Blood Spirits (55 page)

The bishop patiently repeated, “It. Is. Time. To. Sound. The. Shadow. Ones. Alarm,” pronouncing each word distinctly.

“Ah! Ah!” The old monk cackled. “The alarm against the Shadow Ones has not been rung since 1722.” He looked old enough to have personally pulled the bell rope.

The Prime Minister winced as he tottered to a chair. There was an enormous bruise on the side of his head, and another on his jaw. I hated to think what the rest of him looked like.

The bishop held out his hands to the group, Council and Tony's guys alike. “Please make yourselves comfortable. I will see about breakfast.”

Tony said, “I'll send someone to accompany you. As guard. You never know what might be waiting.”

The bishop gave a short, dignified nod, but returned no answer as he vanished beyond a bookshelf full of centuries-old, hand-bound books. One of Tony's guys followed him, weapon ready, but pointed downward.

The ancient monk shoved the tunnel door shut. It fitted into a woodpaneled wall, and a tapestry depicting St. Dominic fell into place over it.

“I was not expecting this tunnel to come up in monk-space,” I muttered as I sank down on the floor next to the tapestry-concealed door, my back against the wall and the rapier at my side. One of the pistol guys wandered by, checking the walls—for more passages I guess—as others scanned out the row of windows, which were blue with the coming daylight. The meeting had been set for eight, just before sunrise this far north. Though it seemed like hours since my arrival, it had been no more than twenty minutes. Twenty very intense minutes.

Phaedra gave a sniff of amusement, then blew out her lantern and began to prowl the room, ignoring Tony's goons.

All the chairs and benches had been claimed by the old folks. Beka winced as she slowly lowered herself down next to me. “During the early Soviet years, most of the religious orders had to take up residence down there, just like during the war.”

I said, “All of a sudden a bunch of what I'd thought hazy or innocuous references in Milo's diary have just decoded. Wow. Milo was flashing all around the city, using these tunnels to vanish and reappear, like some kind of superhero.”

“He evaded pursuit by using them, yes.” Beka gently rubbed her middle over her broken ribs, and winced. “My grandfather showed him the first of the tunnels when Milo was chosen to inherit the throne.”

“So all the kings knew?”

“Not all,” Beka began, falling silent when Cerisette stalked up to me, and glared down from the empyrean height of self-righteousness.

“I hope you realize,” Cerisette said in a venomous tone, “that you can make a fool of yourself all you want but Alec will never stoop to your level. Except as a—”

Saved by the bell? But I didn't have to hear it to know what she was going to say. A couple of people jumped as the biggest of the cathedral bells began the deliberate toll, in patterns of three.

“Cerisette, this is not the time. Or the place,” Beka said as soon as human voices could be heard.

“Shut up, Beka.”

During that pleasant exchange, I did a full tai chi breath, consciously trying not to take on the poisonous anger that Cerisette so obviously wanted to share. I said, “‘Stoop to my level.' That's a weird way to look at a relationship, or do you mean that what you really want is to be Queen of Dobrenica?” When her face tightened preparatory to an answer, I said quickly, “Never mind. I don't want to hear it. In fact, the worst thing I can think of is to see the world the way you do. But yeah, if I do hook up with Alec, I am completely down with the fact that I will never be more than a mistress, whatever our legal status, because he's married for life to Dobrenica.”

“
Ripou
,” Cerisette muttered under her breath, then stalked back to her mother's side, where she got the sympathy she wanted, judging from the twin looks of loathing fired my way.

Phaedra sauntered up, her expression cynical. “How much of that do you really believe?”

“Check back in ten hours. Or ten years. Right now I'm making it up as I go along.”

Phaedra's fine brows shot up. She gave me a rakish smile, and an unwilling laugh as she flipped up a hand in a fencer's acknowledgement of a hit, then wandered away.

A door opened. Everyone stiffened. But it was only the bishop, to invite everybody to the refectory for breakfast. This was a rectangular room whose line of windows overlooked a secluded garden, now covered with snow. The continuous toll of the vampire alarm was not quite as loud here.

A couple of the white-cassocked Dominicans brought in several loaves of fresh bread, a tureen of
mammaglia
, honey, butter, and scrambled eggs. They set it out for us to serve ourselves, and then departed.

The Prime Minister conducted the duchess to the head of the main table, where she picked up her coffee in both hands, as though the little cup was too heavy to hold. The Council settled themselves along the middle of the table below the von Mecklundburgs. I sat at the end, as far away from the von M.s as I could get, and Beka sank down across from me.

The guards had spread around the perimeter of the room. After a quick glance, Tony made an airy gesture of invitation. “Help yourselves, mates. “

And so our guards swooped down on the platters of food, then decamped to the second table, where they laid their weapons beside their plates and dug in. A distinct atmosphere of vintage laundry plus unwashed male emanated from that side of the room.

I shut them out, and sat there staring at the piece of bread I'd put on my plate. There was nothing wrong with the bread, but I couldn't dispel that picture of Alec, leading the line to attack those horrible
things
.

I looked up at Beka, who was only drinking coffee, as were the rest of her family. I remembered that they keep kosher.

“Do the charms make the vampires difficult to see, or is it their powers?” I asked, touching my necklace.

Beka seemed relieved to have her thoughts interrupted. “I don't know,” she said. “Both, maybe?”

“If the charms make us perceive them as confusing splinters of light, is it possible that's how the charms work to protect us—make us into smears of confusing light for the vampires?”

“The prevailing theory is—”

A noise at the outer door brought Tony's guards up and alert. The door opened, and Alec walked in, his coat gaping where steel had sliced it, his hair hanging down in his eyes, smears of drying blood on his ruined suit and on his jaw.

He ignored Tony's guards. “The vampires went to ground as soon as the sun appeared,” he said.

“So you didn't destroy them?” Phaedra asked, fierce in her disappointment.

Alec said, “Too many of them, and too difficult to see for some of us, but we think they had trouble seeing us as well. When we set fire to the entire building, and put our charms at every corner, they began their retreat.”

Alec looked my way and smiled. “Trasyemova just received a report that Mam'zelle Dsaret gave out an order for everyone in the city to hang charms and lanterns, lamps, candles, every kind of light possible. Before dawn, people were putting them outside the houses, along walls, and in the street on the benches and statues and fountains.”

I blushed. “Uh, actually, I asked Tania to spread the word.”

Beka flashed a quick smile my way. “Tania was smart. An order from Tania Waleska would be ignored, but not one from the heroic Mademoiselle Dsaret.”

“Murray,” I muttered under my breath, the old poser prickles making my ears itch. “My last name is Murray.”

Alec lifted a hand toward the window. “As you can see, we now have daylight. We have to assume that the vampires will reappear as soon as the sun sets, so Trasyemova is coming up with some kind of strategy while the Vigilzhi lock down the city.”

“Was anyone hurt?” the duchess asked. The coffee seemed to have woken her up. “Where is Morvil? Where is Gilles? What was that about Interpol?”

“Gilles brought Interpol agents, Mother,” Tony said. “Since everyone's here but Gilles and his people, we might get to the purpose of this gathering. Before we do, I suggest that everyone place their deflections on the table. Honoré, if you would serve as conscience?”

“If you wished to hear the truth, you might have begun by telling it,” Beka said.

The silence was . . . really silent. Tony glanced her way, that telltale flush along his cheekbones, but he didn't answer. Instead, he reached up and unhooked his diamond earring and then, at a leisurely pace, divested himself of diamond cufflinks. These he set on the table before him.

He looked around, waiting. The Prime Minister gravely removed a diamond tie clip and laid it gently next to his coffee cup. One by one the others followed suit, some shooting nasty glances at Tony, or Alec, or both.

I took off my necklace, and Beka slowly removed her charm bracelet.

Alec laid his cufflinks down and twisted the cobalt ring off, which had tiny diamonds inset. Then he lifted his hands; his wedding band glinted. He said, “Why, and how, have so many vampires turned up in Riev for the first time in hundreds of years?”

Tony waved that aside. “Where is my sister?”

“Anton!” the duchess snapped, eyes wide in horror.

“
Ubi innocens damnatur, pars patriae exsultat
,” Honoré said in that detached voice.

“If you are going to so rudely interrupt, young man,” the duchess said to Honoré, “then you may speak intelligibly.”

“I was intelligible, Tante Sisi,” Honoré said, completely without heat. “It's from the mime Syrus, once a slave. Roughly translated, it means,
When an innocent man is convicted, part of his homeland is exiled
.”

Alec gazed over Honoré's head at Tony. “So that's what this is about?” A tip of his head toward Tony's guards. “To get me to tell the truth?”

Tony held out his hands. “It seems to be working.”

Alec's expression matched Tony's. “Will it comfort or annoy you to be told that I've never lied about what happened that day?”

We waited as everyone swiveled to look at Honoré. “Alec believes what he says,” Honoré said in a goading tone, gazing coldly at his cousin Tony.

Alec went on. “As for your question about Ruli's whereabouts. We can begin with where she isn't.”

“The sarcophagus,” Tony said.

Alec said, “I take it this is not news to you?”

“No.” Tony waited as the listeners checked the living lie detector. Honoré sat there like stone.

Alec went on, “You have neglected to share your discovery with your family.”

“And that is why I am angry,” Honoré said.

The duchess sat back, her face blanched. “Aurelia?” she whispered.

Tony repeated softly, “So where is my sister?”

“What are you talking about?” Cerisette's voice went shrill. “She's dead. And buried! We were all there at her funeral!”

“She is not in that sarcophagus,” Tony said, watching Alec. “At my request, Gilles brought a couple of Interpol agents, like I said. One from Lyon, the other a forensic specialist. Under the guise of filming, they have been investigating everyone and everything they could. Including the crypt in the cathedral. They discovered last week that the bones in Ruli's sarcophagus belong to a male between the ages of 25 and 35.”

Alec said, “I found out myself four days ago. There's a strong possibility that those are the remains of Marzio di Peretti. Whom Magda Stos swore she drove to the border. So my question for you is, where is Magda Stos?”

Tony flicked a glance Honoré's way, then sat back down, frowning. The duchess raised her head. Tears gleamed along her eyelids. She said angrily to Alec, “You were drunk. You drove her off a cliff. You admitted you were drunk!”

“I said the last thing I remembered was that toast, after our agreement that she would go to Paris.” Alec said to Tony, “I now believe I was drugged. It would explain why I only remember toasting, and the next thing I knew I was sitting on that mountainside with Ruli's purse. Since Magda brought those drinks, I have some questions for her about that, as well.”

“He's lying,” the countess's voice trembled with fury. She glared at Honoré. “He's lying, and you're covering for him!”

“He believes it is true,” Honoré said. “Every word.”

The duchess stiffened when Robert cursed violently, then growled, “I believe
I
was drugged on the twenty-first. Perhaps that is why the vampires are here.”

“What?” Tony asked.

“But you told us—” Phaedra began.

“I insist that this discussion be held privately,” the duchess stated, sending accusing glances at the rest of the Council.

The Night of the Thorn. She doesn't want it outed
, I thought.

“A private discussion can be arranged.” The Prime Minister's voice was mild. He pushed himself to his feet with difficulty and tottered past two of the gunmen to address the bishop in a low voice.

And I will bet anything that the Prime Minister has known about the Night of the Thorn all along.
Tania had hinted that the Salfmattas knew at least something.

Then the bishop said, “There is an alcove through that door, used by our community for family visits. Please make use of it.”

The von Mecklundburgs marched off, leaving their breakfasts half-eaten. Honoré got to his feet to follow, leaning heavily on his cane.

I hesitated, then caught Alec's eye. He twitched his head toward the door, and I got up, making an internal wager on who would try to throw me out first, Cerisette or her mother. Of course there was always the duchess. Why not go for a threefer, I thought as I followed him.