01 Those Who Hunt The Night ja-1

by Barbara Hambly

  "Yes, it was," Anthea replied. "Why?"

  "Because there's a wound here-look."

  They gathered close, Ysidro rising from his chair and even Ernchester stumbling out of his shocked lethargy to look around his tall wife's shoulder.

  "It has to have been done as she died, or after," Simon said after a moment, his long fingers brushing the pinched flesh. "Something that small would heal almost instantly on one of us. See?" With uncon-cerned deftness he drew the pearl-headed stick pin from his gray silk cravat and plunged its point deep into his own wrist. When he withdrew it, a bead of blood came up like a ruby, and he wiped it away with a fastidious handkerchief Asher had a momentary glimpse of a tiny hole, which closed up again, literally before his eyes.

  "She'd no such thing when she were made," Grippen put in, leaning close, his words weighted with the nauseating reek of blood. Asher realized the master vampire must have fed while he and Ysidro were waiting for him to finish with the police at Charing Cross; it had be-come, to him, a matter of almost academic note. "I knew every inch of her body and 'twas flawless as mapping linen."

  He looked sidelong at Asher, grayish, gleaming eyes full of intelligent malice. "We are as we were when we were made, sithee. I'd this..." He held out a square, hairy hand, to show a faint scar cutting over the back of it. "... from carving an abscess out of a damned Lombard's thigh, and the clothhead fighting the scalpel every inch of the way, damn him."

  "Like Dante's damned," Ysidro murmured lightly, "we are eternally renewed from the cuts we receive in Hell." Ernchester covered his face and looked away.

  "Interesting." Asher turned his attention back to the white arm in its slender shroud of lace. "It's as if her blood were drawn with a needle, as well as drunk."

  "A frugal villain."

  "Not so frugal, if he's in the habit of slaughtering nine men in a night." Anthea's dark brows pulled together in a frown.

  "His human friend, then?"

  "What use would a living man have for a vampire's blood?"

  Grippen shrugged. "An he were an alchemist. I'd have sold much for it, in the days when my own veins

  weren't bursting with the stuff..."

  "An alchemist," Asher said slowly, remembering Lydia strolling along the rocky brink of a lake of boiling blood, a beaker in her hand. Reaching down to dip it full.. .I wanted to examine him medically, she had said... The articles about blood viruses in her rooms...

  "Or a doctor." He looked up again at them grouped behind him- Ysidro, Grippen, and the vampire Countess of Ernchester. "Take me back to Lydia's rooms. There's something there I need to see."

  "A doctor would have the equipment for drawing blood, and for storing it once it was drawn." Seated at Lydia's desk, Asher leafed unhandily through the chaos of notes and lists in his wife's sprawling script, pick-ing up and discarding them and searching under the heaped papers for more. He was so tired his flesh ached, but he felt, as he often had in the midst of his work abroad or on a promising track in some research library in Vienna or Warsaw, an odd, fiery lightness that made such consideration academic.

  "This is somewhat embarrassing," Ysidro remarked, studying the Ordnance Survey map on the wall with its clusterings of colored pins. "I had no idea you hunted so much to a pattern, Lionel."

  " 'Tisn't I as leaves my carrion where it may be fallen over by girls out a-maying," Grippen retorted, turning the newspaper clippings over roughly. " 'Bermondsey Slasher,' forsooth!"

  "I think that was Lotta." Ysidro walked over to where Asher had turned his attention to the pile of medical journals on the bed, opening them to the marked articles and taking mental note of the topics: Some Aspects of Blood Pathology; Psychic Phenomena, Heredity or Hoax; Breeding a Better Briton. "What would a doctor want with a vampire?"

  "Study," Asher replied promptly. "You have to make allowance for the scientific mind-if Lydia met you, she'd be pestering you for a sample of your blood within the first five minutes."

  "Sounds like Hyacinthe," Ysidro remarked. "It still does not explain how such a partnership commenced-why a vampire would work for a human, doctor though he may be..."

  "No?" Asher looked up from the stiff pages of the journals. "I can think of only one reason a vampire would go into partnership with a doctor and would reveal to him who and what he was-the same reason you went into partnership with me. Because he needed his services."

  "Balderdash," Grippen snarled, stepping close to tower over him. "We're free of mortal ills..."

  "What about immortal ones?" Asher cut him off. "If the virus of vampirism began to change, began to mutate, either as the result of long-ago exposure to the Plague or from some other cause..."

  "Virus forsooth! Ills have root in the humors of the body.,."

  "Then if the humors of the vampire flesh slipped out of true," Asher continued smoothly, "what could a vampire do? Say a vampire who had lived in secret, even from other vampires-or any vampire, for that matter-if he found himself suddenly, frenziedly craving the blood of other vampires or knew himself in danger of going on rampages for human blood, as you said was an occasional symptom that developed in a few of those who had been exposed to the Plague. If he found himself transforming, day by day, into the thing I saw at your house, Grippen -if he knew such a course would inevitably lead to his destruction- wouldn't it be logical for him to seek help wherever he could find it?"

  Grippen looked uncomfortable and angry, black brow lowering like a goaded bull's; beside him, Ysidro's face was inscrutable as always.

  "It might account for the renewed sensitivity to silver," the Spaniard remarked. "Certainly for the wounds caused in his own flesh by the growth of his fangs. And you think this vampire, whoever he was, chose his physician in the same fashion in which I chose you-through jour-nal articles?"

  "He must have," Asher said. "Depending on who it is, he may be forcing the doctor to work as you are forcing me-with a threat against the life of someone he cares for. Maybe that isn't even necessary. Some doctors would welcome the chance to do research on an unknown virus and wouldn't care that they were working for a killer. Or maybe," he added pointedly, his gaze suddenly locking with Ysidro's, "like Calvaire's friends, he's under the impression that he'll win, and that his partner won't kill him when it's over."

  Ysidro's chilly eyes returned his gaze blandly. "I am sure he is quite safe so long as there is a use for him." He turned away and began sorting through the papers scattered across the bed. "And I take it Mistress Lydia discovered the medical partner in the same fashion? Through the journals?"

  "I think so." Asher returned to his own examination, flipping the pages awkwardly with his single good hand. "She may only have had a list of suspects and was visiting them one by one. It would account for her not taking her weapons-the silver knife, the revolver, or the silver nitrate..."

  "Silver nitrate?" Ysidro looked up from a list he'd fished from the floor. "Pox," he added mildly. "I see we're all going to have to go through the tiresome business of changing residences again. Do you really own a place on Caswell Court under the name of Bowfinch, Lionel?"

  "None o' your business an I do!"

  "Filthy neighborhood, anyway. Gin shops everywhere-you can't feed without getting stinking drunk in the process. This one doesn't look familiar..."

  "Twas one of Danny's."

  "I'm surprised he didn't get fleas. As for the one in Hoxton, I wouldn't be buried there, much less sleep the day. Where would she get silver nitrate?"

  Asher nodded toward the little velvet box. Ysidro picked up the hypodermic gingerly, but did not touch the gleaming crystal ampoules. "As a doctor, she'd have access to it-it's used as an antiseptic, I think. I do know most doctors carry it in small quantities."

  "This is scarce a small quantity," the vampire remarked, setting the syringe back in its case. "That much must have cost a pretty penny."

  "I expect it did," Asher said. "But Lydia's an heiress and she's al-ways had control of her own money-though I suspect her father wouldn
't have settled it that way if she'd married someone more re-spectable than a penniless junior don at her uncle's college. I expect she thought to inject the silver nitrate intravenously. It would certainly kill a human, let alone a vampire. It was naive of her," he added quietly. "A vampire's psychic field alone would prevent her from getting that close, and she obviously had no idea of how quickly a vampire can strike."

  "Here's more of the curst things." Grippen came over, carrying a pile of journals which had been stacked

  on the bureau.

  Asher flipped open the dog-eared pages. Viral Mutation. Interaction of Viruses in a Medium. The Pathology of Psychic Phenomena. Eugenics for National Defense. Physical Origins of So-Called Psychic Powers. Iso-lating a Viral Complex in a Serum Medium, He paused, and leafed back through the articles again. They were all by Horace Blaydon.

  Softly, he said, "Dennis Blaydon was a friend of Bertie Westmoreland's. He'd have known Lotta. And through him, Calvaire and anyone with whom Calvaire had associated would have known of Blaydon."

  Eighteen

  It was nearly three in the morning, and the windows of Horace Blaydon's tall brown-brick house on Queen Anne Street were dark.

  "Can you hear anything?" Asher whispered, from the shelter of the comer of Harley Street. "Anyone within?"

  Ysidro bowed his head, colorless hair falling down over his thin fea-tures in the glow of the street lamp, his heavy-lidded eyes shut. The silence in this part of the West End was profound, sunk deep in the sleep of the well-to-do and self-justified who knew nothing of vampires be-yond the covers of yellow-backed penny dreadfuls and gave little thought to how their government got its information about the Ger-mans. The rain had ceased. In an alley, two cats swore at one another- lovers or rivals in love-and there was the smallest flicker of Ysidro's head as he moved to listen and to identify.

  At length he whispered, "It's difficult to tell at this distance. Cer-tainly there's no one in the upper part of the house, though servants sometimes have rooms in the cellars."

  "It has to be here," Asher breathed. "His country place has been closed up for years and it's a good thirty miles as the crow flies. He's a research pathologist-he doesn't have a consulting practice to worry about. His wife died some years ago and his son's in the Life Guards. It wouldn't be difficult to keep him away on some pretext. He's not very bright."

  "He would have to be intensely stupid," Ysidro murmured, "not to notice, if his father were forced into such an alliance as I forced you."

  Asher flattened to the corner of the house and scanned the empty street. "Set your mind at rest."

  It was difficult to tell whether the soft sound in the darkness was a comment or a laugh. "You know this Blaydon," Ysidro then said softly.

  "Is it likely we could win him to our side-turn him, as is said in the parlance of your Foreign Office?"

  "It depends on what his partner's told him." The street before them was still. The lamplight gleamed like fractured metal on the water of the gutters. If Ysidro, turning his head slightly for what even the cob-web nets of his far-flung awareness failed to bring him, could hear nothing, it stood to reason Asher wouldn't, either. But still, Asher's every nerve strained to hear. "I never knew Blaydon well-I went to fetch Lydia at some of his lectures and had been to the Peaks a few times. I think he was piqued that I'd married the Willoughby fortune instead of letting his son do it, but I don't think he held it against me the way Dennis

  did. Horace is a stiff-backed and self-righteous old bigot, but he's honest. He was one of the few dons who stood up to Lydia's father when he wanted her taken out of University-though, of course, at the time Horace had a stake in wanting her to stay.

  "In his place-the vampire's, I mean-I'd make damn sure he thought the Limehouse rampages were the work of the vampires we were tracking."

  "You think he'd believe that?"

  "I think if Dennis were in danger-if the vampire were threatening Dennis' life as you're threatening Lydia's to win my compliance-he'd want to. We did it in the Department all the time. The old carrot-and-stick routine: on the one hand Dennis' life is in danger; on the other, Blaydon can do viral research with what blood he can take, and con-gratulate himself on killing vampires at the same time. He may not even know Lydia's a prisoner or he may know there is a prisoner, but not that it's Lydia. It's surprising how ignorant the right hand can be when it would really rather not know what the left hand is doing,"

  They left the shelter of the corner and glided back like specters through the wet blackness of deep night in October London. "The mews is just past the next street," Ysidro murmured, barely audible even in the utter silence of the empty street. "Do you plan to speak to this Blaydon, then?"

  "If I can," Asher replied, as they slipped into the cobbled, horse-smelling canyon of the mews. "After I get Lydia out of this, and see how the land lies, if possible. Like Lydia-like a lot of people in the medical profession-Horace has a little streak of saintmanqut in him, in his case one of the stiffer-backed Scots variety. It could be the vam-pire is playing on that as well."

  "I would give a good deal to know who it is." The vampire's touch was light on his elbow, guiding him around half-seen obstacles. What little lamplight filtered in from the street glistened on the puddles in the center of the lane, but left the sides in velvet shadow; the air was sweet with the clean smell of hay and the pungency of well-tended horses, prosaic odors and comforting. "I suspect Calvaire came to London to seek in him a partner in power, but I still find it strange that he would have heard of him at all when I had not, much less been able to locate him."

  "Perhaps Brother Anthony told him whom to look for and where to look."

  "Maybe." Ysidro's voice was absolutely neutral, but Asher, who was growing used to the tiniest nuances of his speech, had the impression he was not satisfied. "There are many things here which I do not under-stand, and among them is why Calvaire's appearance on the scene should have triggered these murders-if it did trigger them, and all these matters are not simply a chance juxtaposition in time. It may be that your Mistress Lydia can enlighten us, when we find her, or Blaydon. As I recall, Tulloch the Scot was big, though not so big as you describe. Your height, but bulkier..."

  "No," Asher said. "I looked up at him-he came over the top of me like a wave."

  They moved down the darkness of the mews, scanning the tall, regu-lar cliff of houses visible beyond the stables and cottages. All were dark; it was the ebb-tide hour of the soul. He went on softly, "But conceivably this virus, this mutation, could trigger abnormal growth. It could..."

  The vampire beside him checked, and the slim hand tightened on his arm; turning his head swiftly, Asher caught the glint of the luminous eyes.

  "What is it?"

  The vampire moved a finger, cautioning. For a time, he listened like a hunted man for sounds which he thought he might have heard. Then he shook his head, though his eyes did not relax.

  "Nothing." The word was more within Asher's head than without. In a stable, a horse wickered and stamped sleepily. "I-all of us-have grown used to the idea that as vampires we are, barring acts of violence, immortal, and to the idea that acts of violence are all we need fear. Like Lemuel Gulliver, we were stupidly willing to believe 'immortal' means 'safe from change.' It is disconcerting to learn that there may be terms to that bargain after all."

  Asher felt awkwardly in the pockets of his ulster for the reassuring weight of Lydia's revolver, which, like the one the police had confis-cated from him, was loaded with silver bullets-it was astounding what one could purchase at hyperfashionable West End gunsmiths. He'd also brought both silver knives and even the little hypodermic kit with its ampoules of silver nitrate. He'd found bills from Lambert's, for silver chains and at least one silver letter opener, stuffed into the medical journals as bookmarks, so she hadn't gone out completely unarmed. His own silver chains lay slim and cold over the half-healed bites on his throat and left wrist-the right was muffled in sling and splints and puffed up to twi
ce its normal size-but even so, he felt hopelessly out-gunned.

  The briefest of investigations revealed a brougham and a trim bay hack with one white foot in Blaydon's stables. After a moment's silent listening, Ysidro murmured, "No one in the quarters upstairs, though someone has lived here recently-not more than a few months ago." "He'd have turned off the servants," Asher breathed in return. From the stable's rear door, they could see the tall back of the house, past the few bare trees and the naked shrubs of a narrow town garden. "You can't hear whether someone's in the cellar?"

  Simon's eyes never moved from the house, but Asher could tell he was listening all around him and behind nun, just the same. The night seemed to breathe with unseen presence, Asher's hair prickled with the certainty that somewhere nearby they were being watched; that some-thing listened, as Ysidro was listening, for his single breath and the beat of his solitary heart. By mutual consent, they both backed out of the small stable and into the lane again, where a sound, a commotion, was likely to bring every coachman and dog on the mews.

  "I'm going in." Asher shrugged his arm clear of his ulster; Ysidro caught it and lowered it to the baled hay piled just outside the stable door. With his left hand, Asher fumbled the revolver and a silver knife from the pocket, transferred the revolver to his corduroy jacket; the knife-since he was wearing shoes rather than boots-slid conveniently into his sling. "Can you watch my back?"

  "Don't be a fool." Simon slipped his black Inverness from his shoul-ders, laid it in a soft whisper of velvet-handed wool on the hay, and reached into Asher's jacket pocket for the revolver. He patted the cylin-der gingerly a few times with his other hand, like a man testing for heat inside. Satisfied, he concealed it in his own jacket. "If you had four hours' sleep on the boat from Calais last night, I should be surprised. No, stay here-you should be fairly safe. A cry from you-a sound from you-will wake every groom and dog in the mews, and this vam-pire must remain unsuspected now for his very life."