The Book of Life (35 page)

18

T
hat voice.
When I’d last heard it, it was higher, without the low rumble at the back of his throat.

Those eyes.
Golden brown shot through with gold and leafy green. They still looked older than his years.

His smile.
The left corner had always lifted higher than the right.

“Jack?” I choked on the name as my heart constricted.

A hundred pounds of white dog pawed out of the backseat of the car, hopping over the gearshift and through the open door, long hair flying and pink tongue lolling out of his mouth. Jack grabbed him by the collar.

“Stay, Lobero.” Jack ruffled the hair atop the dog’s shaggy head, revealing glimpses of black button eyes. The dog gazed at him adoringly, thumped his tail, and sat panting to await further instruction.

“Hello, Gallowglass.” Jack walked slowly toward us.

“Jackie.” Gallowglass’s voice was thick with emotion. “I thought you were dead.”

“I was. Then I wasn’t.” Jack looked down at me, unsure of his welcome. Leaving no room for doubt, I flung my arms around him.

“Oh, Jack.” Jack smelled of coal fires and foggy mornings rather than warm bread, as he had when he was a child. After a moment of hesitation, he enfolded me within long, lean arms. He was older and taller, but he still felt fragile, as though his mature appearance were nothing more than a shell.

“I missed you,” Jack whispered.

“Diana!” Matthew was still more than two blocks away, but he’d spotted the car blocking the entrance into Court Street, as well as the strange man who held me. From his perspective I must have looked trapped, even with Gallowglass standing nearby. Instinct took over, and Matthew ran, his body a blur.

Lobero raised an alarm with a booming bark. Komondors were a lot like vampires: bred to protect those they loved, loyal to family, large enough to take down wolves and bears, and ready to die rather than yield to another creature.

Jack sensed the threat, without seeing its source. He transformed before my eyes into a creature from nightmares, teeth bared and eyes glassy and black. He grabbed me and held me tight, shielding me from whatever loomed behind. But he was restricting the flow of air into my lungs, as well.

“No! Not you, too,” I gasped, wasting the last of my breath. Now there was no way for me to warn Matthew that someone had given our bright, vulnerable boy blood rage.

Before Matthew could hurtle over the car’s hood, a man climbed out of the driver’s seat and grabbed him. He must be a vampire, too, I thought dizzily, if he had the strength to stop Matthew.

“Stop, Matthew. It’s Jack.” The man’s deep, rumbling voice and distinctive London accent conjured up unwelcome memories of a single drop of blood falling into a vampire’s waiting mouth.

Andrew Hubbard.
The vampire king of London was in New Haven. Stars flickered at the edges of my vision.

Matthew snarled and twisted. Hubbard’s spine met the metal frame of the car with a bone-crushing thud.

“It’s Jack,” Hubbard repeated, gripping Matthew by the neck and forcing him to listen.

This time the message got through. Matthew’s eyes widened, and he looked in our direction.

“Jack?” Matthew’s voice was hoarse.

“Master Roydon?” Without turning, Jack cocked his head to the side as Matthew’s voice penetrated the black haze of the blood rage. His grip loosened.

I drew in a lungful of air, struggling to push back the star-filled darkness. My hand went instinctively to my belly, where I felt a reassuring poke, then another. Lobero sniffed at my feet and hands as if trying to figure out my relationship to his master, then sat before me and growled at Matthew.

“Is this another dream?” There was a trace of the lost child he had once been in his bass voice, and Jack squeezed his eyes shut rather than risk waking up.

“It’s no dream, Jack,” Gallowglass said softly. “Step away from Mistress Roydon now. Matthew poses no danger to his mate.”

“Oh, God. I touched her.” Jack sounded horrified. Slowly he turned and held up his hands in surrender, willing to accept whatever punishment Matthew saw fit to mete out. Jack’s eyes, which had been returning to normal, darkened again. But he wasn’t angry. So why was the blood rage resurfacing?

“Hush,” I said, gently lowering his arm. “You’ve touched me a thousand times. Matthew doesn’t care.”

“I wasn’t . . .this . . . before.” Jack’s voice was taut with self-loathing.

Matthew drew closer slowly so as not to startle Jack. Andrew Hubbard slammed the car door and followed him. The centuries had done little to change the London vampire famous for his priestly ways and his brood of adopted creatures of all species and ages. He looked the same: clean-shaven, pale of face, and blond of hair. Only Hubbard’s slate-colored eyes and somber clothing provided notes of contrast to his otherwise pallid appearance. And his body was still tall and thin, with slightly stooped, broad shoulders.

As the two vampires approached, the dog’s growl turned more menacing and his lips peeled back from his teeth.

“Come, Lobero,” Matthew commanded. He crouched down and waited patiently while the dog considered his options.

“He’s a one-man dog,” Hubbard warned. “The only creature he’ll listen to is Jack.”

Lobero’s wet nose pushed into my hand, and then he sniffed his master. The dog’s muzzle lifted to take in the other scents before he moved toward Matthew and Hubbard. Lobero recognized Father Hubbard, but Matthew received a more thorough evaluation. When he was through, Lobero’s tail shifted from left to right. It wasn’t exactly a wag, but the dog had instinctively acknowledged the alpha in this pack.

“Good boy.” Matthew stood and pointed to his heel. Lobero obediently swung around and followed as Matthew joined Jack, Gallowglass, and me.

“All right,
mon coeur
?” Matthew murmured.

“Of course,” I said, still a bit short of breath.

“And you, Jack?” Matthew rested a hand on Jack’s shoulder. It was not the typical de Clermont embrace. This was a father greeting his son after a long separation—a father who feared that his child had been through hell.

“I’m better now,” Jack could always be relied upon to tell the truth when asked a direct question. “I overreact when I’m surprised.”

“So do I.” Matthew’s grip on him tightened a fraction. “I’m sorry. You had your back turned, and I wasn’t expecting ever to see you again.”

“It’s been . . . difficult. To stay away.” The faint vibration in Jack’s voice suggested it had been more than difficult.

“I can imagine. Why don’t we go inside and you can tell us your tale?” This was not a casual invitation; Matthew was asking Jack to bare his soul. Jack looked worried at the prospect.

“What you say is your choice, Jack,” Matthew assured him. “Tell us nothing, tell us everything, but let’s go inside while you do it. Your latest Lobero is no quieter than your first. He’ll have the neighbors calling the police if he keeps barking.”

Jack nodded.

Matthew’s head cocked to the side. The gesture made him look a bit like Jack. He smiled. “Where has our little boy gone? I don’t have to crouch down anymore to meet your eyes.”

The remaining tension left Jack’s body with Matthew’s gentle teasing. He grinned shyly and scratched Lobero’s ears.

“Father Hubbard will come with us. Could you take the car, Gallowglass, and park it somewhere where it’s not blocking the road?” Matthew asked.

Gallowglass held out his hand, and Hubbard put the keys into it.

“There’s a briefcase in the trunk,” Hubbard said. “Bring it back with you.”

Gallowglass nodded, his lips pressed into a thin line. He gave Hubbard a blistering look before stalking toward the car.

“He never has liked me.” Hubbard straightened the lapels on his austere black jacket, which he wore over a black shirt. Even after more than six hundred years, the vampire remained a cleric at heart.

He nodded to me, acknowledging my presence for the first time. “Mistress Roydon.”

“My name is Bishop.” I wanted to remind him of the last time we’d seen each other and the agreement that he’d made—and broken, based on the evidence before me.

“Dr. Bishop, then.” Hubbard’s strange, multicolored eyes narrowed.

“You didn’t keep your promise,” I hissed. Jack’s agitated stare settled on my neck.

“What promise?” Jack demanded from behind me.

Damn. Jack had always had excellent hearing but I’d forgotten he was now gifted with preternatural senses, too.

“I swore that I’d take care of you and Annie for Mistress Roydon,” Hubbard said.

“Father Hubbard kept his word, mistress,” Jack said quietly. “I wouldn’t be here otherwise.”

“And we’re grateful to him.” Matthew looked anything but. He tossed me the keys to the house.

Gallowglass still had my bag, and without its contents I had no way to open the door.

Hubbard caught them instead and turned the key in the lock.

“Take Lobero upstairs and get him some water, Jack. The kitchen’s on the first floor.” Matthew plucked the keys from Hubbard’s grasp as he went past and put them in a bowl on the hall table.

Jack called to Lobero and obediently started up the worn, painted treads. “You’re a dead man, Hubbard—and so is the one who made Jack a vampire.” Matthew’s voice was no more than a hollow murmur. Jack heard it nonetheless.

“You can’t kill him, Master Roydon.” Jack stood at the top of the stairs, his fingers wrapped tightly around Lobero’s collar. “Father Hubbard is your grandson. He’s my maker, too.”

Jack turned away, and we heard the cabinet doors open, then water running from an open tap. The sounds were oddly homely considering that a conversational bomb had just gone off.

“My grandson?” Matthew looked at Hubbard in shock. “But that means . . .”

“Benjamin Fox is my sire.” Andrew Hubbard’s origins had always been shrouded in obscurity.

London legends said that he had been a priest when the Black Death first visited England in 1349. After Hubbard’s parishioners all succumbed to the illness, Hubbard had dug his own grave and climbed into it.

Some mysterious vampire had brought Hubbard back from the brink of death—but no one seemed to know who.

“As far as your son was concerned, I was only a tool—someone he made to further his aims in England. Benjamin hoped I would have blood rage,” Hubbard continued. “He also hoped I would help him organize an army to stand against the de Clermonts and their allies. But he was disappointed on both counts, and I’ve managed to keep him away from me and my flock. Until now.”

“What’s happened?” Matthew asked brusquely.

“Benjamin wants Jack. I can’t let him have the boy again,” was Hubbard’s equally abrupt reply.

“Again?” That madman had been with Jack. I turned blindly toward the stairs, but Matthew caught me by the wrists and trapped me against his chest.

“Wait,” he commanded.

Gallowglass came through the door with a large black briefcase and my book bag. He surveyed the scene and dropped what he was carrying.

“What’s happened now?” he asked, looking from Matthew to Hubbard.

“Father Hubbard made Jack a vampire,” I said as neutrally as I could. Jack was listening after all. Gallowglass slammed Hubbard against the wall. “You bastard. I could smell your scent all over him. I thought—”

It was Gallowglass’s turn to be tossed against something—in his case it was the floor. Hubbard pressed one polished black shoe against the big Gael’s sternum. I was astonished that someone who looked so skeletal could be so strong.

“Thought what, Gallowglass?” Hubbard’s tone was menacing. “That I’d violated a child?”

Upstairs, Jack’s rising agitation soured the air. He’d learned from an early age how quickly ordinary quarrels could turn violent. As a boy he’d found even a hint of disagreement between Matthew and me distressing.

“Corra!” I cried, instinctively wanting her support.

By the time my firedrake swooped down and landed on the newel post, Matthew had averted any potential bloodshed by picking up Gallowglass and Hubbard by the scruffs of their necks, prying them apart, and shaking them until their teeth rattled.

Corra gave an irritated bleat and fixed a malevolent stare on Father Hubbard, suspecting quite rightly that he was to blame for her interrupted nap.

“I’ll be damned.” Jack’s fair head peeked over the railing. “Didn’t I tell you Corra would survive the timewalking, Father H?” He gave a hoot of delight and pounded on the painted wood. Jack’s behavior reminded me so strongly of the joyous boy he had once been that I had to fight back the tears.

Corra let out an answering cry of welcome, followed by a stream of fire and song that filled the entrance with happiness. She took flight, zooming up and latching her wings around Jack. Then she tucked her head atop his and began to croon, her tail encircling his ribs so that the spade-shaped tip could gently pat his back. Lobero padded over to his master and gave Corra a suspicious sniff. She must have smelled like family, and therefore a creature to be included among his many responsibilities. He dropped down at Jack’s side, head on his paws but eyes still watchful.

“Your tongue is even longer than Lobero’s,” Jack said, trying not to giggle as Corra tickled his neck. “I can’t believe she remembers me.”

“Of course she remembers you! How could she forget someone who spoiled her with currant buns?” I said with a smile.

By the time we were settled in the living room overlooking Court Street, the blood rage had receded from Jack’s veins. Aware of his low position in the house’s pecking order, he waited until everyone else took a chair before choosing his own seat. He was ready to join the dog on the floor when Matthew patted the sofa cushion.

“Sit with me, Jack.” Matthew’s invitation held a note of command. Jack sat, pulling at the knees of his jeans.

“You look to be about twenty,” Matthew observed, hoping to draw him into conversation.

“Twenty, maybe twenty-one,” Jack said. “Leonard and I— You remember Leonard?” Matthew nodded. “We figured it out because of my memories of the Armada. Nothing specific, you understand, just the fear of the Spanish invasion in the streets, the lighting of the beacons, and the victory celebrations. I must have been at least five in 1588 to remember that.”