Dark Ages Clan Novel Ventrue: Book 12 of the Dark Ages Clan Novel Saga

by Matthew McFarland

  “Not uncommon, either. What of it?”

  “When you looked down…” She stopped, looked up him with eyes so weak they made him wince. “I didn’t see myself. I saw her.” With that, she turned and left the room.

  Her. Jürgen knew who Christof meant, of course.

  Rosamund.

  Chapter Two

  “This is all, then?” Jürgen looked over the prisoners with some distaste. Hans, Jürgen’s jailor, nodded. The nod was too familiar, Jürgen thought. Hans was growing too comfortable in his role, taking too many liberties simply because he knew that Jürgen would not drink his blood. Jürgen fed only on prisoners of war. ”Those taken in battle, alive or dead, I own, and will claim my tribute,” the Sword-Bearer told his troops before any battle. The jailor therefore assumed that, since he was a ghoul in Jürgen’s service, he was safe and could behave as though he was the prince’s familiar or friend, instead of a lackey.

  Jürgen turned towards the jailor, facing the man down. “Answer me, Hans.”

  “Yes, sir. That is all.” Hans looked confused and frightened. He did not realize his crimes; he had meant no offense. Jürgen considered that for a moment, and then let the issue pass. Hans served him well.

  “All right, then.” Jürgen stepped forward and pinned one of the prisoners against the wall. The man began to protest, but Jürgen didn’t even bother trying to place the man’s accent. He sank his fangs into the prisoner’s wrist. The prisoner—still a soldier, despite his fear, beat at Jürgen’s back for a moment before the Kiss took hold, and then slumped against the wall, trying in vain to fight the pleasure that numbed his mind.

  Jürgen often wondered about the Kiss. He had only felt it once as a mortal, during his Embrace. He didn’t remember the kind of pleasure that most kine seemed to feel, a sensual and carnal euphoria that Cainite poets spoke so blushingly of in their works. He remembered submission, as a vassal submits to a lord or (he imagined) a priest submits to God, but nothing he would describe as particularly pleasurable, ordinarily.

  But then there is Rosamund. And that wasn’t mere pleasure… that was nothing he could describe.

  The man under his fangs shuddered suddenly, and let out a quiet death rattle. Jürgen glanced up, startled, and the wound on the man’s wrist released a tiny gout of blood, enough to stain the Sword-Bearer’s shirt. He dropped the corpse and looked at the others. They were all pale, but that was to be expected in prisoners. And yet there was something else, something about the way they were sitting, their backs to the walls but hands pressed to the floor as though hiding something….

  Jürgen crossed the room and yanked up another prisoner. The man protested, but weakly. Something was wrong with these people. Jürgen never kept vessels long enough for them to become ill—although he knew he had nothing to fear from plague, the illness left a fetid taste on the blood that he found quite unpalatable. These prisoners didn’t look sick. They simply looked drained and weak. He turned the man around and examined his back, and then pulled up his arms and looked at the wrists. He found nothing. In frustration, he spun the man around again and peered into his thoughts.

  As useful an ability as it was to be able to steal the very memories and thoughts of another, Jürgen detested using it. His line—the Ventrue, the Clan of Kingship—prided itself on ruling because they were meant to rule, not because they could tell people what they wished to hear. And yet, as the most powerful vampires in Europe fought each other, the traditional structures were breaking down, and he was forced to resort to such trickery much more often. Reading the mind of a Cainite, while distasteful, was often fascinating, although Jürgen preferred to avoid it. Using the power on mortals, however, was utterly disgusting.

  Jürgen pushed aside the man’s will as a woman would clear away cobwebs, but even so, he felt the man’s thoughts crowding in him. Fear, loneliness, even lust clung to him like blood and shit from a battlefield. Worse, really—those scents had an earthy purity that Jürgen could appreciate. The stench of a mortal’s mind wasn’t oppressive or even heady, it was insidious, and his mind would feel it for nights afterwards.

  Nonetheless, he continued. He saw the man’s capture. He saw the man being led to the room, chained, locked in with his fellows. He saw long nights of prayer and mewling before God, saw their horror when a figure entered the room to drink their blood.

  But Jürgen had never visited these people before.

  Jürgen withdrew his senses from the man’s mind, and the prisoner twitched in his grasp like a peasant woman in the grip of a randy knight. With a scowl, Jürgen dropped him. The Beast hissed for more blood, but Jürgen had quite lost his appetite for these vessels. He turned towards Hans, who was standing in the doorway with eyes with as big as wagon wheels.

  “What did you hope to accomplish, Hans?” Jürgen didn’t bother subsuming Hans’s mind; he knew the jailor would answer a direct question honestly.

  “I hoped… to become like you, sir.”

  As infuriating as it was, Jürgen laughed aloud. “Did you think the Gifts of Caine were so easily stolen? That all you had to do was drink the blood of a few captured soldiers and you would walk among them as a god, as a Scion?” He shook his head. “Hans, you amuse me. You disgust me, too, of course, and you have violated my trust and the oaths you swore to me, but you do amuse me. Were it so easy to become what I am, do you not think that others—others more learned or more clever than you—would have found out that secret long ago?” Jürgen walked to the quivering jailor, grabbed him by the shirt and pulled the door key from around his neck. “The Gifts of Caine can only be given, and my gifts are given only to those who are worthy. You are simply a jailor who victimizes his prisoners—and that serves no end except for making terrified prisoners. For my purposes, that won’t do.”

  Hans managed to croak out the word “mercy” before the prince threw him against the wall. The jailor fell to the floor, bleeding but alive. Jürgen nodded back to the prisoners. “Take back your blood, if you wish.” He shut the door behind him, reminding himself to arrange for the corpse he’d left to be removed within the next few nights. He’d let Christof deal with Hans’s punishment, provided the other prisoners didn’t kill him first.

  The door to the prison led directly out into the night air. While the prison was certainly in better repair than many other such places—after all, to Jürgen it was more like a larder than a jail, and he had no desire to feed in a place that smelled like a privy—the air was stale and smelled of old blood. The night was cool, and Jürgen took a moment to listen to the world around him. Somewhere nearby, two people were sparring with swords—from the sounds of the blows and the timber of their grunts, he guessed it was Václav teaching one of the younger Knights of the Black Cross some of the maneuvers the eastern vampires used. He began to walk towards the sound, but a set of footsteps behind him caught his attention. His seneschal, Heinrich, stopped respectfully behind him and waited to be acknowledged.

  “Yes?” Jürgen was aware his tone was harsh, but he wasn’t having a pleasant night.

  “A messenger, my lord. He wonders if you can see him tonight, or if he should return.”

  Jürgen glanced off towards the sound of steel on steel, and shook his head. It wasn’t battle, but it was as close as he was likely to get for some time. “Tonight, I think. Where is he?”

  Heinrich smiled. “Right this way.” Jürgen looked down at his steward. Heinrich had a bounce to his step that usually indicated he was moments away from securing a large amount of money or goods. Jürgen didn’t ask; he knew Heinrich would tell him within a few seconds. Heinrich was shrewd, but had trouble containing good news. “The messenger is really quite an interesting fellow,” he said.

  “Do tell,” sighed Jürgen.

  “He’s a zealot, I think. I’m not sure.” Jürgen almost groaned. Zealots were annoying—the wrong word could send them into a violent frenzy and he wasn’t in the mood to have to write a letter to the messenger’s master explaining why sendi
ng Brujah on courier missions was risky. He’d already had to do that once, when a Brujah representative from the baronies of Avalon had flown into frenzy after taking a comment about Scotsmen the wrong way. Mithras, fortunately, had been understanding, but the incident was embarrassing. “He’s got a book with him—a collection of notes on the Via Regalis. It’s written by someone called Acindynus.”

  “Acindynus?” Jürgen stopped short, trying to place the name. “The scholar? What does he want with me?”

  Heinrich stopped as well, but fidgeted, obviously wanting to bring Jürgen to the messenger. “I don’t know, exactly. He just said he wanted you to read what he brought, as other noble Cainites had done.”

  Jürgen started walking again. He had heard of this sort of thing. Ashen priests of the Road of Heaven sometime made notes in the margins of their Bibles, notes in languages long dead or in code that only other Cainites would understand. But the enforcers of his own road—the justicars—didn’t bother with such obfuscation. And what possible message could Acindynus have for him, secret or otherwise? He was a soldier, not a philosopher. Jürgen was intrigued, but rather feared that it would turn out to be a waste of time. Or, worse yet, that it might be some ephemeral matter of the soul or the mind that he would be happy to hear about but could not, in any way, contribute to.

  Possibly Rosamund could, however. Rosamund was much more able to put a poetical spin on matters that Jürgen merely found practical. He knew that many Cainites waxed poetic about the roads they walked, about the moral codes they used to keep their ravening Beasts in check and about the disposition of their souls. Jürgen, of course, knew the disposition of his soul. He had made his own decision in that regard, and had never doubted it.

  “You mentioned other Cainites had read this messenger’s works, Heinrich. Did he say who exactly had done so? And also, what’s the messenger’s name?”

  Heinrich opened a door into the keep for his master, and his eyes rolled heavenward as he thought. “I remember him mentioning Prince Mithras of London, and of course Acindynus. I seemed to recall the name Rodrigo, as well, but I don’t know who that is.” Jürgen shook his head; “Rodrigo” sounded Italian or Aragonese to him, but he wasn’t sure. “The messenger calls himself Rudolphus, but I suspect it to be a name he’s using while here in Germany. His accent is strange. It isn’t that I can’t place it—it actually sounds like he was born and raised in Magdeburg, but since he wasn’t—”

  “I understand. Pay it no mind. He’s a messenger, a professional traveler. Such men are paid to be invisible to all but those meant to see them. Lord knows I hire them occasionally. They are meant be,” he paused and grimaced, “ghosts.”

  Heinrich closed the door behind them. He gave Jürgen a quizzical look, but did not ask. That was just as well. Jürgen had no wish to discuss his own particular “ghost” with Heinrich. A clanless vampire called Albin the Ghost had once served Jürgen, and had subsequently betrayed him. Jürgen had unwisely spared him, but then sent him on a mission Jürgen had assumed was suicide. Albin hadn’t returned and now didn’t respond to summons. Just one more thing I should attempt to resolve before leaving, Jürgen mused, though I’m sure Christof could handle the wretch should he reappear.

  The two Cainites walked down the hall in silence, and from the hall where Jürgen received new guests, they heard two people, a man and a woman, laughing politely. It seems, thought Jürgen, that my visitor has not been wanting for entertainment. He entered the room ahead of Heinrich; the seneschal surely noted the breach of protocol, but the breach was Jürgen’s to make.

  Rosamund stood, and Jürgen stopped. Every fiber in his body willed him to keep walking, to greet—or even look at—his guest, but he could not but stop and look at her. He met her eyes and tried to smile. He dropped his eyes to her red lips and tried to speak.

  Rosamund drifted to his side and touched his hand, and for one brief but excruciating second Jürgen saw in his mind’s eye what Christof had described earlier—Rosamund kneeling before him to drink of his blood. Jürgen pulled his hand away. Rosamund gave him a strange, slightly hurt look, but Jürgen finally found his manhood and smiled gently at her. Then, at last, he turned his attention to the messenger.

  Rudolphus stood patiently, and when the prince finally looked to him, he bowed deeply. He was stained from the road, but only someone with the keen senses of a Cainite would notice. He wore dark robes—a mortal traveling by night might well mistake him for a friar, if the mortal were to see him at all. A short sword lay on a table, well out of arm’s reach—he obviously understood the etiquette of court enough to know that a civilized man does not wear arms in the presence of a Cainite prince he does not serve. A leather satchel hung around his neck, and Jürgen could smell ink and wax from inside it.

  “My Lord Jürgen, permit me to introduce myself. I am called Rudolphus, and I serve Acindynus, a scholar of the Clan of Kings. I have come to deliver to you a letter and a book from my master.” He opened the satchel and pulled forth a folded slip of paper sealed with an imprint Jürgen had never seen and a thick sheaf of bound papers.

  Jürgen took the letter and the book, but did not open either. Instead, he looked over his visitor. He looked low-blooded to Jürgen, but that might well have simply been the dust of the road. The man’s bearing was impressive enough; he had obviously been trained well, but who knew how many years had passed since that training? The prince glanced at Heinrich, who was still smiling broadly, and then back at Rosamund, who had seated herself and was waiting patiently to be addressed. Jürgen saw no reason to distrust the messenger, other than the fact that he was a messenger. “How long do you plan to stay here in Magdeburg, good sir Rudolphus?”

  “If I could impose upon you to read the letter tonight and give me the answer to the question it contains, I could leave as early as tomorrow night, my lord.”

  Jürgen nodded. The letter looked brief enough, and he had no desire to leave Magdeburg with a newly arrived Cainite in the city. “And where will you go from here?”

  The messenger looked thoughtful. “Actually, I hadn’t made that decision yet. It depends, again, on your answer to the question in the letter.”

  Rosamund smiled. “Much depends on this letter, it seems. Don’t make us wait any longer, my prince.”

  Jürgen felt his mood lighten when she spoke. He glanced at her face, afraid that she was employing one of the gifts of her clan, but she merely looked beautiful. He took up the letter and broke the seal, and read aloud:

  Most honored and revered Prince of Magdeburg,

  I am called Acindynus, and am considered something of a scholar among the Nobility of the Night. In an effort to collect thoughts and information regarding the Via Regalis from those most suited to rule (and therefore to walk our road) I have sent my messenger to you, bearing my written works. You may read them and inscribe whatever comments you feel are appropriate. When you have made a notation, I ask only that you inscribe a symbol or mark that other Cainites will know as yours—this serves to keep the words and thoughts of the great princes separate from the seneschals and keepers who have also committed their thoughts to paper. Of course any Cainite’s view may be of interest, but in matters of kings, it is truly the kings who matter.

  While reading the Letters, you may discover notations from allies, vassals, friends and enemies. You may read commentary that is counter to your own philosophies and even offensive. I ask, however, that you not mark out or destroy anything that you read here. “By his fruits shall you know him,” after all, and that wisdom extends to foolish or crass words as well as wisdom and insight.

  When you have finished, my messenger will take the book and continue on his way. I assume responsibility for any of his actions while he is visiting your city, though he has served me faithfully for many years and has never caused me any embarrassment. If you choose not to lend your wisdom to these pages, I will not fault you for it—there is much to demand your time in the current nights. However, please feel free to
keep the book as long as necessary. We have nothing but time, after all.

  I thank you for your time and look forward to reading your thoughts on the rights of kings.

  Regere Sanguine Regere In Veritaem Est,

  Acindynus,

  Childe of Phoebe,

  Childe of Marcus Verus,

  Childe of Mithras,

  Childe of Veddartha

  Jürgen lingered over the signature and Acindynus’s lineage. “Marcus Verus,” he murmured, “is one of Mithras’s Barons, but I did not know he was a childe of the Prince of London as well.”

  Rudolphus nodded. “Baron Marcus declined to make any comments in this book himself. He said something about it being a waste of time, but I did not spend much time in his fief. The British Isles are strange lands, my lord.”

  “So I have heard,” Jürgen replied, casting a look towards Rosamund. She hailed from England, but had never visited her home as a Cainite. Jürgen had, while still in the direct service of his sire, but it had been years. He remembered the country being prone to rain, and that the wilds were even stranger and more infested with Lupines than the German forests.

  The room grew quiet. Rosamund gazed at Jürgen as though expecting him to ask her something. Rudolphus cast a glance back at Heinrich, who smiled cheerfully. Jürgen looked at the book, and then back at the letter. The fire crackled and popped from across the room, far enough away that even the most fearful Cainite wouldn’t be unnerved.

  After a long moment, Jürgen spoke again to the messenger. “I would very much like to read this book and perhaps to add my own thoughts, though I caution you that I am a soldier, not a philosopher.”

  Rudolphus smiled. “Other noble Cainites have said as much, and their contributions are much prized. I am sure yours will be invaluable to our road.”

  “However,” Jürgen continued, “I am leaving on a matter of some importance. I cannot give this project the time it deserves before I leave, and I certainly can’t ask that you leave the book here or wait while I am gone.” The messenger looked disappointed; Jürgen suspected he was as intrigued by this scholarly endeavor as his master. “I have a solution, though, but it requires some trust on your part.”