For Love of a Vampire

Chapter 37

It was a week since I'd convinced Duncan to speed up my recovery by giving me some of his blood. He'd hesitated for fear of Rosalie's concern of my turning vampire would occur, but he eventually gave in. I really didn't need his blood to heal. I was healing well without it, but I didn't tell him that. When I had Duncan's blood flowing through my veins all of my senses were heightened and my powers more acute. I needed all the advantage I could get for what I was about to do.

I'd managed to connect with Elizabeth's spirit. She wasn't as easy to summon as Isabelle's, but I eventually managed. My heart ached as she told me how Lady Margaret learned of her association with me and arranged to have her killed. She laughed at the irony of how she'd feared losing her life to her vampire brother instead of her human mistress. The danger of being in Rufus' company was so blatantly acute that it never dawned on her to look in other directions.

When Margaret's men approached her, she'd greeted them with warmth and friendship. They'd asked her to accompany them to the dungeon as her ladyship wished to speak with her. She went willingly.

Having lived on the estate for so long, Lady Margaret was well aware of its secret passages. It was one of these passages that her men used to escort Elizabeth into the depths of the dank dungeon where her mistress awaited. Elizabeth's eyes took some time adjusting to the darkness as she walked down the narrow passageway, but by the time she'd reached the dungeon's main chamber that glowed from the low illumination a few small torches propped near the entrance provided, she could see well enough.

They led her past several empty cells until they reached the one farthest away from the entrance. There, sitting behind bars and with both hands and feet secured in chains was a very bedraggled looking Lady Margaret Chapman. Elizabeth's mind conjured up the image of the women she and I'd been held in the cell with while awaiting the hangman and compared them to Margaret. Margaret looked far worse.

"M' lady," Elizabeth gushed as she peered through the bars, "what have they done to you?"

"Do not feign concern wench!" she hissed. "'Tis well known of your comradeship with Lord Duncan's freak from the future. You cannot have loyalty to me while consorting with the likes!"

"M' lady... I," Elizabeth was at a loss for words.

Margaret spoke truth. She had become my friend, while remaining in her employ. They'd never manifested any type of relationship, other than that of lady's maid and mistress. The fact that Margaret would have expectations of Elizabeth in that direction galled me.

Margaret proceeded to taunt Elizabeth about how she and Rufus had whipped up a plan to destroy Duncan and make me Rufus' wife for eternity. Knowing my love for Duncan was real, she was satisfied that this would be the cruelest sentence she could place on me. Far crueler than death. Then, without a morsel of remorse, she ordered her men to dispose of Elizabeth like she was no more than a bag of trash.

Before she could do anything more than gasp in shock, one of Margaret's men snapped her neck. She never knew what hit her.

Elizabeth rose above her body and watched as one of the guards carried her over his shoulder like a sack of flower, mindless of the many times her head slammed into the wall as a result of the rough gait a poorly healed leg injury created.

When they reached the edge of the witch's encampment, they dumped her body and left without looking back. She was in such shock that all she could do was hover over her lifeless corpse and stare. It was because she hadn't moved on that she was around to witness her murders returning with a scruffy looking third man. They were arguing about how Margaret had insisted they made her death look like it occurred in a manner that could not be tied to them. Margaret had aspirations of convincing the earl to forgive and release her and wanted nothing added to her case to prevent that from happening.