"You don't have to beg, but, Melissande…" It was my turn to do a little lip-gnawing. "I didn't lie to you when I told you I wasn't a Charmer. I'm not."
She gave me a sad, disappointed look.
"Well, obviously, now I am," I allowed, trying to think of a way to explain the situation without exposing my true relationship with Adrian. "I told you that I had an accident ten years ago. That accident resulted in the death of a very good friend, and caused me to have a stroke that took me months to recover from."
Her eyes widened.
"My actions, my attempt to charm a curse, caused my friend's death. My own destruction aside, you can see why I was so hesitant to offer to charm the curse that binds your nephew—I could very well kill him in the attempt."
"Of course I understand," she said sympathetically, her hand giving mine a little squeeze. "But that's all in the past! You warded earlier this morning, and although you swooned afterward, you do not seem to have seriously harmed yourself."
"What… uh… what happened to Sebastian?" I asked, suddenly worried that maybe I had killed him.
She grimaced. "I'm afraid your banishment charm wasn't as successful as you would have liked."
Oh, God, I did kill him! Now I had two deaths on my soul!
"Rather than Adrian being banished from the building, it was Sebastian who was removed."
"He's alive? Not hurt?" I asked, almost afraid to hope.
"Oh, no, not hurt at all. He is here, as a matter of fact. I'm sure you're distressed that your ward went awry, but I have every hope that you will succeed with Damian's curse."
Pride that I had successfully cast a ward, which had been growing as she spoke, suddenly took a nosedive to despair. "But… but, Melissande! There's a big difference between casting a banishment ward and trying to unmake a demon lord's curse!"
"I am confident you will succeed," she said, an obstinate look on her face. "You have to. There is no one else."
There might not be anyone else to charm the curse, but sure as shooting there was a big ole magic ring that could do the job.
"I can't," I said as firmly as I could without being obnoxious. "The curse I tried to lift when I caused my friend's death and my stroke was cast by Asmodeus. It is very clear to me that when it comes to besting a demon lord, I'm out of my league—dramatically and fatally out of my league. And while I would be willing to risk my own soul, I will not risk another's."
Her gray eyes were stormy as I spread my hands. "Please, Melissande, you must understand. I have already taken one life—I will not be responsible for taking another."
Her gaze dropped. "Then he is lost to us."
I struggled with the desire to swear I would do what she asked, knowing full well that the only chance I had of saving Damian involved using Asmodeus's ring. "I swear I will do everything within my power to help him. I swear it."
She left after murmuring a hope that it would be enough. I stayed put just long enough to have a quick wash and bundle up the sandwiches and fruit she'd brought me, pausing to look out the window at the rain-washed streets of Cologne. It was about an hour to sunset, but I felt driven by a strange need to get Adrian out of there. I didn't want to risk disabling myself by trying to contact him via our mental phone line, which meant I couldn't reassure myself that he was not harmed and in no danger.
The door wasn't locked, a fact that surprised me. As I strolled down the corridor and turned to a grand sweeping staircase, I saw why. A big musclebound man sat in a wing-backed chair reading a German magazine.
"Hi," I said with my friendliest smile, holding behind my back the small metal statue of Pan that I'd snatched up from a hall table. "Can you answer a question for me?"
Mr. Muscles towered over me when he stood up. He had a hard, suspicious look about him, as if he were a professional bodyguard. "You are woman American?" he asked in a heavy German accent. "You should not be out from room. What is question?"
"What's the difference between a bird and a tractor?"
He blinked at me. I smiled as I swung the statue down on his head. "They can both fly… except for the tractor."
Chapter Ten
The big guy crumpled up without a sound. I dropped the statue and crouched next to him, feeling for a pulse. It was steady and fairly strong.
"Sorry I had to do that, but it was necessary." After peering over the banister to the floor below to make sure it was empty, I hurried down the stairs, pausing frequently whenever the house made a noise. Breathing a sigh of relief that no one was around, I ran silently down a hall that seemed to stretch the length of the building, listening at doors for conversation or sounds of habitation. Melissande's voice was audible at one of the doors, along with the low rumble of a male voice. I picked up my pace upon hearing them, stopping only when I reached the back of the house. Another stairway faced me; this one had obviously been meant for servants in the days when people could afford such luxuries.
"Down means basement," I whispered as I descended the bare wooden stairs as quietly and quickly as possible, stopping to bend over the railing midway down to see if anyone was standing around below. No one was on guard.
The basement was laid out in old compartment style—one room leading to another, which led to another, and so on the length of the big house. I had no trouble finding the door to the room Adrian was kept in, not just because it was the only door available, but because the wood of the door glowed gold with a confusion of numerous interlocking three-dimensional symbols that made it look as if someone had read too many books on how to create a Celtic knot.
"Let's see if I can unward this thing without blowing out any more circuits in my head," I said softly, looking at the door, allowing my vision to slip into a soft focus that let me visualize the pattern of the wards without subjecting them to intense scrutiny. It didn't take long before the mishmash of curves, lines, and curlicues doubling back on themselves separated into distinct symbols. I breathed a silent prayer as I reached out to the brightest symbol, tracing it in reverse. The ward flared for a moment when I reached the end of it, then dissolved in a shower of silver. Relief trembled in my voice as I touched the next ward. "One down, five to go."
Only the last one gave me any grief, and that was because it was a powerfully drawn ward that did not take kindly to me unmaking it. It was a circle-shaped ward, and as I undrew one line, the rest of the pattern shifted, knotting itself up again. My hand was shaking with strain by the time I finally wrestled the ward into nothingness, but I thought little of that as I threw open the door to Adrian's prison.
I didn't get two steps into the unlit room before I was thrown backward onto the dirt floor by an enraged, furious vampire. A flash of fang was all I saw before he was at my neck, his teeth sinking deeply, pain hot and sharp mingling with my fear that he had been somehow pushed too far.
"Adrian! It's me!" My voice was a thin whimper, but it was enough. Adrian pulled his mouth from my neck, his lips crimson with my blood.
"Nell?" His eyes were a cold, flat onyx. "You're alive."
"As are you. I wasn't sure you were, for a while," I said on a sob of happiness. I clutched him tight, reveling in the feel of him in my arms again. "I thought at first I'd killed you. You're all right? You're not hurt? Sebastian and Saer didn't harm you?"
"They tried," he growled, his lips lowering to mine. I tipped my head back to welcome him, but he stopped before he touched me. "Why didn't you answer me when I called you? Why did you ignore me?"
"I didn't know you were trying to reach me," I wailed, relief at finding him whole and safe making me weepy. "I burned out my intercom when I spoke that banish ward. I tried to find you, but…"