“Sarah and Em?” I asked.
“Waiting to see you,” he said with a smile.
After visiting with my aunts, I slept a few hours, until a restless yearning for Matthew had me clawing myself awake.
Em got up from my grandmother’s recently returned rocker and came to me carrying a glass of water, her forehead creased in deep lines that hadn’t been there a few days ago. Grandma was sitting on the sofa staring at the paneling next to the fireplace, clearly waiting for another message from the house.
“Where’s Sarah?” I closed my fingers around the glass. My throat was still parched, and the water would feel divine.
“She went out for a while.” Em’s delicate mouth pressed into a thin line.
“She blames this all on Matthew.”
Em dropped down to her knees on the floor until her eyes were level with mine. “This has nothing to do with Matthew. You offered your blood to a vampire—a desperate, dying vampire.” She silenced my protests with a look. “I know he’s not just any vampire. Even so, Matthew could kill you. And Sarah’s devastated that she can’t teach you how to control your talents.”
“Sarah shouldn’t worry about me. Did you see what I did to Juliette?”
She nodded. “And other things as well.”
My grandmother’s attention was now fixed on me instead of the paneling.
“I saw the hunger in Matthew when he fed on you,” Em continued quietly. “I saw the maiden and the crone, too, standing on the other side of the fire.”
“Did Sarah see them?” I whispered, hoping that Miriam couldn’t hear.
Em shook her head. “No. Does Matthew know?”
“No.” I pushed my hair aside, relieved that Sarah was unaware of all that had happened last night.
“What did you promise the goddess in exchange for his life, Diana?”
“Anything she wanted.”
“Oh, honey.” Em’s face crumpled. “You shouldn’t have done that. There’s no telling when she’ll act—or what she’ll take.”
My grandmother was furiously rocking. Em eyed the chair’s wild movements.
“I had to, Em. The goddess didn’t seem surprised. It felt inevitable—right, somehow.”
“Have you seen the maiden and the crone before?”
I nodded. “The maiden’s been in my dreams. Sometimes it’s as though I’m inside her, looking out as she rides or hunts. And the crone met me outside the keeping room.”
You’re in deep water now, Diana,
my grandmother rustled.
I hope you can swim.
“You mustn’t call the goddess lightly,” Em warned. “These are powerful forces that you don’t yet understand.”
“I didn’t call her at all. They appeared when I decided to give Matthew my blood. They gave me their help willingly.”
Maybe it wasn’t your blood to give.
My grandmother continued to rock back and forth, setting the floorboards creaking.
Did you ever think of that?
“You’ve known Matthew for a few weeks. Yet you follow his orders so easily, and you were willing to die for him. Surely you can see why Sarah is concerned. The Diana we’ve known all these years is gone.”
“I love him,” I said fiercely. “And he loves me.” Matthew’s many secrets—the Knights of Lazarus, Juliette, even Marcus—I pushed to the side, along with my knowledge of his ferocious temper and his need to control everything and everyone around him.
But Em knew what I was thinking. She shook her head. “You can’t ignore them, Diana. You tried that with your magic, and it found you. The parts of Matthew you don’t like and don’t understand are going to find you, too. You can’t hide forever. Especially now.”
“What do you mean?”
“There are too many creatures interested in this manuscript, and in you and Matthew. I can feel them, pressing in on the Bishop house, on you. I don’t know which side of this struggle they’re on, but my sixth sense tells me it won’t be long before we find out.”
Em tucked the quilt around me. After putting another log on the fire, she left the room.
I was awakened by my husband’s distinctive, spicy scent.
“You’re back,” I said, rubbing my eyes.
Matthew looked rested, and his skin had returned to its normal, pearly color.
He’d fed. On human blood.
“So are you.” Matthew brought my hand to his lips. “Miriam said you’ve been sleeping for most of the day.”
“Is Sarah home?”
“Everyone’s present and accounted for.” He gave me a lopsided grin. “Even Tabitha.”
I asked to see them, and he unhooked me from my IV without argument. When my legs were too unsteady to carry me to the family room, he simply swept me up and carried me.
Em and Marcus settled me into the sofa with great ceremony. I was quickly exhausted by nothing more strenuous than quiet conversation and watching the latest film noir selection on TV, and Matthew lifted me up once more.
“We’re going upstairs,” he announced. “We’ll see you in the morning.”
“Do you want me to bring up Diana’s IV?” Miriam asked pointedly.
“No. She doesn’t need it.” His voice was brusque.
“Thank you for not hooking me up to all that stuff,” I said as he carried me through the front hall.
“Your body is still weak, but it’s remarkably resilient for a warmblood,” Matthew said as he climbed the stairs. “The reward for being a perpetual-motion machine, I imagine.”
Once he had turned off the light, I curled into his body with a contented sigh, my fingers splayed possessively across his chest. The moonlight streaming through the windows highlighted his new scars. They were already fading from pink to white.
Tired as I was, the gears of Matthew’s mind were working so furiously that sleep proved impossible. It was plain from the set of his mouth and the bright glitter of his eyes that he was picking our road forward, just as he’d promised to do last night.
“Tell me,” I said when the suspense became unbearable.
“What we need is time,” he said thoughtfully.
“The Congregation isn’t likely to give us that.”
“We’ll take it, then.” His voice was almost inaudible. “We’ll timewalk.”
Chapter 39
W
e made it only halfway down the stairs the next morning before stopping to rest, but I was determined to get to the kitchen under my own steam. To my surprise, Matthew didn’t try to dissuade me. We sat on the worn wooden treads in companionable silence. Pale, watery light seeped in through the wavy glass panes around the front door, hinting at a sunny day to come. From the family room came the click of Scrabble tiles.
“When will you tell them?” There wasn’t much to divulge yet—he was still working on the basic outlines of the plan.
“Later,” he said, leaning into me. I leaned toward him, pressing our shoulders closer.
“No amount of coffee is going to keep Sarah from freaking out when she hears.” I put my hand on the banister and levered myself to my feet with a sigh. “Let’s try this again.”
In the family room, Em brought me my first cup of tea. I sipped it on the couch while Matthew and Marcus headed off for their walk with my silent blessing. They should spend as much time as possible together before we left.
After my tea Sarah made me her famous scrambled eggs. They were laden with onions, mushrooms, and cheese and topped with a spoonful of salsa. She put a steaming plate before me.
“Thanks, Sarah.” I dove in without further ceremony.
“It’s not just Matthew who needs food and rest.” She glanced out the window to the orchard, where the two vampires were walking.
“I feel much better today,” I said, crunching a bite of toast.
“Your appetite seems to have recovered, at least.” There was already a sizable dent in the mountain of eggs.
When Matthew and Marcus returned, I was on my second plate of food. They both appeared grim, but Matthew shook his head at my curious look.
Apparently they hadn’t been talking about our plans to timewalk. Something else had put them into a sour mood. Matthew pulled up a stool, flapped open the paper, and concentrated on the news. I ate my eggs and toast, made more tea, and bided my time while Sarah washed and put away the dishes.
At last Matthew folded his paper and set it aside.
“I’d like to go to the woods. To where Juliette died,” I announced.
He got to his feet. “I’ll pull the Range Rover to the door.”
“This is madness, Matthew. It’s too soon.” Marcus turned to Sarah for support.
“Let them go,” Sarah said. “Diana should put on warmer clothes first, though. It’s chilly outside.”
Em appeared, a puzzled expression on her face. “Are we expecting visitors? The house thinks we are.”
“You’re joking!” I said. “The house hasn’t added a room since the last family reunion. Where is it?”
“Between the bathroom and the junk room.” Em pointed at the ceiling.
I told you this wasn’t just about you and Matthew,
she said silently to me as we trooped upstairs to view the transformation.
My premonitions are seldom wrong.
The newly materialized room held an ancient brass bed with enormous polished balls capping each corner, tatty red gingham curtains that Em insisted were coming down immediately, a hooked rug in clashing shades of maroon and plum, and a battered washstand with a chipped pink bowl and pitcher. None of us recognized a single item.
“Where did it all come from?” Miriam asked in amazement.
“Who knows where the house keeps this stuff?” Sarah sat on the bed and bounced on it vigorously. It responded with a series of outraged squeaks.
“The house’s most legendary feats happened around my thirteenth birthday,” I remembered with a grin. “It came up with a record four bedrooms and a Victorian parlor set.”
“And twenty-four place settings of Blue Willow china,” Em recalled. “We’ve still got some of the teacups, although most of the bigger pieces disappeared again once the family left.”
After everybody had inspected the new room and the now considerably smaller storage room next door, I changed and made my halting way downstairs and into the Range Rover. When we drew close to the spot where Juliette had met her end, Matthew stopped. The heavy tires sank into the soft ground.
“Shall we walk the rest of the way?” he suggested. “We can take it slowly.”
He was different this morning. He wasn’t coddling me or telling me what to do.
“What’s changed?” I asked as we approached the ancient oak tree.
“I’ve seen you fight,” he said quietly. “On the battlefield the bravest men collapse in fear. They simply can’t fight, even to save themselves.”
“But I froze.” My hair tumbled forward to conceal my face.
Matthew stopped in his tracks, his fingers tightening on my arm to make me stop, too. “Of course you did. You were about to take a life. But you don’t fear death.”
“No.” I’d lived with death—sometimes longed for it—since I was seven.
He swung me around to face him. “After La Pierre, Satu left you broken and uncertain. All your life you’ve hidden from your fears. I wasn’t sure you would be able to fight if you had to. Now all I have to do is keep you from taking unnecessary risks.” His eyes drifted to my neck.
Matthew moved forward, towing me gently along. A smudge of blackened grass told me we’d arrived at the clearing. I stiffened, and he released my arm.
The marks left by the fire led to the dead patch where Juliette had fallen. The forest was eerily quiet, without birdcalls or other sounds of life. I gathered a bit of charred wood from the ground. It crumbled to soot in my fingers.
“I didn’t know Juliette, but at that moment I hated her enough to kill her.” Her brown-and-green eyes would always haunt me from shadows under the trees.
I traced the line left by the arc of conjured fire to where the maiden and the crone had agreed to help me save Matthew. I looked up into the oak tree and gasped.
“It began yesterday.” Matthew followed my gaze. “Sarah says you pulled the life out of it.”
Above me the branches of the tree were cracked and withered. Bare limbs forked and forked again into shapes reminiscent of a stag’s horns. Brown leaves swirled at my feet. Matthew had survived because I’d pushed its vitality through my veins and into his body. The oak’s rough bark had exuded such permanence, yet there was nothing now but hollowness.
“Power always exacts a price,” Matthew said.
“What have I done?” The death of a tree was not going to settle my debt to the goddess. For the first time, I was afraid of the deal I’d struck.
Matthew crossed the clearing and caught me up in his arms. We hugged each other, fierce with the knowledge of all we’d almost lost.
“You promised me you would be less reckless.” There was anger in his voice.
I was angry with him, too. “You were supposed to be indestructible.”
He rested his forehead against mine. “I should have told you about Juliette.”
“Yes, you should have. She almost took you from me.” My pulse throbbed behind the bandage on my neck. Matthew’s thumb settled against the spot where he’d bitten through flesh and muscle, his touch unexpectedly warm.
“It was far too close.” His fingers were wrapped in my hair, and his mouth was hard on mine. Then we stood, hearts pressed together, in the quiet.
“When I took Juliette’s life, it made her part of mine—forever.”
Matthew stroked my hair against my skull. “Death is its own powerful magic.”
Calm again, I said a silent word of thanks to the goddess, not only for Matthew’s life but for my own.
We walked toward the Range Rover, but halfway there I stumbled with fatigue. Matthew swung me onto his back and carried me the rest of the way.
Sarah was bent over her desk in the office when we arrived at the house. She flew outside and pulled open the car door with speed a vampire might envy.
“Damn it, Matthew,” she said, looking at my exhausted face.
Together they got me inside and back onto the family-room couch, where I rested my head in Matthew’s lap. I was lulled to sleep by the quiet sounds of activity all around, and the last thing I remembered clearly was the smell of vanilla and the sound of Em’s battered KitchenAid mixer.