Mozart’s Blood (37 page)

The Countess, her voice constricted by the pressure of Nick's arm, ordered, “Stop! Tomas! Wait!”

It did no good. It seemed that the gardener's long service had erased the last of what wits he had. He was trained to protect the elders. There was no subtlety, no comprehension in his dim brain. Consequences were beyond his powers of reasoning.

He leaped upon the two, Nick and Zdenka Milosch, and the knife flashed up and out. Octavia cried out.

Tomas crumpled to the floor. Kirska was beside him in a heartbeat, crouching in a spill of dark skirts. At first Octavia thought she had gone to help him. But she saw, as she sagged against the sofa, that Kirska held her pitcher to Tomas's throat, where the knife had pierced it. She pressed the curved lip against his skin to catch the flow of blood.

Octavia straightened and took two steps toward Nick and Zdenka Milosch with some thought of separating them. She was extending a hand, thinking to plead reason and restraint, when the Countess gave a terrible shriek.

Octavia froze. The cry seemed to go on and on, a scream that died away slowly, the pitch dropping, slowly descending. The sound lasted so long it seemed it was not breath that sustained it, but blood.

Octavia watched, amazed and repelled, as Zdenka Milosch's heart's blood, that blood that sustained the life of even a near immortal, pumped out through her severed femoral artery. Nick dropped the Countess as if she were a rag doll. He held the bloody knife before him in a fencing pose, and he showed his own even, short teeth in a grimace—or a snarl.

Kirska, quick as a flash, was beside her mistress. She bent, pushing aside the torn flaps of the Countess's dress. She pressed her narrow-necked pitcher against Zdenka's white thigh. Octavia heard the swishing of jets of blood collecting in the ewer.

The ancients muttered and moaned, huddling in the shadows.

Octavia, immobilized with shock, stared at Zdenka Milosch, dying on the floor. Nick stepped sideways to seize her at the same time that Tomas began to struggle to his feet. The wound in Tomas's throat was already closing, the flow of blood drying on his neck.

Nick seized Octavia with one arm and pulled her against him, her back to his chest, his breath hot and sour against her neck. The flat of his blade, sticky with Zdenka's blood, pressed against the inside of her thigh, that most fragile of places, her one vulnerability.

“I don't want to kill you,” he gritted. “But you can see I know how to do it. I want the bite. I want Mozart's blood!”

Ugo padded across the icy stepping stones that led to the stone gatehouse. He lifted his hand to knock on the door, but at the first touch of his knuckles, it swung inward and stopped halfway, blocked by something on the floor.

Ugo sidled in and stood looking down at the inert form of the old servingman, the little wizened fellow who had been part of the staff since Ughetto's first visit to Prague. He lay in an enormous pool of dark blood that had already seeped from the gaping wound on his inner thigh to flood the tiled floor. The grout lines had become threads of vermilion. His head had fallen back, and his mouth was open. His long canine teeth pointed skyward.

Ugo blew out a breath. He stepped over the corpse's splayed legs and hurried toward the back door. When he reached the garden, he didn't bother to take time to scrape the blood from his feet. He suspected there would soon be more.

He broke into a run, dashing beneath the hanging branches of the yew trees that crowded the path, dodging cobwebs, slipping on the mossy cobblestones. He had almost reached the house when he heard the unearthly scream. It racketed around the garden, rebounding off the stone wall, shattering the darkness. It hardly sounded human, its pitch so high, its duration so long, its timbre like that of a broken violin.

It jangled even Ugo's hardened nerves. As it wavered and began to drop, he burst into the house, striking the door hard with both palms. It banged against the wall just as the scream died away, then slammed itself shut.

Ugo was already in the parlor, staring at the body of Zdenka Milosch, the near immortal, who should have outlived him ten times or more.

The scene was wreathed in shadows, with only the feeble flicker of candle flame brightening one end of the long parlor. The ancients wavered and hissed like a trio of great unsteady crows. Kirska was kneeling beside the Countess's body, sobbing in a mindless monotone. She had a pottery pitcher in her hand. It tilted as she got to her feet, and a rivulet of blood spilled down its neck.

Tomas, the brutish gardener, staggered around Zdenka Milosch's crumpled form. His shirt was soaked with blood. His face was a mask of dumb rage, and he emitted a steady river of obscenities in Czech.

And just beyond him Ugo beheld the appalling sight of Domenico, one arm securely around Octavia's body, the opposite hand poised above her thigh. A bloodstained knife shone in his fist, and Domenico's eyes glittered. When he saw Ugo, he laughed.

“Now, you see!” he exclaimed. The knife moved lower, its point depressing the fabric of Octavia's jeans. “I didn't need you after all!”

Octavia spoke with stubborn dignity. “Ugo. At last. We've missed you.”

Ugo held up both hands, palms out. “Domenico, let her go. You're here now. Isn't that what you wanted?”

Octavia said, “Domenico? Ugo, this is Nick! Nick Barrett-Jones, our—” She grunted as Domenico squeezed her tighter, wringing her ribs as he might a wet towel. She finished in a constricted voice, “This is our
Don!
”

“You laughed at me, didn't you, Octavia?” Domenico said. His deep voice echoed against the high ceiling, and the ancients cooed and swayed at the sound of it. “You think I didn't know? That you, and Russell—and that young fool Massimo—”

“Let her go,” Ugo said in a conversational tone. “If it's the bite you want, we have Tomas here, or Kirska. They can help you.”

Nick gave a short bark of laughter. “Oh, no, my friend! There's only one bite I want, and she's going to give it to me.”

Ugo took a tentative step forward. Nick pressed the knife deeper into Octavia's thigh, and through the gloom, Ugo feared he saw blood well beneath it, a dark stain on the blue denim.

“Stop right there,” Nick said. “We'll just be leaving now. Octavia and I, together. You're going to stay back and let us pass.”

Octavia held her body still. Her eyes were fixed on Ugo's. Her face was tense, her lips bloodless. Domenico—Nick—knew what he was doing. She must know that if things went badly, he could kill her.

Ugo said, “Anastasia. Eusebio, Henri. If he kills her…it's all gone, you know that. Mozart's blood. Gone.”

One of the ancients gave a rattling gasp, as if it drew breath into a cage of naked bones. Another muttered something unintelligible. The three of them began to move, parting from each other as they circled the scattered furniture. Their garments flapped like raven wings.

Tomas and Kirska froze where they were. Tomas muttered an endless stream of curses, without seeming to pause for breath.

Domenico swiveled, keeping Octavia in front of him, and began to back toward the door. Octavia's hair had come undone and spilled over one shoulder. In her sweater and jeans, she looked like a teenager playing some strange game.

Ugo said, “You can't get past me, you know. I'm hardly going to move out of your way.”

Domenico—Nick—lifted his knife to point it at Ugo. He said grimly, “You're not immortal, are you, my friend? Move. I knifed that bloody giant over there, and I won't hesitate to do the same to you.”

 

The blood soaking her jeans alarmed Octavia. It was hot at first, but cooled quickly as the denim soaked it up. Nick's arm was hard as iron. She could hardly breathe for the pressure on her ribs.

In the midst of the shock and alarm, she felt a wave of relief at seeing Ugo. Though he was half naked, barefoot, and missing one leg of his trousers, he was still Ugo. He was alive, and she meant to keep him so. Ugo was more vulnerable than she. The threat to him was all too real. And it was her fault.

“Stand aside, Ugo,” Octavia gasped through the constriction of Nick's arm. “He won't hurt me. He wants—”

Nick's arm tightened. “Shut up.”

Ugo said, “I know what he wants.”

The ancients crept closer, faltering, weaving, murmuring unintelligible words. She thought she heard Anastasia saying, “Mozart, Mozart,” but she couldn't be certain.

Octavia felt her toes catch in the stickiness of the Countess's lifeblood. Nick hadn't hesitated to use his knife on her, and Octavia, through her shock, had no doubt he would use it on Ugo.

Kirska kept up her continuous, toneless mourning, standing with her back bowed, the pitcher held before her like the chalice it had become.

One of the ancients managed to grind out one comprehensible word. “Ughetto!”

“I know, Anastasia,” Ugo said. He raised his arms as if to demonstrate what a worthy target he was. His bare chest made an easy target, a pale rectangle in the dimness. “Stab me if you have to,” he said to Nick.

Nick gave a triumphant laugh as he dragged Octavia with him. “Last warning,” he said. “Don't think I won't do it.” He brandished the knife.

At least it was no longer poised over Octavia's thigh. She wrestled with Nick's arm, but she couldn't budge it. It was the fencing, she supposed, that had developed his muscles. He grated in her ear, “Stop that, bitch. I'll kill you both if I have to.”

He lifted her nearly off her feet as he dragged her toward the door.

Ugo braced his hands on the door frame. He no longer looked like a half-naked waif. His face was fierce and hard, his eyes mere slits.

Nick said again, “Move, goddammit!”

And Ugo, slowly, shook his head.

Octavia pleaded, “Ugo! Be careful!”

Nick raised the knife, and she felt his muscles tense as he prepared to strike.

Free of the threat of the knife for the moment, she gathered herself and poured all her energy into one great effort. Just as Nick struck at Ugo, she kicked with both feet and writhed in his grip with all her strength.

At the same moment, Tomas lunged toward them, grunting.

Ugo's hands had come up to seize Nick's arm, and Octavia thought he could surely succeed in blocking the knife. Ugo looked slight, but she knew the strength of his hands and arms.

Just as she had the thought, Tomas collided with Nick. Octavia heard Ugo's gasp of pain even as she found herself slammed against the wall, mashed there by Tomas's bulk pressing Nick against her. He gave a great “Oof!” as Tomas's momentum knocked the air from his lungs.

Octavia slid down the wall, borne to the floor beneath the tangle created by Tomas and Nick. They fell, all three of them, in a pile. Octavia frantically pushed at the legs and arms restraining her, hardly knowing if she was right side up or upside down. Nick, breathless, had gone limp. He was heavier that way, but after struggling for a few seconds, she managed to wriggle out from beneath him. Tomas was just getting to his feet as she scrambled to hers and turned instantly to Ugo.

Tomas's tackle had changed the trajectory of Nick's knife. Ugo should have easily deflected it, seized Nick's arm, protected himself.

Instead, she saw to her horror that the knife had found its home in Ugo's chest after all. As she watched, he pulled the blade free. Blood poured out of the wound just below his collarbone. He fell back against the door frame, pressing his fingers over it. She was at his side in a stride, holding him, helping him as he sagged to the floor.

She ripped her scarf from her neck and pressed it against Ugo's chest as hard as she could. In seconds it was soaked through. “Kirska!” she commanded. “Bring me something to stanch the bleeding—a towel, a cloth—something!”

She heard Kirska's feet as the housekeeper hurried the length of the parlor toward the dining room. Behind her, she heard Nick's breath come back in a noisy, inward rush. Then all sound faded away from her as she watched, stunned, as Ugo began to disappear.

His fine features distorted. His hands twisted, hardened, distended. His back bent until it was horizontal, and his knees, exposed by the torn trousers, seemed to turn inside out, the angle of the joint reversing until it was no longer recognizable.

Octavia dropped her blood-soaked scarf. She said, “Ugo!” faintly, but it was pointless. Ugo was gone.

In his place the wolf bared its teeth and gave a great snarling roar. Still kneeling, she spun to watch as the wolf, a river of silver and gray, flowed past her in a long bound to leap at Nick Barrett-Jones.

It seemed strange to her now, watching the great sleek creature, that she had never seen it before. Its ferocity was noble, undiluted by complicated emotions. Its body, its sharp claws, its white teeth, were beautiful beyond words, purely animal, unfettered by scruple or principle.

The ancients shrank back, and their mutterings ceased. Kirska, returning with a kitchen towel in her hands, stopped where she was. Tomas, confused, turned in a circle, and then, with a plaintive whine, turned the other way.

Nick scrabbled on the floor for the knife Ugo had dropped. He barely retrieved it in time, seizing it with its point upward, before the wolf was upon him.

The three candles guttered in their cut-glass holders, their flames burning low. Octavia groped for the wall and leaned on it as she struggled to her feet. She could barely make out what was happening. The wolf growled and snapped, and Nick gave a shout of pain. It seemed to her the wolf drew back to find his target, surely Nick's throat, but this gave Nick his opening. The knife caught what little light was left in the room, a single dim gleam.

This time the cry was from the wolf, a chilling whine. Though Octavia could see it was trying to press its attack, its limbs crumpled beneath it. It fell to one side. Footsteps thudded on the hard carpet and then clattered on the parquet of the entryway. Someone's breathing tore in his chest, ragged and shallow. The door opened and closed with a bang, leaving silence behind. Octavia knew that Nick was gone, but she gave him no thought.

She was already beside the fallen wolf. It lay on its side, panting, whimpering in its throat. The whites of its eyes showed, rolling as she approached. Its lip pulled back, showing its long, sharp teeth, and it snapped at the air near her hand as she knelt beside it.

She jerked her hand back, but she didn't move away. After several moments, she extended a wary hand to touch the coarse silver-gray fur. She felt the spasm of its muscles as it tried again to snap at her, its head twisting, then falling back, as if it hadn't the strength to resist.

“No, no,”
she murmured.
“Buono, povero. Son io. Buono.”

Someone—it may have been Kirska, but she didn't turn her head to see—lighted one of the oil lamps. In the flare of light, Octavia tried to discover where the wolf was injured. Its eye rolled, trying to follow her movements as she probed for the wound. Hardly able to breathe herself, she ran her hands over its chest and body, threaded her fingers through its double coat of coarse fur, touched its flanks as delicately as she could. The wolf's body quivered beneath her touch. Its forepaws twitched once or twice, helplessly, and she crooned again,
“Quieta, quieta.”

She found the injury on the wolf's hindquarter, just above the hock. She said, over her shoulder, “Kirska. Another light.” When a second lamp was burning, she took the kitchen towel from Kirska's hands. She wound it snugly, but not too tightly, around the wolf's leg, tucking in the ends. “Water,” she said then, and Kirska, though she moaned constantly under her breath like a demented child, hurried off and returned with a bowl of water.

Octavia dipped her fingers into it and let water drip from her fingertips onto the wolf's muzzle. To her delight, its lips opened, and she fed it a palmful, and then another. Its lips, whiskered as they were, were soft beneath the rough hairs. She heard it swallow. One hand on its chest told her its breathing had steadied. Though the towel was soon red with its blood, it seemed to Octavia the flow was already slowing. The other wound, in its chest, had ceased to bleed, but its fur was sticky with dried blood. When the wolf would drink no more, she used the rest of the water to wash its chest, then to gently dab at the slashed hind leg.

After the frenetic movement of the crisis, the hours of the winter night seemed to pass with glacial slowness as Octavia knelt beside the wolf. The ancients crept away with Kirska's pitcher of blood, squabbling incoherently among themselves. Tomas came to lift Zdenka's limp body. Her white fingers dragged on the floor as he carried her away.