A Discovery of Witches - Deborah Harkness [42]
“Not really, no.” Standing in the fall twilight, he positively screamed vampire, yet the rising tide of undergraduates and dons passed him without a second glance. If they couldn’t sense what he was—see what he was, standing in the open air—the car was immaterial. The irritation built under my skin.
“Have I done something wrong?” His gray-green eyes were wide and guileless. He opened the car door, taking a deep breath as I slid past.
My temper flared. “Are you smelling me?” After yesterday I suspected that my body was giving him all kinds of information I didn’t want him to have.
“Don’t tempt me,” he murmured, shutting me inside. The hair on my neck rose slightly as the implication of his words sank in. He popped open the trunk and put my mat inside.
Night air filled the car as the vampire climbed in without any visible effort or moment of limb-bent awkwardness. His face creased into the semblance of a sympathetic frown. “Bad day?”
I gave him a withering glance. Clairmont knew exactly how my day had been. He and Miriam had been in Duke Humfrey’s again, keeping the other creatures out of my immediate environment. When we left to change for yoga, Miriam had remained to make sure we weren’t followed by a train of daemons—or worse.
Clairmont started the car and headed down the Woodstock Road without further attempts at small talk. There was nothing on it but houses.
“Where are we going?” I asked suspiciously.
“To yoga,” he replied calmly. “Based on your mood, I’d say you need it.”
“And where is yoga?” I demanded. We were headed out to the countryside in the direction of Blenheim.
“Have you changed your mind?” Matthew’s voice was touched with exasperation. “Should I take you back to the studio on the High Street?”
I shuddered at the memory of last night’s uninspiring class. “No.”
“Then relax. I’m not kidnapping you. It can be pleasant to let someone else take charge. Besides, it’s a surprise.”
“Hmph,” I said. He switched on the stereo system, and classical music poured from the speakers.
“Stop thinking and listen,” he commanded. “It’s impossible to be tense around Mozart.”
Hardly recognizing myself, I settled in the seat with a sigh and shut my eyes. The Jaguar’s motion was so subtle and the sounds from outside so muffled that I felt suspended above the ground, held up by invisible, musical hands.
The car slowed, and we pulled up to a set of high iron gates that even I, though practiced, couldn’t have scaled. The walls on either side were warm red brick, with irregular forms and intricate woven patterns. I sat up a little straighter.
“You can’t see it from here,” Clairmont said, laughing. He rolled down his window and punched a series of numbers into a polished keypad. A tone sounded, and the gates swung open.
Gravel crunched under the tires as we passed through another set of gates even older than the first. There was no scrolled ironwork here, just an archway spanning brick walls that were much lower than the ones facing the Woodstock Road. The archway had a tiny room on top, with windows on all sides like a lantern. To the left of the gate was a splendid brick gatehouse, with twisted chimneys and leaded windows. A small brass plaque with weathered edges read THE OLD LODGE.
“Beautiful,” I breathed.
“I thought you’d like it.” The vampire looked pleased.
Through the growing darkness, we passed into a park. A small herd of deer skittered off at the sound of the car, jumping into the protective shadows as the Jaguar’s headlights swept the grounds. We climbed a slight hill and rounded a curve in the drive. The car slowed to a crawl as we reached the top of the rise and the headlights dipped over into blackness.
“There,” Clairmont said, pointing with his left hand.
A two-story Tudor manor house was arranged around a central courtyard. Its bricks glowed in the illumination of powerful spotlights that shone up through the branches of gnarled oak trees to light the face of the building.
I was so dumbfounded that I swore. Clairmont looked at me in shock, then chuckled.
He