Touch the Dark
Page 13

He handed me a golden clip that he'd pulled from his own hair. I took it, careful not to brush his fingers with mine. My hair was barely shoulder length, but I got most of it into a messy ponytail as he watched. I tried to talk myself out of the near panic attack I was having, but it didn't work. Some instinct older than reason, older than polite phrases spoken in well-lit rooms, wanted me to run and hide. Of course, that could have been a reaction to the night I was having, but part of me definitely didn't like him so close. I forced myself to sit still as he finished his examination, to pretend that my arms hadn't broken out in goose bumps and that my pulse wasn't racing through my veins like I was already fleeing for my life. I didn't understand my reaction, but harsh experience had taught me to trust my instincts, and every one I had was loudly begging me to get away. "Ah, bon. Ce n'est pas très grave," he murmured. Seeing my expression, he smiled, and it lit even his eyes. "It is not serious," he translated. I fought not to scream.
Louis-César rose and walked to a nearby table, and suddenly I could breathe again. I tried to figure out what there was about him that so alarmed me, but there was nothing tangible. His face, which was set in pleasant, friendly lines, looked to be that of a man maybe five or six years older than me, although if his clothes were anything to go by, he'd been around for centuries. His eyes were mild—a calm blue with flecks of gray that held no discernable attempt to influence me—and his movements, while graceful, were nothing a mere mortal couldn't have imitated. Admittedly, my nerves weren't in great shape—even I wasn't used to almost getting killed twice in the same night—but that didn't explain why, out of all the possible candidates, it was Louis-César who was freaking me out.
He returned, and my panic rose with every step he took. I watched him the way a small animal does a predator, staying quiet, barely breathing, in hope that the big, bad thing won't pounce. He knelt again in a puddle of gleaming satin and lace, and the overhead lights glinted on a few strands of auburn threaded through his hair. He'd brought back a first aid kit, and he lined up an antiseptic, several gauze pads and a packet of baby wipes on the tiles in front of the fireplace. "I will clean the wound, mademoiselle, and bandage it for you. A nurse will come tomorrow and improve on my clumsy efforts." He was relaxed, even cheerful, but it took every bit of self-control I had not to run for the door.
A pale, slender hand framed in cascading white lace engulfed my filthy, blood-stained one. His fingers were cool and his grip light, as if he thought his touch would give reassurance. It didn't. No matter how careful he was, I knew that hold could tighten in an instant, trapping me as securely as a steel handcuff. I felt the fingers of his other hand moving deftly over my scraped skin, then the barest brush of the cloth as he began cleaning it. Although the antiseptic stung only lightly, I shuddered and closed my eyes. I had a very bad feeling that I knew what was coming.
"Mademoiselle, are you ill?" His voice came from a distance and echoed hollowly in my ears. I felt a familiar sense of disorientation wash over me, and I fought it with everything I had. I struggled harder than ever before, trying to push it back inside whatever part of me usually held it, begging it to go back to sleep. Whatever it wanted to show me, I was absolutely certain I didn't want to See it. But, as ever, the gift was stronger than I was; it always had been. I gave in to the inevitable when I felt a cold chill settle on my face. It wasn't cold in the sitting room, but part of me was no longer there. I took a deep breath and opened my eyes.
The chill came from a window partially open to the night.
The breeze was nipping at my bare skin, raising goose bumps all along my exposed flesh. The window looked sort of like stained glass, except that there was no color and no pattern, other than small diamond shapes where its many panes had been joined together. The glass was thick and wavy, like in some of the historic houses in Philly, and it gave back only an indistinct reflection. But it was enough to make me begin to breathe faster.
I looked around in panic and my eyes lit on a mirror across the room. The image it returned was also dim, but more because of the faint light, which came from a few candles and a low-burning fire, than because of poor construction. In fact, it was a masterpiece of a mirror, huge, with a massive gilt frame, opulent like the rest of the heavy, carved-wood furniture. The room had a feeling of luxury about it: the dark cherry of the great four-poster bed gleamed with reflected flames from the marble fireplace, and echoed the color of the heavy velvet drapes of the canopy. The walls were stone, but hung with tapestries, their colors as bright and vibrant as if they had been completed only that day. A bouquet of deep-red roses sat on a nearby table in a painted porcelain bowl. I was in no mood to appreciate the scene, though, being far too distracted by the reflection in the mirror.
A man knelt on a bed approximately where I should have been. I couldn't tell who it was because a black velvet mask covered most of his face except for cutouts for the eyes. It looked comical, like part of a bad Halloween costume, but I didn't feel like laughing. Maybe because it was the only thing he wore. Long auburn curls hung below the velvet, sticking to his upper body, and in the candlelight they gleamed with strands of bronze and hints of gold. The warm, faintly golden light of the room drenched him, dripping down his skin from the muscular chest to the flat planes of his stomach and the slight indentation of his navel. It glistened on the tiny beads of sweat dewing his torso that the chill from the window had yet to dry, so he looked like he was wearing a transparent shirt strung with tiny diamonds. He was a gilt statue come to life, except that statues aren't generally rampantly erect. I swallowed and so did he, and the blue eyes in the mirror widened as realization hit.
But that was crazy, not to mention impossible. I didn't star in my visions. I was a watcher, off to the sidelines, as unseen and uninvolved as a ghost. Or, at least, I had been until tonight. Before I could even start to think what to do, I felt a warm hand close over me in a very personal place, and looked down in shock to find a brunette young woman lying beneath me, almost buried in the heap of blankets on the bed. The room smelled of sex, musty and heavy, and now I knew why.
A dainty little hand played over my—his—flesh with a sure touch. She stroked me again, harder this time, and I watched with something close to horror as an anatomical part I'd never possessed grew even longer under her hand. A flood of familiar sensations came from that very unfamiliar equipment, along with thoughts I was absolutely sure weren't mine. She flicked a fingernail over the rosy tip that had curved towards her and I almost screamed. Arousal had never felt like this. Of course, my experience wasn't exactly extensive, and it came from the other side of the coin, but this was almost unbearable. I was used to a languid heat that built slowly and spread from my core outwards along my veins, not this desperate need to thrust into her white body as deeply as I could.
She writhed in the blankets that lay thick and soft against our naked skin. "What is wrong, handsome one? Don't tell me you've lost interest already!" She sped up her pace and I suddenly found it hard to breathe. "You can manage a third; I know it."
My almost-trance broke when she moved closer, wetting her lips, and I flung myself back. I yelped in pain, both because she hesitated for a second before letting go, and from my borrowed body's demand for release. It was so stimulated it was painful, but I was in no way interested in what was on offer. I honestly thought I was going to be sick as I stared from her bemused expression to the undeniably male form I was wearing. There are no words for what I was feeling—utter confusion and disbelief miss it by a hell of a lot.
My hands scrambled for the edge of the mask and yanked it up. Staring at me from the mirror was Louis-César's face, white with shock. I wanted to scream at him to make this stop, to get out of me, but I knew it was the other way around. Somehow, I had invaded him, and I had no idea how I'd done it or how to undo it. The woman let out a shriek and grabbed for the mask, tugging it out of my hand and trying to put it back in place.
"Don't take risks, monsieur. You know how literal your keepers can be—never take it off." She smiled up at me wickedly. "Besides, I like it when you wear it while we make love." She wrapped her arms around my neck and tried to draw me down to her. "I'm cold without your heat. Kiss me."
I jerked away from her and scrambled to the end of the bed, wondering what would happen if I gave in to the black fog at the edge of my vision and fainted. Would I wake up back where I belonged, or was I stuck here? I decided to not even think about that last possibility. After a moment, the woman sighed and lay back on the bed, caressing her small breasts lightly. Her nipples were very brown against the white of her skin, and she watched me with a knowing smile. "Are you tired, my love?" Her hand trailed lower, tangling in the dark hair of her groin, and she smirked. "I'll wager I can revive you."
Before I could even try to persuade my overloaded brain to think up an answer, the heavy oak door opened and a middle-aged woman entered, flanked by four guards. Her expression told me she hadn't come to join in, thank God. "Get him up." Two of the guards dragged me out of the bed, and the woman I'd recently gotten to know far too well shrieked and pulled the covers up to her chin.
"Marie! What are you doing? Get out this minute! Get out, get out!"
The older woman ignored her and looked at me, the scorn on her already unattractive face not improving her looks. Her eyes ran over me contemptuously. "Always ready, I see. You get that from your father." She glanced at the guards. "Bring him.'"
I was forced out of the room with no chance to get dressed. The brunette tossed me a heavy brocaded robe, which I slipped over the embarrassing evidence of my condition, but there was no time to get shoes or even trousers. The girl in the bed screeched strange obscenities after us, most directed at the older woman. It dawned on me that she was not speaking English, although I could understand her perfectly. Or maybe this body could, and was somehow translating for me. I had no time to wonder about it, since I was manhandled down a long stone corridor to a set of stairs. They had deep hollows in the center of each step, where thousands of feet had walked over hundreds of years. It was dark down there and the air coming up was freezing, to the point that I was surprised that I couldn't see my breath in front of my face.