“As I don’t intend to go anywhere… and as my patrons would be sorely missing me… I think you might perhaps be leaving empty-handed. If you leave at all.” Katerina bared her teeth, showing large ones that looked like yellow tombstones.

Victoria saw the warning in Sebastian’s eyes at the same moment as prickles rose at the back of her neck. She whirled to face two tall vampires just as they leapt at her.

Her timing was a bit off, and the force of their bodies slammed her into a nearby table. Victoria bumped her head on a corner dulled by years of use, and used the momentum of her fall to roll under the heavy wooden trestle. Ignoring the pain, she reached up and grabbed the long, slender leg of the vampire nearest her and slammed a fist into the back of his knee.

He collapsed, and as he fell, Victoria erupted from under the table and shoved a stake into his chest. The dust poofed in her face as she pulled to her feet, her breath faster but by no means labored, and she swung around to kick out at another attacker. Pushing, whirling, punching, shoving… she found the thrill of the battle coursing through her in a way she had been missing for a while. The spray of spilled drinks, the dull sound of wood crashing into flesh, the smell of undead ash, the satisfaction of seeing the vampire’s red eyes widen just as the stake thrust home… this was her world. Her moment.

This threat, of corporeal demons who lunged and shoved and kicked, was one she was well used to combating. She found herself slipping into her familiar kalaripayattu moves, ingrained by hours of practice with Kritanu. She used her strength and speed to upend a vampire, to knock another into his companion, to slam an elbow up into the chin of still another and then, each time, to finish it off with a stake to the heart.

Exhilarating. Exhilarating and-not simple or easy by any means-but familiar.

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Sebastian join the fray, battling directly with Katerina. One of his wrists had been captured by the massive woman, and Victoria saw that he was doing everything to free himself but shoving a stake into her chest.

With a wave of exasperation at his sentimentality, Victoria finished off a sixth or seventh undead attacker and, grabbing the arm of yet another vampire, flung him out into the cluster of his companions. As the vampires tumbled to the ground, she turned and, with one sleek movement, shoved her stake into the back of Katerina’s torso.

The pike slid in, Katerina froze, and Sebastian cried out… Then, as Victoria pulled back, the vampire stilled and poofed into a dark cloud of dust.

The clang of metal told her where the copper ring dropped from the vampire’s person, hitting a wooden table, then falling silently to the dirt floor, and she dove after it.

Sebastian followed, and they found themselves face-to-face under the table. “I would have done it,” he protested immediately.

Victoria snatched up the ring and allowed him to help her surge back to her feet. She turned, bracing herself for a renewed onslaught, and found that the few remaining vampires had begun to flee. “Well. That was simpler than I expected,” she said, looking at the empty pub.

Sebastian pushed past her, stepping over a splintered bench as he made his way toward the counter, now vacated. He moved behind it and gave her an impudent smile as he raised a dark bottle to examine its label. “I don’t believe she’ll miss this at all anymore,” he said, pouring a generous draft into a glass. “Care to join me in a victory drink, Victoria?”

She navigated her way through the debris and selected a stool next to the empty counter. “I do believe I shall.”

Thirteen

In Which We Observe Venators in Their Natural Habitat

Sebastian was well into his cups by the time he left Goldsmith Lane. He certainly wasn’t staggering along the street-indeed, he was much too refined to make a fool of himself in such a manner.

But the fine-very fine-brandy Katerina had kept for those “special” customers had put a sort of glaze over the world, over the dull throb of emptiness in his middle and the remnants of dreams that continued to linger and tease. It softened the edge of unpleasantness… and aside of that, it was damn fine brandy.

Perhaps even better than the Armagnac from which he’d relieved Katerina all those years ago. It was a shame she’d never forgiven him for that transgression, but, as he’d said, she rather owed him. It wasn’t his fault her daughter had seduced him.

However, Katerina hadn’t quite seen it that way, and had been furious with him for not “keeping his dillyjohn packed away,” as she had termed it. So Katerina had set a bunch of undead goons on him in retribution and caused a riot that destroyed half of the Lone Horse. Not to mention Sebastian’s arm, leg, and a few ribs.

Yes indeed, she’d owed him for that, and those casks had been a nice little start to his proprietorship of the Silver Chalice.

After Victoria left the Lone Horse, Sebastian had taken it upon himself to hunt around in the hidden storage room to see how much of this brandy was left. Perhaps he’d take the rest back to London, or wherever he thought he might settle after things were done with the Midiverse Portal, and open another establishment.

Having ascertained that there was, in fact, a nice store of various libations hidden away, Sebastian finished his last drink and left the tavern.

Though it was late in the afternoon, once he was outside of the dark place, he had to blink rapidly in the glare of sunshine. The great towers of Tэn Church rose in the distance, high over the city across the river. He looked away. Victoria hadn’t given a reason for leaving the Lone Horse, but he knew where she’d gone.

As he made his way back to their inn with nary a stumble, he wondered when Wayren and Brim and Michalas might arrive in Praha, or whether they would all attempt to meet up on the way to Muntii Fagaras. Sebastian had no desire to visit Lilith’s mountain lair in Romania, but in the last year, he’d become accustomed to doing things he preferred not to do.

Staking vampires, including his grandfather, was one.

Loving a woman who had to be coaxed into a kiss-or more-every time.

Fighting his arse off against paralyzing demons.

Even seeing Katerina poof into a pile of dust had raised melancholy in his mind.

Or perhaps it was the brandy.

No. It was more than the brandy. For all her faults, Katerina had been kind to him once upon a time, and it had been Sebastian’s fault that her husband was no longer living undeadly by her side.

At least now they rotted in Hell together.

The thought made his belly swish. Maybe he had had too much of the brandy.

Giulia in Hell. Sent there by his own bloody hand.

Was there no way to change that? To save her soul?

Of course not. He’d wondered and wished and hoped for years for some way to change that. What was done was done. Ashes to ashes… and in this case, ashes to ashes to Hell.

Damn. The brandy. Bitterness rose in the back of his throat, and Sebastian had to swipe the back of his hand over eyes that watered from the bright sun.

When Wayren had given him the papers written by Rosamunde Gardella, Sebastian felt certain they would contain something important… something that he needed to know. Some kind of message for him. After all he’d been drawn to them so strongly, there had to be a reason for it. And all the dreams, coming stronger and clearer than ever.

Was it just because he’d lost Victoria that Giulia had come back to haunt him? Had his relationship-such as it was-been simply a distraction from Giulia and her memory?

But so far, though he’d pored over them night after night so that the words seemed to be burned into his brain, there’d been nothing that spoke to him on those brittle, cramped-character pages.

Rosamunde prophesied Eustacia’s death in Rome:

The golden age of the Venator will find rest at the foot of Rome.

She’d foretold of Victoria’s near-turning by Beauregard:

And the rising daughter shall find herself blemished, and malevolence will fight to reign within. Yet the strength of a pure heart may overcome this test.

There was another passage that seemed to stick deep within his mind, but it meant nothing to him:

And in the new world shall be a savior who carries the deepest taint. A long promise shall the savior make, and in the end those for whom he lives will be saved.

In his sober moments, and in those early-morning hours when the words slipped around in his mind, Sebastian thought that perhaps it spoke to him for a reason. Might he be meant to go to America-the New World? He certainly carried a deep taint.

But a savior?

That couldn’t be him. Pesaro, perhaps-the damn hero who never shirked from his duty. The man who hadn’t a sensitive bone in his body.

Perhaps Pesaro was the savior and he would go off to America for some “long promise.” And leave Victoria for Sebastian. He smiled grimly. Then the bloody bastard could be as heroic as he wished, an ocean away.

Sebastian swallowed, tasting the strong flavor of brandy again. He had had too much. But it was day, and a bit of a nap would leave him clearheaded by evening.

The door to the chamber he shared with Victoria-shared with Victoria ; of all the blasted lies, teases!-opened easily, and he stepped over the threshold with a slight shuffle.

And stopped short.

Blood. He smelled blood.

The vestiges of the brandy fell away as he took in the scene: Victoria, pale visaged, sprawled on the bed, her dark hair plastered to her face… Antonнn’s face buried against her, his jaw moving as he drank… long and deep.

The scent of iron filled Sebastian’s nose, and red tinged his vision. With a roar, he leapt across the room, grabbing up the vampire by the hair, somehow remembering not to yank him away from her flesh before his fangs slid out.

“Sebastian, no!” she said, lifting herself from the bed. He saw blood trickling down her white arm, a stake in her other hand, and surprise in her eyes, heavy lidded and soft. He managed to stop his hand from slamming the stake down into Antonнn’s chest just as she lunged up from the bed, surging toward him.

“What the bloody hell are you doing?” he shouted, realizing belatedly that the vampire was still bound helplessly, hand and foot. That he’d been feeding from her wrist, and she had a stake at the ready. Revulsion swamped him as he understood. He grabbed her by the shoulders, his fingers driving into her soft skin.