“Bugger!” Cuinn exclaimed, leaping onto the bed and forcing it to dip under his weight. “Why’d ye have to go and tell her that, Queen?”
Renata shook her head at him.
Cuinn came to me. He tilted his head downward, his large ears flopping forward. “I’m not sharing a bed with that thing.”
I reached out to snatch hold of his ears with my free hand. “Oh, Cuinn,” I said, tugging his head to me and placing a kiss on the top of it. “Shut up.”
Cuinn snickered. It should’ve sounded odd coming from a fox, but it didn’t. Coming from Cuinn, it sounded just right.
“You’re larger than any fox I’ve seen,” I said to him, scratching his ears affectionately.
Cuinn flopped over on his back to offer his furry belly. His head lolled back and his tongue dangled out of his mouth when I scratched his tummy.
“I’ve been waiting a long time to feel again,” he said. “Lugh’s balls, that’s the spot!”
“How?” I asked Emilio.
“The Fatas are immortal,” he said. “Truly immortal. There is not a thing in this world that can kill them. The Dracule can be killed. Vampires can be killed. Even we witches have our bane, and some of us grow old with time, but the Fatas are a wild magic and cannot be destroyed.”
I stopped stroking Cuinn’s stomach. “If recollection serves me well, you tried to tell me that if I died, you would as well, Cuinn.”
“It was just a wee little white lie,” Cuinn said with a smile.
I pinched him and he yelped. “That’s for lying to me.”
Cuinn frantically licked the part of his stomach that I had pinched. He looked up at me with narrowed eyes. “I’d do it again if it’d keep you from giving up.”
“I know.”
I clutched the necklace and Cuinn’s amber gem. “If you’re here now, what about this?”
“He’s still partially bound to the stone,” Emilio said. “We’ve just pulled him from it and bound him in this realm.”
“That makes so much sense,” I said, letting him know with my tone that it didn’t make any sense at all.
“There are still traces of my magic in the stone, make more sense?” Cuinn asked.
“As much as it needs to make, I guess.”
“We have much more to discuss,” Renata said, letting me know with a glance that she was sorry for interrupting. “For the time being, we will stay here. I will make the appropriate arrangements for you to bathe and change your attire. Then we will meet with Helamina and Augusten downstairs and discuss the rest of our matters.”
As far as a plan went, it sounded like a good one to me.
Renata did as she had said she would. I rose and put the bat in its gilded cage. Cuinn was at my heels, keeping me company while the others left to set about whatever duties Renata saw fit for them.
“So how does this work?” I asked him. “How are you here in the flesh?”
“The witches bound us together as the Dracule are bound to you,” Cuinn said, following me like a dog back to the bed. “When they bound us, it pulled me to this side of the world.”
I remembered Andrella’s words about Cuinn being able to move through the worlds. “Can you still move between the worlds?” I asked him.
“Aye and nay,” he said. “I can still use my powers here, but I’ll never be able to go back to the place where I was. I was bound there, remember? Vasco’s witchy son broke that binding.”
Cuinn curled up against me and I draped an arm around him. “That’s a good thing, though, right?”
“A very good thing,” he said. “I didn’t mind it with you, Piph. You were the only one that made existence there tolerable.”
I smiled. “I’m sorry I can’t say the same for you in my head, Cuinn.”
He snapped at me and I laughed, shoving him to the floor.
Chapter Twelve
True to her word, Renata managed to procure a bath and water for me to bathe. The tub was brought up to my room and filled before the fireplace. Cuinn curled up at the foot of the bed, and neither Renata nor I bothered to usher him out of the room. Fata or no, he had been in my head. A little nudity didn’t seem as intimate as that.
A change of clothes was brought for me, and I was grateful to see that they were mine, though I imagined Renata had asked one of the Dracule to take the risk of returning to the Sotto to get them, I was grateful.
I sank into the tepid water and rested the back of my neck against the tub. I couldn’t remember the last time I had fed, but strangely, I wasn’t hungry and the pain that had nearly driven me mad had gone completely.
“How is everything at the Sotto?” I asked. “Was our clan attacked when Damokles attacked Bull Shoals and Ravenden?”
“Oddly not,” Renata said, coming to kneel beside my bath. The clear water was familiarly scented with rose.
Renata touched my shoulder and I dipped my head to fully saturate my hair. When I sat up, she set about scouring my hair with a thick liquid soap that smelled of milk and honey.
“Where’d they get that?” I asked as the unfamiliar scent tickled my nostrils.
“Queen Helamina,” she said, “there are those in her clan that venture more deeply into the human world than we do.”
“It seems all our clans function very differently.”
“It depends on the abilities within the clan.” Renata rinsed my hair with a small pitcher. “There are a few among the Rosso that have the ability to pass unseen, but if one vampire is able to leave the Sotto, the others would want the same freedom to do so. There are those in Queen Helamina’s realm that shroud themselves from the humans exceptionally well.”
“How is Augusten after the attack?” I asked.
“He’s here,” Renata said. “You’re welcome to ask him yourself later.”
“So Queen Helamina and King Augusten are both here?”
Renata offered a brief smile. “Yes, and we’ve sent word to as many clans as we can reach. Iliaria and Anatharic have managed to sway some of the Dracule into joining us.”
I traced Iliaria’s sigil at my wrist, which now branched, as Morina’s did, up to my elbow.
“She cares about you a lot, you know,” Renata said.
I gazed at my wrist and arm, finally allowing myself to take in the binding Iliaria had placed on me. Her mark appeared very similar to Morina’s now. Both had the same vine-like appearance and traveled up to my elbows, but there was one major difference and that was the sigil of their names tangled up in the base of the mark.
Iliaria had bound me to her as deeply as Morina had in an attempt to save my life. I knew she wouldn’t have done so if she didn’t care a great deal for me.
“I know,” I said, feeling quite moved in that moment.
Renata toyed with a wet curl of my hair, appearing most thoughtful. “Do you love her?” she asked. I couldn’t sense any jealousy in her.
I placed my hand over hers. “Being away from the both of you has given me a considerable amount of time to think. Yes,” I said. “Yes, in a way, I do.”
I wasn’t sure how she would take my words, but I couldn’t find it in my heart to lie to her. Besides, she would see beyond any lie I told her.
“You knew that though, didn’t you?” I asked.
“Yes.”
Renata rose and offered me a fresh linen sheet. I wrapped it around myself and stepped out of the bath. I twisted my hair over the bath to wring out the excess water before getting dressed.
The clothes that had been brought for me were simple and comfortable, a pair of knee-high flat boots, black leggings, and a loose-fitting aubergine tunic.
“What happened to the sword?” I asked Cuinn while I slid on my boots.
He yawned widely before grumbling. “It’s still yours when you need it.”
That seemed answer enough.
When I was done, I followed Renata downstairs. On the way out of my chambers, I noticed Anatharic and Vasco just outside the room across from mine.
I didn’t nee
d to ask what they were about. They were obviously on guard duty. I was fairly certain I knew who they guarded.
“There’s a balcony in that room, my lady,” I told Renata.
“Aye,” Cuinn said beside me, “that’s why Emilio’s bound her to the room.” He grinned. “Karma’s a bitch, isn’t she?”
Karma or no, I didn’t feel particularly sorry for Morina.
King Augusten rose from his seat on the sofa when we entered. The woman I guessed to be Queen Helamina remained seated, though she examined me with some scrutiny. The scrutiny in her gaze didn’t seem to match the rest of her. The words lovely and cat-like came to mind, but her hair was long and blond and fell to frame a body that was slender and petite and a face that was only slightly angular with a tapered chin. Her chartreuse gaze was mesmerizingly feline-like.
“Lady Epiphany,” Augusten said, bowing slightly. “We are glad to know that you’re well.”
“Thank you, King Augusten.” Cuinn’s weight settled against my leg, but I turned my attention to Queen Helamina.
Renata made our introduction. “Queen Helamina, this is my Inamorata, Epiphany.”
Helamina rose. When she was close enough to reach out and touch me, Cuinn gave a warning growl, sounding more like a perturbed dog than a fox.
“And this, I presume, is your Fata, the one who saved your life?”
“Yes, my lady.” I placed a hand lightly on Cuinn’s head and he inclined at my touch. “This is Cuinn.”
“He’s mighty large,” Helamina said.
“Have ye ever seen a fairy fox?” Cuinn asked.
“No. Until now.”
“Ah well, we’re a big lot. Best left unprovoked, too.”
Queen Helamina seemed more amused by his threat than anything else. “I’ll take your word for it, Lord Fox,” Helamina replied smoothly, managing not to sound as if she were teasing him with the title.
Cuinn’s ears pricked forward pleasantly.
“Careful, Queen Helamina. You think he’s big,” I said, “his head’s bigger than the rest of him.”
Helamina smiled and it was friendly and pleasant. I wasn’t sure what I had expected, but pleasantness from another vampire queen certainly hadn’t been it.
Cuinn put his ears back in delayed reaction as my words sank in and turned a glare on me that was supposed to be intimidating. I ruffled his head affectionately and whispered, “It’s true, and you know it.”
“We have matters to discuss,” Renata said, taking a seat on another sofa that had been brought into the room. I sat beside her and Cuinn hopped up to sit with me.
Of course, I didn’t really expect him to curl up on the floor, especially not in a room full of vampire royalty. Cuinn considered himself an equal, and none of us argued or attempted to burst his bubble of confidence.
Discuss, they did. Mostly, they talked about strategy. Queen Helamina spoke of her visions and informed us that she knew Damokles would strike again.
If we waited long enough, she was sure he and the Dracule helping him would attack us here, at the castle. I wasn’t sure I wanted to stay much longer, but I had little reason for protesting or disagreeing with the decisions of those who outranked me.
“We have word from the clans of Phoenix, Malvern, Jardin Dieux, and New Orleans. They will fight with us when the time comes.”
“Has Damokles amassed so many followers as that?” I asked Queen Helamina.
“He has gained enough loyal devotees to attack both Augusten’s and my clan simultaneously,” she said. “That I find worrisome.”
Augusten nodded his agreement. “As do I, but it is more a matter of cutting the serpent’s head off, I think.”
“Well,” Iliaria said from the doorway, drawing our attention to her, “when targeting the serpent’s head, best you make certain it doesn’t grow another.”
“She’s right, I’m afraid,” Renata said. “Yet, how do we defend ourselves without our actions of defense being seen as a threat to the Dracule as a whole?”
“Those not aligned with Damokles’s agenda will already know it is not an affront to them.”
“Ye better give them a scare,” Cuinn said. “Let them know the vampires won’t sit idle when they’re trifled with. It’s the only way.”
“Then,” Helamina said, “we’re all in agreement? We stay and fight?”
One by one, Iliaria, Renata, King Augusten, and even Cuinn nodded. I let out a sigh. Never, in all the time that I had been with the clan, had the Rosso Lussuria had cause to go to war.
Now that we did, I feared the price of it.
*
Renata did not press me to tell her what I had endured. Granted, being Morina’s prisoner could have gone far, far worse than it had, but I did not wish to speak of it or divulge what I had gone through. Not yet, anyway. I had only spent a week and a day as her prisoner, but strangely, it felt as far more time had passed.
In the days that followed, I thought of her. I thought about confronting her, and every single time the thought crossed my mind, I did not act on it. I remembered when I had tried to speak with her before, remembered that it had all came to naught. Too, I thought on the White Lady’s words. If there was some way that I could help Morina, I didn’t see it. The more distance I placed between Morina and me, the better. It was not cruelty or apathy in regard to her, not necessarily. It was a matter of distancing myself from who I had been as her captive and remembering who I was.
With the distance between us and my thoughts percolating, I began to feel a measure of pity for Morina. It didn’t happen overnight. It was not until some days later I gained enough distance between myself and the events that had transpired that I began to remember things other than how I had felt. Namely, Morina’s pain and the grief she masked in anger.
Iliaria did not feel pity for her. She made it abundantly clear that whatever Morina was going through was her own doing. In a way, she was correct. But I don’t think she had seen as much as I had. I didn’t feel she had all of the pieces to the puzzle that was Morina.
Then again, when it really came down to it, I didn’t think I had all of the pieces, either, and I found myself over thinking it, wondering if Morina was truly as bad as she wanted to be. A part of me wanted to lean toward compassion, whilst the other part argued and pointed out the fact that Morina had taken me and left me to die.
But she had been willing to die with me. I wasn’t sure what to make of that.
Cuinn glanced up at me while we walked the castle grounds. Anatharic followed. He was far enough away to give us the illusion of privacy, but it really was just an illusion. When I’d first requested to take the bat out and release him to find food, Renata had hesitated. The only reason she yielded to my request was through her own sense of compassion. She knew that if she did not let me roam somewhat freely, I would begin to feel as captive with her as I had with Morina. And so she let me leave, so long as Anatharic played the role of my unobtrusive guard. Well, as unobtrusive as the incredibly tall Dracule could be.
“You’re going to have to help put the entire puzzle together, ye know,” Cuinn said almost idly and I knew he’d been eavesdropping on my thoughts.
“I know, but I don’t think I’m ready to face her again just yet.”
Blessedly, he seemed to understand. I had learned that Cuinn could still communicate with me telepathically. Fortunately, for the most part he’d respected my wishes. We had both decided to leave the telepathy for situations where we needed it.
Since he had become physical in our reality, he had not left my side. Once or twice, I had thought he was not there with me, but when I looked I found that he was. Strangely, I didn’t mind. After the scare of nearly losing him, I gained a greater appreciation for his company.
Renata, Iliaria, and Vasco managed to keep themselves busy as they made arrangements with King Augusten and Queen Helamina for the other clans to join us. I didn’t think the small castle would hold everyone, but I had faith they would find a way for it to acc
ommodate the lot. Vito and Vittoria and the rest of the Elders had joined us. Even Gaspare, whom Cuinn cunningly suggested using as Draculian bait. Alas, although Renata found his suggestion amusing, it was not meant to be. It was apparently déclassé to single out only one of your Elders and to use them, in Cuinn’s words as, “giant bat-beast fodder.”
I knelt in the dry grass and opened the latch on the cage door. The bat didn’t take much encouragement to climb the bars to the cage’s opening. He climbed onto my open palm and I set him off in search of food.
Cuinn watched him with an expression of mischief and fascination.
“You’re not going to eat him one of these days, are you, Cuinn?”
“Ah, no.” He shook his head as he lay in the grass beside my feet. “I wouldn’t eat the little bugger. Too many sharp and wee little bones get stuck in your throat and—” He made a terribly loud hacking noise that made me laugh.
I sat beside him, watching the bat flap its wings wildly and dive for a small flying insect I couldn’t see.
“That’s a comfort.” I grinned. I laid my hand on his back, feeling the rise and fall of his breath. It soothed me and I felt a bit of tension leave my shoulders. He stretched his front paws out in front of him like a lazy cat. “This is better, Piph. It is so much better.” He gazed at the night sky above us. “If I wasn’t so peeved at Ol’ Patch for almost killing ye, I might thank her.”
I ruffled his ears. “I know, you hooligan. I’m just afraid it won’t stay this way.”
His mouth opened wide as his tongue curled in a yawn. He dropped his jaw onto his forepaws. “Ye gots to have faith that we’ll give ’em a good arse kicking.”
“I hope so,” I said. “But the conflict seems childish. Is it really worth their lives and our lives to fight over something as stupid as one man’s ideals or his hatred for another?”
“Why not?” Cuinn asked. “Mortals throughout the centuries have been doing it for ages for land, for wealth, for power, for hate, for lies. It just makes the beasties no better than the mortals. We’ve no choice but to defend ourselves, and we’ve every right to do just that.”
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