Anna dropped her hand. “What is wrong?” she demanded. “You have never denied me before. Is it that man? The Earl?”
Alarmed, Alex answered quickly. “There are sick and wounded men that need me. Some of them are barely grown and caught up in a war that they do not understand. My conscience makes it difficult to enjoy myself when they lie a quarter league away, suffering.”
It was the truth, but only part of it.
Anna whirled away, reaching for the robe she preferred when they were in private. The robe was made of silk, which was still virtually unknown in this corner of the world, although Muslims had been using it for centuries as a luxury fabric fit for sheiks and kings. It clung to her curves in a way that Alex usually found intriguing, but not now.
She attempted to push the sleeves up her slender arms, for it was warm inside the tent, but the wide sleeves fell back down. She put her hands on her hips. “You were a physician before you became a vampire, so I will allow this…distraction to run its course.”
Alex inclined his head. “Thank you.”
“I am surprised I must remind you after all this time of your obligation to me. You would be long in your human grave if not for me. I am your maker. You swore your fealty to me in return for your making.”
“I have not forgotten.” The words fell stiffly from his lips. The facts of his making and the duties required of him were emblazoned in his mind in fiery emphasis. “But I would remind you that in this human world we live you are my wife and should honor me as a good woman would. I provide you with the leverage you need to fulfill your ambitions. Before you met me, you were a hunted witch living in the most desperate circumstances. As your husband, I give you a cloak of legitimacy and respectability. It would do you well not to forget that.”
This time, Anna’s surprise held her speechless. She stared at him, a frown marring the flesh between her thick brows.
“I must pretend to sleep,” Alex told her. “I will use the time to think about the treatments I can apply when I return to the surgery.” He brushed past her, still naked, and sank down upon the straw-stuffed mattress that was their shared bed, which neither of them needed. Anna had arranged sheets over it and he slid beneath the top one, rolled over on his side so his back was to her and closed his eyes.
Anna did not try to disturb him, as he expected. She moved around the tent, rearranging clothing and possessions, until dawn was fully upon the camp. Then she stepped out and he was left alone.
It was a long time before he could settle his heart and his thoughts.
* * * * *
Anna did not return before Alex rose and dressed in a freshly laundered shirt and tunic, ready to return to the wounded and dying once more. Her absence was not unusual. At this time of day she would be somewhere near the cooking pots, collecting food to break their fast that neither of them would eat. There would be lords and knights aplenty standing around eating with whom she could curry favor.
Alex immersed himself in the absorbing work of tending the wounded and healing the sick. Western medicine was far behind eastern practices but he was careful not to show superior healing skills, which would draw attention. But when he thought he was unobserved, he used every skill he could muster.
In his purse he carried rare herbs with strong medicinal properties that he could apply unnoticed. If there were no other physicians nearby, he would clean and dress wounds and fail to bleed the patient. After nearly eighty years of practice, he had accumulated knowledge from the length and breadth of the known world, some of it effective and some of it highly dangerous to the patient. As time passed, Alex had watched the sum of all medical knowledge develop and grow more sophisticated, as physicians learned from their work and from each other. It was a profession that would never become weary.
It was almost a shock to him when Anna appeared at the opening of the tent. The sun blazed behind her, for it was close to sunset. Alex hadn’t noticed the entire day slide past as it had.
Anna gathered up her hems and moved carefully through the patients, who rested on the bare earth with the thinnest of sheets beneath them.
Alex finished re-dressing the wound of the man he crouched next to, patted him on the shoulder and stood up as Anna reached his side.
“I desire a word with you in private, my husband,” she said softly and sweetly.
Alex nodded. “I would like to rest for a few moments,” he said. “Let us move outside. The air is fresher there.” He nodded to the page who carried his chest of tools and supplies and the boy hurried away thankfully. Alex led Anna out of the tent and over to where a single palm tree leaned dolefully to one side. It looked like it might fall altogether with only a little more encouragement, which was perhaps why no one raised a tent beneath it, or used the minimal amount of shade it provided during the day. They would be quite alone there.
Anna spoke even before she halted in front of him. “You lied to me!” she said, low enough so that no one passing would hear her. “I knew you were hiding something from me when your heart jumped. He’s a vampire! You knew he was.”
Alex frowned. “How did you learn of this?” he demanded.
She straightened, as if his response had surprised her. “What does that matter?”
“I did not tell you. He certainly would not volunteer the information, not to you. Did you follow him?”
Her expression shifted and her gaze dropped from his. “I got close enough to hear his heartbeat. His lack of a heartbeat.”
“And you believe he did not notice you from that distance?” Alex asked dryly.
“It does not matter, anyway,” Anna said dismissively.
“Your aversion to the company of other vampires has kept us isolated for years….” Alex broke off, looking at her. There was something in the way she had dismissed his concerns. “What have you done?”
“Nothing that need concern you, since the Earl is but a stranger to you.”
His heart squeezed painfully, moving on its own in a frantic way that he had not felt for a very long time. “Oh, dear God in his heavens,” he whispered. Even his lips suddenly felt thick and awkward. He turned and hurried north, toward the English camp.
“What are you doing?” Anna called after him.
Alex broke into a run, slogging through the hot sand toward the tents that had seemed much closer this morning than they did now. He was moving faster than he should. Someone might notice for there were people everywhere. But he didn’t stop.
He ran through the narrow gap between two tents and burst out into the wider alley between two rows of them. Most of the tents had their sides untied and lowered, and were merely awnings providing shade and shelter from very occasional rain.
Many of the soldiers were sitting and lying about, taking full advantage of the lull in hostilities, but their heads jerked up. The sound of someone running had put them on alert.
Alex addressed the closest man. “Quickly, where is Lord Silchester? Have you seen him?”
The man shook his head.
Another spoke up, from farther down the alley. “I saw him aways, up by the King’s pavilion.”
“Show me,” Alex demanded.
The man pointed and Alex started to run again, weaving in between the tents, looking for the most direct route in the direction he wanted to go. He dodged soldiers and horses, leapt over gear and supplies and, once, a cooking fire. He saw a smithy ahead of him, with a row of swords laid across a low table, where a young lad was polishing their blades. As Alex passed, he snatched up one of them and flipped it around so he was gripping the hilt.
He began to ask, hurriedly and urgently, every man he came across, for direction to where he would find Silchester.
The last man he spoke to got to his feet, looking concerned. “I’m the lord’s knight commander,” he said flatly. “He came back from the King’s pavilion half an hour ago, with fruit the king had given him. He was going to feed the apples to his horse.”
“Where?” Alex said. It occurred
to him he should pretend to be breathless, but the matter was too urgent to bother.
The man picked up his sword.
“No. I’ll handle it,” Alex said quickly. “If I’m right, these are foe you will not fare well against.”
“I won’t show you if you won’t let me come.”
“Very well. But hurry. Show me the way.”
The man took off at a sprint, which Alex had no trouble keeping up with. They dodged between tents and down narrow alleys, out into open sand dotted with dried out tufts of sea grasses and sickly palms. Rope lines were strung between palms and horses were tethered there. They would come to no harm out in the open in this climate and were probably cooler for it than their riders enclosed behind canvas walls.
There were pages and knights scattered among the horses, caring for them and carrying hay and feed sacks. One lad was spraying the horses with seawater from a bucket and the horses were neighing with delight.
Brody was standing at the head of the rope line, talking to a pitch black destrier, which nuzzled his shoulder affectionately.
There were two men with crusader tunics, fully armed and standing directly behind Brody, facing the other line of horses there. Both of them had dark skin and one looked over his shoulder at Brody.
Alex knew he would not reach Brody in time. He lifted his voice. “Benedict! Behind!”
The two men spun to deal with Brody now the alarm had gone up. Brody threw himself sideways at the same time as the first thrust a spear at what would have been his back. The second man leapt forward with a curved knife raised. “Monster!” he cried in the language of the Saracens, which was close enough to Alex’s milk language that he could understand it.
The knife plunged down but Alex was already there. He thrust past Brody’s hip, driving the point of the sword upward. It caught just under the man’s breastbone and slid upward into the heart, killing him instantly. The Saracen didn’t make a sound, but slithered down to the ground limply.
Behind, Alex heard a grunt as Brody’s knight dealt with the first Saracen. He turned to ensure the man had been dealt with conclusively and saw Brody’s knight fold over, the spear in his stomach. He was clutching the shaft, preventing the Saracen from taking the weapon back.
Brody snatched the knife from his belt and leaned over his knight, using the man’s shoulder for leverage and thrust the blade up through the Saracen’s chin, pushing it through the back of his throat and into his brain.
The man let go of the spear he was holding. He didn’t drop like the first. He fell backward like a toppled tree, wrenching the knife out of Brody’s grip.
Brody turned his knight over and removed the spearhead from him. The man was bleeding from the mouth and scrabbled at the sand with weak fingers. He tried to speak, then his eyes glazed over lifelessly.
Brody swore softly.
Alex let out his breath. “A useless waste of life,” he murmured.
Brody looked at him. “Who were they?”
“Saracens. I think they are Assassins. The stealth of their attack and the wearing of Crusader colors suggests they are.”
“And why?” Brody added.
Alex breathed in and let it out. “That is a longer answer.”
Brody looked around. There were too many men about and most of them had stopped what they were doing and were watching with open dismay this unexpected violence.
Alex gripped his tunic and tugged. “Let’s find somewhere enclosed and private.”
Brody nodded and let him pull him into a fast walk.
* * * * *
They could not find anywhere enclosed that was not already occupied, so they walked out along the beach until they were away from everyone, where the afternoon breeze would snatch their words away long before anyone could hear them. They stripped off their boots and stockings and stood ankle-deep in the water, letting the sand run from between their toes and watched the sun sink into the water, glowing red and turning the sea pink.
Brody looked at him. “Why are Assassins trying to kill me?” he asked bluntly.
Alex sighed. “Because my wife hired them to do that.”
Brody nodded, as if this wasn’t the surprise to him it should have been. “Tell me about her,” he said flatly.
Alex crossed his arms and held them against him. He made himself start. “Twelve years after the siege of Jerusalem, I found myself in the mountains in Spain. I had been looking for a creature that some called a monster, but that I was sure was the same in nature as I had come to believe you and Will had been.” He shrugged. “You never ate. You rarely slept. And I saw both of you on separate occasions move with a speed that was unnatural. It was that supernatural quality that began my search and the more questions I asked, the more sure I was that the creature I was looking for, that so many humans seemed to be deathly afraid of, would provide the answers I sought.”
“Your wife was that creature?”
“She was. Like you and Will, she seemed to be completely human in appearance. But she was in far more dire circumstances, for the village where she had been living had grown suspicious of her and named her a witch.”
“That is not a reputation that is easy to lose,” Brody murmured.
“Anna made a bargain with me. She would make me a vampire—that was the word she gave for her true nature. In return, I would help her overcome her difficult situation. As I was a man, in a man’s world, it was easy for me to pass as a lord and Anna as my wife, which gave her the protection she needed.” Alex shook his head. “I did not understand that Anna had ambitions far beyond rising above her difficulties. She used my position to further her personal power and has ever since.” He described the intervening eighty years and how they had ingratiated themselves into court life first in Toledo, then later in Zaragoza.
Brody was silent for a time once Alex had finished. He kept his face turned into the wind and breathed in the salt air. “In all that time you never came across another vampire?” he asked. “Not once?”
“There were others I suspected might be, but Anna would not let any sort of relationship develop. She said that was not the way among vampires. She said we avoid each other deliberately to not rouse suspicion.” Alex unclenched his fingers from the tight fists he was holding them in. “But I have always wondered if that truly was the way of it. I only had to recall you and Will—”
“Veris,” Brody said.
“That is his real name? Thank you. I remember how you and Will were together and it seemed to me that your relationship was much more….”
“Civilized?” Brody growled.
“Kind,” Alex amended.
Brody stared at him. “Of course we are kinder to each other. That bloody woman cut you off from everyone who might have told you otherwise and used your sense of honor to hold you to her for nearly a century! Alex, no one treats another person that way, not even vampires!”
Alex realized his hands were back to tight fists again. His heart was thudding in a way that made him feel slightly ill, a sensation that he’d not experienced for a very long time. “I hadn’t realized how deeply and thoroughly her taste for power ran,” he said at last. “Of course, I must sever the relationship, now I know.”
“I suspect she’s already done that for you,” Brody growled. “Once she hears that her assassins have failed, she’ll either try to kill you, or try to leave.” His gaze met Alex’s directly. “What she does do is entirely up to you.”
“I won’t kill her,” Alex said quickly. “No one deserves that.”
“She might not give you a choice,” Brody warned.
“In that case, the decision is hers.” Alex spoke with far more calm than he felt.
“Listen to you,” Brody said and rested his hand on Alex’s shoulder. “This is all too much news for you to take in. Your heart is working too hard.”
“I’m fine,” Alex said stiffly.
“You’ll force yourself to feed early if you do not compose yourself.”
“The
events of this day have already ensured that I must feed soon.” Alex shrugged.
“Still, let’s sit for a while and speak of happier times. No one can approach us across the sand without us hearing it. We can speak freely.” He walked up the slight slope to the dry sand and sat, crossing his ankles.
Alex settled himself in the sand next to him and turned a little so he could watch Brody’s reactions. He hesitated. There had been so much Brody had said and not said, that he had implied between the words, which spoke of a far different world than the one Alex had known for the last eighty years. And now, perhaps, he could get the answers he craved.
“What is it that you do not ask?” Brody said, with a small smile.
“Where is Veris now?”
“He’s back in Tuscany, healing the locals and writing books. He grew tired of war and had no wish to be part of this one. He travels to England every five years or so to see if I need his help.” Brody smiled. “He hates the damp, so he returns to Tuscany to dry out.”
“You’re still…together?”
Brody lifted a brow. “You knew that much?”
“I guessed. It explained many little mysteries.” Alex shrugged. “I have passed my century mark, Brody. There is little that I have not seen or heard now and even less that shocks me.”
Brody smiled. “Oh, you will learn to take that back. Give it time. Life hands out lessons every time you become too complacent.”
Alex nodded. “Like today? Such as this moment right now?”
“You weren’t handed this lesson because you grew complacent,” Brody said firmly. “Your ignorance was taken advantage of by another with no scruples. Now, you have merely learned the truth. You can feel shamed or humbled by that, Alex, but if you had been one whit less a decent man than you are, she would not have been able to do what she did.”
Alex absorbed that. “Thank you. I think. Decency does not seem to have served me well.”
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