Chapter 14
It was a small room, maybe ten by twelve, with bare stone walls, floor and ceiling. The only light came from a pair of torches, one on either side of a rather mundane-looking metal cabinet. It looked really out of place, like something that ought to be in a modern office building, not sitting in the vault of a magical stronghold. The Consul was standing before it, as still as a statue except for her living costume, holding a small silver ball in her hand. The cabinet door was open, showing rows of shelves full of black boxes.
I didn't waste time saying hello, but splashed the contents of the bottle all over Mircea and me. As soon as the liquid hit my skin, it was like a veil had been lifted. I could See everything, each image and sensation from that other time, as clearly as if I were leafing through pages in a book. Mircea put me down and I clutched him as my feet hit the floor. The images shifting through my head gave me double vision and I was afraid I'd fall.
"We have five minutes," the Consul said mildly, as if discussing the weather.
"I know." Mircea looked down at me. "Can you do it?"
I nodded. I had the scene I wanted. It was perfect—two people all alone with no one to see if they suddenly began acting strangely. It was a bonus that one of them was Louis-César. I figured he would be a lot harder to kill with Mircea in residence. "I'm going to try to jump us into a couple of bodies, since it'll give us more time. We can feed off them as Billy does me. But I don't know if this will work. I've never done it deliberately." I looked at Billy Joe, who was hovering anxiously. "Come in."
"Cassie, listen, I…"
"There's no time, Billy." I regarded the spirit I was trusting with my body, possibly permanently, and for a second I saw the man he might have been had he lived. "If I don't make it back, do your best to kill Tony and free my father. Promise." I didn't know if he could do it, but Billy was amazingly resourceful when he wanted to be.
He stared at me, then slowly nodded. He dissolved into a cloud of sparkling energy and flowed across my skin like an old, familiar blanket. I took him in gladly, ignored the flash of his last card game, which he should have played to lose, and felt him settle in. There was nothing left but to let go. I concentrated on the scene I'd selected, saw again that dim, candlelit room, felt the cool breeze from the window and smelled the scents of firewood, roses and sex. Then the earth gave way and we were falling.
The jolt of impact felt like I'd hit the ground after diving out a second-story window. But I barely noticed it considering the other sensations flooding through the body I had borrowed. I looked up to see Louis-César haloed in candlelight for an instant, just before he plunged into me. I cried out in surprise, but not in pain. It didn't hurt as Mircea had warned; it felt wonderful. I watched him pull out and tried to say something, but then he slammed into me again and all I wanted was for him to go faster, harder. My nails were scratching his back, but he didn't seem to mind. I looked into his eyes and saw that they had turned a beautiful liquid amber, a color Louis-César had never had in life or death.
It was difficult to think, because my thoughts were confused with those of the woman whose body I'd borrowed. I tried to focus, but all her attention was on the fine beads of sweat trailing down his face and chest, and she overrode me.
I reached up and ran a hand through his damp auburn curls to his neck, and drew him down to me. His rhythm didn't falter, but the angle changed slightly and we both groaned in response. I ran my tongue over him, tasting him, and his face grew slack with need. I wrapped my legs around his waist and pulled, driving him into me even harder. The muscles in my lower areas tightened, wrenching a strangled gasp from him. I grabbed handfuls of his hair, pulling his mouth down to mine, bending him almost double. He cried out and, finally, lost his rhythm.
I laughed into his mouth as he thrust into me in ragged bursts, as if he couldn't get enough, couldn't go fast or hard enough, to satisfy some overwhelming need. I understood it, because I was also feeling two rising tides of desire, mine and that of the woman whose body I had invaded. She didn't seem to care; at that moment, all she wanted was to be satisfied, and on that we both agreed.
I slid out from under him, causing him to clutch at me convulsively to keep our bodies together, and flipped him over. I smiled down in satisfaction. He was glorious, sprawled there among the soft, pale sheets, his hair glimmering richly in the candlelight. It should have seemed wrong, to see Louis-César's body with Mircea's knowing eyes, but it didn't.
"I want to be on top."
He didn't argue. His hands moved up my body to cup my breasts and we both sighed as I slowly settled back onto him. I liked this angle better: I liked seeing him beneath me, although I still had to fight not to have that strange, double vision. It was Louis-César's face that stared into mine, filled with longing, but it was Mircea's triumphal smile as he began moving again.
"I told you before, Cassie," he murmured, "anything you want." Then the waves of pleasure caught us both, robbing us of speech, and I didn't care. The world burst into perfect, liquid pleasure a minute later and I cried out his name, but it was not my voice and it was not the name of the body beneath me.
When the world coalesced again, I was wrapped in warm arms and soft blankets, my head pillowed on a chest that still rose and fell with slight tremors. A hand was running through my hair, soothing me, and I realized I was crying. His words were a strange mixture of French and Romanian, neither of which I understand, but somehow they warmed me anyway.
"Cassie." A murmur in my ear brought me back the rest of the way, and I left the woman to enjoy that warm, wonderful haze on her own. "You can really do this." He gazed around in wonder. "Can you choose which time to send us back as well? Can you do it before the attack, to give us time to prepare?"
His words finally helped me slam down a barrier between the woman, who was basking in the golden glow of sexual satisfaction, and myself. I glanced in panic at the door, but it remained closed, with no sign of the older woman, the guards or a crazed Russian psychopath. We seemed to be safe for the moment, but there were probably people on the way to kill him even as we lay around recovering.
"Mircea, we have to get out of here! They'll come here first!"
"Cassie, calm yourself. There is no rush. The sybil and her assistants know where this Frenchman will be. As you said, they will be along presently, expecting him to be pleasantly preoccupied and unwary. But we will be waiting for them instead." He slipped out of bed and walked over to the mirror. He touched Louis-César's cheek softly. "This is a marvel!" He examined his borrowed body in astonishment. He turned towards me as he looked over his shoulder to check out the rear view and my mouth went dry. Louis-César was simply stunning; there was no other word for it. Backlit against the fire, his hair a reddish halo around his face, he might have been a Renaissance angel come to life.
"This is the famous mask, is it?" Mircea picked up a scrap of velvet that had been flung over the mirror and held it up to his eyes. "A piece of history indeed."
"Are you going to tell me who he was now," I asked impatiently, "or do I have to guess?"