“Yes,” Val said, breathless despite his best efforts. His lungs tightened of their own accord, and he felt sweat bead at his temples, beneath his shoulders where they were pressed to the cool stone. He could recall the nursery of his earliest memories: the roaring fire, the Asian-patterned carpets, the intricate toys carved from wood, and cast in gold, set with precious jewels. Scent of the rose oil Mother dabbed behind her ears, the warm voices of their elders conversing.
Uncle had come to see them, alone, had crouched down in front of them much the way Vlad was crouched now, backlit by the fire, his Roman features cast in flickering orange light.
“One day,” he’d said, smiling at them in a way that was very different from their father, “you will be great generals in my army. When we take the world.”
It was years later that Val would learn taking the world meant breaking it first.
When Vlad got down on one knee before the Holy Roman Emperor and vowed to send their uncle to the hell he didn’t believe existed. Back to the awful dark place from whence Romulus’s army had crawled.
“Vlad,” Val said, and took a steadying breath. “They woke you up to get to your blood.”
A smile cut across Vlad’s face, the fast, humorless slice of a knife. “To heal their soldiers. To make them stronger. Yes. And what do you think they need so many soldiers for?”
Val took another breath, and another.
“They have you. They have your blood. Why do you think they needed a crusader?”
Val closed his eyes and let his head fall back. He’d known; he’d felt the shifting, the way, even back in the nineteen-forties, immortals were growing restless. He’d thought that Philippe’s failure, and Rasputin’s death would slow things…and it had, no doubt. But he couldn’t stop what was coming. Not from the inside of a cell.
“They found something in the desert,” Vlad said, clothes rustling as he stood. “It’s awake.”
Val cracked his eyes open a fraction and watched his brother step back and brace his broad shoulders against the wall. Fold his arms.
“You’ve been dream-walking,” Vlad said like an accusation.
“Did you think I wouldn’t?”
“No. It’s in your nature to be slippery and deceitful.”
“My, your grasp of the English language is extraordinary. Did they teach you any of the curse words yet? Fuck is my favorite. And Americans use it so frequently and creatively–”
“If you’re trying to interfere with what they’re doing here, you’re going to regret it.”
“I regret most things, brother. Why should this be any different?”
Vlad wasn’t amused. “This is not a joke, Radu–”
“That’s not my name!” Val shouted before he could catch himself. The words just came boiling out like steam.
Vlad’s brows lifted. The mildest surprise, that was really more censure than anything. “It’s the name Father gave you.”
Val breathed raggedly through his mouth. He brought his hands up to push his hair from his face, and his chains rattled and clinked together. “I had more than one parent,” he snapped. “We both did.” And Mother had called him Valerian, because she thought it sounded like a pretty name for a Romanian prince; for old Roman royalty: the son of a king’s brother. Second in line to a throne that no longer existed.
Vlad sighed. “Do what you will. Valerian.” It was a concession, and not a small one by Vlad’s standards. “But don’t interfere.” He tipped his chin down, eyes wide and dark, driving the point home.
I will hurt you, his steady gaze stead. Do not test me.
Val sketched the most elaborate bow he could manage given his present position. “Of course, Vlad Dracula. Your majesty.”
Vlad snorted and pushed off the wall. “Do not test me, brother,” he said aloud. You know how that always goes.”
“Yes.” Val rotated his wrists, cuffs clinking softly. “I know.”
Vlad had nearly reached the first door when Val called after him. “Are you glad to be awake?” He said it nastily, bitterly. Mocking. But he was curious.
Vlad paused a moment, hand resting on the hilt of his dagger. “No,” he said, without artifice. “I am not.”
And he left.
The door shut with a heavy thump, and Val was alone again.
“My brother, ladies and gentleman,” he said to the empty space around him. “What a fucker.”
32
Annabel – Annabel le Strange the baroness! – had told Sasha that it would be best for him to cooperate with the doctors and nurses for the time being. Protesting would only get him chained up tighter, maybe even drugged again, and that if he wanted to earn a little bit of freedom he had to be polite and agreeable.
So though it went against his screaming internal alarms, he sat quietly in his hospital bed and thanked the technician who brought him his next meal. The tech, a skittish young man, startled badly when Sasha spoke, and then managed to scrape together a smile before he fled the room.
He ate every bit of the meatloaf and potatoes he’d been given, because he was hungry, and then set the tray aside on the night table that he could just reach from the bed. He was sitting up against the wall, hands folded neatly in his lap, when two scrub-clad nurses, and a man in black tac gear with a gun on his hip came to collect him.
“Hello,” Sasha greeted, forcefully bright.
“Hello,” the nurses echoed back. They were both women, both middle-aged and maternal-looking. One came to him with a blood pressure cuff and a stethoscope, and another brought a penlight to peer into his eyes, nose, and ears, unafraid and proficient.
The guard, though, was on edge. He stood just inside the door, one gloved hand holding a baton – a stun baton; Sasha could feel the faint hum of its electric charge. He stared dispassionately at the far wall, a well-trained, emotionless soldier. To a human, he would have given the appearance of an immovable object. Jaded and unconcerned. But Sasha could smell the ripeness of fear sweat gathering beneath the man’s arms, detect the rapid flutter of his pulse, visible in the side of his throat. Anxiety had a scent, and it filled the room now, rolling off the guard.
Sasha almost felt sorry for him.
He smiled. “I’m not going to hurt anyone.”
“Oh, we know, honey,” one of the nurses said, peeling off the pressure cuff. “Keys, please,” she said over her shoulder.
The guard stepped forward and handed a set to her.
His cuffs were unlocked, all four, and the nurses stepped back. “Okay, if you’ll follow us,” the one with the penlight said. “We’ll go see Dr. Talbot.” She gave him a quick, impersonal smile.
Sasha’s stomach churned with worry, but he tried not to show it as he swung his legs over and eased to his feet. He was stiff and sore, unsteady. He had to grab at the bed’s handrail, and a nurse steadied him with one strong hand on his shoulder.
“Easy now. We can get a wheelchair.”
“I’m fine.” And he was, once he’d taken a few shuffling steps and felt his circulation coming back. “I heal quick.”
“Mmhm.”
They fell into a loose formation as they exited the room: the two nurses shoulder-to-shoulder in front, Sasha after them, and the guard behind, stun baton held across his chest, ready to use.
Sasha was dressed in loose white shirt and pants, socks with rubber grippy bumps on the soles that were, at the moment, necessary. He moved slow, careful little steps that sent aches shooting up both legs and into his knees. He felt like an old man, and nothing like the lithe wolf that he was.
They moved down a white hallway that smelled of new paint and plaster, and then emerged into a cavernous space that looked like a retrofitted wine cellar: stone floors and ceilings, empty sconces that would have once held torches. And a mess of modern wires and computers and lab equipment set up on long tables. He turned his head back and forth, nostrils flared wide, and tried to take it all in. He hadn’t been inside a place like this since he was first turned, and that had been an Americanized Soviet facility. This looked like Dr. Frankenstein’s lab…but much, much more high tech.