“I could...show you?”
It was an offer, not a demand, and that meant a lot to me. I looked at my phone. It was late, really late, and I was tired, but the lure of books was pretty intense for a bibliophile like myself. “Alright, but I'll need to get to bed soon.”
He offered me his arm like he was some kind of knight. Maybe he was. Did Russia had knights, long ago? I didn't know, but I should probably find out. Heck, I should probably learn about all these guys. While I still had no intention of carrying some magic baby, I wasn't completely immune to the idea of being wooed by three really attractive men. Okay, two really attractive men. Wei had made it very clear that he was in no way interested.
“Does Wei hate me?” I asked as I curled my fingers over a very impressive bicep.
“Wei doesn't hate anything,” Dmitri promised, “but he doesn't like being told what to do.”
I couldn't blame him for that, but I wasn't sure that there wasn't some animosity there. I didn't push on that, though. It felt weird to ask one guy too much about another. I might not have had any actual boyfriends in my life, but I wasn't completely without knowledge. Thanks, Cosmo.
Now that I wasn't completely exhausted or barely awake, I got to see the house in all of its late-night glory. It was half museum, half historical movie backdrop. There were incredible paintings along the walls, some of people and some of places. I glanced at the smear of blue, now at eye level, and then at the paintings. “Are these yours?”
He blushed again. Man, it was really cute when he did that.
“They are.”
“Poetry, painting, what else do you do?”
“I used to ride horses,” he admitted.
“Horses?” I asked. It was far too easy to imagine him on horseback with some kind of weapon in his hand.
“My people lived a great deal of their time on horseback. I was on a horse before I had seen three winters. I had my own horse to take care of.”
“Where did you live?” I asked as he led me down the labyrinth of halls.
“It is the Ukraine now.”
Suddenly it hit me. “You're a Cossack!”
He blushed again, his dark eyes sparkling with amusement. “Does this please you?”
“A little,” I had to admit. Anthropology had been my focus in the short term of college I had attended. My focus had been on military-based tribes. I'd written an entire paper on the people who had pretty much established the culture of modern day Russia, otherwise known as the Cossacks, and how their mobile culture eventually had a hand in the creation of the Romani people. I looked at him with his sparkling eyes and curling hair, and I couldn't figure out how I hadn't known what he was before.
“I'm glad.”
He was flirting. Call me slow, but I hadn't realized it before. He was good at it, or at least good at the subtly of it. His bicep flexed beneath my grip as he opened up a heavy door of dark wood, and I stepped into what I can only call Heaven. Now I knew how Belle must have felt. There were two stories of wall-to-wall books. The covers ranged from antique leather to the modern paperback and everything in between. Comfortable plush chairs had been scattered here and there, including a big lounging couch in front of a fireplace that had already been lit.
“Holy crap,” I said.
“Do you have a favorite author? A favorite book?” he asked.
I shook my head. “What's that line from Ever After? ‘I could no sooner choose a favorite star in the sky?’ Something like that.”
“What is Ever After?”
“A movie,” I answered, “A really cute movie. A re-imagining of the Cinderella story with Drew Barrymore. I love it.”
“Then, I would like to see it.”
“We could do that for our date?” I suggested. I took one of the aisles of books at random, pausing every now and then to run my fingers over one of the spines. I didn't know half the languages that some of these books were in, but they were still pretty to look at.
He gave me an uncertain glance. “You wouldn't want something more...spectacular?”
I laughed and shook my head. “Like what? Horse-drawn carriage and princess gowns? I mean, those things are cool and I totally wouldn't turn them down, but dates aren't always about extravagance, you know? Sometimes, they are more about spending time with someone doing something you can both enjoy.
A night in with a great romantic movie and some takeout? Just add in a kitten on my feet and that's pretty much my definition of the perfect night in.” I pulled one of the books off a shelf and opened to the first page, letting my eyes roam over some of the words without actually reading them.
He smirked. “A kitten?”
I shrugged. “I'm a witch, right? Shouldn't I have a cat and a pointy hat and that really big cast iron pot thing?”
“Cauldron,” he supplied.
“Yeah, that's the one.” I put the book back on the shelf and continued down the aisle. “How about you pick a book for me?”
He raised his brow at me. “Really?”
“Dude, I could be here all night and never choose, and I am already starting to get fuzzy in the brain stem. You pick one that you think that I would like, and I'll read it. Then, on our date, we can talk about it.”
He grinned, and I felt my stomach melt all the way to my toes. He really was cute as hell, even with the pointy teeth. Maybe, I admitted silently, because of them. “What kind of books do you enjoy?”
“Well, normally, I like romantic books, but I think I've got plenty of that in my life right now. A good mystery or something would be nice. Something about a woman finding herself or whatever.”
“Or whatever,” he repeated, but the smile grew. “I think that I can find something to your tastes. Why don't you go sit on the couch?” He motioned to the long couch. “You are stumbling a little when you walk.”
“Tired,” I explained, feeling a little embarrassed. I wandered away from the shelves and plopped down on the lounging couch, toeing my feet out of my shoes and letting them clatter to the ground.
Okay, I had to admit that I liked him. Dmitri was really cute and sweet, and he liked books. What more could a girl like me ask for? Oh, well a killer body would be nice...and, uh, check?
He came back to me, a book in his hand.
“What's that?” I asked.
“This is Agatha Christie.”
“I've never read her,” I admitted. My head was heavy; I didn't want to lift it off the cushion. “I think I'm too tired to read her right this second. I'm sorry.”
“Shh,” he said, “I will read it to you.”
Any other time, it would have been a weird thing to say, but right now? Having a book read to me by a Ukrainian vampire sounded like just the thing. “Okay.”
I was asleep before he was done with the first page, but his voice was like music.
CHAPTER SEVEN
On the plus side, I woke up the next morning in my own clothes and in the same place that I had fallen asleep. Someone had even pulled a blanket over my legs so that I stayed warm after the fireplace had gone cold. On the bad side, I hadn't moved all night, so my neck felt like someone was shoving a chisel into it. I sat up and tilted my head from one side to the other in the hopes of alleviating some of the pain.
A book clattered to the floor, and I recognized it as the one that Dmitri had been reading to me when I had zonked out next to him. A piece of paper fluttered to the ground. I picked it up and my cheeks went instantly pink.
It was a quick sketch of me done with a bit of charcoal. Expert fingers had captured my unconscious face as if I were some kind of sleeping beauty.
There was a quote down at the bottom of it. “I had seen the princess and let her lie there unawakened, because the happily ever after was damnably much work.”
I laughed and I wasn't even sure why, but it made me deliriously happy. A happy tingling started in my stomach, and warmed me all the way down to my toes. Oh no, I thought, I was totally crushing on Dmitri. Jeez. What the heck was
wrong with me? One nice evening and already I was having squishy feelings about an immortal vampire.
Wait, I realized, they were totally immortal. Every last one of them. What the heck was I supposed to do? Fall in love and then grow old and die, while they remained perpetually perfect? That popped a hole in my balloon, and this time, I didn't have a grumpy vampire to blame for ruining my happy feelings. Great.
There was a very polite knock at the door and I blinked. “Uhh...yes?”
The door opened, and there stood Peter with a silver tray in one hand, and what looked like a fancy notecard in the other.
“Good morning, Miss.”
“Hey,” I said, drawing my legs up, feeling a little self-conscious. “Sorry, I didn't mean to fall asleep here. It just got...late.”
He smiled gently down at me. It was the kind of smile I had always imagined a good father ought to have. That sort of quirk of the lips that managed to say, without words, that everything was alright. “Do not fret. You are not the first of the house’s denizens to find comfort in front of the library fire. I have fixed you breakfast, or rather lunch.”
I winced. “Jeez, is it that late?”
“In fifteen minutes it will officially be after noon.”
It wasn't the latest that I had slept. I had worked closing shifts at the restaurant, but it was pretty close. “Wow, I'm sorry.”
He smiled again and placed the tray at the end of the couch. It was a cheese omelet , served with some kind of hash browns.
“I hope this is acceptable. I still am not well versed in your dietary requirements.”
“Oh,” I said, picking up the fancy fork, “I'm pretty easy. As long as it's not loaded with onions or nuts, I'll be happy. I don't like onions, unless it's French Onion Soup. God, I can never get enough of that. But I'm allergic to tree-nuts.”
“Understood.”
“But seriously, you don't have to wait on me. I'm not really...used to it.”
He shook his head. “I am more than happy to, Miss. It's been many years since I had anyone but vampires to wait upon, and they don't much appreciate my cooking.”
I frowned and took a bite of eggs so light and fluffy they were basically air, and perfectly melted cheese. This was something I could get accustomed to quickly. “I thought vampires could eat?”
“They can, but many choose not to. Master Wei still enjoys his teas, and Master Alan will eat any sweet I create, but I enjoy having someone actually depend upon my food. That is the way of Brownies, I'm afraid. It's our nature.”
There was a name I was familiar with. “The Fae?”
His eyes glittered. “You know of my kind?”
“Disney and I were buddies growing up. I know a little bit about that kind of thing. I know that Brownies are good fairies, and that they like to make things?”
“It is as good a definition of my people as any other I have seen. We like to care for the people that we enjoy the company of. We grow easily attached.”
“Are you attached to the guys?” I asked.
He bowed his head. “They have their own charms. Speaking of the Masters...” he passed the notecard to me.
The handwriting on it was fancy, with loops and swishes that would have been right at home in the font section of an invitation maker. Turned out that I was right on the mark, because it was definitely an invitation to dinner that night with Alan.
“Lovely Lorena,
Would you do me the great honor of attending dinner with me tonight? I promise that it will be a night beyond compare, worthy of your dreams.
Yours, Alan”
Wow, I thought, he certainly was full of himself. I wasn't a fan of empty arrogance. If someone could live up to their boasting, I could appreciate it, but most guys who promised the world could only be counted on to give a square mile of swamp.
I raised my brow. “Is he for real?” I muttered, taking another bite.
“Master Alan is most serious in his desire to impress.”
“I bet.” I wasn't sure that anything could match Dmitri's quiet flirtation, but whatever. I had made a promise to let them both try, and I was going to do my best to live up to that. In the meantime, I was going to practice magic. An idea struck me. “Hey, Peter? Is there a place that I could work on my witchy-ness? Somewhere that I won’t be a bother and that I won’t be bothered by accident?”
He thought about it for a moment. “I think I have just the place.”
I hurried up the rest of my breakfast and stood up. “Will you show me?”
He bowed his bald head again. “Absolutely.”
He let me gather up my shoes and the book and then lead me up some stairs and to a room on the furthest side of the house. The moment I saw it, I was in love. Unlike the rest of the house, there were big windows, big arching ones that were taller than I was. They flooded the entire room with warm natural light that brought out the warm tones in the wooden floor. The room was surprisingly empty, with only a chandelier in the very center of the ceiling.
“It's perfect. What was it?”
“It was a music room at one point in time, back when Master Zane was still in residence.”
“Who?” I asked.
“The fourth brother of the boys.”
“There's another one?” I asked. “Why hadn't I been told before?”
“He has been missing for quite some time. It is assumed that were he able to come back, he would have.”
It was the nicest way that I had ever heard “we think he's dead.” It made me feel a little sorry for the group. It had to be hard enough living forever, but losing someone you thought was always going to be there had to be even worse.
“That sucks.”
“Succinctly put, Miss. Will this do?”
“It's perfect.”
He left me alone to work on my magic. I went back down to my bedroom to shower and change, grab the books that Jenny had picked out for me, and my phone. I had a few texts from her, and one from my father. I responded to hers, but didn't bother with Dad's. What was there to say? I forgive you for lying to me my entire life? Nope. Not gonna happen.
I plopped myself down on the floor, opened my grandmother’s grimoire, and started to read.
“A witch,” it said, “can see into the world of magic. The name for this realm varies depending on the place and language of the practitioner, but I have always called it The Weave. The first task for any witch is to learn how to see it and become always aware of its presence.”
“Yeah,” I snorted, “that sounds easy enough.”
I folded my legs beneath me and scooted across the floor until I could rest my back against the wall. The book described relaxing one’s eyes until they were open, but asleep. This might have sounded strange to other people, but I had pretty much mastered that ability during math classes. I despised math.
“Okay, let's do this.”
I plopped my hands down on my knees and started to breathe deeply, pushing it all the way to the very bottom of my lungs, and then blowing it out as slowly as I was able. I did it again and again until I wasn't thinking about it anymore. I rested my head back on the wall and looked out the massive windows to what lay beyond.
They were gardens, I realized, massive ones. There was a small brick courtyard in the very center with a large fountain at its most northern point. The fountain fed into what looked to be a pond. Around all of that was a series of perfect circles with what must have been thirty different kinds of plants all snuggled up with one another. A breeze teased the leaves, making them dance and sway in the afternoon sunlight. I let my entire body rest, relaxing one part of me after another until I wasn't aware of anything but my mind.
I thought it was some trick of the light at first, a line of color across my vision. It was the softest shade of blue I had ever seen, almost silvery. It ran through the glass like a spider’s web, perfect, and yet pliant. I wanted to reach out for it. The moment that I thought it, it bent towards me, harkening to my unspoken command.
I looked down at myself and nearly gasped. My whole body was a series of spirals of what I assumed was The Weave. The cords of magic extended throughout my entire person, all in shades of copper and gold. Where the silver thread that extended from the window touched me, the spirals unfurled, jumping to touch the line of magic, sort of like those tesla ball things you saw in tech-shops. They combined, one line wrapping over the other until I couldn't tell where one started and one ended. Energy that I could almost taste built in that connection, and I was sure I could do something with it. What? I didn't know, but something.
House Of Vampires (The Lorena Quinn Trilogy Book 1) Page 7