19
Into the Fire
H
ow did she speak in her thoughts to a woman she did not know?
Octavia went to her window. It overlooked the wintry gardens at the rear of the house that stretched toward a forest of skeletal bare trees. Bars covered the window panes; her door was locked from the outside.
L-Lady Brookshire, can you hear me? My husband, Lord Sutcliffe, told me to try to speak to you. I saw you once . . . at Vauxhall in a supper booth. Your husband and brother-in-law are with my husband at his castle in Scotland, fighting vampires and werewolves and witches.
How could she do this—speak through minds—if she was not in a dream? Octavia sagged in frustration, her hands on the window sill.
She would have to rely on herself.
On her magic.
First she would get Lottie, then she would escape.
She strode to her door and glared at the lock. The door handle exploded and flew off the wooden door, bursting out into the hallway. The paneled door swung into her room, a large splintered hole where the doorknob had been.
She hesitated in the doorway, expecting to see Mrs. Darkwell rushing up the corridor, or a servant sent by the woman. But there was only silence.
Octavia rushed to the stairs and sprinted up them to the uppermost floor, to the nursery. The large room was filled with bassinets and all were empty but one.
Panic ate at her stomach as she crossed to her baby’s crib—the farthest from the door. It was the fear of being caught now, only a few feet from her child, and being taken prisoner again, unable to protect Lottie. She crept on tiptoe to the crib. Holding the side, she leaned over, her heart in her throat.
Covered by lace-trimmed blankets, Lottie slept peacefully on her back. Heart thudding, Octavia scooped her little girl into her arms.
Lady Sutcliffe.
She heard a female voice in her head, just as clearly as she heard voices in her dreams.
It is Lady Brookshire. We will come and rescue you.
I do not know exactly where I am,
Octavia answered in her thoughts.
Mrs. Darkwell brought me to a house in the country, but I don’t know where. I can get out of the house, and perhaps reach a village nearby and then I will know where you can come.
I can follow your thoughts, Lady Sutcliffe,
Lady Brookshire answered.
You need only to keep talking to me, and we will come as quickly as we can.
I am going to get away from the house first though,
Octavia answered.
That way, I will feel my daughter will be safer.
Just take care of yourself and your child. I will be there as quickly as possible, with other vampire slayers. I will bring an army of men to keep you safe. I am a mother, and it worries me greatly to think you and your baby are in danger.
Lady Brookshire sounded indignant, even in her thoughts.
Octavia held her hand to the nursery window. The glass exploded. But it was too high off the ground to escape that way.
“You cannot go out of the window with your child in your arms.”
Octavia whirled. Mrs. Darkwell stood at the door
“Vampire slayers are coming for me,” Octavia cried. “You cannot stop them from rescuing me. Let me go now.”
“I will,” the woman answered. “I will not try to stop you. But you will come back to me. I will let you leave now, because I know you will return.”
She had spent most of her life surrounded by books.
While her father had traveled the world for much of the time, he had amassed a remarkable library. Octavia used to work in it when she drew the illustrations for his books.
But Guidon’s Charing Cross bookshop was stuffed with more books than she had ever seen. He had several rows of shelves, and the books were piled upon these, crammed between the shelves. Every horizontal surface was covered with books, and stacks towered on the floor.
Before she had walked through the doorway, the door itself had opened by magic. That hadn’t surprised her. Then she’d seen the cords running along the wall. Curious, she’d tugged one, and the door shut with a swift slam.
A trick, not magic.
She was so used to magic now that a trick seemed more remarkable. She moved forward to let Althea, Lady Brookshire, into the tiny open space at the front of the shop.
“Goodness, it is packed to the ceiling with books,” Lady Brookshire remarked.
Once she had escaped from Darkwell’s house, Octavia had taken Lottie to the nearest village. It had been the village of Reading, very close to London. Lady Brookshire had arrived within hours.
They safely reached London and the Royal Society. There, Octavia had confirmed that Sebastien De Wynter, the Earl of Brookshire, and Matthew had flown—literally—to the castle in Scotland. She had been torn: Should she go to Scotland at once to help Matthew, or try to learn what she was? Lady Brookshire had insisted Octavia come here, to this tiny bookshop, to meet a vampire named Guidon, who could tell her about her past. Lady Brookshire had given birth a few months before, and her child was at home with nurses. She had insisted on carrying Lottie for Octavia. Fortunately Lottie had fed in the carriage and was now a sleeping bundle.
Octavia suspected Lady Brookshire had insisted they come here because she wanted to keep Octavia away from the castle and danger. She suspected Matthew had asked the lady to do it.
But once she had answers from Guidon, she was going to her husband’s side.
“Mr. Guidon?” Octavia called.
Clattering sounded in the back of the shop, then a tiny man with tufts of frizzy yellow-gray hair appeared between two rows of shelving.
“Ah, Lady Brookshire. I am honored.” He bowed deeply to Lady Brookshire, and turned to Octavia with a puzzled smile. “Indeed, your face is quite familiar to me.” He stroked his chin. “I believe I knew your mother. Yes, I am quite sure of it.”
Octavia was about to speak, when Lady Brookshire clasped Guidon’s hand and gave it a squeeze. “This is the Countess of Sutcliffe. Her husband, Lord Sutcliffe, has recently become a vampire, turned by a vampiress named Esmeralda. Lady Sutcliffe possesses strong powers of her own.”
It seemed madness to hear Lady Brookshire speak so coolly about all these things.
“She believes she is a witch,” Lady Brookshire began.
“But she is not,” Guidon finished. “She is a succubus.”
“So it is really true? How can you know this?” Octavia cried.
A high-pitched whistle came from behind the stacks of books. “I put the tea on when you came in,” Guidon said cheerfully.
“Please,” she begged. “I want to know how you know what I am. How can I be this thing, when I—I was always quite normal? I must know right now—”
But the bookshop owner shook his head. “You must have tea, then we can deal with questions. All news is easier to digest with a cup of tea.”
She didn’t believe that, but Lady Brookshire took her arm. “We must humor him,” she said softly. “Even my husband cannot escape here without having tea, and he is a most stubborn man. My other husband, Bastien, is even worse, yet he always takes tea with Guidon. I promise you it will be worth it.”
She must be hearing things. “I misunderstood. You did not really say your ‘other husband,’ did you?”
In Lady Brookshire’s arms, Lottie began to fret.
But Lady Brookshire smiled, stroked the baby soothingly on her back, then whispered, “After Guidon’s tea, I will explain. And you must call me Althea. In your thoughts, I could tell you are calling me Lady Brookshire.”
“You can read my thoughts?”
“Only a little. A few words come to me. It is because we are friends that I cannot read more than that—it is the same way with my husbands. I can speak to them in our thoughts, but I can’t hear anything private.”
Althea propelled her to the back of the shop. They went through a door to a tiny sitting room. Guidon was leaping up and down in front of his almost miniature settee. He took their cloaks, bonnets, and fur-trimmed gloves. Then Althea cradled Lottie to her chest and took a delicate wing chair, while Octavia perched on the small sofa. Guidon sat at her side and poured tea. “I promise this will set your nerves at ease.”
Octavia did not believe it, but she took the cup to be polite. Then she realized the vampire would not continue until she actually tried his tea. She took a sip. It was warm, aromatic, and it did seem to ease the tautness of her muscles.
Guidon smiled at Lottie. “A lovely little infant.” He made cooing sounds. Then he turned to Octavia, and his smile disappeared, his expression turning grave. “Yes, my lady, you are a succubus. This means you are a type of demoness, but you are not an evil one. What you do is not a deliberate act on your part.”
“Do you mean my magic? That is what I do. Esmeralda called me a succubus—I do know what those are, and it cannot be true.” She feared it was, but she wanted to deny it.
“No, Lady Sutcliffe, I mean your true mission. Your purpose. A succubus goes to men in their sleep; she seduces them, and she takes a little of their souls. When she has taken a man’s complete soul, she brings it to Lucifer. He then claims his victim: He takes the man’s life, and he claims the man as a slave for eternity in the underworld.”
She shook with horror. “How could I be one of those?” Dear God, how was it possible? She did not serve Lucifer. How could she?
Guidon paused and refilled her cup. He drank his tea in one swift swallow. “You were dying before you . . . uh . . .” He turned pink. “Before you gave your innocence to Lord Sutcliffe. Once you reached womanhood, you were beginning to die slowly, because you did not begin to gather souls. They nourish you and keep you alive. Once you . . . gave your innocence, you acquired your powers. As Mrs. Darkwell told you, you have very unusual and strong powers. You were destined to be a queen amongst succubi. You were given the strongest powers by Lucifer.”
“How can I have been given anything by Lucifer?” she protested desperately. “I had a father and mother, and I lived an ordinary life. How could I be this thing and not know it?”
“Humans may not have many special powers, but they excel at keeping secrets. Until you blossomed into full womanhood, you would have never suspected you were different.” His tufts of hair jiggled as Guidon nodded. “Now I must tell you about your past. What you suspected is correct—Lord Sutcliffe’s father did indeed fall passionately in love with your mother. She, however, was devoted to your father. But your mother was killing your father. Her powers were slowly destroying him. She loved him too much to leave him, yet she could not bring herself to hurt him.”
“How was she destroying him?”
“By making love to him. Little by little, she took his soul. When she realized she either had to leave him and go to other men or die, she chose death.”
“Oh dear heaven. But why did Lord Sutcliffe’s father die?”
“He could not live without her. So he took his own life.”
“That was because my mother was a succubus?”
“It might have been,” Guidon answered. “Or it might have been because she was a beautiful woman with a good heart. Those qualities can make a gentleman lose his head.”
“How can I make this all stop? I don’t want to be a queen of anything. I don’t want to be hunted. Is there any way to save my husband and to be free?” She quickly told Guidon about the curse.
“Of course there is,” the vampire said. “If you and your husband love each other, the curse will be broken.”
“But what happens then? Will he be safe from me?”
“What we must do, Lady Sutcliffe, is save him first.”
She nodded, but in her heart, she suspected Guidon was not speaking of what would happen beyond that, because there was no solution.
Would she have to do what her mother did? Chose between leaving her husband forever and taking her own life? And what of Lottie? It had been awful to be without her mother, from when she was young—only nine years of age. How could she do that to Charlotte? If she died now, Charlotte would never know her at all!
“What about Mrs. Darkwell? I think she has . . . rigged the curse somehow. She wants my husband dead—”
“No.” Guidon shook his head. “She wants love for you. She has to find love for you—it is the only way she can escape her imprisonment in this world.”
Octavia had told Lady Brookshire about this, as quickly as she could, in the carriage. “Is she truly Aphrodite, the goddess of love?” Althea asked. “Who imprisoned her? Guidon, why did you not tell us she had taken Octavia before?”
Guidon gave a sorrowful sigh. “You did not tell me her name was Darkwell.”
Althea arched an eyebrow. “Indeed. Well, is this woman really a goddess?”
“She is beautiful,” Guidon answered, “but she is not the real Aphrodite. She uses her mother’s name—she is the daughter of the goddess Aphrodite. Aphrodite had a love affair with a dangerous vampire and the product of that union is the woman you know as Mrs. Darkwell. The name given to her when she was born was Darkwell, for she had great power and the capacity to bring love to humans, but she has a dark side, inherited from her father.”