***
Once the rest woke, we gathered in the kitchen to discuss who would be going to Inara’s castle to see if our two friends were actually friends or foe. The one rule that would remain with the ones that stayed behind was to stay hidden in the house but not explore anything until the others returned.
Jacob, having a head on his shoulders for planning strategic moves for the past few hundreds of years, decided to split the best of the fighters up, taking two with him, and leaving the others behind to fight if the occasion should arise. I wanted to go and got my wish. I almost immediately wanted to retract my statement of wanting to be a part of the group that headed out when I found out we would have to cover ourselves in the same horrific gore of the decaying bodies before we entered the secret tunnels under the castle. Just the thought made me gag, which made Cates begin laughing loudly, because this time would be staying back with Tammy, Tanda, Garvin, and Sydney. Fala and Jacob would be the strength behind Derek and me, in case the whole thing was a trap to capture more of Martin’s creatures.
We left the others safely locked in the house and ran like the wind through the tunnels, seeing the scavengers once along our way. They moved out of our way so fast it was a mere glance for both parties. It wasn’t until the stench of rotting death filled our noses that our feet slowed down, no matter how much our minds wanted to push forward. I had found some old rags that I think once belonged to the help, and all but Fala wore them. His stature was too big, so he had to wear the same pants that he had on the night before.
“I say we just all do it at the same time,” I suggested when we reached the putrid pile of decomposing bodies.
“Should I not do as Cates?” Fala offered.
“We have to look like we did when they saw us, Fala, and we won’t be swimming in a pit of blood this time,” Derek explained, grabbing his knees, trying to keep the feeding down that none of us should have had before we left.
I was grateful that Tanda had helped me braid my long hair as I put it down my shirt and tucked it into my pants, fighting back the gags myself. “On the count of three?” I asked, looking at Jacob, who also had dread written all over his face. “Glad to see that this is bothering you, too,” I smiled.
“You thought it would be pleasant to me?” he asked, with a forehead full of wrinkles.
“No, you just have guts of steal and sometimes it’s nice to see that you’re a little softer than you seem,” I replied, winking at him.
He looked at me, laid his torch on the ground and counted to three before I was ready for him to even say one. He hit the pile of gore first with the rest of us right behind him. Derek and I were making sounds like wild animals as we slid, and pulling on flesh that had bone that came away with the slightest touch. My arms and legs were sinking in the more I tried to climb, soon I was face to face with a face that was eaten away to the skull and filled with earthworms and other creatures that lived comfortably off of the flesh of the dead. I threw up right on it. I felt a hand grip the back of my shirt, pulling me up by the cloth and my braid, feeling like they were going to rip my braid right off the back of my head. Fala set me down, and reached back in for Derek who was also stuck up to his waist, speechless, and ghostly white in horror of the whole thing. Jacob was the least covered of us all, but was out too fast for me to witness how he had done it. Fala, on the other hand, had stormed right over the pile using the strength of his arms to pull himself right out.
“I thought we were supposed to be ten times stronger than we use to be, and I couldn’t get on top of that…” Derek spoke, desperately shaking the decay from his hands, “to save my life.”
“It is true. Fala has brute strength to fight through just like Cates. But, you are thin and your limbs find their way into the small places and the wetness sucks you deeper,” Jacob explained. “It does not mean you are weaker.”
“So, now we have to cut back and go through the marsh you spoke of earlier?” Derek asked, about to wipe his hands down his pants but rethinking his decision when he saw folds of skin sliding down his leg.
“I think we can use the safety of the forest,” Jacob turned, looking into the depths of its darkness.
“I don’t mean to speak out of place, but I believe it may be best if we do not use the forest this night,” Fala interjected, sniffing the air. “Many others move about the trees this night.”
“What kind of others? Can you tell?” I asked, walking up beside him.
“Other weres, but I’m not sure of their breed.”
“So, if we keep to the outer line of the trees will they know we’re there?” Derek asked, joining us with Jacob coming to stand beside him.
“They already know that we are here, much the same as I can tell that they are in the forest.”
“Then we best move,” Jacob suggested, as he turned on his heel and took off for the marshlands, at the base of the mountain.
I could see why Jacob wanted to use the forest when I stepped down into the grassy marsh, but I also didn’t want to run into anything that shifted into ‘anything’ like that in the graveyard the night of our first adventure in London. By the time we reached the end of the marsh I had lost both shoes somewhere back in the middle, due to the fact that I was knee deep to everyone else’s mid-calve submersion. Even Derek, who was close to my height, seemed to only go down so far compared to me, and no one else lost a shoe. We turned back to the left at the base of the mountain and continued for about a mile; Fala kept an eye on the forest while Derek watched our back. Jacob took the lead, and I just watched my footing.
The entrance was easy to find with the white silk cloth that had been tied around one of the bars on the gate that was closed over the opening. “Fala, the key,” Jacob whispered, who unlocked it as soon as he was handed the key and pulled the rusty hinged gate back. At the entrance on the inside, two torches leaned up against a large rock that looked like it had been purposely placed there just for that reason and to keep them out of the water that ran down the middle of the tunnel floor. Jacob scraped his flint across the wall and brought the one he picked up to life, then waved his hand for us to join him. The moment I stepped in I could smell the hint of death, and knew that this would be just like the rest of the places that we had ventured into.
Derek handed Fala the second torch and he tilted it into the one that Jacob was holding and took the back. The deeper we made our way in the worse the smell thickened. It felt like the rotting death of the pile that we had climbed through was just the beginning of the horror that we would witness before our plan was put into motion. That is, if the ones we looked for didn’t have plans set in motion of their own. Jacob whispered back for us to watch our step about the time my foot felt something roll underneath it. By the time I looked down there were several things that my feet were hitting and it was very hard to miss them. Body parts were strewn about the tunnel floor. Some just bone; some with flesh still attached. One arm lay severed at the elbow with the hand still open, as if waiting to be shaken in a passing greeting.
Torsos, with more on the outside than in, lay grotesquely up against the tunnel wall; with a faceless head a few feet away. A full leg mixed together with bones that I had no knowledge of what part of the body they came from, lay up a few feet away from the torso, but not one whole body was to be seen. I wanted nothing more than to be carried at this point but my pride would not allow me to ask, so I kept the thought to myself, sliding my feet through God only knows what hoping that we would soon reach the end. Jacob put his hand behind him, touching my stomach as he came to a stop.
“Someone’s coming this way,” he said in a normal voice.
“The torch, put it out,” I whispered as softly as I could.
“It’s…” he began to say, once again in a normal tone.
“Not so loud,” I hissed.
“They know we are here,” he turned, looking at me with frustration on his face. “If I can see their torch, they can surely see mine.”
“Well you
don’t have to get so pissy about it.”
“And you do not have to question my decisions, either,” he whispered.
“Oh, that you whispered,” I smirked, putting my hand on my hip.
A young man came around the curve of the tunnel and smiled at us. “It’s me Felicia, only like this I’m known as Alex,” he smiled, walking closer. He was alone and didn’t seem to care that it was just the four of us; telling me that had there been a plan to take us all prisoners that he would have asked about the others first thing. I guess it showed on my face when I refused to take those first steps when he asked us to follow him. He turned, explaining that the rest of the way was a bit tricky, so, he thought he would come show us in case that we had come this night, and that if we went the wrong way to make sure we didn’t end up in the butcher’s corner. The last statement made him laugh as he kicked a hand down the tunnel. “The butcher is the one who disposes of the bodies, but you can tell he does a sloppy job while taking them out of the tunnel,” Alex laughed like the bones he was kicking through were just an every night ordeal. And by the look of things, I guess it was.
“Where is your companion?” Jacob inquired, making me think he was going to receive the same question.
“The mistress was ordered to the high mistress’s castle, to go over the coming of, what they seem to be calling, the ‘demon seed of Martin’. Bernard was taking her to her coach when I headed down here. We were hoping you would come this night and not last night. Our owners had us very busy and there is no way we could have played. But we are as free as any slave could be this night.” The way he looked back and licked his lips was almost enough to make me lose what the stench of the dead had not.
“Do you know what they mean by that?” I asked, keeping my head low and behind Jacob.
“We were drawing the mistress her bath and heard her arguing with her sister…as if that was anything unusual. It was then that the phrase came out. Angelica claimed she knew for a fact that the one traveling to London was the very creation of Martin Vegee Lebrun himself,” he stopped, turning slightly around. “Your master!”
“He has been away for a while. I wonder if they got the bastard?” Derek blatantly asked, with me spinning on him.
“Excuse me?” I grabbed the front of his shirt before I even realized what I had done, causing Derek to take a step back. “I wanted that son-of-a-bitch to be taken by us,” I quickly added as soon as I caught on to my own actions.
“Too late, flesher…if that’s what you really are?” Alex asked. turning to the right and heading up a set of stone steps. “I told Bernard you were more than just fleshers, or Martin would not have you. He is far too picky. Hell, he won’t even allow slaves in his home.”
I think we all let out a breath that we were holding when he made that first comment, thinking he had made us for what we really were. He went on to tell us that he and Bernard had argued after we had left the first night about whether or not we were fleshers made breeders or breeders made fleshers, but neither could figure out how the breeder part of us held down the meat. I snickered out loud at not only the thought of them arguing about it, but the thought of seeing Derek actually trying it back in the beginning of his first nights as a breeder. Like the time when he drank a glass of cold tea and became extremely ill, or the time he jumped off the side of the cliff, thinking he could fly, and dropped down to the beach floor with a thud.
Bernard met us at the top of the stairs scaring me right out of my humorous thoughts and right into the defensive mode. Bernard was holding a sword that had to be four feet long with red tassels hanging off of the gold swirled handle. “She may not let me touch these when she’s here…” he smiled “but, she’s not here now, is she?” he stuck it out in front of himself and said ‘en garde’, stepping out, moving away from the door in strange looking steps, putting the same foot forward every time. Almost like short hopping moves, while swinging the sword in circles. To me, he looked quite silly, but I was glad to see he was dancing with the thing and not trying to drive it through one of our bodies.
“Did you hear Inara talking about the elders and the two they sent?” Bernard asked Alex as we exited from the stairs.
I was looking at the elaborate surroundings, while Jacob spun Bernard around by the shoulder. Bernard yelped out in more of a feminine tone than masculine, dropping the sword on the ground, showing he would be no problem taking back to our home. “Tell me what you know of these two of which you speak,” Jacob demanded not caring for a second what either of them may have thought about his aggressiveness.
“She…she said she heard word that the elders sent two assassins out from the counsel; that they now sought the ones coming this way as we speak,” he explained in such a nervous reply that his hands were visually shaking.
“She told you this personally?” Jacob asked, yanking him closer by the lace on the front of his shirt.
“No, of course not. You don’t discuss orders with things you consider your pets. She was talking to her lover while I painted her toe nails. I forget your name,” Bernard said, touching Jacob’s hand lightly.
“Jacob,” he replied, removing his grip from Bernard’s shirt.
“Why do the elders concern you?” Alex asked, walking up and wrapping his arms around Bernard’s shoulders, leaning his head over to see Jacob.
“Forget that. Where is our master being held?”
“At Angelica’s, she would never allow him to be any place else. Who are you really?” Alex asked, stepping back a few feet from Bernard, looking from one of us to the next. “I believe there are things that are much different about you tonight.”
“We are the ones that your mistress’s have been speaking about,” Jacob stepped up and looked Bernard directly in the eyes; he dropped to the floor, and passed smooth out.
“You’re not even fleshers are you?” Alex yelled as he turned to flee.
Derek was on him before he even knew he was on the ground. He began screaming for mercy the moment his stomach touched the shiny tile. Jacob walked over and bent down, telling him that we were not the ones that he had to worry about. He told him the rumors were true about us saving the slaves that had been tortured and placed in harm’s way and taking the lives of those who had committed the acts against them. Afterwards, Jacob lied and said that he was only going to use him and Bernard to turn the two sisters against one another but we needed their help to do it and by doing so, he and Bernard could have all that their master’s owned. I almost swallowed my tongue listening to Jacob lie the way he was, because we all knew that if Tammy was anywhere near these two for five minutes alone, they were dead and she was their executioner.
Our main plan was long past once we realized that there was absolutely no way we could take down one master and its home without alerting the other two that we were here. So, Jacob had devised a better plan of taking what belonged to one sister the same way she’d taken Martin, leaving a note behind stating if she wanted to see her beloved pets alive again that she would do everything her sister asked of her. The note would not only infuriate her, it would confuse her as to who had her precious pets. Derek pulled Alex to his feet, while Fala lifted Bernard up as he started to come around. When he began to scream, Alex, still in the grip of Derek’s fist, told him to calm down that they were in no danger, then explained quickly what Jacob had told him.
“May I go to him?” Bernard cried, tears rolling down his face as he leaned back to look up at Fala, who in turn looked over at Jacob.
“When will your mistress be back?” I asked, stepping up and cleaning my face with a cloth from the arm of the chaise lounge that was close to the door.
“You’re the…” Bernard said sluggishly, looked at me, then went limp in Fala’s grasp.
“She won’t be back until tomorrow night. When they plan a gala they plan for days” Alex explained. “I will help you in any way that I can, but I must ask that you do not take me from my home. My mistress needs me.”
“You will
do as you are told and ask nothing from us. Do you understand?” I smiled, showing my fangs as I walked closer.
Alex nodded, saying nothing, and looked at me like I had just sprouted a second head. Jacob took the note from his pocket and told Alex to lead him to the one place that only Angelica would go to visit his master that others were not permitted. When Alex tried to say that he didn’t know what Jacob was talking about, Jacob’s face contorted much like it had when he thought Jessica had been killed in Cuba. His fangs elongated, the bone structure in his cheeks and forehead shifted, and the sound of his voice changed to tones ten times in depth. “You dare lie in the face of your own demise?” Jacob growled, storming up to Alex so fast that Alex’s eyes grew as his mouth fell open in a silent scream, too afraid to produce sound.
Derek dropped his grip on Alex’s shirt, stepping out of the way, staring at Jacob in the same astonished manner that Fala and I were. Alex began to move backwards until his body was flat against the floral patterns on the wall in the sitting room of sort. I found myself trying to force my face to do the same thing that Jacob had done but nothing happened, other than my making a fool out of myself by moving my mouth around and grunting so bad that even Jacob took a second to look over at me. I shrugged my shoulders and thought it best to try later.
“It’s a room hidden off of her study. I didn’t mean to lie,” Alex begged, holding out his hands, now looking back and forth from me to Jacob, perhaps thinking I was about to morph like he had. “We were told we would be taken to the care of Lord Cheree if we ever gave out the information.”
“Lord Cheree should be the least of your worries right now,” Jacob replied, grabbing him around the throat causing him to scream out. “Take me to it!”
Alex took Jacob up a flight of stairs that appeared when Alex pulled down on a golden rope hanging by one of the plush sofas that were spread throughout the lavish room. Once they were gone, we waited. It was then that I noticed that the walls were made of material. The paisley print was raised just enough to feel the texture under my fingers as I glided them along the golden print of velvet swirls. Three chandeliers hung from the fifteen-foot high ceilings, which were lit by some form of oil, I assumed from the faint smell, but as to how they were lit, I had no idea. Black and white marble-topped tables that sat in between the lounge sofas stood on shiny golden pedestals with intricate leaves decorating the legs. The room was not what I was expecting to see coming up from the horror not half a foot behind a secret door that hid not only the hell we had just walk through, but the passage of what we now knew was the creature called the ‘butcher’.
Bloodbreeders: Lies Beneath London Page 13
