She couldn’t imagine why she would ever need such a thing. Eli, listen to me. You don’t have to teach me to lock you out. I don’t want to lock you out. I know you would respect my privacy if I wished it. You would never do anything to me I didn’t want you to do. I trust you.
He was silent for a long moment before answering. I would hate to shatter your faith in me more than anything in this world, little one.
And you’re still dead-set on teaching me this spell, she finished for him.
He circled down and brought them back to their natural forms on the little lawn of a two-story Victorian which was remarkably undamaged by the quake. “Now more than ever,” he said grimly. “You have to be safe, Renee.”
The way he said it completely disarmed her. Nothing would dissuade him, and despite her exasperation, his persistence touched her heart. He still believed Apollo’s curse would corrupt her as it had the others, but even though he was certain that she would eventually turn Outcast, he gave her the means to protect herself. “Eli—”
“Enough.” He didn’t look at her as he led her across the lawn. “Don’t argue with me on this.”
She finally turned to look at the house. Like most Victorian houses, this one was nearly identical to its neighbors in all but color. Only when she looked closer did she note the little details that hinted at a vampire’s hand in its design.
The roses around the little porch were night-blooming. Their scent, more complex than any flower Renee had ever encountered, seduced all her heightened senses. She frowned at tiny patterns painted over each window in a shade almost identical to that of the frame. She was certain no human eyes could tell the difference. “What are those symbols?” she asked Eli as they neared.
“Signs of warding,” he answered. Renee blinked blankly at him and he explained. “Magical protection. Only the owner of the dwelling can pass by them freely. They can be broken, but it’s very difficult. You’d know if anyone tried. You’ll find those painted over every entrance, windows and doors. Even the letter-slot.”
Renee nodded, impressed. “Big bad magic,” she said as they started up the stairs to the porch.
He shook his head and smiled a little at her description, but his eyes were still solemn. “They wouldn’t keep me out for five seconds.”
She sighed, knowing he was about to start in on the need for learning the spell again.
He crossed his arms over his chest at the sound of her sigh. “And it probably wouldn’t completely stop Diego or Ronin, although it would take them longer to get through. You can’t depend on these alone to keep you safe.”
Renee waved a hand, wishing she could dismiss his insistence as easily. Her gaze traveled over the front door, searching for the symbols he’d promised rather than dwelling on the implications of him teaching her the spell. She didn’t need to be told that no Outcast could ever be permitted to learn such a thing. “Ronin would probably burn the house down with me in it rather than mess with trying to break in,” she mumbled, but when Eli abruptly gripped her hand, she knew he’d heard her.
“Has he threatened you again?”
Renee hesitated, remembering her surety that Ronin had been hunting her specifically last night. Eli’s posture was aggressively protective and he didn’t even try to hide his fury. His eyes burned with the promise of retribution. Even his fangs were out. If she told him the truth, he’d tear the other Slayer limb from limb.
She couldn’t allow that. Much as she disliked Ronin, he was in the League for a reason. He might hate her unjustly, but he was a guardian angel for the humans he protected. She didn’t want to be the cause of any trouble between him and Eli.
“Not really,” she said, fudging the truth just a little. Eli’s eyes narrowed as if hearing her slight dishonesty and she sighed. “Don’t worry about it, Eli. It’s no big deal.”
Besides, after seeing the Outcasts at work, she well understood Ronin’s suspicions. Kalen had certainly fooled her.
A low growl escaped his throat and his hand tightened around hers. To Eli it clearly was a big deal, but he didn’t say anything else about it.
Renee started to open the door but paused at the sight of the runes. He’d said they could be broken, but she had no idea how to do such a thing. “How do I get in?” she asked, reaching out to touch the faint mark over the letter-slot. She thought better of it at the last instant and stopped short of actually touching it. She didn’t want to get zapped or something.
Eli reached past her and turned the doorknob. The door swung in easily. She shot him a look before stepping over the threshold, knowing he’d wound her up on purpose to defuse the tension between them. “Very funny.”
The interior of the house was dark but for the faint light coming through the open door from the streetlamps outside. The living room was huge but unfurnished. An enormous marble fireplace took up one entire wall, and when she crossed the room to run her fingertips over the intricate designs engraved in the stone, she knew.
“You create such beautiful things,” she said softly as she traced the designs, not turning to look at him to see if she was correct. She had no doubt it was his work even though it was completely different from anything in his home. No one else could create such detail. “Why didn’t you tell me this was your house?”
He brushed the hair away from the back of her neck and dropped a soft kiss on her nape. “It isn’t mine, remember? It’s yours.”
Renee leaned back against him and smiled when his arms slipped around her waist. “Would it do me any good to say this is too much and I can’t accept it?”
His mouth moved, working magic on the sensitive curve of her shoulder. She closed her eyes and gave herself up to the sensations his incredible lips invoked.
“None at all,” he said, then hugged her tight and groaned. “By the stars, woman, how can I want you again?”
Her smile widened. “It’s mutual,” she assured him.
But to her intense disappointment, Eli released her and stepped away. “There’s not a bed here,” he said, and Renee thought he sounded relieved.
She grinned at him. “Don’t tell anyone,” she teased, “but I’ve heard that a bed isn’t strictly necessary.”
Eli laughed. “Insatiable and shameless. You’d better go look around before that suggestion really sinks in.”
He was surprised when she actually complied. As soon as she disappeared up the stairs, Eli’s smile faded. He hated giving this place up. He’d bought this house in the nineteenth century when it was brand new, but despite the protections he’d added to the structure, he had never lived here. Like his other residences in the area, it was merely a smoke-screen to hide where he truly resided. He’d had no sentimental attachment to it before this moment.
It was as if Renee’s mere presence within its walls had made it precious to him.
He crossed to the fireplace he hardly remembered carving and ran his fingers over the same curve she’d caressed. He sighed. He was no damn good at lying to himself.
It wasn’t the house he hated giving up.
Renee’s footsteps on the stairs jolted him from his melancholy thoughts. She crossed straight to his side and slid her arm around him. “It’s perfect, as I would expect anything you created to be. Now that I have a safe, Outcast-free place to go, do you feel better?”
No. He felt worse. But he found a smile for her and nodded. “We still have work to do here,” he said, unable to stop himself from draping an arm around her shoulders. “The spells protecting this place are mine. We have to replace them with yours. There’s also the bolt-hole downstairs. I need to teach you to open it. You need to learn how to lock everyone out in case you have to go there. If there’s an earthquake or you’re attacked—”
Renee placed her fingers over his lips. “Furniture,” she interrupted him softly. “There’s no furniture. Let’s start with that, okay?”
Eli kissed her fingertips because he couldn’t help it before catching her hand in his and pressing it agai
nst his chest. “The other things are far more important, little one,” he murmured.
Her eyes were luminous topaz in the dark. “I don’t want to learn to keep you away, Eli. If something happened—and I’m telling you again that I won’t turn—I wouldn’t want you to be unable to get to me. I meant it when I told you I would rather die than live as one of those monsters.”
He rested his forehead against hers. “Don’t even think of that.” He meant it to come out sternly, but instead his voice was hoarse with the pain of the thought. He knew then that he’d lied when he’d said he would slay her if she turned. He couldn’t do it now, couldn’t bear to harm her, no matter what she did. Not after what they’d shared. “There are other reasons to know this thing, Renee.”
She rested her head on his shoulder. “Why else would I possibly need to know it?”
Because if you don’t use it, I might force the third exchange on you. Because any mate you chose would be in mortal danger from me. Because there is no place on this Earth that I could not find you, and no other way you could keep me from your side.
But the words caught in his throat and he couldn’t force them out. “There are times,” he murmured when he found his voice again, “when I don’t trust myself with you, little one.” It was as close as he could come to the truth.
She hugged him. “I trust you all the time,” she told him simply, and he thought he would shatter from the painful burden of her misplaced faith. “Teach me this if you feel you have to, but I want you to know that I won’t ever use it.”
He kissed her and prayed she was right.
Chapter Twelve
When the dawn came, they were both exhausted. Lifting wards that had been in place for almost one hundred and fifty years didn’t come easily, and though Renee was incredibly strong for a fledgling, Eli had to guide her extensively through the process of re-weaving them around the structure. By the time he was able to draw her down into the basement to teach her to open the hidden panic room he’d constructed there, she was so fatigued she barely managed to open it by herself.
Renee sat down heavily inside the little earthen-walled room when she’d at last managed to move the heavy door with her mind. “I can’t do any more tonight, Eli,” she said wearily, raising tired eyes to his. “Can we rest now and finish later?”
He nodded, feeling guilty for pushing her. There was no way he could teach her in one night everything she would need to know to keep herself safe once he was gone.
She’d need a Clan, and soon. He used his own powers to close the secret door as he considered which Clan Patriarch would be most likely to take her in. “We’ll stay here. It’s too close to dawn to return home.”
She snuggled against him as soon as he lowered himself to the ground beside her. He felt her lips curve into a smile against his as she kissed him. “Told you we should’ve done furniture first,” she whispered. “Or am I the only one wishing for a bed?”
He stroked her back and hair. “You can use me for your bed,” he offered, knowing that exposing himself to yet more temptation was an extremely bad idea and still unable to resist. “And I will use you for a blanket.”
She laughed softly as she shifted to stretch out on top of him with her head tucked beneath his chin. “You’re right. This is way better than any bed.” She leaned up and pressed another kiss to his jaw. “Warm enough?”
Eli barely bit back a groan. “Any warmer and I’d go up in flames. Now go to sleep.” And to his great relief she did.
But sleep refused to come for him. He sighed. It was time to do the right thing.
When Renee woke an hour after sunset, she was alone. She stretched and found herself wrapped in a thick quilt. It protected her from the cold floor, but even its warmth didn’t dispel the chill that enveloped her when she realized Eli was gone.
When had he left her?
She sat up, clutching the quilt around her shoulders. He’d been acting strangely ever since he’d told her who he really was. Had she said something wrong, pushed too hard to stay with him?
Her wanton behavior last night rose in her mind, reinforcing her doubts. He hadn’t wanted to make love but she’d ignored his attempts to stop her. He’d prevented her from taking his blood or touching his mind, withholding the intimacy she’d craved. She hadn’t thought anything of it last night—she’d been too caught up in the ecstasy of the moment and his teasing afterward.
What if she’d misunderstood his intentions completely in giving her a place of her own? With all the mixed messages he’d been sending out, it wouldn’t be hard to do. He said he wanted her to come to him freely, and then ushered her out. He was as affected by their lovemaking as she, there was no doubt of that, but he’d refused to make love with her last night. And she couldn’t ignore his silence after she’d told him she loved him.
God or not, he wouldn’t be the first male to run for the hills at those words.
Renee sighed and got to her feet. She was surprised at how tired she still felt. Eli hadn’t given her any breaks last night when they’d worked to prepare this place and she knew she still wasn’t fully recovered from her ordeal with the Outcasts. She opened the door to the little panic room with more difficulty than she would have liked. Apart from what she’d taken from Eli when they’d made love, she hadn’t fed in two days.
Hunting had to be her first consideration. She could be confused later.
She walked through the basement and left through the kitchen door, expending precious energy to renew the protective spells as she left. No matter what Eli had said, she still thought of this as his house, and she was determined to keep it safe for him.
Thinking Eli might try to find her—hoping, actually—Renee headed toward the familiar nightclub district. When she glanced at the dance club where he’d last taken her, Renee knew she couldn’t feed that way again. There was something too intimate about it. Just the thought of getting that close to any other man made her skin crawl.
It was back to the alleys or nothing, but Renee refused to use a vagrant again. She sent her senses winging over the crowded street, searching for a mind weak enough to bend to her will. She had no trouble finding what she needed and took extra care to keep the minds of the human couple calm and willing as she drew them one by one into a little alcove in the alley and drank from them. The remembered horror of the Outcasts’ frenzied feeding still lived in her memory. She would never feed like that. No matter how tired she was, she would always find the energy to do this for her prey.
Releasing their minds from her enchantment after planting the suggestion to go home early tonight, Renee watched the pair stumble from the alleyway and disappear into the crowd thronging the main thoroughfare. Now that she’d fed, she didn’t quite know what to do. With the vague notion of trying to find furnishings for the house, she stepped out of her little alcove and turned to leave the alley.
But as she neared the mouth of the alleyway, a pack of dogs melted from the shadows and blocked her path. Renee’s heart froze.
She knew these dogs.
Niko materialized from his dog form and gave her a sarcastic little bow. The others followed suit, changing back into their human forms right there in the mouth of the alley without even trying to hide what they were doing from the mass of humanity only yards away.
“Greetings, young one.” Niko’s smile did nothing to dispel the cruelty in his eyes. “I see you have already fed. That’s a shame—we hoped you would hunt with us again tonight.”
Renee stepped back instinctively, then cursed herself for showing fear to these beasts. “Not if I live to be a thousand and never feed again.”
The others closed in around her as if scenting her alarm in the air. Niko’s frigid smile widened. “I can guarantee you won’t live quite that long.”
Renee reached for the mist, determined to make her escape, but nothing happened. Gathering all her strength, she concentrated harder on transforming her body into tiny molecules, lighter-than-air, free of gravity
and able to fly away…and she remained frozen in her body.
Niko raised an eyebrow mockingly. “What’s the matter, Renee? Having a little problem vanishing?”
She didn’t give his taunt the dignity of a reply. Her nails sharpened into talons and her fangs lengthened in response to his threat, but she’d still rather flee than fight. The form of the greyhound wouldn’t come either. The strange words of the chant Eli had insisted on teaching her came to mind but she didn’t dare use them—Niko had already proven he could read her mind. She raised her psychic shields and locked the chant deep away. She would not teach such a powerful thing to Outcasts.
Without a way to escape, she had no choice but to stand her ground. The Outcasts might have bound her powers and locked her in human form, but she could still fight. She shoved aside her fear and all the memories of being bested in her sparring matches with Eli.
She would do better. She’d have to.
Niko laughed when she tried one last time to dissolve into mist. His faux-sympathetic expression grated on her nerves like fingernails on a chalkboard. “It was a shame to deny you such interesting tricks, but I must admit we ‘spiked your drink’ tonight, as humans would say. A little injection as they passed by us. It didn’t harm them.” His eyes sharpened as if sensing her uncertainty. “I’m afraid I can’t say the same for you.”
Kalen stepped forward and sniffed her. He grimaced and spat in disgust. “The Slayer’s scent is all over you, and yet here you stand, unprotected. What a fool he is to let you hunt alone. Does he truly think I cannot undo what he has begun?”
Renee had no idea what he was talking about. She didn’t dare try to figure it out now. She focused all her attention on Kalen as he took another menacing step toward her and held up his hand, all five fingers tipped with razor-sharp talons.
“I think we should begin by draining his foul, self-righteous blood into the sewers where it belongs,” Kalen murmured, his hate-filled eyes belying his gentle tone. “Then you will accept what I offer you.” His gaze moved over her body without even trying to hide his lust. “You will be mine, Renee. Make no mistake there.”
Amelia Elias - [Guardian's League 02] - Outcast Page 21