The Dark Blood of Poppies by Freda Warrington

if her senses were dampened by her blood-feast – she might assume he was out on the roof.
    He watched the stairwell, listening… and realised he could no longer hear her.
    She’s in the Crystal Ring
, he thought, shivering.
    The hairs rose on his neck and his head whipped round. She appeared – not from the stairwell but in the roof doorway, a silhouette in the dark-blue arch.
    “I haven’t finished with you,” she said.
    She glanced dismissively at the spear, and began to approach.
    Pierre would not give her a chance to get near him. With a shout, he leapt up and charged, aiming the iron tip at her heart.
    Startled, she hesitated. The tip passed between the long fur reveres of her coat and made contact. He felt the fabric of her dress tear, felt her flesh break, bone splintering. She gave a cry. He smelled blood, saw a dark stain growing between her breasts.
    Fevered, he ran her into the opposite wall and pinned her there.
    Her eyes were white orbs, her mouth open. Blood ran from her lips. She spoke, her voice bubbling through the fluid. “A stake through the heart, Pierre? You know you can’t kill me like that.”
    “Run away into the Crystal Ring, then,
chérie
,” he grated. “I will destroy you, one way or another.”
    “For making you feel foolish?”
    He stabbed and twisted the spear. “They were right about you! You are insane, you’re the thing that mortals daren’t name!”
    “Satan?”
    “Cancer!”
    He pushed the spike deeper, feeling horribly exhilarated, yet helpless. She was in pain but she wasn’t dying. And why didn’t she escape into the Crystal Ring? Was it pain that stopped her, or was she mocking him further?
    The metal slid deeper. He felt it break through the heart to touch her spine. She groaned, and her hands came up to grip the shaft, forcing it out of her body. Her gloves were wet and black with blood, yet her grip was solid. He pushed, she resisted. They struggled against each other, static, and all the time her gaze held his.
    Mon Dieu, her expression!
A blank, sightless look, as if some demon had possessed her and all she could do was observe its actions, aghast. Her horror infected him and he wanted to scream.
    Then she wrenched the spear out of her chest and lifted it with terrible strength, swinging Pierre clear off his feet. Taken by surprise, he couldn’t let go. She swung him in an arc, rushing forward as she did so. He was borne backwards at speed, felt the window at his back, the impact as the leading burst and the glass shattered around him.
    He was out in thin air. The maw of the valley tilted beneath him. Frantically he held onto the shaft of the weapon, his legs jerking for a purchase on nothingness. He glimpsed Violette’s face above him, a white gargoyle, an ice-queen.
    “Please—”
    She let go of the spear. Cast it away, as if releasing a dove.
    He fell, limbs flailing, down the high grim walls of the Fortress, down into the trees, and onwards down the sheer side of the Mönchsberg Ridge.
    Cruel rocks bruised him until at last he slammed into a hard surface. The momentum of his descent translated to shivering waves of agony. He slid over a curved ridge and came to rest in a niche, with saints looking down at him. Curving above him was the copper-salted cupola of a church. He’d landed on its roof.
    The feel of broken bones made him cringe. Ribs, an arm, his left leg in two places. He stared up at the clouds, at the louring presence of the fortress high above.
Is she still up there
, he thought,
laughing at my distress?
    Pierre knew he must lie here until his unnatural body began to heal. He wouldn’t die… but after a while, he wished he could. He wept with pain.
    God, what’s she done to me? Something more than physical injury, worse than humiliation.
    A clawed creature with an owl’s predatory eyes and a serpent’s body swooped down, brushed him with dark feathers, covered him with a mantle of bitter darkness. Then it was gone.
    * * *
    Cesare found