Innocent Blood Page 9

  Until he could escape.

  10

  December 19, 7:13 A.M. CET

  Rome, Italy

  The hunter had become the hunted.

  Elizabeth sensed the pack trailing her across the dark narrow streets and alleys, growing ever larger in her wake. For now, they remained back, perhaps wanting strength in numbers. These were no human curs, no brigands or thieves seeking the soft target of a lone woman on these predawn streets. They were strigoi, like her.

  Had she intruded upon their hunting grounds? Broken some rule of etiquette in her feeding? This age held many pitfalls for her.

  She glanced to the east, sensing the winter sun was close to rising. Fear trickled through her. She wanted to return to her loft, to escape the burning day, but she dared not lead this pack to her home.

  So, as the day threatened, she continued down a narrow street, her shoulder close to the cold stucco wall, ancient cobblestones uneven under the soles of her boots.

  The hours before the dawn had grown to be her favorite in this modern city. At this early time, the growling automobiles fell mostly silent, their breath no longer fouling the air. She took care to study the men and women of the night, recognizing how, in many ways, little had changed from her century, easily spotting harlots, gamblers, and thieves.

  She understood the night—and she had thought she owned it alone.

  Until this morning.

  In the corners of her eyes, shadowy wraiths shifted. They numbered more than a dozen, she knew, but how many more she could not say. Without heartbeats or breaths, she could not be confident until they were upon her.

  Which would not be long.

  The beasts circled, drawing their net ever tighter.

  It seemed they believed that she had not marked them. She allowed them this belief. Deception might yet save her, as it had so often in the past. She drew them onward, toward her own choice of battleground.

  Her destination was far. Fearing they might attack before she reached it, she quickened her steps, but only a little, for she did not want them to know that she had sensed their presence.

  She needed an open area. Trapped in these narrow alleys, it was too easy for the pack to fall upon her, to overwhelm her.

  At last, her boots drew her toward the Pantheon at the Piazza della Rotonda. The square was the closest patch of free ground. The gray light of the pearling sun lightened the shadows on the Pantheon’s rounded dome. The open eye of the oculum on top waited for the new day, blind in the dark.

  Not like her. Not like them.

  The Pantheon was once the home of many gods, but it was now a Catholic Church dedicated to only one. She avoided that sanctuary. The holy ground inside would weaken her—likewise those that hunted her—but after being reborn to this new strength, she refused to forsake it.

  Instead, she kept to the open square in front.

  On one side, a row of empty booths waited for daylight to transform them into a bustling Christmas marketplace. Their festive golden lights had been turned off, and large white canvas umbrellas dusted with frost protected empty tables. Elsewhere, restaurants stood lightless and shuttered, their diners long abed.

  Behind her, shadows shifted at the edges of the square.

  Knowing her time ran short, she hurried to the fountain in the center of the square. She rested her palms on the basin’s gray stone. Near at hand, a carved stone fish spat water into the pool below. In the center rose a slim obelisk. Its red granite had been quarried under the merciless Egyptian sun only to be dragged here by conquerors. Hieroglyphs had been cut in its four sides and reached to its conical tip: moons, birds, a sitting man. The language was old gibberish, as meaningless to her as the modern world. But the images, carved by long dead stonemasons, might yet save her this night.

  Her gaze rose to the very top, to where the Church had mounted a cross to claim the power of these ancient gods.

  Behind her came the squeak of leather, the scrape of cloth against cloth, the soft fall of hair from a turned head.

  At last, the pack closed in.

  Before any of them could reach her, she vaulted over the side of the basin and onto the obelisk, clinging like a cat. Her strong fingers found purchase in those ancient carvings: a palm, a moon, a feather, a falcon. She clambered upward, but as the pedestal grew thinner, the climbing grew harder. Fear pushed her to the very top.

  Perched there, she braced herself against the searing pain and grabbed the cross with one hand. She spared a quick glance downward.

  Shadows boiled up the obelisk like ants, befouling every inch of granite. Their clothes were tatters, their limbs skeletal, their hair matted and grimed. One beast tumbled back into the fountain with a splash, but others poured into the space it left.

  Turning away, she glanced at the nearest house across the plaza and gathered her strength around her like a cloak.

  Then leaped.

  7:18 A.M.

  Far below St. Peter’s Basilica, Rhun crawled on all fours down a dark tunnel, his head hanging so low his nose sometimes brushed the stone floor.

  Still, he whispered prayers of thanks.

  Erin was safe.

  The urgency that had shattered him out of his agonizing prison had faded. Sheer will alone now drove him to lift each bloody hand, to drag each raw knee. Foot by foot, he crossed along the passageway, seeking light.

  Taking a moment to rest, he leaned his shoulder against the stone wall. He touched his throat, remembering the wound, now healed. Elisabeta had taken so much of his blood. She had purposefully left him helpless but alive.

  To suffer.

  Agony had become her new art. He pictured the faces of the many young girls who died in her experiments. This dark incarnation of his bright Elisabeta had learned to sculpt pain as others did marble. All those horrible deaths remained on his conscience.

  How many more deaths must he add to that toll as she ran wild in the streets of Rome?

  While entombed, he caught whispers of her delight, of the elation of her feeding. She had drained him, carried his blood inside her, binding them.

  He knew she had crafted that connection on purpose.

  She had wanted to drag him along on her hunts, forcing him to witness her depravations and murder. Thankfully, as she fed, washing new blood over old, that bond weakened, allowing only the strongest of her emotions to still reach him.

  As if stoked by these thoughts, Rhun felt the edges of his vision narrow, fraught with panicked fear—not his own, but another’s. As weak as that bond was, he could have resisted her pull, but such a fight would risk further sapping his already-drained reserves.

  So he let himself be taken away.

  Both to conserve his strength and for another purpose.

  Where are you, Elisabeta?

  He intended to use this fraying bond to find her, to stop this rampage once he found the light again. For now, he fell willingly into that shared darkness.

  A tide of black beasts rose toward him. White fangs flashed out of that darkness, ravenous, ready to feed. He leaped away, sailing through the air.

  The sky brightened to the east, promising a new day.

  He must be locked away before that happened, shuttered against the blazing sun.

  He landed on a roof. Terra-cotta tiles broke under his boots, his hands. Pieces skittered over the edge to shatter on the gray stone of the square below.

  He ran across the roof, sure-footed. Behind him, one of the hunters attempted the jump, failed, and hit the ground with a sickening thud.

  Others tried.

  Many fell, but a few made it across.

  He had reached the far side of the roof—and vaulted to the next. Cool night air washed across his cheeks. If he forgot his pursuers, he could appreciate the beauty here, running across the top of Rome.

  But he could not forget them, and so he ran onward.

  Ever west.

  His goal climbed high into the blushing sky.

  Rhun returned to his own s
kin, slumped in the tunnel. He rose on hands and knees, knowing this was not enough. Tapping into the last dregs of his waning strength, he shoved to his feet. With one palm on the wall, he shambled forward.

  He must warn the others.

  Elisabeta was leading a pack of strigoi straight to Vatican City.

  7:32 A.M.

  She held nothing back as she fled across the rooftops, heading west, fleeing the rising sun to the east and chased by a furious horde. The surprise of her climbing the obelisk had gained her precious seconds.

  If they caught her, she was dead.

  She vaulted from rooftop to rooftop, breaking tiles, bending rain gutters. She had never run like this in her natural or supernatural life. It seemed those centuries trapped in the sarcophagus had made her stronger and faster.

  Exhilaration washed through her, holding her fear in check.

  She spread her arms to the side like wings, loving the caress of the wind from her passage. If she lived, she must do this every night. She sensed she was older than those who pursued her, faster—certainly not enough to outdistance them forever, but perhaps long enough to reach her destination.

  She hurdled onto the next roof, landed hard. A flock of pigeons startled and rose around her. Feathers surrounded her like a cloud, blinded her. Momentarily distracted, her boot caught in the crack between a row of tiles. She had to halt to pull it loose, tearing the leather.

  A glance behind revealed her lead was gone.

  The pack was upon her, at her heels now.

  She fled away, pain lancing up from her ankle. The leg would not take her weight. She cursed its weakness, jumping more than running now, pushing off with the good leg, landing on the bad, punishing it for failing her.

  To the east, the sky was the same light gray as the pigeons’ wings.

  If strigoi did not strike her down, the sun would.

  She hurled herself forward. She would not lie down and let those who followed claim her. Such beasts were not fit to end her life.

  She focused on her goal ahead.

  A few streets separated her from the walls of Vatican City.

  The Sanguinists would never let such a pack of strigoi enter their holy city. They would cut them down like weeds. She ran toward that same death with one hope in her silent heart.

  She bore the secret of where Rhun lay hidden.

  But would that be enough to turn their swords from her neck?

  She did not know.

  11

  December 19, 7:34 A.M. CET

  Vatican City

  “Help us!” a voice called at his door.

  Hearing the fear, the urgency, Cardinal Bernard rose from his desk chair and crossed his chamber in a heartbeat, not bothering to hide his otherness from Father Ambrose. Although his assistant knew of the cardinal’s hidden nature, he still stumbled back, looking shocked.

  Bernard ignored him and ripped open the door, coming close to tearing it off the hinges.

  At the threshold, he found the young form of the German monk, Brother Leopold, newly arrived from Ettal Abbey. On his other side, a diminutive novice named Mario. They carried a slack form of a priest between them, the victim’s head hanging down.

  “I found him stumbling out of the lower tunnels,” Mario said.

  The vinegary scent of old wine poured from the body, filling the room, as Leopold and Mario entered with their burden. Waxen wrists stuck out from the damp robe, the skin stretched tight over bones.

  This priest had starved long, suffered much.

  Bernard lifted the man’s chin. He beheld a face as familiar as his own—the high Slavic cheekbones, the deeply cleft chin, and the tall, smooth forehead.

  “Rhun?”

  Past his shock, waves of emotions battered within him at the sight of his friend’s ravaged form: fury at whoever had inflicted this upon him; fear that it might be too late to save him; and a great measure of relief. Both for Rhun’s return and the plain evidence that he could not have murdered and drained all those girls in Rome, not in this state.

  All was not yet lost.

  Tortured dark eyes opened and rolled back.

  “Rhun?” Bernard begged. “Who did this to you?”

  Rhun forced words through cracked lips. “She comes. She nears the Holy City.”

  “Who comes?”

  “She leads them to us,” he whispered. “Many strigoi. Coming here.”

  With his message delivered, Rhun collapsed.

  Leopold slipped an arm under Rhun’s knees and picked him up as if he were a child. His body hung there, spent. Bernard would get nothing more from him in this state. He would need more than wine to recover Rhun from this devastation.

  “Take him to the couch,” Bernard ordered. “Leave him with me.”

  The young scholar obeyed, placing Rhun on the chamber’s small sofa.

  Bernard turned to Mario, who gaped at him with wide blue eyes. New to the cross, he had seen nothing akin to this. “Go with Brother Leopold and Father Ambrose. Sound the alarm, and make for the entrance of the city.”

  As soon as the others were out of the room, he opened the small refrigerator under his desk. It was stocked with drinks for his human guests, but that was not what he needed now. He reached behind those bottles to a simple glass jar stoppered with a cork. Every day, he refilled it. Having such a temptation near him was forbidden, but Bernard believed in the old ways, when necessity tempered sin.

  He carried the bottle to Rhun and uncorked it. The intoxicating scent wafted out, causing even Rhun to stir.

  Good.

  Bernard tilted Rhun’s head back, opened his mouth, and poured the blood down his throat.

  Rhun shuddered with the bliss, lost in the crimson flow through his black veins. He wanted to rebel, recognizing the sin on his tongue. But memories blurred: his lips upon a velvety throat, the give of flesh under his sharp teeth. Blood and dreams carried away his pain. He moaned with pleasure of it, riding waves of ecstasy that pulsed through every fiber of his being.

  Denied this pleasure so long, his body would not let it go.

  But the rapture eventually ebbed, leaving an emptiness behind, a well of dark craving. Rhun struggled for breath to speak, but before he could, darkness overwhelmed him. As it consumed him, he prayed that his sin-filled body could withstand the penance to come.

  Rhun passed through the monastery’s herb garden, heading to midmorning prayers. He lingered and let the summer sun warm his face. He ran his hand along the purple stalks of lavender that bordered the gravel path, the delicate scent swelling in his wake. He brought his dusted fingers to his face to savor the fragrance.

  He smiled, reminded of home.

  Back at his family’s cottage, his sister would often scold him for dawdling in the kitchen garden and laugh when he tried to apologize. How his sister had loved to vex him, but she always made him smile. Perhaps he would see her this Sunday, her round belly rising in front of her, full with her first child.

  A fat yellow bee wandered along a dusky purple bloom, another bee landing on the same stalk. The stalk bent under their weight and swayed in the breeze, but the bees paid that no mind. They worked so diligently, sure of their place in God’s plan.

  The first bee lifted off the blossom and swooped across the lavender.

  He knew where it was headed.

  Following its meandering path, Rhun reached the lichen-covered wall at the back of the garden. The bee disappeared through a round hole in one of the golden-yellow conical hives—called skeps—that lined the top of the stone wall.

  Rhun had constructed this very skep himself late the previous summer. He had loved the simple task of braiding straw into ropes, twisting those ropes into spirals, and forming them into these conical hives. He found peace in such simple tasks and was good at them.

  Brother Thomas had observed the same. “Your nimble fingers are meant for this kind of work.”

  He closed his eyes and breathed in the rich smell of honey. The sonorous buzzing of
bees enveloped him. He had other work that he could be doing, but he stood a long moment, content.

  When he came back to himself, Rhun smiled. He had forgotten that moment. It was a simple slice of another life, centuries old, from before he was turned into a strigoi and lost his soul.

  He smelled again the sweet rich scent of the honey, the light undertone of lavender. He remembered the warmth of sun on his skin, when sunlight was not yet mixed with pain. But mostly he thought of his laughing sister.

  He ached for that simple life—only to recognize it could never be.

  And with that hard realization came another.

  His eyes snapped open, tasting blood on his tongue, and confronted Bernard. “What you did . . . it is a sin.”

  The cardinal patted his hand. “It is my sin, not yours. I’ll willingly accept that burden to have you at my side for the upcoming battle.”

  Rhun lay still, wrestling with Bernard’s words, wanting to believe them, but knowing the act was wrong. He sat up, finding renewed strength in muscle and bone. Most of his wounds had also closed. He drew in a breath to steady his riotous mind.

  Bernard held out his hand, revealing a familiar curve of tarnished silver.

  It was Rhun’s karambit.

  “If you are recovered enough,” Bernard said, “you may join us in the battle ahead. To exact vengeance upon those who treated you so brutally. You mentioned a woman.”

  Rhun took the weapon, shying away from the cardinal’s penetrating gaze, too ashamed even now to speak her name. He fingered the blade’s sharp edge.

  Elisabeta had stolen it from him.

  How had Bernard found it again?

  The strident clang of a warning bell shattered the moment.

  Questions would have to wait.

  Bernard crossed the chamber in a flash of scarlet robes and lifted down his ancient sword from the wall. Rhun stood, surprised by how light his body felt after drinking blood, as if he could fly. He firmed his grip on his own weapon.

  Rhun nodded to Bernard, acknowledging that he was fit enough to fight, and they took off at a run. They sailed down the gleaming wooden halls of the papal apartments, through its front bronze doors, and out onto the square.