She frowned, knitting her dainty little eyebrows at the turn of the conversation. “May I see that heirloom you have?” I asked, holding my hand out cautiously. Roxann nodded slowly, and then reached down to pluck the blade from her boot.
Carefully I took it from her, making sure my hand didn’t come in contact with the metal. “This is your family crest; you know that of course.” She nodded, still appearing confused. “Well, this is the crest of the best hunting family known to humankind,” I said.
“I know my parents were hunters, they were very fond of taking me camping and trying to teach me how to shoot game. Where are you going with this, Zeke?” she asked impatiently.
I grimaced. “Not just hunting game, Roxann, love. They were vampire hunters… Your family was murdered by a pack of rogue vampires who found out where you guys lived…” I handed her the blade back and backed away from her in case she decided to try her hand at swinging the blade in my direction.
She appeared furious suddenly and threw the blade in my direction. I dodged it easily and stepped closer to her, hugging her tight. “It wasn’t us. It was some bunch of vampires who started the rumor that the hunters were dead, that they killed them. No one believed them,” I assured her. “Not until you told me about your family history. Your name jogged my memory, and I realized that your crest belonged to the hunters… It was just then that I realized that those losers hadn’t been bragging falsely; they really did take out the greatest hunters in the world. I am sorry for your loss,” I repeated, whispering hurriedly into Roxann’s ear in an attempt to calm her down.
“You know the game I play, or used to play,” I began again with a new topic. Roxann’s stiff body relaxed a little and she nodded, her head rubbing against mine. “Well, I’ve decided to stop beating women – or anyone, really. Do you want to know why?”
She looked somewhat fearful as I spoke, but nodded slowly anyway. Apparently her hesitation didn’t outweigh her curiosity at why I stopped beating women.
"It’s because I am falling in love with you, Roxann. You make me want to be a better person. A better man. And if I were to have you look at me with fear and contempt as you did during your first hours here, I think it would honestly break my heart," I told her.
None of it was a lie, but something felt off about what I said anyway. Incomplete, almost. Maybe you are saying this to the wrong woman, a part of me taunted.
I fought the urge to look down at my feet and glower, instead keeping my eyes trained on Roxann's. She hadn’t said a word, but her eyes were wide, her gaze unwavering as our eyes met. I worried that I was moving too quickly for her.
Come to think of it, I probably was, but vampires felt things a lot stronger than humans. So we would know how we feel a lot sooner than humans would. To me, it made perfect sense.
Of course it makes sense, that voice taunted once more. You knew you loved Elyssa almost from the moment you first began to toy with her mind.
I growled softly under my breath, but it was loud enough for Roxann to hear, and she angled herself away from me, her dainty eyebrows furrowing. "Are you okay?" she asked hesitantly. I’d scared her. Great.
"I'm fine. I didn't frighten you, did I?" I asked, smiling softly at her.
She slowly shook her head, and moved back into my space. Taking her hands into mine, she squeezed them and smiled back at me.
"I’m glad to hear that you want to change for me. It makes me happy that you have such strong feelings for me and want to make up for everything that you have ever done that might have wronged me." Her words were slow and deliberate, and I knew there was a big but coming up. I wasn’t disappointed. "But it is too soon for me to know how I truly feel about you. I literally just learned about my family's heritage, as well as the fact that so much is going on in your life. Might it be that with all of this confusion going around the castle, you are only mistaking this feeling for love?" she asked.
I could tell she wasn’t trying to hurt my feelings, but nevertheless it stung to be half rejected by the woman before me. "I am very sure of my feelings. If anything, everything that is going on here is more reason to embrace them. It is well past the time where I should have been accepting of how I feel toward the people I surround myself with, and you are the reason that I am finally coming out of that shell I made for myself." I hesitated before continuing. "If you don’t mind, I would love to take you to my favorite part of the castle."
I loosened my grip on her hands to show her that she can refuse my request if she so desired, but Roxann merely smiled and squeezed my hands once more. "I would love to know a place that you love to be at. It makes me happy that you want to share it with me," she said. I nodded and began to lead her away from the gardens, into the castle and toward that staircase...
I hadn’t been there since the night that Reid died, and it felt almost sad to be going back there. But there was a new reason for going, and my mother would be proud of me for letting go of Elyssa in favor of a woman who was actually available.
But Elyssa's words stuck in the back of my mind, and I wondered how my mother would feel if she knew that I was changing who I was for someone else, instead of for my own benefit. I brushed those thoughts away as we climbed the long staircase. Once we were inside the attic, Roxann's gasp was all that filled the air.
Her expression was one of awe as she stared around the room in amazement. "What is this place?" she asked softly.
"This is the attic where we store things, but more importantly, this is the attic where we keep the only portrait that remains of my late mother," I said slowly. I watched her face carefully as she took in my words and began to look around. I knew when her eyes landed on my mother's portrait because her heartbeat faltered just enough so that I knew she was stunned by what she saw.
"Zeke, this is..." Roxann trailed off and I knew she was at a complete and total loss of words for how she could possibly describe what I was showing her.
It was a huge thing for me to do, to bring someone so new, so completely different than myself, up here to visit with my mother. To show Roxann my most private place could only serve to confirm that I was, indeed, falling in love with the human woman beside me.
"I come up here to think a lot," I murmured. "To be alone and to talk with my mother about the things going on in my life, around the castle. It truly is my place of rest and relaxation, and I am glad to share it with you."
I was happy to have her 'meeting' my mother, as well as to introduce her to this place. A part of me hoped that sometimes we might be able to come here together and spend time. While we were there on that day, however, I had another idea in mind.
"Roxann. I know you just said that this is moving a bit too fast for your liking, so I know you will be hesitant about what I am about to say. But I do know how I feel about you, and I hope that someday you can grow to feel the same about me. So," I paused, turning away from Roxann to rummage through a drawer near my mother's portrait. Turning back toward her, I extended my hand, slowly lowering myself to kneel on one knee.
Lying in the center of my palm was an old, but well-maintained, white gold engagement ring. Roxann's eyes widened and I feared that they might pop right out of her head, but hoped that they would not as I brought myself slowly to one knee. "Roxann, like I said, I know it might be a little fast, but I would like to spend the rest of my existence proving to you that I can be a better man than you have seen from me so far. I need you to accept this so that I can make it all up to you," I said.
I was as serious as I could be as I spoke, and could only wait for her reply. Everything was in her hands now, and that left me feeling more vulnerable than I’d felt in a very long time. Nothing could be worse than if Roxann said no right now.
As she opened her mouth to respond, her brows furrowed, and I feared the worst. "Zeke," she whispered, eyes tearing up. I was unable to tell if she appeared happy or if she was upset that I had brought this up to her, but she continued before my mind was able to bring me down ugly paths
.
"I did say this was too fast," she said softly, stepping toward me. "But maybe I can grow to love this place as much as the rest of your family does."
A part of me laughed inwardly. It wasn't like you were going to be able to leave anyway, I thought, fighting the grimace that threatened to show on my face.
"I hope that you know what you’re doing, because I would... Very much like to spend the rest of my life beside you, helping you to become a better person one day at a time." Roxann's smile was blinding, and she held her left hand out for mine. Grasping it, I brought myself up to my feet and kissed her, hard.
I had to ignore more jeering thoughts from the nagging little voice in my head – a part of me wondered if it was Tywin in my head this time – that poked fun at the fact that we had only just shared our first kiss and now we were engaged to be married.
When we pulled away from each other, I slipped the ring on her finger. Or, I tried to. It was slightly too small for her, and I grimaced, before sliding it onto her index finger instead. "We will have to get you your own ring," I murmured, smiling gently down at her. Although I seemed to be okay with this turn of events, it was actually killing me inside.
That was my mother's ring. I wanted the woman I was going to spend the rest of my life with to wear that ring... But it would not fit her on the proper finger.
What if that’s an omen? the voice sang to me.
Dmitri
The sword I'd retrieved with Elyssa from the attic mocked me from the corner of the room as I sat in my room – Our room, I reminded myself. You do have a Mate still, Dmitri.
It reminded me of Elyssa every time it caught my eye. "Maybe the sword is the key to distracting me from her," I mumbled to myself, getting up from my desk to retrieve the long blade. I picked it up carefully, and then sat on my bed with it, removing it from its sheath to examine it.
We hadn't gotten to begin training with the blades we'd procured from the attic yet, but I was already fond of it. It was the perfect length for me and it wasn't silver, of course. That was always a bonus. I wondered how I could have gone so long without coming across it.
I ran my fingers along the smooth, unmarred surface of the blade and smiled. I couldn't wait to get the chance to work with it, whenever that would be. I swung it a few times from my seat on the bed, just a few half-assed practice swings.
It felt good to have a good sword in my hand again. It was always hard to find a blade that wasn't made from silver in my world – anyone who needed a blade was trying to protect themselves from someone else of our kind, so it had to be silver or it wasn't going to be very effective.
I, on the other hand, was unable to wield such a blade, so I always had the hard job of trying to find a blade that would suit my needs without kicking my ass in the process. "It’s been right under my nose this whole time," I mumbled, shaking my head with a chuckle. "Who would have thought that?"
I put the blade away and set it down across our pillows so that I could think. I used the most foolish methods of avoidance, I realized. Thinking about and examining a blade that I got while spending time with one of the women I was trying to not think about?
“But you really shouldn’t be thinking about that one,” I told myself out loud, glaring down at the blade as though it was its fault that Elyssa was pregnant, and that she didn’t know whether or not Reid was the father, or if it was Zeke’s child in her womb.
There was nothing more I could do to pry my mind off the matter, so I faced it.
What was I doing, doubting my Mating to a wonderful woman, over spending some time with the other? And comparing the two was low, even for a vampire.
I got up and headed to the bathroom so I could talk to myself in the mirror. When I looked at my reflection, though, I sighed and leaned against the wall.
“Comparing them isn’t too foolish,” I told myself uncertainly. “I suppose.”
They were two very different women, and I had feelings for them both because of who they were. I couldn’t find it in myself to regret having feelings for either of them, I realized. Thinking about Elyssa, my eyes lit up and a smile broke out across my face like it was Christmas morning and I was a little boy again, waiting for the rest of the family to wake up so that I could open my gifts with gusto.
Turning my thoughts to Ollie, this goofy little smile fell into place on my face, and my eyes were tender.
They evoked different feelings within me, but the outcome was still the same: I loved them both on certain levels. But loving Elyssa was wrong, I reminded myself with a stern look.
“She is Mated to your dead brother, and is hopefully bearing his child. And if it is, in fact, Zeke’s child that rests in her womb, what kind of person are you for loving a whore who sleeps with her Mate’s brother right after said Mate’s death?” I berated myself silently for that last one, because anyone who knew anything about the situation knew that Elyssa was in pain, and Elyssa had even mentioned along the way that Zeke was hurting over the situation as well.
It was wrong of her to sleep with him of course, but I was suddenly certain that Zeke had taken advantage of her kindness, her own vulnerability over the situation. I knew they both were wrong for doing what they did, and we wouldn’t even know whose baby it was until it was born anyway.
“And who can resist the face of a baby Lanistter at any rate?” I asked my reflection. I shrugged and grinned, knowing full well that even if it was Zeke’s child, it would still be raised with love and adoration directed at it, and that it would be a baby that would be very well off for its entire life, both concerning attention and finances.
And if it was Reid’s, then…
It would grow up without a father in its life.
Although, with Reid’s brothers still being alive, the baby would certainly still have father figures. There was no way we would allow Elyssa to go through the process of raising the baby on her own, no matter what had happened between the inhabitants of the Lanistter castle during her stay.
Suddenly I realized that it didn’t matter whose baby it was, because there was just no way that Zeke was going to let Elyssa take off with the baby anyway.
“Wait a minute,” I said, laughing. “That doesn’t fix my problem!” I chuckled and shook my head at my reflection. “Man, how easy it is for me to be distracted by the issues of those around me instead of figuring out a solution to my own problems! …Although, I suppose the fact that she’s pregnant with one of my brothers’ babies does solve my problem, in a way…”
I sighed again and left the bathroom, having thoroughly depressed myself with my random conversation with my reflection.
I turned for my bedroom door, snatching up the long sword on my way out. If I was going to be trapped inside my own head for the remainder of the day, then I at least needed to be doing something to rid myself of the energy that was flowing within me.
So training with the sword it was. As I made my way out to the garden area that I always used to train, I strapped the sword across my back and made sure it was in its proper place. There was nothing that was more uncomfortable than training with a new sword and having it settled in the wrong place on one's back.
When I arrived in the gardens, I was mildly disturbed to find that it was not empty. Elyssa sat on a stone bench, toying with her steel Kodachi. She didn’t look up when I stepped outside, although I knew that she was aware of my presence.
I ignored her as she did to me, and began my training. With each motion that I put myself through, her presence dulled on my radar, until she faded away into a speck on the very edge of it.
I was grateful later on as I thought about it; I truly needed time away from thinking about my family's newest dilemma, and Elyssa honestly was the only problem my family had at that point. Tywin was gone, and there was nothing splitting us apart aside from the possibility of Zeke fathering her child and not Reid. And even then, it wasn’t really separating us, so much as making us look at the both of them in completely new ways.
<
br /> "Dmitri," Elyssa interrupted my thoughts. I was mid-swing as she spoke to me, and followed through with the motion, bringing it all the way around my body until it was at the proper point where I could twist it slightly and re-sheath it.
"Yes, Elyssa?" I asked coolly. Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed her flinching at my tone, but I couldn’t bring myself to feel bad for it. She brought all of this onto herself...
"How is your training coming?" she asked after a moment of silence. I could tell that wasn’t what she had been planning to ask me, but since she spoke it, I was not going to search for another topic.
"Training is good," I replied with a shrug. Sending a lazy glance over my shoulder at her, I nodded to my sword. "It is not the first time I’ve handled such a weapon, you know."
Her cheeks colored momentarily and she glanced down. "No, of course not. I didn’t mean for it to sound as though I believed that. Of course someone with your experience would have had times where he has come across a blade that is similar to the one on your back," she murmured thoughtfully. "Someone with your experience knows a lot about blades in general, and would of course know which he prefers..."
She paused, daring to look up and meet my eyes. For the briefest moment, it was as though none of the bad things that were going on existed. It was just me and my new best friend, chatting. Then the moment passed, and I sighed.
"Your point being...?" I asked quietly, making sure my tone was as least offensive as possible. Elyssa sighed as well and looked away.
"It looks like this is your preferred type of blade, that is all," she said. She stood quickly then and walked away without another word.
I guessed that whatever was on her mind in the first place was no longer pressing on the forefront of her mind, since she was walking away without speaking on a different topic other than swords.
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