The Greyfriar (Vampire Empire, Book 1) by Clay & Susan Griffith;Clay Griffith;Susan Griffith (25 page)

Flay hardened visibly at his slur. "If I go, Gareth, I will never offer
myself to you again."

He shrugged. "We've always been enemies, Flay. And we always will be."

Her shock and embarrassment turned to rage. She drew back her
lips. "He will never believe you if you tell him I was here."

Gareth merely looked at her. He had no intention of telling Cesare
anything, but he wouldn't give her the satisfaction of knowing that, preferring for her to wallow in confusion and doubt.

"I hope you die, Gareth!" Flay shrieked. "You're weak and worthless.
I hope you die!" She threw herself into the air, rising slowly through the
turgid air of the museum until she caught a draft and vanished abruptly
through a broken window. The faint echo of her anguished cry could be
heard mixing with the bloody screams and cheers across the murderous
city.

LAY RETURNED T the museum the next night.

This time she came to the front door, and she had others with her:
five red-jacketed members of Cesare's honor cadre called the Pale because
of their role in slaughtering so many of the Irish. Gareth stared at the
grim-faced war chief, who refused to look him in the eye.

"What now, Flay?" Gareth's voice was tired.

She replied flatly, "Your prisoner is required at the palace."

"Tell Cesare I think not."

Flay raised her head, briefly caught his eye, then glanced away. "This
is directly from King Dmitri."

Gareth had no choice but to agree. "Then I'll come along."

"Do as you wish." She paused, then added, "Great Lord."

Gareth went back inside, where he found Adele staring enthusiastically at a wall of marble carvings. She turned easily, but quickly noticed
the stern look on his face and went grim herself.

He said, "You must come with me. The king has asked for you at the
palace. You will see things no human has ever seen, and lived. Terrible
things. In a feeding frenzy, my kind is unpredictable and very dangerous.
Do not get isolated. I will protect you so long as you stay near me."

"I will."

"You'll be safe."

"I'm sure. Can I get my cloak?"

"Of course."

Adele ran to her room, where she grabbed her heavy cloak. She
touched the washabti in her pocket and was grateful that Gareth would
be with her in the wretched palace. Clearly, though, he was worried
about this summons; it was something out of his control. His promises
of safety were weak.

The Rosetta stone was propped in the corner. Behind it, she had
hidden two stone blades. She slipped the knives into her blouse.

The walk to the palace horrified Adele. Mobs of vampires with their
faces and torsos stained red wandered the streets or flitted overhead,
feeding on naked and ragged humans with blank cattle faces. Men,
women, and children. Sometimes they were chained or hobbled, but
usually they stood motionless without restraint or squatted quietly on
the cobblestones waiting for their devourers to collect them at their
whim. It angered Adele that the humans didn't at least try to run, but
she knew they were no longer humans in any real sense; they were bred
as food and they acted like food.

Gareth stayed close, which Adele found comforting. Still, frenzied
ruby-faced vampires occasionally surged at her from out of the crowd in
hopes of tasting something new. The Pale shoved interlopers back with
annoyed rebukes, although Flay trudged on without apparent interest.
Gareth, however, was not so lenient. He seized several vampires who
reached for Adele and put a quick and savage end to their evening festivities. Soon the black-suited prince was as bloody as the sodden revelers, and the growls that came out of him reminded Adele of a trapped,
vicious dog. Even so, she found herself pressing closer against him as the
air grew thicker with shrieks of pain and delight with every step.

Soon the old Buckingham Palace loomed in the darkness. They
made their way up stained steps, past columns of veined marble, and into a great corridor once bright and lavish with intense colors and
golden fixtures but now drab and caked in filth. Ragged remnants of
carpet clung to the floor of the wide gallery. The palace's decrepit decorations were overwhelmed by piles of bone and hundreds of skulls
staring down from broken chandeliers. Vampires slouched along the
walls, drunk with blood, sometimes with red hands resting on humans
who still showed signs of life.

The princess and her escorts passed out of the main gallery and
through a series of smaller rooms crowded with vampires not yet drunk
and bloodmen quickly herding humans from one place to another. They
all cleared the way for Flay and her red-coated entourage. Heads turned
as the Pale passed, and hundreds of curious blue eyes locked on Princess
Adele. In a small grim room, a tall vampire wearing an odd checkered
jacket and striped trousers met them and conferred with Flay.

Gareth leaned down to Adele. "That's Cesare's bailiff, Stryon. It's
rare to see him outside of Dublin."

When Stryon concluded his discussion with Flay, he bowed to
Gareth. "My lord, won't you join His Majesty and Prince Cesare?"

Gareth received the homage with a bare nod. "I'll wait here with my
prisoner."

"Very good." The bailiff's eyes flicked between Gareth and Adele
without emotion before he withdrew.

"We wait until we're summoned," Flay said wearily. Then her gaze
settled on Adele, and she studied the princess with a severe curiosity.

Several of the Pale began to chat in low hisses, wondering if the
royals were going to share the princess with the lords of the clan. Flay
didn't bother to quiet her troopers, and in fact an impertinent smile
twitched at the corners of her full mouth.

None of them realized that Adele understood what they were saying.
She managed to keep her face calm while their chatter became bloodier as
the soldiers waxed on about how delicious she might be. Behind the folds
of her cloak, Adele plunged one hand into the deep pocket of her heavy
skirt, feeling for the hard, smooth washabti. She found a sense of serenity
as her fingers slid over the supple facets of the small figurine. Gareth
glanced at the young woman and shifted his feet subtly, as if to put a few more inches between them. Flay's eyes narrowed and dropped to Adele's
skirt, as if the vampire sensed something peculiar.

Abruptly, Stryon the bailiff summoned them with a long crooked
finger. Flay stood aside with a look of disgust as Gareth motioned to
Adele. The bailiff led Gareth and Adele to massive double doors where
he paused to listen. Raucous but muffled sounds drifted from the room
beyond, led by Cesare's rabble-rousing hiss and complemented by guttural responses from a sizable crowd. He was listing the many triumphs
of the clans over the humans, extolling the strengths of vampires versus
the weaknesses of humans. He exhorted the clan to greater victories in
the future in the face of growing threats from the grasping humans. The
lords cheered at the appropriate times.

Cesare's topic changed to Equatoria and the growing threat of an
alliance between two ambitious human states. He explained that the
leader of this evil alliance had already massacred the clan of Bordeaux.
But Cesare had succeeded in scoring a significant victory; he had seized
the mate of the Butcher of Bordeaux.

At this, Stryon motioned Gareth forward, threw back the doors, and
stood aside. Gareth paused, hoping to score a minor victory of his own
by throwing his brother's stage show off its timing. He was amused by
the thought of Cesare standing before the throne with his arm extended
toward the empty doorway, watching and fuming impotently as no
Equatorian captive was dragged screaming into the throne room. Stryon
touched the prince's elbow and pressed him forward with a look of
alarm. Gareth freed himself and glared back as if ready to rip the bailiff's
arm out of the socket for his temerity.

Gareth whispered to Adele, "Stay near me. Don't be afraid." Then
he added after a moment's thought, "And don't do anything to antagonize them."

The Prince of Scotland swept into the vast chamber, his heels
clicking loudly in the expectant silence. The waiting lords stared, surprised first by the delay and now by seeing Gareth when they expected
the delightfully demeaning spectacle of a free human royal in chains.
Then followed the human woman, but she was unbound, with her head
up, staring back at them in disdain. The vampire lords parted reluc tantly for Gareth. They hovered around Adele with wild eyes and wet
grins, but none reached out to molest her. Adele was reminded of a
hideous version of her father's Privy Council lurking through a state
event at Victoria Palace in Alexandria.

The throne room was very large and had once been lavish enough to
befit the greatest ruling family in Europe, as it still did. Cesare stood on
a raised platform at the far end of the room with an arch above and
columns on either side. An ancient rag doll that Adele took to be the
fabled King Dmitri slumped in a chair behind the vile prince. Gareth
mounted the royal dais, and Adele followed.

Cesare extended his hand toward the princess and spit in his vampire tongue, "Here is our enemy! This is the future mate of the one
called Clark, who slew so many of the American clans and our kin just
days ago in Bordeaux."

The lords began to rumble with outrage.

"But I," Cesare continued, "have her now!" He laughed, and the
lords laughed with him. "I took her because she came with her army into
clan lands. I believed we could negotiate a peaceful settlement with the
human warlords. I believed the humans would care for their own enough
to talk to us. But I admit now that I was wrong. Ask the dead in Bordeaux about peace! Ask the children who were slaughtered by the
human fires about peace! There can be no peace with the human warlords. They do not understand the concept."

Unabashed hatred grew in the chamber as a tall grey-haired lord
shoved to the front of the crowd. He dragged a filthy young human
woman by the hair as any partygoer might circulate with his wineglass
in hand. The woman slapped at his strong forearm, forcing the clan lord
to frown with distracted annoyance and shake the woman as someone
might a misbehaving puppy.

"So what now?" this old lord boomed. "What would you have us do,
Cesare?"

"Lord Ghast," the young vampire prince muttered at the elder with
unconcealed contempt, "what would you expect us to do? We must
fight! We must strike now before we are taken unaware! Would you have
our herds taken from us?"

Ghast snarled. "Don't try to demonize me, Cesare! My history of
killing is well told! I welcome war with the humans!" He searched the
room with fierce eyes. "But I won't have your upstart as clan war chief!
Flay is not noble. I demand the role." There was a murmur of agreement
among some of the lords.

Cesare raised a calming hand and gave a cynical grin. "One thing at a
time, please, Lord Ghast. Can we begin the war before you begin
demanding your position? The king will name the war chief. Not you."