Finally, silence fell again, and to Elijah’s keen ears this one was deeper and more perfect than all the rest had been. The rainstorm had come and gone, and he could hear cicadas and bullfrogs outside. In the distance, the lazy spill of the Saint Louis River swept along. But inside the house, there was no sound at all.
Hugo Rey sat in his chair, one hand wrapped around his mug, but his eyes were empty and lifeless. The rise and fall of his chest had stopped, while Elijah’s attention had been diverted. He had passed, silently and peacefully, in his home and attended by a friend. Elijah knew that few humans were so lucky, but still, as he collected the papers from the table and returned to his horse he felt a painful twisting of regret in his chest.
CHAPTER NINE
THE ATTACK CAME at sundown. Cries went up from the sentries near the river first, and then Rebekah heard a second set of shouts rise from the woods to the west. The setting sun had turned the Saint Louis River into a long line of glittering fire, blinding the soldiers and confusing their line of defense. The attackers had chosen their approach well.
They looked human, but Rebekah knew better: A dead werewolf had been carried out of the camp the night before, and now his pack had come for vengeance. Soldiers called to her to stay in her tent as they ran past, and Eric shouted to Felix and pointed her way. His hook-nosed lieutenant immediately separated four men out from the ones running toward the battle to form a ring around Rebekah’s tent, keeping her safe within.
She wanted to tell them it wasn’t necessary, that she was better equipped to protect them than they her, but there was no point. Men would die who didn’t have to, but that was the nature of the world. She could hardly look out for their interests and her own at the same time, and so she waited patiently in her tent, listening to the brutal sounds of death all around it.
By the time it was fully dark outside, it was clear that the worst of the battle was pitched along the western edge of camp, and all of her guardians but Felix himself had left to join it. He had refused, sending the others to glory or death while he stayed behind, under orders.
Rebekah was restless. There were other things she could do than stay put, if only Felix would leave her alone. While the attention of the soldiers was elsewhere, this would be the perfect time to explore the forbidden reaches of the camp. The gruesome fate of the werewolf she had condemned weighed on her mind, and she needed to find out how much Eric knew. And, even more important, what his intentions were.
Rebekah had been inside the public chamber of Eric’s tent many times, but she doubted that he’d conduct an interrogation and an execution across his polished rosewood desk. Did he have a secret room that he was hiding from her? She’d previously assumed that his private chamber was a sleeping space, but now she wasn’t so sure. It was time to find out, and to see what else Eric kept secreted away.
The werewolf would not have revealed anything intentionally, but Eric was too clever by half. He was an impressive man all around, really: intelligent and generous and obviously well respected by his men, even after such a short time in command. It frustrated Rebekah that the same qualities that made him so agreeable to spend time with also made him more of a danger to her kind. If things had been different, Rebekah could see herself falling in love with a man like him.
Eric knew what he wanted from life and how to take it without resorting to cruelty, setting him apart from the men she’d been surrounded by for most of her interminable life. If she was honest with herself, Rebekah knew she was having trouble combating her attraction to Eric, even in spite of her very reasonable suspicions about his activities. In her heart she hoped that his tent would reveal nothing nefarious, and she’d be able to let her feelings of affection grow without fear...as if she had ever been so lucky.
She peeked through her tent flap’s opening, ready to make her move across the barracks to Eric’s headquarters. Felix was prowling the perimeter and saw her immediately. He was obnoxiously devoted to his job, but as long as she was stuck with him as her “protector” she decided she might as well use him.
She beckoned Felix close with one finger, and then let the power of compulsion fill her. “Escort me to the captain’s tent,” she ordered, her voice quiet but throbbing with magic. “I have business there, but no one else must know.”
His face clouded, and then, inexplicably, cleared. “You must stay here, Madame,” he disagreed. “I have been given my orders.”
Rebekah rocked back on her heels, stunned that he would—that he could—defy her. She could not think of another human who had resisted an Original vampire’s compulsion. That shouldn’t be possible. Maybe it was her own nerves, she decided, and tried again, leveling her powerful gaze into his eyes and repeating her demand.
“We will go at once,” he agreed thickly. It was as if he had never argued in the first place. Felix looked around to make sure no one was watching, then took her arm and led the way.
Together they crossed the camp, crouching low and staying near the walls of other tents. There wasn’t anyone around, but Felix took her command of secrecy very seriously, sometimes shielding her body with his own when he seemed to notice a movement nearby.
Felix stopped at the entrance of Eric’s tent, looking sadly purposeless. “Stand guard,” she ordered, compelling him anew. He shifted as if he wanted to object, but she took no chances, layering her power over and over itself until whatever restless will he had of his own was buried beneath the weight of hers. “Let no one enter until I have returned.” It was unlikely that anyone would attempt to come in while she was there, but in the very worst case she would hear the scuffle if they did. Felix, unable to reveal what he was really doing there, would seem to have gone mad, but such things were common enough even among seasoned officers. His fellow soldiers would be surprised, but hardly suspicious.
Apprehensively, Rebekah lifted the fleur-de-lis–covered flap of Eric’s tent. It was empty, and yet she felt like something was waiting for her.
The outer office looked just as she remembered it. The room was dark, but she could see perfectly well with her heightened vision. Nothing looked amiss, and she wished she could leave it at that. She liked Eric, she had to admit to herself, and she was reluctant to find out his secrets. Exposed secrets usually led to someone dying. And that wasn’t going to be Rebekah.
With a deep breath and a muttered curse, she shoved aside the curtains to the inner chamber with defiant force.
And then she froze.
It wasn’t a bedroom at all. It wasn’t a sanctuary or a place of repose...it was a shrine to death. The fabric walls were covered with crosses and mirrors, and around three sides of the room sat carved wooden chests. They were piled high with stakes, objects wrought in silver, crossbows with wooden bolts, and even strings of garlic cloves. One chest held piles of dusty books stacked among instruments she didn’t recognize with purposes she could not guess. Rebekah approached them carefully, studying each one. This was a room designed for catching and killing vampires.
It was all wrong, she realized with a sigh of relief. Some of the books looked ominously authoritative at first, but most were nothing but fairy tales. She nearly laughed aloud at one pretentiously titled The Mythes and Truthes of the Monstyrrs Known Throughout the Known Worlde as “Vampyrre.” She didn’t see anything in the tent that would especially hurt her. The thing that stung, actually, was that a man she’d begun to like had built a room dedicated to discovering the weaknesses of her kind.