The Vampire Narcise (Regency Draculia 3)

Giordan hesitated for a moment. He wanted more than anything to get away from this abhorrent man, out of this dark, close place and back to his own...but the more time spent in his presence, here in the highly secure, subterranean locale, the more he could learn about its layout and his host's habits...and the sooner he could find a way to relieve Cezar Moldavi of his favorite plaything.

His fingers curled into each other as he thought of having to leave Narcise here...but he forced them to smooth out. Patience.

Thus, although he truly wanted to be alone-with his thoughts, his memories, his fears-his concern and care for Narcise's future easily prevailed. "Perhaps...perhaps, yes, for a brief time. I would be delighted to sample your offering. It sounds most intriguing." He kept his voice mellow and even enthusiastic with effort.

Moldavi's face changed, a brief contortion, and his eyes widened a fraction...then it was gone. "Please, then, with me," said his host in his imperfect French. "And, if you like, Cale, I would be happy to provide you with new attire. I suspect you don't wish to be traveling back to your home in nothing but breeches. I have retrieved your coat from our dining area, of course, but perhaps you would accept my gift of a shirt and shoes as well."

Giordan realized that his host was correct, and that he hadn't given his bare feet, legs and chest any thought at all. Ah, Narcise. You've already destroyed me. "I would be very grateful."

As he walked along with Moldavi, Giordan considered the option of killing the man right here, right now. It was an efficient way to resolve things; one he'd employed far too many times, if the priests had anything to say about it. Which, of course, they didn't. It was a plain truth: Giordan had grown up with violence and poverty all around him, and was more likely to kill a man who crossed him than he was to waste time trying to find other resolutions.

That was yet another reason, he was certain, that Lucifer had found him an appropriate addition to the Draculia.

Killing Moldavi would end the man's domination over Narcise, and they would find their way out of this labyrinthine lair beneath the rues of Paris.

But Giordan was forced to reject the fantasy nearly as soon as it presented itself, for a variety of reasons, the simplest being, he didn't have a weapon. It wasn't as if he could choke the man to death or pummel him into the ether like one could do on the streets. Either a wooden stake or a sword that would take the man's head off were the only ways, and aside of the wooden sconces, there was nothing else that would work. And to tear down a sconce, break it into a ragged point and then attack Moldavi...even Giordan wasn't confident it could be done quickly and without mishap.

Aside of that, to do anything that would make the man suspicious would ruin any chance he might have of further access to Narcise.

Patience.

"So you have lived in Paris since you were a child?" Moldavi asked as they approached a heavy wooden door.

"Yes. Although the place I lived while a boy was much different than Le Marais," Giordan said with a sidewise, wry smile.

"I have come to prefer Paris myself," Moldavi said. "Romania is rough and wild with its own beauty, but also dark and sharp and difficult to navigate...and I find the City of Light a much welcome change." He had the key on a ring at his waist, but there was a guard stationed there to provide additional security.

"Although I travel much now for business purposes, I always return to Paris, for it's my home," Giordan replied.

It appeared even the guard didn't have access to the door, for it was his master who used the key to unlock the door. From what Giordan had observed on his journey to and from, the single purpose of this corridor was to provide access to The Chamber where he and Narcise had been. There was no other entrance or exit along here, no other rooms, and certainly no other way in or out of the room in which they'd been.

He wondered, suddenly, and with a painful shaft of horror, whether Narcise was kept in that place of torture all the time, or if she had some other sort of living space.

They walked through the door and Giordan took in the details of what he'd only vaguely noted the first time through. This underground tunnel had been in Paris much longer than Moldavi had.

"How did you come to choose the catacombs as a place to live?" Giordan asked as they passed along the corridor. What he really meant was how had Moldavi taken over control of these underground tunnels where varlets and vagrants had lived for centuries. "I would have thought you'd prefer a chateau or some other mansion."

The walls of this hallway were lined with neat rows of skulls, their empty eyes and toothy upper jaws an eerie and morbid decor. Above each row of skulls were lined several layers of large bones-femurs, he guessed by the size of them, with the joint ends facing out. They made for bumpy texture, and the hollows provided homes for spiders and other insects.

Giordan made no attempt to hide his surprise that a man as refined as Moldavi-at least in attire and his selection of food and drink-would choose to live in such base surroundings. But then again...this was a vampire who bled children to death and who imprisoned his sister for the pleasure of others. He tightened his jaw to control the rage. Perhaps he would kill the man now.

"It is a bit gauche, isn't it?" his companion replied, brushing a hand lovingly over one of the skulls. "But I find it such an interesting topic of conversation. At the least," he said with his faint lisp, "they are long dead and gone and we don't have the rot and smell of the decomposing bodies in the...the place where they are moving all of them now...what is it called?"

"The Ossuary," Giordan replied, having regained control of his temper. He noted that the skull-lined corridor had branched off into two different directions and that they'd taken the eastern route. "In the old stone quarries."

He recognized that the tunnels they now traversed were old quarries as well, but that these bones must be the original ones from the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. The placement of these bones decades ago were the inspiration for the disposal of the bodies from the overcrowded church cemeteries, the newest wave which had begun thirty years earlier from parishes like Holy Innocents.

Giordan had traversed many of these underground tunnels even before he was turned Dracule, and now he was redrawing a map in his head. Combining his memory of the network and the actual route they took, he was attempting to connect the two areas. That would come in handy if-when-he helped Narcise make her escape.

They came to another door at a T-intersection of the corridor. When they passed through the entrance into a hallway that looked exactly like one in his own home, Giordan realized that Moldavi must simply use the skull-lined quarry as a conduit between his torture chamber and his real living space.