by BETH KERY
Her aura was in constant movement—alive, golden and glorious. Blaise had the ability to tune out vitessence in his visual field in order to focus on the physical body. In Isabel Lanscourt’s case, her body was possibly more distracting than her brilliant life force.
Blaise and the other five Sevliss princes in existence were as sensitive to energy fields as a farmer was to his crops. They required vitessence to live, after all. They were also deeply attracted to the corporal body. It was their acute awareness of humans as energy beings that made them so physically adroit—brilliant fighters, keen observers…knowing lovers.
He shifted restlessly on the bed when the image of Isabel lying naked on the silken pane flashed into his mind’s eye yet again. Her long hair wasn’t as dark as her eyes, but a lustrous chestnut brown shot through with strands of dark gold. It’d looked like waving silk spread on the amber pillowcase. The vision of her smooth belly and the dark pubic hair between slender, shapely thighs had been electrical somehow. He kept having the most brazenly illicit fantasies of filling her with his come, seeing that flawless skin dripping with his essence.
It was strange for him to envision such things. He did not typically have intercourse with women. Because of his wolf-nature, his penis grew painfully swollen following ejaculation, locking him to a female for a short period of time. He pleasured women, and they gave him pleasure, but he found intercourse too difficult…too intimate, especially in those moments when he became fused to a female’s body. There was always the possibility that he might have to watch, with no escape possible, as disgust eventually entered a woman’s eyes at the evidence she had just had sex with something inhuman.
An animal.
He couldn’t banish the image of Isabel from his mind. His cock stiffened next to his thigh. He felt weak, unable to muster the energy to control his rebellious brain.
She’d been so helpless lying there, so vulnerable, so beautiful, like a fertile virgin field waiting to be harrowed.
His cock wasn’t just erect now, it was a heavy, plaguing ache. His upper lip and abdomen had grown damp with sweat. He felt a strange combination of sharp need and listlessness. He needed to feed, yet he didn’t move. It was as if he thought the vivid image of Isabel Lanscourt that had taken root in his brain could nourish his very body.
He barely had the energy to blink his heavy eyelids when his bedroom door opened and a woman with shoulder-length auburn hair entered, shutting the door behind her. She smiled as she approached his inert form. Her grayish-gold vitessence moved sluggishly, reminding Blaise of dawn peaking through a London smog.
“What do you want?” he asked with great effort. His jaw had grown as heavy as his eyelids.
“I would think the question is what you want, my Lord,” the woman said in a husky, knowing voice. She fleetly removed her robe, baring apricot-hued skin and large, firm breasts. “Mr. Cane sent me to you. He said you would be…hungry by now.” Her avid, green-eyed gaze lingered on his swollen erection. She laughed seductively. “I see he was right.”
“What’s your name?” he grated out. He’d never seen her before. He never fed from a woman twice. His need was vast. He would harm a human if he took from her too greatly. Besides, she would become attached to him if he saw her more than once. Worse, he might become attached to her, just as he had Elysse.
Blaise had vowed never again to need a woman beyond nourishment. Why desire what would eventually be ripped away from you by the inevitability of fate? Of death?
“Margarite,” the woman said as she began to make a show of herself, palming her breasts from below and plumping them as she ran her fingertips over the peaking nipples. Aubrey knew Blaise’s tastes and he’d chosen well for him tonight. Aubrey often joked over the fact that playing pimp for Blaise was not the least favorite, even if it was the least respected, of his many professions. His friend had taken on the role centuries ago when he realized that Blaise occasionally fell into a malaise because he resisted the urge to feed.
Anger began to trickle into his awareness at the temptation Aubrey had offered him.
“Margarite,” he muttered as he watched her finesse her nipples. He doubted the name was real, although the breasts definitely were. The women Aubrey brought him might be nothing more than very expensive whores, but they were typically of the highest quality flesh. Aubrey saw to that.
“Yes, Lord Delraven?” she whispered, a hint of a smile on her pouting lips.
“Get out.”
Circling fingertips paused. “What?”
He lifted his head off the pillow. “Leave.”
The single word had barely come out as a hoarse whisper, but she must have seen something in his expression, because she started back in alarm. Her gaze flickered down over his cock.
“But—?”
“You heard me. Find Aubrey. He will pay you.”
She hesitated. Her gaze remained on his cock. “I do not need pay,” she whispered. She glanced up at him, beseeching.
He bared his fangs.
She reached for her robe, keeping her wary gaze on him as she bent. When he heard the door click shut behind her, he lay back in mixed regret and relief.
When he closed his eyes, Isabel was back to haunt him. The throb in his cock escalated to a sharp ache. He winced and wrapped his hand around the warm, tumescent member.
He had never hated anyone or anything before. Passions did not typically rule Blaise Sevliss. Duty did; that and the daily dread of his fate.
His hand moved on his cock as he envisioned her exquisite face. He damned Isabel Lanscourt for doing the impossible, and making him feel again.
Chapter Four
She had witnessed wonders beyond belief in her tour of Sanctuary—an arboretum so vast and so lush that Isabel mentally mocked Margaret Turrow’s ridiculous claim that they were far below the surface of the earth. She’d seen what appeared to be an entire field of the white mulberry. (No, no…they simply could not be underground.) Jessie told her the white mulberry was cultivated in Sanctuary to provide silk for Lord Delraven’s factory.
She had stared in wonder at a gravity-defying fountain featuring water that flowed up instead of down. She’d seen a vast aquarium that was the size of a large room and contained colorful fish and creatures she’d never seen or imagined. Jessie had shown her a swimming pool surrounded by lush tropical wildlife and an expensively equipped exercise facility, which was apparently chiefly used to practice combat. There had been men there. Her cheeks had warmed when two sets of males fighting, along with one trio in a third ring, all paused in the midst of stunning displays of athleticism and violence in order to stare at Jessie and her as they passed.
Well, not at Jessie, precisely. Just her. She’d felt their gazes on her like burning lasers.
They had seen no one else in the large, luxurious rooms, each one more amazing than the last, every one filled with priceless frescoes, tapestries and sculptures. As they had passed a hallway, Isabel had paused and commented on the brightly painted crest at the center of the entrance.
“It’s Lord Delraven’s coat of arms,” Jessie said.
Isabel studied her companion covertly through lowered lashes. She had found him to be a pleasant escort and liked him. There could be little doubt that he was not mortal, given his aura.
“How old are you, Jessie?” she asked pleasantly.
His cheeks reddened. “I-I am older than you think, Miss.”
He glanced at her in surprise when she laughed. “Believe it or not, I know it.” He went rigid when she stepped toward him. “I can see your unusual life force,” she said delicately, not sure what else to call the energy field that surrounded him. “I can see that you aren’t mortal. How old were you when you became so?”
“Nineteen, Miss. I was turned at the same time most of the Literati were. I’m not one of the Literati—not really—but I served Aubrey Cane, and he valued me. After my master was turned, he embraced me so that I could continue to serve him.” His Adam’s apple b
obbed when he swallowed. Isabel realized too late she was disturbing him by her nearness and she took a step back.
“Embraced you?”
“He took my blood, Miss.”
“Were you made this way against your will?” Isabel whispered.
Jessie blinked. “Against my will? No. It was my greatest wish to continue to serve my master. He was—and is—the greatest genius of the age. Besides, I did not want to submit to the plague.”
“The plague?”
Jessie nodded earnestly. “The Great Plague of 1665. We had avoided it by evacuating London. Many of the brightest scholars of the age who either lived in London or were visiting there from various countries fled first to Oxford. We feared the plague would follow us there, and it did. My master—Aubrey Cane—became the leader of a select group of men, all of them made outcasts by the plague, all of them brilliant in their own right. The group became known as the Literati. We traveled from Oxford to the north, and eventually to Scotland. By a series of circumstances, Delraven befriended Cane and some of the others. We took refuge at Delraven’s estate. The plague was present in the country as well, though, and my master began to show signs of having contracted the illness. So did several other members of the Literati. By that time, Cane understood what Delraven was, and he begged him to make him immortal—to save him from death and a life wasted. Eventually, Delraven agreed, and it is that core group that survives today, each loyal to Lord Delraven and his fight against Morshiel and his band of Scourge revenants—the walking dead. We have had new members join us over the years—brilliant scholars who have been diagnosed with mortal illness. Aubrey occasionally approaches them, and gives them the choice of joining our small army, if they choose it. The Literati have lost many of their number to Morshiel and the Scourge over the years. We shrink in number, while their population grows, so we must fight harder and smarter than ever.”
“Are you saying that Lord Delraven was the one to make all the Literati into…vampires?”
“We are more than vampires, Miss. That is a term that comes from folklore. We crave vitessence and need it to survive.”
“And vitessence is in the blood,” Isabel said slowly, recalling her earlier conversation with Margaret.
“It can be found in bodily fluids most associated with human emotion—sweat, tears—” Jessie flushed again when he noticed her narrowed eyelids. “You spoke of the life force earlier, Miss. Humans are energy beings. We need that energy to survive.”
“And this energy can be found in its most concentrated form in the blood?” Isabel murmured as understanding dawned. Somehow it made intuitive sense to her.
Jessie nodded. “We do not take enough to harm the mortal, Miss. We are not like Morshiel and his revenants. They take pleasure from draining a human’s vitessence until death. They drink the very soul. Such taking is considered taboo by us. Lord Delraven has taught us to control our hunger.”
Isabel straightened, staring at Delraven’s painted crest, her curiosity for the leader of such a strange, powerful group of creatures mounting by the second. “Delraven said Morshiel was his clone. How did the two come into existence, Jessie?”
“I don’t know, Miss. None of us knows, save perhaps Delraven himself, and if he does know, he doesn’t share that secret with us. Perhaps he does with Aubrey Cane. They are as close as brothers. We only know how much Delraven strives to control Morshiel, and we share in his mission. Morshiel is cruel beyond belief. He murders Londoners regularly, and some—a small percentage of his victims—turn Scourge and strengthen Morshiel’s army. If you knew a tiny fraction of Morshiel’s crimes over the centuries, you would also have sympathy for Lord Delraven’s cause.”
“Are you saying I would consider Delraven a hero?” she asked with a small smile.
“The greatest,” Jessie said without hesitation, her sarcasm going unnoticed. “He is a fierce fighter. He was our maker, and is the strongest of all the Literati. None can best Lord Delraven, save Morshiel—and that is only half the time, and because fate has made the balance between good and evil such a close thing.”
Well that was an odd thing to say, Isabel thought as she studied Jessie’s earnest expression. It’d sounded like someone quoting from scripture or something.
“And how did Delraven acquire his title?” she mused, striving to strike a note between casual interest and dawning respect—an attitude to which she sensed Jessie would respond.
“He has done service to several members of the royal family throughout the centuries,” Jessie said proudly. “Of course, each new monarch doesn’t realize he’s the same man, believing instead he is another Delraven ancestor. Once, Lord Delraven saved an Italian princess from kidnap by agents of the Spanish crown. His service in that matter was what earned him his title. The Spaniards thought an alliance between an English prince and an Italian princess, Elysse de Gennere, might prove a threat to the Spaniards.”
“What happened?”
“Lord Delraven rescued Elysse from her captors, who had actually come under the influence of Morshiel. It had become a personal matter for Delraven.”
“Hmmm, very romantic. And did the princess end up marrying the English prince?” Isabel asked, her smile turning wistful. “Or did she instead fall in love with the hero who had saved her from her kidnappers?”
“She did—both,” Jessie glanced away, a troubled expression on his youthful-seeming countenance. “There is little doubt she was in love with Lord Delraven, but Elysse de Gennere did her duty and married the crowned prince. She killed herself soon after the royal marriage.”
Isabel’s small smile faded. It’d been as if they were discussing a charming fairytale until she fully took in Jessie’s crestfallen expression. It wasn’t a story. Jessie clearly was remembering the untimely death of someone he had known, admired…liked.
You don’t know much of anything. Not about his world, you don’t.
Isabel blinked, recalling Margaret Turrow’s words. Maybe she had a point.
She edged toward the corridor with the Delraven crest above it, drawn to it for some reason. She started back in surprise when Jessie moved with preternatural speed, blocking her path.
“Ever played sports, Jessie? Basketball, maybe? You’d be a natural for track,” she said, her wry tone disguising her shock at the evidence of this paranormal ability. Jessie didn’t appear interested in her banter, however.
“I’m sorry. Lord Delraven’s quarters are off limits.”
“Of course,” she said lightly, waving to the corridor to the left of them. “What wonders shall we witness next in Sanctuary, Jessie? Flying pixies? Talking beasts, perhaps?”
Jessie’s small smile disappeared and he twisted around. His nostrils flared. Isabel had the distinct impression he was seeing something besides the shadows cast from the flickering torches that lined the hall. She knew she was right a moment later when she caught the dim glimmer of a human aura. A woman’s figure resolved out of the darkness. The female who approached them wore only a satin robe and thin slippers. She was obviously naked beneath the thin fabric. She ran a cool, hard look over Isabel.
“Don’t waste your time. He’s in a mood. Doesn’t want female company, he was clear about that.”
“He must be a great fool, then.”
Isabel let out a small squeak of shock at the deep, seductive male voice that came from just behind her right shoulder. Aubrey Cane’s gray eyes were directly on her when she turned, although he had obviously been responding to the woman in the skimpy robe. He smiled. Isabel gave a sigh of relief when she saw his teeth were straight and even, the incisors she’d witnessed earlier nowhere in evidence.
His smile widened, as though he’d perfectly read her thoughts.
“My Lord,” Jessie said, clearly almost as surprised as Isabel had been by Aubrey’s unexpected presence. “I had not realized…that is…I thought you were organizing the patrols for this evening in the detail room.”
“I was. Tunnel patrols are off,” Aubr
ey said smoothly. “I was wondering, Jessie, if you might escort this lovely young woman to the Angelus Salon.”
“Of course.”
Isabel started to accompany Jessie, but Aubrey halted her with an upraised hand.
“Not you,” he said softly to Isabel. He turned his head, finally removing his stare from Isabel’s face. She was relieved. His eyes—his nearness—disturbed her.
“I will meet you in the Angelus Salon in a moment…Margarite, isn’t it?”
The auburn-haired woman nodded, her gaze running over Aubrey with a cool gaze that turned warm. She apparently liked what she saw.
“We will settle our business then,” Aubrey told Margarite.
The woman’s eyes widened slightly, as though Aubrey had just given her a secret, intimate caress, although Isabel could clearly see they were many feet apart. Margarite’s lips curved and she thrust her breasts against thin fabric, displaying the areolas of her nipples to full advantage. Aubrey Cane didn’t glance downward. His smile seemed to indicate appreciation of Margarite’s gesture, nonetheless.
He relatched his gaze upon Isabel when Jessie led Margarite away.
“My name is Aubrey Cane. Are you enjoying your stay at Sanctuary, Isabel?”
“How do you know my name?”
He laughed. Isabel almost felt as though she could reach out and touch his charm, it was so thick and tangible. Even so, Aubrey Cane made her wary. Perhaps her skittishness was associated with the fact that she’d watched him making love earlier, and that he’d known of her voyeurism.
“All the Literati know your name, Isabel. You are our resident celebrity.”
“I’m your resident prisoner,” she corrected acerbically. Irritation swelled in her when she recognized the truth of her statement, making her bold. “Which reminds me, I need to go find my jailer. I’m pretty much ready to wake up from this nightmare, and they say the best way to do that is just to confront the monster head on, if you know what I mean. Have a good evening, Mr. Cane.” She nodded once briskly and headed down the corridor with the crest above it.