Chapter 15 #2
The dusty library had not yet been touched by the industrious cleaning crew outside.
Kendrick shut the door firmly behind them, which seemed to signal to the work crews to move farther away, and the hubbub faded in volume a bit.
The room had also been designed for quietude and study by the hands that had built it.
Few books adorned the shelves—Genevieve did not think Rupert had had any interest in reading—and the room on the whole seemed threadbare and forlorn.
There was, however, a camelback trunk in the middle of the floor, old and much scarred.
Genevieve twisted her hands together and tried to think of how to begin.
Kendrick moved to the trunk and opened it, taking out some of the objects and setting them on the main library table.
“These are mine; I left them behind with Dominic while I visited the Continent. They’ll make a start on filling these shelves, I think.
Northanger Abbey! My favorite of the Austens.
” He brushed the book off and set it on the table.
“Do you like to read, Miss Dryden? I would think so, if you are a lady who knows her Beowulf.”
“Yes. My father read to me all the time as a child,” she whispered.
Kendrick set another book on the table. “What is it you needed to tell me?”
“I have heard another whispered plot.”
“Yes? Who is it this time?”
“This isn’t a joke,” she said, stung by his inattention.
Kendrick straightened to look at her. “I know that, Genevieve. I didn’t expect them to stop after one benevolent gesture. Vampires don’t like to change their thoughts or their behaviors.”
“That’s not an excuse.”
“For their behavior, or my nonchalance? No, don’t answer—I shudder to think what you will say. You could fatally wound my amour-propre.” He smiled. “Tell me what you heard.”
“Someone will move against you tomorrow night. I don’t know who.”
He nodded. “Forewarned is forearmed. I thank you.”
“Be wary,” she insisted. “The person driving this plot—he is craftier and more devious than most.”
Kendrick’s gaze sharpened. “You know who it is?”
“I heard a name,” she hedged.
“And you know the name.”
Reluctantly, she nodded. “Laurent.” She stared down at the rugless floors, scuffed and dusty from years of neglect.
“I don’t recall a vampire named Laurent. Unless he has taken a different name to the one I knew.”
“He was good friends with my deceased maker. Bacchus.”
“Ah. The one who was once Cuthbert.” Kendrick’s eyes narrowed dangerously. “I always thought of them as Cuthbert and Crony. I don’t think I ever bothered to learn his real name. Still extant, is he?” He drummed his fingers on the library table.
“He will not be the one to try for you tomorrow, if you were thinking of changing that.”
“No, it would be just like him to use another for his dirty work,” Kendrick agreed. His eyes sharpened on her. “Oxley mentioned him. He said you should have asked Laurent before assisting me. But Laurent was not your maker.”
“I told you they were good friends. They did nearly everything together,” she reluctantly said. “I was commanded to obey him. He did not like it when I tried to protect Elspeth.” What an understatement. “He is her maker.”
Kendrick asked softly, “And what did he do to Elspeth? To you?”
“He hurt me,” she said flatly. “But he can’t anymore. The command to obey broke with Bacchus’s death, and I am free of him. But please don’t speak of this to Elspeth. Or Robbie,” she added as an afterthought. “I will tell her myself. Laurent is just a symptom of the larger problem.”
“We are making progress,” Kendrick said, gesturing to the industry she could still faintly hear, even though dawn had to be nearly upon them.
“Not quickly enough.”
“Everything must be done immediately, is that it?”
“As soon as it can be accomplished! You never know how close a soul is to the brink. Why do you think so many snap and go mad down in the dark?”
Kendrick urged, “Won’t you help me, Genevieve? I could accomplish much more with your assistance.”
She sobered, her shoulders slumping. “I can’t help you.”
“Why not?”
She laughed and heard the bitterness in her voice. “You think those vampires will let a woman be in charge? Not the ones grateful for your coin, but the ones who think might makes right. Who think their power gives them the ability to rule over vampires and humans alike.”
“This age is so backward. In my time, women had more rights and protections. They could even divorce a husband if they needed to.”
“The Dooms of AEthelberht,” she murmured.
Even dry law code could sound like magic when her father read it in the original tongue.
Genevieve shook her head, shoving aside the grief.
“Sadly, all these vampires share this unenlightened perspective. If I tried to do anything on your authority, everyone would think I was your—your leman.”
Kendrick raised an eyebrow. “So?”
“It would erode any respect I tried to build! Gisela—Rupert’s woman—and the previous master’s leman liked the power that came with the position enough to make any who slighted them regret it through fear and pain.
To say nothing of what the Master would have done.
But no one respected them, and I heard all the resentment and hatred that was muttered behind their backs.
I can’t become the target of such distaste. ”
Kendrick crossed his arms. “Because you think I won’t support you?”
Genevieve threw up her hands. “Ugh, men! No. Because it would destroy any trust I tried to build with the rest of the Ossuary.”
“What if you were my woman?”
She snorted and turned away, staring at the empty shelves. What a metaphor for her life. “No, thank you.”
“Not like how you’re thinking. If you were my wife.”
Her eyes flew wide.
From behind her, Kendrick said, “Queens hold power in their own right. If I am ruler of the Ossuary—lord, king, what have you—then you would be queen. And no one would have a reason to resent you for getting above yourself or enacting change.”
Genevieve said shakily, “Vampires don’t get married.”
“Vampires don’t bother to get married. There is no reason that we can’t.”
She turned around and examined his face. “You’re serious?”
His eyes flared gold in the dark. “Yes.”
She swallowed and lifted her chin. “Why? Why marry me?”
Kendrick took a step towards her. “I need your vision for what could be. It’s very hard to see the way to anything different when you are as old as I am.
I know things need to change, but you can see how with new possibilities.
I need your hope. And a covenant between us would protect you and give you the respect and power to enact your own change without bringing the matters to me. ”
Genevieve clenched her hands in her skirts. “And you’re willing to go through a farce of a marriage to get it?”
He moved closer and tilted his head to the side. “It wouldn’t be a farce.”
“What?” she breathed.
“Everyone would need to believe we were truly married to accept my authority conveyed to you.”
“Yes, but no one would need to know it is a—a marriage of convenience.”
He tilted his head, watching her closely. “They would be able to tell.”
“H-How?”
“Through scent. Have you never noticed?”
“Oh,” she breathed. Genevieve suddenly realized why she associated some vampires together in her mind, even though they did not lodge together. Scent. “How…?”
“Vampires in intimate relationships—that is, ones beyond casual coupling—exchange blood as well.”
She flinched and looked away. The ghost of the past she could not remember rose up. She whispered, “I don’t know that I can do that.”
“Not handsome enough for you, am I?”
Her head snapped up.
Only a step away now, Kendrick grinned at her. “You watch me when you think I don’t notice, Jenny.”
Her stomach swooped and decided to take roost in her throat.
He chuckled. “It’s all right. I watch you when I know you don’t notice, so fair’s fair.”
Vampires didn’t blush, so why was her face so hot? “Kendrick, I can’t marry you.”
“Will you think about my suggestion? That’s all I ask. And—here. It’s no bride gift, but I think you appreciate a good tale.” He sorted through the piles of books on the table and plucked one free. “This is one of my favorites, in the vein of Sir Walter Scott’s books. I think you would enjoy it.”
Genevieve took the book and stared down at the faded, green-cloth cover, worn at the corners like it had been much thumbed. She could still read the title in gold text: Wynnflaed’s Knight, by E.D. Saxon.
With shaking hands, she opened the cover to touch the dedication.
To My Daughter Jenny,
Who has always believed there is nothing a heroine cannot do.
Genevieve burst into tears.
Every sob she had held in the cage of her ribs for the last month escaped at once as she clutched the book to her chest. Her vision blurred, hot liquid spilling down her cheeks in a red river.
“Genevieve,” Kendrick said in helpless alarm, his arms encircling her. She pressed her face into his shirtfront to try to muffle the keening wail clawing its way out of her throat. But she couldn’t stop it. The wave of grief was crashing over her, pulling her into the undertow.
Her knees gave way.
Genevieve never hit the ground. Kendrick scooped her up, and for a second, she was airborne. Then she came to rest in a lap, still held in his embrace.
“Ah, Jenny,” he murmured in her ear, his hand coming up to cradle the back of her neck. “I never meant to make you weep.”
“It’s my book,” she gasped brokenly. “How did you know it was my book?”
“Your book?”
She clutched it tighter, curling around the book like it might disappear. The grief tore into her like a wild thing. “My father wrote it for me.”