Page 34 of Secrets of the Highwayman (Immortal Warriors #2)

H ad Nathaniel taken the locket from around Pengorren’s neck? Surely he had the key by now? Melanie’s hopes and dreams were resting on that key, and the favor the queen would grant her when it was returned. She and Nathaniel had just as much riding on the outcome of this night as Pengorren. More.

She reached the bottom of the staircase and halted. The faint echo of voices drifted from the direction of the kitchen. Melanie moved toward the sound.

Her strength was almost fully returned. She could feel the power settling over her like a mantle. If this was how Pengorren felt all the time, then she could understand his overweening self-confidence. She could almost believe herself to be invincible if she hadn’t just received a painful lesson in her own mortality.

The door to the kitchen was just ahead of her when she heard Teth growl. Melanie froze. She didn’t want to reach out with her mind again, in case Pengorren sensed her, but she knew he was in there anyway. Her flesh tingled, and the air sparked from his presence.

Nathaniel raised his voice. He sounded reckless. “Do you think it will melt?”

“You’re being very childish, my boy.” Pengorren at his most smooth and dangerous.

Melanie crept forward and peeked around the corner and into the kitchen. The shadows were lit by a strange blue glow, and she could make out Nathaniel with Teth at his side. Pengorren was several feet away, closer to Melanie, standing very still beside the bench.

“What will happen if you lose the key, Hew? No more traveling through time. No more escaping into the past. She’d find you, wouldn’t she, the queen of the between-worlds? That’s who you’re running from. You stole her key, and she wants it back.”

“I don’t know who told you that, Nathaniel. I’m not afraid of anyone, most particularly not of you.”

Melanie realized that Nathaniel had turned one of the gas rings on, the blue flame up as high as it could be. He was dangling the locket over it, swinging it back and forth. No wonder Pengorren wasn’t moving any nearer.

Melanie held her breath. They needed the key to give to the queen. Surely he wasn’t really going to destroy it?

“Why me, Pengorren?” Nathaniel sounded as if he really wanted to know. “Why Ravenswood, when you have the whole world to choose from?”

Pengorren shifted slightly, but Teth growled again and he remained where he was. “You made everything sound so inviting, dear boy. I couldn’t resist. I began as a monk, did you know that? I wasn’t a very good one, I’m afraid, but a monastery is a good place to hide. Then I founded a dynasty in France, and then another in Bavaria. To skip ahead a little, I was bored and wanted some adventure. I decided on the Napoleonic wars and changed my name and joined the British army—that was the winning side, after all. While I was in Spain I was fortunate enough to meet you. I think I’ve been in and around Cornwall ever since.”

“So the drowning . . .?”

“Just pretense. It gets embarrassing when the years pass and everyone else grows old and I don’t. I had to think of some way to escape the questions, so I died. I changed my name again, traveled a little. I came back as Trewartha early in the twentieth century. I enjoyed being him, collecting my antiques and writing my masterpiece. The Raven’s Curse. Have you read it, Nathaniel?”

“That’s what gave you away, Hew. Only you could have written something so biased.”

He chuckled. “Do you know, the old lady said that. I used to visit her, sipping at her essence, just enough to keep myself alive. I didn’t want to take it all at once—she might have been the last of my line—and she was going to die soon anyway, I’d take it then. We used to chat, though, and if I have one fault, then I do tend to talk too much about myself. She wheedled the truth out of me. Next I knew she’d gone. Before I could track her down she was dead, and I was left with nothing. I thought I was a goner then. Strange how one’s luck changes!”

“Your luck hasn’t changed.”

“Oh, I think you’ll find it has,” Pengorren said, and he half turned.

Melanie moved quickly back, out of sight. Did he know she was here? Should she declare herself or should she run?

Someone reached out from the darkness behind her and touched her on the arm. The only reason she didn’t scream was because her throat closed over in terror. And then her heart nearly stopped as a face loomed up in front of hers.

“Melanie . . .” It was Eddie in a tremulous whisper. “What the fuck is happening?”

“Sshh!”

He tugged at her arm, pulling her away so they couldn’t be heard. “I’ve got Suzie outside in the car,” he said, and choked. “I swear to you, she was talking right up until the moment we got here. She told me she was all right. She promised. And she didn’t want to go to the hospital . . . she said if I didn’t bring her back here, she’d get out of the car and walk. But when we got here she just stopped. I think . . . oh God, I think she’s . . .”

He caught his breath, held it, struggling not to break down. Melanie was numb, but she knew it was better that way. Numb meant she didn’t have to feel.

“Is she still in the car?”

“Yes. Near my cottage. I thought she’d be safer there, out of the way, if he came. I didn’t know he was already here. When I cracked open the door and saw him coming after Nathaniel, I ran to switch off the electricity, to help him get away.”

“You did good, Eddie.”

“What is he?” His eyes shone like marbles. “He can’t be human.”

“Have you heard about Dracula?”

“Yes.”

“Then that’s him, but without the teeth.”

“I don’t understand.”

“Never mind. Let’s go and find Suzie.”

But before they could move, there was an awful crash from the kitchen. It sounded metallic, as if it was raining spoons and forks, and it went on and on. Teth was barking hysterically.

“What the—” Melanie spun around, but a bulky shape blocked her way. There was someone standing behind her. She sensed who it was even before he opened his mouth.

“Hello, my dear,” Pengorren’s voice was full of menace, “fancy meeting you here.”

This time she did scream. He grabbed her shoulder in a brutal grip.

“Oh no you don’t . . .”

Eddie gave a roar and threw himself at Pengorren, knocking him over. China smashed. She heard them struggling, and then Eddie was flung away as if he was made of papier-maché. But by then Melanie was free. She began to run, blindly, knowing that in a moment Pengorren would be behind her.

Something else crashed to the floor. She slipped on water from a fallen vase and cut her knee on the broken porcelain. The stumble meant she didn’t have time to get to the front door and had to turn to the stairs instead. She ran up them, feeling her way, heart beating in her ears.

Pengorren was closing. She felt him, the oily darkness that surrounded him. The suffocating sense of evil.

They headed down the corridor. Take the servants’ stairs, she thought, but at the same time she knew that was what Pengorren would expect her to do. At the last moment she changed her mind, fumbling along the wall until she found the door to the attic. Opening it quickly, she darted inside.

She could hear him coming. Melanie breathed a sigh of relief as he ran past, heading for the servants’ stairs, just as she hoped he would. She’d wait a little while and then she’d go back to the kitchen, collect Nathaniel and Eddie, then they could go to Suzie. Suzie . . . Maybe she should go now? There was no time to lose if her sister was as bad as Eddie thought.

But even as she reached for the latch, she heard Pengorren returning. Stealthily. Listening between each step.

The attic, a moment ago a place of safety, now felt like a trap. Fumbling along the edge of the door, she found the bolt, sliding it across as quietly as she could. It wouldn’t stop him, she knew that, but it might slow him down.

Melanie climbed quickly up the stepladder into the roof space, knowing that after this there was nowhere left to go.

The attic wasn’t just one big room. It consisted of several, built beneath the slope of the roof. And they were all full to bursting with the paraphernalia of people who had lived in the same house over several hundred years. So far Melanie hadn’t time to do more than gaze in horrified fascination into the little, crowded rooms, frightened she’d break something valuable and happy to leave it to the experts.

Now she blundered her way past boxes and trunks and forgotten furnishings draped in dust sheets. When she knocked over a cane basket, old wooden children’s toys clattered and rolled.

She was looking for somewhere to hide.

Behind her a grinding, splintering sound told her that the attic door had been kicked in. A moment later Pengorren’s heavy footsteps were on the stepladder.

Melanie bumped her shin on the corner of a box, and she bit her lip to stop a cry of pain. It was a large box, and when she felt over it with her hands, she found the lid was open and it was half-full of old clothing. And then she realized she could smell lavender . . .

This must be the same box Nathaniel was talking about. It seemed like a good sign, and she needed to make a decision.

Melanie climbed inside, tucking her knees up under her chin and reaching up to close the lid. For a moment it stuck, and she thought it wasn’t going to give, but then she gave it a sharp tug, and it closed with a muffled thud.

Inside it was sweet and musty. A buckle dug into her neck, and she wriggled, making herself as comfortable as possible. Nathaniel had said something about a cutlass, but she couldn’t feel anything like that, no matter how her fingers probed and searched.

And then the air suddenly grew heavier. Oppressive. She could sense him before she could hear his steps. Melanie kept perfectly still, praying with all her heart that Pengorren wouldn’t find her.