Avrum growls. “Lysander.”
“Henri and I met soon after I was changed by Malcolm in the year sixteen hundred and three. We both craved revenge for what he had done to us, what he had taken away…” His tone turns pained at that, and he glances away. “We went our separate ways and had no contact for hundreds of years.”
“Not until you came to Greystone Manor,” Avrum adds for him.
“Yes, a little over two years before you arrived.”
“And Malcom… Should we be worried about him?” I ask.
He shakes his head. “He is one of the very first of us, and he is deranged. He believes he is God on earth. And he curses those with the vampire gift to live for eternity with their sins. Henri’s been searching for him since his change. He wants to prove to him he’s been wrong in marking him a sinner.”
I shrink back, taking all the new information in. This Malcolm does not sound like a man I ever want to meet. “What will we do?”
“We will have to be twice as careful. That’s all,” Avrum says. “We still go through with everything as planned.”
“What about tonight?” I question, remembering Henri’s order to have me come to his bed. “If he drinks from me, then we can’t…”
“We will have to come up with a distraction tonight for Henri as well,” Lysander puts in. “Until then, you should be hidden.”
Avrum grunts. “He’s right.”
“She can stay in the attic until we know it is safe.”
The attic?“Now, wait just a minute—”
Avrum turns to me with fierce determination. “Do you have the short sword that I gave you?”
“Yes,” I choke, my throat suddenly dry. “In my room, hidden in the armoire.”
“Keep it on you at all times,” he says. “If someone finds you there, don’t hesitate to use it.”
I can only stare up at him, unmoving. This is all happening so fast. The thought of hiding out in the attic all night, just waiting to be found, and then using a sword to potentially kill someone makes my head whirl.
Avrum leans down and places a swift kiss on my lips, which wins us a snorting sound from Lysander. But he ignores it. “Go into the attic and don’t leave. I will come for you when it’s safe.”
There are still so many questions I want to ask. Like what’s going to happen when Henri starts looking for me? He’ll suspect something’s amiss. Or how will I know if something’s gone wrong and Avrum’s in trouble?
“But—”
“I will come for you.”
And before I can blink, he and Lysander are gone.
Avrum
Iburst through the manor’s back doors, the freezing night air hitting me in the face and leaving my skin prickling. I struggle to keep up with Lysander’s frantic pace. His blond hair whips side to side as he runs ahead. Snow falls from the dark sky above, the thick flakes cling to the naked trees and sticking to the ground at our feet.
At the forest line, I can see a group of rowdy men already gathered in a thick circle. Their heads bob up and down, their shouts sounding more like explosions in the late-night silence. When we reach the crowd, Lysander slides in between the close-knit bodies, and I follow.
As he pushes his way to the front, he ignores the angry protests of the others around us. I don’t understand why he’s brought me here in the first place, but Lysander must have some plan he hasn’t included me in yet.
Before I can ask him what’s going on, Lysander steps into the center of the circle, where two men are locked in another battle with swords. One is Cornelius, his broad, heavily muscled arms unmistakable. His opponent is a younger man, younger than me, with much smaller arms that shake with weakness against Cornelius’s powerful blows.
Lysander unsheathes his own sword and steps in front of the young one.
“Enough with this petty quarrel,” he shouts to Cornelius, making a show of it. “It is more of a lover’s waltz then a duel between men.”
What is he doing?
