Hotel Transylvania (20 page)

On impulse, she tugged her hunter off the trail and into a thicket some way back from the track. She stood there in the dim light, not daring to move. She was grateful for the fallen leaves now, because the hunter had left no telltale prints leading to her hiding place.

The sounds of the chase grew louder, and then six horsemen burst into sight, their faces hard and their horses steaming. Madelaine felt herself grow cold, for the rider at the lead of the group was le Baron Clotaire de Saint Sebastien, and beside de la Sept-Nuit was Baron Beauvrai.

Madelaine's eyes grew wide, and her face paled. She put a hand to her throat and wished that she was not trembling. Saint Sebastien! Dread weakened her knees, and she felt herself slump against the shoulder of her hunter. She knew she must get away. She must not be caught by those desperate men.

They were gone now, and only the sound of their plunging horses kept her aware of the great danger that confronted her. She told herself to think clearly, to put her fright aside so that her wits would save her. She heard the hoofbeats growing fainter, and as they receded, she felt her courage return.

She secured the reins to a tree branch so that her horse could not wander, and then she raised her voluminous velvet skirt and began to untie her four petticoats. One by one she dragged them to her ankles and stepped out of them until there was a large heap of crumpled linen at her feet. She was colder now, but her movements were freer. Bending down once more, she pulled the little knife strapped to the top of her boot from its sheath. Her father had given her that knife so that she could cut herself free from the stirrup should she ever fall. Now she put it to another use, cutting long strips from her petticoats and spreading them around her like diapers.

It was hard work, and she felt herself grow tired long before the task was done. But at last there were enough of the linen rags for her to wrap each of her hunter's feet in muffling cloth, and she set to work on that task. She was certain that Saint Sebastien would still be searching for her, and she did not want chance noise to bring him to her side.

It was almost dark when she finished swathing and tying the horse's hooves, and she was much colder now. It was going to be a hard night. And she would have to ride through it if she were to escape her enemies.

She was about to pull herself up into the saddle once again when it struck her that the men hunting for her would be looking for a figure riding sidesaddle. She nodded to herself and unbuckled the girths of the saddle and pulled it from her hunter's back. She put it down with some little regret. It was a fine saddle, and had been made for her. If there was rain that night—and a covert look toward the tiny patch of sky overhead confirmed there would be—the saddle would be ruined. She thrust it under the thickest branches of a low- growing pine and told herself that it might not be too badly damaged.

With hardly more than a sigh, she cut the heavy velvet skirt up the front and up the back, then bent over one last time to secure the flapping hem around each ankle, making herself surprisingly serviceable breeches.

At last she was ready. She unfastened the reins from the branch, and taking a handful of mane in her left hand, vaulted clumsily onto the hunter's back. It took her a few moments to accustom herself to riding astride and bareback, but she had been excellently trained, and it did not take her long to get her balance and adjust her seat for the ride ahead.

The hunter was fairly rested, and did not object to moving off into the deep woods. She tried to glance back toward the track, but the dusk was thick, and the track was lost in the gloom.

It was more than twenty minutes later that she heard the sounds of pursuit once more. She pulled in the hunter and listened carefully, trying to discover where the hoofbeats were coming from. She thought for a moment that she had been mistaken and that it was only the sound of branches knocking together, but it was not so. The next gust of wind brought the sound to her, louder. She realized, as she listened, that the hunters had fanned out and were moving through the forest in a wide swath. She threw her head back to stifle a sob, and felt despair grow in her like some exotic disease. Her escape seemed so useless, so meaningless. But the memory of the cruel smile on Saint Sebastien's face forced her to action. Cautiously she urged the big horse forward, hardly daring to go faster than a walk.

Night had settled in in earnest, and the dark slowed her progress even more. The third time she found herself almost swept from her mount's back, she was ready to weep with vexation. Only the continuing sound of the search near her kept her silent.

There were scratches on her face and arms, and her hair was disheveled now that her hat was gone. Even one of her pigskin gloves was torn, and she felt her hand growing cold as the wind touched her skin and lashed out at the trees, bending them before its invisible might.

Suddenly Madelaine saw a glimmer of movement off to her left, and her horse shied, snorting.

There was a soft moaning in the forest as the trees braced themselves against the onslaught of the gale.

Madelaine reached for her boot to grip the knife there, thinking that if she were to be ravished by Saint Sebastien's men, she would at least fight them until she was overpowered. She might even be able to kill one or two of them before they could rape her.

A shape in the brush moved nearer, and her horse almost bolted.

She sat up straighter, holding the sliding, frightened hunter firmly in check. She looked through the woods, and in the dark discerned a low, gray shape crouching in the underbrush. Her eyes narrowed as she stared; then, trembling violently, she saw it plainly and knew it was a wolf.

Involuntarily she looked about swiftly for more of the sinister gray forms, but she could see no others. Her pulse was as loud as the wind in her ears, but she held her fear as firmly as she held her horse.

The hoofbeats behind her were nearer, and she could hear an occasional shout as Saint Sebastien and his men called to one another in the darkness. Carried on the wind, their words had the eerie sound of madness in them, as if the air itself was touched with their malevolence.

Now the wolf circled in front of her, keeping well back from the terrified horse. It whined, then yelped, starting away into the dark, then once again circling back toward Madelaine, never coming close enough to panic her mount into bolting.

Madelaine hesitated, studying the strange behavior of the wolf. She had almost satisfied herself that it was alone, that no pack ran with it, when it began to bark. It was a strange sound, not like the friendly tumult of dogs. This was lorn, ageless, as desolate as the mountain crags, as primeval as the close-crowded trees around her. Something about that wild, lonely cry tugged at her heart, and she longed for one insane moment to be able to run on four paws away from the horror behind her.

The hunting party grew nearer, and Madelaine fought down her rising panic. She forced herself to watch the wolf, looking for that one moment when the strange gray animal would be far enough away that she could push past it without terrifying her horse still further. Thinking of the monstrous men who chased her, and comparing them to the gaping mouth of the wolf, Madelaine knew that she would much prefer to take her chances with the wolf. That, at least, would be a clean death. Or she might be able to kill it. As her horse reared, she wondered if she could force him close enough to the wolf to trample it into the ground with flashing hooves.

With a kind of desperate bravado, she reached up with one hand and tugged the comb out of her hair, so that her dark tresses streamed out behind her on the wind. She held on to her plunging horse with her knees, waiting.

Now the wolf had circled back again and was whining more loudly, starting off into the darkness of the forest, then moving back where she could see it once again.

Quite suddenly Madelaine remembered something that Saint-Germain had said to her in that elegant little room at Hôtel Transylvania. The words sounded in her mind as clearly as if he had spoken them in her ear.
"Your soul is like a sword, bright, shining, and will always pierce through deception to the truth. Do not doubt what it tells you, ever, Madelaine. "

She shot one swift look over her shoulder, then kicked at her horse's sides, moving away from the hunters into the dark, following the liquid gray shape of the wolf.

It seemed to her that she had been following the wolf for half the night, even farther into the forest, when she saw ahead of her the looming shape of a building. She slowed her horse and carefully approached the structure, saying nothing, making no noise that might alert the inhabitants that she was near.

The first few drops of rain had fallen, and Madelaine was achingly exhausted. She circled the building once and was startled to realize that it was an ancient church, abandoned, yet intact, its heavy arches and squat pillars indicating its great age.

Gratefully she slid off the horse, and after looking over her shoulder nervously, pushed on the thick oaken door of the church.

Old metal screamed as the doors were opened, but the ancient hinges grudgingly admitted her. She stared into the darkness of the narthex, denser than the dark of the rainy night On impulse she turned and tugged at the bridle, pulling the English hunter into the church. His muffled hooves made little sound on the stone floor, and he whickered once, before coming to stand in the little space of the narthex.

Madelaine secured one rein to the door bolt, then turned into the church itself, noticing that in spite of its obvious disuse, the altar was still in place, and there was a slight smell of incense on the musty air. She walked up the aisle, and genuflected automatically before the crucifix, murmuring a brief, incoherent prayer of thanks.

When she turned again, she saw him.

"Madelaine," he said in his deepest tone, and held out his small hands to her. He was dressed in a military-like uniform, with somewhat loose breeches and a heavily frogged tunic of bottle green on black. He wore high cavalry boots and a fur hat, and the smile in his dark eyes filled her heart.

"Saint-Germain," she cried, and ran into his arms, pressing her face into the curve of his neck.

"Hush, hush," he whispered, holding her tightly against him. "You must not be afraid, Madelaine, my heart. You are safe here. Saint Sebastien will not come onto consecrated ground."

The words caught her, and she said rather wildly, "If you are here, this cannot be consecrated ground. The Sisters have said—"

Saint-Germain gave a bitter laugh. "The Sisters do not know everything. All of my kind can walk on consecrated ground. Most of us are buried in it." He felt her stiffen in his embrace. "There, I have said it, and you are horrified." He freed himself from her arms and went toward the altar. "It is not safe to have much light in here, for though the windows are small and high, it is possible we may be discovered." He pulled flint from his sleeve, and steel. "There are a few oil lamps in the choir," he said by explanation as he struck the spark.

In a moment a faint, soft glow suffused the choir, and Madelaine could see him more clearly. She noticed he was rather leaner in the face than she had seen him last, and he moved as one who had run a long way.

Behind the altar there were now revealed several huge murals, done in an antique style, showing a forbidding Christ with His hands spread to show the marks of the nails, surrounded by clusters of tiny saints and martyrs dressed in courtly garb of the eleventh century. To one side was a representation of what was probably Saint Jerome, for an old stylus pen was clasped in one hand, and a leather-covered book was opened with the other.

"I did not know," Madelaine whispered, moving toward the mural. "It is very beautiful, isn't it?"

Saint-Germain was looking steadily at her. "Very."

She turned to him. "How do you come to be here?"

"I said I would protect you." He came toward her and gently touched the scratches on her face and arms. "You are so much in need of protection."

She flushed at this. "I did well enough in the wood. I escaped and came here." She looked at him again. "The wolf...?"

He shook his head ruefully. "I could not leave you to Saint Sebastien. I know you are brave, I know you are resourceful, but I feared for your safety."

She took his hands in hers and held them fast. "I am grateful, Saint-Germain. I do not like to think what would have happened..."

"And you feel safer with me, knowing what I am?" He looked into her face, and he felt his resolution weakening. He broke away from her.

She gave a little cry of entreaty. "Saint-Germain. Saint-Germain, don't do this. No. No. Listen to me. Please." The sound of her voice brought his reluctant eyes to hers. "What did you save me for, if you abandon me?"

His words were lightly ironic as he answered. "You know that what I want to do will not save you."

She reached out for him again. "But it is not so, Saint-Germain. You walk on consecrated ground. You are not damned if you do this."

"Not in the usual way, certainly," he agreed in a neutral voice.

She studied his face in the dim light, seeing the shadow of agony there. Gently she came up to him again, and gently she reached to touch him, her fingers tracing the line of his jaw and the wry curl of his lips. "Communion is partaking of the Body and Blood of Christ, is it not?"