The Lady in Red (#1, Night Kings) Read online

  Chapter Four

  Night Kings: The Lady in Red

  Gregory Blackman

  The Man in Black

  There it stood, Blackrose Manor, the generational estate of the mysterious Castalon family. It housed over a hundred rooms of luxury and affluence that few would know if not for these parties. Colossal stone pillars lined the entrance to the main entrance where stairs of marble awaited to greet the three friends. Despite the welcoming support staff, the group of three stayed just outside the gated entrance in wait of one of them to make the first move.

  “Shall we?” Lukas asked of his companions. “We’re late enough as it is.”

  “Let’s go around back,” Elsa said, nervously. “I hear the staff make a scene when new guests enter.”

  “Since when don’t you enjoy being the center of attention?” Lukas asked.

  The scowl to end all scowls was all the response he needed and Lukas found himself more than a few paces behind the ladies he was to accompany. They skirted around the high stone walls beside the manor and headed to the back area.

  To call the environment they walked into a backyard would have put it as mildly as possible. Blackrose manor looked every bit the estate home from the front, but it seemed the back garden was an entirely different world altogether. Hundreds, if not a thousand, of Salem’s residents had come out for the Festival of the Moon, and still it couldn’t fill the patio space meant for one ancestral family.

  A large ballroom floor had been enacted in the center of the backyard where a formal dance was to be the highlight of the night’s festivities. It was, however, a dance not of particular interest to the young ladies Lukas accompanied to the festival. All the better for him, Lukas thought, for it was on the dance floor he could bust the moves needed to land a lady.

  “Well, you can breathe a sigh of relief now,” said Elsa jokingly, “because I don’t see anyone here jacking your style.”

  “Keep laughing, El,” Lukas said in his defense. “Wait ‘til the men with style show up to this thing. Then you’ll see.”

  Lukas and Elsa argued with each other for some time while Gemma looked around for anyone she recognized, anyone she could use to separate herself from two friends that’d yet to realize what they meant to one another.

  Both Elsa and Lukas were in search of someone at this party to save them from the mundane. Yet, little did they know it was each other they searched for. Gemma could see it. Everyone here could see it except for the two of them.

  “I see one of those fashionably dressed gentleman now,” said Gemma, breaking up the soon-to-be public disturbance, “and I hate to break it to you, Lukas, but your style may be out of date.”

  She pointed to a man in black that stood apart from all the townsfolk. While he might have been apart from the crowds, the man looked as if he belonged at that precise spot now and for all eternity. The man owned not just the secluded ground beneath him, but the entirety of everything around.

  “Why can’t that be your style?” Elsa asked.

  Black dominated the man’s presence, from the pristine oxfords he wore on his feet to the skinny bowtie that lay slightly askew. Even the hair curled around his neck was blacker than an abyss and cast him a mysterious aura that extended far past his ominous shadow.

  “You’re serious?” Lukas asked in disbelief. “The guy looks like he hasn’t stepped outside in half a decade.”

  To say Lukas was jealous of the man in black would’ve been an understatement. He fumbled around in the background for a moment while his two friends crooned over a man not likely to pay them any attention.

  Lukas would soon find out karmic balance restored in their group with the entrance of another.

  The crowd stirred to attention with the arrival of one that stood out from all others. Whispers began to pass among all those at the festival and soon all eyes were on the latest guest to arrive.

  “Who’s the pair of legs?”

  “I’ve got to get me some of that.”

  “You’ll have to go through me first, pal.”

  Her red satin dress was beyond radiant, backless to showcase her exquisite figure, must have cost a small fortune and had all the men chomping at the bit to get at her. Some fawned over her beauty, others argued over her revealing choice of attire, but all eyes were upon the lady in red as she made her way down the cascading patio steps.

  “Now that’s why I come to these festivals,” Lukas said with wide-set grin on his face. “Enjoy the Festival of the Moon, ladies. You’ll find me otherwise occupied for the remainder of the evening.”

  A line of eligible, and some ineligible, bachelors started to form at the edge of the patio where the dance floor lay. A classical band stood ready to play at a moment’s notice, but it wasn’t until the lady in red placed a heel on the floor that the band started to play. The entire festival was wrapped around the tip of her finger. What they didn’t know was that she wouldn’t have it any other way.

  “Too tall,” the lady in red said to the first gentleman with his arm extended, “and you, well, you’re far too small.”

  “You’re too ancient,” she said to the elderly man, accompanied with a smile and tender hand to the cheek. The line of eligible bachelors was shrinking almost as fast as it was forming, and one by one, men were being cast aside as if they were nothing.

  “Isn’t it past your curfew, young man?”

  “Try to find some style.”

  “Sorry, honey, I need someone that knows how to lead.”

  The field dwindled before Lukas’ eyes and soon the lady in red was almost upon him. He was confident, far more than he should’ve been; certain he was neither too old nor too young, of according tastes and well versed in leading a waltz.

  That’s when the lady in red approached.

  “What do we have here?” the lady asked. She looked him deep in the eyes, and as if she could see the man behind, pulled back slowly with a devilish smile upon her face.

  “Uh, well,” stammered Lukas, “my name—.”

  “I care not for your name,” said the lady in red softly. “I care only for what lay concealed underneath. Well, boy, do you know what I see?”

  Lukas turned as red as the lady’s dress and fumbled around as if a school kid without a clue what to do next.

  “No,” he said, “I don’t.”

  “I see the man underneath such garish attire,” the lady answered. She offered Lukas a gloved hand and proceeded to the center of the dance floor to the astonishment of all in attendance. None more than the two ladies he’d accompanied to the festival.

  “Can you believe this?” Elsa asked.

  “I’m still trying to figure out that suit he decided to wear,” Gemma replied.

  Once the lady had chosen her partner the rest of the men accepted their consolation prizes and so, too, did the women. The ballroom floor filled up as quickly as the lady had rejected suitors and soon there was no one left for the two ladies that waited still in the corner.

  The night’s festivities were only just beginning it would seem for the gathered crowd of mild mannered citizens. Lukas would be the first to realize that fact when his waltz with the lady in red was interrupted by an unpleasant passerby.

  It was the man in black and he now stood between Lukas and the woman he so eagerly lined up to meet. In spite of the music from the twelve piece orchestra, the townsfolk stood at a standstill for what would transpire next.

  “What the hell’s your problem, man?” Lukas asked, his fists balled up in anger. He wasn’t the kind of man to raise his fists in anger, but he’d fallen under the hold of another, and the actions he thought his own were guided by another.

  He charged at the man in black with a fist raised high into the sky and threw as heavy-handed a blow he could in the man’s direction. Lukas missed wide of his mark, and with a black oxford to the stomach, Lukas crumpled to the ground as if little more than a minor annoyance to the man in black.

  “Lukas!” Elsa cried out
as she rushed to his aid.

  But it was too late. There wasn’t anything Elsa could do for her friend. Gemma was aware of this and held tightly onto Elsa to keep her from rushing to her close friend’s side.

  “Stay back,” Gemma warned. “There’s nothing that can be done for him now.”