“Before you took off on your little vacation, I was inside you. I was as much a part of you as your stubborn belief I am some sort of evil monster hell-bent on destruction.”
“I don’t believe you’re evil. I’m just scared of what can happen.” I stubbed my toe on the ground and met her eyes. “I don’t want to be a pawn. Surely you can understand that. I don’t think I have a choice about the ceremony at this point, but all this crap about fated couples and that jerk Adrian as my king?” I shuddered.
She nodded and came back to touching distance again. “I don’t care for him either. I felt it when he used you for his own devices. He will seek to control and use you as a weapon. I don’t know much about this nonsense of kings, but I do know I did not care for the way he tasted. The other one, however, he is delicious.” She licked her lips and smiled.
“Yeah, well, he is on some sort of mission of denial where I’m concerned.” The frustration rose up unbidden, and I had to squash it down. “Ever glean anything about the Council or Guardians or the workings of a coven?”
“No, not really. Your father’s court was insular, it seemed to be run fairly, and the vampires in it were comfortable. There was only the one visit by an outside vampire other than the occasional Guardian, and they used spells to keep eavesdroppers from their private meetings.”
“Was it Daniel? In a super secret meeting?” My heart leaped into my throat at the thought.
“No, it was the other. The one who claims you as his queen. When you were nearing the age of Transition, I sensed a powerful vampire in the area and snooped.”
Relief swept me. “That must have been when they struck the betrothal deal.” I chewed my lip. “Have you always had your own, I don’t know, personality? You are magic, right? Are you a being that has chosen to fuse itself to my soul or something else? I mean, how were you able to just leave me whenever it suited you and come back again?”
“I am magic. I believe I have become a being of sorts, although I did not start out that way. I have, as humans like to say, evolved. The older you got, the older I got. Your body grew, and so did I, until I realized one day I could slip away unnoticed and decided to go adventuring.”
“It doesn’t bother you to think you may lose your personality, or whatever, when we merge?” I curled a length of hair around my finger.
“It bothers me more to think of a lifetime spent here, in this place, slowly starving and going mad. You’re going to live a long time, longer than a human lifespan, and I do not want to be tethered to this place for that length of time.”
“I’m sorry I put you here. But surely you understand why I reacted so badly?”
She shrugged and tipped her head to the side. “It is difficult for me to think as a human would. Your body was injured, and you needed to heal. I gave you the means to do that. I know it caused you pain that the boy died, but he was food. It is not much different than what the humans do to cows.”
I opened my mouth to protest and shut it again. She wouldn’t understand. Because even though I had started to think of her as a person, she wasn’t. She was some sort of being, and while not inherently evil, thought more like an animal. It made me think of having a staring contest with a shark at the aquarium. If I fell in the tank it would eat me because that was its nature, and it wouldn’t offer an apology.
What would happen when I completed my ceremony and she lived inside me fully? I knew what happened with only the small root I hadn’t been able to excise. The possibilities with the entire scary package were vast and terrifying. I sat on the ground, suddenly exhausted, and my chin met my chest. I thought I heard my name on the wind.
“He calls you.” She sat down opposite me and folded her legs under.
My eyelids fluttered closed.
Chapter Sixteen
My brain bounced off the inside of my skull from the force of Daniel shaking me. He crouched over my body with a look of panic on his face, muttering under his breath in a mix of English and Italian.
“Wake up, wake up dannazione! Mi hanno mai lasciato solo lei. Prego cara—”
“Hi.”
He looked at my eyes and crushed me to his chest. I couldn’t breathe well, but I didn’t have it in me to complain. I inhaled the scent of his skin and let my head rest between his shoulder and neck. Even if I had a headache now from being shaken all to hell, it wasn’t a bad way to wake up. He kept muttering against my hair in Italian. It was pretty, lyrical, and liquid. It reminded me of water rushing over rocks.
“Ho pensato che lo avessi perso, oh dio, ho denominato ed eravate oltre la mia portata. Come accenderei senza voi interrompere i miei programmi attenti?”
“I don’t speak that language. I don’t think you’re berating me, but I can’t understand you. Care to translate?”
He squeezed me again, and I squeaked. He retreated and stared into my eyes, his hand shaking when he reached up and pushed my hair off my forehead. I grabbed the hand and kissed his palm. Daniel looked pale under his tan.
“You had frost all over your body and were barely breathing. Don’t ever do that again.” His forehead touched mine when he finished. “I said ‘I thought I had lost you, oh God, I called and you were beyond my reach. How would I go on without you to disrupt my careful plans?’”
“Oh.” I blushed and bit my lip, then kissed him and leaned back against the pillows.
I realized then I did seem to be not wet, but damp. My hair plastered to my face in clinging strands. Strange. I wondered if I had physically traveled to that other place or if it had been such an intense vision that the cold of it manifested on my body. I’d thought I’d determined it wasn’t a vision space because I couldn’t manifest clothing. But if I’d gone there physically, Daniel wouldn’t have been able to shake me.
“I don’t have much control over it when it happens, Daniel. That’s the second time it has, and the first time I definitely didn’t come back all wet and cold.” I whispered the words, afraid if I spoke too loudly he would spook and pull away. I could sit here looking at his eyes for hours, no days, and never want to move. They reminded me of star sapphires. The lashes were thick and long but hard to see because they were the same color as his hair.
“Where did you go?” His thigh settled against my hip through the comforter.
“My father told me it was a ‘place of forgetting.’ I don’t really know what it is. But I’m pretty sure I created it or I somehow accessed it a long time ago and have only recently been able to get back into it.” I shrugged and brought my finger to his lips, traced the soft, pliant skin top to bottom.
He kissed it before taking my hand in his own and twining his fingers through mine.
“A vision? Was anyone else there?” The words were low but distinct.
“I don’t know if you can call her a person per say. But there was a being there. A manifestation? Of my power.”
His eyes widened, and he stroked my cheek. “You refuse to follow in another’s footsteps. Trailblazer and troublemaker.”
“Yep.” I smiled. “Will you maybe stick around for awhile? With me? Even if I keep messing up your plans?” I hated to sound needy, but it was what he did to me. Made me need him, want him, love him on a level so deep I didn’t dare examine it.
He rocked back and squeezed my hand. I looked at the wall and pretended the gesture didn’t hurt.
“I am not an ordinary man, Miranda. I made oaths long ago, and if I break them, I will be marked. My Brothers will come for me as they are sworn to.” He kissed me with gentle pressure. “I will be marked for death. When I saw you on the street, touched your mind, I fell halfway. Then I felt your Hunger and the way it called to me. I should have turned tail and run the other way. But I was not strong enough, and it has been so long since I felt that kind of desire for a woman. You overwhelm my senses, intoxicate me. I want you as I have never wanted another. But my vows will be broken if I take you the way I want to.”
“Is that all? Well, what’s a little death threat,
huh? I seem to accumulate threats and enemies everywhere I go.” The flat, sarcastic joke hung in the air between us.
“If it were not for my worry at leaving you unprotected should I be killed, I would have claimed you already. I would spend the rest of my days with you, learning you, loving you. But I cannot.” He rubbed my thigh through the blanket. “You are meant for someone else, and I am promised to the service of the Council until they see fit to release me.”
“I think I love you. I know I don’t deserve you.” When the Hunger had fed on him, rightness settled over me that had nothing to do with food and everything to do with belonging and home. “I knew you had feelings for me, the Hunger showed me. Why can’t we just be together, for however long that is? And I’m not going to Adrian, no matter what your Council says.”
“I do not like you. I am drawn to you; I am bereft when you are not near. Like doesn’t begin to scratch the surface. I have seen down deep into your soul, and it haunts me. I love you, and yet am forbidden to have you.” He kissed the back of my hand and captured my eyes with his as he spoke Italian once again.
“I would follow you to the ends of the earth, to the destruction of my soul. There is nothing for me without you. You have destroyed what no other has been able to, the fortress that encapsulated my heart. I am lost and found in your eyes.”
The words resonated in my brain, and tears gathered in my eyes. I blinked them away. It was beautiful and horrible all at the same time.
“How can you be so sure?”
“I have lived several human lifetimes.” He shrugged. “I know.”
“Well, then we need to get the Council to let you go already.” I gave him a shaky smile. “So, maybe I should give you a new nickname.”
“What, Tall, Tanned, and Blond is no longer accurate?” He brushed a strand of hair behind my ear and smiled at my surprise. “When I bit you last time and our auras merged, it popped into my head. Promise, I wasn’t fishing.”
“I was thinking perhaps Romeo.”
“Ahh, the doomed lovers. It does have a certain fatalistic appeal. But I’d prefer for you to live.”
“I don’t want to without you. If I am not with you, I am dead. They can force me to be their pet Chosen Childe and ship me to and fro like a portable fertility clinic, but without you I will fade from this life. I will not feed; I will not eat until I waste away to nothing and crumble to dust. Only you can fill this void inside me, only you.”
He growled. “I was supposed to come here and discover why you still had not been presented to the Council, a simple mission. It has become anything but.”
“What happens when I’m presented to the Council?”
“I cannot say for certain. They are very old, very powerful, and quite ruthless. If your father were alive, he could offer you a measure of protection as a member of his coven, but his court has been overtaken, and his whereabouts are unknown. They may attempt to take you as their charge under the guise of protection or to train you to use your power. I have no way of knowing for sure.”
“I’m not one hundred percent convinced my father is dead. I saw him not too long ago in a vision. But he was injured. I just have a feeling about it. I don’t know. What if I just don’t go to be presented? What if I just avoid that whole thing altogether?”
“Hard to do if you’re with me.” He petted my hair.
“How so? You’re pretty amazing.”
He pressed my hand to his chest, over the energy buzzing from his tattoo. “This. Think of it as a magical tracking device. With it, I can be found.”
“I’m guessing laser removal doesn’t work.”
His smile twisted into a grimace. “No, only the Council or death can remove it. I am as much at their mercy as you in this.”
I tried to turn it over in my head, to see a way around the circumstances. It seemed there was no way to resolve our situation. We were both at odds with forces larger than ourselves.
“Is that why you had to obey Stephan? Because you are a Guardian?”
“Yes. He contacted the Council and petitioned them for assistance with you. I cannot directly disobey them.”
That explained why he initially acquiesced to Stephan. “This means the Council accepts him as the new ruler of my father’s kingdom.” He nodded. “But then you killed the other and ran off with me. Won’t you be in trouble?”
“Perhaps. I will testify that I felt you were in danger from the Empath. You are more valuable to them, so they will most likely forgive my transgression.”
“Daniel, when I complete my Blooding ceremony, will I be more powerful than I am now? What kinds of things should I expect?”
He leaned back, and I could tell from his expression he was happy to have a change of subject. If he thought I’d given up, he was crazy. I was just changing tactics.
“You will have fangs, all vampires do. We can all feed on blood if need be, but for you sexual energy is going to be your main food source. You’ve been an anomaly since I met you. Who can say what you’ll be able to do. Your body will change over a period of days or weeks before it is fully Transitioned. Like I said before, variations in a population. It depends on what’s lurking in your DNA.”
That’s what I was counting on. I was an unknown factor in their plans.
“Daniel, what does it mean to be Bloodsworn?”
He cocked his head. “Where did you hear that term?”
“When I was a kid I heard it once or twice. It seemed pretty significant." I shrugged and looked him in the eye.
“It means a warrior of our race swears his life and ability to the protection and care of their lover. Many vampires include it as part of their marriage ceremony because it guarantees a swift death if one is killed. The surviving spouse does not have to continue on without the other.”
“I need sex to eat, right? Well, would making sure I am fed qualify as taking care of me?” I traced his tattoo. “Surely the Council wouldn’t want me to go hungry. And, if we find my father…”
“You must be the most persistent woman I have ever met.” He chuckled. “And rather devious too. But you are forgetting your betrothal to Adrian.”
“He is not my king, and I’m not marrying him. In fact, I’m pretty sure he was only able to tap it because he has a similar gift. It’s like being able to drive a stick shift no matter the model of the car. You yourself said there hasn’t been anyone like me in a long time. How can anyone living really know for sure how things are supposed to go?” I poked his stomach. “Besides, the fact remains I want you, not him.”
“In order for any of this plan of yours to work, we must complete your ceremony first. And that will require at least one other full-blooded vampire here to ensure you have enough to eat. The sex isn’t the problem. I know that if I take you again, it will not be long before I will no longer be able to control the urge to Bloodswear myself to you. We are forbidden to place a lover or spouse before our service to the Council. That is why I tried to forgo intercourse with you.”
“Oh. Sounds like they’re a bunch of selfish jerks to me.” I picked at the blanket. “Got any friends? Ya know, around? I sure as heck don’t. So we can take care of my Blooding, I mean.”
“Yes. He helped me dispose of the car and the filth.”
“What, only one?”
“He is the only one I trust. The others are too…rigid. Bound by rules. Gregory is more domesticated than they are. Better housetraining. He has adapted to modern life more easily than most.”
I laughed at the mental image of tough-as-nails vampires dusting and doing the laundry.
“When did you get rid of all that stuff? Was I asleep for forever?”
“Yes, my very own Sleeping Beauty. Several hours have passed.”
I laughed. “You watch Disney movies? Too funny.”
“That story has been around for cent—”
I grabbed him and laid a big smacker of a kiss on his lips and hopped out of bed. I could feel Daniel’s stare boring into my back and
bare ass. I shook my butt at him and smiled over my shoulder. I was all stiff and stuff from sleeping funny and my little foray into Sucky Dreamland O’ Drama.
But I wanted to mess with Daniel.
“I have to perform a little ceremony of my own before your buddy comes over. A protective spell for the apartment.”
“I laid one years ago when I bought this place.” Hot tingles erupted everywhere from the look in his eyes as he watched me.
“Yeah, well, a little brush up wouldn’t hurt. Plus, I want to make sure Adrian can’t get in.”
His gaze fixed on my ass again. I decided to give him something else to stare at and turned around. He swallowed hard and tried to meet my eyes but failed.
“How—” He swallowed again. “How can a spell keep out a specific person?”
I wandered over to his highboy dresser without answering and stretched unnecessarily to pick up a small stone elephant with its trunk raised. It looked very old, worn smooth by years and hands touching it. I wondered where it had come from and turned around with it held out.
“You look like Eve must have with the apple.”
I grinned wickedly and crossed the other arm under my breasts, plumping them up.
“When I set the protection spell on my apartment, I wanted it to keep out any who meant me harm. Adrian couldn’t cross it. One more thing that proves he is not my king.” Each word brought me closer to him until I stood within reach. Temptation to try and tap into the Hunger, use it to call to him, swirled. I thought I might be able to even without the Blooding ceremony. But it would be a betrayal. “My true king would never mean me harm.”
Daniel licked his lips, and I remembered the texture of that tongue rasping across my nipples and belly, lower still. My nipples hardened, and my pussy weeped. The smell of my arousal rose in the air. I held the elephant out toward him, and he took it, his thumb tracing a familiar worn path down its back without looking.
“Where did you get that?”
“My parents. I’ve had it since I was a small child. They said it would bring me luck.” He looked focused on it.
Hunger Embraced (The Hunger Series) Page 20