Mercedes Lackey - The Fire Rose

Literally.

I'm in shock, she thought, dimly. I must get back to the house-

But he had run off, howling, in that same direction. What if he was lying in wait for her, his blood-lust unappeased by his first victim?

This is Jason you're thinking about!

But it had not been Jason who had looked at her with the uncomprehending eyes of a beast. It had been the werewolf, the loup-garou, and she did not know it at all.

Sunset walked along beside her in utter exhaustion, head down, sides heaving, streaming sweat. She dimly recalled hoofbeats approaching before something had flown over her head and sent her sprawling into the underbrush. Had Jason ridden him here? Had the Salamanders alerted him? But why hadn't they attacked du Mond themselves?

She thought of the blood on Jason's hands, dripping from his abbreviated muzzle, and shuddered. She had never seen anyone die before, not even her father. How could he have done that to anyone, even his worst enemy?

How could she stay here? What if he snapped again?

She had once asked him how much of him was wolf, and he had seemed startled and uneasy at the question. Now she knew why.

How close to the surface is the wolf? And what if I am the one to make him angry next time?

As she emerged from the forest in front of the house, two Salamanders flitted up to take charge of Sunset. She dropped the reins listlessly, and stumbled on to the house, with both hands holding the ruins of her blouse over her chest in a vain attempt at modesty. Her hands, her wrists, her arms ached, and she was limping because the heel of her right shoe had broken off in the fight.

She found herself in her room, again with no clear idea of how she had gotten there. With a frightened gasp, she whirled, and with trembling hands, locked her door.

Only then did she stumble into the bathroom, where she knelt beside the toilet and retched until her stomach and chest ached and there was nothing left for her to be rid of.

She wiped her mouth on the back of her hand, feeling the sting of scratches there as she did so.

Shaking in every limb, she got slowly to her feet again, to find a bath waiting ready for her although she had not ordered one. She lifted her hands to look at them with dull curiosity; they were covered with deep scratches, and her hair, now loose and straggling, was full of twigs and knots.

She looked down. There was blood splattered on her skirt, on the remains of her blouse. There was too much of it to be hers.

In a frenzy of sudden horror, she ripped the rags of the clothing from her body without regard for fasteners, breaking a nail in the process. A Salamander appeared just as she struggled out of the last of it. She did not wait for it to ask what she wanted.

"Take it!" she wailed, shoving it away with her foot as far as she could. "Burn it! Burn it all!"

The Salamander levitated the pile of blood-stained clothing from the floor; still shuddering, she turned her back on it and its burden, and freed herself of her corsets and the rest of her underthings, just dropping them and leaving them where they fell. She plunged into the bath as into the waters of life, scrubbing frantically and hysterically to remove any taint, any hint of blood.

She blanked out again, and came to herself as she was dressing in entirely new clothing. Presumably the Salamanders had brought it all; she didn't remember. Something had combed out the tangles and twigs from her hair; perhaps she had, perhaps they had. Perhaps her own Sylph had.

She did not want to go out into the next room. She wanted to stay here, in the clean, white, safe bathroom.

Against her will, her feet walked into the bedroom, and from there into the sitting-room, and her body was forced to follow.

Her trunk and other baggage was waiting for her; she had not packed it before her walk, and could not have packed it afterwards....

There was a note. Numbly, she picked it up and read it.

I have sent for the train. Go into the city, tonight. Stay long enough to see Caruso, if after all this you still wish to. I have engaged a room at the Palace Hotel for you so that you need not see anyone who knows you and who might require an explanation, and there will be a porter and a taxi waiting at the station. You must rest tonight. After that, if you wish to leave, I will understand, leave word with my agent where you wish to go and first-class tickets will be waiting for you at the station. After you have gone, I will arrange for the rest of your things to follow. My agent will arrange for your bank-account to be cleared, and add a generous severance-fee.

It was not signed, but it didn't need to be. Not with the copperplate script burned into the paper as only a Salamander could.

In a state of benumbed emptiness, she gathered up her gloves and her cloak, pinned her hat to her still-damp hair, dropped her veil over her scratched face, and left, without a backward glance.

She told the concierge at the hotel that she had suffered an accident and a great shock and wished to be left alone. He stared at her scratched, bruised face behind the concealment of her veil, murmured polite words of sympathy, and had the porters usher her immediately to a first-class room with a private bath. Presumably, he did not want to take the of risk playing "host" to a young female having a case of strong hysterics in his hotel lobby, for he did not even require her to sign the register, but expedited her check-in himself. Immediately after, the concierge sent up a large bottle of brandy to her room.

She was tempted by it, but did not drink it, much as she would have welcomed the oblivion. Instead, she sent for a pot of hot water, and searched through her toiletries for her selection of Master Pao's herb teas. He had given her what he described as his "medicine chest": a tightly-packed box of herbal remedies, each packet with the purpose handwritten in his peculiar script on the front.

She found two, and hesitated between them. Sleep, said one, and Calm, the other.

But she was already calm; granted, it was the false calm of shock, but it was calm of a sort. Sleep was what she needed now, and that was the tea she chose.

She locked her door, checking it twice to make certain she had done so. Then she undressed, slowly, with a care for the hundred new bruises and aches she discovered with every passing minute. She put on the thickest and most enveloping of her night-dresses, drank down the bitter tea without bothering to sugar it, turned off the lights, and climbed into bed.

It was barely sunset, and her room had a westward-facing window. The setting sun made a red glow against the closed curtains, as if the entire city were aflame outside her window.

There were still those strange blanks in her memory; she also did not remember the train ride here. She must have convinced the men manning it that she was all right, or she suspected they would have delivered her to a hospital and not to the waiting taxi. Shock certainly did strange things....

Her window was open, allowing the sounds of the city to drift into the room. She knew two men in this entire city, and one of them had just torn out the other's throat in front of her.

If I were a normal, rational woman, I would send for the police, she thought, abstractly. But she knew that she would not. What was the point? Cameron would dispose of the body in some fashion, probably by burning it to ash. The chances that anyone would inquire after du Mond were minimal; she had the impression from Cameron that the man had no relatives-or at least none who cared about him. If Cameron was clever, he would file a report with the police himself, describing du Mond as having taking flight to parts unknown with a large sum of Cameron's money.

And why should she say anything to the administrators of justice? Du Mond had clearly been planning something horrible for her; Cameron had saved her. Du Mond had died quickly; possibly more quickly than he deserved. If Jason had shot the miscreant in front of her, would the result have been any different?