Taras did not reply. He had no interest in entering this debate with Theron. Instead he concentrated on getting to his hiding place. The going was difficult, as he had to dodge several spots where the sun shone on his path, but fortunately it wasn’t far.
“Do you even know her name?” Theron pressed.
Taras ignored him.
“I thought not,” Theron said, shaking his head. “You would risk everything, even death, for someone you don’t even know.”
“And you would kill a complete stranger for no reason at all,” Taras countered.
“As should you. You are Bachiyr, after all. Whether you are willing to admit it to yourself or not. I saw what you did to that legionary. There was nothing left of him but pulp and blood. What’s more you enjoyed it, to judge by the look on your face.”
“Spare me your cackling. I-”
“Do you deny that you enjoyed it? Tell me true, and I will leave you be.”
Taras opened his mouth to argue, but closed it again. Theron was right, he had enjoyed killing the legionary. He didn’t know if it was because of his nature or because the bastard deserved it, but he could not deny the elation he felt when the Roman’s blood sprayed him in the face. “I am not you,” was all he said.
“The truest thing you have said all night!” Theron replied, laughing. “You are starting to remind me of Ephraim. Near the end of his life, he turned into a fool, too.”
Taras grunted, unwilling to dignify the remark with words.
Soon they arrived at the door to the building that hid the smuggler’s tunnel. So far it seemed unscathed from the ballistae attacks and the invading Iceni, but that would change soon enough. The sounds of men screaming and dying grew closer by the second, it seemed. It would not take long for the barbarians to reach this place. When they did, they would probably loot the building and then set it alight, which seemed to be their preference.
He set the woman down and allowed the nail of his right index finger to grow, then he stabbed it into his left wrist, waiting for the blood to pool. Once the blood formed a tiny puddle on his wrist, he dipped his finger into it and brought it to the door, tracing a rune he had learned in Greece. The door opened into the street, and he picked the woman up and ran inside.
Theron came along behind, his eyes on the door. “The Locking Psalm,” he said. “You have not been idle these twenty seven years.”
Taras walked to the back of the room and lay the woman down. Then he sifted through the dust on the floor until he found an edge. He strained for a moment, but soon lifted up a slab of stone several paces wide and over a foot thick, revealing the tunnel entrance. He propped up the stone with a thick metal rod he kept nearby for just that purpose, then grabbed the woman and carried her into the shadows. Theron followed, removing the rod and letting the stone close back upon the entrance. The tunnel plunged into blackness.
Taras could see fine, however, and he knew that Theron could, as well. He stepped aside, indicating that the older vampire should pass.
“Don’t trust me at your back, Roman?” Theron asked.
“No,” Taras replied bluntly.
“Very well.” Theron stepped around Taras and took the lead, following the walls of rough-hewn stone deeper into the earth.
“So you have saved this woman-who is an Iceni princess, by the way,” Theron said. “Now what? You will still be Bachiyr. Her blood will still sing to you. And when she wakes up she will either try to kill you or run from you. Either way, you are not likely to receive anything in the way of thanks.”
“Her thanks are not needed.”
“She will not bring Mary back to you,” Theron said, looking over his shoulder and nodding at the swatch of blue cloth on Taras’s belt. “No matter how many you save,” he continued, “it will never bring her back.”
Taras stopped, the muscles on his arms tightening to the point of pain. His vision swam in a red haze as he stared at the back of the creature who had murdered his Mary all those years ago. The urge to drop the woman in his arms to the floor and drive his claws into Theron’s back was so strong he actually started to let go of the Iceni princess.
He caught himself just in time, and tightened his grip on her. If he killed Theron now, the woman would die. Of course, Theron knew that as well, which is probably why the bastard mentioned it. He swallowed his anger and his retort, preferring to walk in silence rather than goad Theron into mocking him further.
Up ahead, Theron chuckled.
“Enough,” Taras said, laying the woman gently on the ground. “We have gone far enough to be safe. Heal her, as you agreed.”
Theron stopped and turned around, favoring the walls of the tunnel with a skeptical glance. “How deep are we?”
“Deep enough that the sun will not find us.”
“And the humans?”
“Have been unable to locate this place for over a decade. I doubt they will find it today.”
“Very well.” Theron stepped up to the injured Iceni and knelt next to her head. He bent down and put his mouth on her throat. The woman moaned, and Taras grabbed Theron by his shoulder and jerked him upward. Two bright red holes marred the skin of the woman’s throat.
“What are you doing?” Taras asked.
“Healing her, as we agreed.”
“It looks like you’re about to feed on her.”
“I am. I did this to you, too. Did you never wonder why you healed so quickly in Jerusalem?”
Taras realized he was grinding his teeth, and forced himself to calm down. “You will not turn her into one of us. I will not allow it.” He pulled Theron’s shoulder back, but the older vampire shrugged out of his grip and glared back.
“How did you survive thirty years while knowing so little?” Theron asked.
“If you don’t begin to make sense soon-”
Theron got to his feet and shoved Taras’s hand away. “For her to change, she would have to drink Bachiyr blood. As long as she doesn’t do that, she will be fine. As you would have been had I not spilled some of my own blood in your mouth by mistake. Your fault, by the way. You stabbed me in the back. The blood from that wound is what fell on your face. You have only yourself to blame for your change.”
You have only yourself to blame, he thought. I did this to myself? Taras looked from Theron to the woman on the ground. “I was not already a Bachiyr that night?”
“Hardly,” Theron sneered. “You were a human with enhanced physical abilities, nothing more. The effects would have worn off in a month or so.”
A month or so. He would have been human again in a month or so. In his anger over Mary’s death and his role in the crucifixion of the Nazarene, he had sealed his own fate. Twenty-seven years of hiding, running, and killing, all because he stabbed Theron in the back. Yet he would do it again, he knew. Theron had deserved to die that night. Who could have known he would live through a sword in his back? If he had it to do all over again, however, this time he would close his mouth.
“So all you have to do in order to heal her is feed on her?” Taras asked.
“Correct.”
Taras scowled. “I could have done that.”
“Of course you could have,” Theron said. “Now that you know, you still could. But it would mean breaking our deal, leaving me free to act on my own while you tried.”
“Get on with it, then.”
Theron barked a laugh, then knelt by the woman again. Just before he sank his teeth into her throat, he looked up at Taras and grinned. “You always were easy to manipulate, Roman.” Then the renegade Bachiyr bit the woman on the neck and began to drink.
After a perhaps a minute, he lifted his head from her throat. Blood dripped from his jaws onto the punctured, swollen flesh of her neck.
“Is it done?” Taras asked.
Theron nodded. “It is. When she wakes up she will be completely healed.”