On a Darkling Plain by Unknown Author Read Free Book Online Page A

years ago.”
    “Of course,” the physician said with a cursory smile, “at the party in the Louvre. I remember.”
    “How is the prince?” Elliott asked.
    Potter frowned. “Let’s talk outside.”
    “That’s right, get out of my sight!” Roger raved. “Plot against me behind my back! It doesn’t matter — I’ll get free and kill you all!”
    His heart heavy, Elliott escorted Potter out of the room and down the painting-lined corridor far enough that, if they spoke softly, even Roger’s hypersensitive hearing shouldn't be able to eavesdrop on their conversation. Lazio trailed along behind them. Potter stared at the dresser coldly for a moment, as if displeased that the human had followed them unbidden.
    “All right,” said Elliott to Potter, “what’s wrong with him?”
    “He’s paranoid, agitated, delusional, hostile, assaultive, and has a compulsion to engage in self-mutilatory behavior.” To Elliott’s annoyance, Potter’s sing-song delivery sounded as if he were reading from a psychiatric textbook, not describing a patient about whom he was supposed to be deeply concerned.
    “Yes,” the Toreador said, “but why?”
    “I don’t know,” the physician said, frowning. “It’s a pity I couldn’t have seen him closer to the onset of the illness.” “We called you the night he got sick!” Lazio exclaimed. Potter glared at Lazio. For an instant, Elliott was afraid that the vampire physician would strike the human down for what he manifestly considered an insolent outburst. The
    Toreador had observed that Caitiff often lorded it over mortal servants in the most arrogant manner imaginable. Perhaps it was the clanless vampires’ way of compensating for feelings of inferiority.
    Elliott reflexively lifted his hand to restrain his fellow undead. But Potter seemed to recall that he wasn’t standing in his own home, about to chastise one of his personal flunkies. Some of the fury fading from his eyes, he pivoted pointedly away from Lazio and back toward Elliott. “It’s true what they say,” he remarked. “You Toreador permit your slaves too many liberties.”
    “Perhaps that is true of some Toreador,” Elliott said evenly, “but the ones in Sarasota don’t have slaves. Lazio here is the prince’s faithful friend, and as such did not, I’m sure, intend any offense to you. He’s just profoundly worried, like the rest of us.” He made his voice steely: “I might observe in passing that I too was disappointed at how long it took you to arrive.”
    Potter frowned uneasily. He was prudent enough to understand the danger of offending Elliott, a respected and powerful clan elder. “I came as soon as I could,” the doctor said. “I was treating another gravely ill patient in Venice. Surely you understand, I couldn’t just walk out on him.” “Of course,” said Elliott in a slightly more conciliatory tone. “Now, about the prince. We conjectured that he might have drunk tainted vitae.”
    “It’s possible,” Potter admitted. “I won’t know for certain whether there are toxins or disease organisms in his blood until I run a battery of tests. But judging from his physical symptoms, or rather, lack of them, I very much doubt it. Has he been in a fight lately? Has he been bitten by another Kindred, perhaps, or a Lupine?”
    Elliott didn’t think so, but he glanced enquiringly at Lazio, who, as Roger’s valet, knew the prince’s movements and activities even better than himself. Wisely reluctant to speak and risk provoking Potter anew, Lazio simply shook
    his head.
    “No and no,” Elliott said to the physician. “Roger’s subjects all love him, and we don’t even have werewolves hereabouts, although I hear there’s a pack in Tampa.” In fact, thanks to Roger’s skill as a ruler and diplomat, Sarasota had been at peace for decades, an oasis of calm in a savage, conspiracy-ridden world.
    “Well,” said Potter glumly, “that would seem to rule certain possibilities out. In all