Lies in Blood

by A. M. Hudson

  “Well—” I turned away. “It’s too bad, Falcon. If David agrees, you can bloody-well get over it.”

  “Yes, Your Majesty,” he said resolutely, following me up the stairs.

  I wished I could tell him to go away. He’d made me mad now, and I really didn’t even want to be in the same space as him. In my old life, I could’ve stormed off and slammed my bedroom door, but this version of me had to wear any disdain under her sleeve and express only composure. It sucked.

  “I’m sorry, Ara.”

  I stopped and angled my neck slowly to see Falcon. He’d stopped about six paces behind me, hanging his head. “What for?”

  “You have every right to celebrate this. What happened at training the other day was spectacular, and if it weren’t for Jason, it wouldn’t have happened.”

  I walked down a few steps and stood on the one just above him so we were almost the same height. “Look, I respect you, Falcon. A lot. And I. . .” I thought about it for a second. “Your support would mean a lot to me, you know.”

  He looked up, his face swapping the sternness for a smile. “I support the result. Just not so much the process.”

  “Then you’ll come to the party tonight?”

  He laughed. “I can’t say I’ll go that far, but I won’t stop you from going.”

  “Well, I didn’t think you would.”

  He wet his lips, nodding. “I was planning to.”

  “What?”

  “Come on.” He walked ahead of me. “Let’s go find Blade and tell him the good news.”

  “I can’t believe you were going to stop me.”

  “Hang on.” He cordoned me off from the last step with the back of his forearm.

  I stopped abruptly against his sleeve. “Why are we hanging on?”

  “Em and Mike are in there.” He nodded to the Great Hall.

  “So?”

  “So, they’re arguing.”

  “Are we listening in?” I asked with a laugh.

  “No.” He lowered his arm. “We’re respectfully not trespassing.”

  “But we’re going to the library.”

  “And if we walk past now, they might think we heard them.”

  “So what if we do? They should take their business somewhere private.” I shoved past Falcon and nearly tumbled backward down the step as Emily flew past us suddenly, her face in her hands. “Em?” I called, but she evaporated.

  “You okay?” Falcon asked.

  “Yeah.” I let go of the railing and dusted myself off. “She was in a real hurry.”

  Falcon looked over his shoulder. “Trouble in paradise.”

  “So it would seem.” I considered the doors to the Great Hall for a second. “I’m gonna go see if Mike’s okay.”

  Falcon nodded once and fell back into guard mode behind me.

  The lone figure sitting at the right hand of the king’s chair didn’t notice Falcon and I on the balcony above him. His head was in his hands, his troubles somewhere on the ground between his feet.

  I tiptoed down the curvy staircase, my hand tracing the railing and, once at the bottom, appeared at vamp speed beside him. “Mike?”

  He lifted his head and our eyes met. I expected to see tears, but he just looked worn. “Hey, Ara.”

  “What just happened? Emily all but caused a tornado on her way outta here.”

  He sighed and his brow landed against his thumb, his elbow on his knee. “I can’t do it anymore.”

  “Do what?”

  “This business with Emily.” He sat tall again. “Ever since she left university and moved here, she’s been really needy and whiney. I just. . .”

  “She’s probably just bored. I’ll assign her a task other than council member. Maybe she—”

  “She gave me back the ring.”

  “What?” I screeched.

  “She gave it back to me—last night. She just walked up and said she was done, that she didn’t want to get married anymore.”

  “Oh, Mike.” I sat down in David’s chair.

  “It’s okay.” Mike spun around to face me, tucking his legs under the table. “I mean, she took it back this morning—she was over it, you know, whatever made her break up with me. But—”

  “But?”

  “But I didn’t want her to take it back.”

  “Why?” I reached out and wound my fingers in the ball of his fist.

  “I’m exhausted, to be honest, Ara. And I think maybe I jumped into a relationship too soon after we broke it off. I just—” He leaned back in the chair and looked up at the roof. “I just need some time to clear my head.”

  I nodded. “She’ll understand.”

  “Well, she didn’t.” He presented the room, aiming his hand off to the path Emily had taken in haste. “She ditched the ring at my head.”

  I tried not to laugh. “She did?”

  “Yeah.” He looked around the floor for a second. “I don’t even know where it landed. For all I know, with a throw like that, it went through twenty-odd walls and ended up in the library.”

  I laughed then. So much for sensitivity. “We’ll find it.”

  “I know.” He nodded. “But she’s not getting it back this time, Ara. I’m done.”

  “You’re ending it?”

  “No.” He stood up. “She ended it.”

  “Mike?” I started, but he walked from the room, and I just watched, deciding then that inviting him to our lighthouse celebration was a bad idea, especially considering how much he hated Jason. “This party is getting smaller and smaller,” I said to Falcon.

  “I’m sure Emily will go.”

  I looked up to where he stood on the balcony of the second floor. “Can you go ask her?”

  “Of course.” He bowed and turned away.

  Nate headed out of the library as I waltzed in, and he flashed a quick grin, holding up the latest book he borrowed, then hurried off before I could ask him about the party. I knew he’d come, though, without question.

  “Blade,” I called into the open space, searching up, down, and around with my entire body. The curtains were drawn across the great windows, the room dark and empty. I noticed the projector set up on a table across from a whiteboard, and a stack of notes beside it, but Blade was nowhere to be seen. “Blade? You here?”

  “Hey, Ara.”

  My eyes moved quickly to the bookcases under the balcony, landing on a hunched figure in the armchair. It was so dark that if he hadn’t spoken, even my vampire night vision wouldn’t have noticed him. “Why are we sitting in the dark?” I asked, wandering over.

  He smiled up at me where I sat on the arm of the chair. “You spoken to Em today?”

  “No, but I heard about her and Mike.”

  He stood up, the leather squeaking behind him. “She loves him, you know?”

  “I know.”

  “Why doesn’t he get it? It’s so simple.” He stopped with both hands propping him up against the oak table. “She just wants his affection, his love, maybe a little attention. It’s like he doesn’t want her, Ara, like he keeps her all to himself because he wants to prove he’s really gotten over you.”

  “He has.” I stood, too. “Emily’s not his trophy girlfriend, Blade. He loves her.”

  “Not enough. Not enough to have asked her to marry him.”

  “Why so sensitive about this?”

  “She’s my friend, Ara. I care about her.”

  I laughed in the back of my throat. “Does . . . does she know you’re all cut up about this?”

  He dropped his hand from his head and looked at me disapprovingly. “I’m not all cut up.”

  I smiled, and it made him smile, too. “Then why can’t I feel the pulse of our bind—your never-ending-Curse-of-Lilith-love that you’ve had for me all these months?” I teased.

  “Shut up,” he said with a grin and sat down on the chair. “Oh God. Why can’t I fall for someone who isn’t taken by a high-ranking member of my new society?”

  I laughed and sat down
beside him. “Now, what fun would that be?”

  He bumped me softly with his elbow. “Well, all jokes aside, and no disrespect but, I’m glad I don’t love you anymore.”

  I leaned my head on his shoulder. “Me too, Blade. And, hey, bright side?” I sat up again. “She’ll be at the party tonight.”

  “Party?”

  I paused for dramatic effect. “We got approval for the lab.”

  “What?”

  I just smiled and continued. “We’re going to the lighthouse to eat and drink in celebration. Jason told me to make sure you were coming.”

  “He knows I’d never miss it.”

  “Yeah, and you have to come anyway. I need a guard.”

  “Lemme guess,” he said flatly. “Falcon doesn’t approve of you hanging out with Jason.”

  “Not really.”

  “They all need to give that guy a break.” He pushed the chair out with the backs of his legs and stood up again. “I’ve never seen anything but the good he’s done for you since he’s been here.”

  “I know. But I guess they just find it hard to forgive what he did in the past.”

  “Yet they praise the king for more heinous actions.”

  “It’s just the way it is.” I shrugged.

  “Well, I got his back, Ara, you know that, right?”

  “I know.”

  “Good.” He clapped once. “Then we have a lesson to get started on.”

  The global view from the rooftop spread my little world outward, but the sight of the new greenhouse narrowed it in again, stealing the glamour from the winding beige roads, the unending fields of green grass, and the vast clusters of trees. I half expected it to be a modest, kind of rounded conservatory, the glass maybe frosted and opaque, but I was dead wrong. I was wrong about the rooftop, too. In my mind, I’d pictured a grey, water-damaged cement surface, cluttered up with blackened chimneystacks and broken roof tiles. But it was remarkably spacious and flat, spread wide across the East Wing, dropping at the edges into slanted tiles, peaked at the window points over the attics on the rear face of the building.

  Ahead, the large dome marking the manor entrance caught the sunlight, making it glint in my direction, but even with all its glorious colours, it sat in pale contrast to the wall of glass Arthur and David had commissioned. Clearly, they’d been planning it for much longer than I realized. Its sheer magnitude and ambience was probably visible from the furthest bridge connecting Loslilian Island to the mainland. It stood at least thirty feet above the manor, the ceiling forming a long peak down the length of it, so clear and open it was a glistening shrine to the sun, inviting its golden beams down onto the mess of greenery inside. I wasn’t sure where’d they stuffed the lab, but there was no sign of another room anywhere up here.

  As I neared the building, I scanned the windows for sight of Arthur. Word had it that he was up here pottering around somewhere, but there were at least four rows of tables and planters inside, and I wasn’t sure I’d spot him once I was in the thick of it all.

  I pushed the door open and stared down the barrel of the first aisle: greenery, stacked high up to the ceilings, came face to face with what I imagined were special kinds of lights for growing things. There was a warm buzz in the air with the sound of life, and under the heat that saturated the room there was a gentle sound of dripping water and a rich soil flavour settling on the scent of newly budding flowers. It was beautiful and almost tropical.

  A flicker of movement down the end caught my eye then, steering it to the busy-looking figure trimming leaves off a plant and laying them in a tub at his feet. He looked old from back here—hunched and almost weathered, but as I drew closer, my eyes adjusted to his form, and his youthful appearance altered my first impression.

  “Arthur?”

  He looked up, laying the scissors down. “Amara? What brings you here?”

  “Came to see the new lab.”

  “Did you now?” he asked in a tone that indicated disbelief.

  “Yeah, um—” I stood beside him, wrapping myself up in my own arms. “And to see if you’d heard yet.”

  “About Jason’s lab? Yes.” He walked across to the planters opposite us. “And I hear celebrations are in order.”

  “Yup. Lighthouse party.” I turned to watch him. “So, you’ll come?”

  “Wouldn’t miss it.”

  “Great. So—” I looked around. “Where’s your lab?”

  He tapped his foot on the ground a few times. “You’re standing on it.”

  I stepped back as though I really were actually standing on a lab, and not a dirt floor.

  “We used some of the attic space,” he explained. “Would you like to see it?”

  “Um, not just now.” I waved a politely dismissive hand. “I uh. . .”

  He drew a loud breath, but kept working like I wasn’t even there, letting it out with, “You want something.”

  “Um, yeah.” I leaned against the table. “I wanted to ask you about why you came here.”

  “Here?”

  “Not to the greenhouse, but I heard that when you signed on to this whole “Project Kill Drake”, the reward you were seeking was. . .”

  He stiffened a little, standing straight. “You’ve spoken with Morgaine.”

  “Yeah.” I took a step closer. “Arthur, I—”

  “You’ve nothing to worry about, my dear.” He turned and lay a firm hand to my shoulder—that gentle reassurance only he seemed able to give with just a simple touch. “I’m not going anywhere.”

  “I know. She told me you’d changed your mind, and—”

  “I haven’t changed my mind about anything, Amara.” He picked up the scissors and began trimming the plant again. “I still want to die. But I won’t. I promised David I would be your eternal guardian.”

  The regret in his tone sent an arrow into my chest. “Why do you want to die, Arthur?”

  “Vampires love eternally, my dear. And no matter how many remedies I mix—” He motioned around the greenhouse. “I can’t mix one for a broken heart.”

  I swallowed hard, nodding to hide the rush of tears in my eyes. “So, you still love her—Arietta—so deeply after all this time?”

  “No,” he said simply. “Despite the absence of her soul from this world, I am sure I love more each passing day.”

  My hand moved to rest on my heart, barely containing the ache that wanted to consume me. “Then why did you promise David you’d stay alive?”

  “Because I know the pain you will suffer without him.” He looked sideways at me for just a second. “And I will be here to make sure you never go to join him.”

  “Why? If I’d be happier dead, why would you stop me?”

  “Same reason you’d stop me, Amara.” He laid the scissors down again and walked slowly over, placing one hand then the other on my arms, gripping firmly. “Where there is life, there is hope. And you are the hope of many. I cannot let that die.”

  “But I’m sad for you, Arthur.”

  “Don’t waste your thoughts on me, Amara. I’m an old man, and I can do enough worrying for myself.”

  “I know.” I reached out and toyed aimlessly with a leaf. “But, I just want you to be happy.”

  “For what it’s worth—” He smiled lovingly down at me. “I am. You make me happy.”

  “Aw, Arthur.” I felt my cheeks flush a little. “You’re too nice to have suffered so much.”

  He laughed through his nose, turning away again to go about his business. “Sufferance does not befall the ungracious, princess; it presents itself to he who knows love and happiness, because without those, one cannot suffer.”

  “What if there was a way?” I said, running my thumb down the leaf repeatedly. I wasn't sure how he’d react to this, but I had to at least ask.

  “A way to what?”

  “What if there was a way to reverse death, her death?”

  He didn’t show it, didn’t make it obvious, but he wasn’t down with it. Not one bit. All he sai
d, in a calm voice, was “Men must not dig where gods lay stones.”

  “But you must have at least thought about it? Even once.”

  “Of course I have. What man wouldn’t? But it’s not right, Amara. Deliberate reincarnation, it . . . it’s against the laws of nature, and God.”

  “Not necessarily.”

  His stern gaze met mine. “What have you found?”

  “It’s not the same spell Drake uses, Arthur—” I held back for a second. If I told him what I found in the Book of Shadows, there was a very real chance he might stop me from using it. “It’s something else.”

  His lips folded inward, making a stern line.

  “It’s a spell written by Lilith, we think. I found it in Morgana’s Book of—”

  “Amara, you must not meddle in the—”

  “But I have magic.” I held my hand up. “You said it yourself. You said all immortal beings, all born immortals have magic of a kind.”

  “Yes, of a kind. That does not mean you can perform witchcraft.”

  “Why not? Drake can.”

  “Drake?” He laughed and turned away, propping his hands on the counter in front of him. “Drake has no soul, Amara. And it is witchcraft that turned it to ash.”

  “Arthur, what if it didn’t have to be that way? What if I could use white magic to bring things back to life?”

  “There is no magic that can bring things back to life, my girl.” He spun around, his voice grumbling with rage in the back of his throat. “It’s the Devil’s work: trickery. You might think you hold the power, but when you cross those boundaries, you open floodways for darker things, and I can’t protect you from those.”

  “This spell I found, Arthur—” I took a step closer, looking up into his bright blue eyes. “It’s . . . it originally came from Aide-Memoire de l’Auress,” I lied.

  Arthur went to speak, but his mouth just sat slightly open, caught on his words.

  “There’s a page missing from the back. I lined them up perfectly, Arthur. I know it’s Lilith’s spell. I can feel it.” I touched my heart.

  He sniffed once. “Do you have it on you?”

  “I’m not that stupid. I know you’ll take it from me.”

  He smiled. “Then you know me well.”