Page 69

“I am well, I thank you, mistress. Prithee, couldst I beg a cup of water, if thou has’t a goodly well?”

“What?” she stared at me.

I cursed the English habit of changing dialects every ten miles, to the point that it was perfectly possible to fail to understand someone who lived in a different part of the country. I didn’t recognize this version of the language, but then, it had been a few years since I had been back, and I had not traversed the entire realm. That damned witch must have gotten her hands on a portal like Mircea’s, and God only knew where she’d sent me.

I smiled again, more broadly this time, to reassure her. “Or of ale if ye do not, for I am sorely parched.”

This simple attempt at stalling did not have the desired effect. I just wanted her to go away and give me a moment. Instead, she suddenly acquired a strange, almost panicked look on her face, and began backing toward the door. “Louis-Cesare! Louis-Cesare!”

Obviously, I had made a mistake, but I wasn’t sure what it was or how to fix it, and now she was calling for reinforcements. Under normal circumstances, that wouldn’t have been so bad, but when I tried to stand, my legs buckled and I went down. The woman started toward me again, but I snarled and she backed up.

Finally, I managed to pull myself upright by grasping the window ledge and glanced out, before turning my eyes back to her. She was halfway through the door, but hadn’t left yet, and I could hear footsteps coming up a set of stairs behind her. I’d had all the time that fate would allot me, it seemed, and jumped out the window, hoping that my legs would hold.

I found a foothold on some sort of pergola, but did not go downward, although that would have been easier. But it would also be expected and I wanted to avoid a confrontation if possible. At least I was well fed, which was one saving grace, and didn’t fall over, as I’d half expected.

I started climbing.

“Dory! What are you doing?”

Thrice damn it! I hadn’t been fast enough, and a man had spotted me. He was a redhead, too, although more of the shade they call auburn than the woman’s fiery locks. Inside or in shadow his hair might have almost looked brown, but with the sun shining on it as he craned his neck to look up at me, it was clearly not.

He was handsome, I thought irrelevantly, and was now climbing out after me.

God’s teeth!

Fortunately, my arms were stronger than my legs, and I had plenty of experience scaling craggy outcroppings in the hills and mountains of Italy, when after my prey. This house, oddly shaped though it was, gave me no trouble. And for some reason, I no longer had the soggy weight of the tavern maid’s dress dragging me down.

The clothes I was wearing instead were as strange as the redhead’s had been, although of a different sort. Instead of a shift, I was in a pair of fisherman’s trousers, albeit ones almost as tight as hosen, and made out of a strange, faded blue material that I didn’t know. They were matched with an odd sort of shirt that had no fastenings and no sleeves, although perhaps they had yet to be tied on. Although the material seemed unlikely to bear any such weight, being as thin as linen but stretchier. I would have taken it for some sort of undergarment, but it was in a costly black color that one wouldn’t use for an item not meant to be seen.

But at least it was easy to move in, and I surmounted the roof quickly, only to find the vampire right on my tail. Even worse, he was a master, with the power he radiated almost a tangible thing despite him not attempting to project it. I had the feeling that, if he did, it would be enough to burn me, but he was keeping it close about him, reined in and subdued.

Did he think I was a fool?

“Get thee gone, vampire!” I hissed. “I knoweth what thou art, and has’t killed a many of thy kind. I will not hesitate to add another to that list!”

The auburn head tilted, like a quizzical dog, although it would likely have been my life to mention it. So, I didn’t, having said enough to warn him, and give him the choice. Although my boast was likely an empty one where he was concerned.

Ye Gods, he was strong!

“Hm,” he finally said, and then nothing more.

For a moment, we just stayed there, with me clinging to a chimney to not give away how weak I felt, and him making no move toward me, or any at all that I noticed. He didn’t even appear to be breathing, which of course, the bastards didn’t need to do. He could wait me out, until I fell on my face from faintness, or drain me dry where we stood.

I couldn’t stay here.

“T’is a long way down,” he said at last, as if I didn’t have eyes!

Not that I’d been using them much, having been focused on the creature opposite me. I continued to be so, having no choice, but took darting glances about, hoping for some kind of weapon. The ones I’d had on me had disappeared along with the rest of my clothes, and there was no way I could take him without one.

But I didn’t see a weapon, even of the makeshift variety. What I did see . . . I had no words for. What was this place?

“That is called a truck,” the vampire said, as a belching, armor-covered . . . thing . . . roared by on a road below us, causing me to clutch the chimney that much tighter. It was a hideous beast, with thick black smoke billowing out of the back like the eruption of a volcano, and round, evil eyes on the front. Yet it was on wheels like a cart—

And, damn it, I’d looked too long! For the vampire was suddenly in my face, close enough for a bite. And I hadn’t even seen him move!

Yet, he didn’t press his advantage, despite the fact that we were almost face to face.

“They call it rolling coal,” he said mildly. “He’s going to get a ticket, in all likelihood. There’s a group of truck enthusiasts in the neighborhood who insist on modifying their rides, and the police have lost patience and set up a stake out down the road.”