It was easy enough to sort out the uniform in the darkness, the thing was so simple. Just a flannel dress with a floor-length skirt as loose as the bodice was tight. I had to suck in to zip it up the side—the woman he’d stolen it from must’ve been miniscule. Naturally, it was gray, and I wondered what it was vampires had against color. The finishing touches were a pair of thick, scratchy woolen hose, my hair tugged back in a bun, and a white cap on top. A white apron topped the whole thing. I felt like a Quaker.
But I guess Buddy had a thing for simple, because when I emerged, he gave me and my snug bodice a cockeyed grin. His tone was sarcastic, but his eyes were approving. “Hot.”
I was about to jump down his throat when Alcántara beat me to it. The vampire practically flew across the cave to him—one minute he stood against the wall, and the next he was in Buddy’s face.
When Alcántara stepped away, I saw the Trainee held his hands clutched over his cheek. Blood was dripping down his jaw, dribbling onto his collar and turning the brown material black. “Dude,” he mumbled.
Alcántara folded his hands behind his back, speaking calmly. “Cuidado, boy. You will honor Acari Drew. Look upon her with respect, or the next time it will be your eyes.”
I watched the boy wipe blood from his face—me, the girl who’d just been defended by a vampire.
It was unnerving and frightening, but it was kind of a rush, too. The feeling I got was that Alcántara honored me, in an old-fashioned, chivalric sort of way.
I held my shoulders back, standing tall. I wasn’t an adolescent like Buddy. I was on a mission.
Thoughts of my imminent escape faded to the background.
The old Drew shed from me.
I focused on the scratch of woolen hose against my skin, imagining the feel to be familiar, not foreign. I imagined myself the part. These were my clothes. I was a maid. I was invisible.
I looked up to find Alcántara’s eyes consuming me. It was one of his epically seductive stares, making me feel I was a blast of the blazing sunlight he hadn’t known in centuries.
With a hand on his chest, he gave me a courtly half bow. “You are perfection.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
“Schnell! Schnell!” a voice shouted at me in German, and I upped my pace. I’d studied etiquette enough to barf, but it turned out real preparation would’ve been running the fifty-yard dash while balancing trays stacked with teetering plates and glasses. Forget finding Carden McCloud—these guys were a grave-looking bunch, and I feared a broken dish might mean my life.
The darkness didn’t help. Old-fashioned was one thing, but did they have to be so freaking authentic? The monastery resembled an old castle, but nothing like anything Cinderella ever saw. It was ancient and freezing, all thick slabs of stone and rats squeaking in corners. I had no doubt there were dungeons—I just hoped the only thing lurking down there was our ancient vampire.
I was pretending to be someone who didn’t speak German, so I pasted a confused look on my face and whispered a deferential, “I’m sorry.” I kept my chin tilted down, having no desire to catch a glimpse of the older scullery maid I’d just addressed. Her gruff voice suggested a cross between drill sergeant and prison warden.
I scampered away, trying to balance my load and cursing the long skirts that kept tangling between my legs. The trek from the downstairs kitchens, up a winding staircase, to the warped timber floors of the private dining room was made more precarious by the fact that these dudes had yet to embrace electric lights. And though torches burnt everywhere, they weren’t enough to cast light in black corners or along the ruts in the floors that kept tripping me up.
I entered the room and slammed on the brakes, cutting my pace from sixty to zero.
A quartet played classical music in the corner, and it could’ve been a scene plucked from any old book, except the men seated around the table were all pale, all deadly. They really did resemble monks, each wearing the same dark, hooded robe. And, at the moment, they mostly looked like outraged monks, their icy glares focused on a girl, kneeling before them and choking back sobs.
I adjusted my tray, quickly wiping the sweat from my palms. Was I supposed to walk in and serve food or just watch this horror show unfold?
I chose the latter—better not to call attention to myself at this very moment. More important, it provided a great opportunity. Studying every detail, memorizing each face, noting every reaction, were the sorts of things that could save a girl’s life later on.
There were seven vampires—the Synod of Seven, I presumed—with three on each side of a thickly hewn wooden table and one at the head. This guy, obviously the leader, got my most intensive scrutiny. Besides, not only was he in charge; he was also the one currently tearing a new one in the serving girl.
“Are you clumsy,” he demanded of her, “or merely a fool?”
Candles littered the place, and long, eerie shadows danced up the craggy stone walls and along the uneven timber plank ceiling. Even the air was different, reminding me of an evening storm in my Florida hometown—I sensed the same sudden cool, the altered light, the air charged with electricity…and danger.
“See what you have done. You have spilled Brother Marcus’s wine.”
She scuttled around on her knees, using her skirts to swab up the spilled liquid, and I cringed for her. Her body quaked too violently, and her efforts were worthless. Her bun had loosened, and wisps of black hair spilled around her face.
Another vampire chimed in—Brother Marcus, I assumed—speaking with an impatient sneer in a thick German dialect. “Yes, and I find myself thirsty.”
This was once someone’s daughter, now reduced to a pathetic creature who’d likely not survive the night. “Please forgive me,” she begged in German. “I’m sorry. I will get you more.”
I winced, my blood chilling for her. In her nerves, she’d accidentally spoken the casual Euch instead of the more formal Ihnen.
The room became utterly silent—silent, but for her whimpering.
“Rise,” the man at the head said. As she did, he raked her with a disdainful look. “You overstep.”
The girl trembled, wavering on legs too weak to hold her.
“Stand, I told you.” The head man grabbed her arm, and she cried out as he pulled her up and shoved her toward Marcus. “Give him aught to drink.”
Marcus’s mouth attached to the girl’s neck in an instant. I’d never seen a vampire feed, and I watched in horrified fascination as he wrenched her backward, his throat gulping convulsively. Crimson pooled in the corners of his mouth and spilled down her skin, shimmering in the candlelight. I couldn’t see it in the shadows, but I heard the hideous plip-plip of her blood dribbling onto the floor.
Her eyes rolled back in her head, eyelids fluttering. She swayed, her expression either pain or ecstasy—I couldn’t tell which.
Two male attendants appeared behind me, and I gave a start. The man at the head of the table gave them a sharp nod, and they grabbed the girl by the elbows, then dragged her from the room.
The leader’s eyes found me then, pinning me. I stood there, uncertain. My tray, heavy with plates of meats and breads, felt as if it weighed five thousand pounds. But I couldn’t spill; I couldn’t tremble—there wasn’t room to make a single mistake.
“Sie bringt die nächste Portion,” he said, announcing the next course. I just hoped the next portion didn’t involve me.
I remembered my role—I was a dim, timid, English-speaking attendant. I didn’t move, and he beckoned impatiently.
Only then did I step forward, imagining graceful things—ballerinas, cats, flowers in the breeze—delicate things I’d never been but needed to act like now if I wanted to survive. I made my body move in long, elegant movements.
“You may stay,” he told me in German, “and see that our cups overflow.”
I pretended not to understand. I dared raise my chin just a little bit and widened my eyes. Pretty…I was a pretty, graceful, innocent ballerina, I reminded myself. I curtsied, whispering, “I beg your pardon, sir?”
He gave me a long, lingering look. I estimated he’d been in his fifties when he was turned, and with a few lines etched on his face, and a head of longish, white hair, he was neither ugly nor handsome. He didn’t look cruel, either, but when it came to vampires, I knew better than to judge a book by its cover. “Solch ein schönes Stück. Und sie spricht nicht deutsch.”
I schooled my features. I was dumb and invisible. I definitely was not a genius undercover superspy who hated being called a pretty piece who was unable to speak German.
The other men chuckled, but instead of a jovial thing, the sound was menacing. Candlelight cast them in dramatic light and shadow, and some of their faces were clearly visible, while others were merely shadowy silhouettes, with black holes where mouths and eyes should have been.
One asked with a laugh, “Better that way, is it not?”
“You may stay,” he told me in English. “See to it that our glasses remain full and our food plentiful.”
“It would be my honor, sir.” More deferential whispering from me, another curtsy.
“To the fine wine of Brother Jacob,” one of the vampires announced, and they forgot my existence. They raised their glasses in a toast, repeating their leader’s name, sounding like a baritone chorus…Yaa-cub.
Jacob touched his glass to his forehead. “Danke. Und herzlich Willkommen, meine Brüder.”
The meeting commenced, and so much for the myth that vampires couldn’t eat. These guys chowed. And drank. And drank some more.
I supposed eating wasn’t just a physical thing—sometimes we ate because we enjoyed eating—and if I could spend eternity not worrying about my waistline, you can bet I’d consume my share of Nutter Butters.
I scampered to and fro, ensuring their every need was met and all the while struggling to follow the conversation. Their dialect was old and coarse, and I discovered that reading Old High German was one thing, but hearing it was something else entirely. With no context to work from, I had a hard time parsing discussions filled with disjointed references to conflicts and people I knew nothing about.
