But how did he know she had it?

No one but Wayren, Ilias, and Ylito knew she’d found it. Even Max was unaware.

No one else except—

Victoria felt cold; then a blast of angry heat shuddered over her.

Sebastian knew.

Sebastian had seen her holding the shard when they escaped from the burning opera theater on the night of Aunt Eustacia’s death.

She stood abruptly, automatically feeling for the stake under her gown.

The sun would have gone down by now, and she would take herself out onto the street to hunt down someone who could bring a message to Beauregard or Sebastian. Or she would go herself.

She’d squandered her first chance to talk to Sebastian and find out what he knew about Aunt Eustacia’s armband. Now she had two reasons to find him.

And to find out if the entire scene at Villa Palombara had been a farce put on by Sebastian and his grandfather to acquire the shard.

Perhaps Akvan wasn’t back at all.

No. No, he was. Or something just as evil was.

Victoria had smelled him.

She looked down at the table where the shard sat, long and black and wicked. The little pendant glinted next to it on the rough wooden table.

Now that Victoria was certain someone—Akvan, Sebastian, Beauregard, or all of them—was after the piece of the obelisk, she didn’t want to leave it sitting so visibly on the table.

The heavy splinter was still a bit warm when she picked it and the leather necklace up. The obsidian stake felt good in her hand. Comfortable.

Her fingers closed around it, and Victoria positioned it as if a vampire were in front of her, making an experimental stab into the air. The swish and swirl of movement was audible in the silent chamber, and she imagined stabbing the shard into the chest of a vampire. Lilith. Beauregard. Any of the creatures with red eyes and flashing fangs.

The shard would send them back to Lucifer.

Victoria’s lips tightened, curling in against her teeth, and she felt a surge of hatred for those red-eyed creatures who’d taken so much from her. Sebastian had tried to make her believe that some vampires weren’t wholly evil, that they didn’t deserve to be damned to Hell. But he was wrong.

And if he tried to stop her, she’d send him there along with them.

The large splinter was growing warmer, and Victoria looked down at it. Her fingers were leaving moist prints on the sleek black glass. It must be kept safe. Secret.

She had to put it away in a drawer or chest. No one would find it there.

In the darkest corner of the room she found a small wooden chest filled with nothing but fragrant wood curls, as though someone had sat and stripped them from a branch of cedar. Or had been carving a stake.

The splinter and the necklace fit easily in the box, and it was with a sigh of satisfaction that Victoria closed the lid, placing another chest on top of that one.

The pieces of Akvan’s Obelisk would be safe.

Now to deal with Sebastian.

She rose to her feet and, with one last look back at the dark corner where the chest held an evil treasure, Victoria moved quickly from the chamber.

Back out in the passage, she paused outside of Wayren’s library, but there were no sounds from within. No one else was about; it was just as silent as it had been when she arrived. A gentle knock drew no response, and when Victoria gently prodded the door open, she found the room dark.

The Consilium was silent and bare as she walked back toward the main chamber, where the rush of the fountain made a pleasant hum.

At least Victoria had one of her questions answered: Max had to be all right, for if he’d been otherwise he would be in the Consilium with Hannever, being treated for his injuries. A seriously wounded Venator would be kept safe in the Consilium until he was well.

Having had her question answered by omission, Victoria left the Consilium through the secret spiral staircase that led into a hidden passage behind one of the confessionals at Santo Quirinus.

Instead of leaving through the doors of the small chapel, she went into its tiny rear courtyard and into a ramshackle old building across from the church. She exited onto the nearly empty street, where she found it was indeed well past sunset on the chilly February night.

The sky was as black as the shard she’d left below, and a full moon glowed high and small among the stars. She walked toward the unpleasantly sharp smell of wet umbrella silk. Her wooden stake felt light and weak in her hand after the heaviness of the shard, but it would do its duty if she required it.

There were no vampires about, however. Of course, that was no surprise, as this particular block of the Borghi was deserted of human prey.

Victoria had walked nearly all the way to the Passetto when she stopped. Had she closed the door to the storage chamber, where the shard was secreted?

She didn’t remember.

Just because the door was open didn’t mean that anyone would find the piece of obelisk…but it made her nervous to leave such important things unattended and open.

It just wasn’t safe.

She hesitated only a moment before turning to make the trip back to the little run-down building, moving at a more rapid pace than when she’d been walking away from it. If any of the few shopkeepers or pilgrims Victoria passed noticed a slender figure wrapped in a dark cloak walking back the way it had just come, they gave her no second look.

Urgency built in her chest. The shard might not be safe, and she couldn’t allow it to fall into anyone else’s hands if Akvan and Beauregard and Regalado were after it.

Perhaps she’d move it to a different place in the chamber. A locked chest? Or…

By this time Victoria was moving through the hidden passage behind the confessional in Santo Quirinus. She carefully stepped over the middle stair and moved silently along the short hall hung with icons, then pressed the intricate stonework that would reveal the spiral staircase.

The floor glided open without a sound, and Victoria hurried down the curling steps, driven to get to the storage chamber to check on the shard. Make certain it was safely in its dark corner.

Tomorrow she would tell Wayren about this, but—

Someone was standing at the fountain.

Dipping his fingers into the sparkling holy water, there in the dim light, looking down into the pool. Only one sconce lit the area, as it had when she’d left perhaps twenty minutes earlier, but she recognized him. Even from the back.

Impossible.

Yet…perhaps not.

He must have sensed her presence, for he turned, an uncharacteristic look of shock on his handsome face.

Victoria refused to allow him to see that he’d caught her off guard as well. Instead she stepped closer, noticing the way he clamped a wet hand over his bunched-up white shirt.

“And here I was planning to tear the city apart looking for you, when all I had to do was wait for you to show up. What are you doing here, Sebastian?”

Thirteen

In Which Our Heroine Divests a Gentleman of an Article of Clothing

A chagrined expression flashed over Sebastian’s face for an instant, then was masked. He stepped away from the fountain, his wet hand making a print on his light shirt. She noticed a dark coat hanging over a nearby chair.

“You returned much sooner than I anticipated,” he said, recovering quickly to summon a teasing smile. “I should perhaps have waited a bit longer before coming down here…but I can’t say that I’m terribly disappointed to have you alone at last. After all, last night in the dungeon with Maximilian was hardly—”“Give me an answer, Sebastian.” Victoria’s heart was pounding, panic replacing bald shock as she realized what this must mean. Her mouth had dried; she felt it shrivel like a pea in the sun. Her fingers were shaking, and nausea curled in her belly. How could it be? “Tell me you didn’t bring your grandfather,” she said in a voice that didn’t belong to her, even as she tried to assimilate what Sebastian’s presence meant. He couldn’t have done.

The Consilium, the safe, secret sanctuary, had been found.

No. Not under her watch. Not after almost two millennia of secrecy.

No.

Victoria felt fear and anger—emotions she’d struggled to keep out of her mind—envelop her, clouding clear thought as she started to dash past Sebastian, desperate to get to the secret storage chamber—and to Wayren’s library—before they could be despoiled.

His teasing smile faded. “I’m here alone.” His voice, urgent and low, stopped her. “I wouldn’t—”

The panic eased enough for her voice to be steady when she snapped, “You wouldn’t what? Infiltrate our sanctuary? How did you find out about this place? How?”

But no, of course Beauregard wasn’t here, she realized belatedly, her mind beginning to function again. She would have sensed him the moment she came into Santo Quirinus. That, at least, was good.

Sebastian was staring at her, his eyes shadowed by the dim light glowing behind tawny curls that made him look so absurdly holy. He seemed to be studying her, waiting for her to speak.

His chest rose and fell easily, but the tension that skittered between them made Victoria restless and unwilling to play the game of silence. “Answer me, Sebastian. At least tell me how you learned of this place, and how it is on my guard that you’ve found us.”

He stepped toward her. “Never fear, ma chère. Your secret shall remain safe with me. I’ve known of these chambers for a rather long time, and I’ve told no one yet.”

A lopsided smile tilted his lips as he reached for her shoulder, skimming his knuckles over her collarbone and then drifting his fingers loosely around the nape of her neck. “Don’t you yet know that I’d do nothing to endanger you? Now, since we are here together and unlikely to be interrupted, there are other activities we might find to divert ourselves. Ones that I, at least, have missed greatly.” His smile, slow and sensual, mirrored the look in his eyes, a look she’d seen more than once before. Despite her anger and confusion, the desire in his gaze had its effect on her, sending flutters through her belly. “After all…you sought me out, Victoria.”

“It was a necessity, Sebastian.”