The Slayer (14 page)

Read The Slayer Online

Authors: Theresa Meyers

Tags: #Fiction, #General, #Historical, #Fantasy, #Romance, #Paranormal

BOOK: The Slayer
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“So it is true, just as the oracle foretold?” he asked smoothly.
“Yes. The three shall become one, but never whole,” she recited from memory.
“Who took the piece of the Book?” Winchester's voice was strong and commanding and caused a shiver to race from the base of her skull down her spine. All eyes in the room turned toward the Hunter in their midst. Even surrounded on all sides by hundreds of vampires, confidence radiated out from him. Inwardly Alexa tensed. While she was proud of him, she also feared a backlash from the others who might perceive him as far too bold in his demand and dictate to the emperor.
The emperor eyed him speculatively, but apparently approved of his question. The tension in Alexa's chest eased.
“We believe it was the
Oboroten
,” Valdimir answered.
Winchester frowned. “What?”
“Russian werewolves,” Alexa said, not bothering to conceal the contempt in her tone. “They, along with most of the Darkin, have sided with Rathe in his bid to uncover all the pieces of the Book.”
Winn pulled at the brim of his hat in his hands. “Surely the lot of you could take on a few overgrown furballs. Why'd you really go to all the trouble to fetch me?”
His Imperial Majesty leaned forward, lacing his hands together and steepling his index fingers so that their tips touched his mouth. “It was foretold long ago that the Chosen would decide the fate of this world.”
Winchester shifted his weight from one booted foot to the other, and glanced briefly around the room, his bottom lip coming up and over the bottom edge of his mustache and smoothing it out before he locked his gaze back on Vladimir. “You're puttin' a powerful lot of hope in one prophecy.” The challenging tone of his voice caused a ripple of reaction among the crowd.
“Are you not up to the task?” Vlad challenged.
The Hunter's jaw flexed, and Alexa's sensitive hearing picked up the grinding of his teeth. “Oh, I can get the Book back,” he shot back, “but I might have to do some damage. You up for that?”
“If it will stop Rathe, you may do as you please.” The emperor's eyes sparked with appreciation. Vlad's voice echoed in her brain.
He'll do just fine. Take him to see Kostick. He's in the dungeons.
An uncomfortable pressure clamped down inside her chest.
Whatever for?
He let the
Oboroten
take the Book from the imperial library, and paid dearly for it, I'm afraid. The wolves left him to the villagers, who attempted to burn him alive.
Alexa gasped. A vampire as old as Kostick would never burn completely; he'd just suffer endless pain.
But why did you put in him in the dungeons? Surely
—
It was necessary, Alexa. Not only is he recovering from his injuries away from the light, but he's gone mad. It was not safe to keep him among the courtiers.
“Lady Drossenburg,” the emperor said slowly, out loud. Alexa's stomach twisted uncomfortably. She knew that tone of voice from Vlad. He was about to proclaim something, damn the insufferable man.
“You shall accompany the Chosen one on his mission to recover our missing piece of the Book of Legend.”
Every cell in her body wanted to rebel, knowing the temptation it set firmly in her path. She had thought once she'd gotten him here, she would be free of the far too attractive Hunter. “But sire—”
He held up a finger, silencing her. “Take him to Kostick.”
She bent her head and deeply curtsied again, knowing she had no further recourse. The emperor's word was law. “Of course, Your Majesty.”
Vladimir rose from his throne. Instantly his personal guard surrounded him. He walked down the dais and out of the throne room to his private chambers without so much as a backward glance. The instant the door shut behind the monarch, the chatter started. There was outrage and anxiety, and the combination of so much noise both in her ears and in her head was almost more than she could bear. She grabbed firmly onto Winchester's duster sleeve and wheeled him about, marching out of the throne room with far less grace than she had entered it.
“Where are we going?” Winchester shoved his black cowboy hat back on his head, his eyes sparkling with purpose.
“To the dungeons.”
“Whoa there. Nobody said anything about dungeons.” He dug his heels in, forcing her to look back at him. “Who's Kostick?”
“One of the oldest vampires in the court. He's been protector and prophet. He was the one who prophesied the Chosen more than seven hundred years ago. Now come on.”
Winchester shook his head as he fell into step with her. She liked the way he matched the length of her stride, and gods help her, she liked that he was broad and strong and a reassuring physical presence in this time of uncertainty. Of course, she reminded herself, his frail human form would be no match for the Darkin he was going to encounter on his perilous journey. But for now she drew from his strength as they moved through the castle.
The castle was enormous, constantly being added to over the centuries, with a labyrinth of corridors and hundreds of chambers. It took them half an hour to reach their destination. Time Alexa would never get back, since she could just as easily have transported herself there in the blink of an eye.
Eventually, they arrived at a simple wooden door bound with thick black iron bands. “And you keep this geezer in the dungeon? What kind of people are these friends of yours?”
She glared at him and opened the door. The air smelled stale and fetid, and she produced a scented handkerchief and pressed it to her nose. “He was tortured and maimed by the werewolves. He's gone mad.” Lifting her skirts she started descending the worn stone stairs lit with only a flicker of a torch burning in the iron sconce in the wall.
“Jumpin' Jehoshaphat.” His deep voice echoed in the close confines of the spiral stairwell. “You tellin' me the closest lead we got to finding this missing part of the Book in the next week is some half-dead vampire more than a few pickles short of a barrel?”
She stopped pressing forward for a moment and gazed at him in confusion. “If that means what I think it means, then
da,
he's old and likely insane.”
They circled down a spiraling staircase that grew darker with each step. Alexa knew this area of the castle well. Until the Darkin of her country had made alliances with the Hunters, they had hidden here like vermin, forced to go out only at night and subsist on what nourishment they could find.
“Damn, it's like a crypt in here,” Winchester said, a distinct tone of discomfort in his voice.
“It
is
a crypt in here,” Alexa said dryly. Her eyes were far more sensitive than his. She grabbed another torch from a bracket on the wall and lit it with a flare of materialized flame. “Better?”
The flickering light of the flames highlighted the strong edge of his jaw and made slashing shadows beneath his brows and cheekbones. “If this is the vampire idea of how to help your wounded, remind me never to get hurt around you.”
“Surely you aren't scared of the dark,” she teased.
“Just don't like dark closed-in spaces like this. I'm a wide-open, fresh-air-spaces kind of man.”
He'd never make a decent vampire, she thought with amusement. She pointed down a dank row of cells, each with a half-moon-shaped arch filled with bars. “This way.”
Alexa actually smelled Kostick before she saw him. The cell had been made as comfortable as possible, but being that it was in the castle's massive dungeon, that had been an almost fruitless effort. Seeping water stained the stones with black and green slime, and while the bed was a thick mattress, rather than a plain straw pallet, there was still evidence of rats in the cell. She could see their beady little eyes in the recesses beneath his bed and hear their skittering feet upon the stone. She handed the torch to Winchester and put both her hands on the bars.
“Kostick! Kostick, awaken. It is I, Alexandra.”
“What in the sam hill is all that jibberish?” Winchester muttered.
Alexa scowled at him. “What are you talking about?”
“That.” He pointed and slowly moved the torch to illuminate each of the three walls. Where the walls were dry, they were covered in the scrawl of various sigils and pictures, made in charcoal or, she thought, with a sick sliding in her gut, dried ichor. The frightening images and cryptic bits of phrases looked like the ravings of a madman written in his own fluids.
Mr. Jackson stared hard at the walls, and his eyes narrowed. “Tessa, I hate to crush your hopes, but if this is the fella who's supposed to help us, I'm afraid we're out of luck.”
The pile of blankets on the mattress shifted at the sound of Jackson's voice. A balding head, the hair no more than wisps upon the grimy and scabby scalp, poked out and swiveled toward them.
Alexa gasped at the gruesome sight, then clapped a hand over her own mouth to hold back the bile surging up in the back of her throat.
Half of Kostick's face had been burned away, the charred remains housing an eye socket, but no eye. His remaining eye was white with cataract. White teeth and a fang were visible through the blackened husk of what had once been lips. Clearly he could not talk to them physically. He shifted the covers off of himself and limped toward them. The loose nightshirt he wore shifted on his frame, revealing a blackened shoulder and chest and one blackened leg. Half of him had been badly burned nearly to the bone. When Vlad had said he needed to recover, he'd never hinted it was this bad.
Who are you?
The voice of the vampire poured into her mind.
“I am Alexandra, the Contessa Drossenburg, from His Imperial Majesty's court,” she answered out loud, so Winchester would at least hear part of the conversation. “We need to know where the Book has been taken.”
Kostick shuddered, flinching away from them and sidestepping back to his pallet.
Alexa swallowed hard. Kostick was far worse than she'd ever anticipated. “We know the
Oboroten
took it. But do you know where?”
Those thieving bastards! It is because of those werewolves I was captured and burned by the villagers!
Kostick communicated.
“What's he saying?”
She speared Winchester with an irritated glance. If they were going to make any progress whatsoever, she had to focus on getting the information out of Kostick, not acting as the interpreter for a Hunter. “The Russian werewolves ambushed Kostick and left him to be burned at the stake by villagers.”
“I thought you said you had peaceful relations with the folks around here,” Winchester challenged.
“We have. The werewolves have been raiding the village, and as a consequence the villagers no longer trust us either. All Darkin are the same to them. Monsters. Sound familiar?”
She turned her attention back to the ancient vampire. “Where have they taken the Book, Kostick? Help us find it. It is important,” Alexa urged.
The vampire scrambled to the far wall, his fingers searching, counting the number of cracks and interpreting the shapes of the individual rock blocks.
Here! Here is where it lies!
Alexa leaned in, peering at the scrawled gibberish on the wall. “He says that is our clue.”
Winchester leaned in over her shoulder, taking a closer look. The masculine scent of him and the pounding rush of his pulse made her squirm with sudden discomfort and yearning.
“What the hell does
Herve
mean?”
She glanced at him, which brought their faces dangerously close. “See the outline of a wolf beneath it?”
He shrugged. “Still don't make sense.”
“St. Herve?”
“Never heard of him.”
Alexa threw up her hands in disgust and groaned. “St. Herve of Brittany. He was said to be blind and led about by a wolf he tamed.”
“Nice story. Does it have a point?”
She turned back to Kostick and grasped the bars of his cell.
Kostick, have they taken it to Brittany, to the chapel of St. Herve?
Kostick frowned.
Herve was a werewolf. They'll take it where they feel safest, among their own.
But why not take it directly to Rathe?
Kostic swiveled his opaque white eye in Winchester's direction.
They think to capture him with it, to ingratiate themselves further with Rathe. They don't just want our piece of the Book. They want to hasten the opening of the Gates of Nyx. They will try it at Cleder, in Brittany.
“The Russian werewolves have taken our piece of the Book to Brittany. There was once a chapel in Cleder, before the Revolution, that held the cradle of St. Herve. He thinks they've taken it there.”

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