Chapter 12
Chapter Twelve
Am I really doing this? Genevieve kept asking herself the question as she and Kendrick approached the Ossuary entrance and the guards at the door.
One of the guards reflexively held up a hand before he realized who was with her. “S-Sir,” he said.
“What is your name?” Kendrick asked.
“A-Athos, sir.”
“Ah, a Dumas aficionado. Well met, Athos.” Kendrick smiled affably, but his keen gaze warned onlookers to be wary. The broad shoulders and sword hilt didn’t hurt, either.
“Thank you, sir.” The guard’s gaze flickered from Kendrick to Genevieve and back again. “Ah…”
“Yes?” Kendrick said. His smile grew sharper.
“Begging your pardon, sir, th-the woman did not exit by this door.”
“Lady.” Kendrick’s growl sent a shiver down Genevieve’s spine. “The lady did not exit by this door. But now she is returning through this door. With me. Is there a problem?” His voice made it clear that if there were, he would not be keen on the result.
Cowed under the weight of personality, the guard bowed and stepped out of the way. His counterpart did the same, staring silently.
“That was an example of guards exercising control, I suppose?” Kendrick asked once they had passed down into the tunnels below.
“We are not supposed to exit and enter by different doors. The guards keep track to monitor that all who have left return. Those with repeat infractions are reported to their makers and eventually to the Master. You now, I suppose.”
“And what happens then?”
“Punishment.”
Kendrick’s face hardened, but he did not press for clarification. “You did not come via this door?”
“I did. They just didn’t see me leave.” Genevieve met his eyes steadily.
“You are a woman of many hidden depths, Miss Dryden.” A reluctant smile spread over his face.
“A veritable catacomb’s worth,” she said in a dry voice.
His laugh boomed out, rich and deep, echoing through the tunnels. It sent shivers of heat down her spine.
“It’s just down here,” she said quickly, not wanting to dwell on the sensations that his laugh conjured within her. “Let me—” She let go of his arm and hurried forward along the narrow passage. “Elspeth! Are you there?”
“Is that you, Genevieve? You’re back early—”
“We have a visitor,” Genevieve said hurriedly, poking her head into the bolt hole. “Is everyone decent?”
“Yes, of course,” Elspeth said, frowning.
Sparrow looked up from her mending. “Who?”
Elspeth looked beyond Genevieve and her eyes widened.
“Your Christian name is Genevieve?” Kendrick rumbled.
Genevieve turned sharply.
“‘Woman of the tribe,’ or ‘woman of the family.’ It suits you.” He looked beyond her and bowed.
“Pleased I am to meet your acquaintance, ladies. Please, do not stand on ceremony,” he said, as the women started to scramble to their feet.
It would have been a difficult feat in the small space.
“In truth, I am a man of humble origins.” He went to one knee and took Elspeth’s hand in his, bowing over it. “I am Kendrick.”
“This is Miss Elspeth Gibbins,” Genevieve said, taking the reins of the introductions, “and this is Miss Sparrow.” Sparrow had eschewed her former name.
“Miss Gibbins, Miss Sparrow.” He tipped his hat to Sparrow, declining to encroach farther into the small, cramped hole.
Genevieve flushed with embarrassment for how he must have seen it—a small cave in the stone and dirt, barely small enough for three people to fit, and not tall enough for her to stand up straight in.
The remains of candlewax dripped down the walls, and one lone flame flickered to light the space.
No belongings or furnishings. They slept wrapped in their cloaks during the daylight hours and owned little more than what they could keep in their pockets.
Elspeth and Sparrow shared a small basket of sewing supplies that they guarded carefully, and that was all there was to the space.
“How do you do, sir?” Elspeth said carefully. Sparrow stared at him, wide-eyed and silent.
“Better than I have in many nights. Miss Dryden has kindly allowed me to accompany her on her rounds this eve.”
His voice had a honeyed quality to it. Genevieve had noticed it before, the first night they had spoken.
With only a few sentences, he was quietly coaxing words out of Sparrow and politely inquiring how they found life in the Ossuary, how long they had lived under vampire rule—a kinder way of asking when they’d died, perhaps?
—and what they were desirous of to see changed.
Sparrow mentioned the door guards. Elspeth said nothing, but Genevieve put in, “Oversight into the use of blood bonds.”
Kendrick shot her a keen glance but did not comment when Elspeth ducked her head. “I won’t take up any more of your evening,” he said, rising to his feet. “I appreciate you speaking to me. It was a pleasure to meet you both.”
They both assured him, slightly starry-eyed, that the pleasure was theirs.
Once Genevieve had turned the bend of the hallway, she stopped and said, “What on earth did you do to them?”
“Do?” Kendrick seemed genuinely puzzled.
“That—voice of yours. Is that your talent? Did you manipulate them?” she demanded.
Realization dawned on his face, and his expression grew grave. “I assure you, Miss Dryden, I did not. But persuasion is where my talents lie, and after so many centuries, a good deal of it is instinctive and bleeds out into much of what I say and do.”
Centuries, Genevieve thought. Gracious. “So you didn’t—”
“I did not compel your friends to speak. They simply became…more at ease with me. Because I meant what I said.” He met her eyes seriously. “This, I swear to you.”
She lifted her chin a fraction in the air. “And you’re not using your talent to persuade me now?”
The corner of his mouth ticked up. “If I were, you would know it. Indeed, you did know it, the first night we were introduced. And you pushed back against it. The fact is, anyone can push back on my persuasion unless I bring the full force of my will against them. And I rarely do unless the need is great. You can trust me, Genevieve,” he said quietly.
“I have not given you leave to use my Christian name,” she said, striding off again.
“Ah, but it is beautiful and rolls off the tongue. Genevieve, Genevieve, Genevieve.”
“Miss Dryden,” she corrected him, steeling herself against the way her name dripped from his tongue. Like a caress.
He laughed. “All right, Miss Dryden. Carry on.”
She stopped in at many of the other domiciles she regularly checked on, introducing to Kendrick apprehensive huddles of women who relaxed into wide-eyed wonder at his solicitous inquiries and clumps of glowering, suspicious men whose faces cracked into grins when he shook their hands and made jokes.
He was correct; it was less a direct use of power and more an aura of personality that infected people.
Any other night, those men might have come to blows over something inconsequential as their tempers wore thin, or the women shut down before a male authority. But not now. Because it was sincere.
Could this be real? Do we finally have a ruler who cares? Genevieve thought.
Around a bend, she came upon Robbie, probably making his way towards their bolt hole to spend a little time with Elspeth. “Are you acquainted with Mr. MacPherson, Kendrick? Sometimes I think he knows everyone in the underground.”
“I have not had the pleasure.” Kendrick held out his hand, and Robbie switched his crutch to the other arm to shake it. “MacPherson. Any relation to Cluny?”
Robbie nodded, squeezing his grip in the way men did. “He was my clan leader, and Culloden where I fell.”
“A bloody business,” Kendrick said. “Bloodier when soldiers are promised invincibility and a way to turn a battle’s tide and receive only dust in return.” His face was grim.
“Aye,” Robbie growled. “And then to lie in the dark of Cluny’s Cage for nigh eight year, good for naught else than guarding, with only one leg. T’was after he decamped for France that I came south.”
“I am surprised we have not crossed paths before, but much of that century, I was in Wales,” Kendrick said. “It is good to meet you, Mr. MacPherson.”
“It’s Robbie I am, sir.”
“Robbie.”
Genevieve supposed Robbie would have said more, but along came Winnie down the passage, and he excused himself in favor of visiting Elspeth.
Robbie and Winnie were not friends, and as much as Robbie could not find it in himself to be rude to a woman, he avoided her as much as possible.
According to Elspeth, Winnie had once said something deeply cutting within his hearing about being half a man.
And her so newly made, and turning so hard and uncaring already, Genevieve thought, watching Winnie advance coquettishly upon them. Sometimes she wondered whether a side effect of vampirism caused such cruelty. Other times, she believed it had far more to do with inner character.
At least Kendrick has his wits about him, she thought as she performed the introductions with a neutral expression.
The man was discerning and canny, and he tempered whatever magnetism spilled out of him from a warm exuberance into a pleasant politeness as he bowed correctly but did not take Winnie’s hand.
“How do you do, Miss Cunningham?” Kendrick said.
It was like the man stuffed all the force of his personality under his hat.
Winnie, for her part, gushed.
Was she trying to throw herself at him or communicate her sophistication? Genevieve wondered. Perhaps Winnie was not quite sure herself, as she several times glanced at Kendrick’s yeoman garb doubtfully. For all her social-climbing ambitions, Winnie did not have much in the way of practice.
Kendrick did not allow his thoughts on this clumsy attempt at machination to show, but Genevieve thought he might be amused. Sort of like a kitten batting at an old tom’s tail. She bit the inside of her cheek.
Mid-sentence, Winnie stuttered to a stop, her hand going to her throat.