Midnight`s Daughter Page 0,122
Louis-Cesare’s unbound legs could have swung up, locked around his throat and snapped his neck, probably in the time it took to blink. Yet they didn’t. Even when Jonathan worked the poker into Louis-Cesare’s already mutilated chest, he did not so much as grunt.
My heart lurched sickeningly, caught between fear and outright panic. Was he already dead? Had one of the shafts sticking out of his chest pierced his heart? It was possible—he looked like some parody of Saint Sebastian, red wounds like gaping mouths over all that pale flesh. But no, he was still bleeding. I saw a light trickle seep out around the poker. And dead bodies don’t bleed.
Jonathan traced the outline of the wounds he’d inflicted on his captive’s chest and belly, his touch an obscene mixture of delicacy and brutality. The new flow of blood seemed to dissipate into mist at his touch, a tiny wisp floating from Louis-Cesare’s tortured form to wrap itself around the mage’s hand. “Ah. It begins,” he murmured, as my heart kicked hard against my chest, sick realization curling in my stomach. He was bleeding him of power, of life, little by little. Yet Louis-Cesare did nothing.
The only reason I could think of for the suicidal passivity was Radu’s imprisonment. Maybe they had threatened him if Louis-Cesare fought back? It didn’t make a lot of sense, as he knew perfectly well what Drac had planned for his brother, but it was the best theory I had. I grabbed the mage standing guard at the door, who had been too caught up in the little torture session to notice the wild-looking woman sneaking up on him. His neck snapped almost silently, any tiny sound covered by Jonathan’s thick voice.
There was blood under the mage’s fingernails as he caressed his prize, toying with the purple bruises and crusty blood around the older wounds. It slicked his hand and stuck his fingers together, thicker than honey as it dried. The urge to snap the thin man’s neck made my fingers twitch sharply as he leaned in, staring at Louis-Cesare with a hungry look. “Do you remember how inventive I could be?”
I ignored the dull beat of anger throbbing behind my eyes and stowed the mage behind the sofa. I slipped into the entryway, careful to keep close to the wall. It was dark in the shadows, away from the chandelier’s light, and my coating of black mud was good camouflage—for both sight and scent. Another mage was a few feet in front of me, watching the show.
In a sudden, savage motion, Jonathan pulled out the poker and was rewarded with a barely audible gasp, just a brief inhalation that was soft even to my ears. But the mage heard.
He smiled at Louis-Cesare tenderly, approvingly, his hands stroking down the long torso, smearing the spattered blood that stained his skin. “He died every day, and was reborn every night,” he crooned, his voice a sing-song, “like an ancient god, like Mithras himself.” Without warning, he slid his finger into the gap left by the poker; I could see it moving under the flesh of Louis-Cesare’s side. “I never killed him twice in the same way.”
“You never killed him at all,” Dracula said testily. Apparently I wasn’t the only one to see the madness in those gray eyes.
Jonathan didn’t seem to hear. “He died so beautifully, every time. Mostly in silence, but occasionally I would bring him to screams of agony, to passionate death throes.” His free hand caressed Louis-Cesare’s bare flank while his finger sank farther into its sheath of skin, to the base of his knuckles. “Will you scream for me one last time?”
Louis-Cesare shivered in revulsion, but he lifted his head to stare at him, haughty, defiant. I thought that’s how the French aristocrats must have looked, going to the guillotine on the order of a middle-class bureaucrat, the blood of Charles Martel flowing in their veins. Then, over Jonathan’s shoulder, he saw me.
He gave a sudden jerk and his eyes widened. The mage in front of me must have seen, because he stiffened and started to turn. I strangled him with his own scarf before he could sound an alarm. Only, if Louis-Cesare continued to look like that, no other warning would be needed.
Fortunately, Drac had never been known for patience. He knocked Jonathan out of the way, grabbed a poker sticking out of Louis-Cesare’s thigh and twisted it cruelly. “Enough of this! Tell me where Mircea is, or I will let