“You’re in dangerous territory, my love.” Matthew ran his fingers through his hair, which never failed to make him look more handsome. “I’ve told the Congregation that your status as my wife is a convenient fiction to protect you from charges of witchcraft and to keep the Berwick witch-hunts confined to Scotland.”
“But our friends and your fellow vampires know it’s more than that,” I said. A vampire’s sense of smell didn’t lie, and Matthew’s unique scent covered me. “And the witches know there’s something more to our relationship than meets even their third eye.”
“Perhaps, but Rudolf is neither a vampire nor a witch. The emperor will have been assured by his own contacts within the Congregation that there is no relationship between us. Therefore there is nothing to preclude his chasing after you.” Matthew’s fingers found my cheek. “I don’t share, Diana. And if Rudolf were to go too far . . .”
“You’d keep your temper in check.” I covered his hand with mine. “You know that I’m not going to let the Holy Roman Emperor—or anybody else, for that matter—seduce me. We need Ashmole 782. Who cares if Rudolf stares at my breasts?”
“Staring I can handle.” Matthew kissed me. “There’s something else you should know before you go off to thank the emperor. The Congregation has fed Rudolf’s appetites for women and curiosities for some time as a way to win his cooperation. If the emperor wishes to have you and takes the matter to the other eight members, their judgment won’t be in our favor. The Congregation will turn you over to him because they cannot afford to have Prague fall into the hands of men like the archbishop of Trier and his Jesuit friends. And they don’t want Rudolf to become another King James, out for creatures’ blood. Prague may appear to be an oasis for the otherworldly. But like all oases, its refuge is a mirage.”
“I understand,” I said. Why did everything touching Matthew have to be so snarled? Our lives reminded me of the knotted cords in my spell box. No matter how many times I picked them apart, they soon tangled again.
Matthew released me. “When you go to the palace, take Gallowglass with you.”
“You’re not coming?” Given his concerns, I was shocked that Matthew was going to let me out of his sight.
“No. The more Rudolf sees us together, the more active his imagination and his acquisitiveness will become. And Gallowglass just may be able to wheedle his way in to Kelley’s laboratory. My nephew is far more charming than I am.” Matthew grinned, but the expression did nothing to alleviate the darkness in his eyes.
Gallowglass insisted he had a plan, one that would keep me from having to speak to Rudolf privately yet would display my gratitude publicly. It wasn’t until I heard the bells ringing the hour of three that I caught my first glimmer of what his plan might entail. The crush of people trying to enter St. Vitus Cathedral through the pointed arches of the side entrance confirmed it.
“There goes Sigismund,” Gallowglass said, bending close to my ear. The noise from the bells was deafening, and I could barely hear him. When I looked at him in confusion, he pointed up, to a golden grille on the adjacent steeple. “Sigismund. The big bell. That’s how you know you’re in Prague.”
St. Vitus Cathedral was textbook Gothic with its flying buttresses and needlelike pinnacles. On a dark winter afternoon, it was even more so. The candles inside were blazing, but in the vast expanse of the cathedral they provided nothing more than pinpricks of yellow in the gloom. Outside, the light had faded so much that the colorful stained glass and vivid frescoes were of minimal help in lifting the oppressively heavy atmosphere. Gallowglass carefully stationed us under a brace of torches.
“Give your disguising spell a good shake,” he suggested. “It’s so dark in here that Rudolf might miss you.”
“Are you telling me to get shiny?” I gave him my most repressive schoolmarm expression. His only reply was a grin.
We waited for Mass to begin with an interesting assortment of humble palace staff, royal officials, and aristocrats. Some of the artisans still bore the stains and singes associated with their work, and most of them looked exhausted. Once I’d surveyed the crowd, I looked up to take in the size and style of the cathedral.
“That’s a whole lot of vaulting,” I murmured. The ribbing was far more complicated than in most Gothic churches in England.
“That’s what happens when Matthew gets an idea in his head,” Gallowglass commented.