Beauty and Her Vampire {Watty Awards}

BAHV (Part 9)

2012 © Sonia Bartlett

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

Part Nine

     "You are to return to your room."

     The moment he’d uttered his terse command the castilian had turned on one solid boot heel and strode towards the door, leaving Arabella gaping in his wake.

     “Wait!” she called involuntarily. She did not want the overbearing man to stay but something about his abrupt departure had spurred in her a perverse desire for him to stay.

      He stopped at the door, one hand curled around the handle, but he did not face her.

     “You can’t just go,” she blurted.

     “I go as I please; as I have always done and shall always do.” The slam of the door behind his solid frame echoed eerily in the small chamber. It reminded her of the beast’s temper when she’d refused his presence at supper. Was the entire manor full of hot-tempered men? Arabella hoped not.

      Walking to the door, Arabella quickly opened it just in time to catch the swish of the castilian’s dark cloak around a stone corner. Checking the hallway to see if anyone was watching, she crept from the room and closed the door closed behind her silently.

     Her bare feet padded against the lush floor tapestries noiselessly as she turned the corner after the man. She made sure to stay back, only turning a corner after he’d already disappeared behind another. At first it seemed he was lost in a maze of halls, turning aimlessly with no real direction in mind. But then a pattern became apparent.

     Each corner he turned, each doorway he went through, the passages got darker. There were fewer and fewer lamps lit, leading to the impression the walls were closing in on her. Arabella shivered. The air had gotten cooler.

     Where the main hall she’d been through had been lit and well-kempt, these were covered in darkness and cobwebs, filth and grime. It seemed as if there were more gargoyles every step she took, all staring at her silently in accusation.

     The overwhelming sense that she was where she was not supposed to be increased until a firm slam of a door startled her from her increasingly terrified thoughts.

     Snapping her head to face the noise, she peered around one last corner to see an enormous set of double doors. Where they had once been ornate and opulent they now hung from rusty hinges, the gold brocade barely visible.

     But that was not what sent a sudden chill of fear down Arabella’s spine. No – it was the five deep gouge marks in the wood.

      Claws, Arabella thought, horrified. It has claws.

     Her first instinct was to run, preferably screaming, back to the front doors of the manor and leave, never looking back. But something held her back: an insane, self-defeating desire run towards the door and take hold of the unfriendly, intimidating castilian and bring him to safety as well.

      He had all but run into the lion’s den and she wanted to save him from his folly?

      Arabella shook her head. It was not up to her to decide the imperious man’s fate. He had obviously been dealing with this beast for a long time; surely he would know best how to avoid its wrath? And claws? A niggling voice in the back of her head asked. What about those?

      Arabella pushed thoughts of those marks, and what had caused them, far from the forefront of her mind. She needed to get out of this place – immediately. She would settle for being back in her room under her soft silk covers – anywhere but here.