Origins (11 page)

“You won’t be,” I said, with more conviction than I ever had in my life. “I’m not sure what I’ll do yet, but I will protect you. I promise.” I was making the promise to the three of them, but was looking only at Katherine. She nodded, a tiny spark igniting in her eyes.

“Good,” Pearl said, reaching out her hand to help a sleepy-eyed Anna to her feet. “Now, we’ve been here in the forest too long. The less we’re seen together, the better. And, Stefan, we trust you,” she said, just the tiniest hint of a warning in her otherwise rich voice.

“Of course,” I said, grabbing Katherine’s hand as Anna and Pearl walked out of the clearing. I wasn’t worried about them. Because they worked at the apothecary, they could get away with walking in the middle of the night; they could easily tell anyone who saw them that they were searching for herbs and mushrooms.

But I was scared for Katherine. Her hands felt so small, and her eyes looked so frightened. She was depending on me, a thought that filled me with equal amounts of pride and dread.

“Oh, Stefan,” Katherine said as she flung her arms around my neck. “I know everything will be fine as long as we’re together.” She grabbed my hand and pulled me onto the forest floor. And then, lying with Katherine amid the pine needles and the damp earth and the smell of her skin, I wasn’t frightened anymore.

I
didn’t see Damon for the next few days. Father said he was spending time at the camp, an idea that clearly filled him with no small amount of pleasure. Father hoped that Damon spending time there would lead to him rejoining the army, even though I figured his hours would be spent mostly gambling and talking about women. I, for one, was glad. Of course, I missed my brother, but I would never be able to spend so much uninterrupted, unquestioned time with Katherine if Damon was around.

Truthfully, although I felt disloyal to say it, Father and I adapted well to Damon being gone. We began taking meals together, companionably playing hands of cribbage after dinner. Father would share his thoughts about the day, about the overseer, and about his plans to buy new horses from a farm in Kentucky. For the hundredth time, I realized how much he wanted me to take over the estate, and for the first time, I felt excitement in that possibility.

It was because of Katherine. I’d taken to spending each night in her chambers, leaving just before work began in the fields. She hadn’t bared her fangs since that night in the woods. It was as if that secret meeting in the forest had changed everything. She needed me to keep her secret, and I needed her to keep me whole. In her small, dim bedroom, everything was passionate and perfect—it almost felt as if we were newlyweds.

Of course, I wondered how it would work, me growing older each year as Katherine stayed just as young and beautiful. But that was a question for later, after the fear of the vampire scourge was over, after we were engaged, after we’d settled into a life without hiding.

“I know you’ve been spending time with young Katherine,” Father said one night at the dinner table, as Alfred cleared the table and brought Father his well-worn deck of cards for us to play.

“Yes.” I watched as Alfred poured sherry into Father’s glass. In the flickering candlelight, the normally pink liquid looked like blood. He held the decanter to me, but I shook my head.

“So has young Damon,” Father observed, taking the card deck in his thick fingers and slowly palming it from hand to hand.

I sighed, annoyed that Damon had once again come into a conversation about Katherine. “She needs a friend.
Friends,”
I said.

“That she does. And I’m glad that you’ve been able to provide her with companionship,” Father said. He placed the cards facedown on the table and glanced at me.

“You know, I don’t know very much about her Atlanta relations. I’d heard of her through one of my shipping partners. Very sad, a girl orphaned by Sherman’s battle, but there aren’t very many other Pierces that say they know of her.”

I shifted nervously. “Pierce is a common enough name. And maybe she doesn’t want to be affiliated with some of her relations.” I took a deep breath. “I’m sure there are other Salvatores out there that we haven’t heard of.”

“There’s a good point,” Father said, taking a sip of his sherry. “Salvatore
isn’t
a common name, but it’s a good one. Which is why I hope you and Damon know what you’re getting into.”

I looked up sharply.

“Fighting over the same girl,” Father said simply. “I wouldn’t want you to lose your relationship. I know I don’t always see eye to eye with your brother, but he’s your flesh and blood.”

I cringed, the familiar phrase suddenly complicated. But if Father noticed, he didn’t say anything. He picked up the deck and glanced at me expectantly. “Shall we play?” he asked, already beginning to deal six cards to me.

I picked up my stack, but instead of looking at the cards, I glanced out of the corner of my eye, to see if I could spot any movement from the carriage house through the window.

Alfred walked into the room. “Sir, you have a guest.”

“A guest?” Father asked curiously, half standing up from the table. We rarely had guests come to the estate unless there was a party. Father always preferred meeting acquaintances in town or at the tavern.

“Please forgive my intrusion.” Katherine walked in, her thin arms filled with a bouquet of flowers of all different shapes and sizes—roses and hydrangeas and lilies of the valley. “Emily and I were picking the flowers by the pond, and I thought you might appreciate some color.” Katherine offered a small grin as Father stiffly held out his hand for her to shake. He’d barely had a four-word conversation with Katherine since she’d arrived. I held my breath, as anxious as I would be if I were introducing Father to my betrothed.

“Thank you, Miss Pierce,” Father said. “And our house is your house. Please don’t feel you need to ask permission to come visit. We’d love to have you, whenever you wish to spend time with us.”

“Thank you. I wouldn’t want to be an imposition,” she said, batting her eyelashes in a way that was irresistible for any man.

“Please, have a seat,” Father said, settling down at the head of the table. “My son and I were just preparing to play a hand of cards, but we can certainly put them away.”

Katherine eyed our game. “Cribbage! My father and I always used to play. May I join you?” She flashed a smile as she settled into my chair and picked up my hand. Instantly, she frowned and began rearranging the cards.

How could she, when worried for her very existence, be so carefree and enchanting?

“Why, of course, Miss Pierce. If you’d like to play, I’d be honored, and I’m sure my son would be happy to help you.”

“Oh, I know how to play.” She set a card in the center of the table.

“Good,” Father said, putting his own card on top of hers. “And, you know, I do worry about you and your maid, all alone in the carriage house. If you want to move to the main house, please, just let me know and your wish is my command. I thought that you would like some privacy, but with things as they are and all the danger …” Father trailed off.

Katherine shook her head, a shadow of a frown crossing her face. “I’m not frightened. I lived through a lot in Atlanta,” she said, placing an ace on the table faceup. “Besides, the servants’ quarters are so close, they would hear me if I screamed.”

As Father placed a seven of spades on the table, Katherine touched my knee, slowly brushing it with a feathery stroke. I flushed at the intimate contact when my father was so close, but I didn’t want her to stop.

Katherine placed a five of diamonds on the card pile. “Thirteen. I think I may be on a lucky streak, Mr. Salvatore,” she said, moving her peg one spot on the cribbage board.

Father broke into a delighted grin. “You’re quite a girl. Stefan’s never really understood the rules of this game.”

The door slammed, and Damon walked into the room, his rucksack over his shoulder. He shrugged it off onto the floor, and Alfred picked it up. Damon didn’t seem to notice. “Looks like I’m missing all the fun,” Damon said, his tone accusatory as his gaze flicked from Father back to me.

“You are,” Father said simply. Then he actually glanced up and smiled at him. “Young Katherine here is proving that she’s not only beautiful but that she has brains, too. An intoxicatingly infuriating combination,” Father said, noticing that Katherine had racked up an additional point on the board when he wasn’t looking.

“Thank you,” Katherine said, deftly discarding and picking up a new card. “You’re making me blush. Although I do admit that I think your compliments are just an elaborate plan for distracting me so you can win,” Katherine said, barely bothering to acknowledge Damon.

I strode over to Damon. We stood together in the doorway, watching Katherine and Father.

Damon crossed his arms over his chest. “What is she doing here?”

“Playing cards.” I shrugged.

“Do you really think that’s wise?” Damon lowered his voice. “Given his opinions on her …
provenance.”

“But don’t you see? It’s brilliant. She’s charming him. I haven’t heard him laugh so hard since Mother died.” I felt suddenly delirious with happiness.
This
was better than anything I could have planned. Instead of trying to come up with an elaborate plot to push Father off the vampire trail, Father would simply see that Katherine was
human.
That she still had emotions and wouldn’t do any harm save for ruining his winning streak at cribbage.

“So what?” Damon asked. “He’s a madman on the hunt. A few smiles won’t change that.”

Katherine erupted into giggles as Father put down a card. I lowered my voice. “I think if we let him know about her, he’d change his mind. He’d realize that she doesn’t mean any harm.”

“Are you crazy?” Damon hissed, clenching my arm. His breath smelled like whiskey. “If Father knew about Katherine, he’d kill her in an instant! How do you know he’s not already planning something?”

Just then Katherine let out a peal of laughter. Father threw his head back, adding his hoarse laugh to hers. Damon and I fell silent as she glanced up from her cards. She found us with her eyes and winked.

But since Damon and I were standing side by side, it was impossible to tell who it was meant for.

T
he next morning, Damon left with the brief explanation that he was helping the militia at the camp. I wasn’t sure I believed his excuse, but the house was decidedly more peaceful in his absence. Katherine came over each night to play cribbage with Father. Occasionally I’d join her as a two-against-one team. While playing, Katherine would tell Father stories from her past: about her father’s shipping business; about her Italian mother; about Wheat, the Scottish terrier she’d had as a girl. I wondered if any of them were true, or if it was Katherine’s plan to act as a modern-day Scheherazade, spinning stories that would eventually persuade Father to spare her.

Katherine would always make a show of going back to the carriage house, and it was agony waiting for the moment when Father went to bed so that I could follow her. She never talked about her past—or her plans—with me. She didn’t tell me how she got her nourishment, and I didn’t ask. I didn’t want to know. It was far easier to pretend she was just a normal girl.

One afternoon, when Father was in town with Robert, discussing business with the Cartwrights, Katherine and I decided to spend an entire day together, instead of a few stolen, dark hours. It was nearing October, but no one would know it from the high temperatures and the daily late-afternoon thunderstorms. I hadn’t gone swimming all summer, and I couldn’t wait to feel the water of the pond on my skin—and Katherine in my arms in the daylight. I stripped down and jumped in immediately.

“Don’t splash!” yelled Katherine. She lifted her simple blue skirt up to her ankles and cautiously stepped toward the edge of the pond. She’d already left her muslin flats beneath the willow tree, and I couldn’t stop staring at the delicate white of her ankles.

“Come in! The water’s fine!” I yelled, even though my teeth were chattering.

Katherine continued to tiptoe toward the edge of the pond until she was standing on the muddy strip between the grass and the water. “It’s dirty.” She wrinkled her nose, shielding her eyes from the sun.

“That’s why you have to get in. To wash off all the mud,” I said, using my fingers to flick water toward Katherine. A few droplets landed on the bodice of her dress, and I felt desire course through me. I dunked under the water to cool my head.

“You’re not afraid of a little splashing,” I said as I emerged, my hair dripping on my shoulders. “Or, shall I say, you’re not afraid of splashing Stefan?” I felt a little bit ridiculous saying it, because such comments didn’t sound nearly as clever on my lips. Still, she did me the favor of laughing. I carefully sidestepped the rocks on the bottom of the pond to walk closer toward her, then flicked more water in her direction.

“No!” Katherine shrieked, but she made no move to run away as I walked out of the pond, grabbed her around the waist, and carried her into the water.

“Stefan! Stop!” she screamed as she clung to my neck. “At least let me take off my dress!”

At that, I immediately let her go. She lifted her hands over her head, allowing me to easily pull off her dress. There she stood in her little white slip. I gaped in amazement. Of course I’d seen her body before, but it had always been in shadows and half-light. Now I saw the sun on her shoulders, and the way her stomach curved inward and I knew, for the millionth time, that I was in love.

Katherine dove underwater, reemerging right next to me. “And now, revenge!” She leaned down and splashed cool water on me with all her might.

“If you weren’t so beautiful, I might fight back,” I said, pulling her toward me. I kissed her.

“The neighbors will talk,” murmured Katherine against my lips.

“Let them talk,” I whispered. “I want everyone to know how much I love you.” Katherine kissed me harder, with more passion than I’d ever felt. I sucked my breath in, feeling so much desire that I stepped away. I loved Katherine so much that it almost hurt; it made it harder to breathe, harder to talk, harder to think. It was as if my desire was a force larger than myself, and I was simultaneously frightened and overjoyed to follow wherever it led me.

I took a shaky breath and looked up at the sky. Large thunderclouds had rolled in, obscuring the sky, which had been a pure cerulean just moments before. “We should go,” I said, heading toward shore.

Sure enough, as soon as we stepped onto dry land, a clap of thunder rolled off in the distance.

“The storm came in fast,” Katherine observed as she wrung out her curls. She didn’t seem at all self-conscious even though her soaking-wet white slip left nothing to the imagination. Somehow, it seemed almost more illicit and erotic to see her scantily dressed than to see her naked. “One
could
think that it was almost a sign that our relationship is not meant to be.” Her voice was teasing, but I felt a shiver of dread go up my spine.

“No,” I said loudly, to reassure myself.

“I’m just teasing you!” Katherine kissed my cheek before leaning down to pick up her dress. As she stole behind the weeping willow tree, I yanked up my breeches and put on my shirt.

Katherine emerged from behind the tree a moment later, her cotton dress clinging to her curves, the damp tendrils of her hair sticking to her back. Her skin had a bluish quality to it.

I put my arms around her and rubbed her arms vigorously, trying to warm her up, though I knew that was impossible.

“I have something to tell you,” Katherine said as she tilted her face up to the open sky.

“What?” I asked.

“I would be honored to attend the Founders Ball with you,” she said, and then, before I could kiss her again, she broke from my embrace and ran back to the carriage house.