“Babies can’t help drooling, so it doesn’t count.”
She raised an eyebrow and looked at Giovanni, who only shrugged his shoulders.
“I think you’re wrong.” They heard Tenzin speak again. “And I am older, so I am right.”
“Do you think that B and Gio will ever adopt a baby?”
“I certainly hope not. They’re very messy, and they smell horrible.”
Beatrice shook her head and walked toward the living room. Giovanni locked the door behind him before he followed her.
“If we do,” she said as she entered the room, “you two will be last on the babysitting list, that’s for sure.”
“Hey!” Ben raised his hands. “I was defending the human babies. Tenzin is the barbarian here.”
Tenzin rolled her eyes. “I was simply saying that once a human has reached the drooling stage, it is a valid question whether they should be considered a real human or not.”
Ben just stared at her, shaking his head. “So not cool, Tenzin.”
Giovanni sat in his favorite chair and pulled Beatrice to sit in his lap. “You two bicker more than old married people.”
“Hey! You’re the only old married people I see,” Ben said.
Tenzin curled her lip at Giovanni. “We do not.”
Beatrice shrugged. “Just be nice to Dez and Matt’s baby when it gets here, that’s all I’m asking.”
Dez and Matt had been married the previous week, and the couple was vacationing on one of Ernesto’s yachts before they returned to Los Angeles and accompanied Beatrice, Giovanni, and Ben to Rome. Beatrice had some concern about her friend traveling so early in her pregnancy, but Dez seemed nonchalant about the matter, so she was trying not to worry.
“Is Tenzin coming on the plane with us?”
“No,” Tenzin said firmly. “I will meet you all within the week, but you will not get me on that flying contraption again. It’s unnatural.”
“Who’s coming on the plane, then?”
Giovanni leaned back and closed his eyes. “Desiree, Kirby, and the three of us. Carwyn will meet us there.”
“Cool,” Ben said as he stood. “I’m going to bed.”
“Good, it’s late.”
Tenzin piped up from the couch, “We are watching movies tomorrow night.”
Beatrice asked, “What are we watching?”
“We’re going to Rome.” Ben shrugged. “Gladiator. Spartacus.”
“Ben Hur. Cleopatra,” Tenzin said.
Beatrice grinned. “Roman Holiday?”
“The Life of Brian?” Giovanni suggested.
“No,” Tenzin and Ben said together.
Beatrice said, “You two are so predictable.” She leaned back and laid her head on Giovanni’s shoulder. She felt his hand comb through her hair, and she closed her eyes, content and sated in her lover’s arms. Soon, Ben walked up to bed, and Tenzin retreated to the den with the television.
“Everything’s going to be okay in Rome, right?”
“Yes. Whatever happens, we will handle it.”
Beatrice still had the sneaking suspicion that their trip to the Eternal City was going to be far more interesting than Giovanni predicted, but she kept silent. They had to go, and they might find out more about her father’s informant when they were there. Stephen De Novo had received too much valuable and accurate information on his hunt for Geber’s elixir of life for it to be merely coincidence. The ancient city held secrets, and hopefully, a few answers as well.
For almost a year, she had been studying Geber’s journals and jotting down characteristics the alchemist had noted from his immortal “donors” when she found them. With enough time, and with Giovanni’s knowledge of the intricate immortal court in Rome, Beatrice might have a chance of identifying the original four vampires who had contributed to the elixir. If they could find those four, then they were one step closer to understanding the mystery, and just maybe, they would be a step ahead of Lorenzo.
She felt Giovanni’s skin heat up, and he began to nose against her neck.
“More?” she murmured.
“More.”
Chapter Four
Crotone, Italy
1494
Jacopo was starving.
He pulled himself up from the thin pallet on the floor and crawled to the door where a jar of water stood. He had eaten the four thin wafers that had been slipped under the door, but his stomach still growled. The flavorless bread was the only food he had been given in the previous week, though his water had been replenished on a daily basis.
Jacopo reached for the door, pulling on it again before he paced the room. Just then, a timid knock sounded. A few moments later, he heard the key turn, and the door cracked open. He saw the edge of a vivid-blue eye in the darkness of the corridor, and then a mop of shining blond hair poked though.
“Hello?” The boy was small, perhaps ten years of age, and he held a large loaf of bread in his hands. He was dressed in clean clothes, costly: the clothing of a servant in a fine house.
“Who are you?” Jacopo crouched in the corner, watching the small boy come closer. His stomach rumbled as the smell of the warm bread wafted toward him.
“It’s morning, so the master is in his chamber,” the boy said. “He won’t come out until nightfall. I brought this for you.”
Still, Jacopo eyed him warily. “Who are you?” he asked again.
“I’m Paulo.” He smiled and held out the bread. “Master told the servants not to feed you, that you had to steal food for yourself, but no one had seen you, so I thought you might be sick.”
Bits of information clicked into place. The week before, Andros had come to him and told Jacopo that he was strong enough to start his training. You need to be taught self-reliance, Andros had said with a strange glint in his eye. The next morning, there was water when he woke, but no food.
Jacopo frowned at the boy and ignored the gnawing in his stomach. “He wants me to steal food from him?”
Paulo nodded. “I heard him telling the cook. He told her if she found food missing, not to be alarmed, that he wanted you to learn how to escape your room and steal it.”
“Crazy old man,” Jacopo muttered. “Fine, he wants me to steal; I’ll steal from him. And I will learn how to escape this wretched chamber, as well.” Though he hadn’t been forced to steal since his uncle had adopted him, he had once been adept at picking locks. If Andros wanted Jacopo to escape his room, it wouldn’t be a problem.
“So”—Paulo held out the bread—“do you want it? I brought it for you.”
Jacopo looked at the seemingly innocent boy with the wide, blue gaze. Why would he bring him bread and risk the anger of the master of the house? Was this boy a spy of some sort? Would Jacopo receive a beating for taking the bread from him? Perhaps it was a test.
“I want nothing from you,” Jacopo said. “Why do you bring me bread when Andros wants me to steal it? Do you run to him and tell him of my weakness later?”
As soon as he said it, Jacopo knew it had not been the boy’s intention. Paulo’s face fell, and a hard mask slipped over his previously open features. Jacopo regretted that he had rebuffed the boy’s kindness, but he had no desire to attract the wrath of Niccolo Andros by defying him.
The boy straightened his shoulders. “I brought it to tempt you,” Paulo said with false bravado. “It’s only a shame you can’t taste it for yourself.” The blond boy took a large bite from the fragrant loaf, and Jacopo could smell the herbs the cook had used in the bread. His mouth watered.
He leapt up, pouncing on the boy and knocking him to the ground. Jacopo slapped his face and grabbed the loaf from his hands. Paulo’s eyes watered, but he twisted his mouth into a sneer as Jacopo tossed the bread to the corner.
“Go. Tell the cook I stole your bread and beat you. She will not blame you for the loss.” He stood and held out a hand to the boy, but Paulo rolled away and stood on his own.
“You’re a filthy animal.” Paulo curled his lip. ?
??I can smell you from here. Signore Andros will surely get rid of you when he smells you through the house.”
“Oh?” Jacopo cocked his head. “Has he brought boys to his home before?” What was this madness Niccolo Andros had planned? Where there other boys like him hidden in this cold, stone castle?
“No,” Paulo said. “Signore Andros is a most cultured and honorable man. When he sees you, I’m sure he will be displeased and send you away.”
Jacopo smirked. “So, I am the only one he ordered the cook not to feed?”
“Yes,” Paulo said with a shrug.
He wandered to the corner and grabbed the bread, tearing off a chunk and stuffing it in his mouth. It was the finest thing he had ever tasted. “So I am the only one he keeps like this? The only... prisoner.”
“He calls you his student.”
“Is that so?”
“Yes.” Paulo was backing toward the door as Jacopo tore off another chunk of bread.
“And I am the only student?”
“Yes, but he will send you away when he smells you, animal.”
A grim smile curled Jacopo’s lips. “Paulo, how many servants does Signore Andros have?”
“Many.” He sneered again. “He has many servants.”
“And how many ‘students’ does he have?”
Paulo’s eyes narrowed. “Just you.”
Jacopo walked toward the haughty boy, towering over him. At seventeen years of age, he was taller than most grown men, as tall as the father he had never met. He stared down at the blond boy in his clean clothes and scrubbed face.
“Well, if I am your master’s only student, and you are one of many servants, then I think we know the one who is expendable, no?”
En route to Rome
May 2012
Giovanni woke, brushing the dream from his mind and looking around the compartment for Beatrice. He could hear the low hum of the engines as they flew. He spotted her sitting in a chair in the corner, notebooks spread over her side of the bed.
“Where are we?”
She looked up with a smile. “Hey! You know, you’re sleeping a lot less now, too.”
“I don’t find that surprising, considering how much blood we exchange.” His wife’s blood was powerful, more powerful than even he had predicted, and his waking hours were growing longer as a result. Though the phenomenon had its advantages, he did not envy her lack of rest.
“I’ve found something interesting in the journals.”
“Oh?”
She nodded with a grin. “I think I’ve finally identified the four original donors.”
He sat up and leaned over the spread notebooks. “How? You’ve been looking for months.”
Beatrice opened her notebook and handed it to him. “I don’t have them exactly, but I’ve been making notes every time he mentions them in his journals, and I finally found a reference to the one I’d been missing, the earth donor.”
“What did you find?” He began paging through her notes, deciphering the strange shorthand she had developed since she had turned. Most vampires developed some sort of unique language for their thoughts over time. Since their minds moved more rapidly than mortals, it was the best way to record thoughts and had the added benefit of concealing their meaning from the casual reader. To anyone else, Beatrice’s writing would have been gibberish; Giovanni alone could read it.
“What is this?” He pointed toward an unknown symbol. “This is new.”
“It stands for ‘Aethiop.’”
“‘Aethiop?’ You mean the earth donor was Ethiopian?”
She nodded with a grin. “Yep, and she—”
“She?”
“Uh-huh, another surprise. The others were clearly male, but this one was definitely female because Geber notes that preliminary testing on her blood showed no discernible difference because of sex.”
“Which would only be notable if her sex was different.” Giovanni smiled. “Nicely done, Tesoro.”
“So, we have his names for the four, which all indicate their origin... except for his friend.”
Giovanni paged through the notebook. “The Greek, the Numidian, the Aethiop, and ‘my dear friend.’”
Beatrice sighed. “I don’t want to make assumptions, because medieval Kufa was so diverse.”
He nodded. “It was in decline, in a political sense, during Geber’s lifetime, but it was an active center of learning and scholarship, so it could have been a friend from any number of backgrounds. Arab and Persian are the most likely, but many vampires were drawn to the Middle East during that period because there was so much going on.”
“He does use the medieval Persian word for ‘friend’ so that could be significant.”
Giovanni shook his head. “It could just as easily not be significant. All his personal journals were written in Persian. And if we are looking for your father’s contact in Rome, it could be less than helpful. Livia has always kept a very diverse court... well, diverse for a Roman.”
She cocked her head. “What do you mean?”
“She takes pride in having tokens from all areas of the Roman Empire, thinks it adds to the ‘imperial’ quality. Shows how magnanimous she is. So, all of these, Greek, Numidian, Ethiopian, any of these would be common in the Roman court. Nothing particularly notable there. We’ll have to wait and see who’s been keeping her company the last few years. It changes all the time with a few notable exceptions. Rome is probably the most ‘international’ of the European immortal courts.”
“But old. We’re looking for older vampires, for sure.”
He shrugged. “The experiments were conducted around 800 A.D.? We’re looking for four vampires over a thousand years old. In Rome, it’s not uncommon. Though the majority of the population is fairly young, there are so many older vampires who come and go that one of a thousand years would not stand out.”
She scowled. “Well, thanks for raining on my parade, Captain Sunshine.”
He chuckled and put the notebook down. “However, this is exceptional work, as always. I don’t tell you enough how brilliant you are.”
“No, you really don’t.”
Beatrice was still pretending to pout, so he pushed the notebooks aside to grab her hand and pull her toward him. “You’re brilliant... beautiful.”
“Yes, keep it coming,” she said, waving her other hand.
“Smart, sexy.” He pulled her to straddle his lap and began running his fingers along her spine, enjoying the shiver of excitement that rose between them. “Very sexy.”
“More,” she whispered, and Giovanni grinned, not sure whether she was talking about the compliments or the caresses.
“Thorough. Thoroughly lovely, that is...” His lips nibbled along her jawline as her hands tangled in his hair. “You’re just so...” He breathed out along her skin, causing her to shiver. “So...”
“What?” She panted as his fingers teased her.
He pulled back and traced his tongue along her lower lip. “You’re so... meticulous.” He drew the word out sensuously.
Finally, she giggled and tackled him to the bed.
“Giovanni Vecchio, you sure know how to seduce a woman.”
“No.” He rolled over and tucked her into his chest as his hands continued to tease. “I just know how to seduce you.”
Rome, Italy
It was after ten o’clock when they landed in Rome. The plane had touched down without incident, but Matt and Giovanni were both wary in the foreign territory. Luckily, neither was unfamiliar with the city; Matt had spent plenty of time in Rome, and for Giovanni, Rome was like a second home. His knowledge of it was trumped only by his knowledge of Florence, which had a very low vampire population. Rome, on the other hand, was teeming with the creatures.
They exited the plane, only to be met by a dark car that Matt had ordered. As planned, Beatrice stood guard over Dez and Ben, her watchful gaze sweeping around as Giovanni and Matt thoroughly checked the vehicle for any listening devices or explosives. He
knew their arrival was expected, and Giovanni would take no chances with his family’s safety. Rome was a city with a long memory.
“Clear for bugs,” Matt said quietly.
“And I don’t sense any energy signatures or smell any explosives. Beatrice?” Beatrice, like most water vampires, had developed an extremely keen sense of smell.
“I don’t smell anything suspicious.”
“Excellent.” Giovanni walked over to the driver, shaking his hand and quickly asking him a few questions that reassured him the man had been sent by the usual car service he used in Rome. The five passengers squeezed into the small car as Matt sat in the front, directing the driver to Giovanni’s home near the Pantheon.
“How old is your house?” Ben asked as they sped through the streets. The driver swerved to avoid a horde of passing Vespas, and Giovanni could hear the man cursing under his breath. It was Friday night in Rome, and the streets were alive with activity.
“Wow,” Beatrice said. “And I thought New York was busy at night.”
“My home was built in the sixteenth century, Ben.”
“Wow, that’s old. It has bathrooms and stuff, right?”
He grinned. “Yes.”
“And I have my own room?”
“Yes, Angela said she had prepared a room just for you.”
“Sweet.” Ben grinned and settled back into his seat as he watched the lights speed by. “Dude, I need a Vespa.”
“I do, too!” Dez said.
“No, you don’t,” Giovanni and Matt said together, while Beatrice laughed.
“There’s really no need for a scooter.” Giovanni tried to reason with them. You will be within easy walking distance of most of the sites. My home is very centrally located.”
“And, Honey,” Matt protested, “the baby—”
“Likes going fast. He told me.” Dez patted her still-flat belly and grinned at her husband. “Just like he told me that he hopes there’s food at Gio’s house ‘cause he’s starving.”