“Cannot kill you…” She felt dizzy, unable to breath
e. Send my true Black Knight, she had prayed to the druids. Send a demon to protect our sanctuary. I am cursed, this man had told her, cursed by God. I must forsake the light. “You are the Black Knight,” she said softly, barely as loud as a whisper. “My father sent you to me.”
“Yes,” Simon answered, barely hearing her, so lost did he feel in her gaze. She trusted him; this innocent believed him. Deliver this penitent, she had prayed as he passed through her gate. Save him from this demon. But he did not break the trance; the spell still lingered in his voice, entrancing this woman, bending her to his will. “Your father sent me to you.”
“My lord!” The door to the solar opened, and Orlando came in, breaking the trance. “Have you told Lady Isabel of your vision?” he asked, pretending a servant’s respect while his eyes blazed a reproof.
“He has,” Isabel answered. She moved away from Simon, her heart beating faster, but she felt calmer, too, now that she knew the truth. “He says there is some wisdom in this castle that can save him from his curse.” Did Simon even realize why her father had sent him? He spoke of his curse, of needing some wisdom, some way to break it—what if he knew his curse was to protect her? Would he stay?
“Or so he was told in a vision,” Orlando agreed. The dwarf was still staring at Simon, obviously waiting for him to speak, but the vampire could not. He had entranced hundreds of mortals in his nights of darkness, but he had always been in control of the trance. He had never once felt entranced himself. What magic did he feel from this innocent’s blood? What new temptation beckoned from her gaze?
“Was his vision true, my lady?” Orlando said at last. “Is there wisdom at Charmot?”
“Perhaps,” Isabel answered, her mind racing. If Simon thought there was a way to break his curse at Charmot, he wouldn’t dare to leave until he found it. But why should she want him to stay? “What did you do to be cursed, Simon?” she demanded, turning on him. “Did you kill?”
If another woman had asked him that question, testing him before she allowed him to stay in her home, Simon would have known to deny it at once, would have played the harmless penitent to soothe her. But something in Isabel’s eyes told him that was not what she wanted at all. “Yes,” he answered, meeting her eyes with his own. “More than I can remember, more than I could count.”
“And would you do it again?” she pressed him, a shiver racing through her. He might be dressed like a priest; he might be beautiful; he might not even carry a sword. But looking into his eyes as he answered her now, she didn’t doubt him for a moment. This man was a killer. “If you had to kill again, could you do it?”
“Yes,” he answered, a smile barely curling the corner of his mouth. “If I had to kill, I could.”
“Then come,” she said, smiling back. If he thought there was a way to break his curse at Charmot, he would want to protect the castle until he found it. And if Michel should show up in the meantime, she would make him see that the catacombs where his cure was hidden would have to be protected. “I will show you.”
She led them back out through the hall and down a spiral stairway into an earthen cellar. “There’s another door just there,” she said, pointing past some barrels into a shadowy corner. “It leads out to the lake at the back of the castle.” But she led them in the opposite direction to another, smaller door—Simon had to stoop to follow her. Beyond it was another, much older stairway cut into the natural rock. He looked at Orlando, and the little wizard smiled.
“I will have to lend you the key, I suppose,” Isabel said, handing Simon the torch. He looked as shaken as she felt, she suddenly realized. Had he felt the same strange power she had when he touched her? She tried to remember exactly what they had been saying to one another when Orlando came into the solar, but it was difficult, as if it had been a dream. All that seemed certain was that he was meant to be her Black Knight. “If my father’s spirit summoned you here, these catacombs would be the reason why.”
Simon watched her fit an iron key into a stone carving like the effigy on a tomb, a man in robes holding a sword or a mace; the cobwebs made it impossible to tell which. “Good evening, Joseph,” she said, forcing the key to turn. “I have brought you another scholar.” The stone door swung open, revealing a circular room.
“These caverns belonged to the druids,” Isabel said, lighting her father’s candle. “My father made a study of their records.” She turned back to Simon and Orlando, both of them staring in wonder. “If he thought there was help for you at Charmot, this is where you will find it.”
“Thank you, my lady,” Simon said, finally able to speak. Whatever else had passed between him and this woman, these caverns must surely be the reason he had found his way to Charmot. Of all the holy and un-holy places he and Orlando had seen in their quest for the Chalice, this was the first time he had thought they might actually find it. The chamber was lined with stone coffins carved with ancient runes like the ones on Kivar’s map. Three more tunnels led off from it to make a compass cross with the door through which they had passed.
“Call me Isabel,” she answered. “I am your cousin, remember? And don’t thank me yet. Each of those coffins is packed full of scrolls, all written in a language unlike any I have ever seen, and there are more in the tunnels besides. You may not live long enough to find this wisdom you seek.”
Simon smiled. You just don’t know, darling, he thought. I am doomed to live forever. “I do thank you,” he answered. “Isabel.”
When he smiled that way, she could almost forget to be afraid, she thought. He would protect her, cursed or not. And perhaps she could help him as well. Perhaps the druids really did hold the key to this silly curse. “I will have some rooms made up for you and Orlando,” she said. “Unless you would rather stay together.”
“We’ll stay here,” Orlando answered, going to one of the coffins. “Simon, push this lid off.”
“We must begin at once,” Simon explained, doing as he was told.
“Very well,” she said, amused. This dwarf might be a wizard or not, but he certainly had the manner of one. “Then I will see you at breakfast, I suppose.”
“No,” Simon cut her off. “I can’t—”
“Oh, yes, of course,” she said, almost laughing at the absurdity of the thing. “You don’t eat.”
“Or see the daylight, remember?” he reminded her. “I will stay here, in these caverns, until I have found what I seek.” She must have looked horrified, because he smiled. “Orlando will bring me what little I need.”
“A bed?” she suggested. “Some blankets so you don’t freeze to death—it can get rather chilly down here.” She hugged herself, just noticing. “It’s rather chilly now.”
“We have blankets in my pack,” he promised.
“Simon, are you mad?” she demanded, almost losing patience again. “How on earth or in heaven should it please God for you to starve yourself and live in a hole in the ground?”
He looked at Orlando, hoping for help, but the dwarf just shrugged before going back to the scroll he was perusing. “I don’t know, cousin,” Simon admitted. “You will just have to trust me that it does.”