The Black Rose Chronicles by Linda Lael Miller

Author:Linda Lael Miller [Lael Miller, Linda]
Language: eng
Format: azw3, epub
ISBN: 9781647343378
Publisher: City Lights Press
Published: 2020-06-16T16:00:00+00:00

42

Valerian

Las Vegas, 1995

She was there.

Even before I walked onstage that fateful night, to regale the baffled masses with my illusions, I felt her presence in the grand showroom of the Venetian Hotel. The knowledge that she was nearby left me so shaken that I could barely concentrate on the performance. Brenna. Dear God, my Brenna…

My lusty Elisabeth. And sweet, fragile Jenny. And Harmony. And Sarah.

But of course she had a new identity now, and those other names, all of which had been her own at one time or another, would mean nothing to her. Nor would I, I was certain.

I’d be lying—not that I’ve ever hesitated to bend the truth should it serve my purpose to do so—if I said I took no joy in the prospect of another encounter with my elusive beloved. Just the thought of speaking to her again, of touching her, was rapture, but there was fear, too, and I already felt the weight of the sorrow that would inevitably follow any bliss we might share.

For my darling and me, the story, played out over and over on the stage of six centuries, had never had a happy ending. Not once.

Invariably, except in her first incarnation, the ruby ring had arrived, out of nowhere, a mysterious thing of splendor and antiquity, and precisely a fortnight later I had been bereaved again. And always, try though I did to discover who had sent that glittering jewel, and with it the curse, the thing vanished while I was caught up in my mourning. The tragic puzzle was no closer to solution that night, when I found Brenna once more, than it had ever been.

I used my powers to hold her in her seat, there in that large and otherwise anonymous audience, sensing her desire to bolt as well as her fascination with my legerdemain, but even after the carriage trick had been completed and all the others had straggled out, I lingered backstage.

I remember wishing I could simply walk away—each time I found her, I entertained that same futile notion, of course—but I am neither fine nor noble enough to make such a sacrifice. I was starved for the sight and sound and feel of her, just as I had always been. It would have been easier to forgo the taking of blood than to turn my back on that particular woman.

So it was that I stood in the wings as the silence lengthened in that great room, watching her fidget at her table, seeing the shadows play in her coppery hair, for some fifteen minutes before one of the dancing girls appeared at my side. Her name was Jillie, and she was still wearing her delectably inadequate costume.

I do enjoy the many and varied facets of my work.

“Someone you know?” she asked with a slight edge of envy to her voice. Jillie was more than passing-curious about me, and I suspect she saw me as a romantic challenge. Being older, to say the least, and infinitely wiser,

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