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What if the Order fails?
Tegan turned a hard stare on her. Pray we don't.
In the answering silence, he flipped through more of the journal pages. Marek wanted the book for some reason, so there had to be a clue of some sort secreted in the damn thing somewhere.
Wait a second. Go back, Elise said suddenly. Is that a glyph?
Tegan had noticed it at the same time. He turned to the small symbol scribbled onto one of the pages near the back of the slim volume. The pattern of interlocking geometric arches and flourishes might have appeared merely decorative to an untrained eye, but Elise was right. They were dermaglyphic symbols.
Shit, Tegan muttered, staring at what he knew to be the mark of a very old Breed line. It didn't belong to anyone called Odolf, but to those of another Breed name. One that had lived--and died out completely--a long time ago. So what reason could Marek have for digging up the ancient past?
Screams carried into the drawing room of an opulent Berkshires estate, the howls of anguish emanating down from a windowed attic room on the third floor of the manor house. The chamber boasted a wraparound wall of windows with unobstructed views of the wooded valley below.
No doubt the scenery was breathtaking, bathed in the day's last searing rays of sunlight.
The vampire being held upstairs by Minion guards certainly sounded impressed. He'd been treated to a front row seat of the UV spectacle for the past twenty-seven minutes and counting. More screams poured down the central staircase, agony giving way to the weariness of sobs.
With a bored sigh, Marek rose from a fine Louis XVI wing chair and crossed the room to the double doors of his dimly lit private suite. Other than the attic interrogation room, the rest of the mansion's windows were shaded for the day by sun-blocking electronic blinds.
Marek moved freely into the hall outside and summoned one of his Minion attendants who waited to serve him. At Marek's nod, the human dashed up the staircase to instruct the others that their Master was on the way and to ensure the windows were covered for his arrival.
It took only a moment for the captive vampire's bleating to dry up. Marek climbed the wide marble steps, up and around to the second floor, then up and around again, to the smaller flight of stairs that rose to the attic. As he progressed, fury kindled to life in him again.
This was only one of several frustratingly exhaustive interrogations of the vampire in his custody the past couple of weeks. Torture was amusing, but rarely effective.
There was little amusing about the day's developments back in Boston. The Minion courier dispatched to obtain an important overnight delivery for him had instead turned up at the city morgue--a John Doe stabbing victim, according to Marek's contact in the coroner's office. As he was killed in broad daylight, that ruled out the Order or any other Breed intervention, but Marek still had his suspicions.
And he was very interested to learn that the package he'd been expecting had gone missing from the FedEx store that very day. The loss was serious, but he intended to reclaim it. When he did, he would take great pleasure in personally questioning the thief who had it.
Up ahead, at the top of the attic stairwell, one of the Minions on guard opened the door to permit Marek entry into the now-darkened room. The vampire was naked, strapped to a chair by chain links and steel shackles at each ankle and wrist. His skin was smoking from head-to-toe burns, emitting the sickly sweet odors of sweat and badly seared flesh.
Enjoy the view? Marek asked as he strolled in and looked on the male with revulsion. A pity it's still winter. I understand the colors up here are amazing in the fall.
The vampire's head was dropped low on his chest, and when he tried to speak, the sound was nothing more than a sputtered rasp in the back of his throat.
Are you ready to tell me what I need to know?
A pitiful moan slipped past the male's blistered, swollen lips. Marek crouched down before his captive, offended by both the stench and sight of him. No one would know that you broke. I can give you that, if you cooperate with me now. I can send you away to heal, ensure your protection. That's easily within my power. Do you understand?
The vampire whimpered, and Marek sensed a possible teetering of conviction in the pained sound. He had no intention of making good on the lies he fed his captive. They were merely tools meant to bend him where torture and suffering had not.
Speak it, and be free of this, he coaxed, his tone quiet and unhurried despite the urgent greed swimming in him to have the answer. Tell me where he is.
There was an audible click of the prisoner's throat as he attempted to swallow, a vague tremor in his head as he struggled to lift it from its slump on his ravaged chest. Marek waited, eager with hope and uncaring that the Minions standing around him could probably feel that hope vibrating off him.
Tell me now. You don't need to carry this burden any longer.
A hiss began to leak from between the vampire's lips, a drawn-out, rattling exhalation. A shudder overtook him, but he gathered himself and tried again, expelling the start of his confession at last.
Marek felt his eyes widen in anticipation, his own breath ceasing as he waited for the words that would begin his destiny.
Ffff... One eye peeled open just a crack behind the vampire's seared lids. The iris was bright amber from the prolonged suffering, the pupil a thin slit of black that found Marek's own gaze and burned into him with hatred. The captive drew in a breath, then spat it out on a low growl. "Fff...fuck...you."
With an utter calm that belied the storm of rage that swept instantly to life inside him, Marek rose and began a deliberate stroll toward the attic stairs.
Open the blinds, he instructed the Minion guards. Leave this worthless offal to the sun. If he doesn't perish by the time it sets, let him bake up here with the dawn.
Marek quit the room, not so much as flinching when the first terrorized screams cranked up again in his wake.
