Page 35 of The Doctor and the Devil
I glared at Marguerite, suddenly feeling drained from the long, frustrating evening. Dawn wasn’t far off, and both of us would need to rest. I blew out a breath.
“Very well, Marguerite. I’ll play along. The Order has Laszlo. What do you want to do about it?” I rubbed at my temples. It couldn’t be true, could it? It must be another of her lies.
She looked at me like I was an imbecile.
“I want you to go get him. Return him to me, obviously,” she spat. “I want you to stop cowering in the shadows—the both of you—and seize the power that lay carelessly at your fingertips. Go to the Order, wherever those bastards are hiding out, break down that door, and drain every single one of those old fools for daring to challenge your mighty legacy. You have the strength, the power, the wisdom, and cunning to do it, Rafael, so stop bleating like some wounded animal and remember who you are.” She stepped forward, grabbing me by the shoulders and shaking me with each word. “Rememberwhatyou are. You are a Dracul! You are a hell-cursed monster who has walked more nights than most men could dream.”
I was stunned into silence, my eyebrows lifting at her sudden passion.
She gestured wildly around her. “You possess abilities that Lucifer himself would envy and that he would have used to overthrow the righteous angels in Heaven and claim it for himself. If you won’t be responsible for your kingdom or your failings, be responsible for your brother,” she pleaded, collapsing into a chair under the weight of exhaustion, or perhaps defeat. Her steely eyes met mine, imploring and shimmering with unshed tears. “Go, Rafael, and bring him back to me.”
I stared, angry but oddly inspired by Marguerite’s tirade. What could she want from this endeavor? Could she really love him? Was this how she won him over—by charming him and flattering him and making him feel like he was so much more than a pawn in my father’s political games? Was he really in the hands of the Order? If so, how could that have happened? Sudden anxiety gnawed at me—was it possible she was telling the truth?
She shook her head, sighing heavily, and rose to her feet. When she spoke, I could hear the fatigue and exasperation in her tone.
“Sunrise approaches. There is a guest room downstairs. The servants have all been dismissed, but I’m sure it will still be comfortable, even if it’s a bit dusty and stale. Rest here today, if you wish.” She inclined her head in a curt nod and left the room in a swirl of deep sea-green silk.
Weariness dragged at my limbs as I found my way downstairs, shuffling toward the small guest room. Marguerite had been right—the room hadn’t been aired out in years and the dust and cobwebs were thick throughout. I didn’t particularly care, except that it made me wonder how long ago it truly was that the money had run out. Perhaps longer than I’d originally thought.
I shook the dusty blankets out and climbed into the soft bed.Laszlo, Laszlo. Why her? Why at that moment?
And then, as exhaustion pulled me into sleep, I thought of Mina.
* * *
I awoke hours later, just as the sun was setting. I trudged back upstairs, hoping to borrow some of Laszlo’s clothes to replace the ill-fitting ones I’d stolen from last night’s meal. I didn’t see or hear anything from Marguerite, but it was possible she was still sleeping. I decided to wait and amused myself by perusing their home.
They hadn’t bothered to keep a kitchen but had instead turned the space into a small painting studio and gallery. Oil paints and watercolors littered the rough wooden table in the middle of the room, along with brushes and sheaves of paper with painting studies and sketches. Someone was a talented artist, and it grieved me more than I realized to not know if it was Marguerite or Laszlo.
I continued my tour, rifling through an office—nothing out of the ordinary, except that it seemed Laszlo had made some rather poor investments but did seem to own another residence in England. I sneered.Was Marguerite lying? Had Laszlo simply left here and ventured across the sea to escape her disdain?
Something about that didn’t feel quite right, though, and I pushed the thought aside. I was driving myself mad with the possibilities of my brother’s fate. It would be best if I could simply find him and ask him about the past twenty years.Would he even tell me the truth?
Having finished my tour, I realized it had been nearly an hour since I’d risen, and night had fallen. I didn’t know Marguerite’s habits, but I decided if I were to play her knight in shining armor and rescue my brother from his captors in this farcical tale, I could at least demand the use of some of his clothes so I could travel home comfortably.
I crept upstairs to their bedroom and found myself facing a single locked door at the top of the landing. I knocked and waited, but no sounds spilled forth.That’s interesting.
After another minute, my anxiety flared, and I kicked the door in, tensing as it shattered into an explosion of sticks and splinters. The room was empty, the bed undisturbed. It was tidy, as if it had been used recently, but obviously not last night. Where had she gone? Had she slipped out to hunt while I slept?
Unease threaded through me as I scanned the room, looking for signs of anyone—anything. When had she left? And why?
“Marguerite?” I called out. I listened for the creak of floorboards, the rustle of fabric, the rattle of the cold sea breeze through an open window but heard nothing. The silence blanketing the townhouse felt unnervingly lifeless.
Despite my dislike of my brother’swife—even the thought made me growl—I worried that something had happened to her in the daytime while I’d slept downstairs. I had no firm evidence or reason to believe foul play, except decades of intuition and the knowledge that if it was indeed the Order playing these games, they would stop at nothing and had every resource at their disposal.
Above all, I needed to return to Paris. I found Laszlo’s wardrobe and pulled a smart black waistcoat and breeches out, along with a worn linen shirt and a fine wool overcoat. The garments fit me better than my dinner’s, but still not as well as my own. It didn’t matter. I only needed them to wear until I reached the outskirts of the city, and then I could shift into my wolf form and run the rest of the way.
I left the townhouse, still scanning for any sign of Marguerite. Not even her scent lingered here, which confused me more than anything. It was almost as if I’d been with a ghost, and no trace of her had remained after our encounter. While I didn’t believe that, there was a part of me that clung to my earlier unease.
I walked casually through the city, trying to avoid notice and pacing myself to reach the outskirts in good time. Fortunately, no one paid attention to me. I knew that in this frustrated, heightened state, death would surely meet anyone who attempted to delay me. But finally, mercifully, I crossed the road at the bottom of a hill, and the farmlands gave way to green fields and budding forests. The winter had delayed the onset of spring, but I marveled at how nature had demanded new life.
The roads were empty, but to be safe, I hiked a bit to a small glade of trees to shift into my wolf form. Picking up Laszlo’s borrowed clothes in my lupine jaws, I took off heading south, hoping to reach Paris in two days’ time. At a full run, if I only stopped for sunrise and didn’t pause to feed, I could just make it, but I would be weak when I arrived. It was a chance I would have to take.
My paws dug into the wet earth, flinging mud around me as I ran through the trees. At this speed, it would be difficult for humans to see me, and I could only hope my luck would hold.
Onward I raced, not daring to stop until the sky began to lighten and the stars faded from view. I bolted for a cave in a nearby hill where I could rest for the day, and then as soon as the sun set, I was off again. Perhaps it was my exhaustion, worry, and hunger that drove me so quickly, or perhaps it was my worry for Mina, or the whispering doubts I had about Laszlo and Marguerite’s fates—either way, I reached the countryside outside of Paris just before the sun started to rise on the second morning. During the entire journey, I’d wondered about my next steps…where I would go, what I would do, how I would verify Marguerite’s story, and I’d come to one dreaded but somehow inevitable conclusion.
My paws crunched along the gravel drive up to the grand entrance of the stately château, and before I could shift and knock, the massive door flew open. I faced a bristling, irate brunette with flashing, red-gold lupine eyes.
