A Discovery of Witches(160)

He hadn’t spoken or written the words for ages, but Matthew remembered each one perfectly. The Knights of Lazarus were in his blood, just as Diana was. Long-unused muscles flexed deep within him, and talents that had grown rusty began to sharpen.

“The Knights don’t come to their master’s aid because of a love affair gone wrong, Matthew. We fought at the Battle of Acre. We helped the Albigensian heretics resist the northerners. We survived the demise of the Templars and the English advances at Crécy and Agincourt. The Knights of Lazarus were on the ships that beat back the Ottoman Empire at Lepanto, and when we refused to fight any further, the Thirty Years’ War came to an end. The brotherhood’s purpose is to ensure that vampires survive in a world dominated by humans.”

“We started out protecting those who could not protect themselves, Baldwin. Our heroic reputation was simply an unexpected by-product of that mission.”

“Father should never have passed the order on to you when he died. You’re a soldier—and an idealist—not a commander. You don’t have the stomach to make the difficult decisions.” Baldwin’s scorn for his brother was clear from his words, but his eyes were worried.

“Diana came to me seeking protection from her own people. I will see to it that she gets it—just as the Knights protected the citizens of Jerusalem, and Germany, and Occitania when they were under threat.”

“No one will believe that this isn’t personal, any more than they would have believed it in 1944. Then you said no.”

“I was wrong.”

Baldwin looked shocked.

Matthew drew a long, shuddering breath. “Once we would have responded immediately to such an outrage and to hell with the consequences. But a fear of divulging the family’s secrets and a reluctance to raise the Congregation’s ire held me back. This only encouraged our enemies to strike at this family again, and I won’t make the same mistake where Diana is concerned. The witches will stop at nothing to learn about her power. They’ve invaded our home and snatched one of their own. It’s worse than what they did to Philippe. In the witches’ eyes, he was only a vampire. By taking Diana they’ve gone too far.”

As Baldwin considered his brother’s words, Matthew’s anxiety grew more acute.

“Diana.” Ysabeau brought Baldwin back to the matter at hand.

Baldwin nodded, once.

“Thank you,” Matthew said simply. “A witch grabbed her straight up and out of the garden. Any clues there might have been about the direction they took were gone by the time we discovered she was missing.” He pulled a creased map from his pocket. “Here is where we still need to search.”

Baldwin looked at the areas that Ysabeau and his brother had already covered and the wide swaths of countryside that remained. “You’ve been searching all these places since she was taken?”

Matthew nodded. “Of course.”

Baldwin couldn’t conceal his irritation. “Matthew, will you never learn to stop and think before you act? Show me the garden.”

Matthew and Baldwin went outdoors, leaving Marthe and Ysabeau inside so that their scents wouldn’t obscure any faint traces of Diana. When the two were gone, Ysabeau began to shake from head to toe.

“It is too much, Marthe. If they have harmed her—”

“We have always known, you and I, that a day like this was coming.” Marthe put a compassionate hand on her mistress’s shoulder, then walked into the kitchens, leaving Ysabeau sitting pensively by the cold hearth.

In the garden Baldwin turned his preternaturally sharp eyes to the ground, where an apple lay next to a billowing patch of rue. Ysabeau had wisely insisted that they leave the fruit where they’d found it. Its location helped Baldwin see what his brother had not. The stems on the rue were slightly bent and led to another patch of herbs with ruffled leaves, then another.

“Which way was the wind blowing?” Baldwin’s imagination was caught already.

“From the west,” Matthew replied, trying to see what Baldwin was tracking. He gave up with a frustrated sigh. “This is taking too much time. We should split up. We can cover more ground that way. I’ll go through the caves again.”

“She won’t be in the caves,” Baldwin said, straightening his knees and brushing the scent of herbs from his hands. “Vampires use the caves, not witches. Besides, they went south.”

“South? There’s nothing to the south.”

“Not anymore,” Baldwin agreed. “But there must be something there, or the witch wouldn’t have gone in that direction. We’ll ask Ysabeau.”

One reason the de Clermont family was so long-lived was that each member had different skills in a crisis. Philippe had always been the leader of men, a charismatic figure who could convince vampires and humans and sometimes even daemons to fight for a common cause. Their brother Hugh had been the negotiator, bringing warring sides to the bargaining table and resolving even the fiercest of conflicts. Godfrey, the youngest of Philippe’s three sons, had been their conscience, teasing out the ethical implications of every decision. To Baldwin fell the battle strategies, his sharp mind quick to analyze every plan for flaws and weaknesses. Louisa had been useful as bait or as a spy, depending on the situation.

Matthew, improbably enough, had been the family’s fiercest warrior. His early adventures with the sword had made his father wild with their lack of discipline, but he’d changed. Now whenever Matthew held a weapon in his hand, something in him went cold and he fought his way through obstacles with a tenacity that made him unbeatable.