As Shadows Fade

Six An Unwelcome Summons

“Wayren?” asked Victoria as soon as she saw Max coming toward her. She didn’t have to ask the other question that had burned in her mind all during the long ride home. Though his face looked haggard in the early dawn, and she could see bloodstains all over his clothing, he was walking. Limping, moving slowly, but walking. Thank God.

Thank God.

“Recovered,” he said.

The tension drained from her, then surged back.

They were safe. For now.

Victoria saw Max’s attention shift to Sebastian, who sagged against her, an arm around her neck while she steadied him with one around his waist. She suspected he was exaggerating his weakness just a bit, for his fingers had been tracing little designs under her braid for the last fifteen minutes. The gentle caresses sent shivers skittering over her shoulders, and down along her arms, reminding her that Sebastian, unlike Max, had no problem with intimacy.

At least with her.

When they left the cemetery, Sebastian had been unable to walk on his own, due to a deep slash from hip to knee. Though his face had creased with pain, his eyes gleamed with delight when she suggested that he ride pillion with her so that she could keep him balanced on the cantering horse. His leg was still bleeding; she’d felt the warmth of his blood soak through the back of her left trouser leg as they rode.

And though his leg was immobile, his hands had not been. Settling at her hips, those strong fingers had curled around them like the handles of a teacup as he leaned gently against her wounded back.

Max turned away, moving toward Brim, leaving Victoria and Sebastian to make their way up the three steps onto the front stoop. Kritanu waited in the doorway.

The sun seemed to move suddenly, and all at once, clear yellow beams shone between rooftops and chimney peaks as though the earth’s lamp had been turned brighter. Victoria found it difficult to believe that only hours before, she’d dressed to attend Lady Winnie’s dance and had walked down these very steps in that crimson gown.

Now it felt as though many things had changed, in some indefinable way.

Inside, Victoria went directly to Wayren, who, though she appeared fully recovered, did not rise when they came into the small room.

“Thank you,” she said to Victoria, extending her slender hands.

Victoria took them, feeling the warmth, the peace that always came with Wayren’s touch. She didn’t know as much as she’d like to about the woman. But based on what she’d seen of her at the hands of the demons, she felt as if she’d learned quite a bit tonight. She shook off the older woman’s gratitude. “It was Max who got you to safety.”

Wayren’s fingers tightened over Victoria’s, and their eyes met. “It was both of you. You had to let him go… and he had to go.”

Victoria felt a sudden unexpected flush warm her face, and an automatic desire to pull away. The feelings were still new to her, and so deeply buried that it felt uncomfortable to have them spoken of so easily. So openly. Yet Wayren understood how difficult it had been to send Max away, where she could no longer watch over him… and how, at the same time, she’d known he was the one she could rely on to succeed in taking Wayren to safety.

“What happened?” Victoria asked, easing her aching body onto the floor next to Wayren. She was strangely loath to release the woman’s hands, though her muscles reverberated with the remnants of battle. She ached, she bled, she trembled… yet the protective vis bullae had ensured that it was so much easier than it could have been.

“They took me when I wasn’t expecting it,” Wayren said simply. “I had gone to an old graveyard to see to… something. Not the one in which you found me, I don’t believe. But it’s a bit of a muddle in my mind. The black shadow demons pummeled me, flying into me, weakening me so I couldn’t call on my power, cutting off my resistance.”

Victoria nodded, remembering the feel of those winged creatures shoving into her body, through her, leaving her cold and paralyzed, and shuddered. It was a miracle Wayren hadn’t been killed.

But… she hadn’t been breathing when Victoria found her. No heartbeat. Yet… she moved. Lived.

“Max explained how you found me. Thank God for Myza.” Wayren looked over, and Victoria noticed for the first time that Kritanu cradled the small bird against his body.

“Who or what was it?” Victoria asked. She felt Sebastian brush against her as he limped to a chair nearby, his hand lightly touching the top of her head.

Wayren looked around the room, her serene face grave. “Brim, Michalas… you returned to help. Thank you. And Sebastian.” She looked at him steadily, then nodded. “My thanks.” Her eyes lingered on him a bit longer than necessary, then slid away. “Fallen angels. Demons. They took me… For what purpose, I’m not yet certain. But the very fact that they dared to touch me…” Her eyes looked like cool moonstones for a moment, clear and colorless, as she faded into silence.

Suddenly, she seemed to come back to herself. “I am tired, Victoria, and you must have your injuries seen to. All of you. And some rest. I am safe here… and it will keep until we’ve all had a chance to rest.”

Victoria pulled slowly to her feet, her hand squeezing, then finally releasing Wayren’s. “I’m glad you’ll stay here tonight,” she told the older woman. “We’ll all rest easier.”

The draft that Kritanu had given him leeched away some of the agony radiating through Max’s body, though it pained him to admit it was needed. But it was.

His muscles trembling, his salved wounds still oozing stubbornly, he changed out of his dirty clothes, all the while grimly considering Wayren’s request.

Become a Venator again.

He’d not need the bloody draft if he did. He’d not need to step aside and let a faster, stronger Vioget save a comrade. He’d have no reason to leave.

Yet he couldn’t bear to stay.

Even if he got his Venator capabilities back, he couldn’t. He couldn’t trust himself to be strong enough, to do the right thing.

To share her.

Pouring the still-hot water into the basin, Max felt a wave of steam rise. He splashed it on his face and chest, gasping at the sudden twinge of pain when he moved his arms too vigorously in his ablutions, and pausing to catch his breath.

His face was buried in one of Kritanu’s lemon-scented towels when there came a knock at the door. He flung the door open, startling the twitchy red-haired servant, Oliver. The groom who’d taken his mount earlier tonight had obviously been pressed into other service within the small household.

“Beg your pardon, sir, but my lady wishes you to attend on her,” Oliver said most correctly.

Max glowered at him. “My lady?” Wayren or Victoria?

Oliver looked confused for a moment, then recovered, offering, “Lady Rockley.” Apparently, he didn’t consider Wayren a lady, which wasn’t surprising. Only the Venators-and the evil ones-knew what she was capable of.

Max wadded up the towel and tossed it onto the table. One end flipped over the side of the basin, landing a corner in the water. Blast it. Could she not leave him be? He pulled out his last clean shirt and tugged it over his damp skin, where it seemed to stick everywhere. Just as his head emerged from the opening, he heard the man add, “She awaits you in her chamber.”

Max stilled, his hands crushing into the soft linen. “Her chamber?”

Christ.

Then he centered on the whirl of thoughts-and, damnation, the images-that bit of information invoked, and extracted the most palatable one. Victoria’s face had been dead white and her clothes soaked with blood. Was she injured more severely than he’d thought? She’d never released Wayren’s hand during their short meeting in the parlor.

Max opened his mouth to ask Oliver, but the young man had scuttled off, leaving the door ajar.

There was nothing for it but to “attend to her.”

His mouth closed grimly, his jaw tight, he set off, certain that whatever he found, it wouldn’t be to his liking.

When he reached Victoria’s chamber, his peremptory knock produced no response. Max waited for a moment, then knocked again, a bit harder, and the door edged open. Hell. Was he supposed to go in?

Blast it.

He’d not hesitated entering her chamber a few months ago when he first came back to London. He’d been uninvited then.

And now it was morning. Filled with light, which meant exposure. And few shadows in which to hide.

Max pushed the door open, his attention going immediately to the bed. It was empty.

He stepped inside and closed the door, firmly, behind him, looking around the chamber. Early-morning sunlight filtered through the nearby tree branches, casting the small room in a soft warm glow. The bed lay pristine and made, high off the ground, with a bumpy white coverlet. The dressing table was situated near the entrance to what must be a small dressing room. The mirrored table held an array of ladylike items-and a few that were not so ladylike: perfume bottles, combs, brushes, jewelry, stakes, holy water vials…

He paused and looked more closely, seeking a slender blue-tinted bottle. No. It was gone. The potion that he knew Victoria drank in order to keep from getting with child. Aunt Eustacia, and now Kritanu, made it for her. But it was gone, and he knew that Victoria had made good on her promise to stop taking it.

Max did not want to consider the implications of that fact, and he turned abruptly to examine the rest of the room.

The fireplace held a neat stack of kindling ready to be lit should the weather turn chill or rainy. A chair in the corner near the floor-to-ceiling drapes would provide a good, distant seat from any other furnishings or activity in the room; it was the same chair in which he’d sat when he’d visited her chamber before. This morning, the windows had been flung open, and a soft breeze filtered through them.

Where the hell was Victoria? Had she sent for him or not?

Suddenly, he heard a faint… splash. Water.

Max looked past the dressing table toward the dressing room and swore. Under his breath.

She was taking a bloody bath.

He turned, ready to flee, when the chamber door opened and in bustled Verbena, the poof-haired maid. She carried a load of linens and didn’t appear surprised to see him.

And now it was too damned late for him to slip out without being noticed.

“Oh, an’ there y’are,” the maid said, bustling past him. “S’sorry t’keep ye waiting, my lord, sir,” she added, her skirts sending a glass bottle clinking against another on the table as she hurried into the dressing room.

Where Victoria was bathing.

Christ. Almighty.

Max considered making his escape anyway when the chamber door opened again and in limped Vioget.

He hadn’t even knocked.

And he looked exceedingly pleased with himself as he came into the room dressed no more formally than Max himself, in trousers and an untucked shirt. Vioget never went about in such dishabille. He likely thought he’d not long be attired at all.

Fully aware of Vioget’s penchant for carriage seductions, Max couldn’t keep his mouth closed. “You’re a bit out of your element, Vioget. There’s not a carriage in the vicinity.”

He had to give the man credit; he eclipsed his shock almost immediately. “What are you doing here?”

“Likely the same as you,” Max replied smoothly, sinking into the chair in the corner. “Responding to our ladyship’s beck and call. Unless you weren’t beckoned and are calling uninvited?”

“I was referring to your presence in London, not in this chamber,” Vioget responded.

Max looked away. Bloody damned good question. If he’d leave, Victoria would have no choice but to be with Vioget.

Now that she wasn’t drinking from the little blue bottle.

He eyed Vioget with a mixture of loathing and candor. For all the man’s faults, Max knew Sebastian cared for Victoria and would protect the woman who feared little and needed no protection-at least, overt protection.

If only Max would get out of his way and allow him to do what both men wanted Vioget to do.

“She attended a ball without an escort last evening,” Max said. “And left with none other than George Starcasset. Perhaps if you were a bit more attentive, I could leave you to your courtship.”

Vioget’s fist tightened, and for a moment, Max thought he might use it. His glance flickered down to the clenched fingers, then back up to meet Vioget’s eyes. Yes.

Just then, he heard the quiet scuff of bare feet and the soft swish of clothing. Victoria entered the chamber, fresh from her bath. Her face flushed from the heat, her eyes bright, she brought in a waft of something spicy and exotic. She was properly clothed in a neck-to-floor robe. Only her bare toes peeked out, and in light of the fact that both Max and Vioget had seen-touched, tasted-considerably more than those slender digits, it seemed ridiculous to focus on that immodest display.

“Ah, so you’re both here. Good.” She sat on the edge of her bed, high enough off the ground that her feet didn’t quite touch. “I’m sorry for bringing you in here, but there was no other place for us to talk. Wayren is in the parlor, and I didn’t want to disturb her… and Brim and Michalas are sleeping on the floor in the kalari room. The house isn’t large enough to accommodate so many people.” She raised her chin, as if challenging him to argue that they could have met in the dining room, or… somewhere. Else.

In the most surreal moment of his life, Max realized he was about to have a strategy meeting with Victoria and Vioget in her bedchamber.

Someday, perhaps, he would find it amusing.

“Brim and Michalas aren’t invited?” he drawled. “What a shame.” Her hair fell in a dark cascade over one of her shoulders, and he remembered her scream as the clawed demon had lifted her by the scalp.

Victoria looked at him, and hell if there wasn’t a glaze of smugness in her expression. “I apologize for the informality of the accommodations, Max,” she said. “I realize you’d prefer to be anywhere but here.”

Bull’s-eye.

She turned to Vioget, who’d selected the chair in front of the dressing table, turning it to face the rest of the room. “How is your leg?”

“Verbena assisted Kritanu, and I do believe that between their efforts, I’ll be able to retain that limb, at least.” Vioget’s smile held a bit of self-deprecation, and Max’s attention flickered to the man’s left hand-which was missing two knuckles of his little finger, thanks to a particularly bloodthirsty woman named Sara Regalado.

“I never doubted that,” Victoria said, shifting on the edge of the bed. The hem of her robe gapped a bit, revealing a slice of the gown beneath it.

Max recognized it. Unfortunately. The fabric was the same pale lilac as the lacy, satin-skirted night rail she’d been wearing the last time he’d ventured into her chamber. The one that left little to the imagination, as the bodice was made purely of lace. At the time, he’d complained, telling her to cover up the ghastly gown… but he suspected in retrospect that she’d realized it wasn’t because of the design that he’d insisted. Hell.

“Perhaps I should take a look at it, Sebastian. Just to make certain,” Victoria was saying. She leaned forward, and the front of her robe gapped a bit, giving a hint of shadow and textured lace.

“Perhaps we could get to the matter at hand,” Max said crisply. “Then I can excuse myself and the two of you can examine each other’s injuries to your hearts’ content.”

He found it a bit more difficult to sound bored and annoyed today. And when Vioget gave him an arch look, Max merely ignored the smugness in his face.

It really would be best if he took himself away and disappeared. For good.

At least then he’d not have such trouble making decisions. And sticking to them.

Victoria drew the edges of her robe closed and straightened in her position. Her face grew serious. “I spoke with Brim before he went to sleep-his injuries were very severe, but he’ll be all right. Thank you, Sebastian.” She glanced at Vioget, who raised a brow at Max.

“Pesaro got there first. Credit where it’s due. Shall we?”

“Of course. Max.” She nodded at him, and he recognized a decided frost in her eyes.

Good, she was still annoyed with him. Best to keep it that way.

“Brim agreed with me that there has never been any kind of attack like this, that we know of. However, when he and Michalas were in Paris just before coming here, they had been investigating a rise in demonic activity. And there was, from one source, the report of an eerie black cloud forming over a cemetery.”

Brim and Michalas had left off their investigation in order to assist Victoria to foil Lilith’s plot to kill the king a few weeks ago.

Max straightened. His mind had moved from frivolous matters like lacy lilac night rails and on to more important topics. And he didn’t like where his thoughts led. “Wayren’s divine powers were rendered useless by those demons,” he said. “If we hadn’t gotten there in time, she may have been destroyed. She was in Paris before she came here,” he added meaningfully.

Victoria looked at him. “I suspect that’s what they were after.”

“Of course.” He let the impatience thread his voice. “That must mean-”

“There’s something greater afoot. Demons rising.”

Their eyes met, and Max felt an uncomfortable stirring in the pit of his belly. Vampires were a serious enough problem, but an uprising of demons-great numbers of them released from the pits of Hell-would annihilate both mortals and undead. Demons-angels who had fallen from grace long ago-and vampires were immortal enemies, just as mortals and vampires were.

Max and Victoria had faced demons in the past-one or two at a time, and of the lower rungs of power. But the demonic activity in the cemetery tonight had been like nothing else: smarter, sharper, more dangerous than Akvan or even Lilith.

“Wayren understands the strength and power of demons better than anyone. Of course they would attempt to incapacitate her before surging to power. Unless she was their target.”

“But where are they coming from?” asked Vioget, who’d been watching the two of them. “Demons cannot just rise from Hell. They have to be released. Somehow, somewhere.”

“Not by Lilith,” Victoria said, glancing at Max.

He stifled a snort even as an uncomfortable shiver rippled under his skin. “Of course not. Lilith would never consort with demons. She hates them.”

“But she asked you to destroy Akvan’s Obelisk, knowing that it would call him back to earth,” Vioget said pointedly.

“One mere demon is of no consequence to Lilith. And Akvan was little more than a thug. These… these are different. A whole different caliber of evil.”

Victoria was nodding. “They are. Something’s changed.” She looked almost frightened for a moment… Then it was gone. “I’m sending Brim and Michalas back to Paris, as I want them to see if they can find any more information about the events there. And whether they’ve continued since our experiences here-in other words, are the demons moving about looking for… something… or are they in more than one place? In the meantime, I would like us to visit the cemetery again. During the day. And armed with much holy water.”

Max gave a short nod, then rose. The meeting was over. He hurt. He was exhausted. He wanted to get far away from the two of them. “Very well.”

Victoria slid off the bed, her feet making a little thump, muffled by the rug. “I hope it wasn’t too much trouble for you to attend me, Max,” she said stiffly.

Before he could turn, there was a knock at the door and it opened. Verbena stuck her head in, eyes wide and blue. “S’sorry to interrupt, my lady,” she said. “But… Kritanu is calling for Monsieur Vioget.”

Max felt Vioget’s eyes flicker to him, then to the door. As if Max had somehow arranged such an interruption. He tightened his lips. If anyone had arranged anything, it was Victoria. Not Max.

And if Vioget didn’t understand that, then perhaps he was not wholly prepared to handle Victoria.

Max looked at her, noticed that while she wasn’t looking at him, she was looking extremely innocent. Blast it. Blast her.

“Pardon me,” said Vioget, standing abruptly. He gave a little bow to Victoria. “Are you quite finished?” he asked.

She looked directly at him and replied, “For now. But I will be here if you wish to return.”

Max blinked and nearly missed the sharp look Vioget sent toward him. He edged toward the door, ready to make his exit. Vioget stepped aside, quite willing to let him pass.

“Max.”

He turned, his fingers tightening. Their eyes met, and he knew she wasn’t about to let him leave.

Vioget could delay no longer without looking the fool, and so he left, leaving the door ajar behind him. Victoria walked over and closed it, brushing against Max as she did so.

He steeled himself, remembering those moments in the carriage. She’d looked up at him, everything written on her face that he knew was also engraved deep inside himself. “What is it?” he said, his voice hard. Angry.

Why did she persist?

“Thank you for taking Wayren last night. I knew… you were the only one I could trust to do it.”

“I was the one you had to protect.”

“I knew you were the one who would succeed in bringing her back, Max. Vis bulla or no. We spoke last night. She told me she asked you to return to the Venators.”

“I won’t.” The words were out of his mouth before he could consider them.

“As she told me.” She stood there, far enough away that he couldn’t reach to touch her-if he’d wanted to-but close enough that he could smell the remnants of her bath. “You don’t have to risk your life and become a Venator again. It matters not to me.”

Max snorted. “I risk my bloody life every damn day, Victoria. As if that fear would keep me from the Trial.”

“Ah, that clears things up for me, then.” Her voice grew cold, and she turned slightly away. A damp curl clung to her bruised cheek. “It’s not fear of death. It’s that if-when-you succeeded in reinstating your Venator powers, then you would have no excuse to leave. No reason to hide. To shunt me off on Sebastian. Isn’t it, Max?”

He opened his mouth to speak, anger driving through him. He didn’t want to talk about this. “You should cut your hair.”

She looked at him in surprise, but accepted the change of subject. “I’ve thought of it. It’s too long and dangerous.”

That was not the response he’d expected. He didn’t like it.

Damn it to Hell. He didn’t like anything right now.

“Max, you’re right. As long as Lilith is obsessed with you, there is an added danger.”

He narrowed his eyes at her, an uncomfortable feeling rising inside him again.

“So I’ve decided to take matters into my own hands.” She smiled. It wasn’t a seductive smile, or even a pleased one. It was feral. Bestial. “Once I’m sure Wayren is safe, I’m going to find Lilith, and kill her.”