Is that possible? No, of course not...
Then, just as my flashlight sputtered again and went out, plunging me into blackness, I found the thirteenth exit from the main path, and refusing to hesitate—because the way was tight as a grave, so my shoulders would brush the walls—I squeezed into the darkness. Seven steps later, I felt the very thing I had feared.
A dead end.
But when I put out my hand to feel in front of me, coming very close to a claustrophobic panic, I felt not stone but wood under my fingers. Damp but smooth wood.
Although I knew there was probably some hidden mechanism to release the door, I needed to get out of there, so I pushed hard—and nearly tumbled through, because it gave way without the slightest effort.
Probably because Raniero had opened it from the other side and was waiting for me—along with a box of freshly carved stakes.
Chapter 78
Antanasia
THE CAMERA DE MIZA—the room of stakes—seemed to make Raniero as uneasy as the narrow passage had made me. He paced while I lit the two candles, because he'd been waiting in the dark, and when the light flared, I saw him glance around warily ... without coming even close to looking at his own stake, encased in glass.
He hates being here. Hates being in the presence of all these weapons and his own stake.
"This was a bad place to meet," I said. "I chose here because this is where Lucius keeps his stake, but you're upset."
"No, I am fine." But he kept pacing like a lion desperate to get out of its cage.
"We should go somewhere else," I offered. I glanced at the box of stakes, which appeared newly carved. He'd set it on the table next to Lucius's weapon, which had been returned to its usual place after his detention. "Especially since I guess we don't need Lucius's."
Raniero slowed down then and met my eyes, speaking more calmly. "I am sorry that I am agitated. I ask you to be brave—and then I act cowardly myself." He took a deep breath. "We should stay, Antanasia."
I watched his face, trying to judge whether that really was a good idea. Each time I saw him, he seemed less like the surfer I'd first met. He never slouched anymore, the blissful smile was gone, and the shorts and logo tees had disappeared. He seemed to raid Lucius's closet at will, and stood before me in one of my husband's many pairs of Levi's and a gray shirt that matched Raniero's eyes, which never seemed green anymore. But when I looked into those eyes, I didn't see anything that terrified me. I saw a vampire who was powerful and dangerous in the way that Lucius was, but not one who was about to snap. Not yet, at least.
Maybe that was why I took a risk and pushed him a little, like he'd pushed me. Stepping to the glass case, I said, "Raniero, before we go any further, I think you should tell me why your stake is kept here like either a precious artifact or a virus that needs to be contained. And I want to hear the story of the day you almost destroyed Lucius, too."
When I said that, and he finally looked at the case, I did see something scary flare in his eyes—but he got it under control and agreed. "You are correct, Antanasia. I suppose it is time that you know the whole truth about the vampire who stands with you—an arm's length from the weapon which nearly makes him the next king-to-be."
Chapter 79
Antanasia
RANIERO DIDN'T START his story right away. He spent a few moments looking down at his bloodstained stake, like he was getting used to seeing it again.
"Which is it, Raniero?" I prompted softly. "Enshrined—or contained?"
"In truth, I believe it is both," he said. "The Elders removed my stake from my possession, as is customary for those condemned as blestemata, but it was Lucius's decision to provide it with this special place." He traced the glass case with a finger inked with a small peace sign. "Although I have expected never to touch this again, Lucius believes that it waits for me and is different from the others—not because it has caused perhaps more destruction than any other here, but because its owner is still with us. And for a long time, Lucius believes."
He raised his face then, and I saw that familiar shadow of pain. Vladescu pain. But although his eyes were stormy, his emotions were still in check. "I think Lucius also wishes to memorialize the day when he comes closest to destruction."
It was hard to even hear those words, and I had to remind myself that the story had a happy ending. "What happened?"
Raniero dragged one hand through his long hair, clearly pained to relate the tale. "One day, Lucius and I were training in the dungeons ... it was near the end of our time as partners in combat, and we fought the contest viciously, hand to hand. There was much blood, for we were growing stronger. No longer boys, but men." He smiled wryly. "I suppose we had been men for very long and did not even know it."
Knowing that the story ended with Lucius alive didn't stop my mouth from getting a little dry. "So...?"
"We are given a rest," he said, slipping into present tense, this time like his memories were too vivid to be contained in the past. "And the ones who oversee our fighting—Claudiu and Flaviu—pull us aside to tell us, as always, what we do wrong." He rubbed the back of his neck, hard, and I wondered if I had made a mistake by asking for this story. But it was too late to go back. It was like he was taking his own first steps into a mausoleum or a dark tunnel, like I'd just done. Facing things Lucius believed he could handle, too.
"It is Claudiu who speaks to me," he continued. His mouth turned down and his eyes got like flint. "He tells me that Lucius is the victor that day. That he is sorry they bother to take me from my beloved home in Tropea and waste precious efforts on making me a warrior."
"That must've been awful," I sympathized. "To be told your lost childhood was pointless..."
"Si," he agreed. "And then, when I am so angry, Claudiu whispers in my ear, 'Why do you not prove yourself now? Take down the prince, rise to the throne and make your sacrifice worthwhile?'"
I stood stiffly, rapt and horrified.
"I did not need to be urged twice," Raniero admitted. "Lucius is still speaking with Flaviu—his back to me—and I cross the floor and grab his shoulder, and when he turns to face me, he sees the look in my eyes and grasps immediatamente that we are no longer playing at war."
A chill ran down my spine as Raniero's fingers clenched like he held an imaginary stake, and the look in his eyes ... He wasn't playing in memory, either.
"I strike without hesitation, because I have one moment of advantage as Lucius grapples with the change in our contest." I saw a flash of fangs. "And my aim is good."
I took a step back, sickened—and aware that he was lost in the past. I've pushed him too far. Made a mistake. And how close did he come...? "But?" I said loudly. I was suddenly desperate to hear the end of the story—the happy end—and to call Raniero back, too. "What happened?"
My voice did seem to reach him. He met my eyes, and I saw that he was in the present again, although his shoulders heaved like he was still in the heat of battle. "We are evenly matched enough that Lucius steps back, perhaps an inch, and it is that small move which saves his heart."
NO! I wanted to cry out. I hadn't expected that Raniero'd come that close to ending Lucius's existence. How many times will my husband come close to destruction—and survive? How many chances does one vampire get?
"Lucius lies upon the floor," Raniero added, sounding spent of his anger. His fingers unclenched, his shoulders drooped almost like they used to, and his fangs were gone. "I am above him, and I kneel down, prepared to be the victor that day. The victor for all time." He hung his head and looked at that hand he hated. "But as my fingers wrap around the stake to press it the inch deeper which will give me the throne, your husband, who is always brave, even when suffering, somehow manages to smile while his blood drains out upon the dirt, and says to me, through many gasps, 'Raniero, my brother! I would almost think you mean to destroy me, if we were not engaged to have dinner this very night. You will not make me miss a hare that I have looked forward to all day, will you?'"
Raniero raised his eyes, and I saw that he was laughing at the memory. Horrified and laughing, just like I was.
When Lucius is released, I will order sixty-five thousand euros' worth of rabbit for him, for being brave enough to joke in a way that almost certainly saved his existence, so I could meet and marry him.
"Lucius calls me brother—and smiles." Raniero kept looking at his fingers, which were trembling. "My hands begin to shake like this, and I pull the stake from his flesh and press my fingers to the wound, telling him to close his eyes. That he is safe, and I am sorry that my hand slipped." He raised his eyes to meet mine again. "But we both know that what I have done was no mistake."
I understood everything that had passed between Raniero and Lucius that day. The strange mix of anger and brotherhood and jealousy that had led to that moment. But there was something important that I didn't get. "Why wasn't Claudiu punished for inciting you to do that? He used you as a weapon. I don't know much about our laws, but that must be treason."
Raniero shrugged. "Lucius and I do not speak more of the incident, and soon I am dispatched as an assassin, and it is not until much later that we even mention what nearly occurred—and never directly."
"I see."
But Raniero wasn't quite done confessing, and he dragged his hand through his hair again. "I think you do not see the most terrible part of the story, Antanasia. No one ever does, for I never confide it before."
I got chills again, because he spoke very strangely. Yet I had never trusted him more than when he showed me his eyes, full of self-recrimination, and admitted, "As I prepare to destroy your husband, there is a part of me that acts not out of childish anger, but from a genuine desire—a powerful hunger—to take away everything that he has and make it my own."
Raniero and I faced each other across his bloody stake, that confession hanging between us. The vampire who once swore he needed nothing had really wanted EVERYTHING. Lucius's power—and his life.
I let that sink in; then I told him, "It's getting late. Hand me a stake."
Chapter 80
Mindy
I SAT ON Ronnie's bed eating vanilla Häagen-Dazs and thinking about Jess and Raniero and Ylenia and Lucius, and the whole mess we were all in.
"Connections, Min," I told myself. My Critical Thinking professor always said that anybody can memorize stuff, but a smart person makes connections. "Connect the dots."
A dead vampire in a foyer. Blood on a stake. Raniero being treated like a scary rock star—and carving weapons. The way Ylenia looked when she talked about both guys—and Jess. Not to mention that picture on the Internet, which showed Ylenia at some vampire party ... with Ronnie. And my best friend, who was the sanest person I knew, hallucinating at the most important moment of her princess-ship.
"Oh, gosh." I took another bite of ice cream and slammed the container down on the nightstand, mad at myself. "I'm not smart enough to put all that together."
Giving up, I flopped back on the bed that smelled so much like Ronnie—and like incense, too, the kind he always burned when he meditated. The little marble thing he used to hold the incense cones was next to my ice cream, and I rolled over to look in the bowl. The ashes looked old and cold and didn't smell that much, like he hadn't blissed out in a few days.
The first time I smelled that incense, I got on his case, 'cause I'd thought he was smoking pot. But he didn't do that. That was those stupid guys he crashed with, who were always getting high with anything they could get their hands on, from cough syrup to cactuses and herbs and little bags they bought on street corners.
"Do not let it bother you," Raniero said, when the guy named Dirk had an honest-to-god bad trip and freaked out. "To induce visions is part of many religions, many cultures, and is not for us to condemn. Live and let live, yes? This is just a place for me to sleep and be near you."
I leaned over the mattress and checked that pile of stakes again. I guessed "live and let live" wasn't the philosophy in this castle. Not even for Ronnie, who would have some explaining to do ... if he ever came back.
I rolled over, and even though I was scared and mad and had a broken heart, too, after a while I got sleepy, and right before I dozed off, I thought I was either gonna have amazing dreams, 'cause I could smell the beach—smell Ronnie—on his pillow, or I was gonna have nightmares from eating ice cream right before going to bed with a bunch of stakes all around me.
And right then, when my eyes were shutting, I finally felt the tiniest start of one connection shaping up in my brain. It was a crazy connection, but I was in a completely whacked out place where vampires who quoted Gandhi carved stakes and the world's sanest girl had visions, and I kinda left it alone to glow like Raniero's incense, to see if it might just catch fire in my head.
Chapter 81
Antanasia
RANIERO WRAPPED HIS hand around mine, guiding my fingers like Lucius had done when he'd shown me the latch behind the dressing-room mirror. But while the warrior I loved had been offering me an escape route, the pacifist was trying to show me how to fight.
"This still doesn't feel right." I pulled out of his grasp and set down yet another stake, rejecting it. "Are you sure I shouldn't try Lucius's?"
"No." Raniero's grip had been soft, but his tone was firm. "Lucius's stake is much too big for your hand. I have carved these to fit you. They are the best of perhaps fifty I create." He lifted probably the tenth stake from the box. "Try this one."
I accepted yet another piece of sharp wood and wrapped my fingers around it, already shaking my head. "I'm sorry. It just doesn't feel right."
"Antanasia."
I raised my eyes to find Raniero frowning. "Yes?"
"Is it that the weapon feels wrong in your hand—or in your mind? Your conscience? For you cannot reject them so quickly."
I paused with the stake in my grasp. He was right. I was being squeamish again, in spite of my promises to stop cowering. "I'll try again," I said more resolutely. "And try harder."
"Good." His tone softened as he took one more stake from the box. "You must take time and understand the weapon. You grip it too tightly, and do not allow yourself to feel it against your fingers. Do not be afraid to let it rest in your palm and find its own place."
It was strange how he brought a touch of the philosopher to even that setting and lesson. I watched as he tossed the stake in his hand, allowing it to fall naturally into his palm, clenching and reclenching his fingers around it, but gently. There was a look of concentration on his face, but it was obvious that he was very familiar with the motion, too. "Here!" He found what he was looking for. "This is the way to hold this one."
"How?" I still didn't get it. The stake looked perfectly smooth, uniform all the way around. How could there be a "right" place to grasp it?
Raniero opened his palm and bent so our heads were nearly touching. "See this?" He drew his index finger down the wood, close to his thumb. "There is a slight groove and a notch."
"Yes." I saw it. A very subtle concave sweep, which ended in a slight bump that was just enough to delineate the "blade" from the "hilt." "That's for..."
"Keeping your fingers from slipping, yes, when the weapon meets flesh." Before I could get squeamish again—I refused to get squeamish—he added, "Here." And without seeming to move his fingers, he spun the stake so the wider part faced me and the point faced his body. It reminded me of gunslingers in the Old West who spun their weapons and then fired off six rounds with deadly accuracy. "You try it, yes?"
Feeling even more like a novice after watching that, I gingerly plucked the stake from his palm, using my thumb and forefinger.
And he snatched it right back.
My head jerked up. "What?"
Raniero held out the weapon again. "Take it like you mean it, Princess."
It was probably wrong for him to taunt a sovereign, but I'd asked him to teach me, and I understood what he was doing. I wasn't like Cinderella, trying to learn to hold a teacup without breaking the china. I w
as a vampire princess and needed different skills.
He held his hand out, waiting, and I nodded. "Okay." Then I pressed my palm against his and grasped the stake with my whole hand, without hesitating—with confidence—and to my surprise it slipped into place like it really was meant for my fingers.
Raniero saw the expression on my face, and for the first time since I'd joined him in that room, he smiled with genuine pleasure. "That is good. You do well." Then he seemed to catch himself, like he didn't think he should grin about anybody's proficiency with a stake. "I think that is enough for one night, yes?"
"Yes. It's getting late."
"I will return with you through the tunnels, for you are correct that we should work in secret. Surprise is an excellent weapon, too. It is good when your enemies underestimate you—and we do not yet know who are they are, yes? It is best to keep everyone complacent."
He was full of surprises and secrets, too. I knew the biggest ones by then, but I was sure he had lots of other tricks up his sleeve. He hadn't drawn that map of the passages from distant memory—and had very likely omitted something important. As we reached the door, I stopped him with a hand on the arm. "Raniero ... you've seen Lucius, haven't you?"
He hesitated, then admitted, "I watch over him sometimes. I think it is not quite breaking his beloved law if I do nothing more than observe from the shadows as his guard sleeps—under the influence of the wine I send to him, almost every night."
I squeezed Raniero's arm, and although I was getting better at issuing orders, I heard a touch of pleading in my voice when I said, "Take me to see him, too."
Raniero's eyes got very troubled, like he was going to object—but he was my subject. "Of course. You are the princess, yes?"