A Dance in Blood Velvet (57 page)

Karl forced himself towards the desk. “You seem to know a lot about your brother’s activities.”

“Naturally.” The magus smirked. “I know everything Ben’s been up to. I have my spies.”

“Who? Holly? The unfortunate Maud? Simon?” Karl reached towards the thick, pitted cover of the Ledger. No good, he couldn’t touch it.

No reply. “Do you know what the Book is?” Lancelyn spoke from the side of his mouth as he lit a pipe.

“I have theories, but it was stolen before I had a chance to test them.”

“You think it has power? You think it enabled Benedict and myself to summon vampires from their hidden realm?”

“I don’t know.” Karl leaned on the edge of the desk, staring at him. “Did it?”

“Look.” Lancelyn opened the Book. On the age-stained paper, Karl saw for the first time the scrawl of ink in a barely legible, medieval hand. Names.
Iohn the Fisher. Iohn atte Ford. Mary Whelespinner. Aelfric Parsonservant...
And on the right-hand page opposite were notes in cramped, indecipherable Latin. The names vibrated inside his skull until he felt he would pass out -if vampires could lose consciousness. Unfortunately they rarely enjoyed the luxury of such an escape.

Karl asked, “Have you translated it?”

“Yes, though it wasn’t easy,” said Lancelyn. “The author used a code, not helped by the fact that he was barely literate. His grammar and spelling are abysmal. However, that’s not to say he was stupid. He possessed uncanny intelligence within a deeply warped mind; a vampire more at the mercy of his victims than they were at his.”

“And the names are those of his victims?”

“Is it usual for a vampire to log their names and store their corpses?”

“Quite the opposite,” Karl said emphatically. “Our instinct is to distance ourselves, with good reason.”

“This fellow was quite the exception, then. He not only recorded the names of his victims but also wrote detailed observations of how they died, documenting their mental and emotional response to the process of death. In doing so, he inadvertently stored their anguish, the emanation of those untimely deaths, until it reached critical point and claimed his life. Is it not so?”

“You are a very wise man,” said Karl. He forced himself to touch the Book. Sour coldness bled into his hands, numbing them. This greedy vacuum had seized Kristian, bringing down an immortal that no vampire could touch... “Yes, they took back what he stole. Obviously the hermit-vampire didn’t realise what he was doing.”

“On the contrary, I believe he did. He was a scientist of a primitive sort. One who experimented to the ultimate limit: his own destruction.”

Karl was struck by the twisted irony of this. He, too, had once sought a scientific way to destroy vampires, without such devastating success. Unable to endure the Book’s malice any longer, he went over to the fireplace, craving heat. “How did you find it?”

“By hypnotising Holly, in search of a physical link to Raqia. She guided us to the tunnel, the vampire’s cell, and there lay the Book.”

“And did it give you what you wanted?”

“I believe it was a focus. The aptitude resides in here -” he touched his forehead - “not in any artefact. My three daemons have always been around me in shadow form. The Book enabled me to focus, to communicate with them. Ben absorbed some of the Book’s aura, even Holly took in a little - and once absorbed, it remains. That’s why Ben didn’t need the Book to control his vampires, nor did Holly when she made her appeal to you and Katerina.”

“You seem to know everything.”

“If only.” Lancelyn pulled a face. He picked up a sheaf of paper; the translation, Karl realised. “Listen to this. ‘The lowest circle of heaven is dark and thickly strewn with human spirits and the ghosts of their dwellings. The second circle of heaven is the lake of fire-clouds from which pathless ways lead upwards. The third circle is the ocean of bronze hills that flow with the ineffable light of the firmament...’ On it goes until we reach, ‘The highest circle of heaven, the uttermost extremity of ice, beyond which lies the blinding glory of God.’ What is that, but a description of Raqia? The subtle power of the Book is to leech strength from vampires while feeding their secrets to humans. Subtle, but dangerous, don’t you agree?”

“I am impressed,” said Karl, “but I need to feed. If you don’t let me go, the victim may well be you.”

“No, it won’t,” Lancelyn said with confidence. “I’m sorry, you’ll have to bear with us a while. Won’t you sit down?”

“Sitting would not help,” Karl said thinly. It would be so delicious, so satisfying, to reach out and squeeze Lancelyn’s throat, like bursting a plum... and yet he couldn’t. He pushed the thirst away. “So, what do you intend to do with your powers?”

Lancelyn smiled crookedly, drawing on his pipe then speaking through billows of blue smoke. “Contrary to what Ben has probably told you, I am not a megalomaniac. I don’t plan world domination, nor even to bring down the government - though I have enough on certain politicians to turn the country on its complacent head. I don’t even care about the Order. No. A marriage is what I plan, sir. A marriage.”

“To your sister-in-law?” said Karl.

Lancelyn looked blankly at him. “Holly? Good God, are you mad? That would be like marrying my own daughter! Whatever you think of me, I draw the line at incest!”

“But Holly was convinced you wanted her as your ‘Dark Bride’.”

“Ah.” Lancelyn grinned. “Oh, I see. No, she perceived my intention without understanding, and mistakenly applied it to herself. Not her fault; she’s intuitive but poor at interpretation. No, I’m talking about the marriage of Earth with Heaven, God with Sophia, Man with Wisdom.”

“A symbolic marriage?” Karl spoke quietly, floating on the edge of his hunger. “With what purpose?”

“To bring completeness, to discover ultimate Wisdom. Rather a perilous undertaking; to unveil such a bride would bring madness or death to ordinary men.”

“And does it involve your daemons initiating you into the Crystal Ring?”

Lancelyn laughed, his face turning red under the coarse beard. “Is the thought of my becoming immortal really so horrific?”

Karl didn’t reply, but he thought,
Yes, actually; you would make the most dangerous vampire since Kristian.

“No,” Lancelyn went on. “I am going to enter Raqia through the strength of my own will.”

“That isn’t possible.”

“How d’you know? Not possible for ordinary men, obviously. But I am going to enter through the Goddess, my bride.”

“Forgive me for being obtuse,” said Karl, “but is she real or symbolic?”

“She is Sophia, Wisdom - but yes, she’s embodied in a real woman. My angels are bringing her to me now. I wish I could explain better, but the thing is this: no one, not even I, can understand fully until they draw back the veil and discover Wisdom.”

There was something terrifying in Lancelyn’s self-importance and conviction. Yet he was uncannily likeable. Repulsive, yet attractive. A
human who controls vampires,
Karl thought.
Where does that leave us? And, God forbid, what kind of vampire could he become? We can’t allow it to happen.

“You know, you are the most beautiful young man I’ve ever seen,” Lancelyn said thoughtfully. “Women must die for you. Ha, literally, I suppose. I hope my daemons aren’t
too
angry with you about Kristian. I’d rather we could be friends, truly.”

“I suppose anything is possible,” said Karl.

This remark appeared to galvanise Lancelyn. “Oh, for heaven’s sake! Don’t you ever say what you really feel? You’re bloody furious with me, but you think I’m rather interesting - no? Admit it!”

“Benedict loved you,” said Karl. “He thinks you have degraded yourself. And I think it a shame that a decent young man like Ben has overturned every principle of decency in pursuit of revenge.”

Lancelyn’s jovial expression turned rancid. “Degraded myself -he thinks that, does he?” His merriment returned. “Ha! Of course he does! And doesn’t he realise that I could have killed him ten times over, if I’d wanted?”

“But there’s more fun in playing cat and mouse.”

“That’s not the point. He’s my flesh and blood, but pig-headed young men will sometimes respond only to the lash.”

As Lancelyn spoke, Karl sensed a dark bustling of the air. Out of the Crystal Ring stepped Lancelyn’s allies, the vampire-angels, holding between them a female with wild black hair. Her lavender silk dress looked more suited to a cocktail party than a lofty stone mansion. Her aura was that of a captive leopard, frightened, ferocious.

She lifted her head, and Karl found himself looking into the eyes of Violette Lenoir. It took a moment to recognise her. He’d never been so close to her before, and she was no longer human...

Lancelyn turned and stared. Never taking his eyes off her, he carefully balanced his pipe on an ashtray. Then he went to her, fell to his knees at her feet, and began to weep. Over his bowed head, Violette stared blankly at Karl.

The three ancients also regarded him, but they were hard to see clearly, at once too bright and too ghostly. Silver, scarlet, raven’s-wing blue.

“Most revered Sophia, highest of the high,” Lancelyn said. “Be welcome here, Goddess and Bride.” Words of ritualistic courtesy that Karl only half-heard as he studied Violette.

Katti spoke the truth,
he thought grimly.
Charlotte can’t have wanted this.
How different she was from the sublime dancer he remembered! Her hair was tangled, her skin stretched like silvery birch-bark over the lovely bones of her face; a starved caricature of beauty, yet still radiant.

Clearly she hadn’t fed, and was in the full agony of thirst. But an ethereal vampire shimmer enhanced her natural allure, and her eyes were magnificent in their depth and pain; endlessly blue-violet as night. The colour of the Crystal Ring itself.

She unnerved Karl in every fibre. If she’d been a threat when human, as a vampire she was deadly. Everything he’d dreaded had come to pass...

And this is Charlotte’s doing.

Lancelyn rose from his knees and turned eagerly to Karl, laughing and crying with joy. His naked emotion was embarrassing. “Dear God, she’s beautiful!” he said hoarsely. “So beautiful. I knew she would be. Karl, you are privileged indeed to meet my bride-to-be.”

“Madame Lenoir, I am charmed,” Karl said without expression, inclining his head. “I am Karl von Wultendorf.”

Violette stared at him through a wild mesh of hair. She looked demented. He wondered if she could speak, but after a pause she said, “So you are Karl. Charlotte speaks of you. But you’ve made a mistake; Violette Lenoir is dead. I am Lilith.”

Karl’s unease grew. What had the transformation done to her? “Why isn’t Charlotte with you?” he asked, seeing a vision of her trying to defend Violette, the daemons savaging her and flinging her aside. “Where is she?”

“I’ve no idea.”

“Did your captors hurt her?”

Her lips drew back. “I don’t know, I don’t care! You’re her lover, are you? I despise the lie of love. All it brings is disaster, as vampires do!”

Her fervour shook him, but it sprang from the maelstrom of despair in which she was quietly drowning. Despite everything, Karl’s strongest feeling towards her was sympathy.

“And you,” he said kindly. “Are you hurt?”

She drew away from him, her eyes aflame with hostility. “What is it to you?”

Karl looked from her to Lancelyn, who was watching them intently.
Doesn’t he wonder how we know each other? He can’t possibly be unaware that she is - or was - a famous dancer.

He looked at the serene faces of her captors and said, “Why have you brought her here?”

The scarlet angel spoke, in Simon’s voice. “Don’t interfere. You’ve done enough.”

“Envoys of God,” Violette said quietly. “I’d tear your wretched eyes out, if I could. Why can’t God leave me alone? There is nothing in this world of any worth, nothing.”

The envoys seemed sadly amused.

“Something of worth, surely,” said Lancelyn. He went to Violette and touched her cheek.

Princess and toad,
Karl thought, gazing at them in the honey sheen of firelight.
Lancelyn’s taking a risk; the state of mind she is in, she may kill him.

Strangely, his touch seemed to quieten her. “I am so glad you came to me at last, beloved Sophia.”

“Why do you call me that?” she said. “I am Lilith. God made me from filth and drove me away to consort with demons. I am no one’s ‘beloved’.”

“But you are more than Lilith,” Lancelyn said with feeling. “You’re in distress and you don’t fully know yourself. You are the Veiled Goddess, soon to be my wife.”

“A chance to be redeemed,” said the dark one who had been Rasmila.

Karl said, “Is this what you want, Madame Lenoir?”

Out of natural chivalry, he wanted to help her.
I don’t hate her,
he thought.
I even understand how she came between Charlotte and me. Even wrapped in hostility, she is magnetic.

Violette’s reaction was to turn her head away in sour amusement. “What do you care?” The whites of her eyes became shining circles. “No one cares about anything at all in this world. I care least of all!”

In the scorching desert of thirst, everything around him -shining chalices, red velvet and rich brocade, the windows set like jewelled dragonfly-wings in the stonework - seemed to throb with the pressure of unanswered questions. He wanted to help, but her savage indifference warned him to harden his heart.

“Am I to take it,” he said, “that I need not waste my strength trying to rescue you?”

“You can go to hell!” said Violette. “Rescue me? Who in this godless Earth do you think you are?”

Lancelyn added, “Don’t try anything noble, my dear friend. There’s no point. This conversation is unseemly and I will not have my lady Sophia upset.” He turned to Rasmila. “Kindly take the Goddess away and prepare her for our wedding. Most revered lady, until we meet again...” Lancelyn bowed deeply.

Violette did not spare her husband-to-be a glance. With the passivity of a slave, she let Rasmila lead her towards a door on the far side of the room.

Sorrow descended on Karl. He remembered her radiant genius, and mourned her lost humanity. And although he tried not to blame Charlotte, it was hard.
Why couldn’t she listen to my warning? But she did what she believed best, as I did when I transformed Ilona...