Bleeding Dusk

Quirinus.

A second door led to Wayren’s private library, and the third door was the entryway Victoria sought. The doors were not secret to keep out other Venators; they all knew this chamber existed, and many of them had visited it.

They were hidden merely as a precaution. In the event the Consilium should ever be breached, the important and valuable items kept in this room and in Wayren’s library would remain safe and would be able to be evacuated through the nearby alternate entrance if necessary. Thus, Victoria reasoned, this would be the safest place for Aunt Eustacia to have hidden the armband with the key.

Perhaps she’d had the opportunity to secret it here before going to the meeting that resulted in her death. It wasn’t likely, but Victoria wanted to make certain all other possibilities had been exhausted before she talked to Sebastian.

She pushed on the marble relief of a trail of vines, her fingers sliding one of the leaves to the side. The heavy marble wall rumbled and opened enough for her to slip through.

Inside this chamber, which always had torches ready to be lit, the Venators kept their greatest secrets, their most valuable weapons, and the most dangerous souvenirs of their history. Victoria held her candle aloft, showing cabinets with deep cupboards and shallow, wide shelves that lined the walls. Display tables with glass tops that enclosed some of the objects sat adjacent to one another. A desk with curling manuscript papers and a large magnifying glass was positioned in a corner.

On display here was the stake given to Gardeleus when he was called to his destiny of fathering the generations of Venators. It was made of aspen wood, and had been part of the True Cross. Lady Catherine’s emerald ring, which she’d worn during her days in Queen Elizabeth’s court, was in a small, silver-cornered box made of ash. A head-size egg that belonged to the serpent demon Pithius was locked in an iron cage. It had never been incubated, but for security’s sake it was locked up, just in case it might someday spontaneously hatch. So far it had been there for centuries with nary a wiggle, according to Ilias.

There was the gold clasp that Eustacia and Kritanu had seized one Christmas Eve in Venice, thereby saving the city from horrific destruction at the hands of a powerful vampire. The golden anklet that had belonged to Dahhak, one of the divs of long-ago Persia. A twining copper ring, one of the five that had been given by Lilith to her most trusted Guardians centuries ago. An odd-shaped box made of jade that Victoria had never had occasion to see opened sat next to the egg. And, there on one of the tables, a long, obsidian object.

A shard from Akvan’s Obelisk.

Victoria walked over and looked down. The piece of shiny blue-black stone was no longer than her forearm from wrist to elbow, and perhaps as thick as three fingers. It was splintered to a lethal point at one end and a wider, jagged edge at the other. One side was smooth and curved; the opposite was fragmented and ridged.

It had been a part of a large obelisk that had contained a great, primitive evil harnessed by the demon Akvan. When the obelisk had been destroyed, it had shattered and disintegrated in a great explosion. Victoria had found the piece of obsidian during her escape with Sebastian from the aftermath of its destruction, and she had brought it here for safekeeping.

The gleam of her candle flame flickering on the shiny object reminded her of the blue and black flames that had erupted from the obelisk when it was still whole. As she looked at it, Victoria felt the shimmer of evil that had once been contained therein and placed her hand over her belly, where the vis bullae dangled, protecting her.

Stepping closer, Victoria smoothed her hand over the length of the shard and felt the prickle of evil present. She wondered, belatedly, if it was safe to leave it here, in the deepest, most remote part of the Consilium.

“What are you doing?”

Max’s voice caused her to jerk her hand away and whirl around. “Stop sneaking up on me,” she snapped, hating that he’d surprised her. She stepped away from the table, refusing to look at the shard behind her. “What are you doing here? I thought you weren’t sure if you were back. And now you are everywhere, as if you had never left. As if you have the right.”

He’d stepped into the doorway, filling it, casting a long, dark shadow from the brighter hallway behind him. “I’m back for now,” he said. “Are you looking for something?”

“Just making certain Aunt Eustacia didn’t leave her armband here before going…that night. It was a possibility,” she said defensively as he raised a brow. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m late for my meeting with Wayren.”

Brushing past him, forcing him to back out of the entrance, she went into the small vestibule, closing the storage chamber door behind her. But to her surprise, when she turned to enter the library Max was right there in her wake. “What are you doing here?” she asked rudely.

“As an adviser to the previous Illa Gardella,” he said smoothly, “I was invited to attend. Ilias felt that it was appropriate for me to be here.”

Wayren interrupted any response she might have made. “Please sit down, Victoria, and Max, perhaps you will take that seat.” If the mild-mannered woman was surprised or upset by the barbed comments of the Venators, she gave no sign of it. “Now, tell us what has happened.”

With a glare at Max, Victoria had no choice but to speak. “My mother and her friends have been invited to a gathering at none other than the Palombara villa tonight for a treasure hunt.”

“Perhaps they’re searching for the missing key,” Max said. He was settled back in his chair, nearly lounging, with his long legs crossed before him and his wrists resting on the arms of his seat. Almost as if he knew that the more relaxed he looked, the more irritated Victoria would be.

And she was.

“Yes, of course, that was what I thought—that the missing key is likely somewhere in the villa. I’ll be attending tonight as well, however, to make certain all goes well…and to perhaps find the key myself—”

“On the capable arm of Zavier,” Max interrupted. “A good plan, indeed, to have someone to watch over your mother. But not the best plan.”

Victoria took a deep breath, forcing her bubbling annoyance to simmer and settle. She was Illa Gardella now…no longer the naive amateur Venator that Max had had the ability to pique so easily a year ago. She was the one; she’d proven herself; she had the blood, the skills…the two vis bullae.

This was her life now.

He might have more experience than she, and it was valuable. But she still had her own merit and could listen to his suggestions without feeling challenged.

Even if it irked her. But as she released her breath slowly and evenly, as Kritanu had taught her, she merely lifted her eyebrows—both of them, in direct contrast to Max’s single eyebrow lifting—and waited for him to continue.

“We know that Sara Regalado attempted to kidnap you, so it’s likely that she and her father are interested in the key, or something else related to the villa. There are no Palombaras in Roma, yet there are vampires—we presume—who are attempting to find the keys and open the Door of Alchemy. It is possible, do you not think, that someone is pretending to be the Palombaras, and opening the deserted villa up to this…party tonight in the hopes of finding the key?”

“And that they might indeed be vampires or Tutela members?” Victoria added. “Yes. Which is why I have asked Zavier to attend…as my mother’s escort.”

Now it was her turn to settle back in the chair. “I will be attending, Max, but anonymously. I don’t particularly wish to be recognized by any vampires who might be at the treasure hunt tonight. And especially since my mother was invited by the Tarruscelli twins, whom I already know to be acquaintances of the Regalados, I was well aware of the dangers of promenading up to the villa unsuspectingly.”

“So you plan to sneak into the villa yourself?”

Victoria nodded. “I’ll make up some excuse in the carriage on the way to the party that will allow me to leave Zavier as escort for my mother and the others while I pretend to return home.”

“Brilliant, Victoria. You’ve thought the whole thing through.” Max nodded as if bestowing a great favor on her. “I’ll meet you there and we can find our way in together.”

She didn’t say anything. It would have given him too much satisfaction.