Notwithstanding the undercroft, the castle itself had been silent, but the untamed gardens of Castle Winterly were alive with symphonies — crickets, nightingales, and the majestic solo of a tawny owl somewhere in the boughs overhead.
She listened to it all, felt the rhythm of the night as it floated around her, seductive and powerful. Like the creature at her side. Her hand no longer rested over his steely arm, but he did, more than once, brush her arm with his ever and anon — and not by accident, she was sure — as they perambulated over the cats eyes glinting from the pathway.
Why did he not speak? she wondered. Why had he brought her out here? What was this all to the purpose? And did she dare seek to know the answer to these disturbing questions? "Why will you not remove your mask?" she asked at last, deeming that question the least perilous of them all.
"Suppose instead that I have only ever worn a mask; perhaps the mask incarnates who I really am, and the face beneath — the face you think you know — is only a lie."
"Do you mean to tell me you're a devil?" Satyr or not, on his imposing frame the mask certainly appeared demoniacal.
"As you fancy." His teeth flashed white as he smiled into the gloom. "How I wonder what you might do if you knew what I really looked like; what I really am."
"Then remove the lie," she challenged, her own mask affording her a dauntlessness she did not wholly feel, "and you shall see."
"And ruin this little idyll?"
"If the idyll is the lie, then yes. Howsoever treacherous the truth may be, I wish to know it."
"There are some truths not worth the knowing," he cautioned, his voice hard. "The lamb ought not tempt the wolf overmuch with impulsive curiosity."
After that, and by tacit agreement, they continued on in silence, Emma somewhat subdued by what he'd said. At length they passed by a massy hedgerow of wild roses, the carmine petals gleaming blackly in the nighttime.
She had, at first stepping outside, been entranced by the wild beauty of the castle grounds — lit by hundreds of red lanterns strung up in the trees — but now that they had left the stone pathway, and were passing deeper into the shadows, she stopped and would go no further.
"Before we continue I must know what it is you wish to show me." She'd grown more leery with every step that had taken her farther from the castle.
"Still suspicious of me?"
"Always." Especially now that she could hardly make him out in the darkness at all, even the delineation of his horrible mask was now lost to the umbrage. "Devil that you claim to be."
"Why then are you here?" he asked, with an elegant flick of his wrist to encompass the dark copse they'd entered, voice husky. He then stepped closer. "You are no milk-blooded miss, but what can you mean by going off into the night alone ... with me. My intentions I have made no secret — I care nothing for your virtue. I mean to take it for myself, and I'll be bound you know that much already."
"By force?" Her hands trembled violently with the thought.
"I have no need to enforce or ensorcel you, Emma; I have only to be patient, for you will gladly bestow it soon enough." There was no hint of conceit, as she might have expected from such a claim, but merely a quiet confidence that irked.
Presumptuous devil. "You are very sure of yourself," she scoffed.
"Why are you here?" he asked again, disregarding her gibe.
That was a very good question; and one that had her blushing hotly, for she knew she ought not be here with him. Unchaperoned. Nor should she have returned his kiss earlier or allowed him even half the liberties he had thus far enjoyed from her. And, ordinarily, she never would have dared any such indecencies, for she was no wanton; but he was no ordinary being. Moreover, her reality now included vampires, for pity's sake! There was, therefore, no more room in her life for anything in the common way, least of all prosaic etiquette and proper behavior.
"Because," she answered finally, determined that her question receive primacy, "you wished to show me something. So tell me once and for all why you've brought me here?"
"The night air," he replied, his sculpted lips compressed sardonically. "I brought you out to take the night air with me."
Many were those that were of the opinion night air, diseased miasmata, was dangerous to one's constitution. She had not forgot his rose analogy earlier, and his desire to corrupt her. It was in that same morbid vein that she answered him. "And shall I catch my death, do you think?"
"From mal aria?" he scoffed, understanding her dark jest. "No, nothing so bland as that for you."
"How obliging," she murmured, rubbing the chill from her arms. "Will you take your mask off. Please, Lord Winterly." The needling along her spine was now become unbearable and his mask, now that her eyes were better adjusted, appeared very devious indeed.
"In a moment," he whispered, holding up his hand for her to be still. "But first..."
She was of a mind to press the matter and parted her lips to do just that, but her words were swallowed abruptly when a faint glow materialized before her eyes. She finally knew now why he'd really brought her out into this corner of the secluded night.
Very gradually, and mesmerically, did she descry tiny green lights pulsing to life around her amidst the stygian trees. Hundreds of glowworms, kindled like muted stars, drifting indolently to and fro as she stared, enthralled. She swept her eyes from one verdant light to another until her gaze found its way to Winterly's. And there, where his eyes ought have been shadowed by the night, were two green orbs, chatoyant as not even the glow worms could be. He had, as promised, removed his mask whilst her attention had been absorbed by nature's illuminating spectacle.
With a sharp intake of breath she staggered back, reeling from the shock. Eerie malachite, like green embers, seemed to flash with momentary hunger as he returned her gaze.
"By thunder! Your eyes!" At the shock of her words the little insects sputtered their flames and disappeared back whence they came. Only two unblinking dots remained fixed unwaveringly to her. "What in Heaven's name are you?!"
But ere those words had even tumbled from her lips, he was gone. Vanished. She whirled around, bemused and disquieted, to see that he had dematerialized into the shadows themselves. Lungs constricting and chest heaving, she backed away the while her eyes flew hither and thither in search of him. "Lord Winter—"
Suddenly she felt herself weightless and flying through the air, her breath stolen. She gave a yelp of terror that was abruptly cut short as she was thrust against a tree, the roughened bark gnarled and painful against her back. A wall of solid flesh caging her there.
"Oh, I daresay you know," Winterly seethed, his nose a hairsbreadth from hers as he loomed over her. He had her compressed against the tree, his chest unyielding and his iron fingers holding her fast. "Play no more games with me, Emmaline. You know what I am."
"Yes," whispered she, her hands like claws, as of a petrified cat, where she grasped them to the domino draped over his granite shoulders. "I know."
With that he released her, abruptly, and stepped away, giving her his back.
She licked her lips and pushed herself off the tree. "You're a—"
"I warn you," he interpolated, "once the words leave your tongue you may never take them back." He spun around, glare fierce. "There is no going back, you understand."
She knew, as well as he, that they had crossed the point of no return the instant he'd pulled his mask down and let her glimpse him for what he really was. "You're a daemon."
He chuckled. "You can do better than that."
"Cannibal."
"Ahh, but I am so much more than that. Try again."
She swallowed, steeling herself to say the one word that had disturbed her slumber the better part of a sennight. "Vampyre. You're a vampyre."
One corner of his mouth lifted mordantly as he approached her again. "My brothers and I have, over the centuries, been described as that ... and a great many other appellations besides."
"Like what exactly?" She made no move to retreat as he stepped closer.
"Beliel. Hades. Lucifer. Iblis. Azazel. Dragon." He shrugged. "Take whichever epithet you prefer."
"I prefer to use the name you were born to?"
After a silence, in which she felt his measured look graze across her features, he said, "I was not born, as you understand the term, but created out of nothing; pulled from the ether and given a purpose I neither wanted nor believed in. The first name by which I was known was Kassiel. The seraph, Kassiel."
"An angel!" This was indeed a revelation, for he looked nothing of the sort. Though he was beautiful and stately, she had always imagined angels to be blue-eyed and cherubic, their halos of golden hair framing innocent countenances like those said to be depicted in the frescos stretched athwart the Sistine Chapel. But this creature was the antithesis of all that was angelic — eyes obsidian, hair black as sloe, and something of wiliness in his grim demeanor.
Interpreting her astonishment correctly, he gave a bitter laugh and expounded further. "I am He That Stalks In The Darkness; a fallen."
"A fallen angel!" The notion robbed her instantly of all thought.
"Ay, and there is no greater vampirism than the appetites of the fallen," he drawled.
That did not bear thinking of just yet. "How old are you, Kass—?"
"Markus," he bade her. "My earthly name is Markus. As to your question, I am not yet one-and-thirty."
"No—" clucking her tongue "—your real age."
"Millenia." He gave a lift of one impassive shoulder. "What does it matter?"
"It matters very much!" She pressed her fingers to her temples, lest her mind unravel with all that he had told her. "Before I met you I was only tedious, old Emma Lucas—"
"You were never that," he said, "but always a nonpareil. You only hid it behind your spectacles and your high necklines, your stern countenance, and your austere coiffures; but I saw you. In that way, you yourself have also hidden behind a facade."
"And what all did you see?" She was transfixed, warmed by his silky voice and intoxicating words.
"I saw then the woman who stands before me now — bold, lionhearted, shrewd, and beautiful. I have always seen in you the woman in the red dress."
"Am I to believe the words of a vampyre?" And what he wanted with her she could well guess. "One who by his own admission seeks to seduce and corrupt me with smokey words and drugging kisses?"
"I have no need of lies, your desire matches my own."
"You know nothing of my desires, vampyre."
"An incubus, you called me once. I recall I knew even then what your desires were; and still are."
"My God!" Her eyes flew wide with the implication. "You were in my room in London! You scaled the walls to my window?!"
"I did no such thing," he said, mouth pursing distastefully. "I am not a bloody spider."
Did he then fly to her upper storey window? "But—"
He waved his hand dismissively. "I merely accepted your uncle's invitation."
"Not to my blasted room, you devil!" And then, with a gasp, another thought occurred to her. "You meant to kill me that night!"
"Which night?" he asked, contemplating her with a wicked smile. "The night we met or the night I first kissed you?
"The night I met you in the street when—"
"When I saved you."
But had he saved her only to savor her later? "You were hunting me, weren't you?"
"I craved your flesh that night. I crave it still." Another step brought him inches from her, yet still she held her ground. "And your blood most of all."
The Idyll — the ball, the waltzing, the harlequins, costumes, and sumptuous splendor — for such it had been, was now well and truly at an end, his words dousing her with rippling chills. "How ... how then does the next part of this act play out?"
"The possibilities are many and varied."
"And I see you mean not to share which recourse suits you best."
"I have no intention of satisfying your curiosity, Emma. At least not yet."
"Yes, why give up the game so soon," said she, unable to keep the hurt from her words. "No matter, I need not hear the particulars, for I know how this ends."
"Do you? Surprise me."
She glared at him through the slit of her grimalkin mask, bristling with feline anger. "Curiosity, you know, kills the cat in the end."
"That has been the general consensus, yes; but I wager this cat—" raking his eyes over her face "—has more than one life at her disposal."
"I could leave, you know." But she'd spoken rashly, momentarily forgetting her precarious position, faced as she was with an entity she knew not how to overcome. And it occurred to her, far too late, that she was well and truly powerless here; he could snap her neck as easily as pluck a rose from it's root. "Or am I a prisoner here?" She had to know.
"Leave tonight if you must. But unless my senses play me false, I rather believe you'll stay. It is, after all, in your nature to question; to seek; to watch and observe." He brought his lips to the corner of hers, and from there brushed them softly along her jawline and thence to her ear. "Moreover, there is no fun in running away, lest you wish me to give chase."
"Whether or not I wish to run or stay is moot. Not at the expense of my sister's life shall I stay here a moment longer." She raised her hands to his chest to ward him off; his mouth at her neck was far too distracting. "What will happen to Milli if I stay? If I die?" she subjoined.
The green luminescence flickered knowingly. "She will not leave here unscathed, Emma. Nor shall you..."
"Then you give me no choice but to leave; however I must." But achieve it she would, or die trying.
"It is too late for that. Even if I was of a mind to forget you, which I am not, Victoria has taken quite a liking to your sister."
"Will you not protect her?!"
"No."
"Please—"
He gave a wearied sigh. "There are rules of etiquette even in my world, Emma. Vampyre manners, if you will."
"So it comes down to a matter of whosoever is first at the table is first to be served?" Her hands balled at his chest.
"How astute you are, my exquisite Rose."
"I despise that moniker!" More so because she did not wish to ever be the sick rose that he clearly meant to make of her.
It was with surprise that she felt the tears spill warmly onto her cheeks. It was not for fear of her own safety that had so quietly filled her eyes but the unspeakable dread that her sister might be in mortal danger. Her throat constricted with great painful sobs whelming up from the bottom of her heart, but she held back the torrents, loth to have him witness what she would rather do in private.
For his part, or what she could see of him through the darkness and her watery vision, Winterly looked bemused. Two deep clefts had appeared between his brows at the first sign of her tears. When she began to wipe earnestly at her dampened cheeks and wet lashes, sniffling indecorously, she was surprised to find a piece of lace pressed suddenly into her hand.
"Your tears cut no ice with me, Miss Lucas," he replied, voice gruff, studying her coldly as she dried her eyes with the handkerchief he'd provided her. She was coming to find that of late she was always "Miss Lucas" when he was vexed with her. "Will you be easy," he continued, "if I tell you that the state of your sister's mortality will maintain its natural course whilst she remains under my roof?"
"Yes." She sniffled again. That reprieve gave her enough time to devise a plan of action. Perhaps time would even furnish her the means to do away with Victoria altogether. Or Winterly himself. Could she do it? she wondered, blanching at the thought. For the love of a sister she could certainly try to do whatever it took to save her. But to get close enough to kill a monster, one had to earn its trust. "For now I must be content, I suppose." She wiped the last of the moisture from her eyes and retuned his monogrammed hanky to him, noticing at last the curious quirk of his mouth as he beheld her. "Why do you look at me in that way?"
"Because you fascinate me. I find it intriguing that you have borne my revelations with such equanimity and such show of mettle. Such compos mentis."
"Hardly equanimous to be caught in a weep."
"Well, you are only human," he allowed. "But doughty all the same."
"That," she replied tiredly, "is only because I still question my compos mentis. Perhaps I shall awaken in Bedlam tomorrow and discover that you have, all this time been nothing but a villain of my own making."
"I could prove it to you; show you..."
Certain she was not equal to any more disclosures, Emma lifted her fingers warily to her neck, suspicious of how he might go about proving himself.
"Ay," he said, chuckling darkly, "I could very well demonstrate it that way, but I won't. Not just yet. No, I have other ways and means."
"I have no doubt of it, but I'd be obliged to you if you'd continue your ... unveiling at another time."
"By light of day, you mean." He inclined his head, impenetrably watchful.
Although it hadn't been a question he'd posed, she gave him a nod of assent. The night was dark and the advantage all his own; this was neither the place nor the time for him to ... enlighten her, Lucifer or no. "My requisition is that you wait till morning." Once the sun was up to fortify her courage she would feel herself then, and only then, equal to bear witness to whatever he meant to show her.
"So be it," said he archly, conceding to her wish, "For tonight I am merely a villain of your choosing. Only tell me which one I am to play at? Cassius perhaps? I know your predilection for Shakespeare."
She shook her head, for they were comparable in name only — Kassiel and Cassius. "Yon Cassius," she purred, the 'woman in red' suddenly rising to the fore, "hath a lean and hungry look. Such men are dangerous."
Markus smirked, eyes roving appreciably.
"No, you are far more clever and devious than Cassius," she went on. "Only the most notorious villain will do for your. I think Iago suits you best."
Clutching his heart with affected injury, which was promptly belied by his leer, he said, "You must not esteem me very highly to think so lowly of me."
"On the contrary, Iago is one of the bard's most impressive characters. His manipulation and cunning have no equal. Just think what good he might have achieved had he not so misspent his brilliancy."
"Ahh, I understand you now — you think to reform me; and ameliorate my demoniacal character to your own purpose. Your good against my evil. Your light versus my darkness. Is that to be our game?"
"Perhaps" — her eyes narrowed — "but I am not yet ready to satisfy your curiosity as to my motives. They shall, for the nonce, remain my own."
He laughed, the sound of it genuine and rare. "You, my dear, might prove yourself to be as shrewd a woman as Cleopatra herself."
Emma ran her teeth over her bottom lip in a thoughtful manner as she mulled over his compliment, wondering which Cleopatra he meant, Shakespeare's version or the flesh and blood Ptolemaic queen herself. Deciding on the former, she said, "I always bethought myself more of a Rosalind."
"No, no! You, my dear, are Beatrice — sharp-tongued and quick-witted."
"You cannot mean to imply that you are therefore Benedick, for I cannot—"
But he held up his hand sharply, cutting her off as he inclined his head suddenly to glare up into the boughs. After a heavy silence he bent his eyes back to her. "Leave, Emma." The words were terse and at complete odds to the badinage they'd shared only a short moment ago.
"But—"
"I insist!" He took her wrist and stroked the pad of his thumb over the bracelet he'd placed there earlier in his library. "And not for any reason are you to remove my protection, is that understood?"
"Yes, but what's the—"
He kissed her then. Hard. When he finally pulled his lips from hers he guided her to the edge of the copse, the lights of the castle finally visible to her again. "But before you go," he said, all trace of the earlier humor gone from his visage, "tell me, shall I come to your room tonight, Emma?"
With only the slightest hesitation did she answer him as she did before, her heart syncopating wilder than ever before.
Nodding curtly, he released her. "Then meet me in my library tomorrow. At dawn." With that he bade her leave once more, his voice brooking no remonstrance. "Good night, fair Rose."
"Good night," she answered, most befuddled. Then, in a blink of an eye, her mind still reeling from his second indecent proposition, he was gone, subsumed into the darkness like the shade he well and truly was.
🌟Ta-da! The secret is out! Did you guess that he wasn't quite your average vampire? The cover gave it away, I know. @stellina79 I thought of your comment on chapter twenty-two about light vs dark and the antipodes of both Emma's and Markus' characters regarding good and evil. This chapter is dedicated to you.🌟