Читать книгу The Vampire's Protector - Michele Hauf - Страница 9
ОглавлениеThe Villetta cemetery in Parma sat close to the edge of town, nestled near residential areas. On one side of the cemetery stretched gorgeous vast green fields and trees. Summer drove along the road edging a field, feeling as though it were a little oasis within the bustle of the busy world.
It was nearing noon, a lazy time of day that found most inside eating or relaxing before a meal. She wore her sunglasses, and she tinted all the windows in her cars for protection. A vampire could certainly venture out in the daytime, even in the sunlight. But they did burn much easier and faster than most, and direct sunlight could leave nasty sores and burns. So she never went anywhere in the summertime without a sweatshirt jacket and sunglasses. Sunscreen helped a bit, as well.
Though homeschooled by her parents, she’d been allowed to study those subjects that had most appealed to her and had basically designed her own education. Music and mechanics had topped her study list. So what she knew about Nicolo Paganini was that he had been buried in the cemetery only after much struggle to actually allow his body a proper burial. History books told that he’d refused the last rites on his deathbed, so the priest had denied him burial in consecrated ground. His son, Achille, had fought and struggled for years and had finally, after decades and agreeing to donate the remaining bulk of his father’s estate to the Catholic Church, won his father a resting place in Parma.
One could read the details of that weird burial struggle and assume Paganini had refused the last rites because he had been dabbling in the occult and perhaps had even made a deal with the devil, but it was also known that, at the time of refusal, he hadn’t thought he was going to die.
But it didn’t make sense to Summer. If he’d refused to play the violin then he couldn’t have been the devil’s associate, as so many had accused him.
Then again, what did she know? The musician had a sordid and interesting history. Accused of deviltry merely because he had been a prodigy on the violin? Stupid. But not for the time period, she supposed. And if he really had made a deal with the devil that would easily explain his phenomenal talent.
Summer knew people made deals with Himself every single day. And they were real and signed in blood and paid with breath and bone. She’d had a run-in with Himself once. She tried very hard not to ever let that happen again. And she had a built-in warning system thanks to her allergy to demons.
Checking the GPS map on her phone, which she’d attached to a plastic holder on the dashboard, she verified the cemetery wasn’t far off. She’d not once been in Italy before today, but appreciated the quiet afternoon drive. With luck, the cemetery would be as peaceful. And if she had to actually do some grave digging she would be granted privacy.
If she arrived at the graveyard to find that indeed the grave had been disturbed and the body was gone, she’d...
Summer blew out a breath. “I have no earthly idea what I’ll do.”
Her Retriever training had not covered tracking a newly unearthed dead man and returning him to the grave. Though, now she thought about it, all she had to do was rebury him. Right? It made sense. But what about a violin raising hell did make sense? And was it all of Beneath, or was it a metaphorical hell in the form of the man being some kind of demon or hellish being?
“You’re thinking about this too much,” she muttered as she drove by a man wandering along the road’s edge.
The single-lane tarred road was paralleled with grass growing high in the ditches. In need of a mow, but she liked the overgrown nature. A quaint countryside drive. So seeing a man wandering by in a black suit, looking rather dazed, gave her pause. She slowed the vehicle and peered in the rearview mirror. He stared after her, yet continued walking. Dressed in a long black coat, black pants and white shirt, and with long black hair. Was the coat actually a tux? The tails of it went to the back of his knees. His eyes looked like black voids from the distance. He was slim, but not unattractive. Maybe a little dirt on his face and hands?
In that somber suit he looked out of place against the cerulean sky and emerald field. On the other hand, maybe he was coming from a funeral that had just been held at the cemetery?
Or he could be...
“No. Freaking. Way.”
Summer’s heartbeats dropped to her gut, and she slammed the Audi to a halt. Grabbing the cell phone from the dash, she clicked online, thankful that she got Wi-Fi out here. Searching for Paganini brought up a page full of images. Tall, slender and darkly handsome for a nineteenth-century guy. Some caricatures made him look comical with a bent spine and spider-long fingers as he viciously attacked the violin. No actual photographs, though. She supposed photography had been invented a little later.
She shook her head as she gazed at the man walking away in the rearview mirror. “Can’t be. He looks...healthier, if not...normal.”
Shouldn’t a guy risen from the dead look...dead?
Tapping the steering wheel with her thumb, she then rubbed the hematite ring along the leather wheel. She was seeing things she didn’t want to believe. The director had spooked her with his warning about disturbing the dead. “He’s just a local. Wandering home from a funeral. Yeah.”
She shifted into Drive, but didn’t take her foot off the brake pedal.
The cemetery loomed ahead, within shouting distance. Could he really have climbed out of a grave and now be wandering the countryside? The man had been buried—she quickly did the math—around one hundred and seventy-five years ago. Wouldn’t her car freak him out? And the modern paved roads and—hell, everything?
“This is insane. He’s not a dead guy. He just happens to look like Paganini.” She was in Italy. All the guys were darkly handsome, right?
But she had to be sure. She wasn’t going to let this mission get any more messed up than it already was.
Shifting into Reverse, she backed the car down the road. When she paralleled the man, he paused and cautiously stepped back from the car as if it were a vicious bull staring him down. After a few moments of consideration, he leaned forward and peered through the window at her.
She rolled down the window. Grabbing her cell phone and clicking on one of the pictures, she then held it out, to compare images side by side.
“Ah shit. It’s him.”
* * *
Nicolo marveled as the dark glass window in the moving carriage slid downward to allow the driver to speak to him. A female driving a carriage without horses? Such a wonder the world had come to. He could not even be frightened at the strange prospect of allowing a woman such leeway as to drive about unescorted.
She held a small device out toward him and asked, “Is this you?”
What? Him? He leaned forward and saw there was a small painting on the device. Or rather it looked like a sketch. Of him. He’d seen that sketch. Sir Edwin Henry Landseer had done it during a concert when Nicolo had performed at the Royal Opera House in London.
“Yes, me,” he said in French because she had used that language. He spoke Italian and French.
“You are Nicolo Paganini?”
“But of course.” He leaned closer to her, but wasn’t sure about touching the carriage. It gleamed silver. Not a bit of wood to its construction. “How do you know this? What magics do you practice to identify me as such? And what witchery is contained in that box you show me?”
“It’s called the internet and this is a cell phone,” she said with a wave of the object before pulling it back inside.
He understood neither of those words.
She opened the carriage door and got out. The woman was petite and...dressed most strangely. Yet, Nicolo had seen a few women since wandering out from the cemetery. All wore trousers such as a man and close-fitting shirts with sleeves short enough to reveal more than enough arm, and on some, the necklines were so low as to show ample bosom. It had startled him so much he’d initially walked directly into a street lamp. And then a few feminine giggles had reassured him that the modern-day women still possessed a wicked tease comparable to those from his time where their wardrobe was concerned.
“Okay, Monsieur Paganini,” she said. With a shake of her head to spill the untidy long blond locks over one shoulder, she hooked her thumbs at the back of her slender-fitted trousers that hung low, exposing a slice of skin above the waistband, and rocked back and forth a few times on some odd violet shoes. “So uh...this next question is a doozy.”
“Doo-zee. I do not understand that word.”
“It means it’s going to set you off your feet real good.”
He stared down at the bespoke leather shoes he’d been buried in. Treasures to him. For to find a comfortable shoe that had fit his large feet? Not so easy. “Very well then.” He crossed his arms and prepared for the remarkable question to set him off his oversized feet. “Serve me your best.”
Because really? After climbing up from one’s grave, it couldn’t get much worse. Or was that better? He hadn’t yet decided if he should be pleased or worried about his new alive status. He’d been buried for a long time. The world had changed. And he was in a daze from it all.
“Did you just crawl out of a tomb?”
Nicolo’s jaw dropped open. And then he snapped it shut. There was only one explanation to her having such information. “Are you a witch? I know witches exist. How did you portend such a fact?”
“Just answer me. I was on my way to the Parma cemetery to see if you were still safely buried. Uh, but I guess you’re not.”
“I am not. For reasons beyond my knowledge, I have been summoned from death.” He brushed his fingers over the velvet coat he’d been buried in. His son had style, indeed. Though it fit tightly across the shoulders. When being resurrected, he’d gained some muscle. It made the coat cumbersome. “Does everyone know about this strange occurrence of my resurrection?”
“No, just me. And I’d like to keep it that way. You’d better get in the car. We have some things to talk about.”
“Get. In?” He stretched his gaze along the carriage. There were seats for others inside the compact conveyance, but— “No, I am perfectly fine standing outside on this smooth pavement. Such wicked alchemy you’ve concocted to make this vehicle travel without a horse is not something in which I wish to partake. I have avoided the devil’s work all my life. I shall not soon subscribe to such folly in my afterlife. As it is.”
“Your afterlife is because of me, I’m afraid.”
“How so? Did you summon me from the grave? You are a witch!”
She held up both hands, one of which still held the mysterious device containing his image. “Chill, Paganini.”
“I am rather warm in this attire. These are my funeral raiments. I’ve seen people wearing so much less. And you in your odd trousers and shoes. What has become of the gowns the women once wore? Your attire is freakishly masculine.”
She bristled at that statement, but then set back her shoulders, proudly. “I may be a freak, but the clothes are common for women nowadays. The world has changed a lot in a hundred and seventy-five years.”
“One hundred and...” He gaped. Truly, it was well beyond the 1920s in which Mary Grace had been buried.
“Like I said, we need to talk. I suppose I can’t interest you in climbing back into the coffin and letting me bury you again?”
“Are you— That is perfectly ghastly! You are worse than a witch, you—”
“Yes, yes. But since you know witches exist and suspect I am one, I need to set you straight right from the start. Get a load of this.”
She grinned widely, and Nicolo watched her upper incisors descend. They were pointed and sharp and—mercy, he knew what she was. He hated that he had such knowledge of the paranormal creatures that existed in this world. But he did because he’d had far too many conversations with the devil Himself.
And he knew what this woman was. “Vampire?”
She nodded and grinned. Surely the world must be overrun with her sort? For the very first person he should converse with would be a blood-drinking vampire? Perhaps crawling back into his coffin would not be such a terrible idea after all.
No. He was alive. And he wanted to remain that way.
“No,” he said defiantly. “I will not get into that conveyance with you today. Good day, vampire.”
And he strode off down the smoothly paved road, not sure where he was headed, but dearly hoping that his path landed him at the nearest tavern with a kindly serving wench who would take pity on his empty pockets and allow him a drink. Or two. Or many. Drunk seemed to be the only way to handle the day’s events.
Quickening his pace, he tried to ignore the vehicle rolling backward toward him. He had walked a great distance from the cemetery, but he was not tired nor were his muscles taxed. In fact, he felt good. Remarkably good. He couldn’t remember a time during his first life (that’s what he was calling it; how else to term it?) when he’d felt so utterly alive. So vital. So strong.
And he wanted to keep this strength. And figure it out.
The carriage stopped and out jumped the woman. She marched toward him. Petite and very pretty, despite her messy blond hair that seemed to fall in twists down to her elbows, and the terrible clothing that made her resemble a boy. He was surprised at her insistence. And even more surprised when she grabbed him by the arm and spun him around.
“Take your hands off the coat,” he insisted. “It is fine velvet.”
“Yeah, yeah, velvet is cheap nowadays, buddy. Get over it. So the fact I’m a vampire didn’t freak you?”
“Freak me? You mean, you expected me to run screaming from you? I know of your sort, blood drinker. Have never met one, but I do have knowledge of the occult.”
“We call it the paranormal. Vamps, witches, werewolves, demons. All that jazz.”
“I’m not sure what creature a jazz is, but I am aware of the others you listed. Demons.” Nicolo stifled a shudder.
“You and me both.” She echoed his shudder.
“But I’ve always thought vampires—” He glanced skyward where the sun beamed brightly. “Aren’t you supposed to lurk in the shadows?”
“We vamps can do sunlight for a bit. But we still keep our heads down. But, as it probably was in your time, most humans are not aware of us.”
“So you are still not a large part of the population?”
“Large enough. But smart enough to walk in the shadows.”
“Yes, shadow creatures. So you are vampire.” So opposite of what he’d expected. Completely un-creature-like, this woman of the enticing blond hair and blue eyes. Save for those vicious fangs. Best not to rile the creature. He could play nice to protect his ass if need be. “I don’t think you should bite me. My blood may be...off.”
“Off?”
“I did just rise from the grave.”
“Right. Don’t worry, buddy. I’m not going to sink in my fangs. You’re a job.”
“A job—”
“So tell me how you’re feeling after a climb out of the grave? I should probably keep an eye on you. For, uh...possible decomposition.”
“Decomposition?”
“Well, yeah.” She gestured her hands through the air in exclamation and blurted out, “You could be a zombie.”
“A—what? I am not familiar with that term, vampire. What year is it, by the by?”
“2016. So you could be a zombie.” She pressed the tiny box a few times, then held it before him to display yet another painting. “Because zombies are dead things that have risen from the grave.”
The image was of a person. Maybe. Whatever it had been, it was decayed and—flesh was falling off its face and it oozed gore.
Nicolo flinched and made a disgusted face. “That is not me.”
“Probably not. Zombies are usually mindless and gross. They have limbs falling off and look like they just rose from the grave. They also eat brains. You’re...hot. So not zombie-like.”
Again she did something with the tiny device, then turned it toward him. “Here’s the mirror app. Take a look.”
He bent to study the reflection in the silvered surface of the device. Indeed, it had changed from showing a painting to a mirror. Marvelous. And diabolical. And yet...
“That is...me? I look...well.” He tapped his teeth again. They were white and not wobbling in their sockets. “Such a marvel.” His nose, long and with a bend at the middle looked like the same nose. His eyes were gray and clear. His hair seemed longer. As did his face look—well, healthier. Such a handsome fellow, eh?
Realizing he was mooning over himself, Nicolo cleared his throat and stood upright. “Did you say it was you who facilitated my rising from the grave?”
“Inadvertently.”
He quirked a brow.
“When I was inspecting my find, the bow slipped across the violin strings. Played a few notes. But I didn’t do it on purpose. It was accidental.”
“You have the black violin?” Nicolo’s heart thumped once, and he winced at the aching remembrance of that vile instrument.
“I do.”
Blowing out a heavy breath, he clutched his hair in frustration. “I asked Achille to destroy that monstrosity! Oh, this is most awful.” He started to stride away, then turned and paced the pavement back up to her. “Do you know what this means?” He slapped a hand over his chest. “That explains why I feel so alive and strong. I feel as though I could run round the world and not pause to catch my breath. And my teeth.” He tapped the perfect teeth in his mouth.
“Oh wow.” She peered at his teeth. “I read you had lost all your teeth before your death.”
“I did lose them! As well as my voice. I could not speak above a whisper for years before my death. And now it is as if I have transformed into a new version of myself when I climbed up out of that coffin. And you are the reason for it!”
He clutched her about the neck and squeezed. She struggled and then kicked and landed her foot successfully at his hip, just missing his groin. Nicolo dropped the vampire and with a shout, stumbled backward into a swath of lush tall grass.
“We women have learned a thing or two about defense since your time,” she said, standing over him. “Let that be a warning. You’re strong, though.” She rubbed her reddened throat. “Kind of weird for a dead guy.”
“I am not dead,” he managed as he fought to free himself from the long grasses tangled about his shoes.
“No, you’re not. But what are you?”
That was the question, indeed. By all the blessed mercies he prayed that foul brimstone bargain had not been enacted.
“Why did you play the violin?” he asked the vampiress. He had best be cautious for another attack. The next time she could use her fangs.
“I didn’t play it,” she said. “I was supposed to find the violin and bring it to Acquisitions, but I figured I’d better open up the case and check to be sure it was inside first. When I did, it was almost as if the violin had a mind of its own. I’m sure it played those notes by itself.”
That did not surprise him. What he knew of the violin was that it was magic most foul. Diabolical, even.
Truly, had she summoned him by enacting that bedamned brimstone bargain? It didn’t seem possible. The condition had been that he should be the one to play the violin. Only then would he be granted immortality and immeasurable supernatural power.
Did he have immortality now? He certainly felt...something. Stronger, and more powerful. Sure. Yet if not immortal, what, indeed, had he become? And how to fix it?
Did he want to fix it? That may imply his going back to the grave, of dying. Again. He rather liked the air today and the soft, sweet grass beneath his shoes. The sky appeared so clear and bluer than ever he could remember. When had he last admired the sky and simply inhaled the crisp summer air?
No matter, he must not rile this woman overmuch in case she might bite and kill him. Perhaps he could play along with her suggestion to keeping an eye on him. Yes, must needs.
A zombie? If he started to decay he would immediately request a second death, because if he turned into something like that thing displayed on her little box then—absolutely not.
“Where is it?” he asked.
“The black violin? It’s uh...” Her eyes wandered along the side of the fancy silver carriage, then snapped back toward him, though she didn’t meet his gaze directly. “...on its way to the Archives for storage.”
“I don’t understand that.” She was lying to him. Moments earlier she had said she had it. “You played it not too long ago. I felt the music. It moved through my veins. And it called out to me.”
“Really?” She stepped before him, admiration sparkling in her pale blue eyes. He recognized that look. So many had looked upon him as a literal idol when he’d been at his prime performing on the stage. “You’re really him. The Paganini.”
“Indeed.” He set back his shoulders and puffed up his chest. Felt good to step back into the acknowledgment of his talents. He was a maestro, and he would resume that status. Because he knew nothing else.
“What is your name, vampire?”
“Summer Santiago.” She offered her hand, and he assumed she wanted him to shake it.
He gripped it and her skin felt warm. Amazing to feel another being’s warmth and life, to be reassured that he, as well, possessed life. Then a flash burst in his brain, and he received a series of images as if a manic dream chased his reality. The vampire was twenty-eight, had always been a vampire, had a vampire brother named Johnny, and vampire parents. Her job title was a Retriever, and that had something to do with finding lost items or magical objects. An image of her lying beneath a steel carriage such as the one they stood before confused him. She wasn’t hurt. It was a place where she enjoyed being, or rather, working.
Summer pulled her hand from his, and the images flickered out like an extinguished candle. Nicolo chugged out a gasp as the blue sky and sweet grass resumed his senses. “What was that?”
“That was a handshake. I’m pretty sure they did it back in your time. Nineteenth century, right?”
“No, those images. I saw...” He tapped his forehead. “You have a brother who is a vampire, and he sings on the stage alongside his wife. Why does she have horns?”
“How do you know that?”
“It came to me when I held your hand. Is the woman demon?”
“No, Kambriel is vampire, but she wears horns as part of her stage costume. So holding my hand gave you images of my life? That’s some kind of cool power.”
“I don’t know. It wasn’t cold. Your reference to things being hot and cold makes little sense to me.”
“Oh, buddy, it’s slang, and you have so much to learn. But of course I don’t think you’ll have much time to gain all that knowledge.”
“Why?”
“You shouldn’t exist.”
“Is that so? Why? Do you believe I am some unholy beast resurrected from death?”
“Well...are you?”
He hadn’t an answer to that one. And if he thought about it too much, he wouldn’t like the truth. She wanted to put him back in the grave? Never. He was alive, and nothing would change that. And he was strong enough to get one little vampiress off his back.
He shoved her shoulder hard and watched as her body soared through the air a good thirty feet and she landed on the side of the road, tumbling into the grassy ditch.
Nicolo winced. That had to hurt. But he had to protect himself if he wanted to survive this new world.
“So long, vampire Summer. I am off to live my new life.”
