Chapter 22
Twenty-Two
THE FIRST WEEK OF our journey to court went forebodingly smoothly.
Raleigh’s carriage was a custom monstrosity that required four horses to drive, with the look of a stagecoach somebody had bred with a hearse.
There was a single seat inside, facing backwards, so one could sit comfortably inside as they would in a stagecoach, but the only door was fitted on the back as it would be on a hearse, with a tiny curtained window peering out.
The majority of the space inside was dedicated to housing a great wooden chest filled with bedding.
This, Raleigh explained, was not a coffin.
It was simply a padded chest he lay in as a safety precaution to protect himself from any fleeting glimpses of sunlight that might shine through the curtain.
He then reiterated that it was not a coffin and made it clear that if I didn’t stop laughing I would be left behind.
It was a coffin.
Moira and Enrique came with us. Lukas protested at first, insisting that the invitation only extended as far as me and Raleigh, but Raleigh insisted that a prince should never go anywhere without his personal attendants.
Enrique, he added, was technically a member of the court and didn’t need an invitation anyway. Besides, we needed drivers.
Personally, I was glad for the company during the day.
There was space enough on the driver’s bench for the three of us to cram in side by side, though we took turns retiring inside to sit among the bags, the coffin and the small armoury of weapons Raleigh, Moira and I all thought we’d managed to hide from each other.
‘It’s for self-defence,’ Moira grunted on the first evening, after Raleigh rifled through the bags in search of the source of an apparently intolerable reek of garlic and discovered that Moira’s was filled with anything and everything that could be used to kill a vampire.
‘A dagger is for self-defence – yes, Clara, I don’t know how you got your hands on my father’s knife, but I found that too. You,’ he turned back to Moira, ‘brought a bloody hunting kit.’
Moira scoffed. ‘You know there’s a silver sword hidden behind your coffin?’
Raleigh bristled with embarrassment. ‘It’s not a coffin! And the sword is part of my regalia. Of course I’d bring it for an audience with the Queen.’
‘Didn’t bring your robes, though, did you?’ Moira said. She winked at me as Raleigh stormed off in defeat, but rummaged through her bag and tucked a bulb of garlic into her pocket regardless.
We saw little of the Queen’s men as we rode, which I was glad for.
Lukas pretended our altercation the other night had never happened, but I had no desire to find out if he’d keep up the act if we were alone.
Each night when we stopped at an inn Yorik had marked on the route, they would join us for a terse drink that was fun for them and torturous for the rest of us, then disappear off into the nearest town or village to hunt.
Raleigh never joined them, but I could tell the temptation grew stronger each day.
Three days in he took a sip from one of the bottles he’d packed and found the whole batch had gone rancid.
He insisted it didn’t matter, that he’d make do with animal blood in the meantime, but this didn’t sit well with any of us.
Animal blood could stave off his hunger for a time, but it wouldn’t keep him sustained.
It was the same as the sawdust we used to bulk out our flour during the famine.
Each night Raleigh vanished to hunt. And each morning he was a little more withdrawn, a little closer to madness.
On the eighth night Raleigh joined us in the inn, looking paler than I thought was physically possible.
His eyes were sunken, and he jumped at every sudden movement.
I could feel him watching me when I wasn’t looking, his stare full of a hunger I couldn’t possibly sate.
I readjusted my blouse, allowing the silver chain of my necklace to peek above my neckline.
‘You need to hunt with the others tonight,’ I told him.
‘I can’t. It’s bad enough killing someone who is already going to die. I won’t hunt a stranger just to sate myself.’
‘So you’d rather kill us?’ Moira chimed in.
‘Moira …’
‘You’re being ridiculous.’ She jabbed her fork into the dry lump of pork she was struggling to saw through. ‘You know full well that if you don’t eat soon you’re going to snap. And then what? You kill Clara and then I kill you? Or will you kill all of us?’
‘I won’t let it get to that point.’
‘You’re already at that point!’ Half the room turned to stare. Moira lowered her voice to a whisper. ‘Can’t you drink without killing? Glamour someone, drink a few mouthfuls, and move on to someone else.’
‘I can’t just “drink a few mouthfuls”. Do you have any idea how hard it is to stop once you’ve started?’
‘Let Yorik kill someone and drink his leftovers, then. But if you don’t feed by the end of the night’—she wrenched her fork back out—‘I will kill you.’
The words hung over the table. I didn’t know if she was serious but, knowing Moira, I suspected she probably was.
‘Fine. I’ll come up with something. Just …’ His eyes darted to me. ‘Just know I don’t have a choice.’
I took a breath and set down my cutlery. ‘You do have a choice,’ I said. ‘I’ve seen what people do to avoid starving to death.’ I placed a hand on his arm. ‘And the best choice is always the one to live.’
Raleigh softened.
‘There’s also no shame in choosing not to snap and kill us,’ Moira cut in.
I kicked her under the table. And when Raleigh excused himself, I wanted to kick her again.
‘Don’t give me that look,’ she said. ‘If his instincts take over he’ll go straight to the thing most desirable to him, and it doesn’t take a genius to know that’s you.’
I couldn’t refute her, not without risking Yorik or Lukas overhearing.
She knew about the web of deals Raleigh and I had tangled ourselves in, but she hadn’t seen the way Raleigh had acted in his room the night the others arrived.
My glare had to be enough to remind her I was a means to an end to him. Just as he thought he was to me.
Moira rolled her eyes. ‘I’ll tell you a secret, Clara,’ she said. ‘He’s never been that good of an actor.’
There came a knock at my door after midnight.
It was too dark to see much through the keyhole, but a glimpse of dusty coat was enough to tell me it was Lukas and Yorik’s entranced driver.
I still hadn’t learnt the poor soul’s name and he wasn’t much for conversation, preferring to stare into empty space while the rest of us pretended he wasn’t there.
Enrique and I had tried to disenchant him one night with every remedy we could think of – going so far as to spike his drink with a careful measure of holy water from Moira’s kit – but Raleigh had been right when he said lasting entrancements were irreversible.
The driver would remain this way until he died or his master removed it by choice, assuming he didn’t live long enough for it to wear off.
Given that Raleigh’s had taken three hundred years, I suspected that was unlikely.
‘The master has requested you.’
I didn’t know which one was his master. ‘Tell him I’m asleep.’
The boy blinked. ‘You are not asleep.’
‘Then tell him I refused.’
‘He said this is a matter that concerns the Prince of Rostenburg.’
I exhaled. This was a trap so clumsily laid a baby rabbit could avoid it, but if something actually happened to Raleigh, I would never forgive myself for going back to bed. I placed my hand over the blade in my pocket. Enrique had prepared me for this; I wouldn’t be an easy victim. ‘Where is he?’
It turned out the boy’s master was Lukas.
He was waiting at the end of the lower corridor, smiling to himself as though he had seen something to amuse him earlier and forgotten to adjust his expression.
The cheaper rooms were down here, where the servants of guests would board. He lit up darkly as I approached.
I stopped as soon as I made out his figure through the gloom, a tremor working through me at the memory of the last time we were alone together. He couldn’t glamour me this time, but I didn’t feel particularly reassured. ‘I’m armed,’ I said.
‘Of course you are,’ he said.
‘What happened to Raleigh?’
Lukas raised his brows in a carefully choreographed echo of surprise. ‘Oh, nothing. I only want to show you who you’re really marrying.’
And I knew then, before he opened the door, what I was about to find.
Raleigh was on the floor, eyes vacant and half-lidded, his fangs buried in the husk of a young woman draped in his arms. Any decorum was gone, replaced by something wild, something animal.
Blood dripped down his chin, pooling at the tip and muddying the pure white of her nightgown.
His fingers pressed into her skin so hard I could see the dimples.
Most people would have bruised instantly under that kind of pressure, but there was no blood left to bruise.
I gagged, turning from the door before I could be sick. I had seen Raleigh drink blood countless times, but it was different when he drank from a cup. I could almost convince myself it was wine.
Was this what Raleigh’s mercy had looked like when he bled my mother dry?
The sight was a sharp reminder of what he was, what they all were. Monsters. Demons. No matter how well Raleigh spoke, how well he dressed, or how kindly he treated me, there was no changing what he was.
And we were travelling to a castle full of creatures just like him.
Cold hands settled on my shoulders and Lukas’s hair brushed against my left ear. He pulled me back into the doorway, forcing me to take in every drop of gore. ‘Is this the prince you love?’