The Burning (21 page)

He glanced about as though he might find what she did want lurking somewhere in the room. “You . . . you need sustenance . . . some broth perhaps? Or perhaps you should sleep.”

“In a minute,” she whispered. He approached the circle of light, tentatively. How could such a powerful creature be tentative? “Talk to me.”

He hesitated. Then he turned and pulled the wing chair
farther into the circle of light. He leaned forward, elbows on his knees, worry lines around his eyes.

“How did I get here?”

He cleared his throat. “I brought you.”

She closed her eyes in acknowledgment. “Thank you.” She creased her brows. “Now they know about the cave.” Her refuge would be lost to her.

“I brought you straight to your rooms. No one knows you were out.”

“How?” Ahhh . . . but she knew how. He must have translocated directly to the fourth floor. What a wonderful ability, to go where you want, immediate and unseen! The flash in his eyes said he was about to lie to her.

“Up the back stairs,” he answered smoothly. “They were all asleep.”

He wanted to protect her from the truth about him. Should she tell him she knew everything about him? Would anyone welcome someone knowing
everything
they had experienced, everything they were
?
Definitely not. That’s why the villagers hated her so.

She wondered if he knew her in return. That was how it worked. She got all of them, but they always got at least a little of her. That was why her uncle understood her, and Malmsy. Now Jemmy understood her, too, for all the good it did her. He was now sure she was a witch. Maybe she was. Did Stephan Sincai understand her?

“Thank you, Mr. Sincai. I wouldn’t want my uncle or the servants worried,” she said.

Sincai looked at her strangely for a moment, then apparently weighed his words. “You may not realize that you have been unconscious for more than three days.”

Three days! “Oh, dear!” She tried to raise herself on one elbow. “I must see to my uncle.”

He lurched out of the chair but stopped himself from touching her. “Please, lie back. You’re weak,” he protested.

He needn’t have bothered. Her weakness was only too evident. She fell back onto her pillows. “Three days,” she breathed. “With only that dreadful woman to care for him . . .”

“Polsham and Mrs. Simpson have been assiduous in their attentions. I wouldn’t fret.”

“Is he well?” she asked, her voice a clear indicator that she was unable not to fret.

Sincai straightened. “If it will help you sleep, I’ll check on him.”

She took her dry lips between her teeth and nodded, fighting tears. What if her uncle died without her to watch over him? “Yes, please,” she whispered.

He nodded, and without another word turned into the shadows. He seemed to melt into them, but she knew better now. He would go see to her uncle. He had said he would. And Stephan Sincai kept his promises. She breathed a sigh of relief. She could count on him.

She was so tired. She should take Mr. Sincai’s advice and sleep. But not until she knew about her uncle. Who knew what might have happened with Erich in the house?

Still, her thoughts returned to Mr. Sincai. No one knew he was in her room. Surely the servants or even Erich would forbid something so scandalous as a strange man in her room alone with her at night. How had he been here just at the moment she woke? Could he truly have been here for three nights? He couldn’t visit during daylight hours. Stephan Sincai slept during the day and stayed out of the sun.

How strange that she accepted all that about him! But of course, she always accepted the people she touched. It was impossible
not
to accept them when you knew all their fears, their secret desires, all the experiences, wonderful and horrible, that made them what they were. In fact, it was almost as if you had experienced them yourself. What deeper kind of understanding could one have? She could accept even the fact that Stephan Sincai was a vampire. But then, it was not
his fault. He did not choose it, would not have chosen it perhaps, though even he wasn’t sure of that. He didn’t appreciate the thirst for life he had from the Companion in his blood. He lived so intensely! He drank blood because the Companion demanded it, but he did not kill when he drank. She looked back through the ages. Once he had taken too much and drained someone. But he was devastated by it. She could forgive him that. She wondered that she did not despise the drinking of blood. But she had felt what it was like, through him, and to him it wasn’t horrible.

Stephan Sincai had killed, though, on purpose and recently, in a ghastly way. She had experienced that nightmare. The scene at the lodge flickered through her mind. It made her suck in her breath convulsively. He had done that? She felt the pain of his wounds, the excruciating guilt at his deeds, the certainty that he was damned for it, the suppression of his emotion. But he thought he was protecting his kind and humans, as well. Regardless of the cost to his soul, he meant to kill again.

She was too tired to think about what that meant to her. She returned to the fact that he might have sat three nights by her bedside. Why? What was she to a man like Stephan Sincai that he should do that for her?

Ahhh. The guilt. Guilt was his driving force. He was killing others of his kind to atone for crimes, crimes she didn’t understand. Did he feel guilty for causing her illness? Was that why he sat here? For it was certainly the rush of his experience which blew out her consciousness.

She turned her head as he strode out of the darkness. He came bearing a bowl.

“Your uncle is resting peacefully,” he said.

Relief washed through her. She took a deep breath and smiled at him. He tightened his mouth for some reason. He looked down at the bowl. “I brought you some broth from
the kitchen. If you could . . . uh . . . take some, it would help you regain your strength.”

She nodded. She did feel better. She might be able to push herself up to eat. And she owed it to her uncle to gain strength quickly. He set the bowl down and adjusted the pillows behind her. But the effort of sitting was too much. When he handed her the spoon, it trembled in her hand. He took it gently back and sat beside her. “Let me help.”

She shook her head. “I don’t . . .”

He held up a hand. “I won’t touch you.” He let a small smile escape. “Just feed you.”

She let him. He was gentle with her. Surprising, considering how strong he was. He had lifted a boat out of a raging river once and rolled away the stone from a tomb in Jerusalem. Dear God! Was it
the
tomb? Had he . . . ? Had he been there? Her glance stole to his face.

The spoon paused on the way to her mouth. “Don’t be afraid of me,” he said. The voice was a low rumble, filled with pain. “Difficult with what you saw, I know. But truly, there is no need. I will not hurt you.”

She rolled her lips between her teeth.
You know what kind of . . . man he is,
she told herself.
Man? Yes, man
. She searched his face.
A good man, in spite of almost impossible circumstances. A man of principle
. She took a breath. She nodded. “I know that.”

He looked surprised. He examined her face. Then she saw him swallow once and offer his spoon again. She sipped the broth. It was a simple beef broth and only lukewarm, but it tasted better than anything she had ever eaten. He scraped the last of the bowl. She sipped the final spoonful and he set it aside. “Can you sleep now?”

She looked around at the dark nursery.
What if I don’t wake up?

“I’ll stay with you and wake you at dawn, if you like.”

Had he read her thoughts? But no, she knew he couldn’t read minds. Was she so transparent? Or was it that one of his immense experience could guess what she was thinking? His experience was now hers in some ways. Could she use it as he did?

She slid under the bedclothes. He sat back in his chair and picked up his book. She could tell he was only pretending to read. That made her smile inside. She closed her eyes.

Stephan stole down to the kitchen well before dawn and washed the bowl. She was alive. She was awake and might be none the worse for wear in time. He had never felt so relieved. He hastened back up to her side. What he did not know was just how much she knew about him. She remembered what she had seen in the cave—she had asked him if he was well. Maybe . . . maybe she just remembered the wounds, not the fact that he had appeared out of nowhere. Maybe her touch did not tell her that he was vampire. Or she did not remember that part. What still amazed him was that she mastered her fear of him. How could she accept him, even if all she knew was how wounded he had been that night? No human could heal those wounds.

Now, as he watched her, standing over her, feeling the coming dawn outside, he realized he had another problem. He had been just watching over her until she wakened to make sure she was all right. As Mrs. Creevy and Mrs. Simpson came to tend her today, they would see she was awake. He was not needed anymore. That made him feel . . . lost somehow.

“Miss Van Helsing.” Her eyelids fluttered.

“Miss Van Helsing. It is dawn.”

She turned her face toward his voice even before her eyes opened. She smiled. God, how that smile seemed to shower moonlight over him! He loved that smile so much he had to
clench himself against its influence. She opened her eyes slowly.

“You stayed.” Her voice was musical, feminine, small, like she was.

“I said I would.” He glanced up at the lightening sky from the dormer windows. He had not thought to close the draperies. The sun would rise at any moment. “And now I must go.”

“I know,” she whispered. “Thank you.”

She couldn’t know, of course, not really, not
why
. Could she? He turned on his heel and strode into her dressing room to conceal his disappearance.

Eleven

The fuss of Mrs. Simpson’s tears of joy, the brusque handling by Mrs. Creevy as she helped Ann wash and change into a fresh night shift, and the visit of the doctor left Ann exhausted. The doctor proclaimed her well, but bled her nonetheless and recommended thin gruel and rest. Her cousin sent up word that he wished to see her. Mrs. Simpson, who brought the message, smiled in satisfaction when Ann said she was just too tired to receive him. The very thought of seeing him made her want to shudder in repulsion.

At least all the fuss kept the memories at bay. Well, they weren’t really memories, or at least not her memories. They belonged to Stephan Sincai. Snatches of them floated in and out of her brain. He had advised Alfred the Great to build a navy. He spoke Chinese, and surprisingly, she understood it, too. No man would want someone who knew everything about him. She didn’t want to frighten him away. And yet, to hold her knowledge secret seemed . . . underhanded. Finally, the frenetic activity of her brain just wore her out.

Ann slept in fits most of the afternoon. But she had
disturbing dreams of silken skin, and dark, burning eyes. When she woke, she was wet and aching between her legs. She felt swollen and sensitive. This was getting out of hand. She couldn’t afford this kind of reaction to any handsome face that came along. Not when her life would be devoid of the simplest physical pleasure of touching a man. She remembered the feel of touching the flesh of his belly, even though he was wounded. She would never forget that sensation, though it cost her consciousness.

Would tonight bring Stephan Sincai?

Sleep was far away for Stephan. He was thinking about Maitlands. By now he was unneeded. He had no business there anymore. If he had ever had business there. He shouldn’t stain another life. And now he knew that she was well, there was no excuse.

But
was
he unneeded? What about Van Helsing haunting the house? He was due from London today. Surely he would not dare try to take advantage of her during the day with the servants about. But at night?

Perhaps he ought to stand guard at night, just until she regained her strength. What would it cost him to spend some hours by her side? Of course, when Van Helsing returned, he might sense Stephan was here. But he could handle Van Helsing.