangerous giving us an answer we didn't like might be. "I don't know. No one has returned here with news."
Not good enough. I caught her gaze, plundering her will with my eyes as I said quietly, "If we wanted to kill you, you'd be dead before any of those slugs scratching themselves on the other side the room noticed anything had happened. Unlike us, they're too busy talking about the size of their balls to actually use them." I let my voice hover for a second, as though her fate hinged on my next question. "Are you sure you haven't heard anything more about the lady?"
As a motivational speech, I suppose it was effective. Any spirit deserted her. Terror added a stutter to her answer. "N-n-no ... I swear I know nothing!"
Since I believed her, she had no more use to us. I let her go, tossing the woman to the floor like any other piece of refuse.
Bourbon watched as she scrambled away, a faint hint of deathly glimmer still simmering in his eyes. I studied him, resting one fist on the tabletop, rubbing at my knuckles to stop the itch of swinging it, daring him to match my stare.
He must have felt my fury, because his gaze suddenly rebounded to me. "What are you thinking?" he snapped.
"I'm thinking how you're the one who set Dumarchais free without bothering to clean his memory so that he wouldn't lead anyone straight back to Lucrece. Are you really that dense, or were you so excited playing vampire hero for the first time that it slipped your mind?"
He hit the table in frustration. "I wiped everyone I could wake. He was the only one who wouldn't regain consciousness. I thought him harmless - too far gone! He was at death's door!"
"You should have finished the job," I countered unsympathetically. I was brilliant in hindsight when I put my mind to it, never mind that I'd been the one for leaving Thérèse's memory intact back at the convent when I hadn't thought it made a difference. But my mistake hadn't come back to haunt us, Bourbon's had.
"His disappearance caused too much talk," he excused. "If they had his body, if he died quietly, and Lucrece stopped collecting blood, I thought - "
"You didn't think," I bit out. "If you'd thought, we wouldn't be sitting here right now."
"You'd like to believe that, wouldn't you?" Bourbon countered. "Let it be the Frenchman's fault. That way, you don't have to wonder about why, if you wanted her so much, you didn't take her when you had the chance."
I was across the table, my hands at his throat in a flash. Bourbon, the bastard, kept talking. "Yes, I'm stupid," he declared. "I should have realized Dumarchais was a loose end and tied it, but you, Vachon ... If her fate mattered to you, you should have thought of that before you left her."
I froze. Yeah. I should have thought of that. Passing the blame to Bourbon was hypocritical and pointless, especially when I hadn't had a problem with what he'd done until the local dropped the revenuer's name. He'd made a choice that I might have picked in the same circumstances. Inconsistency plagued me, and I was looking for someone to hate, but I knew that the Frenchman wasn't the proper target for either phenomenon. "You're right." My grip on him slacked. "We're a pair of damned fools." I dropped back to the bench. "I'd like to stake you, Bourbon, but we deserve putting up with each other more."
He cracked a smug smile at that comment. "You? You aren't worth the effort of staking," he vowed, then cursed in annoyance. "But Javier Dumarchais - if he wasn't already dead, I'd love another opportunity to kill him."
Dumarchais. Dumarchais. I'd known the revenuer meant problems from the first time Screed had mentioned him. I'd known, because I'd walked in his boots. He didn't fit in with the people he'd gambled with, and he could never fulfill their expectations. They wanted a piece of him anyhow. They wanted the money they imagined Dumarchais had access to, and their determination to get it had brought Bourbon to heel, just like The Inka kept hounding me to satisfy our eternal marching orders. Dumarchais never came through; he never would have, even if Lucrece hadn't laid a hand on him. Just like I never would, even with The Inka, Tracy, and you simultaneously on my case about doing the right thing.
The way things worked out with Vudu, it wasn't about living up to my responsibilities toward anybody. I showed up because I happened to catch the bad guy in a lie, and ever since I met Lucrece, I've had a sore spot about calling people on deceit and betrayal. Vudu waved a red flag, and I went after it. I never do anything that I don't want to do; I only make promises I plan to keep. If I decide I don't want any part of a scene, I leave. If I choose to stay, I head into the fight straight on, regardless of the consequences, just like a lemming headed for the cliff. Yeah, I understood Javier Dumarchais, the reckless risk-taker who couldn't resist rolling the dice, even when the odds were against him, even if it might cost him his life.
But Bourbon and I realized the tavern wasn't so empty anymore. We glanced toward the entrance and found a pair of men dressed in dark, plain clothes who appeared to have the personalities to match. The Frenchman and I faced each other again, each confirming the other's verdict with a glint in our eyes. The inn's vampire population had just doubled, and we had mixed reactions when it came to welcoming them.
They walked up to our table, taking seats beside each of us without preamble. The taller of the two deliberately rested one hand on the table surface, idly toying with a stake. I shot Bourbon a brief, incredulous look. These guys were planning to shake us down? Incredible. Laughable. "Comfortable?" I asked archly, giving them one of my 'bring it on' smiles.
They didn't have a wealth of social skills. The one with the stake simply sat there, glowering in what I guess was his best imposing manner. The other one studied Bourbon with black, round eyes, saying in a thick Old World accent, "Neither of you are the one we're hunting."
Bourbon made an amused sound of discovery. "Ah, you are Enforcers." He shot me a smirk that said, 'Yes, our night just got worse.'
He picked the word 'worse.' I considered it interesting, myself. "Who are you looking for?" I'd guessed already, but I wanted it confirmed.
"A carouche. We learned there was one roaming Lyon. In fact, we've already felt him in this vicinity. We shall find him, and we shall enforce the Code." He sounded overly proud of himself.
Bourbon leaned back from the table, his features closed in the condescending French way he had. "Killing carouche isn't part of the original Code. It's a preference dictated by a privileged few."
The talkative Enforcer smiled thinly. "Isn't all law? The Code has always meant to instruct those who may not know better what is acceptable, and what is not, to the vampire community." Underlying his speech, the suggestion hovered that we agreed with this instruction, or we joined the list of wayward fangs demanding permanent correction.
"Well, there you go," I said conclusively, completely unimpressed by the threat of a Code or the people who would prescribe it. Those rules came from Lucrece and Bourbon's world, not mine. I hadn't begun to learn them and had no plans to start. "That carouche you're looking for is a friend, and I don't twiddle my thumbs while friends are dying. You're going to have to find me unacceptable by association."
"As for myself," Bourbon added, "while I find the rat-drinker has an odd smell about him, I wouldn't want him to perish for such a trivial reason, especially as I sit here, and you Enforcers stink three times worse."
Bourbon and I exchanged a high-five glance. Separately, we'd declared war against anyone who would attack Screed. So Bourbon's allegiance came from the fierce desire to strike out at someone in the wake of the destruction at D'Asile. Bourbon hadn't embraced any personal wish to make the world safe for carouche, but he was still standing up for one as a form of battling his own demons of conscience. As for me, Screed was still my friend. He would always be my friend. Just the suggestion that he roamed Lyon, a lynch squad chasing him down, was enough to make me feel like I could sense him nearby, in need of my set of fists to cover his back.
From what I've gathered, I was supposed to be too blown away by the Enforcers' reputation to consider fighting them. Too bad. I hadn't hung around long enough for the brainwashing of vampire gossip to work, and I'd never lost anything that I couldn't afford. I didn't have the experience where caution would sway me. My past encouraged the opposite. Maybe if I had a stronger sense of self-preservation, second thoughts would have prevailed, and I would have tried the tack of smooth talking them, manipulating them with words so we could all stay buddies forever, like someone who actually cared about their position in the vampire community would have. Yeah, someone might have tried that, but I was the Javier Dumarchais Vachon at that table. I didn't care about the risk. I didn't care about vampire legends. I didn't care about the consequences. I wanted a fight just as badly as Bourbon did, and this pair of Enforcers had made the mistake of getting in our faces.
As I pushed off the bench, I assumed my death mask, flashing my fangs at the meager number of mortal patrons. They shrieked and scattered even before I recommended, "Get out. We're going to have a hell of a fight now."
As the mortals pushed out the door, Bourbon made a performance of shaking his index finger at me. "Badly done, Vachon. You revealed that you were a vampire to the unsuspecting populace. You broke the Code."
I struck a casual pose, rubbing my chin thoughtfully. "You think?"
He held out his hands, gesturing toward the other vampires. "Yes, and in front of the very people who would stake you for such an infraction."
"Oh." My bad. Like I cared. At that moment, I didn't.
The taller Enforcer rose from the table with a snarl, brandishing his weapon. He moved faster than I expected, lunging toward me. I cuffed his elbow, knocking away his arm, and felt the tip of the wood scratch against my shoulder. I braced one hand against his arm carrying the stake to slow him striking again, and punched him repeatedly in the stomach. I took a split-second to ask myself - did I want to play dirty? I decided I did, and kneed the Enforcer in the groin. He snarled anew, but he wasn't nice enough to drop the stake. I was the one with a grip on him, though, so when he staggered, then lunged a second time, I jumped backward out of range.
As soon as the Enforcer with the stake made his first move on me, Bourbon turned on the other, swinging his feet from underneath the table to kick his opponent off the bench. He drew his sword, and, as a former Musketeer, he didn't flirt with using it. Bourbon didn't simply stab his Enforcer. He lashed at the vampire's stomach, in three swipes effectively disemboweling him. It was impressive, but his efficiency aggravated me. Within ten seconds, Bourbon had his guy on his knees, while mine was still trying to play 'hide the stake' in my rib cage. The Frenchman was trying to make me look slack.
I scanned for a weapon as my Enforcer loomed, preparing to thrust the stake at me again. Grabbing a bench, I slammed it into his chin, causing his head to snap back with an abrupt crack. Sensing the fight momentum shift my direction, I jammed the bench at him a second time, striking the vampire in the middle of his chest in the style of a battering ram. He stumbled backward, but he didn't make me happy by dropping the stake. Instead, he barreled forward, swiping at me again. I ducked, tumbling the Enforcer's body over my back, and whirled around to catch whatever he tried next. He'd dropped into a roll as his hands met the floor and twisted around to grab me by the ankles. Sure, I lost my balance when he yanked, but he let go of the stake to do it, and I found myself in the perfect position to kick him between his glowing, gold eyes. Even with my boot planted in his face, he acted like I'd just tickled his nose. He immediately recovered the stake and dove forward, going for my heart a fourth time.
As fun as fighting for my existence was, I wasn't in the mood for all the foreplay. It had been a long night, filled with one battle and unpleasant discovery after another. The sun had to be up by now, meaning we were in for a long, tedious day in town, when I'd rather be finding Screed or discovering what had happened to Lucrece. It seemed just my luck that, out of the two Enforcers, I'd drawn the silent, stubborn type. As I jolted to the side so that the stake stabbed harmlessly at the floor, he jabbed me in the jaw with a random punch. Typical. On top of everything, my guy had a wicked left cross.
I gathered my patience and my killer instinct, consoling myself that the only reason Bourbon had had a swift time of his battle was that his Enforcer was the talker, not the fighter. Lucky, lucky break. I weaved and bobbed, but my opponent bypassed targeting a blow at my head again, and shot for my lower ribs. I felt my bones crack and dig into my chest. Another lucky, lucky break.
He must have thought that would slow me down, but how could he have known I'd spent almost seventy years in constant battles mirroring this one, only against The Inka? He's the one who took too much time, anticipating the kill. The Enforcer leaned back slightly, like he wanted to see the look on my face as he staked me. His center of balance shifted in doing that, so I grabbed his hand that held the stake, tilting the tip toward him as I flipped around to his back, then fell against him with all my weight. The hardness of the ground worked as my partner, shoving our hands into his chest. Landing with a grunt, I could feel the prickle of the stake tip now poking out of his back. I crouched on my knees and turned the Enforcer's body over, finding the stake had pierced the dead center of his heart. Perfect.
Climbing to my feet, I found Bourbon with one boot on his Enforcer's face, holding him down as he sliced through the vampire's neck. I walked around the body as though I was evaluating his work. "Bourbon, you've cut off an Enforcer's head. I'll make a wild guess and say that's breaking the Code."
He struck an arrogant pose, tilting his nose in the air. "You think?"
"Yeah. I think. And if it's not, I'm sure they'll make an amendment." I extended my hand toward him, making our team official. "Welcome to the crew of the unacceptable."
He finished wiping his sword and sheathed it, then gave me a dubious look as he brushed off his gloves, like he had to give my offer consideration. After an annoying delay, he shook on it, but that's just the way my friendship with Bourbon went - moments of camaraderie interspersed with long periods of each of us calculating the best method to dig into the other's spine.
Read Chapters Fifteen and Sixteen Return to Story Index