Read Perilous Partnership for Free Online Page B

rectangle, leaving a central open area originally for outdoor activity or perhaps as a pen for livestock. Either way, with a little attention to landscaping, it would provide a lovely terrace and garden for those who enjoyed such pleasures.
    Madame Prost produced the key to the largest of the buildings, ushering them inside the shadowed interior. Jean breathed a soft sigh of relief. He had fed from Raymond the day before, so the sun posed no threat to him, but a thousand years of survival instincts telling him to shun sunlight were hard to cast off in only a year with his partner.
    “The monastery is not actually in the parc naturel,” Madame Prost was saying when Jean relaxed enough to mentally rejoin the conversation, “so you shouldn‟t have any problem with permits for any changes you want to make. It wasn‟t interesting enough historically or architecturally to end up on any of the landmark registers either.”
    “All to our good fortune,” Raymond said, looking around and mentally assigning functions to the different spaces. The refectory would serve as a dining hall, of course. The monks‟ cells could be turned into private rooms— small ones, but hopefully the people who were there as students would only stay for a week or two, and they could take out a few walls to make larger rooms for the researchers and faculty who would be staying for longer stretches of time. “Is it heated?”
    “The previous owners had plans to open it as an auberge, but they ran out of money before they could finish the renovations,” Madame Prost said. “They installed radiators in some of the areas, but not all.”
     
    24
     
    Ariel Tachna
     
    Raymond nodded, internally debating the logistics of completing the heating system versus asking the wizards to maintain the temperature in whatever spaces they were using. That would work for their rooms and for the public areas but not for the rooms the vampires slept in. He would have to think more on that. “What about electricity?”
    “They did that first,” the real estate agent replied. “The main complex has electricity and running water. I believe they also installed electricity in the grange, but with no plumbing fixtures, it doesn‟t have water.”
    Raymond nodded and moved deeper into the abbey, opening doors and letting his imagination run wild. The scriptorium could be one classroom, the salle capitulaire another. As he kept walking, he found the infirmary, the chauffoir, the apothecary, even the old laundry room, all of which could be converted into meeting space, office space, laboratories. Eyes alight, he turned to face Jean, hoping to see the same enthusiasm on his partner‟s face. Jean‟s expression was composed as always, but Raymond saw a smile playing around the corners of his mouth. “Could we see the other buildings?”
    “Of course,” Madame Prost said, leading them back out into the weak winter sunshine.
    A quick tour of the grange, obviously used for keeping animals and tools, revealed holes in the roof and in one wall, but the rest of the structure seemed sound. Raymond wished Thierry was there, but he could always arrange another visit before they signed the contract. The purchase would be “as is,”
    since the previous owners had defaulted on their loan and the property was currently owned by a bank, but at least they would know what they were getting into before they made their own purchase. The other two buildings, the Hostellerie that had been used to welcome guests when the abbey was active, and the abbot‟s lodging, were in somewhat better shape, but even they would need work after ten years of standing empty.
    The air was fresh, though, as Raymond moved to the center of the cloister and breathed deeply. “Will you excuse us for a moment, Madame Prost?” he asked, not wanting to share the privacy of this ritual with an outsider.
    The real estate agent looked startled, but she stepped out of their line of sight without protest.
    “What