She turned to Rafe, then. “But you did me a favor with your interest in the stencils in the kitchen.” She cackled. “Oh, she was a cunning one. The secret was there, on her kitchen walls. Her cellar below the swans. I found her laboratory.” She spread her arms and gazed around.
Then her face twisted with fury. “But it’s not here. There’s nothing here.”
“That must be disappointing for you,” I said. “I guess she moved everything when she knew you were onto her. I bet you’ll never find it.”
She screamed then. A scream of rage and frustration that echoed off the dank walls. She reached behind her and picked up what looked to me like an old service revolver. From maybe World War I. Not that I was any expert on guns, but that thing was not new. Where on earth had she found it? Worse, was it loaded? Did she know how to use it?
She waved it around at us.
She looked at Sylvia and with a nasty sneer said, “Well, you wanted to live forever. Try doing it underground.”
And then, waving the gun in our general direction, she backed herself up the stairs and flipped off the light.
We were plunged into total darkness. And then I heard the slam of a door and the turning of a key. And then the echo as the second door slammed. There was complete silence for a moment. Both Jennifer and I managed to get our phones out and the flashlight app on at about the same time.
Sylvia said with contempt, “What a ridiculous villain.”
Jennifer looked at me, and I looked at her. She said, “How’s your door-opening spell?”
I was pleased to say that it was quite good. I’d been practicing.
She said, “After you, then.”
I couldn’t imagine how terrifying it would have been to be locked down here in normal circumstances, but any one of the four of us could have broken out without any problem at all. I sort of appreciated that Sylvia and Rafe stood back and let us witches handle it. Lighting my way with my phone flashlight, I got to the top of the stairs and found the light switch and turned it on.
I whispered my unlocking spell and had the pleasure of hearing the soft click as the lock released.
Out of courtesy, I let Jennifer use her spell to open the outer door. It wasn’t any quicker than mine, but it did the job.
As he came up behind us, Rafe switched out the light.
Sylvia looked quite put out. “Now I suppose we’ll have to find her.”
Tilda had, of course, run straight into the other vampires. Carlos had hold of her gun, and they were marching her back towards where we’d come from. She was arguing with them that she had no idea what they were talking about, and then she saw us come out of the mausoleum and screamed.
“How did you get out? This is witchcraft. That’s what this is. You’re monsters!” And then she broke away and began to run. Rafe pushed Carlos’s hand down, not that he was in any danger of shooting the woman.
“What shall we do?” I asked, watching the woman run toward the woods at the end of the property.
“One of us will have to take care of her,” Sylvia said quite sharply. “We can’t have her raving about alchemists and witches and monsters.”
“She’ll probably just end up sectioned under the Mental Health Act,” Lochlan said.
“I don’t like it. Too dangerous,” Sylvia said.
Rafe looked at me. “Lucy, what do you think?”
“Well, you can’t murder the woman. I agree with Lochlan. We’re just going to have to hope that no one believes her. If you ask me, she’s completely insane anyway.”
I could barely see the woman now, still running, still screaming, but then it seemed like she tripped, and we heard a strangled cry.
I ran forward, but of course I was no match for the strength and night vision of vampires. By the time I got to where they were standing, the woman was crumpled on the ground.
“What happened?” Jennifer asked.
Rafe glanced up. “She must have tripped in her haste. She hit her head on a rock.”
“Is she…?” I couldn’t finish. I felt the darkness of death, and I knew that Jen did too.
“She’s dead. Yes.”
“Well, that’s convenient. But what shall we do with her?” Sylvia asked. “You can’t just leave dead women lying all over the ground.” Then she seemed to think. “At least, not in these times.”
Alfred stepped forward. “I can’t think of a better place to put her than in the crypt.”
It was a brilliant idea. We’d put her at the bottom of the crypt stairs, leave the doors unlocked, and it would look like an accident. Of course, by the time dawn came, every scrap of alchemist equipment would have been removed, and she’d be found lying in an empty crypt.
Luckily, we had the truck.
Rafe said, “I’ll drive Lucy and Jennifer back to town.”
“But we can help,” I said.
He shook his head firmly. “If anybody comes, we can disappear easily. You’d just be a hindrance.” Rude, but true.
He turned to the others. “While I’m gone, get everything out of the crypt and into the truck.” He paused for a moment. “And find some supplies for making creams and so on. If there aren’t enough in the old pub, find some somewhere and stack them in the crypt so it looks like Tilda was retrieving supplies from the storeroom when she slipped and fell.”
“Excellent,” Lochlan said. “You get on, and we’ll have this done in no time.”
To Jennifer and me, he said, “And you two should get a few hours of sleep.”
Chapter 19
“That’s quite the knitting club you have,” Jennifer said when we were back at the flat. I put on the kettle, knowing it would be a while before we could sleep. Both of us needed some time to decompress.
“I know. You really got the full-on vampire knitting club experience.”
“Do you think they’ll be able
