Elizabeth’s scream jolted him from his thoughts, and instantaneously, Damon was at a run to reach her.A hulk of a man, perhaps twice Elizabeth’s size, pinned her to the side of Lord Thomas’s crypt and pressed her lustfully to the wall, meaning to have her in a
She shook from sobs of joy and of fear. Damon’s breath rasped in exhaustion as he held her close. “I am so sorry, Elizabeth.” He caressed her hair, stroking gently as he held her head to his chest.“I should have protected you.”
Elizabeth pressed her face against his shoulder.“It was my fault; I should have waited for you. I foolishly put both of us in danger.”
Damon tightened his embrace and gently kissed the top of her head. Elizabeth’s arms encircled his waist, and they stood as such, hearts pounding from the unbelievable terror.
Breathing normally at last, Damon loosened his grip, but did not release Elizabeth. “Do you hear what I hear?” he whispered close to her ear.
Elizabeth tilted her head back to listen carefully. “I do not hear anything.”
“Exactly.” Damon smiled down at her.
Elizabeth pulled away and looked around her. “But we are not finished.”
“Maybe we are.This is the newer part of the cemetery—more than likely containing families not from this area originally.We will still check each one, but I suspect we have finished our task.” Triumphantly, they shifted between the last two rows of headstones, but nothing happened when they lifted the staves.
“No more!” Elizabeth nearly cackled when she speared the last stave into the frozen ground. “What of Fitzwilliam?” she asked in surprise at having forgotten her husband’s ordeal in the midst of her own struggles.Turning curiously towards the house, she called to the colonel,“My God, Damon, look!”
“We finish it, Darcy—only one of us.”
The words still reverberated in the room when Wickham threw himself at Darcy, clawing at him like a wild animal. His nails shredded the sleeve of Darcy’s coat and ripped the skin along his forearm. Like a rabid wolf,Wickham’s jaw snapped viciously, trying to reach Darcy’s face and neck.
Overpowered by the sudden attack, Darcy, knocked from his feet, braced his arms, holding back the sheer monstrous force of the beast. All of Darcy’s other dealings with Wickham had been with a mildly taunting gentleman vampire, who used his powers to strike quickly and then escape. This Wickham tried to tear Darcy limb from limb.This animal felt no remorse—just the compulsion to kill its prey. Finally able to wedge his knee between them, Darcy used his legs to hurl Wickham across the room, where he landed on all fours.
Immediately, the wolflike Wickham rebounded, crouching in preparation for the next attach. Like him, Darcy rolled from his back to a semiclosed position, grabbing the sword as he did. Straightening slowly, he shifted the sword to his other hand, and then made a come-hither motion, a silent challenge. Unhurriedly, Wickham began to circle, a bestial specter needing to hunt—needing to kill and feed. His eyes, now coal black, flashed with a fiery glow, as if coal tar burned within them. “You cannot win, Darcy,” he growled.
Warily, Darcy turned in a slow circle, keeping Wickham always where he could see him. Like the dance he arranged each night, Wickham turned in a definite pattern, and Darcy adjusted accordingly. As he turned once more, he began to search the room behind Wickham for weapons he could use. Surprisingly, just as in the great hall, Wickham’s earlier windstorm had left much of the periphery untouched. The candles still burned and the golden torque still rested on the altar.The three golden plates, which once hung above the coffin, now lay flat on the floor and off to the right. The cauldron, turned on its side, spilled out its contents: a layer of grey ashes, just like those Darcy had found in London; and then Wickham hides something in that house. You must find his grave and destroy it.…Without his grave—his coffin—Wickham cannot survive. As he surveyed the room, Elizabeth’s instructions meant even more.Watching.Waiting.Wary.They circled each other cautiously.
Two more steps and Wickham sprang again. Darcy spun just as the creature leapt, leaving his opponent lying face down among the ashes. Using the sword, he hacked twice at his adversary’s left side, hoping to open further the previous wounds. As Wickham tried to recover, Darcy darted to the coffin, still sitting askew on its base, and with a gargantuan effort tipped it over.The dirt sprawled across the floor in dark streaks of decaying matter, and Wickham crawled to it, scooping it up with his right arm, trying to repair his home. “No…o…o!” he screamed as he dumped handfuls back into the opened front.
Hoping now to destroy it all, Darcy poured one of the vials of holy water on the satin as Wickham used his body to protect his grave. Darcy waited, but nothing happened.
Wickham, covered in earth and ashes, looked up with amusement. He rubbed the dampened dirt between his fingers.“It is oil, Darcy.You fool,”Wickham charged.“You poured oil into the dirt.” Triumphantly, Wickham stood, brushing his hand against the side of his pants. “You will pay for this degradation” The ominous words became Wickham’s challenge.
Realizing he needed to retreat before he could attack again, Darcy began to edge along the wall, backing away from the advancing, infuriated Wickham.
“I plan for you to suffer long and hard.” Wickham hissed the words.“You will pray for hell’s relief.”
“What makes you think, Wickham, that I am not already in hell?” As he spoke, Darcy moved slowly in the direction of the burning rows of candles. He knew he carried another vial from the church in his pocket; he said a silent prayer that the second one contained anointing oil, as well. “In fact, hell is right here in this room.” With that, he threw the second vial against the wall; the
Not caring about death,Wickham dove for Darcy’s legs, knocking him to the floor, where they rolled in the dirt again.The beast of a few minutes ago returned, and Wickham bit down on Darcy’s leg, only to find part of his boot. Darcy used his other leg repeatedly to kick relentlessly at Wickham’s face, tearing chunks of skin away from his enemy’s eyelid and cheekbone. Fists landed. Cries of pain split the heated air.Their gazes met and did battle.
Darcy’s assault forced Wickham to release his hold, and uttering a curse, he clambered to his feet. Picking up the sword that Darcy had dropped, he began irrationally swinging the blade in arcing figure eights, slicing at everything in his wake. Darcy scooted backwards in a crablike manner, trying to evade Wickham’s demonic fury.“Hell! Darcy, we are in hell!” he howled, his voice grating.
Reaching the wall closest to the door, Darcy shoved to his feet, sliding his back up the smooth surface. Half the room was now engulfed in flames, but Wickham still railed, screaming of hell and damnation. He caught the tip of the blade on the satin lining of the coffin, pulling part of it free and dragging it through the fire. The material caught the flames, and in his choler, Wickham flung it from him, sending it through the open door to land on the carpet found there.
Out of control,Wickham stalked Darcy, herding him, blocking his every move to flee. Darcy reflexively worked his way sideways along the wall. Heart pounding, he tried to recover from the attack and to judge how to escape the fire and Wickham’s wrath. He shifted his weight several times, but each time Wickham countered with a move of his own.Then it happened:The flames reached the coffin. As the fire spread to the lining, the wood popped and cracked from the heat. Wickham spun around to see the damage, and Darcy took his chance and dove out the door, barely missing the flames now crawling along the carpet runner and skipping up
Clumsily, Darcy struggled to his feet and broke into a run, heading for the staircase.
“Darcy!” Wickham boomed as he menacingly stepped into the hallway.
Without thinking, Darcy knelt down and jerked hard on the runner, pulling it from under Wickham’s feet and sending his opponent tumbling backwards. Throwing the flaming runner over the banister, Darcy shot a quick glance in Wickham’s direction before taking the steps, bounding over the landing. Hitting the main hallway at a run, he looked around frantically for a weapon, hearing the ominous sound of Wickham’s boots on the upper stairs.The great hall loomed to the right, and Darcy madly ducked into the room, looking for safety, but Wickham followed only a few heartbeats later. “Darcy!” he bellowed.
Finding no immediate escape, Darcy nonchalantly stepped from behind the pile of broken furniture.“I am here,Wickham.”
“So you are.”Wickham’s eyes glowed red in the darkness as he slowly brought the sword to Darcy’s chest. “I expected more from you, Darcy.” He moved the blade in a gesture towards the debris. “Have a seat.”
Darcy warily moved to the ornate offering, the only piece still intact.
“It seems I no longer have my followers.” Wickham looked about the room, feeling anger well up again. “I suppose you had something to do with that.”
“You suppose correctly.” Darcy watched the flames behind Wickham scatter about the entranceway, jumping from item to item.
“Then I will start over.”Wickham pressed the tip of the sword to Darcy’s chest. “In fact, I will leave tonight—your wife has three more sisters, if I recall, and there is always sweet Georgiana.” The words incensed him, but Darcy realized he needed to keep control; he squeezed the arm of the chair in disgust.
He expected Wickham to run him through, but his rival did not. Instead, a strong right caught Darcy’s jaw, shoving it upward
How long he was out, Darcy did not know, but long enough for the fire to spread, because when he touched the door, the heat told him not to open it. For the second time,Wickham had left him in a burning house. Grabbing the back of a broken chair, Darcy struck the window through which he had spied Wickham that first night. He hit it full force, and it shattered into hundreds of pieces. Using the chair’s leg, he battered away at the shards. Climbing out the window, his eyes fell on a shadowy figure, silhouetted in the moonlight, mounting the hill to the cemetery. “Oh, God, not Elizabeth,” he murmured and took off at a run.
“My God, Damon, look!” Elizabeth stood transfixed by the fiery glow in the sky.“It is the house!”
She was running as hard as she could in the direction of the hill—towards Wickham’s house—towards her husband.With each step, her eyes filled with tears. She could not lose Darcy now.
Damon caught her around the waist just as Elizabeth reached the back of the graveyard. She fought him like a wildcat, kicking and screaming for him to release her.“Let me go!” she pleaded, but the colonel pulled her away from a house now fully consumed in flames. Pungent smoke filled the air, and burning embers showered down on them as they clung to each other and stared at the inferno.
“He got out.”The colonel said the words aloud, trying to convince himself.
Elizabeth shivered and collapsed against him, defeated. As they watched, the walls began to give way, leaving only a shell.
Then they heard it, running steps coming their way.
Elizabeth broke away from Damon’s grasp and, cutting through the barriers they set up to contain those they hunted, she rushed to
The colonel skidded to a halt behind her. Annoyed by the new configuration, Wickham insisted, “Do you care to introduce me, Mrs. Darcy?”
Elizabeth took another step back. “Where is Fitzwilliam?” she demanded.
“What? No manners, Elizabeth?” Wickham amusedly nudged her with the blade again. “I expect the gentleman knows my name. After all, he broke into my house twice, and I have no need of his name.”
Damon caught Elizabeth with his left hand and placed her behind him, offering his chest as Wickham’s target. “Answer the lady,Wickham,” the colonel pressed.
Sinisterly, he complied.“I believe I left Darcy in the grand hall.”
Elizabeth caught her breath, and Damon could feel her trembling hand on his back. He reached behind him and caught that hand; he needed for her to move before Wickham charged. He guided her backwards with a tighter-than-usual squeeze of her hand.
Wickham watched the interaction closely. “Does Darcy know how you feel about his wife?”Wickham enjoyed being in control, and this situation played to his conceit. He flicked a finger in the direction of the gravesites, and the colonel stepped back into the arena, but he carefully kept Elizabeth out of Wickham’s way. She now lightly rested her hand on his back and stepped in unison with him.
Seeing the graveyard adorned with the perpendicular markings, Wickham actually laughed. “This was your idea, Mrs. Darcy? How very astute of you! I knew you were trouble from the beginning. Truthfully, taming you would have been much more pleasurable than bringing that insipid sister of yours to heel.” Damon knew
“No one,” Damon responded.
“Your husband warned me as such, Mrs. Darcy, but I thought he bluffed, though not so well.You are more tenacious than I expected.”
Interrupted by the sound of running feet behind him, Wickham automatically spun to meet the new provocation.
Darcy cleared the rise of the hill, only to once again be at Wickham’s disposal. He caught his breath in a great gulp when he saw his wife and cousin safe, and he forced calm into his body although he faced the tip of a sword. He took Wickham’s attention from Elizabeth, and that was all that mattered.
Seizing the opportunity, Damon caught Elizabeth up and carried her to safety. She began to resist, but a slight shake of Darcy’s head told her to stay, and she let Damon drag her behind a massive memorial.“Stay put,” he warned her and began to circle to the far side of the line of graves.
“Darcy?”Wickham said as he smirked. “We return to where it all began.”
“Where it began for you, Wickham,” Darcy countered,“but not for me. My life began only a few months ago when hope walked in.”
“Ah, is that not sugary sweet! Did you hear that, Mrs. Darcy?” he called out to Elizabeth. “Your husband speaks of your love.” Using the sword, Wickham herded Darcy in the direction of the cemetery’s center.“You may be right, Darcy. Maybe this is only my personal hell.”
They now stood directly between the two crypts, which anchored the site.“Let me show you something.” Although barely able to move on his left side,Wickham raised his hands and with a quick burst of air, the lock of Ellender D’Arcy’s burial chamber exploded, and the iron gate swung open. “Step next to the gate, Darcy.” Darcy moved slowly, not knowing what to expect. “Do you remember the part of the legend where Lady Ellender gave me to Leána?” Darcy nodded as he took up a position next to the
As if a supernatural force carried her forward, Lady Ellender D’Arcy appeared in the door of the open vault. “Come, my dear.” Wickham extended his hand, and the lady placed hers in his.
