Character death - Jean-Claude
May. 10th, 2006 10:47 am![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
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lkh_lashoutsTitle: Pandora’s Lie
Word Count: 3,200
Spoilers: None.
Part: 1/3
Summary: Rocks fall, everyone dies.
A/N: This is my end-game fantasy that I wish would take place instead of NiC onward. And thank heavens for RPGs. And for the purposes of Awesome, let’s assume that the Anitaverse has the best mobile phone coverage that’s ever existed.
I tried to figure out where to cut it off for a "cinematic" release, but I'm afraid you're stuck with the Director's Cut.
Disclaimer: All things AB:VH belong to LKH. I’m just playing there, and I brought a bunch of my own characters with me. Gabriel is mine, all mine, yes he is my preciousss…MUAH HA HA HA!
Something was wrong. Very wrong. When the council came to town for the third time, they played by the rules. They turned up on time – not early, not unannounced – they didn’t complain about their rooms or the guards posted outside, they didn’t hunt the citizens of St Louis, and they hadn’t pulled any of their usual arrogant superiority crap. Past experience has taught me that nothing goes this well without something bad waiting to happen.
Tonight was some fancy-to-do in honour of our guests. I was dreading it, not just because I was jumpy about all the things that could go wrong – but because Jean-Claude had picked out my dress. For a man that has been around women for so long, he had no concept of comfort. I’m a busty woman, but put me in a corset and I’m suddenly a ship in full sail. I don’t like having to lean forward to try and see my feet.
The dress was also impractical for carrying weapons. All I could carry was a knife in a thigh sheath. The corset saw to that. I was stuck with one knife and hated it as much as I hated the long, flowing skirts that whispered every time I moved. I had one cross on me, on a long chain so that the crucifix was nestled between my breasts, out of sight. Jean-Claude thought it was bad form for me to wear my cross charm bracelet at a party for vampires. Whether it was or not, I would have felt better.
I don’t know how women managed back when corsets were they hight of haute couture – I had only been wearing this thing a few hours and still hadn’t quite gotten used to how it limiting it was. I had to relearn how to breathe and walk.
“Ma petite,” Jean-Claude murmured, warm and low, in my ear. “You are scowling again.”
“If you’re asking me to smile, it’s a bit much.” I sounded as bitter as I felt as I looked around him. He’d gone all out in the Circus underground. The massive chamber, where Musette’s party had disastrously wrong, had been given a makeover. Candles and torches gave it a gentle glowing hue, while the table settings probably cost more than a year’s worth of my salary. Everyone had…eaten…and we’d all moved onto the small talk and schmoozing phase. “I feel naked without my guns.”
Even though his face was carefully schooled to reveal nothing, something warm and bright slid through his deep blue eyes. “Then look at it this way, ma petite, that it could be worse. You really could be naked.”
I glared and wondered if it was bad form to punch your main sweetie in public, and in front of your other sweeties.
His eyes grew shiny with the effort of quashing his laughter as he raised my hand to his mouth. His lips were warm and soft, lingering on my skin longer than was prudent. But the kiss promised me so much. Suddenly, I wanted this party to be over so I could have his mouth linger on other parts of my body.
“Dammit, Jean-Claude!” I said through clenched teeth as I felt heat flush through my face.
He arched his brows and drew back from my hand, giving me an innocent look. “Oui, ma petite?”
“How am I supposed to concentrate if you’re going to do things like that?” I hissed and glanced to the crowd, nodding toward the first of our ‘guests’ that I could see. He wasn’t all that hard to find in the crowd – dressed totally in black, the council representative was an inky stain on the cheerful surrounds.
Jean-Claude sighed, his amusement quickly folding back beneath his pleasant mask, set aside for another time. “There is no reason why you cannot be vigilant and enjoy yourself at the same time.”
“Easy for you to say, you get to wear pants.” I growled and bunched my fists into my skirt. I was paranoid about tripping over and falling flat on my face, and because of the corset, I wouldn’t be able to get up. I’d be a mess of petticoats and skirts on the floor. Not a great look for the vampire hunter they called The Executioner.
He smiled at me and gave me that Gallic shrug. “The night is still young, ma petite.”
The heat rushed back through my face. Suddenly I understood why women used to carry fans with them.
The musical clink of a champagne glass drew my thoughts out of the gutter. “May I have everyone’s attention?” one of the representatives for Morte d’Amour raised his voice over the loud murmur of the crowd. The rush of warmth Jean-Claude had raised in me suddenly vanished with a shiver. Gabriel had scared the hell out of me during our introductions. He was old enough to make my teeth swim, and so polite it was nearly painful. But there had been something that showed in his face when he looked at my scars; something hungry, dark and lustful that made my skin crawl. The monster had looked out of that careful exterior and I did not want to be around if he ever let it loose. Everyone else in the chamber fell quickly into silence. Maybe I wasn’t the only one that he scared.
He set down his champagne flute, the remnants of something darker, thicker than wine still clinging to the glass. “It is time to present St Louis with our gifts.” His English was good, but he still put a French inflection on St Louis, so it came out as ‘San Louie’.
He waved to a couple pommes de sang, who dragged forward a large wooden box. It had been sitting against the wall, out of the way for most of the night. I’d just assumed that it was something Jean-Claude didn’t have time to clear out before the celebrations.
The box was set down in front of Jean-Claude with a dull thud. I’d made a mistake. It wasn’t a box. It was a coffin. Holy crap.
One of the pomme de sang, a small blond woman in a filmy white dress that now had a few dark red spots speckling it, undid the locks while the other pulled back the lid. Then they scampered back to rejoin the council entourage.
Inside the coffin, amongst the packing cloth, were three boxes. One was long and wide and took up nearly half of the interior. The second was about the same size and shape as my stepmother’s jewellery box. It was plated in silver, the exquisite scrollwork gleaming in the candlelight. The third was small and reasonably plain, the kind of box that would go with a necklace or an expensive pen.
Gabriel made his way around the banquet table, not in any kind of hurry. I wondered if there had been a gun to his head, if he still would have moved at that careful, deliberate pace. He bent and took out the largest box by a handle on the side and set it on the table. The clasps clicked quietly open. “For Jean-Claude, the Master of the City.” He said with a small smile playing on his lips. “A little something to show that we haven’t forgotten you,” he added as he pulled back the lid.
The lining was as blue as Jean-Claude’s eyes, so dark it was almost black. An assortment of whips were set carefully in place, ranging from riding crop and switch, to the coils of a bull whip held in place with straps. I grew cold as I recognised a cat o’ nine tails. It was tipped with vicious silver hooks and barbs.
I glanced to Jean-Claude. His face was unreadable as he gazed at the ‘gift’, but that told me enough. He was doing his best to hide what he was feeling, so I could only guess what was going on behind that calm exterior. I wanted to pull him away and kiss him back to life, wrap myself around him so that there was just him and me in the world and there was no need to pretend. I wanted to scream on his behalf at the insulting present. I wanted to take out my cross and shove it in Gabriel’s all-too-perfect face and make him scream as my faith seared his flesh.
I looked back at the council vampire, at the cruel curve of lips as he moved back to the coffin. Naw, he’d probably enjoy getting burned. He took out the silver box and advanced on Asher. If this next present was in a similar vein to Jean-Claude’s…my fingers clenched tight in my skirt, my knuckles turning white.
“For Asher, second in command,” Gabriel said with a short nod. It was the closest thing to respect that I had seen him give anyone. “I think you will be pleased with this.”
Asher took the silver box with a wary look. He traced his fingers over the design on the lid – I could make out the form of Judas hanging from a tree, his bowels spilling down to the ground – before he opened it. A low hiss came through his teeth as what little colour he had drained away. The box fell from his hands and clattered loudly on the floor. A couple of stained, white collars – the kind that priests wear – tipped out onto the ground, a rosary spilling past. The tiny cross flared bright for a moment, then turned a dull, angry red.
“It took a while to hunt down the Inquisitors.” Gabriel’s smile grew. “We thought you might appreciate the souvenirs.”
Souvenirs? Those were freaking trophies. I couldn’t decide which was worse; that someone had hunted down the priests that had burned Julianna and scarred Asher, or that someone had these macabre tokens just sitting about for hundreds of years, waiting for the right moment to give to the vampire.
My mind reeled as I started to pull up my skirt. I wanted my knife. If I had my Browning, Gabriel’s head would have resembled a smashed melon. The knife was better than nothing.
Ma petite. Jean-Claude’s voice was cool and calm inside my skull. Stay your hand, they have not broken truce!
Not broken…? I wanted to scream at him. How could he just stand there like this was okay? This was exactly what I’d been dreading. I knew the council’s behaviour had been too squeaky clean, and now I knew why. They’d been waiting to deliver this blow. I don’t think it could have been any more devastating or personal if they tried.
My gaze jumped back to the coffin. There was one box left.
Gabriel picked out the last box and moved toward me. My hands were tight fists, balled into the fabric of my skirt, my teeth clenched so tight that my jaw was starting to ache. If he said anything to me, I was going to explode. Truce be damned.
“And for the Mademoiselle Blake, The Executioner.” He gave me that polite nod and offered the box to me.
“You open it.” I whispered, not trusting my voice.
“As you wish.” He nodded again as he flicked the lid back.
Paper rested against red satin. The paper was yellowed with age, and a slight musty smell tickled my nostrils. My name was written in big, black calligraphy over a blood red wax seal. The image imprinted in the wax was a snake swallowing its own tail.
“You read it.” I told him.
He shook his head. “Non. This is for you, Mademoiselle Blake.”
“I don’t want it.” I backed up a step.
“You would insult me by refusing this gift?” He didn’t sound insulted, far from it. He was amused. I wondered if he could taste my outrage.
Ma petite, careful. Jean-Claude warned me silently.
I shook my head as I looked over at him. Don’t make me take this.
You are better than this, Anita. He used my name to let me know how serious this was. Accept this one thing to show them.
I can’t, Jean-Claude, I can’t! They can’t do this to you, to Asher, to me!
Anita, please, for me, for Asher.
“Mademoiselle Blake?” Gabriel asked quietly, looking concerned. I shook my head at him again.
“Fine!” I hissed. It took conscious effort to unclench my fingers from my skirt and force myself to move back toward him. He stood there, still and lovely as a statue, like he could offer me that box forever. For all I knew, he could.
My hands were shaking as I reached for the letter. The paper was thick and rough around the edges. I started back as Gabriel snapped the box closed with one hand as he tucked his other hand into the small of his back. He watched me with that same dark, hungry look as before.
Gooseflesh flowed over my skin as I traced the seal with a fingertip, feeling the impressions in the wax. The seal cracked loudly as I broke it to unfold the paper. I stared at the letter. It was done in gorgeous calligraphy with illuminated letters. About the only thing I could make out was my name and a couple of words in French. Down the bottom were signatures. Belle Morte was written in the floury, ever-so-feminine writing. Cold sweat slid down my spine as I counted the others. Five, in total; one for each member of council.
“I…I can’t read this.” I stammered, my tongue suddenly dry. “It’s in French.”
“It is an order of arrest.” Gabriel replied. “Put simply, we are to escort you back to Paris to stand trial and execution.”
“Wait a minute,” I glared up at him, my anger pushing aside my disbelief. “You can’t arrest me.”
“But we can. We have council authority.” He nodded to the letter in my hands.
“I haven’t broken any of your damned council laws!” My voice crept up in volume until I was nearly shouting at him. “I’ve been playing by your rules! You have no right to barge in here and say that you can arrest me!”
“You refuse to comply with the terms of the order of arrest?” He tilted his head to one side, unfazed by my temper starting to unravel.
Anita, Jean-Claude silently warned me. I ignored him, too angry and upset.
“Damned right!” I yelled. “I haven’t done anything wrong!”
“So be it.” Gabriel nodded politely. “Un moment.” He set down the box beside the whips and reached into his coat to pull out a slim cell phone. Most of the older vamps had technophobia, I guess he wasn’t one of them. He pushed a couple of buttons and raised the phone to his ear. “Oui. Go.” He snapped the phone shut and tucked it back into his jacket.
I blinked, suddenly unsure of what had just happened. “What…was that?”
“In the event of your refusal to comply with the order of arrest, we are charged with the task of replacing the Master of the City.” He said. He was cool, calm, annoyingly polite, but that dark pleasure remained in his eyes. This was just business, but he was enjoying his job.
My temper came flaring back. “Now wait a minute, you can’t kill Jean-Claude,”
Gabriel raised one pale hand. “Non. No waiting, no bargaining. It is clear that he cannot control you, and thus is unfit to rule this city. The council has spoken.”
“Wait, wait! What if…” I growled through my teeth. “I agree to the order?”
“Too late.” He spread his hands helplessly.
“No, no, no! You get back on that phone and call off whatever it was!” I shouted and started toward him. The swish of skirts undermined whatever look of bad ass that I managed. It was reflected in the look of amusement that crossed Gabriel’s face.
“No.” The one word was stern and harsh.
“Dammit! DO IT!” I screamed at him and grappled with my skirt to try and get to my knife.
“No.” He repeated the word, and with it came a push of power. My dress tore as invisible claws raked the fabric. I could feel something scratch over my skin. I looked down at my left arm and saw lines of bright red blood. What the hell? “It’s not a word you hear very often, is it Mademoiselle Blake? Someone refusing your will?”
I blinked, the sudden sting from the cuts on my arm jarred me out of my momentary shock. I really needed my knife.
“Understand this,” he moved around me in a slow circle. “You are not the authority you think you are.”
“And you are?” I hissed as my fingers brushed against my thigh sheath.
“Oui.”
I carefully slipped my knife free and prayed that he wouldn’t guess what I was doing. I wanted to surprise him with a knife to the chest. “Bullshit! That’s the same arrogant crap I get from every vamp over two hundred.”
“And this is the same arrogance I get from every necromancer that gets too big for her boots.” He threw back the retort, mimicking my tone.
My anger went from white hot to deadly cold. All my emotions became a fuzzy white noise inside my head. This was the place I went to when I killed. I used to be afraid of it, but now I welcomed it. I glanced over my shoulder to see where he was standing. Not too close, for all his snippy remarks. I got myself into a crouch, the muscles in my legs bunching, aching for release.
He folded his hands in front of him and calmly watched me. “So if you’re quite done with your tantrum, we can all best be getting on with things.”
I screamed wordlessly as I sprang up and flung out my hand, throwing the knife with everything I had at his chest. I wanted a killing blow. He was probably too old for it to be fatal, but it would at least slow him down. Long enough to kill him, perhaps.
His hand was a pale blur as he reached up and plucked the knife out of the air, just inches from his ribs. He turned his hold and whipped his arm out and back.
“NO!!!” I screamed and tried to fling myself forward but it was too little, too late. I wasn’t fast enough.
The knife plunged into Jean-Claude’s chest.
An explosion of pain ripped through me as I could feel the blade sink into my flesh, cracking ribs on its journey to my heart. I fell to my knees, screaming. In my head, I could hear Richard howling as he collapsed to the ground.
Crack. Gabriel twisted the knife.
The world went hazy and I could taste blood, Jean-Claude’s blood, on my lips. I could feel his heart flutter wildly, more pain crashing over me like waves.
Je regret, ma petite. I wasn’t sure if he said it out loud or if he whispered it in my mind. Jean-Claude cut me off from the marks as his eyes rolled up in his head and darkness flooded through me.
Word Count: 3,200
Spoilers: None.
Part: 1/3
Summary: Rocks fall, everyone dies.
A/N: This is my end-game fantasy that I wish would take place instead of NiC onward. And thank heavens for RPGs. And for the purposes of Awesome, let’s assume that the Anitaverse has the best mobile phone coverage that’s ever existed.
I tried to figure out where to cut it off for a "cinematic" release, but I'm afraid you're stuck with the Director's Cut.
Disclaimer: All things AB:VH belong to LKH. I’m just playing there, and I brought a bunch of my own characters with me. Gabriel is mine, all mine, yes he is my preciousss…MUAH HA HA HA!
Something was wrong. Very wrong. When the council came to town for the third time, they played by the rules. They turned up on time – not early, not unannounced – they didn’t complain about their rooms or the guards posted outside, they didn’t hunt the citizens of St Louis, and they hadn’t pulled any of their usual arrogant superiority crap. Past experience has taught me that nothing goes this well without something bad waiting to happen.
Tonight was some fancy-to-do in honour of our guests. I was dreading it, not just because I was jumpy about all the things that could go wrong – but because Jean-Claude had picked out my dress. For a man that has been around women for so long, he had no concept of comfort. I’m a busty woman, but put me in a corset and I’m suddenly a ship in full sail. I don’t like having to lean forward to try and see my feet.
The dress was also impractical for carrying weapons. All I could carry was a knife in a thigh sheath. The corset saw to that. I was stuck with one knife and hated it as much as I hated the long, flowing skirts that whispered every time I moved. I had one cross on me, on a long chain so that the crucifix was nestled between my breasts, out of sight. Jean-Claude thought it was bad form for me to wear my cross charm bracelet at a party for vampires. Whether it was or not, I would have felt better.
I don’t know how women managed back when corsets were they hight of haute couture – I had only been wearing this thing a few hours and still hadn’t quite gotten used to how it limiting it was. I had to relearn how to breathe and walk.
“Ma petite,” Jean-Claude murmured, warm and low, in my ear. “You are scowling again.”
“If you’re asking me to smile, it’s a bit much.” I sounded as bitter as I felt as I looked around him. He’d gone all out in the Circus underground. The massive chamber, where Musette’s party had disastrously wrong, had been given a makeover. Candles and torches gave it a gentle glowing hue, while the table settings probably cost more than a year’s worth of my salary. Everyone had…eaten…and we’d all moved onto the small talk and schmoozing phase. “I feel naked without my guns.”
Even though his face was carefully schooled to reveal nothing, something warm and bright slid through his deep blue eyes. “Then look at it this way, ma petite, that it could be worse. You really could be naked.”
I glared and wondered if it was bad form to punch your main sweetie in public, and in front of your other sweeties.
His eyes grew shiny with the effort of quashing his laughter as he raised my hand to his mouth. His lips were warm and soft, lingering on my skin longer than was prudent. But the kiss promised me so much. Suddenly, I wanted this party to be over so I could have his mouth linger on other parts of my body.
“Dammit, Jean-Claude!” I said through clenched teeth as I felt heat flush through my face.
He arched his brows and drew back from my hand, giving me an innocent look. “Oui, ma petite?”
“How am I supposed to concentrate if you’re going to do things like that?” I hissed and glanced to the crowd, nodding toward the first of our ‘guests’ that I could see. He wasn’t all that hard to find in the crowd – dressed totally in black, the council representative was an inky stain on the cheerful surrounds.
Jean-Claude sighed, his amusement quickly folding back beneath his pleasant mask, set aside for another time. “There is no reason why you cannot be vigilant and enjoy yourself at the same time.”
“Easy for you to say, you get to wear pants.” I growled and bunched my fists into my skirt. I was paranoid about tripping over and falling flat on my face, and because of the corset, I wouldn’t be able to get up. I’d be a mess of petticoats and skirts on the floor. Not a great look for the vampire hunter they called The Executioner.
He smiled at me and gave me that Gallic shrug. “The night is still young, ma petite.”
The heat rushed back through my face. Suddenly I understood why women used to carry fans with them.
The musical clink of a champagne glass drew my thoughts out of the gutter. “May I have everyone’s attention?” one of the representatives for Morte d’Amour raised his voice over the loud murmur of the crowd. The rush of warmth Jean-Claude had raised in me suddenly vanished with a shiver. Gabriel had scared the hell out of me during our introductions. He was old enough to make my teeth swim, and so polite it was nearly painful. But there had been something that showed in his face when he looked at my scars; something hungry, dark and lustful that made my skin crawl. The monster had looked out of that careful exterior and I did not want to be around if he ever let it loose. Everyone else in the chamber fell quickly into silence. Maybe I wasn’t the only one that he scared.
He set down his champagne flute, the remnants of something darker, thicker than wine still clinging to the glass. “It is time to present St Louis with our gifts.” His English was good, but he still put a French inflection on St Louis, so it came out as ‘San Louie’.
He waved to a couple pommes de sang, who dragged forward a large wooden box. It had been sitting against the wall, out of the way for most of the night. I’d just assumed that it was something Jean-Claude didn’t have time to clear out before the celebrations.
The box was set down in front of Jean-Claude with a dull thud. I’d made a mistake. It wasn’t a box. It was a coffin. Holy crap.
One of the pomme de sang, a small blond woman in a filmy white dress that now had a few dark red spots speckling it, undid the locks while the other pulled back the lid. Then they scampered back to rejoin the council entourage.
Inside the coffin, amongst the packing cloth, were three boxes. One was long and wide and took up nearly half of the interior. The second was about the same size and shape as my stepmother’s jewellery box. It was plated in silver, the exquisite scrollwork gleaming in the candlelight. The third was small and reasonably plain, the kind of box that would go with a necklace or an expensive pen.
Gabriel made his way around the banquet table, not in any kind of hurry. I wondered if there had been a gun to his head, if he still would have moved at that careful, deliberate pace. He bent and took out the largest box by a handle on the side and set it on the table. The clasps clicked quietly open. “For Jean-Claude, the Master of the City.” He said with a small smile playing on his lips. “A little something to show that we haven’t forgotten you,” he added as he pulled back the lid.
The lining was as blue as Jean-Claude’s eyes, so dark it was almost black. An assortment of whips were set carefully in place, ranging from riding crop and switch, to the coils of a bull whip held in place with straps. I grew cold as I recognised a cat o’ nine tails. It was tipped with vicious silver hooks and barbs.
I glanced to Jean-Claude. His face was unreadable as he gazed at the ‘gift’, but that told me enough. He was doing his best to hide what he was feeling, so I could only guess what was going on behind that calm exterior. I wanted to pull him away and kiss him back to life, wrap myself around him so that there was just him and me in the world and there was no need to pretend. I wanted to scream on his behalf at the insulting present. I wanted to take out my cross and shove it in Gabriel’s all-too-perfect face and make him scream as my faith seared his flesh.
I looked back at the council vampire, at the cruel curve of lips as he moved back to the coffin. Naw, he’d probably enjoy getting burned. He took out the silver box and advanced on Asher. If this next present was in a similar vein to Jean-Claude’s…my fingers clenched tight in my skirt, my knuckles turning white.
“For Asher, second in command,” Gabriel said with a short nod. It was the closest thing to respect that I had seen him give anyone. “I think you will be pleased with this.”
Asher took the silver box with a wary look. He traced his fingers over the design on the lid – I could make out the form of Judas hanging from a tree, his bowels spilling down to the ground – before he opened it. A low hiss came through his teeth as what little colour he had drained away. The box fell from his hands and clattered loudly on the floor. A couple of stained, white collars – the kind that priests wear – tipped out onto the ground, a rosary spilling past. The tiny cross flared bright for a moment, then turned a dull, angry red.
“It took a while to hunt down the Inquisitors.” Gabriel’s smile grew. “We thought you might appreciate the souvenirs.”
Souvenirs? Those were freaking trophies. I couldn’t decide which was worse; that someone had hunted down the priests that had burned Julianna and scarred Asher, or that someone had these macabre tokens just sitting about for hundreds of years, waiting for the right moment to give to the vampire.
My mind reeled as I started to pull up my skirt. I wanted my knife. If I had my Browning, Gabriel’s head would have resembled a smashed melon. The knife was better than nothing.
Ma petite. Jean-Claude’s voice was cool and calm inside my skull. Stay your hand, they have not broken truce!
Not broken…? I wanted to scream at him. How could he just stand there like this was okay? This was exactly what I’d been dreading. I knew the council’s behaviour had been too squeaky clean, and now I knew why. They’d been waiting to deliver this blow. I don’t think it could have been any more devastating or personal if they tried.
My gaze jumped back to the coffin. There was one box left.
Gabriel picked out the last box and moved toward me. My hands were tight fists, balled into the fabric of my skirt, my teeth clenched so tight that my jaw was starting to ache. If he said anything to me, I was going to explode. Truce be damned.
“And for the Mademoiselle Blake, The Executioner.” He gave me that polite nod and offered the box to me.
“You open it.” I whispered, not trusting my voice.
“As you wish.” He nodded again as he flicked the lid back.
Paper rested against red satin. The paper was yellowed with age, and a slight musty smell tickled my nostrils. My name was written in big, black calligraphy over a blood red wax seal. The image imprinted in the wax was a snake swallowing its own tail.
“You read it.” I told him.
He shook his head. “Non. This is for you, Mademoiselle Blake.”
“I don’t want it.” I backed up a step.
“You would insult me by refusing this gift?” He didn’t sound insulted, far from it. He was amused. I wondered if he could taste my outrage.
Ma petite, careful. Jean-Claude warned me silently.
I shook my head as I looked over at him. Don’t make me take this.
You are better than this, Anita. He used my name to let me know how serious this was. Accept this one thing to show them.
I can’t, Jean-Claude, I can’t! They can’t do this to you, to Asher, to me!
Anita, please, for me, for Asher.
“Mademoiselle Blake?” Gabriel asked quietly, looking concerned. I shook my head at him again.
“Fine!” I hissed. It took conscious effort to unclench my fingers from my skirt and force myself to move back toward him. He stood there, still and lovely as a statue, like he could offer me that box forever. For all I knew, he could.
My hands were shaking as I reached for the letter. The paper was thick and rough around the edges. I started back as Gabriel snapped the box closed with one hand as he tucked his other hand into the small of his back. He watched me with that same dark, hungry look as before.
Gooseflesh flowed over my skin as I traced the seal with a fingertip, feeling the impressions in the wax. The seal cracked loudly as I broke it to unfold the paper. I stared at the letter. It was done in gorgeous calligraphy with illuminated letters. About the only thing I could make out was my name and a couple of words in French. Down the bottom were signatures. Belle Morte was written in the floury, ever-so-feminine writing. Cold sweat slid down my spine as I counted the others. Five, in total; one for each member of council.
“I…I can’t read this.” I stammered, my tongue suddenly dry. “It’s in French.”
“It is an order of arrest.” Gabriel replied. “Put simply, we are to escort you back to Paris to stand trial and execution.”
“Wait a minute,” I glared up at him, my anger pushing aside my disbelief. “You can’t arrest me.”
“But we can. We have council authority.” He nodded to the letter in my hands.
“I haven’t broken any of your damned council laws!” My voice crept up in volume until I was nearly shouting at him. “I’ve been playing by your rules! You have no right to barge in here and say that you can arrest me!”
“You refuse to comply with the terms of the order of arrest?” He tilted his head to one side, unfazed by my temper starting to unravel.
Anita, Jean-Claude silently warned me. I ignored him, too angry and upset.
“Damned right!” I yelled. “I haven’t done anything wrong!”
“So be it.” Gabriel nodded politely. “Un moment.” He set down the box beside the whips and reached into his coat to pull out a slim cell phone. Most of the older vamps had technophobia, I guess he wasn’t one of them. He pushed a couple of buttons and raised the phone to his ear. “Oui. Go.” He snapped the phone shut and tucked it back into his jacket.
I blinked, suddenly unsure of what had just happened. “What…was that?”
“In the event of your refusal to comply with the order of arrest, we are charged with the task of replacing the Master of the City.” He said. He was cool, calm, annoyingly polite, but that dark pleasure remained in his eyes. This was just business, but he was enjoying his job.
My temper came flaring back. “Now wait a minute, you can’t kill Jean-Claude,”
Gabriel raised one pale hand. “Non. No waiting, no bargaining. It is clear that he cannot control you, and thus is unfit to rule this city. The council has spoken.”
“Wait, wait! What if…” I growled through my teeth. “I agree to the order?”
“Too late.” He spread his hands helplessly.
“No, no, no! You get back on that phone and call off whatever it was!” I shouted and started toward him. The swish of skirts undermined whatever look of bad ass that I managed. It was reflected in the look of amusement that crossed Gabriel’s face.
“No.” The one word was stern and harsh.
“Dammit! DO IT!” I screamed at him and grappled with my skirt to try and get to my knife.
“No.” He repeated the word, and with it came a push of power. My dress tore as invisible claws raked the fabric. I could feel something scratch over my skin. I looked down at my left arm and saw lines of bright red blood. What the hell? “It’s not a word you hear very often, is it Mademoiselle Blake? Someone refusing your will?”
I blinked, the sudden sting from the cuts on my arm jarred me out of my momentary shock. I really needed my knife.
“Understand this,” he moved around me in a slow circle. “You are not the authority you think you are.”
“And you are?” I hissed as my fingers brushed against my thigh sheath.
“Oui.”
I carefully slipped my knife free and prayed that he wouldn’t guess what I was doing. I wanted to surprise him with a knife to the chest. “Bullshit! That’s the same arrogant crap I get from every vamp over two hundred.”
“And this is the same arrogance I get from every necromancer that gets too big for her boots.” He threw back the retort, mimicking my tone.
My anger went from white hot to deadly cold. All my emotions became a fuzzy white noise inside my head. This was the place I went to when I killed. I used to be afraid of it, but now I welcomed it. I glanced over my shoulder to see where he was standing. Not too close, for all his snippy remarks. I got myself into a crouch, the muscles in my legs bunching, aching for release.
He folded his hands in front of him and calmly watched me. “So if you’re quite done with your tantrum, we can all best be getting on with things.”
I screamed wordlessly as I sprang up and flung out my hand, throwing the knife with everything I had at his chest. I wanted a killing blow. He was probably too old for it to be fatal, but it would at least slow him down. Long enough to kill him, perhaps.
His hand was a pale blur as he reached up and plucked the knife out of the air, just inches from his ribs. He turned his hold and whipped his arm out and back.
“NO!!!” I screamed and tried to fling myself forward but it was too little, too late. I wasn’t fast enough.
The knife plunged into Jean-Claude’s chest.
An explosion of pain ripped through me as I could feel the blade sink into my flesh, cracking ribs on its journey to my heart. I fell to my knees, screaming. In my head, I could hear Richard howling as he collapsed to the ground.
Crack. Gabriel twisted the knife.
The world went hazy and I could taste blood, Jean-Claude’s blood, on my lips. I could feel his heart flutter wildly, more pain crashing over me like waves.
Je regret, ma petite. I wasn’t sure if he said it out loud or if he whispered it in my mind. Jean-Claude cut me off from the marks as his eyes rolled up in his head and darkness flooded through me.
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Date: 2006-05-10 01:28 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-10 01:36 am (UTC)So, *gushes* THANKYOUSOMUCHOMG! *hugs*
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Date: 2006-05-10 02:00 am (UTC)I enjoyed the few minutes of old school Anita and JC when they remembered what sexual tension was. Thanks for sharing!
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Date: 2006-05-10 03:59 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-10 02:04 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-10 04:01 pm (UTC)It took me aaages to get into some kinda groove that wasn't eyesporkingly ID. *bleaches brain after Melanie!death*
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Date: 2006-05-10 02:06 am (UTC)I especially liked this description. But there had been something that showed in his face when he looked at my scars; something hungry, dark and lustful that made my skin crawl. The monster had looked out of that careful exterior and I did not want to be around if he ever let it loose. Everyone else in the chamber fell quickly into silence. Maybe I wasn’t the only one that he scared.
Have you written more about Gabriel?
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Date: 2006-05-10 04:04 pm (UTC)I love playing the villain. *hearts Team Evil*
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Date: 2006-05-10 04:08 pm (UTC)Dammit. Now I'm getting another plotbunny to just have Morte show up in St Louis and lay the smackdown. *headdesk*
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Date: 2006-05-10 03:35 am (UTC)Laurell K Hamilton <
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Date: 2006-05-10 04:11 pm (UTC)*happy dance*
I am filled with writerly pride.
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Date: 2006-05-10 04:48 pm (UTC)Man, I love Gabe.
Did he bring The Boy?
-Dira-
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Date: 2006-05-10 05:24 pm (UTC)Hint: he flitted through the background.
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Date: 2006-05-10 06:11 pm (UTC)-Dira-
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Date: 2006-05-10 06:26 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-10 08:34 pm (UTC)-Dira-
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Date: 2006-05-10 08:43 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-11 08:20 pm (UTC)-Dira-
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Date: 2006-05-10 07:05 pm (UTC)And definitely Go Team Evil! I used to play an rpg where I was engaged to the most evil character in the game. Just for amusement, I dressed up as a "Team Evil" cheerleader and you should have seen his eyes bug.
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Date: 2006-05-10 07:23 pm (UTC)But thankyou! *bes so happy she can get Anita-voice down*
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Date: 2006-05-10 08:33 pm (UTC)-Dira-
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Date: 2006-05-10 08:36 pm (UTC)UNCLEAN!
Rosamunda was kinda scary.
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Date: 2006-05-11 08:23 pm (UTC)I will never forget the way he popped that yahell smiley when she pulled that punchline. I'd been working up to it for what? Two dozen or more posts? Heeee.
-Dira-
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Date: 2006-05-11 03:40 am (UTC)The character I play on my current game is a bit modest and mousy, but she's tremendous fun.
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Date: 2006-05-11 08:22 pm (UTC)-Dira-
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Date: 2006-05-11 02:44 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-11 03:12 pm (UTC)