As Shadows Fade (The Gardella Vampire Chronicles 5)

Was this the portal?

Victoria stood away from it, looking down, wondering if somehow they’d been misled or otherwise mistaken. The crevice ran jagged perhaps as long as a man was tall, and no wider than Aunt Eustacia’s walking stick.

Somehow she’d expected to find demons streaming from the portal-which, incidentally, she’d envisioned as an actual doorway. But other than the odd soundlessness of the area, and the pervading scent of musty death, the place felt little different from any other cemetery.

Victoria turned to Brim, who’d continued his circle around the building.

“Anything?” she asked. Her voice sounded hollow and empty in the air.

“No. Is this it?” he replied, beside her now. She could hear him… but it was as if they were in a soundless windstorm. His words came to her ears distorted and dull, but audible.

“It could be,” echoed her voice. Victoria stepped closer to the crevice, an uncorked bottle of holy water at the ready. She peered down and saw nothing threatening about the crack.

Not a breeze stirred now, and every bit of sound seemed to have been sucked out of her ears. Even her own breathing, faster than usual, had no sound. She tipped the bottle of water, allowing a tiny stream to trickle down into the crevice.

Immediately, a curl of smoke puffed up, angry and black and putrid, exploding in a little poof-not unlike the reaction of a vampire that had just been staked. Victoria jumped back, ready for the onslaught, her eyes fastened on the crevice. But all remained quiet.

Still. Now she knew-at least there was something here.

She looked over at Brim, who’d unsheathed his sword. “Let’s go,” she said. “Come back tonight.”

He gave a short nod, and they turned to make their way back.

Victoria kept watch over her shoulder as they navigated around the gravestones, a simpler process than picking through the piles upon piles of stones in the cemetery in Prague. But though she looked back as they walked away, she saw nothing to disturb the eerie quiet of the plot of graves. No more smoke, no puffs of cloud, no disturbances.

It was that silence, that lingering darkness that bothered her the most.

There was nothing for them to do but wait for the sun to go down, so Victoria and her companions rode back to the small village through which they’d passed on their way to the cemetery. The quaint town consisted of approximately two dozen houses, one inn, and the shops of perhaps four or five tradesmen located directly on the road that wound through it. They settled at the tavern to eat and rest and wait for moonrise-if it came from behind the clouds.

Unfortunately, this time of leisure did nothing but give her the chance to think and worry and stew. While Michalas and Brim sat in the tavern, Victoria brooded so darkly and incessantly, she would have made Max proud.

And that wry thought, of course, brought to mind the man himself and set her stomach to spinning and twisting as it had every night when she tried to sleep. Or anytime she allowed herself to think along that path-which was more often than she wanted.

Her fury with him for leaving her and putting himself in danger had settled into a deep, dark, clutching panic. She’d tried to hold on to the rage, knowing it would help keep the terror tempered if she had that strong emotion on which to focus, but that didn’t last.

She knew that if-when , God, please-she saw him again, she’d have no problem dredging up that anger and skinning him alive with it… but for now, all she wanted was for him to be safe.

But how could he be safe, in the hands of Lilith? Wouldn’t her first task be to turn him undead, now that she had him again?

Victoria shook her head mentally. Max would never allow that to happen. She knew that much, and knew that if he’d gone willingly to her in order to get the rings, he’d be thus prepared.

Didn’t he know she’d come after him? He must know that.

But he’d also know… want… expect her to take care of the portal first. It would be a travesty for his sacrifice to have been in vain, for her to waste his willingness to exchange himself for the rings in order to close the portal… and then not to ensure that it happened.

Oh, Max.

Tears burning her eyes, Victoria shifted in her seat near the smoke-frosted tavern window and in doing so, glanced outside onto the street.

A man caught her attention as he walked along the road, passing several other pedestrians. He was extremely well dressed, at the height of Parisian fashion in fact-an oddity certain to draw attention in a small town in the mountains, hundreds of miles from any city. Yet no one seemed to notice him in his curly-brimmed hat, with a knobby cane, and wearing straight, pressed pantaloons. In fact, he brushed past a woman and her child, nearly knocking into her, and she didn’t even seem to notice.

Victoria couldn’t take her eyes from him and watched as he crossed the street, approaching the tavern, then passed in front of the window through which she stared.

As he strolled by, he looked through the grimy glass. His eyes met Victoria’s for an instant, and she felt a cold, sharp spear thrust through her body, paralyzing her, freezing her breath.

Those eyes… blank and black, fathomless and yet burning… they trapped her for that moment, until he walked on past and released her gaze.

She was out of her chair the moment she could move. Her heart slamming in her chest, she slapped a hand on the table in front of Michalas and said, “Did you see him?”

“Who?” Both of her companions looked where she gestured, even going so far as to open the window and peer out-but the sinister man was gone.

She explained, finding it difficult to describe exactly how it had felt when he looked at her. Before she could finish, however, she lost patience and said, “I’ll be back.”

She rushed out the door, leaving them scrambling to dig out a few coins for the meal and drinks.

By the time she got onto the street, the man had long since disappeared. And even though she, Brim, and Michalas asked everyone they passed whether they’d seen a man of that description, no one appeared to recall seeing the man with the curly-brimmed hat and dapper clothing.

Frustrated, Victoria sent Michalas and Brim toward the tavern, directing them to search along that end of the street. She followed a bit more slowly, looking between and around the clustered buildings.

Just as she was about to give up, she glanced between a bakery and butcher shop. And there he was.

He sat on a bench in a small courtyard, as if he’d been waiting for her. Victoria didn’t hesitate.

As she approached, he removed his hat in a clearly ironic gesture, revealing pure white hair combed smooth to the shape of his skull. His skin was a darker hue, that of tea with a generous portion of milk, and his eyes… those eyes that weren’t red and didn’t burn, but nevertheless fastened on her with an odd, empty, inhuman light.