Perhaps he really had been buried under the castle chapel. If that was the case, his body and any inscriptions were lost for good—unless her photographs showed something?
Brightening, she shoved the bottle into her bag and held up her face to the sun, eyes closed. She’d head back to Bistriƫa, get the photographs onto her computer, and see what she could see. And that would be the last time and effort she’d waste on Saloman. Tomorrow, she’d head south and pick up a few more legends.
A shadow fell across her face. Her eyes flew open and she sat up, shivering. No one stood over her; no vampire threatened to drink her blood; no one dressed up as a vampire threatened to drink her blood. It was just a tiny cloud passing across the sun; yet there’d been an instant, a tiny instant, when she could have sworn she smelled the cool earth and spice scent of the man who’d pretended to be Saloman.
She had some good pictures of the angels in the crypt. She even had one of the stone sarcophagus.
Sprawled on her hotel bed with the laptop on the pillow, she blew the sarcophagus picture up as far as she could and stared at it. It was as exquisite as she remembered, a beautiful piece of art with the handsome, expressive face, the lean yet muscular body very similar to that of the man who’d accosted her moments later. Her gaze lingered, taking in the empty scabbard on the carving.
She had a brief unbidden vision of “Saloman” rising from the stone table, then walking toward her in a cloud of dust while yanking the sword from his chest and throwing it on the ground. But it hadn’t been a sword. There had been no metallic clank on the stone floor. The sound of it falling had been softer, blunter, like wood.
They’d fooled her with a clip-on wooden sword, and now that she thought through the stunned fear of that scene, she realized it had been too short for a real sword.
“Well, that’s one trick explained,” she murmured.
She refocused on the photograph, looking for more clues. The sarcophagus was undoubtedly stone, far too inert and dust covered to be the human male at this stage. And yet she’d been right—there was a gleam of black paint beneath the dust of his eyes and his hair and his cloak. It must have been old. No one could have rustled up something so wonderful just for a prank.
“So how did they do it?” she murmured. “Did they destroy it, hide it? And why is the dead man carved with a sword through his chest and an empty scabbard?” She sighed. “I wish I knew if you were really Saloman. . . .” She touched the computer screen with her fingertip, brushing the sarcophagus’s face. “If I can’t find Dmitriu, I’m going to have to speak to the vampire hunters, aren’t I? And why am I talking to you anyway, computer image?”
Closing the lid, she pushed the computer aside and stood up. Her stomach rumbled, and she realized she’d forgotten dinner again. Well, she’d go out and get something from one of the stalls. She needed some fresh air before bedtime anyhow. And while she walked, she could decide whether to leave Bistriƫa tomorrow as planned, or hang around to talk to the vampire hunters about bloody Saloman.
She grabbed a sweater for defense against the cool of the evening and went in search of food.
It was a clear, starry night, too late for there to be many people still around in the quiet streets near her hotel. But there was nothing threatening about this town. It was merely peaceful in the darkness, and by the time she approached home, munching her way through the warm pie from the corner stall, she’d made up her mind to spend one more day on the elusive Saloman. Though she was in danger of wasting too much time on one anomaly, another day couldn’t hurt. And it would be worth it if she solved the mystery of his existence once and for all.
Emerging from the picturesque vaulted arches that covered the pavement in this part of the old town, she glanced up at the jeweled sky—and something hurtled down on top of her, rolling her to the ground.
Winded and shocked, she could do nothing for the first disoriented moment. Then she realized it was a man’s heavy body pinning her to the ground, a man’s brutal hand shoving her face to one side, and she reacted from pure instinct. Grabbing his hair in both her hands, she heaved with all her might. At the same time, she jerked her knee up between his legs and felt it connect with the softness of male genitalia.
He didn’t scream, and the rising cry from her own throat got lost in shock as she stared into the red, glaring eyes of her attacker. His mouth gnashed like an animal’s, revealing long, pointed incisors. He seemed to grin as he lunged once more toward her neck, paying no attention to the hair that came away in her hands as he pushed downward toward her bucking body.
She changed tactics and punched his face instead. Though it drew a grunt from him, it made little difference to his progress. In wild desperation, she tried another, thudding her left fist into his ribs at the same time. But still his slavering mouth found her neck—just as he was plucked off her and thrown several feet across the pavement.
Gasping for breath, Elizabeth glimpsed a tall figure with his back to her. He wore dark trousers and a white shirt, and long black hair streamed down over his broad shoulders. It couldn’t be. . . .
An inarticulate whimper left her mouth at last, for her attacker had picked himself up off the ground and was charging headlong at the man in front of her. The force of his crash should have knocked the other man off his feet, and yet he didn’t even sway. The two men seemed to be inextricably tangled. Elizabeth heard a sound like a snarl, and then a snap, and her attacker simply disappeared.
For an instant, dust danced like stars where he’d been. The other man whirled around and strode toward her. Glare from the streetlight bounced off his pale, handsome face. It couldn’t be, but it was—it was the man who’d played Saloman.
No residual dust now clogged his pores, his hair, or his clothes. No seventeenth-century cloak swung around him for added dramatic effect. Instead, a tall, fit man of the twenty-first century bore down upon her. His clean, black hair shone under the streetlight, stirring in the air as he moved. His strange eyes bored into her, twisting her stomach with unwanted memory.
Bending at the waist, just like last night’s first encounter, he seized her, dragging her upright and into his arms. There was no denying they felt good around her, hard and strong and comforting after the violence of her attacker, but she couldn’t forget what had just happened.
“Where is he?” she gasped, trying to peer past his broad shoulder. “What did you do to him?”
“I killed him for you.” Even speaking such chilling words, his voice vibrated through her like an agitated flame. “Reward time.” He lowered his head, bending her body into his. His silken hair fell across her shoulder, tickling her naked skin, and she felt his lips on her neck.
“Oh, don’t start that again, you stupid bastard!” She slapped his head hard enough to sting her own hand. “What is wrong with you?”
His body stilled, then began to vibrate. He lifted his head, and his eyes gleamed so brightly she realized he was laughing at her. She struggled in vain to throw him off. Just like last night, he was too big, too strong—terrifyingly strong.
“I’m hungry,” he explained, catching both her agitated hands and dragging them behind her back. “And you really don’t believe in me, do you?”
“No,” she spat. “I don’t.”
He regarded her, holding her breast to breast with him, his head tilted to one side. His arms felt like bands of steel. Treacherously, her nipples began to tighten at his nearness. It seemed that nothing, no trauma, fear, or anger, could prevent her body’s excitement around him.
He said, “What do you think just happened here?”
Confused images struck her—of her attacker’s snarling teeth, of her “savior” absorbing his furious charge, and the brief, flashing struggle that resulted in her attacker’s disappearing in a cloud of dust—Saloman’s specialty. He must carry bags of the stuff. . . .
She stared up into his opaque black eyes. All she could see there was her own reflection. Slowly, he began to smile, revealing long, pointed canines.
He was like a Halloween joke, only sexier.
“You’re all insane,” she whispered.
“You know, it’s not going to be any fun dining on you if you don’t accept me. It offends my sense of—appropriateness.”
“Then fuck off,” she snarled.
“Such foul language for a lady of learning.” He bent closer to her ear and although she felt no breath, she shivered. One of his hands moved with deliberation over the curve of her hip and around to her waist, sliding upward and over her breast. She swallowed, forcing herself to remain still. His palm circled her nipple, forming an invisible line of pleasure to her aching loins.
“Think about it,” he whispered. His lips brushed against her ear, as softly as a butterfly’s wing, sending tingles all the way down her spine. “I won’t allow other vampires to touch you. But I’m afraid I don’t have time to convince you of that right now—or to enjoy my meal. We’ll talk later.”
His hand dropped, and his arms loosened, letting her walk away—again.
She did. This time, she held her head high and prayed he wouldn’t see the shaking of her legs, of her whole body. Desperately, her brain tried to rationalize what she’d just seen and what she still felt.
She refused to look back, even when the hairs on the back of her neck danced with alarm. For some reason, his stillness scared her more than the brutality of her earlier attacker, and she didn’t feel safe until she made it back to her hotel room and locked the door.
Chapter Four
He made no sound. The air barely stirred as he walked between the trees, but Dmitriu knew he was there.
“You’re late,” Dmitriu observed, without taking his eyes off the run-down farmhouse.
“I was held up.”
“By the girl. You reek of her. Did you kill her?”
“Not yet.”
Dmitriu frowned and turned his head. Apparently untroubled, Saloman stood at his side, gazing through the trees at the ramshackle buildings across the field from their sheltering wood.
“Your return to full potency requires it. Both because she bears the blood of Tsigana, and because she revived you. Zoltán’s in there, and without her blood, her life force, you’re not strong enough to face him.”
Saloman’s lip quirked. In his understated clothes, he might have been a waiter or an old blue blood. Making the latter mistake might be excusable, but Dmitriu imagined few would make the former. “Zoltán doesn’t know that. How many others are in there?”
“The three he brought with him—as bodyguards, presumably—and about ten local vampires, two of them weak. Zoltán is by far the strongest.”
Zoltán’s dangerous strength lay in his drive for power and his determination to hold it. There was a time when he’d feared Dmitriu as the older vampire, but these days he seemed to imagine Dmitriu’s failure to seize power from him was due to weakness. It wasn’t. It was due to inertia and boredom and a preference for a solitary life. Dmitriu had no desire to rule the mindless fools who sheltered under Zoltán’s protection.
“There is a lot that Zoltán doesn’t know,” Saloman observed.
“Don’t underestimate him,” Dmitriu warned. “He is strong; he has massive support here and alliances with the vampire communes of most of Europe, America, and Africa. Also”—he drew in a breath and tore his gaze free—“he has dominion over zombies.”
Saloman flexed his fingers. “Zombies? He raises the true dead? Even to me, that’s an abomination.”
“That’s part of their value to him. He uses them as his army, his enforcers—instruments of terror, if you like. If they catch you, they’ll scatter your limbs and your ashes so far apart that you’ll be lost forever.”
“I’ll bear it in mind.” Saloman stepped out of cover and began to walk across the field. No one else, living or undead, moved with that particular grace, almost gliding, yet visibly aware of every inch of his confident, beautiful body—which was about to get sent back to hell.
“Aren’t you even going to mask your identity?” Dmitriu hissed after him. “At least until you get there?”
“No,” said Saloman. “Let them—er—get the wind up.”
He was enjoying modern language, Dmitriu thought resentfully. He was especially enjoying mixing English and American slang into Romanian. Nor did he care that Dmitriu didn’t share his enthusiasm for provocation or for probable death.
Dmitriu’s duty was done. He had brought about the awakening of his maker and onetime friend. He was quite at liberty to leave at this point and to return to the village and to Maria, who had once been his lover and still gave him shelter in her shady out-buildings, despite the protestations of her petrified family. He was accustomed to peace and solitude these days, and he wasn’t going to get either around Saloman, even if he survived.
Dmitriu sighed, then followed him. He always had.
Elizabeth sat on her bed, staring at the mobile phone she held in her shaking fingers. On her knee was the scrap of paper with Konrad’s number. What scared her even more than the attack was the crumbling of her cynicism. She didn’t, couldn’t, believe all that nonsense, but neither could she come up with a reason for continuing any hoax this far. She needed clarification, and yet the last thing she wanted was to be sucked into the nutty world of the vampire hunters and lose all hold on reality.
She was an academic, a researcher. She wanted evidence. But all she had was a photograph of a stone sarcophagus and the dubious memory of the man who’d seemed to spring to life from it. She had a man with fangs attacking her and another man—also with fangs—claiming to have killed him. The evidence of her own traumatized eyes couldn’t be trusted. It had been dark, the dim streetlight misleading, and it had all happened too fast to see properly, let alone take in.
If “Saloman” had really killed him, where was the body?
“Shit,” she whispered, and keyed in Konrad’s number.
She hoped he wouldn’t answer. She wouldn’t bother to leave a message, and then she’d switch her phone off in case he called back.
“Hello?”
Damn. Not only an answer, but a wide-awake tone.
“Hello?” he said again.
Elizabeth licked her lips. “Konrad. It’s Elizabeth. Elizabeth Silk.”
“Elizabeth! Are you all right?”
“Yes. That is, I don’t know. I was attacked in the street.”
His breath hitched. “Since you’re calling me, it was not, I take it, a mugging?”
“I don’t know. He was like an animal, trying to bite me. . . .” She broke off, sucking her lower lip between her teeth as reaction threatened to overwhelm her.
“Did he succeed? Did he bite you? How did you get away?”
“Someone stopped him.” She caught her breath, dragging her hand through her hair. “It was him. The man who pretended to be Saloman. He said he killed him.”
“Look, I’ll be right over.”
“No, don’t,” she interrupted. “I’m fine. I just wanted to ask you—why would he save me from another vampire and then let me go?”
Everything in her screamed out against going along with this nonsense, but she had to make sense of it before she could decide the appropriate reaction.
“Why he would save you is easy. He doesn’t want your blood ‘wasted’ on anyone else. Why he would let you go . . . I can’t answer that. But he was a great player of games in his past. I suppose when you live for centuries, you have to work harder than most to entertain yourself.”
“Cat and mouse,” Elizabeth murmured ruefully. Am I really buying this? “Konrad? If the other ‘vampire’ was really dead, why wasn’t his body there? Wouldn’t it go rigid, like stone? Like ‘Saloman’?”
“Oh no, most vampires just disperse into the air. Released from the borrowed blood that keeps them in existence, their bodies revert to dust.”
“Saloman’s didn’t,” she pointed out.
“Saloman is an Ancient. A pure-blooded vampire, the last of the original race. His kind li
ved for thousands of years until they chose to die, or went insane and were put out of their misery by one of their own. By the time Saloman was at the height of his power, there were hardly any others left, and he killed the last of them himself. Modern vampires are mere human hybrids. In any case, if Saloman’s body felt like stone, it took centuries for it to get like that. Contemporary accounts make the point that lying there, staked through the heart, he looked only too alive. Listen, Mihaela will come and collect you. . . .”
“No, please, I’ll be fine here.” She gave a laugh that was both breathless and rueful. “After all, if Saloman’s ‘protecting’ me, I couldn’t be safer, could I?” At least for tonight.
“Actually, yes, you could be a lot safer. I’ve just had word from my informant that Zoltán is in Transylvania.”
“Zoltán?”
“The regional leader of the vampires of Hungary, Romania, and Croatia. He’s heard about Saloman, and about you. And he wants you both dead. The attack on you tonight might even have been instigated by him, or by someone trying to curry favor. He’s summoned the local vampires to him. Elizabeth, it really is time you got out of here.”
Dmitriu wasn’t stupid. When they made it unmolested to the farmhouse door, he obligingly kicked it open and stood aside for Saloman to enter first. So it was that as Saloman strolled inside, it was he rather than Dmitriu who bore the brunt of the attack.
What interested Dmitriu was that although perhaps fifteen vampires filled that bare kitchen, just one of them flew at Salo - man’s throat. Dmitriu saw no reason to intervene. Saloman barely needed two hands to catch the stupid creature, before sinking his fangs and draining him dry. The body fell at his feet and exploded into silver dust that danced in the light of the flaming torches on the wall.
“Thank you,” said Saloman, as if grateful for the welcome, and walked forward into the room. Dmitriu elected to follow him.
The whole house reeked of human death. Zoltán was easy to spot, sprawled in the only armchair as if it were his throne. His foot rested on a pale, human body, which in death was bent into a grotesque shape.
Blood on Silk Page 5
