Chapter 31

- A Wolf in Sheep's Clothing -

The fall was about fifteen feet. I met the ground hard with a bone-shaking thud and rolled with it. If it hadn't been for the thick piles of dead, wet leaves I might have been really hurt. As it was, I'd have some fantastic bruises later, courtesy of the small stones and protruding roots of the surrounding trees.

For a second I just lay there in the dirt, heart pounding.

Well, there was no going back now.

Now that I was out of sight of the palace I thought it safe to light a lantern. From an inside pocket I pulled out the small brass one I'd stolen, which had somehow miraculously survived both my recent jumps from high places.

Lighting it I held it aloft and looked around.

The forest was thick. It was going to be hard going, but there was no point delaying.

Getting to my feet I walked away without a backwards glance.

Trying to formulate some idea of where I was, what direction I was facing, was tricky. I thought I was heading south, going downhill. If I were right and I kept going straight I would reach the north side of Anhelina's basin. From there I could cross the fields and farms to the city of Velosta.

I tried to move as quickly and quietly as I could through the dense trees, ever conscious that there might already be soldiers out looking for me. But I soon realised just how impossible that was.

My dress skirts and cloak caught on every branch and twig I passed, making movement arduously slow. Leaves rustled with my every step and worse than that I could barely see where I was going.

It was darker here than in the gardens, under the dense canopy of evergreen trees, and the lantern showed me little more than what was right beneath my feet.

I tripped constantly and stumbled over more hidden tree roots and rabbit holes than I could count.

From above I heard the start rain and after about an hour I was thoroughly damp, ladened down by twelve pounds of wet woollen garments.

By then I was so cold and wet and confused I couldn't even tell if I was walking in the same direction or just going in circles.

Every now and again I caught a glimpse of muddy sky, but there was no help for me up there. Even if I knew how to use the stars to navigate, which I didn't, it would have been hopeless.

How long had it been now? How far had I made it? Had someone already found me gone? Would they be out looking for me yet?

Unconsciously I sped up.

I should have found men's clothes and changed out of my cumbersome skirts, I thought. I should have brought a knife, and better shoes and a thousand other things.

Why hadn't I thought this through better?

I was panting now as I pushed my way through a dense patch of bracken. I stumbled again as I felt something rip the hem of my dress. I tore myself free and kept moving.

With every second my predicament seemed to become more and more dire. I'd left with no real plan beyond getting out of the palace, and now I was certain I was lost. Even the Humanists didn't know what I was doing, and I was starting to realise just how royally screwed I was.

It wasn't until I tripped on a moss-covered rock buried in the leaves that I realised I'd started running.

I lay there, trying to catch my breath.

To my left came the babble of water. Crawling towards it I found a small creek, the water icy but clear and crisp.

I splashed some on my face and focused.

Calm down Beaumont. You need to stay calm. You don't stand a chance if you start panicking now.

And I'd almost managed to calm down.

Until I heard the noise.

I froze, my ears straining.

My heartbeat was loud in my chest as I listened again for the noise, rising slowly to my feet.

Maybe it just been my imagination, a trick of the leaves blown up in the wind or the dappled rain above me.

Then it came again.

I spun to my left, raising the lantern. I hadn't imagined it. It was the sound of feet, many feet, moving through the carpet of leaf mulch which covered the forest floor.

Had I been seen jumping over the wall? Had I been followed? Was a palace guard about to jump out from behind a tree?

Then I saw what was making the noise and I wished it had been a palace guard.

A black shape slunk between the trees a hundred yards up a crest to my left.

Its head was bent low over its broad shoulders and even in the dark I could see the yellow eyes glinting in the lantern light with that eerie animal yellow, unmoving, unblinking.

'There are wolves in the woods, as big as bears.'

They weren't wrong I thought, looking at the beast.

He was easily as big as me, fir slick with rain, ears alert and pointed.

From somewhere distant I heard a howl. It made my insides quake.

The animal in front of me pricked its ears, then returned the call, raising its head to the sky. A call to arms. It had found its prey, now it was time to bring in the troops.

The answering howl was much closer this time and there were others, many others.

I took a step back, keeping my eyes fixed on the animal. My heart was hammering somewhere in my throat.

What were you meant to do with wolves? A ranger at a summer camp had once taught us whether to run or face up to different animals, but as with all vitally important information the moment you need it, it vanishes from your mind.

The wolf watched me, calmly calculating, patient.

It took a slow step forward down the crest of the hill.

Then another.

I dropped the lantern, turned on my heels and ran for my life.

I dashed through the undergrowth blindly, heedless of the branches that caught at my clothes and scored my cheeks and arms.

To my right I thought I saw something flicking between the trees, but I dared not turn to look at it.

I just had to keep running.

The sounds of feet, of ragged breathing.

They were closing in.

I tore through a copse of brambles and suddenly the trees were gone. The rain above intensified, half blinding me.

I careered out onto a shelf of barren stone and skidded to a halt just shy of the edge. I looked down. Beneath me the earth fell away into infinite darkness.

I spun around. I was trapped out here, exposed.

I could make for the trees, I thought quickly, maybe climb one.

But it was too late.

Just as I made to run eyes appeared from the darkness of the forest, flat silvery white and bright yellow.

There was at least ten of them, all massive and all more than I could ever hope to fight.

"Fuck, I'm gonna die."

One of the wolves slunk forward, considering me.

There was a fallen branch, half buried in the dirt to my left. I lunged for it, yanking it free.

"Stay away," I said, brandishing the branch in front of me. "I'm warning you. I am already having a really bad day."

The wolf ignored me, continuing forward.

"Stay away!" I yelled. With a roar I swung the branch at it blindly.

To my surprise, and I think the wolf's too, I caught it on the side of its head with a sickening thwack which reverberated up my arms.

But rather than falling limply to the ground as I'd hoped, the beast simply staggered, shaking its head vigorously.

Then it turned to me again, bearing its yellowing teeth and growling low.

Jeez, now I'd just pissed it off.

"Get away from me!" I yelled, waving my stick again and trying to sound braver than I felt. "Get away!"

The wolf lowered its head, opened its jaws, and came at me with a running leap.

I didn't even have time to raise the tree branch again before I was on my back, with a hundred pounds of hot, stinking wolf on top of me.

It knocked the breath from me, I couldn't even scream. Any second I would feel its jaws clamping down on my throat, hear the creaking of my bones as they bent and splintered as the beast ripped me apart.

I could already feel hot, wet blood trickling down my arms from the fatal wounds I couldn't yet feel, steaming in the icy cold of the night.

I was going to die here. I knew it. I was going to be killed and eaten by these wolves.

Instinctively I pushed against the beast's hulking mass in a desperate and futile attempt to escape. To my disbelief the wolf's body slid off me, rolling without resistance into the damp leaves by my side.

I lay there staring up into the rain, the blood and adrenaline pounding through my head.

There was no pain. If I were dying there should have been pain, right? Then I turned my head to look at the animal who had attacked me. Its face was only a few inches from mine, its jaws spread wide in a wicked grin, its tongue lolling out into the churned mud from between inch long teeth.

It was dead, its wide, yellow eyes glassy and sightless. The blood which coated my arms wasn't mine but dripped instead from the fatal bullet hole in the side of the animal's head.

I lay there staring at it for a long minute before my other senses kicked back in and I became aware of the growls and yips coming from behind me.

I turned and felt the breath leave me again.

A tall, dark figure in an oiled cloak loomed above me.

He stood with his back to me in the middle of the clearing, a shield between me and the remailing wolves.

In one hand he held a gun, in the other a lethal looking axe which was already dripping gore.

Three dark, hairy shapes lay motionless at his feet as six more advanced on him, jaws snapping, teeth bared.

I watched as he swung the axe again in a wide arc, forcing them back, and as he did his hood fell.

Dark hair plastered to his face, teeth bared, eyes blazing blacker than the night as he fought to protect me.

It was Dante.

I watched him shoot another straight between the eyes, the wolf falling to the ground like a stone. His aim was perfect.

I had never seen anyone fight like that. He fought like a warrior, like a man used to battle. I knew then that every story of his abilities was true.

He was pushing the wolves back towards the trees, away from where I lay, and might have driven them off. But wolves are pack animals, they hunt as part of a team. They were not stupid.

Time seemed to slow down as a group of five or six wolves drew Dante's attention. They snapped and growled, but never got close enough to the axe to risk danger. To keep them from getting to me, he was forced to turn sideways, just as they'd wanted. A large black female appeared from the tree line and circled around Dante, out of his field of vision.

"Dante, watch out!" I screamed, but too late. Dante turned just as the wolf lunged under his guard and sank its teeth into his leg.

He cried out, dropping the gun which went clattering across the stone. If he'd fallen then he would have been dead within seconds, but someone he managed to keep his feet.

Taking the axe in both hands Dante yelled, bringing the head of it down between the wolf's shoulder blades.

The wolf collapsed, releasing Dante's leg, but sensing weakness and smelling blood the rest of pack advanced.

"Get the gun!" Dante yelled to me, clutching his bloodied leg with one hand, axe in the other.

I didn't need to be told twice. I scrambled across the stone, grabbing it.

"Shoot them!" he yelled, swiping at another wolf and backing away from the rest.

I had never so much as held a gun before, but it couldn't be hard. I picked it up and fired.

The gun recoiled in my hands like a kicking horse and my first shot went wide of their targets.

Okay shooting a gun is easy, hitting a moving target in the dark it turns out is much harder.

Dante was backing away now, blood seeping from between his fingers where they clutched his leg.

He wasn't going to be able to fight much longer like this.

They were pushing us back, forcing us towards the edge of the precipice. If we fell or were felled, either way we were still food.

I tightened my grip, squared my shoulders, and fired again.

My second shot missed too, but my third landed a glancing blow. There was a whimper and a wolf skittered away.

"Again!" Dante yelled at me, and I fired again. Another hit, but not a kill. That wolf limped back towards the trees and disappeared.

The wolf closest to Dante was backing away now, heckles raised and tail low. Seven of its kin were already dead, two injured, and he seemed to be thinking that maybe this meal wasn't worth the effort.

The others seemed to be thinking along similar lines. When Dante swiped with the axe again, one of the beasts turned tail and ran. It didn't take long for its remaining fellows to follow suit.

Adrenaline faded fast and I let the gun fall from my shaking hands as I sank to my knees.

Dante watched their forms disappear, fading back into the darkness of the trees, then panting with the exertion hurried over to where I knelt.

"Are you hurt?" he asked, breath steaming in the air between us. He didn't wait for a response but began checking me over for wounds.

When he found none, he seemed even angrier than he had before.

"A letter!" he yelled, grabbing me by the shoulders and shaking me roughly. He didn't seem to care that he was hurting me. "You leave a goddamned letter then jump from window into the black without as much as a word?!"

I was confused. We'd both just nearly died, and he was talking about my letter?

I tried to speak, to explain myself, but Dante overrode me.

"What the hell were you thinking? Are you actually that stupid?"

"I-I was–"

"Do you have any idea how easy you were to find? Any tacker worth his salt could have followed you blindfolded. I could see your lantern light from half a mile away. You have no weapons, no compass, no provisions and no clue which direction you're travelling in."

"Dante, please. I couldn't-" I tried, but he was incensed.

He jabbed a finger off in the direction of the trees. "If you'd kept going straight you would have hit a bluecoat checkpoint in less than an hour."

I had never seen him like this before, never heard him speak like this. His whole body was practically vibrating, his face twisted, shoulders heaving.

I closed my eyes and tried to let his words wash over me. I almost wished the wolves had torn me apart, instead of his anger.

"What the hell were you planning to do even if you did manage to escape?" he continued. "Were you planning to swim to the mainland? Hijack a ship? Or were you just going to hide out here in the woods until the wolves ate you or the Bluecoats found you and had you hanged?"

I was dimly aware that I was shaking too, my breath coming in short, sharp gasps. I opened and closed my mouth several times, but I was already in shock and speech proved impossible.

What would I have even said? An apology?

I wasn't sorry. Not that I'd run.

However foolish I'd been, however underprepared, I'd had to leave. I'd had no choice.

But how could I explain to Dante the desperation I had felt? The hopelessness, the helplessness, the fear that had blinded me to everything except the idea of escape.

But before I could find the words, before I could even open my eyes, he'd pulled me into him, pressing my head into his chest.

"I thought I'd lost you," he whispered into my hair, his body sagging into mine as he wrapped his arms around me.

I was at a loss. I'd expected the anger, I'd expected him to try and drag me back kicking and screaming to the palace.

I hadn't expected this.

"God, I thought I was too late. I came to get you from your rooms, but you'd gone. All that was left was that letter and I thought… I thought I would never see you again."

It was like all the fight had left him, all the anger gone.

Then I slowly realised that he hadn't been angry. He'd been scared.

I wanted to say something, but I didn't know what. I coughed, trying to clear the obstruction from my throat, trying to speak, but the cough became a whimper and then a sob.

I wrapped my arms around his broad back, hot tears rolled uncontrollably down my cheeks, mixing with the rain.

"I was… I was so scared," I breathed into his shirt, and he knew I didn't mean the wolves.

"I know." He was shaking too. I could feel the tremors coursing through his body as I held him. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry for everything."

"I didn't know what else to do."

"I know. It's my fault. I didn't give you any other choice. I should never have let it get this far. I should have done something. This is all my fault."

That tone in his voice, that cracking quaver, broke my heart.

We sat there on the ground, the rain soaking us both, just holding each other.

Finally, when I'd regained control of myself, I asked the question I really didn't want to ask.

"Have you come to take me back to him?"

His arms tightened around me protectively. "No," he whispered, his breath warm against my ear. "I will never let him hurt you again."

"Then why did you come? You could have just left me." We hadn't spoken in weeks. He hadn't wanted anything to do with me, and now he'd just saved my life.

He pulled away, looking down at me. "You really believe I could have just left you?"

My throat suddenly seemed to close up. "I thought… After what happened… I thought you didn't care about me anymore."

He lifted my chin with a hand, forcing my eyes up to meet his. "Then you're an idiot, Beaumont."

He kissed me.

And I kissed him back.

Suddenly I wasn't shivering anymore.

My hands balled into fists in his shirt as his large, calloused hand cupped my face and drew me in deeper. I'd never thought I would ever kiss him again, but all the tenderness, the affection, the intimacy, it was all still there. In the space of that kiss, it was as if the last few months had never happened.

When we finally pulled apart, he held me close and I wished we could have stayed like that, alone forever.

But I began to shiver as the adrenalin finally wore off and I felt just how cold I was. Letting me go, Dante pulled the cloak from his shoulders and draped it over mine.

The gesture made me feel warm all over, though his cloak was just as sodden and cold as mine.

Dante made to stand, then winced, his hand going reflexively to his leg.

"Is it bad?" I asked, looking at the wound. His trouser leg was shredded and there were deep puncture marks in the skin beneath, still weeping blood.

"I've had worse," he hissed, "but it will heal quickly."

I couldn't help but feel guilty. He wouldn't have gotten hurt if it weren't for me. I ripped a few strips of my already tattered skirt and started trying to bandage the leg as best I could.

My efforts made him smile, then he winced as I tied the bandage too tight.

"Sorry," I said as he reached to help me. "I'm not the best of nurses."

"It's the thought that counts I suppose," he said, kissing my forehead before undoing and retying the bandages. Once done he stood, pulling me up with him.

"We need to get back," he said, looking up at the sky. The rain had eased off now and the moon was starting to make itself known between the clouds. "Time isn't on our side. Miss Nikolayev was frantic when I left, and she can't stall your guards for long if they come to check on you."

"You said you weren't taking me back," I said, suddenly anxious. "Please Dante, don't make me. I can't-"

Sensing my fear, he took my hands. "Victoria, I swear to you, will not give you back to Labauve. However, we must return to the safety of the palace grounds. You can't stay out here in the open, and I can't protect you like this." He gestured to his leg.

For a moment, my mind whirred frantically, then I took a deep breath.

I had to tell him.

"Dante if you can get me to the city there are people, people who can help me."

There was no reason to keep secrets from him now. It could hardly make things worse.

I took his hand.

"Dante the Humanists, they're real. They're in the city, right now, in the Quarter. They've been here all along. I've been working for them, spying on the Duke for months on their orders. They promised me if things got bad, they'd get me and Rachel off the island."

"I know."

"And I…" I froze. "What do you mean, you know?"

He wasn't looking at me. He stared at the ground, and his face… there was something like shame in it.

"Dante, what do you know?" I asked again.

He closed his eyes and let out a deep breath, one I suspected he'd been holding for a long time.

Then his eyes met mine.

In that moment I saw him make one of the hardest decisions of his life.

The decision to tell me the truth. His truth.

To trust me with his greatest secret, even as he knew doing so would destroy any trust I had left in him.

"I have always known you were a spy Victoria," he said, his voice wavering just a little. "I've known about every occasion you visited the Quarter. I know what you told Lesedi, when you told her, I even know how long you stayed and what excuses you told your guards when you returned."

I took a step back, pulling my hand free of his as realisation ran like ice water through my veins.

"I know you use the Marquis Decuir as a go-between when you can't send information in person," he continued. "I know that you sent him to find Lesedi, to plead your case and beg her to get you out. I know why he couldn't find her, or Marco or Cameron Kennedy."

"How do you know? How do you know everything?" But I already knew the answer, an answer I didn't want to know.

His eyes searched mine. Those black depths usually so unreadable showed me everything. When he spoke now, it was as though every word caused him physical pain.

"Because I'm the one who gave them the orders. I've been giving the orders for nearly four hundred years."

There was silence as I stared at him, feeling my insides turn hollow.

I finally understood why he chose his moniker. A vampire responsible for the enslavement of humans secretly leading their rebellion was much like a god with two faces.

"You're Janus" I whispered.