by Lund, S. E.
"I know." I remember how I felt when I took his wrist in my mouth. "I can't even lie to myself. But I hate the idea, even if a part of my mind loves it. It would be terrible. It would be a tragedy."
"You don't ever have to do it," he says, his voice quiet. "I admit it appeals to me, but I hate the idea of it as well. I hate the idea that I want it. I have to pray very long and very hard about it, Eve. I do a lot of penance for it."
"Hmm," I say, smiling up at him. "I like the idea of you doing penance."
"Oh, I do an awful lot of it. Speaking of which," he says, trying to frown, but unable to wipe off that lopsided grin. "You kept tempting me with your dimples. Several times you ignored my commands…" He raises his eyebrows playfully.
"I need more training," I say, grinning as wickedly as I can manage.
He makes that throat sound and presses his body against me harder.
"Do you have any idea what that does to me?"
I press back against him. "I think I have a pretty good idea."
He cups my cheek, strokes my skin with his thumb.
"It scares me," I say, swallowing back anxiety. "How omniscient you are. Knowing me better than I know myself."
"But you can know me as well," he says softly. "In a way no normal human can. You'll get better and better at it – listening in, finding things. I've only got an advantage because you're so new at this. I've had eight hundred years of practice."
I look up at him, his blue eyes so beautiful, his dark hair hanging a bit in his eyes, his skin so pale like an angel, and I have to look away. The age thing does something funny to me that I can't immediately understand, and don't want to. I only know it makes me feel weak-kneed and a bit dizzy.
"How do I obey?" I say, barely able to speak, my cheeks hot. "When I'm so used to being in control?"
"Just give yourself permission. Don't question. Don't hesitate. Don't resist. Don't think. Just do."
"But thinking is how I get through the day."
"You don't need to think with me." He takes my chin in his hand and tips my face up, staring into my eyes. "It doesn't mean you're weak. It means you're strong. It means you trust me. A priest understands obedience, Eve. Priests aren't weak because they obey God's will. It makes us strong. That absolute trust provides so much strength and comfort. It's our joy. It could be yours as well."
I close my eyes because this is making me so emotional, my eyes brimming. I feel almost faint, like I'm not getting enough oxygen and I try to breathe in deeply to calm my pounding heart.
"Mon dieu," he says, his voice breaking. "You are so beautiful…" He takes my face in his hands and leans down to kiss me, finally, his lips soft on mine, tender, then parting, his kiss becoming more passionate so that my heart races and my body responds. He pulls back and looks in my eyes, and I see so much desire there, so much lust.
"Eve," he says, his voice husky. "I want you."
I swallow back the impulse to be embarrassed. "I want you, too."
Oh, God…
Then I lose myself in him, in his kiss and in his arms. When he carries me to the bed, I don't fight.
I know things will never be the same again.
Afterwards, we lie together, our arms around each other, and he starts to kiss my face, my cheeks, for I'm smiling. Then his mouth finds my neck and I know how much he wants to taste my blood right now, how much he wants to feed, and I feel his teeth sharp and on my skin and I almost tell him to just do it. But the moment passes and he pulls away and rests on his elbows above me, his eyes slowly returning to normal, his teeth retracting.
I glance at him lying on top of me.
"How long will you be away?" I run my hand along his shoulder.
He examines his hands, rolling Julien's ring on his finger.
"It depends on how things go. I must negotiate a deal with Soren to use his blood to resurrect Julien. I won't bargain him away for good, but Julien will be his servant for some good amount of time."
"How long?"
"Could be decades. Because we're among the older vampires, it'll be longer and take more to resurrect him. The Ancients have the power, Eve. The rest of us are children in comparison."
"What are they? The first vampires? What's so special about them? There isn't much written about them or any studies."
He takes in a breath. "I'll tell you but you won't believe it."
"The Fallen Angel stuff? I've read that," I say and shake my head. "You're right. I won't believe it. If they're more powerful, it's likely because they're the first to have the mutations. Maybe the mutations have diminished and become milder as time has passed and that's why you younger vampires aren't as powerful."
He smiles, but it's one of tolerance rather than agreement, like I'm a child that he's indulging.
"I've lived with an Ancient on a daily basis, Eve. I know what they are."
"Soren," I say. "He did this on purpose to get to you, didn't he?"
He nods.
"Yes," he says, his voice quiet, a note of distaste in it. "He's playing us all."
"Go to someone else."
"Eve… He's the only one I have any relationship with. I hate to do it. He's a true monster. But if I don't go to him, he'd destroy me if he found out I went to another."
"Go to someone stronger than him."
He just shakes his head as if I can't understand.
"Even if there was someone more powerful, there's no reason why they'd be willing to go to war with Soren just to resurrect Julien. This is a game of power. He won't just make Julien pay for this. He'll make me pay as well and that's what worries me and why I want you in protective custody."
"Protective custody?" I say and frown. "I don't like the sound of that."
"You don't like the sound of it, but that's the reality, Eve. Get used to it," he says and his voice is harsh. "After tonight, things will never be the same again."
I look at him and the anger in his voice and the darkness in his eyes make me fear for myself.
"They aren't just old vampires, Eve. They're not fallen humans as you think of vampires. They're something entirely different."
I trace his bottom lip with my finger. He's so serious, so afraid of this thing he must do.
"I can't come with you?"
"God, no," he says and shakes his head vigorously. "I'll never let you get within a hundred miles of him again."
"I don't like the sounds of that."
"You shouldn't. Let me warn you now," he says, and reaches out to pull me closer, running his fingers through my hair. "If you ever see him again, run the other way. Don't stop and don't look back. I mean it. He'll have you as his blood slave in a second."
"Why?"
"Because you're an Adept, Eve. You can connect. It's what they crave. It's what we all crave. You know how good it is."
I do know how good it is. "Almost too good."
He nods. "If you were my blood slave, it would be even better. With an Adept, we wouldn't have to even touch."
That sends a wave of something through me. "You said that before. You mean real telepathy? Like spooky action at a distance?"
He nods. "Exactly."
I turn over on my back and lie there, staring at the ceiling, the idea of real telepathy – reading Michel's mind at a distance like some kind of connection at the quantum level. It's disquieting and attractive at the same time. Then a thought comes to me – this thing between he and I – it's been going towards that ever since that night at the university when he held my hand too long.
"Tell me about that night I first met you."
"You were there."
"No," I say and turn over on my side so that I face him. I rest on my elbow and look straight at him. "Tell me what you were thinking." I reach out and touch him for good measure, to see if I can read him. "The truth."
He sighs as if he's been expecting this from me and pulls his hand away.
"Don't pull your hand away." I reach out to take his hand back but he won't let me.
<
br /> "Trust, Eve," he says, his voice firm. "Do you trust me to tell you what you need to know?"
I just stare at him. I'm not sure I do. He did take those manuscript pages out because he didn't want me to read them. But I said all in, and so I decide to say I trust him even if I don't.
I nod, but don't say anything.
"When I read the message you posted in the forum," he says. "I thought that maybe this was the manuscript. When you called me, and told me the year it was first written – 1224 and that it was by a writer from Carcassonne, I knew it was the manuscript, but I wasn't sure if you were our lost Adept, despite the name. Stranger coincidences have happened to me over the years. When I touched you, I was overwhelmed by your response to me. You suspected I was a vampire and were debating whether to run. Only someone inside, from an Adept family or associated with the Council would suspect that I was a vampire. Then I read you and knew it was you."
He just looks at me, waiting for my questions.
"So," I say, my cheeks heating, upset at what he's saying for some reason. "When you realized who I was, what did you think? Did you think right away that you wanted me as your blood slave?"
He closes his eyes.
"Yes," he says. "That was my first instinct as it would be any vampire who knows what you are. It's what Julien would want as well. But I rejected that right away and that's why I tried to make you forget our meeting and the manuscript. I don't want it, Eve, at least not here," he says and taps his head. "But here?" He points to his heart. "I can't lie to you. It would be heaven."
"Heaven?" I say, incredulous. "To have me addicted to your blood so that I had to drink it or become sick?"
"I live every day addicted to blood." He glances away. "The heart wants what it wants."
"I know," I say, and a sense of sadness fills me. "I wouldn't wish it on anyone. But I have this fear that that's exactly where you and I are going. Can you deny it?"
"All I can do is try to ensure it doesn't happen."
"There is no try," I say, repeating what he said earlier. "Promise me you just won't do it. I'd rather die."
"I would have preferred death, Eve. We don't always get to choose. Sometimes God chooses for us."
I turn over onto my back and shake my head.
"That's awfully arrogant of you," I say. "Thinking that if a God did exist, he'd be spending all his time ordering the details of your life."
He runs his fingers along my arm.
"God's omnipotent and can do more than one thing at a time, Eve…"
I turn my head and look at him and he's serious. Hell. I pull away so he isn't touching me – so I can think my own thoughts without him knowing it.
How can an intelligent man with so much experience be so trapped by this religious dogma? Of course, he's not just a man. He's a priest. In his heart, if not in reality.
And that really sums it all up. He's a former priest, still a priest at heart, who does penance for his more human nature. He'll have sex with me and love it but feel intense guilt about it. He'll love it but he'll beg for forgiveness afterwards.
He'll make me his blood slave, and hate himself for it, kneel before an image of the Virgin until his knees bleed in penance. But he'll love having me entirely his own, his possession, psychically tied to him by blood. I clench my fists, angry and sad at the truth of it.
He leans over and kisses my shoulder, holding his mouth there.
"Eve?" he says, and moves closer, taking my face in his hands. I dig my nails into my palms harder to try to keep tears at bay. "Eve," he says, a touch of panic in his voice. "I can't read you."
I shake my head, but I'm glad he isn't able to read me, because I'm very upset at these thoughts going through my head.
"You're blocking me," he says, and it's more an accusation than a statement of fact.
"If I am, I don't know how."
He pulls me closer. I don't feel him in my mind. I just feel this pain and it brings tears to my eyes rather than stopping them.
He looks down and sees my fists and takes one hand, opens it. I've been digging my nails into my palms so hard, the corner of one nail has broken the skin.
"You're bleeding."
He looks in my eyes. Then he leans down and licks my palm, licks the blood and the touch of his tongue on the wound takes the pain away. Then he comes flooding in, all concern and panic and fear and I know that I've found one of my blocks.
"Oh, God no," he says, closing his eyes. "Not pain."
That confirms it. I can use pain to block him from reading my mind just as I've used pain to block things from entering my mind for so many years.
"Don't do this. Don't block me, Eve. Don't…"
"You said I'd find my blocks eventually."
"But not so soon. Not until we're ready. Until I'm ready." He hangs his head, running his hands through his hair. When he looks up at me again, his eyes are filled with pain. "I need access to you, Eve. Can't you understand that? I need to know how you are, to know when you're ready and when you're not."
"Ready for what?" I say, angered. "There are other ways to tell that…"
"No," he says, grimacing. "Not sex. To be my Adept."
"I think you want access to me. Maybe you'll have to trust me to tell you how I am."
"You won't. I already know that. You lie all the time, Eve. You lie to yourself. You lie to me. If you block me, I can only guess what you're really feeling and thinking."
His words hurt me. I do lie a lot. I lie to myself, just like he says. I have to in order to get through my day.
"You said something about genies and bottles that applies here."
"And you said all in, Eve. This isn't all in. It's only partial if you block me."
I just look at him, and I do feel sorry for his anguish, but what can I say?
"I can't say I won't block you at times. It would be a lie and I don't want to lie to you. I'll try to only block things you don't need to know, like when I have menstrual cramps or something embarrassing, like if the broccoli didn't agree with me and I have gas. You don't need to know those kinds of things."
I smile, flashing him some dimple in the hopes it brings him out of this darkness, but I'm lying even now because I know I'll block him when I don't want him to know how I am.
My smile doesn't lighten his mood. He wants free access, he wants to reach out any time and read me, know my emotions and thoughts. Now he won't be able to and it scares him. He doesn't smile.
Chapter 22
"We have to distrust each other. It is our only defense against betrayal."
Tennessee Williams
"It wasn't my fault," I say. "I wasn't trying to block you. I was just upset and it happened without me trying. Don't be mad at me."
"I'm not mad at you, Eve," he says softly and moves closer to me. He leans down and nuzzles my neck. "I'm afraid for you."
"What are you so afraid of?" I squeeze his hand.
"That you won't obey me, that you'll make some foolish and reckless and brave plan and block me from knowing it, that you'll get yourself into trouble, and that you'll get killed," he says with an exaggerated shrug, his voice emotional. "That's all. Nothing really."
"I'm not going to plot and plan. I don't know enough, Michel, to plot and plan."
"Ah, but it's precisely those who don't know how to plot and plan who try it and get into trouble."
"I promise I'll follow your rules to the best of my ability." I pull him down and kiss him and my kiss makes us both all squishy feeling inside.
"Get dressed," he says. "I'll show you the house."
I do, putting on my clothes once more, and Michel takes my hand, leading me through the house to show me every room, stopping first in the library where we gave him the news about Julien.
"That's such a beautiful old Steinway," I say and go to it, touching the keys. "I never asked you but do you play?"
"Yes."
"Play something for me." I take his hand and lead him there.
"You haven't played for me yet, and I asked first," he says, pointing a finger at me.
I smile and sit on the bench. "Any request?" While I play a scale, he sits beside me.
"Play the piece that breaks your heart."
I hesitate at the strange request. The piece that breaks my heart?
"That would have to be Ballade No.1 by Chopin," I say. "I don't play it perfectly. I was learning it when my mother died. It brings back painful memories."
"Play it."
I play the first section, the moderato, well enough, and beside me, Michel sighs.
"Lovely" he says and when I look at him, his eyes are closed and a soft smile is on his lips. "Why does it break your heart? Is it just because of her death?"
"No," I say. "It's just so beautiful and so powerful and so haunting. My psychiatrist made me try to finish learning it as therapy, and it was just so lovely and passionate that I think learning it did heal me but I haven't mastered the end."
I play the middle section, which is the most beautiful and then back to the main theme again but when I get to the coda, I can't continue. It's far too hard without much more practice. I rest my hands on my lap.
"That's as far as I can get."
"You should continue practicing until you master it," Michel says.
"I've been so busy with school, I've let other things slide."
"School is a means to an end," he says. "Music is an end in itself."
Hearing it, playing it, has made my heart ache, but it's a good ache. One that reminds me that I loved my mother and she loved me.
"Your turn," I say and move over a bit so he can play. "Play the piece that breaks your heart."
"Very well." He takes in a deep breath and starts, and I don't recognize it.
"Also Chopin," he says. "We have similar tastes."
"What is it?" I say, feeling the emotion in the piece tug at my heart.
"Nocturne in E Minor. His first, written when he was just seventeen."
"It's so beautiful and so sad."
He nods, and he was right when he said music was one of his passions, because he's playing the piece with such a beautiful and expert touch that I know it is his passion.