“Rom,” I pleaded. “Don’t.”
After standing, I took a moment to luxuriate in how much better my feet felt no longer trapped in those tennis shoes.
"Have you seen Juliette?” I asked.
“No.” Billy 's face contorted for a moment before he brought it back to neutral. “I keep asking, but the prince refuses.”
Walking over to the wardrobe, I then opened it and found a particularly gorgeous lavender ball gown with pearls sewn into the bodice.
“Perhaps we should all get ready for this ball or whatever tonight, ” I examined the matching lavender silk shoes sat on a shelf above the dress. "The party’s the thing wherein to catch the conscience of the prince,” I paraphrased Hamlet.
“Huh?” Billy grunted. “I don’t think that guy has a conscience.”
“Never mind, douchebag,” Rom said.
My honey's American English really had improved, I thought.
Chapter Twenty-Three
The ballroom at the foot of the grand staircase glistened under the twinkling lights of three enormous crystal chandeliers. Musicians at the far end of the room played a waltz while elegantly clad couples twirled, as if floating, on the dance floor. Other partygoers lined the perimeter, chatting to each other in clustered groups.
A quick scan of the room failed to produce the sight I most wanted to see: Juliette.
Having dressed in the lavender ball gown, I’d tamed my wild hair into an upsweep that took roughly fifty bobby pins to achieve. I looked pretty good, I thought. Rom was typically gorgeous in a tuxedo with black bow tie.
Taking Rom’s arm, we descended the red-carpeted treads of the staircase. Abruptly, the music stopped mid-tune. The dancers jerked to a halt. The groups ceased chatting and their heads pivoted in our direction. Every eye in the room stared up at us. The expressions on their faces swiftly went from placid interest, or perhaps minor boredom, to what could only be described as hungry. One hundred pairs of eyes reddened and gleamed. One hundred sets of lips curled back to reveal elongated, sharp incisors. Vampires. A ballroomful of vampires.
Rom and I stopped our descent.
A hiss began with one guest at the back of the ballroom. The sound spread until they all seemed to quiver, like cats eyeing a bird. Obviously, it was just like that, except we were the birds. At any second I expected them to break and run at us. If they did, we’d be torn limb from limb and drained dry.
The wigged butler at the double doors to the ballroom knocked his six foot gilded staff against the floor.
“His Royal Highness, the Prince Leopold,” he announced.
The double doors swung open allowing the prince, clad in a tuxedo that fit him like a second skin, to sweep in with Eugene scurrying after him. The prince glanced about the room taking in the tableau. His serene smile quickly fell into a scowl.
“What is this?” he bellowed. “These are our honored guests.” He marched forward and stood between his subjects and us. “Disrespect for my guests shows disrespect for me. And disrespect for your sovereign is treason.”
The prince wound his way among the guests, glaring at each until their teeth disappeared out of sight and a civilized veneer dropped into place.
Several guests visibly backed away, bowing.
“That is better,” the prince pronounced with a smile. “Music,” he commanded and the waltz resumed.
Once the dancing began again, the prince proceeded to the foot of the stairs. Rom and I descended to join him. When we reached the bottom, I curtsied. Or at least the best curtsy I could perform.
This seemed to please the prince.
“Excellent,” he exclaimed glancing from me to Rom. “You both are quite elegant tonight.”
The prince held out his hand. I placed my hand in his and he brought the back to his lips for a kiss.
“I am so happy you finally accepted my invitation, Kizzy. We shall play chess later. This time in person.”
“Your highness. Where’s Juliette?” I asked.
“Oh come now, dear Kizzy.” The prince placed my arm through his before walking me further into the ballroom.
Over my shoulder I saw Rom scowling.
“You must be patient. All in good time,” the prince continued.
Billy appeared from a corner of the room, nervously jerking at the sleeves of his tux.
“Ah, but here is your other friend,” Prince Leopold said.
“Still haven’t got him to produce Juliette?” Billy tugged at his collar. “You’re such a loser, Taylor.”
The prince's brows converged in a vee. “Your antics have somewhat amused me since your arrival," Prince Leopold said to Billy. "But that amusement wears thin. And tonight you behave as an ill-mannered oaf. I do not think I will make you a baronet after all.”
The prince leaned in. "Take care or I shall remove more than just the possibility of a title."
Billy flushed but, for once, had the good sense to remain quiet.
“Nevertheless, you are wrong. I will show Kizzy her stepsister.” The prince inclined his head to a guard and the uniformed ghoul crossed the ballroom and then exited.
In short order the double doors opened wide and a flatbed gilded cart rolled in.
The music stopped and the vampire partygoers fell into silence as they parted to make way. The ogres pulling the cart brought it to a halt in the center of the room.
Positioned atop the flatbed was something that resembled a giant ice cube. Inside the cube stood Juliette, her hands pressed flat against the surface. Her mouth moved, but no sound escaped her enclosure.
“Juliette,” Billy cried.
Out of the corner of my eye I caught sight of two ghoul guards holding him back. However, no one stopped me. Running as fast as I could in the high-heeled dress shoes, I pulled the hem of the dress up so as not to trip.
Who cared if I was showing my legs to every Tom, Dick and Vlad in the place?
Drawing the skirt up further, I climbed onto the cart and placed my own palms against Juliette’s. The surface felt like glass but was cold to the touch.
“Help,” Juliette mouthed.
“I will,” I mouthed back to her. Turning to gaze over my shoulder at the prince, I asked, “What have you done to her?”
“Why nothing,” Prince Leopold replied. “She is perfectly safe as you see.”
“Safe in what?”
“A universe of her very own." He grinned. "When I discovered from my ghoul Stephan that you wished to send him through the portal in order to obtain Juliette’s return, I of course took action to prevent this.”
Stephan, dressed as a groomsman, bowed to me from his position near one of the exits.
The prince motioned and a figure stepped forward. The man, or whatever he was, wore a fez hat and an ill-fitting, tattered brown smoking jacket over white dress shirt and black pants.
“The royal court’s wizard, Gethin,” the prince said, pointing to the fez wearer. “He cast a spell removing Juliette from the universe of the Dorcha so that she could not be pulled back into your world when Stephan returned. Ingenious really.”
“Yeah,” I murmured. And just how were we going to break this spell? I’d left my watch in the guestroom. Nevertheless I knew pretty much what it said. We had less than seven hours to figure out a way.
“Orchestra. More music,” the prince ordered.
After a few random notes, another tune began. Couples commenced dancing again, this time circling the cart.
“Come Kizzy.” The prince held his hand up to help me climb from the cart and then he led me to the front of the room. “We shall have a dance."
“Bitch!” Billy screamed from the sidelines.
Prince Leopold turned a glare on Billy. "I warned you." The prince snapped his fingers at a guard. "Take him," he ordered.
As the guard dragged Billy away, I heard him call out, “I’m gonna kill you, Taylor.”
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Whatever. Billy was the least of my worries. Although I, as one of the teens
he'd tormented, would have liked nothing more than for the prince to feed Billy to the nearest ghoul, I felt obligated as a fellow human to step in.
"You're not going to have anything permanent done to Billy are you?"
"In deference to you, dear Kizzy," Prince Leopold replied. "I will merely have him taken to his room and give him an opportunity to calm himself."
I nearly laughed. Billy had been sent for a time out.
A snap of his fingers brought another ghoul guard running to the prince's side. He whispered to the guard who nodded and scurried away.
The prince put a hand to my waist and whirled me into my first waltz ever. The last thing I wanted to do was dance, but it didn’t seem like a good idea to deny the vicious vampire...particularly when I wanted his cooperation.
Although I didn't know the steps to the dance, I needn't have worried since my feet barely touched the floor. The ease with which the prince handled me, spoke volumes about his supernatural strength. We twirled around the room and each time we passed her, my eyes met Juliette’s inside her cold prison.
After the dance was over, Rom claimed my arm and led me away. Prince Leopold took the arm of a beautiful vampire and returned to the dance floor.
“We shall not go near the refreshment table,” Rom said as we walked “Punch bowls of human blood, eyeballs as appetizers—”
“Enough,” I groaned. “I get the nauseating picture.”
“We must escape.”
Obviously. But what do you suggest?”
He had no answer.
Somehow we ended up on the terrace. The night air was refreshingly clean and brisk. Beyond, and partially hidden in the shadows of the night, lay the gardens. We wandered down the stairs and made our way to an illuminated fountain with a representation of some goddess and water spitting from an urn. In the pond of the fountain enormous orange Koi swam among the lily pads.
I sat down on the edge and Rom joined me.
“What are we going to do?” I gazed down at my hands as they twisted in my lap. “There doesn’t seem any way out of this mess. I told you it would be another fool’s errand. I’m a failure again and it looks like we'll be stuck in this nightmare world forever.”
Rom stilled my hands with his. He placed a finger on my jaw lifting my gaze to his. “You're not a failure. You have found the poultice for my arm. You have found Juliette and Billy. The rest shall come.”
“Do you still find me delightful?” I asked jokingly.
“Even more so as you are dressed tonight,” he said with seriousness in his tone and an earnest gaze.
Reaching a hand up I placed it at his nape and drew Rom’s head toward mine. Our mouths met. This being only my second French kiss I think I did a pretty good job of looping and twining my tongue with his and not slobbering or anything.
Rom deepened the kiss and pulled me onto his lap, on top of his strong thighs, so that we were chest to chest. My breasts, made ample by the efforts of the bustier top of the dress, flattened against his hard muscles. His hands caressed my bare shoulders and then down to the small of my back. His touch sent sparks shooting off behind my closed eyes. My hands clutched at his hair then over his shoulders.
I found forgetfulness and comfort in his arms. And there were other feelings zipping inside me that I still wasn’t brave enough to try to analyze. I would think of nothing but Rom’s mouth, his chest, his thighs, his hands and…his lips.
“Ahem,” a voice came from somewhere nearby, interrupting our interlude. “I’m sorry,” the voice said and I recognized it belonged to Eugene.
Rom and I pulled apart and I jumped off his lap. Standing, Rom placed an arm over my shoulder protectively.
“I hesitate to interrupt, but you should be aware the fish in that fountain are carnivorous and have been known to jump. So…”
“Thanks, for the warning. " I tried not to sound embarrassed. After all why should I care that a ghoul saw me kissing Rom. I took Rom’s hand. “We’ll just go back and, er, dance.”
In the ballroom, Rom proved he could waltz almost as well as the prince. With my hand on his shoulder and his hand around my waist, and our other hands tightly clasped, I almost lost myself in the movement, the glitter of the room, and the music. However, I noticed the cart carrying my stepsister had been removed from the ballroom.
"Juliette is gone. But Prince Leopold is still here.” I inclined my head toward the refreshments area. I saw him tear into a piece of something—I didn’t want to think what—as we danced by.
In another corner Billy, between two guards, hovered nervously and I wondered how he'd persuaded them to let him return. I saw Rom notice him too.
“Maybe Billy saw where they took her,” I said.
Before Rom could respond, the tune ended. The wizard, Gethin, stepped forward and tapped Rom’s back.
“May I have the next dance with the lady?” Gethin asked.
Rom didn’t seem pleased but he gave a small bow and moved to the perimeter. Gethin placed his hand at my waist. As the music began, he swung me into step and promptly trod on my foot.
“Ow,” I cried.
“Forgive me,” Gethin squeaked. “I’m not a very good dancer.”
“In that case, why am I being given this honor?”
“”I wanted to warn you not to trust the prince."
Really? That information was hardly newsworthy.
“The prince will seek to use you. Your life will become a hellish torture." Just as he said the word "torture" he stepped on my foot again.
Grimacing, I restrained a groan. “Sounds like personal experience.”
“I saved his life. Yet he repaid me by making me his slave. The vampires are the only aristocrats here,” he groused, my toes crunching under his foot yet again.
“You seem to have a pretty important position here,” I noted.
“Important?” His lips bent into a sour twist. “I’ve made all this possible and am given no recompense. Look at the clothes I have to wear,” He leaned back to show me his outfit. This caused me to stumble over him before we started the dance again. “One hundred and thirty years of serving him,” Gethin said. “Haven’t I paid enough?”
Personally, given how my feet had suffered during this dance, I didn’t think so.
“Why are you telling me all this?” I asked, praying the song would end soon.
“Because you want to escape,” he said. “And so do I. If you vow to take me through the portal with you, I will help you and your friends.”
After the debacle with Amy, I wondered whether his request was genuine. On the other hand, wanting to get out of this nightmare dimension made sense to me.
“I have no choice but to agree." If this guy could create a whole different world for Juliette, he could surely get us out of here.
“Meet me in the stables in two hours. I shall be there with your stepsister.”
“Can you also get a message to someone on the outside?” I asked.
“Certainly.” Gethin grinned. “You need only tell me who and I will send it by locater spell.”
As the song ended, I told him the content of the message and its recipient. He bowed to me and trotted happily away as Rom approached.
“What was that?” Rom asked.
“Plan B,” I replied before explaining my conversation with Gethin. “We need to get Billy before we meet the wizard,” I stated.
“Mayhap we should leave him in this dimension.”
As much as I disliked the jerk, I couldn't agree. I didn't want to be responsible for anyone's death not even Billy
“No, we can't do that. Namia the ghoul, Billy's counter-part, is in my world. We can't leave her there.”
Rom nodded with a rueful grimace.
“We also need to find the stables.”
“Leave these tasks in my care,” he said and then headed for the double doors through which Juliette’s cart had entered.
As Rom slipped out, the lights dimmed and a hush fell over the crowd. A bi
llowing white screen floated down from the ceiling before hovering above the crowd. A kind of movie began to play.
I observed Gethin in the corner wielding a wand with a sour twisted expression and assumed he had produced this marvel.
Wow, our school AV department would have gotten a thrill from this.
A royal crest and the words “One hundred twenty-five years of excellence” flitted across the screen. The images changed cutting from one to another, all of them pictures of Prince Leopold doing what I assumed were his tasks as a monarch. Sitting at a desk, riding in a carriage, shaking hands with his subjects...the sequence was set to a musical background. Heck this was some kind of corporate ra ra promo film and the prince was the corporation.
The prince's voice interjected itself as the narrator. “One hundred fifty eight years ago, I was born the eighth child of the queen of this realm.” Cut to a cute baby picture...awwww.
Rom re-entered the room and weaved his way through the crowd—many vampires casting him avaricious glances—to reach me. He nodded and I took that to mean he’d accomplished his tasks.
“Billy will meet us in your room,” he whispered.
The film continued. “In 1870,” the prince narrated. “I was tragically struck down and almost perished.” Cut to a pathetic photo of him lying in a bed. “But tragedy turned to triumph and I arose from this sick bed a better, stronger, more intelligent being; I arose super-human, an immortal.”
No credit was given to Gethin. I bet he loved that.
Cut to several clips of Prince Leopold being all vampirey including some grisly biting and limb tearing. Ewww.
“At first I fought my manifest vampiric destiny.” An image of the prince looking conflicted and angsty played across the screen. “But I came to embrace my fate and chose to make myself the successor to my mother’s crown.” The screen filled with successive clips of the prince meting out horrific deaths to his siblings—his siblings being identified with captioning for those who didn’t recognize them.
Helpful.
These clips were followed by one of him tearing at the throat of an old woman. I didn’t need a caption to identify this victim.
Paranormal Realities Box Set Page 22
