Hotel Transylvania (39 page)

"Perhaps. With Tite dead, perhaps." He strolled away to put on his robes.

When he returned, the rest of the Circle had arrived and were concluding the preparations for the first ceremony. Châteaurose was now a little the worse for drink, but he knew the motions well enough that he could complete them without hazard.

"Have the sacrifices wakened yet?" Saint Sebastien asked as he came down the aisle toward the altar. He was gorgeous now in the heavy red silk which hung open showing his lean, hard body that had been only lightly touched by age. Gone was the polish that marked his public dealings, and in its place was a terrible mastery, made even stronger by the signs of office he wore around his neck, die sign of the pentagram and the obscene crucifix.

"Not yet, though the woman is stirring."

"They must be awake in twenty minutes. See to it that they are." He turned away and ignored the efforts of his Circle to force Madelaine and her father to be roused.

Beauvrai strode over to Saint Sebastien. "Well, Clotaire, how is your revenge?" Out of his ridiculous court finery, he was no longer the foppish fool he often appeared to be. In the black-silk robe none of his absurdity remained, and only the malice in him shone at full force, no longer hampered by his outward trappings.

"I have not tasted it yet. But soon. Soon."

"What for Robert? Have you thought of it?"

"Of course." He fingered the two medallions that hung halfway down his chest "It will please you, mon Baron."

"I hope so." He turned aside, saying under his breath, "That nephew of mine is rather an ass, Clotaire."

"He seemed so to me as well," Saint Sebastien replied at his most silky. "One would think he was too foolish to live."

"My point precisely." He bowed to Saint Sebastien and walked off to take his place in the first rank of worshipers.

At last Achille Cressie thought to bring two pails of water, and these he threw over Madelaine and Robert de Montalia. He was satisfied as he heard the woman stutter and her father gag. "I think we are ready," he said, very satisfied.

"That is good. We are very near the hour." Saint Sebastien came forward and plucked painfully at Madelaine's breasts and her cheeks. This brought a quick cry in response, and Saint Sebastien was reassured. "Yes, my dear," he said softly, caressingly, "it is I. You have not fled me."

Madelaine half-opened her violet eyes, and felt herself turn an icy cold that had little to do with the water that had drenched her. "Saint-Germain," she whispered in her desperation.

Saint Sebastien achieved a magnificent sneer. "So you long for that hoaxing fop, do you?" He reached out and slapped her face. "It is not that impostor who has you now." He turned away from the fury in her face and walked to the altar.

"He is awake," Achille told Saint Sebastien. "You have only to touch him to see the disgust in his face." He demonstrated this in superb imitation of Saint Sebastien's grand and evil manner.

"You have done well, Achille. I may let you enjoy yourself again before we dispatch Robert." He put one insolent hand on Robert's cold flesh. "How sad, my friend, that I cannot offer you a blanket. But you have my promise that I will see that you are warmed in other ways. You know that I always keep my promises."

Robert, whose jaw had tightened steadily through this new indignity, spat once, most accurately, at Saint Sebastien, then forced himself once again to stoic silence.

"You will make it worse for yourself, Robert." Saint Sebastien stood back, then lifted his arms and called out to the members of the Circle, who waited, robed and silent, before him. "We are met in the name of Satan, that we may grow in His power and His great strength, which is the strength of the great lie. We meet that we may join Him in power, be with him in potency and in savagery, and to that end we bring Him sacrifices."

"We bring Him sacrifices," the circle chanted.

"Lives, paid in blood, in degradation."

"In blood and degradation."

Madelaine, her arms aching from the bonds that held her to the screen, her body already hurt from the cruelty of the men gathered in the debauched chapel, felt herself sway in her bonds, almost overcome with fear and wretchedness. And she knew that for her the heinous men had not even begun to do what they were capable of doing. She remembered that there would be forty days for her destruction. She told herself in the back of her thoughts that they could not succeed, that she would be missed, and her father, that someone would find her, save her. Again she felt her soul reach out for Saint-Germain, filled with her yearning for him as much as with her panic-stricken desire for escape. But she did not know if she could dare to hope, not with the chanting growing louder.

"This forsworn one, your betrayer, Satan!"

"Your betrayer!"

"Brought back again to make expiation for his duplicity." Saint Sebastien held aloft a curiously curved dagger, letting the blade flash in the quivering torchlight.

"Your betrayer!"

Saint Sebastien put the point of the dagger against Robert de Montalia's chest, and with concentrated precision he cut the pentagram into his skin. "He is marked as yours, Satan!"

"Marked!" This triumphant shout covered the groans that Robert could not hold back.

"For Your strength is not to be spurned, and Your power is not mocked!"

"Power and strength are Yours alone!"

Madelaine shook her head, as if the very motion would shut out the sounds that assaulted her. She could not look at her father as he steeled himself against further outrage, and she would not look at Saint Sebastien. The chanting got louder.

"Let him taste of Your wrath!"

"Let him taste of Your wrath!" came the shout from the Circle as Saint Sebastien brought the
blade swiftly down and held up Robert's ear as a gory trophy. A great cry from the Circle combined with Robert de Montalia's scream, and the noise continued rising like a wave as Saint Sebastien put the ear to his mouth and licked it. The Circle surged forward, hysteria pulling them toward the ghastly spectacle. Saint Sebastien motioned for silence, the dagger held high as he waited.

His dramatic effect was quite destroyed when a voice spoke from the rear of the chapel, a voice that was beautifully modulated, and tinged with a slight Piedmontese accent. "I am glad I am in time, gentlemen," said le Comte de Saint-Germain.

Relief, more weakening than her terror had been, filled Madelaine, turning her very bones to water. The tears she had held back welled in her eyes, and a pang sharp as Saint Sebastien's knife lodged itself in her breast.

The members of die Circle turned, each member's face showing the dazed stupidity that often comes with being wakened from a sound sleep. Their movements were jerky, and the momentum of their ferocity faltered.

Saint-Germain came down the aisle toward the terrible altar. All of the elegant frippery of manner had vanished with his splendid clothes. Now his movements suited the tight riding coat of black leather worn over tight woolen breeches, also black. His high boots were wide-cuffed, and the simple shirt under the coat was adorned with Russian embroidery showing a pattern of steppe wild-flowers known as tulips. He carried no sword or other weapon, and was alone.

Saint Sebastien watched him, wrath showing in his narrowed eyes and malicious smile. He nodded, motioning his

Circle to keep back.
"Ragoczy, "
he said, "I did not believe. I did not recognize..."

Saint-Germain inclined his head. "I have told you before that appearances are deceiving."

"But that was thirty years ago." He moved closer, the dagger held tightly in his hand.

"Was it? I will take your word for it." If he knew that he was in danger, nothing but the hot stare of his eyes suggested it.

"Your father, then?" Saint Sebastien closed in on Saint-Germain, almost near enough to strike.

"I was not aware that I had changed so much in that time." He had taken in the chapel and its uses when he entered it, and now he was prepared to deal with Saint Sebastien on his own ground. He touched the small locketlike receptacle that hung on a chain around his neck.

Saint Sebastien had already raised his dagger, and was about to make a sudden rush, when Saint-Germain's arm shot out, and his hand seized Saint Sebastien's shoulder, not to hold him back, but to pull him forward, sending him hurtling past Saint-Germain to crash into the stack of ruined pews at the back of the chapel.

Saint-Germain glanced toward Saint Sebastien, then directed his penetrating eyes to the members of the Circle who stood around the altar. "How absurd you are," he said lightly. "You should see yourselves standing there in your fine robes, with your manhood, if you can call it that, peeking out at the world like so many birds." He waited for the hostile words to stop. "You are foolish. Do you think that you will enhance your place in the world, obtain power and position, by following Saint Sebastien's orders? It is
his
position and power that your profane offices enhance. It is
his
desires that are met. And you, thinking that you get these things for yourselves, give yourself to him without question. If I were the one you worship, I would think poorly of your practices."

Beauvrai was the first to object. "You think we're stupid, you, who came here with nothing to protect you…."

Saint-Germain held up the locket on the chain. "I beg your pardon, Baron. I have this. You are not so far removed from the faith you were born to that you cannot recognize a pyx."

The Circle, which had been growing restless, now became hushed again.

"You are asking yourselves if this is genuine as I am no priest." He held the pyx higher. "You may try to touch it if you like. I understand the burns are instantaneous." He waited, while the silk-robed men held back. "I see."

A sudden noise behind him made him turn, and in that moment he cursed himself for not being sure that Saint Sebastien was unconscious, for now the leader of the Circle was rushing toward Madelaine, and although he no longer carried a dagger, there was a wickedly broken piece of planking in his hands, and this he held ready to strike.

At that moment, the hush, the almost somnambulistic trance that held the Circle members to their clumsiness and to Saint-Germain's control, ruptured with the explosiveness of a Dutch dyke bursting to let in the sea. With an awful shout, the men in the silken robes flung themselves at Saint-Germain.

Excerpt from a note written by l'Abbé Ponteneuf to his cousin, la Comtesse d'Argenlac, dated November 5, 1743:

...From my heart of hearts I pray God that He will comfort you and open your eyes to the glory that awaits all good Christians beyond the grave and the shadow of death. It is my duty to write this letter to you, my poor cousin, but even now my pen falters and I cannot find it in me to tell you what has befallen. I beseech you to marshal your heart to greet this terrible news with true fortitude, for all of us who know and love you cannot but wish that you would never have to endure the ordeal that is now before you.

It was rather less than an hour ago when a coach called for me, to take me to a church on the outskirts of the city. You may imagine my surprise at this unlikely request, for it is not usual to have such a request forthcoming at so late an hour. But I have not been a priest for twenty years without learning to accept what God sends me without complaints. So it was that I went in the coach to the church to which I have already alluded. We arrived in good time, and I was immediately ushered into the sanctuary, where an awesome sight met my eyes. There, laid out before me, were the bodies of three men. One was a mountebank, from the look of him, and I did not know anything of him. Another was one of Saint Sebastien's servants, whom I recognized by the livery. Saint Sebastien is such an unrepentant sinner of all the Deadly Sins that I did not know the man himself, but his master is not likely to have set his feet on a path toward Our Lord and His Sweet Mother.

It is the third man I must speak of, and it stops my heart to say this. The third man was le Comte d'Argenlac, your own beloved husband, whom you have loved so tenderly, and who has always been your staunch protector. It is further my most unpleasant duty to inform you that he did not die by accident or an act of God. He was, my unfortunate cousin, coldbloodedly slain by a person or persons unknown.

The curé at this church has given me the use of his study that I might send you news immediately. His understanding is not great, but he is a good man, and I have told him that le Comte is known to me, and that it is only appropriate that you, as my cousin, should hear of this tragedy from one who has the knowledge of your particular circumstances.

Do not let yourself be overwhelmed. Pray to Mary for the saving of your husband's soul. You will find that such religious exercise does much to alleviate your grief, which must surely consume you otherwise. I have often remarked that when God made Woman as helpmeet to Man, He made her prey to whims and weaknesses that her mate does not know. The excellent solace of Scripture will help you to control those emotions which must fill your breast as you read this....