“What about Susannah?” Simon said, refusing to rise to the bait. “She was your newborn, was she not?”
“A momentary diversion.” His mouth twisted in a bitter leer that made him look more like the living man whose corpse he had stolen. “You killed her, too, I suppose?” He went back to the table and opened a leather pouch very much like the ones Orlando carried, only larger. “Did you at least fuck her first? She wanted you to so badly.”
“You killed her,” Simon answered. “Not me.”
Kivar looked back at him over his shoulder, considering. “Yes,” he decided. “You could say that, I suppose. But if so, then I also killed you.” He went back to taking objects Simon couldn’t see out of his pack and setting them on the table. “Are you dead?”
The iron shackles cut into Simon’s wrists. “You tell me.”
Kivar looked up at the ceiling with a wry half-smile. “Not yet.” He lifted a curving, golden dagger to the light, and the girl on the floor began to struggle, trying again to scream. Simon couldn’t be certain in the dim light from across the cave, but he was sadly afraid he recognized her, the child of a woodcutter who had taken refuge with her family at Castle Charmot the first night Isabel had seen him as the wolf. If it were she, she was barely more than twelve or thirteen years old.
“It’s all right, sweeting,” he called out, making every effort to sound braver and more certain than he felt. “He isn’t nearly so scary as he thinks.”
Kivar set the dagger aside. “No, perhaps not.” He palmed another, much smaller object from the table. “But you are.” He turned back to Simon. “I should thank you for this body, by the way.” He looked down at his scarred but powerful hand. “Not so elegant or intelligent as our mutual friend, the duke, of course.” He clenched his fist and smiled. “But it should serve my present purpose well enough.” He held the object in his hand up to Simon’s eyes—the signet ri
ng Francis had always worn, the proof of his noble title, given to him by the king. “But I do miss being Francis.”
“You were never Francis,” Simon said, trembling with rage. “His soul escaped to heaven long before your demon spirit touched him.”
“Not so,” his tormentor said with a smile. “His mind was still all but intact when I took possession of it; I could hear his thoughts quite well. As for his soul…” He shook his head like a man who has heard a child prattle a fairy tale. “Of course, the mind does deteriorate over time, even under my command. Still, I owe him a great debt. I could never have kept up with you so well without his help. Orlando is a clever little maggot.” He suddenly grabbed Simon’s right hand in a grip more powerful than any shackle and slipped the ring on his finger. “His one regret in all his stupid life was that he had not made you his heir when he could have so easily,” he said softly as Simon made his face like stone, refusing to react. “So see how I repay him for his service?”
“And I will repay you,” Simon answered, his lips drawing back in a smile that was more like a grimace. “Next time I will finish you.”
“I bid you do your worst, my son,” Kivar said mildly, unimpressed. He took a step back as Simon lunged to the length of his chains, and this time Simon felt a definite slip; the bolts that held him to the wall were definitely bending. “But spare me your ignorant prattle of heaven and souls, if you please.” He walked away again. “I was immortal when your God was still being invented under some sheepherder’s tent.”
“Then why are you so keen to have His chalice?” Simon retorted. If he could get himself free of these shackles, he was almost certain he could reach that golden knife before Kivar could stop him. He might not destroy the devil completely, but he could destroy the body he possessed, cut off the head and cut out the heart as Kivar himself had apparently done to Francis. At least the girl could escape.
“His chalice?” Kivar said with a mocking laugh. “Simon, do not be a fool if you can help it. The Chalice is mine, my birthright. It has nothing to do with your God.” He returned to face him, holding the knife. “Has that little worm, Orlando, not told you yet what the Chalice holds?”
“Salvation,” Simon answered.
“No such thing!” he cried. “Salvation is another pretty story, another myth your priests made up to keep you savages from eating each other alive.” He smiled wryly. “But you should not feel badly; in my time, it was the same.”
“So what good is the Chalice?” In truth, the devil’s words meant nothing to him; if Kivar had said he was on fire, he wouldn’t have believed him even if he smelled the smoke. Simon had been burned by too many crosses and repelled by too many innocent souls to doubt his God was real or that He took a hard but definite interest in the affairs of the damned. Isabel, he thought before he could stop himself. Isabel had driven him from her with a cross, invoking the name of the Christ. What must she be thinking now? How must she feel? He didn’t dare to dwell on it, or he would never escape this trap. “Why search for it?”
“The Chalice is healing,” Kivar answered, a strange, triumphant madness burning in his eyes. “The Chalice makes you whole.” He clasped Simon’s face between his hands, studying it. “You are afflicted with death, my son, a disease of the blood, not a curse. The Chalice could cure you.” He let him go slowly, backing away. “But perhaps I do not need you any more.” He turned quickly and snatched up the girl from the floor, baring his fangs, and she let out a despairing, mewling kitten’s moan. “You look at this and see a soul,” the ancient evil said softly as he removed her gag, sounding gen uinely puzzled. “You fear for her more than you do for yourself, even now, this empty-minded little beast whose name you do not even know.” He let her fall again, her head striking the stone floor with a tiny crack. She shuddered and went limp.
“I am a knight, Kivar,” Simon answered, watching the other vampire’s face, his expression impossible to read. The laws and life of chivalry were not something he had found much cause to think of since he had become a vampire. They just were, a part of him like the arm that wielded his sword, the code of his life. His father and the duke had both been men of honor, protectors of the innocent, and he had loved them, had lived and breathed only to make them proud. So he had become the same. Even as a damned soul, a vampire loosed upon the world, he had never found a way to give up the habit.
“Yes,” Kivar said, turning on him. “A knight— exactly.” He picked up the dagger. “I had heard tell of this new creation in the world, this knight, and it amused me to think of taking one as my son. But after watching you for all these years, I begin to understand your weakness.” He came closer. “And I have seen your Isabel.” He traced the dagger’s point down Simon’s throat, and with an effort, Simon allowed it without flinching. Kivar could not easily kill him with a knife, and if he had truly wanted to do so, he could have done it already. Besides, in another few moments, Simon might have worked himself free. “She is not a knight, but she is strong, stronger than you, I begin to fear. Perhaps I have chosen badly.”
“Leave her alone,” Simon ordered, the words catching in his throat in spite of his resolve. The very idea of this monster touching his beloved was more than he could bear; the killing rage rose up inside him, turning his vision to red.
“I cannot,” Kivar answered. “But I will not abandon all my hopes for you just yet.” He held the blade to Simon’s throat, curved like a scythe. “This knife could behead you like a blade of grass with a single flick of the wrist,” the ancient vampire said, the voice Simon had first heard from him in his true form returning, calm and cold. “Do not move.” He sank his fangs deep into Simon’s throat, sucking stolen blood from his vampire’s veins as his body went rigid with fury. The terrible hunger that ruled him, knight or not, rose up like a fever, gnawing at him like a serpent, driving him to madness, and still the devil fed, drawing deeper, pulling at his very heart. Only when Simon was empty and aching, burning to be filled again, did Kivar lift his head.
“The sun will come to claim you soon,” he said, stepping back, wiping his mouth on Michel’s dirty sleeve. “There is an opening in the earth above us, and now you are too weak to free yourself and escape.” His voice seemed to waver and echo inside Simon’s head. All he could think of was feeding, gorging himself on blood and taking his revenge. “But you can be strong again.” Kivar lifted the girl from the floor again, her head now lolling on her shoulders, but she was still alive. Simon could hear her heartbeat roaring in his ears, feel it throbbing through his weak and starving flesh as if it were his own. “Take the beast and feed from her as you were created to do,” Kivar said, slashing the dagger across the girl’s wrist, filling the cave with the scent of her blood. “Then you will be my son.”
He laid the girl across Simon’s lap, passing her wrist across his face to smear his mouth with her blood. Simon lurched up in his chains like a man possessed, a howl of agony erupting from his throat, but he did not take the bait; he did not bite her. “If you are still a knight, then let the dawn consume you. Do so that your innocent might live,” Kivar finished, backing away. “But if you have the strength to take what is yours by all that is right, I will come to you again.”
“Kivar!” Simon shouted as the ancient left him in the dark.
Isabel waited in her father’s chair in the catacombs as Brautus led Orlando in. “My lady!” the wizard said, rushing forward as soon as he saw her face. Expecting nothing but hostility after keeping him locked up in Simon’s room all night, she was surprised; he looked and sounded genuinely relieved. “Are you all right?”
“Yes,” she nodded as Brautus helped the little wizard into a chair. That wasn’t quite the perfect truth, as she was confused, terrified, and rather nauseated, but it seemed the wisest response. “But there are questions I would have you answer, if you will.” She set the purse Mary had given her and the silver cross she had found at the church on the desk between them. The druid’s map she kept in her pocket. “Questions
about Simon.”
“I have one as well,” Orlando answered. “Where is he?”