Quick Pitch
Set in 1885 London, and the forests of Denmark, Amaranthine is a Gothic love story.
Astral has lived in near seclusion with Davn for six years: ever since he found her lying half dead on the road. She is happy, and safe, and she's nearly forgotten the horrible things she did that last night in her father's house.
But now Davn is sending her away, to London, to live with strangers.
And the questions will begin.
Caught between protecting her secret past and living her new life in the opulent city, it's her memories of Davn that keep her awake at night.
But Davn has his own demons, and now they're coming for her.
In the end, it won't be the horrible things she did, that will threaten her life.
Astral has lived in near seclusion with Davn for six years: ever since he found her lying half dead on the road. She is happy, and safe, and she's nearly forgotten the horrible things she did that last night in her father's house.
But now Davn is sending her away, to London, to live with strangers.
And the questions will begin.
Caught between protecting her secret past and living her new life in the opulent city, it's her memories of Davn that keep her awake at night.
But Davn has his own demons, and now they're coming for her.
In the end, it won't be the horrible things she did, that will threaten her life.
Prologue
SARAID
Southern Wales
146 BC
“Hurry up Magda!” Saraid paused with impatience and watched her acolyte stumble in the dark. “Do you expect the gods to wait for you?”
"No, mistress." Unlike Saraid, who strode unhindered through the forest like a Queen through her subjects, Magda stumbled and fell, tripping over fallen logs and scrubbing her face on rain soaked leaves.
Despite the rain and frosty air, the night was charged with the energy of Samhain. The festival could barely be seen or heard in glimpses through the thick trees but Saraid's skin tingled none-the-less. Hundreds gathered, dancing and reveling, around bonfires in thanksgiving for the harvest, but Saraid and her acolyte stole quickly through the trees, heading farther and farther from the festivities.
Saraid had her own meeting with the gods planned for this evening. She’d planned carefully, choosing Samhain as the most powerful holy day of the year. The one night when the gods drew nearest, and the veil between the dead and the living thinned to a mere gossamer barrier.
She had spent the day in heavy prayer, and cleansed her body with chamomile and honeysuckle. She had meditated and chanted and shed her blood in worship.
She would have her most coveted desire tonight, she was sure. All was ready.
She turned and waited for the girl yet again, her scowl of annoyance hidden in the dark but still evident in her voice. “Do you need me to hold your hand? Hurry up!”
Magda hid her sullen expression behind her cowl. Her friends were throwing wreaths into the fire and feasting on roasted calf and harvest berries and singing with the boys to be heard above the roar of the central fires. She was cold and wet and hungry and the forest frightened her almost as much as the woman she followed, but she hurried through the dense trees to catch up, more cautious of the other woman's temper than the sharp branches that clawed at her skin.
They emerged into a circular clearing. The grass was clipped short and the ground was clear and groomed around the low stone structure in the center. Saraid approached the carved stone slab and knelt with reverence, murmuring age-old prayers.
Magda hung back and waited, stiff and unsure. She watched in shivering misery as rain trickled down her scalp and soaked her shoulders.
As a priestess, Saraid was feared nearly as much as she was revered, and to be chosen by her was a great honor so when Saraid stood and held out her hand, Magda went to her without question.
“You are a very special girl Magda,” Saraid said as she grasped the girl's hand and stroked the back of it tenderly. “You are the daughter of our King, and beautiful. But above any of that you were born on this very night, thirteen years ago.” Saraid’s face was lost in the blackness but her voice was comforting and gentle.
The girl quivered in excitement, suddenly aware that she was about to be initiated into something great. She had been told her whole life how special she was. Those born on the eve of Samhain as she was, were gifted with foretelling. She had been given to Saraid to train because she also had been born on the eve of Samhain and she had foretold many things.
Saraid pulled her forward to the table and pushed her gently to kneel at the edge. “Are you ready to meet your destiny?”
The girl nodded in the dark, suddenly nervous. What would she see tonight? Would the great gods Arawn and Cerridwen speak to her? Would she finally be given the insight she had been decreed at birth?
“Ready yourself, and pray with me.” Saraid raised her face to catch the soft rain. She raised her hands to the sky letting her cloak sleeves slide down to her elbows, revealing the bloody gashes across both her wrists.
“Cernunnus, Great Horned God of Life, I call you up from the Underworld.” Her voice was strong and commanding.
Magda shivered and darted a look around her when a cold wind howled through the clearing and chilled her wet skin.
“Morrigan, Great Raven Goddess of Prophecy and Death, I call you down from the heavens.”
There was a bone chilling shriek and Magda was sure she saw a dark shape swoop through the rain above her head. She dropped her chin and squeezed her eyes shut, suddenly fearful. These were not the gods she would have chosen to converse with. These gods brought strife. Morrigan, monstrous queen of death and terror; Cernunnus, ensured life through sacrifice and blood.
Saraid marched around the table, repeating her command and calling down the gods with every turn. She marveled in the electricity that charged her as her named gods answered her call. Her voice grew harsher and wilder. As she passed behind Magda for the third time she bent and whispered in the petrified girl's ear, “I can't hear you Magda, pray with me. Show them your fealty.”
The girl trembled and started to speak, but not to pray as she was told. “Mistress Saraid, this is forbidden. If we anger these gods--” Saraid shushed her gently with a finger to her lips and started to chant, her voice low and husky. She placed her hands on either side of Magda’s head, pushing her face down till her forehead rested on the cold smooth surface.
The girl whimpered, caught between her panicked desire to flee and her inability to defy her father's priestess. The wind continued to howl around her, it buffeted her body from every side, pulling at her cloak and chilling her to the bone. The shrieking filled her head and split her skull.
“Don't be frightened. I have foretold the future and seen magnificent things.”
With a silent flourish Saraid reached beneath her cloak and pulled out a slim knife. The handle was elaborately worked oak, the blade curved and sharp. From her pouch she withdrew a handful of herbs. She held the knife to the sky in one hand and the green leafy flowers above Magda's head with the other. When she spoke her voice was husky and calm.
“I have seen my destiny!” She brought the knife down and cut the herbs in her hands, slicing her fingers along with the thin stems. Clumps fell to the table around Magda's head and droplets of blood spattered on her hair.
“I offer up my blood!”
Magda's shoulders rose and fell with her short breaths, her sobbing drowned out by the raging goddess' answer.
The wind swirled, a cyclone that gripped their hair and twisted their cloaks, tugging and prying like fingers. “I offer a life!”
Saraid watched the sky, reveling in the physical manifestation she had commanded. An electric charge ran through her from head to toe and she shivered in anticipation.
Lightning started to arch across the sky. Thin branches of light flickered in the deep black night. The rain pelted her, the wind wailed.
Magda raised her head and saw the clumps of leaves scattered around her on the table top. She barely made out the outline of Mistletoe in each flash of white light and her eyes widened with cold terror, finally seeing what her priestess wanted from her.
Mistletoe, was a rare and sacred plant, used only in sacrifices.
She lurched, her feet tangled under her and wrapped in her sodden cloak. She threw herself from the table, but Saraid was ready. She gripped the girl's hair, pulling her back to expose her throat. It was long and white with a twisted gold torc decorating her collar bones.
Saraid wrestled Magda back to the table. The girl was shrieking and clawing but Saraid was stronger and forced her back to the cold, stone slab.
“I ask for immortality, and strength, and power.” Saraid's voice lost its calmness and became shrill with lunacy. Her heart pounded from the struggle but she forged ahead. Exhilaration made her hand tremble, the whites of her eyes flashed in each flicker of lightning. “I offer blood, and ask for life!”
Magda screamed long and loud, but no one from the village could hear. Lightning flashed and she saw the knife glint above her, even as a dark shadow swirled around their thrashing bodies. She could feel how much these gods wanted her blood. The blood of kings.
“Morrigan! A life I give for a life you gift!” With a hard thrust the druid sliced the girls neck, letting a jet of hot blood to spray across the sacrificial table. Magda’s scream ended in a gurgle as her heart pumped her life out onto the wet stone. Saraid panted as she watched, an eager grin across her lips and heart pounding with euphoria. Her fist was wrapped in the girl's hair as her body grew limp in death.
The wind screeched in triumph while a streak of lightning forked down from the sky. It struck the ground several times around Saraid leaving black scorches in the dirt before a thin white branch arced down and struck her, illuminating her body in the clearing. She screamed in pain as the lightning burned through her body. Her spine arched and twisted as electricity burned out her veins and triggered her muscles. Smoke rose from her and she vaguely smelled burned flesh before dropping to the ground unconscious.
****
It was pain that woke her. Small at first but growing. She tried to ignore it and fall back into the comfort and peace of sleep, but it pulled her into consciousness where she remembered, slowly, the events of the night before.
The rain had ended, leaving only a white mist hovering atop the ground. The coming dawn lit the clearing enough to see the aftermath of her gruesome bargain. Magda’s body was there, slumped over the table, her brown hair matted with blood and sticking to the smooth surface. The earth was scorched with dozens of black burns.
The pain continued to grow and Saraid didn’t know how to make it stop. Her body burned hot and dry and she felt as though any second she would light up like a torch. Every inch of exposed skin burned and turned black. Before her eyes she watched as her own flesh turned to ash and flaked away.
In a panic she crawled across the clearing, trying to escape the place and the evil she had brought there. She crawled painfully across the ground, her fingers digging into the soft dirt as she pulled herself out of the light and into the dense trees. She immediately felt relief as she entered the dark underbrush. Sobbing in pain she pulled branches over her and clawed dirt over herself. She pulled her cloak over her head and, in agony and confusion, allowed herself to be drawn again into the nothingness of sleep.
SARAID
Southern Wales
146 BC
“Hurry up Magda!” Saraid paused with impatience and watched her acolyte stumble in the dark. “Do you expect the gods to wait for you?”
"No, mistress." Unlike Saraid, who strode unhindered through the forest like a Queen through her subjects, Magda stumbled and fell, tripping over fallen logs and scrubbing her face on rain soaked leaves.
Despite the rain and frosty air, the night was charged with the energy of Samhain. The festival could barely be seen or heard in glimpses through the thick trees but Saraid's skin tingled none-the-less. Hundreds gathered, dancing and reveling, around bonfires in thanksgiving for the harvest, but Saraid and her acolyte stole quickly through the trees, heading farther and farther from the festivities.
Saraid had her own meeting with the gods planned for this evening. She’d planned carefully, choosing Samhain as the most powerful holy day of the year. The one night when the gods drew nearest, and the veil between the dead and the living thinned to a mere gossamer barrier.
She had spent the day in heavy prayer, and cleansed her body with chamomile and honeysuckle. She had meditated and chanted and shed her blood in worship.
She would have her most coveted desire tonight, she was sure. All was ready.
She turned and waited for the girl yet again, her scowl of annoyance hidden in the dark but still evident in her voice. “Do you need me to hold your hand? Hurry up!”
Magda hid her sullen expression behind her cowl. Her friends were throwing wreaths into the fire and feasting on roasted calf and harvest berries and singing with the boys to be heard above the roar of the central fires. She was cold and wet and hungry and the forest frightened her almost as much as the woman she followed, but she hurried through the dense trees to catch up, more cautious of the other woman's temper than the sharp branches that clawed at her skin.
They emerged into a circular clearing. The grass was clipped short and the ground was clear and groomed around the low stone structure in the center. Saraid approached the carved stone slab and knelt with reverence, murmuring age-old prayers.
Magda hung back and waited, stiff and unsure. She watched in shivering misery as rain trickled down her scalp and soaked her shoulders.
As a priestess, Saraid was feared nearly as much as she was revered, and to be chosen by her was a great honor so when Saraid stood and held out her hand, Magda went to her without question.
“You are a very special girl Magda,” Saraid said as she grasped the girl's hand and stroked the back of it tenderly. “You are the daughter of our King, and beautiful. But above any of that you were born on this very night, thirteen years ago.” Saraid’s face was lost in the blackness but her voice was comforting and gentle.
The girl quivered in excitement, suddenly aware that she was about to be initiated into something great. She had been told her whole life how special she was. Those born on the eve of Samhain as she was, were gifted with foretelling. She had been given to Saraid to train because she also had been born on the eve of Samhain and she had foretold many things.
Saraid pulled her forward to the table and pushed her gently to kneel at the edge. “Are you ready to meet your destiny?”
The girl nodded in the dark, suddenly nervous. What would she see tonight? Would the great gods Arawn and Cerridwen speak to her? Would she finally be given the insight she had been decreed at birth?
“Ready yourself, and pray with me.” Saraid raised her face to catch the soft rain. She raised her hands to the sky letting her cloak sleeves slide down to her elbows, revealing the bloody gashes across both her wrists.
“Cernunnus, Great Horned God of Life, I call you up from the Underworld.” Her voice was strong and commanding.
Magda shivered and darted a look around her when a cold wind howled through the clearing and chilled her wet skin.
“Morrigan, Great Raven Goddess of Prophecy and Death, I call you down from the heavens.”
There was a bone chilling shriek and Magda was sure she saw a dark shape swoop through the rain above her head. She dropped her chin and squeezed her eyes shut, suddenly fearful. These were not the gods she would have chosen to converse with. These gods brought strife. Morrigan, monstrous queen of death and terror; Cernunnus, ensured life through sacrifice and blood.
Saraid marched around the table, repeating her command and calling down the gods with every turn. She marveled in the electricity that charged her as her named gods answered her call. Her voice grew harsher and wilder. As she passed behind Magda for the third time she bent and whispered in the petrified girl's ear, “I can't hear you Magda, pray with me. Show them your fealty.”
The girl trembled and started to speak, but not to pray as she was told. “Mistress Saraid, this is forbidden. If we anger these gods--” Saraid shushed her gently with a finger to her lips and started to chant, her voice low and husky. She placed her hands on either side of Magda’s head, pushing her face down till her forehead rested on the cold smooth surface.
The girl whimpered, caught between her panicked desire to flee and her inability to defy her father's priestess. The wind continued to howl around her, it buffeted her body from every side, pulling at her cloak and chilling her to the bone. The shrieking filled her head and split her skull.
“Don't be frightened. I have foretold the future and seen magnificent things.”
With a silent flourish Saraid reached beneath her cloak and pulled out a slim knife. The handle was elaborately worked oak, the blade curved and sharp. From her pouch she withdrew a handful of herbs. She held the knife to the sky in one hand and the green leafy flowers above Magda's head with the other. When she spoke her voice was husky and calm.
“I have seen my destiny!” She brought the knife down and cut the herbs in her hands, slicing her fingers along with the thin stems. Clumps fell to the table around Magda's head and droplets of blood spattered on her hair.
“I offer up my blood!”
Magda's shoulders rose and fell with her short breaths, her sobbing drowned out by the raging goddess' answer.
The wind swirled, a cyclone that gripped their hair and twisted their cloaks, tugging and prying like fingers. “I offer a life!”
Saraid watched the sky, reveling in the physical manifestation she had commanded. An electric charge ran through her from head to toe and she shivered in anticipation.
Lightning started to arch across the sky. Thin branches of light flickered in the deep black night. The rain pelted her, the wind wailed.
Magda raised her head and saw the clumps of leaves scattered around her on the table top. She barely made out the outline of Mistletoe in each flash of white light and her eyes widened with cold terror, finally seeing what her priestess wanted from her.
Mistletoe, was a rare and sacred plant, used only in sacrifices.
She lurched, her feet tangled under her and wrapped in her sodden cloak. She threw herself from the table, but Saraid was ready. She gripped the girl's hair, pulling her back to expose her throat. It was long and white with a twisted gold torc decorating her collar bones.
Saraid wrestled Magda back to the table. The girl was shrieking and clawing but Saraid was stronger and forced her back to the cold, stone slab.
“I ask for immortality, and strength, and power.” Saraid's voice lost its calmness and became shrill with lunacy. Her heart pounded from the struggle but she forged ahead. Exhilaration made her hand tremble, the whites of her eyes flashed in each flicker of lightning. “I offer blood, and ask for life!”
Magda screamed long and loud, but no one from the village could hear. Lightning flashed and she saw the knife glint above her, even as a dark shadow swirled around their thrashing bodies. She could feel how much these gods wanted her blood. The blood of kings.
“Morrigan! A life I give for a life you gift!” With a hard thrust the druid sliced the girls neck, letting a jet of hot blood to spray across the sacrificial table. Magda’s scream ended in a gurgle as her heart pumped her life out onto the wet stone. Saraid panted as she watched, an eager grin across her lips and heart pounding with euphoria. Her fist was wrapped in the girl's hair as her body grew limp in death.
The wind screeched in triumph while a streak of lightning forked down from the sky. It struck the ground several times around Saraid leaving black scorches in the dirt before a thin white branch arced down and struck her, illuminating her body in the clearing. She screamed in pain as the lightning burned through her body. Her spine arched and twisted as electricity burned out her veins and triggered her muscles. Smoke rose from her and she vaguely smelled burned flesh before dropping to the ground unconscious.
****
It was pain that woke her. Small at first but growing. She tried to ignore it and fall back into the comfort and peace of sleep, but it pulled her into consciousness where she remembered, slowly, the events of the night before.
The rain had ended, leaving only a white mist hovering atop the ground. The coming dawn lit the clearing enough to see the aftermath of her gruesome bargain. Magda’s body was there, slumped over the table, her brown hair matted with blood and sticking to the smooth surface. The earth was scorched with dozens of black burns.
The pain continued to grow and Saraid didn’t know how to make it stop. Her body burned hot and dry and she felt as though any second she would light up like a torch. Every inch of exposed skin burned and turned black. Before her eyes she watched as her own flesh turned to ash and flaked away.
In a panic she crawled across the clearing, trying to escape the place and the evil she had brought there. She crawled painfully across the ground, her fingers digging into the soft dirt as she pulled herself out of the light and into the dense trees. She immediately felt relief as she entered the dark underbrush. Sobbing in pain she pulled branches over her and clawed dirt over herself. She pulled her cloak over her head and, in agony and confusion, allowed herself to be drawn again into the nothingness of sleep.
Astral
Denmark.
1879
Astral woke hours after dark to the sound of cupboard doors slamming and heavy, uneven footsteps on the wooden floors. She sat up from where she lay huddled on the floor in front of the hearth, the only warm spot in the tiny farmhouse, and watched as her father staggered to the small corner pantry.
Sabie quacked softly at the disturbance. He had been sleeping under her chin as he did every night, against her chest and under her long hair, and now he fluffed his silky brown feathers and moved closer to the waning fire.
“Where's the bread I brought home girl?” Her father was drunk again. Astral rubbed the sleep from her eyes and stood to get more wood.
“There isn't any papa, not unless you brought some home with you.”
Her own belly ached with hunger, a pain she lived with every day. She couldn't remember the last decent meal she'd had, or what it was like to feel full. When her mother was alive she'd never known hunger or gone without, but when Sasha died almost two years ago everything had changed. Her father, in grief and weakness, had fallen into a beer barrel and never really resurfaced and Astral had learned that tending a household alone and with no money was frighteningly impossible.
The chickens and pig didn’t last long, and the goat, although stringy, kept hunger away for a few more weeks but in mere months she was hungry more often than not, and subsisting on chestnuts, berries, mushrooms and the occasional truffle; anything she could forage up from the woods around their small farmhouse. Unfortunately her efforts were not richly rewarded, she was painfully thin, her face gaunt, elbows bony and ribs jutting. At fifteen she looked more like she was eleven, and a sickly eleven at that.
Right now, her father seemed oblivious to her dire state.
“It's gone? You ate all of it?” He sounded incredulous, and Astral sighed, resigned to have this same conversation again. “But I brought two loaves and a pound of bacon the other day. How could you have eaten it all already?” His voice rose in pitch as he became outraged at her perceived gluttony.
“It was over a week ago, papa. You haven't been home in days.” She shuffled to the wood box, careful to avoid stepping on a sliver in her bare feet and lifted out a small branch she had collected earlier. “A pound of bacon doesn't last that long.”
She fed the fire and stirred the coals with a poker, blowing it back to life so she could settle back down to sleep. She was tired. She spent all day foraging for whatever she could find either to burn or eat and at night, hungry and cold, she didn't have energy for anything else.
She knew from experience that her father would pass out soon, his heavy blacksmith body sprawled across his bed or slumped over the table. In the morning, when he was sober, he would apologize for his failures. His lack of care. He would promise to return that night with a ham and maybe some apples, and it would be a few more days before he returned home, empty handed and angry.
But this time it was different.
Instead of grumbling and taking himself off to bed he slammed his fist down on the table and glared at her. “I work all day at the fire and when I come home I expect supper.”
Her shoulders slumped. “There just isn’t any food, papa.”
He glared at her, and let out a long breath before growling, “aye, there is.”
She didn't understand; she knew there was nothing. She hadn't eaten more than a few pine cones and winter mushrooms in days, but his unfocused eyes had drifted from his daughter to where Sabie sat, beak tucked under his wing, next to the fire where Astral had just been sleeping. Confusion wrapped her brain so that when her father lunged across the room towards her, she still failed to register any fear until his big hand gripped the duck's brown neck.
“I always knew I let you keep this mangy pest around for a reason and this is it. It’s dinner time girlie, set the table we’re having roast duck tonight.”
Sabie flapped his wings in a rapid staccato as he dangled from the blacksmith’s grasp. Downy feathers sputtered about the room as the panicked bird fought to relieve the pressure on his neck.
She watched in shock for two heartbeats and then she exploded in a flurry of frantic panic. The poker she still held clattered to the floor and she grabbed instead at his arm, dragged at his hips and pried at his fingers, screaming in protest. “No! Stop it!”
Casually, and with almost no sign of drunkenness, Astral’s father walked outside, uncaring that his daughter gripped his elbow ferociously and begged him to release her pet. The small house, and then the quiet yard, filled with her terrified shrieks and Sabie’s muffled but petrified squawks.
Her father trudged to the old stump that had been used to butcher chickens and wrenched the rusty hatchet from its surface even as she pulled on his arm, futilely trying to hold him back.
“Not him, please. Leave him be.” Her terror turned into anguish as he neared the stump and she knew the horrific end to her pet was near. As much as she tried, she didn't have a quarter of the strength needed to slow his pace even a moment.
She sobbed and pleaded, but it had no effect, and with slow precision he gripped the back of her neck and hurled her away. She crashed into the side of the small shed that housed a few gardening tools and watched as he settled the still flapping duck across the flat, blood soaked surface of the stump.
Sabie had appeared out of the blue one day shortly after her mother died, and had quickly filled the void left by her absent parents. The duck was as regular as any duck she assumed but he followed her around day and night, slept tucked under her chin and preened her hair right along with his own glossy feathers. As unorthodox as it was, Sabie was the only real family she had anymore ,and now she stared with huge eyes as the hatchet rose above her father's shoulders, ready to kill the only thing she had left in this world.
Her mouth moved but words no longer escaped the tightness in her throat. Her mother was dead, and her father, broken from grief, was not the same man he once was, but she still had Sabie. She felt bile rise up in her throat from fear and a black haze of hysteria clouded her vision.
The wooden handle of a shovel leaned against the shed next to her and she gripped it. Her hands were numb with cold, and it felt like someone else holding the smooth wood. With more strength than she knew she possessed under normal circumstances she lunged at her father’s back swinging the shovel’s metal blade up and over her head in a long arc that ended with a sickening thud on the back of his head.
Her father's body crumpled forward onto the butcher block. His hand opened and the duck flapped free.
The shovel dropped from her hands and she raised them to her mouth, covering the sobs that blubbered from her lips. Realization of what she had just done turned her blood cold. She watched his body intently for several long seconds hoping for some small sign of life. “Papa?”
He didn't move; didn't make a sound.
She could hear the blood in her ears, and her scalp tingled with shock. Her shaky exhalations misted in the cold air as she willed her father to get up or make some small sound. But he didn't.
"What have I done?"She asked herself in a shaky whisper. She stumbled backwards and looked around her in terror, expecting some mighty retribution to cut her down where she stood. Like a startled rabbit, she darted in one direction and then another, unsure what to do and terrified of her murdered father's body.
Sabie's still frantic fluttering caught her attention and without a clear thought in her head she scooped him into her arms and fled. She sprinted across the uneven field that surrounded the farmhouse and dashed into the dark woods, cutting her feet and scraping her face and arms on the sharp, cold foliage.
In the dark she was quickly disoriented, but she continued forward, farther than she had ever been before, away from her father, and the terrible thing she'd just done. She feared what she would find if she ever went back more than she feared being alone in the woods.
She stumbled into a long overgrown road. The moon shone through a break in the canopy and reflected off the snow covered ground, creating enough light to see that the road wound around in a long curve from North to South and had a gradual uphill slope. The smooth surface of snow had been churned up beneath the hooves of some large animal. She had never come across this road before and she had no idea where it led to in either direction. She stood ankle deep in snow for several minutes crippled by indecision. Sabie struggled to free himself and she let him flutter to the ground where he tossed snow around with his bill and quacked softly.
Astral shivered as she contemplated which direction to follow. Her skin burned in alternating waves of frostbite and raw scrapes. Her brain felt foggy and weak and her stomach roiled around in her belly. Her body, malnourished and thin, worked in vain to keep warm even as her lungs burned.
She watched Sabie as he nestled himself into the snow and tucked his beak under his wing. His feathers fluffed up in an attempt to conserve warmth. Astral watched her precious duck lie in the cold and let her misery bubble to the surface.
Fat, hot tears rose up her throat and leaked down her frozen cheeks. The full weight of her predicament stole the last of her energy and she fell to her side in the snow, curling up with her knees tucked to her chin to try and stay warm. Her mind was vacant and numb as she realized she would die here, cold and alone. She lay in the road, trembling, inhaling the frigid air in short shivering breaths. Her teeth clenched till her jaw ached, and she shivered uncontrollably. Her eyes closed and she drowsed, vaguely aware of Sabie snuggling up close to her knees. In a fog she pulled her skirt out to cover him, and tried to keep her teeth from chattering.
Her mind wandered to sporadic memories and she thought of her father, the image of his thick body lying awkwardly across the butcher block, a few spots of scarlet blood in the snow under his head. That was pushed aside by the last memory she had of her mother, her thin body covered by heavy blankets, her face sunken and ashen. A racking cough drained her life and bloodied the kerchief Astral held to her lips. It was the last thought she had before falling into peaceful unconsciousness.
Denmark.
1879
Astral woke hours after dark to the sound of cupboard doors slamming and heavy, uneven footsteps on the wooden floors. She sat up from where she lay huddled on the floor in front of the hearth, the only warm spot in the tiny farmhouse, and watched as her father staggered to the small corner pantry.
Sabie quacked softly at the disturbance. He had been sleeping under her chin as he did every night, against her chest and under her long hair, and now he fluffed his silky brown feathers and moved closer to the waning fire.
“Where's the bread I brought home girl?” Her father was drunk again. Astral rubbed the sleep from her eyes and stood to get more wood.
“There isn't any papa, not unless you brought some home with you.”
Her own belly ached with hunger, a pain she lived with every day. She couldn't remember the last decent meal she'd had, or what it was like to feel full. When her mother was alive she'd never known hunger or gone without, but when Sasha died almost two years ago everything had changed. Her father, in grief and weakness, had fallen into a beer barrel and never really resurfaced and Astral had learned that tending a household alone and with no money was frighteningly impossible.
The chickens and pig didn’t last long, and the goat, although stringy, kept hunger away for a few more weeks but in mere months she was hungry more often than not, and subsisting on chestnuts, berries, mushrooms and the occasional truffle; anything she could forage up from the woods around their small farmhouse. Unfortunately her efforts were not richly rewarded, she was painfully thin, her face gaunt, elbows bony and ribs jutting. At fifteen she looked more like she was eleven, and a sickly eleven at that.
Right now, her father seemed oblivious to her dire state.
“It's gone? You ate all of it?” He sounded incredulous, and Astral sighed, resigned to have this same conversation again. “But I brought two loaves and a pound of bacon the other day. How could you have eaten it all already?” His voice rose in pitch as he became outraged at her perceived gluttony.
“It was over a week ago, papa. You haven't been home in days.” She shuffled to the wood box, careful to avoid stepping on a sliver in her bare feet and lifted out a small branch she had collected earlier. “A pound of bacon doesn't last that long.”
She fed the fire and stirred the coals with a poker, blowing it back to life so she could settle back down to sleep. She was tired. She spent all day foraging for whatever she could find either to burn or eat and at night, hungry and cold, she didn't have energy for anything else.
She knew from experience that her father would pass out soon, his heavy blacksmith body sprawled across his bed or slumped over the table. In the morning, when he was sober, he would apologize for his failures. His lack of care. He would promise to return that night with a ham and maybe some apples, and it would be a few more days before he returned home, empty handed and angry.
But this time it was different.
Instead of grumbling and taking himself off to bed he slammed his fist down on the table and glared at her. “I work all day at the fire and when I come home I expect supper.”
Her shoulders slumped. “There just isn’t any food, papa.”
He glared at her, and let out a long breath before growling, “aye, there is.”
She didn't understand; she knew there was nothing. She hadn't eaten more than a few pine cones and winter mushrooms in days, but his unfocused eyes had drifted from his daughter to where Sabie sat, beak tucked under his wing, next to the fire where Astral had just been sleeping. Confusion wrapped her brain so that when her father lunged across the room towards her, she still failed to register any fear until his big hand gripped the duck's brown neck.
“I always knew I let you keep this mangy pest around for a reason and this is it. It’s dinner time girlie, set the table we’re having roast duck tonight.”
Sabie flapped his wings in a rapid staccato as he dangled from the blacksmith’s grasp. Downy feathers sputtered about the room as the panicked bird fought to relieve the pressure on his neck.
She watched in shock for two heartbeats and then she exploded in a flurry of frantic panic. The poker she still held clattered to the floor and she grabbed instead at his arm, dragged at his hips and pried at his fingers, screaming in protest. “No! Stop it!”
Casually, and with almost no sign of drunkenness, Astral’s father walked outside, uncaring that his daughter gripped his elbow ferociously and begged him to release her pet. The small house, and then the quiet yard, filled with her terrified shrieks and Sabie’s muffled but petrified squawks.
Her father trudged to the old stump that had been used to butcher chickens and wrenched the rusty hatchet from its surface even as she pulled on his arm, futilely trying to hold him back.
“Not him, please. Leave him be.” Her terror turned into anguish as he neared the stump and she knew the horrific end to her pet was near. As much as she tried, she didn't have a quarter of the strength needed to slow his pace even a moment.
She sobbed and pleaded, but it had no effect, and with slow precision he gripped the back of her neck and hurled her away. She crashed into the side of the small shed that housed a few gardening tools and watched as he settled the still flapping duck across the flat, blood soaked surface of the stump.
Sabie had appeared out of the blue one day shortly after her mother died, and had quickly filled the void left by her absent parents. The duck was as regular as any duck she assumed but he followed her around day and night, slept tucked under her chin and preened her hair right along with his own glossy feathers. As unorthodox as it was, Sabie was the only real family she had anymore ,and now she stared with huge eyes as the hatchet rose above her father's shoulders, ready to kill the only thing she had left in this world.
Her mouth moved but words no longer escaped the tightness in her throat. Her mother was dead, and her father, broken from grief, was not the same man he once was, but she still had Sabie. She felt bile rise up in her throat from fear and a black haze of hysteria clouded her vision.
The wooden handle of a shovel leaned against the shed next to her and she gripped it. Her hands were numb with cold, and it felt like someone else holding the smooth wood. With more strength than she knew she possessed under normal circumstances she lunged at her father’s back swinging the shovel’s metal blade up and over her head in a long arc that ended with a sickening thud on the back of his head.
Her father's body crumpled forward onto the butcher block. His hand opened and the duck flapped free.
The shovel dropped from her hands and she raised them to her mouth, covering the sobs that blubbered from her lips. Realization of what she had just done turned her blood cold. She watched his body intently for several long seconds hoping for some small sign of life. “Papa?”
He didn't move; didn't make a sound.
She could hear the blood in her ears, and her scalp tingled with shock. Her shaky exhalations misted in the cold air as she willed her father to get up or make some small sound. But he didn't.
"What have I done?"She asked herself in a shaky whisper. She stumbled backwards and looked around her in terror, expecting some mighty retribution to cut her down where she stood. Like a startled rabbit, she darted in one direction and then another, unsure what to do and terrified of her murdered father's body.
Sabie's still frantic fluttering caught her attention and without a clear thought in her head she scooped him into her arms and fled. She sprinted across the uneven field that surrounded the farmhouse and dashed into the dark woods, cutting her feet and scraping her face and arms on the sharp, cold foliage.
In the dark she was quickly disoriented, but she continued forward, farther than she had ever been before, away from her father, and the terrible thing she'd just done. She feared what she would find if she ever went back more than she feared being alone in the woods.
She stumbled into a long overgrown road. The moon shone through a break in the canopy and reflected off the snow covered ground, creating enough light to see that the road wound around in a long curve from North to South and had a gradual uphill slope. The smooth surface of snow had been churned up beneath the hooves of some large animal. She had never come across this road before and she had no idea where it led to in either direction. She stood ankle deep in snow for several minutes crippled by indecision. Sabie struggled to free himself and she let him flutter to the ground where he tossed snow around with his bill and quacked softly.
Astral shivered as she contemplated which direction to follow. Her skin burned in alternating waves of frostbite and raw scrapes. Her brain felt foggy and weak and her stomach roiled around in her belly. Her body, malnourished and thin, worked in vain to keep warm even as her lungs burned.
She watched Sabie as he nestled himself into the snow and tucked his beak under his wing. His feathers fluffed up in an attempt to conserve warmth. Astral watched her precious duck lie in the cold and let her misery bubble to the surface.
Fat, hot tears rose up her throat and leaked down her frozen cheeks. The full weight of her predicament stole the last of her energy and she fell to her side in the snow, curling up with her knees tucked to her chin to try and stay warm. Her mind was vacant and numb as she realized she would die here, cold and alone. She lay in the road, trembling, inhaling the frigid air in short shivering breaths. Her teeth clenched till her jaw ached, and she shivered uncontrollably. Her eyes closed and she drowsed, vaguely aware of Sabie snuggling up close to her knees. In a fog she pulled her skirt out to cover him, and tried to keep her teeth from chattering.
Her mind wandered to sporadic memories and she thought of her father, the image of his thick body lying awkwardly across the butcher block, a few spots of scarlet blood in the snow under his head. That was pushed aside by the last memory she had of her mother, her thin body covered by heavy blankets, her face sunken and ashen. A racking cough drained her life and bloodied the kerchief Astral held to her lips. It was the last thought she had before falling into peaceful unconsciousness.
Chapter 1
Astral rummaged through the top drawer of Davn's desk as quietly as she could. He had never strictly forbidden her from going in his desk, but she was still tense and kept her ears pealed for any sound that he might be coming downstairs.
The windows were shuttered against the late afternoon sun, just as Davn liked her to keep them, and she searched by the light of two lamps. Their meager glow helped little as her hands rifled through papers and pots of ink.
The room was large and made entirely of gray stone, just as the rest of the house, and she had already searched every other nook and cranny she could think of. The furniture was over-sized and had been elegant once, but was now ancient and scarred. A fireplace big enough for her to stand in housed a small fire, and besides the desk, a few armchairs, and a small loveseat, the only other furniture was a spindly legged piano. She hadn't found anything in any of those places either.
“It's not here Sabie,” she mumbled as she flipped through the pages of a heavy bound ledger. She abandoned the top drawer with a huff and opened the smaller side drawer. She was momentarily encouraged when she lifted out two small pouches made of brown leather, but they were filled with coins. The clink and weight of them was not what she was looking for.
“Looking for something?” His voice, that she knew so well, was tinged with amusement.
She dropped the pouches as though burned and slammed the drawer closed. She straightened hastily to face him with her mouth set in a moue of guilty chagrin, but the first thing she saw was not the tall, slim man standing in the door where the darkness from the hall and the dim light from the lamps cast him in shadow, but her pet, where he stood on the hearth and happily tore pages from one of her books with his beak.
“Sabie, no! Bad duck!” Astral scolded her pet before dodging around the desk to rescue the last few pages from being torn from their binding. “Look what you've done! I wasn't finished reading that!”
The duck, small, brown and fat, fluttered out of reach of her shooing hands and squawked with indignation.
“Don't talk to me like that!” She retorted in outrage. “You've ruined another of my books you little beast!” She knelt on the stone floor and gathered the shredded pages, trying to shuffle them back into order. She knew better than to leave anything destructible anywhere the duck could reach it but she had been so excited and distracted all day she had set this one down on the hearth and forgotten about it.
She scowled across the room at him and jammed the pages between the hard cover, feeling like one of her most precious possessions had just been desiccated.
“You spend so much time with your nose buried in one I think he does it out of spite.” Davn said behind her as he stepped into the room.
Astral looked over her shoulder and scowled. “Dav!” She stood and waved the book in front of her for him to see. “Look what he's done now. I only set it down for an hour and now look. It's ruined.”
He seemed relaxed, with his hands in the pockets of his dark trousers and his shirt open at the collar. Then he caught the title of the book she was waving at him and his voice betrayed his distaste. “Beowulf. At least he destroyed one of the bad ones this time.”
She tossed the loosely gathered pages onto the threadbare couch that sat in front of the fireplace and planted her hands on her hips with a scoff. “It's a fine book, and he can't eat all my books even if you do happen to hate them. Soon I won't have any left and then what will I do?”
His eyebrows shot up his forehead and he tilted his head towards the left wall, where hundreds of books filled the shelves.
She glanced at the books herself and rolled her eyes in exasperation. “He still can't eat all my books, you can't buy them as fast as he can destroy them.
She whirled and faced where the duck was hiding beneath the ancient, yellow keyed piano. It was warped and out of tune and painted in a faded green lacquer. It must have been a grand instrument when it was new two hundred years ago but now it was sad looking and rickety. It didn't stop her from playing it every day.
“You hear that Sabie? You can't eat all my books!” She fell to her hands and knees and crawled between the piano's legs, reaching out to grab the evasive duck, but he only squawked again and hopped out of her reach. “Come here you little scamp!” She laughed as he waggled his tail at her cheekily and escaped out the open door, waddling as quickly as he could into the foyer and leaving her smiling, trapped, and tangled between her long skirts and the piano legs.
She crawled out awkwardly and climbed to her feet with a cheerful grin on her lips and faced Davn again, where he stood and watched her. “What?” She asked.
“Look at you. Are you ever clean?”
She looked down at her dress and hands and sighed. Her skirt was dark rose and embellished with ruffles and pearls along the waist and had been pretty, but now it was smudged with dirt, and mud caked the hemline. Her palms were gray with dust and her flower print blouse was wrinkled and partially untucked. “I was clean. I had a bath this morning. But then I went riding, and weeded my garden, and made supper.”
The corner of his mouth twitched. “Are you sure you're twenty-one? Sometimes I think you are still that girl of five and ten I found all those years ago.”
She stuck her tongue out at him and then laughed. “Twenty-one today, as you know very well and I do not act five and ten, you're just stodgy.” She dusted her hands and tried to repair her clothes to no avail. “You're up early. It's not even supper yet.”
His smile, tiny as it was, faded. “Well I know how much you've been waiting for your present. I'm sure you tore this old heap of stones apart trying to find it.”
She shrugged innocently and examined her nails, which were dirty. “Well maybe I was a little curious and impatient.” She would never admit it, but she was so excited she had combed every inch of the ancient stone house in search of her present and had found nothing. Her gaze fell to his hands but even they were empty. Her shoulders drooped in disappointment. She wondered briefly if now she was too old for presents.
He crossed the room to his desk and withdrew a slim envelope from the top drawer.
“Happy birthday Aster, it’s hard to believe you’re all grown up and yet another year older.” He looked down at his hands for a brief moment and then sighed and handed her the envelope.
“That's it?” She asked. “Well I saw that. I must have shoved that out of the way a dozen times!” She snatched the white package from his outstretched hand.
“I know it's small and plain. Not what you were looking for I'm sure.”
“Well I suppose it can't always be horses and dresses and jewellery.”
“I remember when a bowl of soup would have made you happy. A lot has changed since then.”
Her smile dropped from her mouth. “That was a long time ago.”
“It was.” He agreed softly. “Do you ever think about it?”
She never thought of that night, except in her nightmares and even those were rare now. When she was awake and with Davn, there was no room for bad memories and fear. She shook her head. “Not if I can help it. Do you?”
He replied wryly with a small grin. “How could I forget the night I almost lost my finger?” His voice was low and cultured, and he spoke English with a slightly different accent than she did.
She scoffed and snatched the hand in question, pulling it forward to examine his fingers. They were large hands with long lean fingers and well groomed nails. She shook her head in denial. “You keep saying that, but I just don't believe it. I've never seen a wound on you, and Sabie just wouldn't do such a thing.”
He pulled his hand back and curled his fingers into a fist. “You think he only eats books? I'm telling you he attacked me. He lunged at me, snapping that beak like a bear trap, and nearly took my finger off. Between him and that gray demon of a horse I had at the time, it's a wonder I got you off the road at all.”
Astral smiled despite herself. She loved this story. Over the years she had romanticized it into a fairy tale. Davn, tall, dark stranger finds her nearly lifeless body in the woods and rescues her. Her faithful pet gallantly defends his mistress against an unknown foe.
Of course, she didn't remember any of it, or the days that followed. All she had were vague, inconsistent memories of waking up in a dark, cold room, with nothing but a small fire in the fireplace to light her surroundings.
She'd been frightened at first; waking up not knowing where she was, with nothing but her underclothes on and a dark eyed man tending to her. She'd been too sick and weak to complain or make anything more than a token resistance when he force fed her broth and bathed her burning face with cool water. But she had been comforted knowing Sabie was there standing over her like a tiny sentinel and of course, she wasn't dead or hurt, and that alone had given her a semblance of security.
When her fever finally broke she'd woken in an old, dusty four-poster with Davn sitting in the chair next to her bed. It was another week before she realized that there was no one else.
“It was fate. I was hungry and cold and you were living out here all alone in a crumbly old castle, miles away from any town in the middle of the woods.” She looked up at him and grinned knowingly. “You were lonely, admit it. Finding me was the best thing that ever happened to you.”
He went to the window, pulling the drapes and opening the shutters to look out over the now dark grounds. Astral’s vegetable garden was on this side of the castle. The stable and paddocks on the other side. The sun had sunk below the horizon and in the last remaining light of day the young plants looked shadowy and small.
“I can admit that.” He faced her again and looked at the envelope in her hands with something close to regret. “I think you should open your present.”
Astral turned the envelope over and with renewed excitement started to tear open the top. Davn gave the best presents. Her flashy bay gelding, Mynstral, was the first gift he had given her over the years, followed by dozens and dozens of books, new dresses, music boxes, ribbons and trinkets, a gold chain with a circular ruby pendant that she had never taken off, and of course her painting; the five foot oil portrait of her that hung above the fireplace in her room.
The painter had come all the way from Ebsjerg, a sweet, squinty eyed, balding man, and spent three days with his brush in hand trying to get Sabie out of her lap.
“You are now immortalized in paint young lady.” He had said as he unveiled the painting for her and Davn to see. It was all bright colors and light. A vivid blue sky swirled with white clouds and emerald green trees in the background. Astral's sapphire eyes and golden hair shone above her happy smile and yellow dress. Sabie had wormed his way into the picture and was portrayed standing on the stone bench beside his mistress, leaning his fat body against her hip.
This present was nothing like that.
She withdrew several sheets of paper and read quickly. “Tickets?” She looked at the next page and scanned a long itinerary that spanned from a departure in Esbjerg to an extended season in London, to France and Italy and finally America. The departure date was listed as just a few weeks away. The last page was a bank draft in her name worth a hundred thousand pounds. She raised her eyes questioningly. “What does this mean?”
“You’re an adult now, you should do something with your life besides grow old in this tomb.” He waved a hand to indicate the stone walls. “I arranged for you to do a two year long trip. I hired a woman from London to travel with you and you’ll have invitations from all the appropriate people in each city to gain you entry into society.” He rambled on ignoring the baffled look on her face.
“Wait, wait!” she interrupted when he would have gone on. “You won’t be coming with me?” She shook her head before he could answer. “I won’t go, I can’t leave here Dav. What about Sabie? And Mynstral? And you? I don’t want to go to America!” She said the word like she had just caught a whiff of smelly feet. She, in fact, had always wanted to go to America, ever since she had read the books on the wild frontier and the gold rush in California. But she had never imagined going without Davn. She couldn’t believe he even suggested it. No, more than suggested it. He had planned it all, bought and paid in full. Tears welled up in her eyes.
“This doesn't make any sense. I've been here for years, and you've never given any indication that you wanted me to leave before.” Her chin quivered. “Do you really want me to go?”
“It’s not like that Aster.” The old nickname rolled easily off his tongue. “You are a very talented and spirited young woman. What does this place have to offer you? I can’t keep you here just to keep me company.” He rubbed his hands in his eyes in frustration. “Of course the animals are going with you I made sure all the arrangements included both of them. I’m sorry, but I’ve made up my mind. You leave in two weeks.”
He walked past her and left the study and a few moments later she heard the front door slam behind him.
Chapter 2
Astral pounded on the door to Davn’ study with her fist. “Davn!” She shouted through the thick, wooden portal. “Open the door, I need to talk to you!” She gripped the knob with both hands and shook it firmly. The old door rattled in the jamb but held. In sheer frustration she beat on the door again, with both hands this time. “I know you’re in there, you can’t avoid me forever!”
It was four days since her birthday when he had announced that she would be leaving on a ship from Ebsjerg to London in just two weeks.
He hadn't had any peace since.
She had hounded him from the moment he emerged from his room at night till he slammed the door in her face just before dawn. She tried everything she could to get him to change his mind. Her voice was hoarse and her throat hurt, but nothing seemed to make an impression. Sometimes he listened attentively while she listed off the reasons why she could not go to London. Sometimes he just ignored her.
She never got any answer from him other than, “it’s in your best interest,” which only accomplished to infuriate her more.
During the day when she was alone, she cried. She hated the idea of leaving here more than anything else. This old castle with its crumbling walls and drafty windows was her safe haven. Davn, with his broody patience and limitless kindness was her most valuable friend. She sobbed in misery at the mere thought of leaving him behind.
She slept when she could, re-read old books, and paced around her room waiting for Davn to get up so she could try again to change his mind. She refused to start packing. She had no intention of going anywhere. He could not really force her, could he?
Now, it was nearly midnight and Davn had locked himself into his study. Astral pounded on the door until her fists hurt and then she switched to kicking, until finally, he opened the door and let her in.
He resumed his seat behind his desk and perused a document from a stack. “I wish you wouldn’t waste our last days together with all these hysterics Aster.” He did not raise his head to look at her. His voice sounded resolved and sad.
Not sad enough, Astral thought unkindly.
“Why does it have to be our last days Davn?” She tried to keep her voice strong but it sounded shrill even to her ears. “Why can’t you come with me? I’ll go if you come. We could travel the whole world together if you wanted. You could show me your businesses and go to London. Anything you want, please. Don’t send me away.”
Davn raised his head and Astral thought she’d break down at the look on his face. “I can’t go with you Aster and you deserve more than to rot away in this cold, dark, shell of a home. You deserve to be happy and young, meet friends, go to parties, travel. I want you to have the chance to fall in love and get married and have babies. You can’t do any of that here. You’ll thank me one day I assure you.”
“I don’t want any of those things if it means leaving you!” She crossed her arms over her chest in defiance. “You can't make me leave. You can't make me go where ever you want. You can put me on a ship, but you can't stop me from coming back!”
He had returned his attention to his ledger, but with her words his head snapped up and his expression turned grim. “You cannot return Aster, it's very important that you follow your travel instructions perfectly. I could force you to obey but I will accept your promise if you give it to me.”
“Why should I? Why should I promise you anything when you want to send me away?” Her voice trembled and she felt tears burn at her eyes.
He scowled slightly but gave no indication that he would give in to her wishes. “Promise me, Aster.”
She shook her head vehemently, “don't you care what I want?” Her mouth quivered in earnest now and tears made twin tracks down her cheeks.
“All I care about is you!” His hand closed into a fist where it lay on the desk and his nearly black eyes bore into her. “It’s just not safe here.”
“What do you mean? I’ve always been safe here.” She hiccuped and wiped her tears with the back of her hand. “After everything I've done, this is the only place I feel safe.”
“Not anymore, something is coming. I can't protect you any longer.” His voice was pained with regret. “Promise me Astral, or I will take the choice from you.”
She stood in silence, facing him over his desk and thinking furiously about how to avoid making a promise she didn't want to keep. When she waited too long he stood and moved around the desk with long angry strides and gripped her shoulders in a near painful grip.
“Promise me!”
She sobbed and turned her face away, but nodded in misery, unable to deny him anything even if she hated him for it. “I promise.”
Astral pounded on the door to Davn’ study with her fist. “Davn!” She shouted through the thick, wooden portal. “Open the door, I need to talk to you!” She gripped the knob with both hands and shook it firmly. The old door rattled in the jamb but held. In sheer frustration she beat on the door again, with both hands this time. “I know you’re in there, you can’t avoid me forever!”
It was four days since her birthday when he had announced that she would be leaving on a ship from Ebsjerg to London in just two weeks.
He hadn't had any peace since.
She had hounded him from the moment he emerged from his room at night till he slammed the door in her face just before dawn. She tried everything she could to get him to change his mind. Her voice was hoarse and her throat hurt, but nothing seemed to make an impression. Sometimes he listened attentively while she listed off the reasons why she could not go to London. Sometimes he just ignored her.
She never got any answer from him other than, “it’s in your best interest,” which only accomplished to infuriate her more.
During the day when she was alone, she cried. She hated the idea of leaving here more than anything else. This old castle with its crumbling walls and drafty windows was her safe haven. Davn, with his broody patience and limitless kindness was her most valuable friend. She sobbed in misery at the mere thought of leaving him behind.
She slept when she could, re-read old books, and paced around her room waiting for Davn to get up so she could try again to change his mind. She refused to start packing. She had no intention of going anywhere. He could not really force her, could he?
Now, it was nearly midnight and Davn had locked himself into his study. Astral pounded on the door until her fists hurt and then she switched to kicking, until finally, he opened the door and let her in.
He resumed his seat behind his desk and perused a document from a stack. “I wish you wouldn’t waste our last days together with all these hysterics Aster.” He did not raise his head to look at her. His voice sounded resolved and sad.
Not sad enough, Astral thought unkindly.
“Why does it have to be our last days Davn?” She tried to keep her voice strong but it sounded shrill even to her ears. “Why can’t you come with me? I’ll go if you come. We could travel the whole world together if you wanted. You could show me your businesses and go to London. Anything you want, please. Don’t send me away.”
Davn raised his head and Astral thought she’d break down at the look on his face. “I can’t go with you Aster and you deserve more than to rot away in this cold, dark, shell of a home. You deserve to be happy and young, meet friends, go to parties, travel. I want you to have the chance to fall in love and get married and have babies. You can’t do any of that here. You’ll thank me one day I assure you.”
“I don’t want any of those things if it means leaving you!” She crossed her arms over her chest in defiance. “You can't make me leave. You can't make me go where ever you want. You can put me on a ship, but you can't stop me from coming back!”
He had returned his attention to his ledger, but with her words his head snapped up and his expression turned grim. “You cannot return Aster, it's very important that you follow your travel instructions perfectly. I could force you to obey but I will accept your promise if you give it to me.”
“Why should I? Why should I promise you anything when you want to send me away?” Her voice trembled and she felt tears burn at her eyes.
He scowled slightly but gave no indication that he would give in to her wishes. “Promise me, Aster.”
She shook her head vehemently, “don't you care what I want?” Her mouth quivered in earnest now and tears made twin tracks down her cheeks.
“All I care about is you!” His hand closed into a fist where it lay on the desk and his nearly black eyes bore into her. “It’s just not safe here.”
“What do you mean? I’ve always been safe here.” She hiccuped and wiped her tears with the back of her hand. “After everything I've done, this is the only place I feel safe.”
“Not anymore, something is coming. I can't protect you any longer.” His voice was pained with regret. “Promise me Astral, or I will take the choice from you.”
She stood in silence, facing him over his desk and thinking furiously about how to avoid making a promise she didn't want to keep. When she waited too long he stood and moved around the desk with long angry strides and gripped her shoulders in a near painful grip.
“Promise me!”
She sobbed and turned her face away, but nodded in misery, unable to deny him anything even if she hated him for it. “I promise.”
Chapter 3
Ten days later Davn escorted Astral to the city.
The night before their departure, she had quietly collected her clothing and the few items she intended to bring with her and packed them in a sturdy cedar chest lined with red velvet. She went to bed early but lay beneath her heavy blankets staring at the bed’s canopy. It was a long sleepless night, filled with fear and grief.
Davn gathered her before dawn and loaded her and her trunk into the carriage in the dim haze of pre-dawn. Astral held Sabie in her arms, stroking his feathers absently as she took one last look out the small window in the back of the carriage. The ancient, run down heap of stone didn’t look like much but it was home, and compared to the tiny farmhouse she had shared with her parents it was almost a palace.
She closed her eyes, committing to memory the essence of Toftlund forest. The hundred year old trees, the quiet serenity, and the memories would travel with her.
When Davn reached in front of her to pull the shade she turned away from the window and took her seat on the cushioned bench. He sat across from her in the dark interior of the box carriage, reticent as usual. Mynstral was tied to the back of the carriage and Franz, the old farmer who delivered supplies every week took the driver’s seat; his two sturdy draft horses hitched up front.
Before today she had never been more than three miles from the tiny farmhouse she had been born in, or the tall stone house where she lived with Davn. London seemed like a whole other world, and one she had no desire to visit.
She stared hard at Davn in the dim light as the carriage pulled away from the castle and rumbled down the dirt road. She didn't bother to hide her bitterness.
“You’ve been planning this for a long time, haven't you?”
With a sigh Davn lit the lamp that hung from the ceiling and lit the small interior with a swinging golden light.
“Yes.” He answered.
“How long?”
“About five years.”
She inhaled sharply.
“I put it off as long as I could, but I always knew this day would come. I should have sent you away years ago.”
“What?” Her voice trembled in disbelief.
“You have been hiding away out here for a third of your life, running from the past, not really living. That is never what I intended.”
“You have been living here in isolation far longer than I have. You haven't run off to London to make babies!” She said in cold response, throwing his own words back at him.
Davn’s jaw clenched and he glared at her in anger. “And is that what you want? To be like me? old and alone?”
“You’re not that much older than me--.”
“I’m a lot older than you!” he snapped, cutting her off. He paused a moment and reined in his temper. With visible effort he smoothed his tone. “I don’t want to argue about it the entire trip.”
Astral turned her head to stare at the wall, and brushed a tear with a trembling hand. She had never seen Davn angry before. Sad, patient, kind, yes, but never angry, not with her. She didn't know how to react to his obvious foul mood. Sabie climbed awkwardly into her lap and she clutched him to her chest.
“How long is the voyage on the ship? What will happen to Mynstral?” She asked, hoping to dispel some of his anger.
“It’s only a day and half, and he’ll be well taken care of. I bought him from London and he has made the trip before. The voyage didn’t seem to bother him then.”
Astral nodded and sniffed back the tears that threatened to fall. Davn pulled a linen kerchief from his pocket and silently handed it across to her.
“And this woman, that is to travel with me, where did you find her?” She blew her dripping nose into the white square and dabbed at her eyes.
“Her name is Helene Mathews, she is a widow. She came very highly recommended to me and I interviewed her thoroughly before selecting her. She has spent over ten years as a tutor and companion to young women, has an extensive education and, most importantly, she is open to your unusual background. I've been corresponding with her regularly for several months and I believe she will do well by you.”
Astral nodded stiffly. Her chest ached to hear how thoroughly he had planned her departure. “And where will I be living once I reach London?”
He rubbed his eyes with his finger and thumb. “I've arranged for you to stay with an old friend of mine. His name is Maksim Konstanov.” Davn looked away, slightly uneasy. “In order to avoid any scandalous gossip we've put out the word that you are his niece, and he is sponsoring you in London.”
Astral raised her brows in quiet surprise, “his niece?”
“You and Maksim share a clear resemblance in coloring so it will be easy to pass you off as a relative.”
“With a name like Konstanov, he can't possibly be British, and it doesn't sound Danish, how am I supposed to explain being his niece when I am Danish and he is what? Russian?”
“His sister married a minor Danish Lord and had you, Astral Stilling. Born and raised in Denmark to a Russian mother and Danish father. Trust me you look the part. Just hope no one asks why you never learned Russian from your mother but managed to learn English and French”
“That's not the only thing I hope they don't ask.” She said bitterly. “Where did the name Stilling come from? Why can't I use your name?” Using her own name never even occurred to her.
“My name is too well known and recognized, my family had a long and major role in Danish history. Stilling is my mother's maiden name. It's still aristocratic but minor, harder to trace.”
Astral nodded and chewed her lip, fearful to bring up the subject of her parents. She hadn't talked about them in years or mentioned what she had done after the first week when Davn had forced the whole story from her. Living out here, far away from anyone who may have known her, she had felt safe. Now she worried that someone would find out what she had done: that she may have murdered her own father. “What about my parents? What if someone finds out who I really am?”
He gave her a look of gentle compassion. “No one will ever know who you really are or what you've done, not even Maksim or Helene.”
“But what if they do?” She leaned forward her eyes wide.
“They won't, and if they do then Maksim will protect you as well as I have all these years. You have nothing to fear Aster.”
“Nothing to fear?” She shook her head dismally and a tear tracked down her cheek. “I've never been to the city before. I don't know what to say to people, or how to act. You won't be there. I'm nearly sick with fear.”
“You needn't be, I imagine you will grow to love London and Paris and New York.”
“You have it all planned out don't you.”
“Yes.”
She breathed deep and forced her heart to stop thundering in her chest. She felt oddly betrayed.
“This friend of yours, how come I have never heard you speak of him before?”
He shrugged, stretched his legs out in front of him and rested back against the cushion, his fingers linked across his hips. “There's never been anything to say.”
Doggedly she persisted. “You are trusting me to his care and yet I know you haven't seen him in the last six years. What makes you so sure he is the man you remember him to be?”
“I just know Astral. You will be as safe with him as you are with me, and he has generously offered to sponsor you. I haven't told him much about your past. It will be up to you to tell him what you wish. I am sure he will be curious of you. If he becomes obnoxious with his questions, tell him to bugger off.” He sounded drowsy, and even as she watched he closed his eyes and started to doze.
He looked very tired, like sleep dragged at him, nagging at him to give in. She wondered if he had been up all night just as she had.
She watched him for a few minutes and then moved clumsily from her seat to sit next to him on the opposite bench because, despite how angry she was with him for sending her away, she was keenly aware that this was the last few hours she would have with him.
He cracked his eyes when he felt her weight against his side but he didn't stop her from laying her head against his shoulder and wrapping her arm around his chest.
She drifted off as the horses plodded along and her arm settled around his waist. She didn't stir when, a few minutes later, he shifted and turned to brace himself in the corner, pulling her up so she was draped across his chest, her face nestled in his throat and his arm around her shoulders.
As the wagon rumbled along taking him closer to Astral's departure Davn closed his own eyes and dropped into a deep sleep.
Ten days later Davn escorted Astral to the city.
The night before their departure, she had quietly collected her clothing and the few items she intended to bring with her and packed them in a sturdy cedar chest lined with red velvet. She went to bed early but lay beneath her heavy blankets staring at the bed’s canopy. It was a long sleepless night, filled with fear and grief.
Davn gathered her before dawn and loaded her and her trunk into the carriage in the dim haze of pre-dawn. Astral held Sabie in her arms, stroking his feathers absently as she took one last look out the small window in the back of the carriage. The ancient, run down heap of stone didn’t look like much but it was home, and compared to the tiny farmhouse she had shared with her parents it was almost a palace.
She closed her eyes, committing to memory the essence of Toftlund forest. The hundred year old trees, the quiet serenity, and the memories would travel with her.
When Davn reached in front of her to pull the shade she turned away from the window and took her seat on the cushioned bench. He sat across from her in the dark interior of the box carriage, reticent as usual. Mynstral was tied to the back of the carriage and Franz, the old farmer who delivered supplies every week took the driver’s seat; his two sturdy draft horses hitched up front.
Before today she had never been more than three miles from the tiny farmhouse she had been born in, or the tall stone house where she lived with Davn. London seemed like a whole other world, and one she had no desire to visit.
She stared hard at Davn in the dim light as the carriage pulled away from the castle and rumbled down the dirt road. She didn't bother to hide her bitterness.
“You’ve been planning this for a long time, haven't you?”
With a sigh Davn lit the lamp that hung from the ceiling and lit the small interior with a swinging golden light.
“Yes.” He answered.
“How long?”
“About five years.”
She inhaled sharply.
“I put it off as long as I could, but I always knew this day would come. I should have sent you away years ago.”
“What?” Her voice trembled in disbelief.
“You have been hiding away out here for a third of your life, running from the past, not really living. That is never what I intended.”
“You have been living here in isolation far longer than I have. You haven't run off to London to make babies!” She said in cold response, throwing his own words back at him.
Davn’s jaw clenched and he glared at her in anger. “And is that what you want? To be like me? old and alone?”
“You’re not that much older than me--.”
“I’m a lot older than you!” he snapped, cutting her off. He paused a moment and reined in his temper. With visible effort he smoothed his tone. “I don’t want to argue about it the entire trip.”
Astral turned her head to stare at the wall, and brushed a tear with a trembling hand. She had never seen Davn angry before. Sad, patient, kind, yes, but never angry, not with her. She didn't know how to react to his obvious foul mood. Sabie climbed awkwardly into her lap and she clutched him to her chest.
“How long is the voyage on the ship? What will happen to Mynstral?” She asked, hoping to dispel some of his anger.
“It’s only a day and half, and he’ll be well taken care of. I bought him from London and he has made the trip before. The voyage didn’t seem to bother him then.”
Astral nodded and sniffed back the tears that threatened to fall. Davn pulled a linen kerchief from his pocket and silently handed it across to her.
“And this woman, that is to travel with me, where did you find her?” She blew her dripping nose into the white square and dabbed at her eyes.
“Her name is Helene Mathews, she is a widow. She came very highly recommended to me and I interviewed her thoroughly before selecting her. She has spent over ten years as a tutor and companion to young women, has an extensive education and, most importantly, she is open to your unusual background. I've been corresponding with her regularly for several months and I believe she will do well by you.”
Astral nodded stiffly. Her chest ached to hear how thoroughly he had planned her departure. “And where will I be living once I reach London?”
He rubbed his eyes with his finger and thumb. “I've arranged for you to stay with an old friend of mine. His name is Maksim Konstanov.” Davn looked away, slightly uneasy. “In order to avoid any scandalous gossip we've put out the word that you are his niece, and he is sponsoring you in London.”
Astral raised her brows in quiet surprise, “his niece?”
“You and Maksim share a clear resemblance in coloring so it will be easy to pass you off as a relative.”
“With a name like Konstanov, he can't possibly be British, and it doesn't sound Danish, how am I supposed to explain being his niece when I am Danish and he is what? Russian?”
“His sister married a minor Danish Lord and had you, Astral Stilling. Born and raised in Denmark to a Russian mother and Danish father. Trust me you look the part. Just hope no one asks why you never learned Russian from your mother but managed to learn English and French”
“That's not the only thing I hope they don't ask.” She said bitterly. “Where did the name Stilling come from? Why can't I use your name?” Using her own name never even occurred to her.
“My name is too well known and recognized, my family had a long and major role in Danish history. Stilling is my mother's maiden name. It's still aristocratic but minor, harder to trace.”
Astral nodded and chewed her lip, fearful to bring up the subject of her parents. She hadn't talked about them in years or mentioned what she had done after the first week when Davn had forced the whole story from her. Living out here, far away from anyone who may have known her, she had felt safe. Now she worried that someone would find out what she had done: that she may have murdered her own father. “What about my parents? What if someone finds out who I really am?”
He gave her a look of gentle compassion. “No one will ever know who you really are or what you've done, not even Maksim or Helene.”
“But what if they do?” She leaned forward her eyes wide.
“They won't, and if they do then Maksim will protect you as well as I have all these years. You have nothing to fear Aster.”
“Nothing to fear?” She shook her head dismally and a tear tracked down her cheek. “I've never been to the city before. I don't know what to say to people, or how to act. You won't be there. I'm nearly sick with fear.”
“You needn't be, I imagine you will grow to love London and Paris and New York.”
“You have it all planned out don't you.”
“Yes.”
She breathed deep and forced her heart to stop thundering in her chest. She felt oddly betrayed.
“This friend of yours, how come I have never heard you speak of him before?”
He shrugged, stretched his legs out in front of him and rested back against the cushion, his fingers linked across his hips. “There's never been anything to say.”
Doggedly she persisted. “You are trusting me to his care and yet I know you haven't seen him in the last six years. What makes you so sure he is the man you remember him to be?”
“I just know Astral. You will be as safe with him as you are with me, and he has generously offered to sponsor you. I haven't told him much about your past. It will be up to you to tell him what you wish. I am sure he will be curious of you. If he becomes obnoxious with his questions, tell him to bugger off.” He sounded drowsy, and even as she watched he closed his eyes and started to doze.
He looked very tired, like sleep dragged at him, nagging at him to give in. She wondered if he had been up all night just as she had.
She watched him for a few minutes and then moved clumsily from her seat to sit next to him on the opposite bench because, despite how angry she was with him for sending her away, she was keenly aware that this was the last few hours she would have with him.
He cracked his eyes when he felt her weight against his side but he didn't stop her from laying her head against his shoulder and wrapping her arm around his chest.
She drifted off as the horses plodded along and her arm settled around his waist. She didn't stir when, a few minutes later, he shifted and turned to brace himself in the corner, pulling her up so she was draped across his chest, her face nestled in his throat and his arm around her shoulders.
As the wagon rumbled along taking him closer to Astral's departure Davn closed his own eyes and dropped into a deep sleep.
Book 2 (still untitled) Prologue
Well here it is, Book two, the beginning. Still not totally edited but I wanted to start posting something. I know I'm committing a mortal sin with both a prologue and a flash back, but I don't care. It's my book and I can write what I want to.
Petrograd 1747
“And I said, if the Council wants to have the treaty before the new year then we'll have to get Vasili back from Germany.” The old gentleman squinted behind his glasses and coughed into a kerchief.
Maksim nodded, and looked around the room, barely caring if he looked less than attentive. He had come tonight to please Anna, and only awaited her signal that she was ready to leave. The room was large enough to hold a thousand people, and had, a few hours ago. As the night progressed the party had dwindled to a mere hundred or so, and he scanned the small groups of people in near desperation for his wife.
Opulent was an understatement. The floors were imported Italian pink veined marble and the walls were covered from floor to ceiling in gold leaf wallpaper. The palace ballroom was lit with two dozen cut crystal chandeliers and a thousand or more candles. An orchestra played on tirelessly and servants moved among the guests with trays of champagne and wine. One young serving girl came to him where he stood with the Privy Councilor and offered bubbly glasses of liquor. He waved her away for the twentieth time.
He caught sight of Anna's dark haired head across the room and he watched as she tilted her head back and laughed at some comment from one of the women she stood with. A curl from her once perfect coiffure fell loose and trailed across her bare shoulder. He smiled.
“Excuse me your excellency.” He gave a distracted bow to the white haired councilor, and strode across the ballroom, without hearing the other man's response.
It must be two in the morning, he thought tiredly. He wanted his bed. He wanted to rid himself of his necktie and constrictive jacket. Anna loved these things. Loved getting dressed up and dancing and revisiting all her old friends. He spent entirely too much time with these people as it was and would have much preferred to spend his evening with his wife and his two small boys. But, watching her now, so happy to have adult conversation after months of tending to infants, he couldn't begrudge her an evening out.
This was a royal ball, the Empress had been in attendance along with every other member of court, government official and man of military reputation. He fell into the first category. The guest of honor was still entertaining a large group of admirers near the champagne fountain. He had met the woman briefly as they entered. She had greeted every guest personally in a long reception line at the beginning of the evening. He didn't know who she was exactly, some English woman of importance. The Empress had spared no expense in her honor, is all he knew.
Anna turned to greet him as he came up behind her. She smiled and held her hand out to him. She had drunk a little too much and was now bright eyed and tipsy. “Oh Maksim, where have you been? Whilemina has been telling me all about her new stallion. I knew you would want to hear.”
Maksim smiled and wrapped his arm around his wife's cinched waist. Her emerald green gown, hung from her shoulders and bared her white cleavage. She was still nursing their youngest and her breasts had grown over the course of the evening, bulging a little over her neckline. A diamond choker circled her throat and long gold earrings fell from her ears.
He kissed her temple and acknowledged the other three ladies who all curtsied in response. “Ivan was telling me all about him earlier my love. I already reserved his first colt.” He tried to head off Whilemina before she broke into a detailed accounting of the horse's heritage, she talked nearly as much as her husband.
He excused them and led Anna a few steps away, out of earshot,
“How are you feeling? Almost ready to go home?” He wanted to keep the hopefulness from his voice but didn't succeed.
“Oh you want to go already?” She pouted playfully. “I wanted to go back and speak with that woman again. She tells the most delightful stories. She has been everywhere. I don't know where she found the time, she can't be more than a few years older than us.” She slurred slightly and Maksim had to steady her with a firm grip on her elbow.
He loved her like this, all loose and carefree. He wanted to get her home even more. “I wanted to spend the rest of the night with my beautiful wife.” He wrapped his arms around her waist and tried to steer her toward the door.
“Ooooh, that is tempting.” She planted her feet and pivoted to face back to the middle of the room. “But you spend the night with your wife every night, and I get to socialize almost never.” She smiled and turned to kiss his cheek, “so tonight is mine.”
He chuckled and squeezed her from behind as he let her lead him back across the dance floor. She fit in his arms perfectly, all soft and round, the top of her head tucked under his chin. She had shiny nearly black hair, wide brown eyes, and luminescent skin, which was flushed with a rosy champagne glow. They approached the group with smiles on their faces, Maksim watching his pretty, dark haired wife and holding her close around the waist.
The guest of honor was an exotic looking woman, short and curvaceous with hazel eyes and medium brown hair coiled atop her head. When they approached she turned to watch them and her mouth curved into a sly grin. Her dress was not of Russian styling, and revealed more than was typical at courtly events, but she seemed perfectly at ease in the black gown with red embellishments.
Her companion stood behind her in cold silence. He was tall, with dark brown hair and eyes the color of coal. His black suit was expensive and well-tailored to fit his large frame. He wore a grim look of resignation and Maksim wondered briefly if he was forced to stay and socialize when all he wanted was to get home as well.
The woman's name was something strange and foreign. Something old sounding, and he grasped to remember what it was, Sarreh? She spoke Russian with a slight accent and told everyone gathered around an amusing story of her last visit to India. Her voice was low pitched and husky.
“The elephant had different ideas, and the poor woman barely had herself in the seat when she was pitched over its head and landed in the mud at its feet. If that weren't bad enough the elephant trampled over her and broke her leg.” The group laughed in horrified amusement.
“But don't let my stories dissuade you from visiting, India is beautiful and there is much to see, my only advice to any of you would be to avoid the elephant rides, and the lion safari.” The group laughed again,
Anna leaned toward her husband and waited for him to drop his ear for her whisper into it. “Who is that man? I've forgotten how he was introduced.” She slurred slightly. “He certainly is an unfriendly looking sort.”
Maksim glanced up to look at the foreign couple, sure that they could not possibly hear his tipsy wife. The man turned his head slowly to face them and gave him a brief assessment, before his eyes flickered to Anna. Whatever he saw caused his jaw to clench and he turned away again to look out across the room, dismissing everyone around him. The woman was now giving them her full attention and Maksim felt slightly uncomfortable at the open appreciation on her face. Something about these two made his skin crawl and he attempted again to get his wife home.
“Come my sweet, the party is over. Everyone is leaving and I'm sure Johan is squalling up a storm right now in loneliness for his mother.”
She scowled over a grin. “Using baby guilt is very unbecoming of you, my love.” She said, tweaking his shirt, but then sighed and nodded. “All right spoiled husband, take me home.”
Maksim held her a little tighter and faced the foreign couple. The woman was staring intensely, and the man was watching them all with clear fury. “It was a pleasure meeting you both.” He said. “If you'll excuse us now, we must retire.” He gave a short bow and stepped back, unconsciously shielding Anna from their gaze with his body.
“I assure you the pleasure was all mine. I'm sure we'll see you again soon.” The woman's grin was predatory.
Maksim turned and ushered his wife from the couple; feeling unbelievable relief to leave them behind.
They made their rounds to their friends, saying goodbye and thanking their hosts, and within a quarter hour were wrapped in fur coats and mittens and hats and intimately ensconced in their carriage. As it bumped along on the long cold ride to Viskansi, Maksim pulled Anna into his arms and settled her giggling softness into his lap. His hand unerringly found its way under her cloak and caressed her hip, even as his mouth found hers. “Finally,” he whispered, forgetting about the strange couple.
“Maks?” She asked, with a chuckle between his eager kisses.
“Hmm?”
“How many times have we made love in this carriage?”
He turned her so she straddled him and settled her thighs on either side of his hips, holding her carefully in his strong arms. “In eight years of marriage? Many many times. And we have a good hour to make it at least once more.” He nibbled her earlobe.
She plucked at the buttons on his trousers and tried not to slur as she teased him. “I just wonder why you get so amorous as soon as the door closes behind us and the horses trot off.”
“I am alone with my beautiful wife and have nothing to do but adore her with my body and you wonder why I take advantage?” He inhaled sharply as she caressed his hard length.
She smiled and kissed him as his hands pushed her cloak off her shoulders and pulled her gown over her breasts “Mmm, when you put it that way it makes complete sense.”
By the time they pulled up in front of their white pillared home, they were dressed and sated, and ready to fall into bed to sleep. It had been a long exhausting night. He gathered her into his arms and carried her from the carriage, up the stone steps covered in a dusting of snow and into their home.
The lights were dim and the servants were already long in bed. The house was quiet and cold and Maksim carried his wife across the foyer to the base of the stairs and set her on her feet.
“You go on to bed, I'll meet you there in a few minutes.” He clasped her neck in his hand and pulled her to him for a last, lingering kiss, before she smiled sleepily and turned to walk up the stairs. He watched her till she disappeared down the hall then turned and set about extinguishing the candles that had been left alight for their return.
He snuffed one flickering flame after another and suppressed a weary yawn. Just a few more and he could go upstairs and crawl into bed beside Anna and sleep till the babies woke them in the morning.
He made his way to the last squat white candles that burned in an alcove at the bottom the stairs, and paused when he heard a faint noise from outside. A scuffle, indistinct and gone before he was sure he had really heard anything.
He paused and stared at the door, wondering if it was worth going to look, and then stumbled back in surprise when the door exploded open with an ear bursting crash. The hinges cracked and collapsed inwards, the thick wood splintered. Small pieces flew across the foyer with such force they pelted the far wall, thirty feet away.
The shock held him still for a half a second and then they were there, standing in the ruined wreck of his front door. The small foreign woman looked around with a calculating smile on her mouth and her companion hung back, looking grim and resigned.
“Look at this place. It's as lovely as you.” She turned and looked at Maksim from across the room. “I won't hate staying here, although that terrible racket has got to stop.”
One of his sons had woken from the noise and was crying in his room at the top of the stairs. He could hear Anna and the nurse trying to quieten his fears.
His anger at this invasion erupted and he stepped forward, blocking their path to his family. “What the hell do you think you're doing?” He shouted in outrage and took a few aggressive steps forward. He watched the other man warily, assessing his size and physical threat. He was tall, but not as heavy as himself, it would be a close fight, if the other man knew what he was doing, as Maksim did. The woman of course was negligible, she was tiny and soft, he barely spared her a glance, and focused his attention on the dark haired male.
“Oh don't scowl like that, it really ruins your handsome face. I hate that.” She sashayed in a few more steps and circled around him, carefully staying a few yards out of reach. Her companion stood where he was and crossed his arms over his chest. “Besides, no one scowls as well as my Davn does, you might as well leave it to him.”
“Get out of my home now!”
“Maksim?” Anna was at the top of the stairs, and he turned slightly to look at her.
“Stay up there Anna.” She looked down on them, a worried wrinkle to her brow. She still wore her gown, but her hair was down around her shoulders.
It was nearly dark, only a few candles and the weak moonlight that beamed in through the ruined door shed some light in the large entranceway, and a cold winter wind filled the room in seconds.
Maksim rounded on the two intruders, ready to launch himself at the man if he made the slightest move towards the stairs, and snarled, “get out now!”
The woman only laughed, but turned her head to look when a movement from the side drew her attention. Jacobi, the steward, who had a small room in the back of the house had woken from the noise and run to his employer's aid, a long barreled rifle held to his shoulder and pointed at the big, dark-haired man's chest.
“I suggest you all depart this house before I shorten your bodies by a head,” he said.
Before Maksim could take a relieved breath the woman raised a hand and flicked it at the steward as if he were of no consequence. “Davn,” she said, without taking her eyes from Maksim. The tall man moved with a speed that was as disconcerting as the stillness with which he had stood previously. In less than the blink of an eye, he had crossed the room, yanked the gun from Jacobi's hands and flung it to the side, to clatter against the floor. Without the slightest hesitation, he gripped the servant's head in his hands and twisted.
The crunch of bones nearly drowned out the scream that echoed from the top of the stairs where Anna stood, horrified.
Maksim stood in disbelief, watching the man turn to face him as if seeing each image in a flash of light, disjointed and disconnected. Jacobi's body had fallen to the polished stone floor with a small thump, and there was a faint smell of urine.
For the first time, fear crept up Maksim's spine. “What do you want?”
The woman sauntered up and stood close in front of him, trailing a red painted nail down his shirtfront. “I want you.”
She didn't seem concerned to be so close, despite being half his size, but he took swift advantage, grabbing her and spinning her to press her back to his chest. He wrapped his elbow under her chin and pressed his hand to the side of her head, putting pressure on her neck bones.
Davn's expression didn't change, but his eyes flickered to Anna who stood paralyzed and white with fear halfway down the steps.
“If you even look at my wife, I'll snap her neck like a dry stick,” Maksim growled in warning, and put a little more pressure on the woman's skull.
“Oh yes, you will do just fine.” Saraid said softly.
Whereas before she had been pliant and put up no resistance, now she straightened her neck as if Maksim's grip was nothing and reached behind her to grasp his arm, pulling it off her neck and yanking him around to her front. Now it was she who held him: an elbow in each of her hands and his back to her. Like a child pulling the wings off a butterfly she raised her knee and placed it in the center of his back, jabbing sharply enough to snap his spine.
His shout of pain rose in harmony with the shriek from his wife as he fell to the floor onto his stomach and hands: his legs now useless behind him. He panted in shock and pain and raised his eyes to Anna who had stumbled even farther down the steps towards him.
“Anna go! Get the boys and run! Now!” She didn't move an inch as she only stared at him, tears streaming down her cheeks, a small hand covering her now silent mouth. The children's nurse upstairs was sobbing and the two boys were both crying now, muffled somewhere behind a nursery door.
Saraid stepped up beside Maksim's prone body and turned to Anna. “Go get your children, and bring them down here.”
Anna raised her skirts and ran up the stairs without the slightest hesitation and while at first he thought she was doing as he had told her, she soon reappeared on the stairs with a small boy in each arm. She looked petrified, and yet she obeyed the woman's order without question.
“No!” Maksim struggled to crawl towards his wife, his legs dragging behind him. As he came up beside the woman, he reached up and grasped her arm, trying to pull her down to ground with him where he could still use his upper body strength against her. But she easily pulled her wrist free and raised it sharply to backhand him across the face. Pain exploded in his temple. Blood gushed from his nose, and his vision blurred. But still he refused to give up and grabbed at her leg. This time she kicked him, hard and in the ribs. He felt his breath leave his lungs in a sharp whoosh and his ribs cracked and splintered. Distantly he could hear Anna sobbing.
He lay helpless and broken in a pool of his own blood and watched in horror as Saraid glided across the floor to where Anna sat huddled with their sons. Saraid squatted on her heels next to them and spoke with fascination. “You're frightened.”
Anna nodded jerkily, trying vainly to watch the woman and her husband at the same time.
“I haven't felt fear in so long, that I've forgotten what it's like.” She inhaled deeply as if breathing in the scent of the other woman's terror.
“What do you want from us?”
“I want your husband. I know you don't really understand, but he's mine now, or at least he soon will be. But you won't care for long, because you'll be dead.”
“Get away from her you crazy bitch!” Maksim shouted, although his words came out slurred.
The woman only grinned. “You are willing to die for her I assume. You played the loving husband better than I have ever seen at the party, but I wonder if she is willing to die for you.” She again faced Anna and posed the question. “Would you die for your husband Anna?”
“Yes!”
“Ah, not even a hesitation! You are a lucky man. Most wives have to think about it and then most of them choose to live.” She shrugged her shoulders flippantly. “Not that I care what they decide. I really only ask out of curiosity.”
Anna pulled her lips back from her teeth in a snarl made even more vicious by the tears that sparked her eyes. “Whatever happens to either of us, my husband will always be mine!”
Saraid smiled, small sharp fangs showing between her lips, and she taunted the black haired woman ruthlessly. “Your husband will be in my bed for centuries to come. Every time I enjoy him, I'll remember how sure you were of his faithfulness.”
Anna opened her mouth to retort but Saraid silenced her with a command, “don't speak,” and Anna closed her mouth even as her eyes blazed with fury.
Saraid's eyes drifted from Anna to the boys she held in her arms. One was still a baby, not even walking yet with bright blue eyes and dark hair, the other a tow headed toddler.
“Sons. You must be proud. I wonder if they will grow up to be as handsome as you?” She turned slightly to peer over her shoulder at where Maksim struggled to remain conscious, as he choked on the blood that rose up from his punctured lung. “I've never had a father and son before, the idea intrigues me.” She reached out and grasped the older boy's forearm, tugging gently to try and pull him from his mother's frantic grasp. He shrieked in protest and tried to cling to his mother's neck.
Saraid seemed to find amusement in Anna's silent terror as she tugged on the boy, placing ever increasing amounts of pressure on his arm until he was screaming in pain.
“Enough!” Davn had stood back passively and watched in silence but now he shouted above the voices of everyone else. He moved across the room with lightning speed and grabbed Saraid's arm just above the elbow and yanked her back to face him, her expression changed from wide eyed astonishment to gleeful satisfaction.
“It will be enough when I have had my fun. Unless you are offering me sport of a different sort?” She leaned against him, rubbing her torso against his chest while he glared down at her in hate filled contempt.
“Just stop.” he growled, as he tightened his fist around her arm.
“I need some entertainment. I want to enjoy myself with them. I want to pass the night with their shrieks and sobbing.” She ran her nail down his cheek and her eyes grew calculating. “But I will let you entertain me, if you would prefer.” She smiled and her fangs pressed lightly to her bottom lip.
“You know I revile you.”
“Yes, that is what makes it so sweet. Because you are my favorite, I will grant you a boon. Turn him, and come to me willingly, and I will let them,” she gestured carelessly at the sobbing woman and her two boys, “live.”
Davn released her arm with a shove and gave a mocking bow, “A night with the one I despise in exchange for their lives, is that the bargain? I hope you enjoy it for it will be the last.” The look on his face was pure hatred, but Saraid smiled with satisfaction.
“I doubt it.” She turned away and gave one last look around the room, at the dead servant in the corner, Maksim who was futilely trying to pull himself across the floor to his family. His head drooped and his eyes were glazed from pain and blood loss but he would live long enough to undergo the change. The woman still stared at her with hate and tried to soothe her frightened children. As she passed her to head up the stairs she gave one last parting shot, locking eyes with Anna and giving a wicked smile, “tomorrow night it will be your husband who comes to me.”
She made her way leisurely up the stairs, humming a faint tune as she went. Davn watched her back until she disappeared down the hall. He heard the nurse's shriek as she was killed and then the door to one of the bedrooms closed.
He turned to face the four humans who huddled near his feet, the woman had moved swiftly to be near her husband's body and now blood soaked her skirt. She struggled to turn him to his back while still holding her two sons and Davn stepped forward to help, ignoring her flailing fist as she tried to ward him off.
Maksim in a fog of pain gripped his wife's hand and glared at the other man, wanting to protect his family but unable to. “Why are you doing this?”
Davn looked and sounded grim. “Because I have to.” He spoke then to Anna, his voice hard. “Say goodbye to your husband, it will be the last time you see him. You need to get in a carriage and leave this place immediately. Don't stop for anything, get as far from here as you can and never come back. Don't go to friends or family, change your name and create a new life for yourself. If you do all of that you may live.”
“No! I won't leave him.”
Maksim squeezed her hand. “Anna, you have to go, get our sons out of here, save yourself. That woman is not an ordinary woman, she had strength like nothing I have ever felt before. I won't live, but you can.” As he pleaded with his wife, the tall stranger left the room and went out the back door, leaving them alone in the cold entranceway.
She rested her head against his chest and sobbed. “No, I'd rather die here with you than live without you.”
He tried to cradle all of them against his body and pleaded with his wife, who he loved more than anything in the world. He would gladly die a thousand deaths if he knew she would be safe. “Anna listen to me.” He wheezed through the pain in his chest and gasped for air to speak. “I don't understand what is happening here tonight, but I need you to go. I need to know that you are safe, that Johan and Aleksie are safe. Do what he says and hide, don't look back. Please, for me. Let me die knowing you are safe. That's all I ask.”
She shook her head and sobbed but kissed him and held his sons for him touch one last time, in these last minutes. She wiped furiously at the tears in her eyes so she could see. “I love you.”
The carriage they had only vacated a half an hour ago pulled up in front of the house, and then the man was back, striding in, pulling Anna off of him despite her protests and dragging her out of the front door. Maksim watched in misery as the other man pushed his wife and children into the carriage. The carriage driver was back in his seat, looking fearful and half dressed. And then they were gone, pulling away from the house at a canter, Anna's face pressed to the glass window.
He watched until they disappeared into the dark and felt his chest explode with grief. The man returned and squatted next to him, his expression foul. Maksim didn't care anymore, what happened next. As long as Anna was gone, away from here and that woman and this man.
“Will you kill me now?” he asked, and coughed blood.
“No, what I am about to do is worse than death.”
Maksim laughed bitterly and turned his head away. “The only thing worse than death is losing Anna, and you have brought both those things to me. At least I know now she is safe.”
“Listen to me very carefully.” Davn responded, his face stark with urgency. “If you want them to live you will never speak their names again. You will never indicate that you even think of them. If you bring them to Saraid's attention there is no telling what she will do. I saved their lives for this night, at great personal expense to myself, but that will mean nothing tomorrow.”
The words sunk in slowly and Maksim turned back to look at the man who leaned over him. “You bargained for their lives, and yet you came here with her. You killed a man at her bidding. Why do you help her?” Reality was slipping away along with his life, but he forced his eyes open.
“I'm not helping her, I'm helping you. You may not understand right now, but you will.” With that Davn picked up Maksim's feeble arm and tore the cuff from his wrist. He brought it to his mouth and let his fangs slide deep into the skin. Maksim fought weakly at the sharp pain, thinking he was being bit by a dog, like he had when he was boy, but then it was over. And the dark stranger stood and looked down at him, with pity. “One last piece of advice. Don't give her what she wants. Until it's time to give her what she wants.”
And then he was gone, ascending the stairs to his Mistress, to pay the price of Anna's life.
Maksim sat at his desk and stared down at the half full glass of brandy that he had poured an hour ago and had barely touched. He held his head in his hands, his elbows on the table, and a tear built up in the corner of his eye and dripped onto the desk, ruining the lacquer.
Memories that he had suppressed for over a hundred years had plagued him for weeks now, ever since the night Davn had come and taken Astral away. He didn't want to remember any of it. The memories of his life before he was turned tore out his heart, and the memories of after that night tore out his soul.
Davn had saved their lives that night, he knew that now. Saraid would have torn his family apart before his eyes if Davn hadn't intervened. There was no limit to the debt he owed him. Maksim had hated him at first, until the reality of the life he led finally dawned on him. The weeks and months that followed quickly changed his hatred into gratitude, and then a hundred years of friendship.
And in return he had betrayed him.
Davn would never forgive him. He was too hard and cold for forgiveness, and really, Maksim couldn't blame him. He wondered now what he had been thinking to try and keep Astral's illness from him.
Davn would have turned her by now and they would have to run, to live in hiding and secret forever. Or until Saraid found them.
He wouldn't see either one of them ever again.
He raised the glass to his lips and drained it in one swallow, hoping miserably for the dulling effects of the liquor.
There was a noise outside his door, but he ignored it. Probably just Dublin again, trying to convince him to eat some dinner or come out.
But then he heard a shriek and his head snapped up in alarm. A half dozen voices could be heard now, all laughing or crying or talking at once.
He stood and walked to his door, and as he reached for the handle he heard one voice in particular, above all the others as everyone else quietened to listen, and he felt his heart stop in his chest.
Astral.
Petrograd 1747
“And I said, if the Council wants to have the treaty before the new year then we'll have to get Vasili back from Germany.” The old gentleman squinted behind his glasses and coughed into a kerchief.
Maksim nodded, and looked around the room, barely caring if he looked less than attentive. He had come tonight to please Anna, and only awaited her signal that she was ready to leave. The room was large enough to hold a thousand people, and had, a few hours ago. As the night progressed the party had dwindled to a mere hundred or so, and he scanned the small groups of people in near desperation for his wife.
Opulent was an understatement. The floors were imported Italian pink veined marble and the walls were covered from floor to ceiling in gold leaf wallpaper. The palace ballroom was lit with two dozen cut crystal chandeliers and a thousand or more candles. An orchestra played on tirelessly and servants moved among the guests with trays of champagne and wine. One young serving girl came to him where he stood with the Privy Councilor and offered bubbly glasses of liquor. He waved her away for the twentieth time.
He caught sight of Anna's dark haired head across the room and he watched as she tilted her head back and laughed at some comment from one of the women she stood with. A curl from her once perfect coiffure fell loose and trailed across her bare shoulder. He smiled.
“Excuse me your excellency.” He gave a distracted bow to the white haired councilor, and strode across the ballroom, without hearing the other man's response.
It must be two in the morning, he thought tiredly. He wanted his bed. He wanted to rid himself of his necktie and constrictive jacket. Anna loved these things. Loved getting dressed up and dancing and revisiting all her old friends. He spent entirely too much time with these people as it was and would have much preferred to spend his evening with his wife and his two small boys. But, watching her now, so happy to have adult conversation after months of tending to infants, he couldn't begrudge her an evening out.
This was a royal ball, the Empress had been in attendance along with every other member of court, government official and man of military reputation. He fell into the first category. The guest of honor was still entertaining a large group of admirers near the champagne fountain. He had met the woman briefly as they entered. She had greeted every guest personally in a long reception line at the beginning of the evening. He didn't know who she was exactly, some English woman of importance. The Empress had spared no expense in her honor, is all he knew.
Anna turned to greet him as he came up behind her. She smiled and held her hand out to him. She had drunk a little too much and was now bright eyed and tipsy. “Oh Maksim, where have you been? Whilemina has been telling me all about her new stallion. I knew you would want to hear.”
Maksim smiled and wrapped his arm around his wife's cinched waist. Her emerald green gown, hung from her shoulders and bared her white cleavage. She was still nursing their youngest and her breasts had grown over the course of the evening, bulging a little over her neckline. A diamond choker circled her throat and long gold earrings fell from her ears.
He kissed her temple and acknowledged the other three ladies who all curtsied in response. “Ivan was telling me all about him earlier my love. I already reserved his first colt.” He tried to head off Whilemina before she broke into a detailed accounting of the horse's heritage, she talked nearly as much as her husband.
He excused them and led Anna a few steps away, out of earshot,
“How are you feeling? Almost ready to go home?” He wanted to keep the hopefulness from his voice but didn't succeed.
“Oh you want to go already?” She pouted playfully. “I wanted to go back and speak with that woman again. She tells the most delightful stories. She has been everywhere. I don't know where she found the time, she can't be more than a few years older than us.” She slurred slightly and Maksim had to steady her with a firm grip on her elbow.
He loved her like this, all loose and carefree. He wanted to get her home even more. “I wanted to spend the rest of the night with my beautiful wife.” He wrapped his arms around her waist and tried to steer her toward the door.
“Ooooh, that is tempting.” She planted her feet and pivoted to face back to the middle of the room. “But you spend the night with your wife every night, and I get to socialize almost never.” She smiled and turned to kiss his cheek, “so tonight is mine.”
He chuckled and squeezed her from behind as he let her lead him back across the dance floor. She fit in his arms perfectly, all soft and round, the top of her head tucked under his chin. She had shiny nearly black hair, wide brown eyes, and luminescent skin, which was flushed with a rosy champagne glow. They approached the group with smiles on their faces, Maksim watching his pretty, dark haired wife and holding her close around the waist.
The guest of honor was an exotic looking woman, short and curvaceous with hazel eyes and medium brown hair coiled atop her head. When they approached she turned to watch them and her mouth curved into a sly grin. Her dress was not of Russian styling, and revealed more than was typical at courtly events, but she seemed perfectly at ease in the black gown with red embellishments.
Her companion stood behind her in cold silence. He was tall, with dark brown hair and eyes the color of coal. His black suit was expensive and well-tailored to fit his large frame. He wore a grim look of resignation and Maksim wondered briefly if he was forced to stay and socialize when all he wanted was to get home as well.
The woman's name was something strange and foreign. Something old sounding, and he grasped to remember what it was, Sarreh? She spoke Russian with a slight accent and told everyone gathered around an amusing story of her last visit to India. Her voice was low pitched and husky.
“The elephant had different ideas, and the poor woman barely had herself in the seat when she was pitched over its head and landed in the mud at its feet. If that weren't bad enough the elephant trampled over her and broke her leg.” The group laughed in horrified amusement.
“But don't let my stories dissuade you from visiting, India is beautiful and there is much to see, my only advice to any of you would be to avoid the elephant rides, and the lion safari.” The group laughed again,
Anna leaned toward her husband and waited for him to drop his ear for her whisper into it. “Who is that man? I've forgotten how he was introduced.” She slurred slightly. “He certainly is an unfriendly looking sort.”
Maksim glanced up to look at the foreign couple, sure that they could not possibly hear his tipsy wife. The man turned his head slowly to face them and gave him a brief assessment, before his eyes flickered to Anna. Whatever he saw caused his jaw to clench and he turned away again to look out across the room, dismissing everyone around him. The woman was now giving them her full attention and Maksim felt slightly uncomfortable at the open appreciation on her face. Something about these two made his skin crawl and he attempted again to get his wife home.
“Come my sweet, the party is over. Everyone is leaving and I'm sure Johan is squalling up a storm right now in loneliness for his mother.”
She scowled over a grin. “Using baby guilt is very unbecoming of you, my love.” She said, tweaking his shirt, but then sighed and nodded. “All right spoiled husband, take me home.”
Maksim held her a little tighter and faced the foreign couple. The woman was staring intensely, and the man was watching them all with clear fury. “It was a pleasure meeting you both.” He said. “If you'll excuse us now, we must retire.” He gave a short bow and stepped back, unconsciously shielding Anna from their gaze with his body.
“I assure you the pleasure was all mine. I'm sure we'll see you again soon.” The woman's grin was predatory.
Maksim turned and ushered his wife from the couple; feeling unbelievable relief to leave them behind.
They made their rounds to their friends, saying goodbye and thanking their hosts, and within a quarter hour were wrapped in fur coats and mittens and hats and intimately ensconced in their carriage. As it bumped along on the long cold ride to Viskansi, Maksim pulled Anna into his arms and settled her giggling softness into his lap. His hand unerringly found its way under her cloak and caressed her hip, even as his mouth found hers. “Finally,” he whispered, forgetting about the strange couple.
“Maks?” She asked, with a chuckle between his eager kisses.
“Hmm?”
“How many times have we made love in this carriage?”
He turned her so she straddled him and settled her thighs on either side of his hips, holding her carefully in his strong arms. “In eight years of marriage? Many many times. And we have a good hour to make it at least once more.” He nibbled her earlobe.
She plucked at the buttons on his trousers and tried not to slur as she teased him. “I just wonder why you get so amorous as soon as the door closes behind us and the horses trot off.”
“I am alone with my beautiful wife and have nothing to do but adore her with my body and you wonder why I take advantage?” He inhaled sharply as she caressed his hard length.
She smiled and kissed him as his hands pushed her cloak off her shoulders and pulled her gown over her breasts “Mmm, when you put it that way it makes complete sense.”
By the time they pulled up in front of their white pillared home, they were dressed and sated, and ready to fall into bed to sleep. It had been a long exhausting night. He gathered her into his arms and carried her from the carriage, up the stone steps covered in a dusting of snow and into their home.
The lights were dim and the servants were already long in bed. The house was quiet and cold and Maksim carried his wife across the foyer to the base of the stairs and set her on her feet.
“You go on to bed, I'll meet you there in a few minutes.” He clasped her neck in his hand and pulled her to him for a last, lingering kiss, before she smiled sleepily and turned to walk up the stairs. He watched her till she disappeared down the hall then turned and set about extinguishing the candles that had been left alight for their return.
He snuffed one flickering flame after another and suppressed a weary yawn. Just a few more and he could go upstairs and crawl into bed beside Anna and sleep till the babies woke them in the morning.
He made his way to the last squat white candles that burned in an alcove at the bottom the stairs, and paused when he heard a faint noise from outside. A scuffle, indistinct and gone before he was sure he had really heard anything.
He paused and stared at the door, wondering if it was worth going to look, and then stumbled back in surprise when the door exploded open with an ear bursting crash. The hinges cracked and collapsed inwards, the thick wood splintered. Small pieces flew across the foyer with such force they pelted the far wall, thirty feet away.
The shock held him still for a half a second and then they were there, standing in the ruined wreck of his front door. The small foreign woman looked around with a calculating smile on her mouth and her companion hung back, looking grim and resigned.
“Look at this place. It's as lovely as you.” She turned and looked at Maksim from across the room. “I won't hate staying here, although that terrible racket has got to stop.”
One of his sons had woken from the noise and was crying in his room at the top of the stairs. He could hear Anna and the nurse trying to quieten his fears.
His anger at this invasion erupted and he stepped forward, blocking their path to his family. “What the hell do you think you're doing?” He shouted in outrage and took a few aggressive steps forward. He watched the other man warily, assessing his size and physical threat. He was tall, but not as heavy as himself, it would be a close fight, if the other man knew what he was doing, as Maksim did. The woman of course was negligible, she was tiny and soft, he barely spared her a glance, and focused his attention on the dark haired male.
“Oh don't scowl like that, it really ruins your handsome face. I hate that.” She sashayed in a few more steps and circled around him, carefully staying a few yards out of reach. Her companion stood where he was and crossed his arms over his chest. “Besides, no one scowls as well as my Davn does, you might as well leave it to him.”
“Get out of my home now!”
“Maksim?” Anna was at the top of the stairs, and he turned slightly to look at her.
“Stay up there Anna.” She looked down on them, a worried wrinkle to her brow. She still wore her gown, but her hair was down around her shoulders.
It was nearly dark, only a few candles and the weak moonlight that beamed in through the ruined door shed some light in the large entranceway, and a cold winter wind filled the room in seconds.
Maksim rounded on the two intruders, ready to launch himself at the man if he made the slightest move towards the stairs, and snarled, “get out now!”
The woman only laughed, but turned her head to look when a movement from the side drew her attention. Jacobi, the steward, who had a small room in the back of the house had woken from the noise and run to his employer's aid, a long barreled rifle held to his shoulder and pointed at the big, dark-haired man's chest.
“I suggest you all depart this house before I shorten your bodies by a head,” he said.
Before Maksim could take a relieved breath the woman raised a hand and flicked it at the steward as if he were of no consequence. “Davn,” she said, without taking her eyes from Maksim. The tall man moved with a speed that was as disconcerting as the stillness with which he had stood previously. In less than the blink of an eye, he had crossed the room, yanked the gun from Jacobi's hands and flung it to the side, to clatter against the floor. Without the slightest hesitation, he gripped the servant's head in his hands and twisted.
The crunch of bones nearly drowned out the scream that echoed from the top of the stairs where Anna stood, horrified.
Maksim stood in disbelief, watching the man turn to face him as if seeing each image in a flash of light, disjointed and disconnected. Jacobi's body had fallen to the polished stone floor with a small thump, and there was a faint smell of urine.
For the first time, fear crept up Maksim's spine. “What do you want?”
The woman sauntered up and stood close in front of him, trailing a red painted nail down his shirtfront. “I want you.”
She didn't seem concerned to be so close, despite being half his size, but he took swift advantage, grabbing her and spinning her to press her back to his chest. He wrapped his elbow under her chin and pressed his hand to the side of her head, putting pressure on her neck bones.
Davn's expression didn't change, but his eyes flickered to Anna who stood paralyzed and white with fear halfway down the steps.
“If you even look at my wife, I'll snap her neck like a dry stick,” Maksim growled in warning, and put a little more pressure on the woman's skull.
“Oh yes, you will do just fine.” Saraid said softly.
Whereas before she had been pliant and put up no resistance, now she straightened her neck as if Maksim's grip was nothing and reached behind her to grasp his arm, pulling it off her neck and yanking him around to her front. Now it was she who held him: an elbow in each of her hands and his back to her. Like a child pulling the wings off a butterfly she raised her knee and placed it in the center of his back, jabbing sharply enough to snap his spine.
His shout of pain rose in harmony with the shriek from his wife as he fell to the floor onto his stomach and hands: his legs now useless behind him. He panted in shock and pain and raised his eyes to Anna who had stumbled even farther down the steps towards him.
“Anna go! Get the boys and run! Now!” She didn't move an inch as she only stared at him, tears streaming down her cheeks, a small hand covering her now silent mouth. The children's nurse upstairs was sobbing and the two boys were both crying now, muffled somewhere behind a nursery door.
Saraid stepped up beside Maksim's prone body and turned to Anna. “Go get your children, and bring them down here.”
Anna raised her skirts and ran up the stairs without the slightest hesitation and while at first he thought she was doing as he had told her, she soon reappeared on the stairs with a small boy in each arm. She looked petrified, and yet she obeyed the woman's order without question.
“No!” Maksim struggled to crawl towards his wife, his legs dragging behind him. As he came up beside the woman, he reached up and grasped her arm, trying to pull her down to ground with him where he could still use his upper body strength against her. But she easily pulled her wrist free and raised it sharply to backhand him across the face. Pain exploded in his temple. Blood gushed from his nose, and his vision blurred. But still he refused to give up and grabbed at her leg. This time she kicked him, hard and in the ribs. He felt his breath leave his lungs in a sharp whoosh and his ribs cracked and splintered. Distantly he could hear Anna sobbing.
He lay helpless and broken in a pool of his own blood and watched in horror as Saraid glided across the floor to where Anna sat huddled with their sons. Saraid squatted on her heels next to them and spoke with fascination. “You're frightened.”
Anna nodded jerkily, trying vainly to watch the woman and her husband at the same time.
“I haven't felt fear in so long, that I've forgotten what it's like.” She inhaled deeply as if breathing in the scent of the other woman's terror.
“What do you want from us?”
“I want your husband. I know you don't really understand, but he's mine now, or at least he soon will be. But you won't care for long, because you'll be dead.”
“Get away from her you crazy bitch!” Maksim shouted, although his words came out slurred.
The woman only grinned. “You are willing to die for her I assume. You played the loving husband better than I have ever seen at the party, but I wonder if she is willing to die for you.” She again faced Anna and posed the question. “Would you die for your husband Anna?”
“Yes!”
“Ah, not even a hesitation! You are a lucky man. Most wives have to think about it and then most of them choose to live.” She shrugged her shoulders flippantly. “Not that I care what they decide. I really only ask out of curiosity.”
Anna pulled her lips back from her teeth in a snarl made even more vicious by the tears that sparked her eyes. “Whatever happens to either of us, my husband will always be mine!”
Saraid smiled, small sharp fangs showing between her lips, and she taunted the black haired woman ruthlessly. “Your husband will be in my bed for centuries to come. Every time I enjoy him, I'll remember how sure you were of his faithfulness.”
Anna opened her mouth to retort but Saraid silenced her with a command, “don't speak,” and Anna closed her mouth even as her eyes blazed with fury.
Saraid's eyes drifted from Anna to the boys she held in her arms. One was still a baby, not even walking yet with bright blue eyes and dark hair, the other a tow headed toddler.
“Sons. You must be proud. I wonder if they will grow up to be as handsome as you?” She turned slightly to peer over her shoulder at where Maksim struggled to remain conscious, as he choked on the blood that rose up from his punctured lung. “I've never had a father and son before, the idea intrigues me.” She reached out and grasped the older boy's forearm, tugging gently to try and pull him from his mother's frantic grasp. He shrieked in protest and tried to cling to his mother's neck.
Saraid seemed to find amusement in Anna's silent terror as she tugged on the boy, placing ever increasing amounts of pressure on his arm until he was screaming in pain.
“Enough!” Davn had stood back passively and watched in silence but now he shouted above the voices of everyone else. He moved across the room with lightning speed and grabbed Saraid's arm just above the elbow and yanked her back to face him, her expression changed from wide eyed astonishment to gleeful satisfaction.
“It will be enough when I have had my fun. Unless you are offering me sport of a different sort?” She leaned against him, rubbing her torso against his chest while he glared down at her in hate filled contempt.
“Just stop.” he growled, as he tightened his fist around her arm.
“I need some entertainment. I want to enjoy myself with them. I want to pass the night with their shrieks and sobbing.” She ran her nail down his cheek and her eyes grew calculating. “But I will let you entertain me, if you would prefer.” She smiled and her fangs pressed lightly to her bottom lip.
“You know I revile you.”
“Yes, that is what makes it so sweet. Because you are my favorite, I will grant you a boon. Turn him, and come to me willingly, and I will let them,” she gestured carelessly at the sobbing woman and her two boys, “live.”
Davn released her arm with a shove and gave a mocking bow, “A night with the one I despise in exchange for their lives, is that the bargain? I hope you enjoy it for it will be the last.” The look on his face was pure hatred, but Saraid smiled with satisfaction.
“I doubt it.” She turned away and gave one last look around the room, at the dead servant in the corner, Maksim who was futilely trying to pull himself across the floor to his family. His head drooped and his eyes were glazed from pain and blood loss but he would live long enough to undergo the change. The woman still stared at her with hate and tried to soothe her frightened children. As she passed her to head up the stairs she gave one last parting shot, locking eyes with Anna and giving a wicked smile, “tomorrow night it will be your husband who comes to me.”
She made her way leisurely up the stairs, humming a faint tune as she went. Davn watched her back until she disappeared down the hall. He heard the nurse's shriek as she was killed and then the door to one of the bedrooms closed.
He turned to face the four humans who huddled near his feet, the woman had moved swiftly to be near her husband's body and now blood soaked her skirt. She struggled to turn him to his back while still holding her two sons and Davn stepped forward to help, ignoring her flailing fist as she tried to ward him off.
Maksim in a fog of pain gripped his wife's hand and glared at the other man, wanting to protect his family but unable to. “Why are you doing this?”
Davn looked and sounded grim. “Because I have to.” He spoke then to Anna, his voice hard. “Say goodbye to your husband, it will be the last time you see him. You need to get in a carriage and leave this place immediately. Don't stop for anything, get as far from here as you can and never come back. Don't go to friends or family, change your name and create a new life for yourself. If you do all of that you may live.”
“No! I won't leave him.”
Maksim squeezed her hand. “Anna, you have to go, get our sons out of here, save yourself. That woman is not an ordinary woman, she had strength like nothing I have ever felt before. I won't live, but you can.” As he pleaded with his wife, the tall stranger left the room and went out the back door, leaving them alone in the cold entranceway.
She rested her head against his chest and sobbed. “No, I'd rather die here with you than live without you.”
He tried to cradle all of them against his body and pleaded with his wife, who he loved more than anything in the world. He would gladly die a thousand deaths if he knew she would be safe. “Anna listen to me.” He wheezed through the pain in his chest and gasped for air to speak. “I don't understand what is happening here tonight, but I need you to go. I need to know that you are safe, that Johan and Aleksie are safe. Do what he says and hide, don't look back. Please, for me. Let me die knowing you are safe. That's all I ask.”
She shook her head and sobbed but kissed him and held his sons for him touch one last time, in these last minutes. She wiped furiously at the tears in her eyes so she could see. “I love you.”
The carriage they had only vacated a half an hour ago pulled up in front of the house, and then the man was back, striding in, pulling Anna off of him despite her protests and dragging her out of the front door. Maksim watched in misery as the other man pushed his wife and children into the carriage. The carriage driver was back in his seat, looking fearful and half dressed. And then they were gone, pulling away from the house at a canter, Anna's face pressed to the glass window.
He watched until they disappeared into the dark and felt his chest explode with grief. The man returned and squatted next to him, his expression foul. Maksim didn't care anymore, what happened next. As long as Anna was gone, away from here and that woman and this man.
“Will you kill me now?” he asked, and coughed blood.
“No, what I am about to do is worse than death.”
Maksim laughed bitterly and turned his head away. “The only thing worse than death is losing Anna, and you have brought both those things to me. At least I know now she is safe.”
“Listen to me very carefully.” Davn responded, his face stark with urgency. “If you want them to live you will never speak their names again. You will never indicate that you even think of them. If you bring them to Saraid's attention there is no telling what she will do. I saved their lives for this night, at great personal expense to myself, but that will mean nothing tomorrow.”
The words sunk in slowly and Maksim turned back to look at the man who leaned over him. “You bargained for their lives, and yet you came here with her. You killed a man at her bidding. Why do you help her?” Reality was slipping away along with his life, but he forced his eyes open.
“I'm not helping her, I'm helping you. You may not understand right now, but you will.” With that Davn picked up Maksim's feeble arm and tore the cuff from his wrist. He brought it to his mouth and let his fangs slide deep into the skin. Maksim fought weakly at the sharp pain, thinking he was being bit by a dog, like he had when he was boy, but then it was over. And the dark stranger stood and looked down at him, with pity. “One last piece of advice. Don't give her what she wants. Until it's time to give her what she wants.”
And then he was gone, ascending the stairs to his Mistress, to pay the price of Anna's life.
Maksim sat at his desk and stared down at the half full glass of brandy that he had poured an hour ago and had barely touched. He held his head in his hands, his elbows on the table, and a tear built up in the corner of his eye and dripped onto the desk, ruining the lacquer.
Memories that he had suppressed for over a hundred years had plagued him for weeks now, ever since the night Davn had come and taken Astral away. He didn't want to remember any of it. The memories of his life before he was turned tore out his heart, and the memories of after that night tore out his soul.
Davn had saved their lives that night, he knew that now. Saraid would have torn his family apart before his eyes if Davn hadn't intervened. There was no limit to the debt he owed him. Maksim had hated him at first, until the reality of the life he led finally dawned on him. The weeks and months that followed quickly changed his hatred into gratitude, and then a hundred years of friendship.
And in return he had betrayed him.
Davn would never forgive him. He was too hard and cold for forgiveness, and really, Maksim couldn't blame him. He wondered now what he had been thinking to try and keep Astral's illness from him.
Davn would have turned her by now and they would have to run, to live in hiding and secret forever. Or until Saraid found them.
He wouldn't see either one of them ever again.
He raised the glass to his lips and drained it in one swallow, hoping miserably for the dulling effects of the liquor.
There was a noise outside his door, but he ignored it. Probably just Dublin again, trying to convince him to eat some dinner or come out.
But then he heard a shriek and his head snapped up in alarm. A half dozen voices could be heard now, all laughing or crying or talking at once.
He stood and walked to his door, and as he reached for the handle he heard one voice in particular, above all the others as everyone else quietened to listen, and he felt his heart stop in his chest.
Astral.
