by Cate Corvin
And to think I’d been only hours away from begging her for forgiveness. She thought she’d had it bad? She’d taken everything from me. She was an embarrassment to the family name, and Mother would turn in her grave if she knew what was happening in her home.
If Tori’s time at Libra so far had her fracturing like glass, one little tap would shatter her, and she wouldn’t have the fortitude to steal my place in this school’s board of honor. Father would be ashamed he’d put so much credence in the likes of Victoria Holmwood.
“Victoria’s upset with you for the succubus, huh?” I tried to sound normal, but Sura didn’t seem to notice the strangled note in my voice. He was too lost in his own world.
“I don’t really care what she’s upset about.” Sura’s shoulders jerked in a shrug. “Let her be pissed. Not my problem.” No matter what he said, he was obviously furious too, his eyes sparking. If he breathed too hard, sparks might shoot out of his nose.
The toxic glimmer of an idea came to mind. “How well do you know the bartenders in Seventh Heaven? There’s something I need, but if word gets back to Father, I’m done for.”
“What do you need?” Sura glanced my way. I felt that strange tug between us again, like we were destined to be on the same path, our roles and rage entwining.
“Something that’ll have Tori acting the fool.” In front of the entire Academy. Let Father see how upstanding his new daughter was. “Doesn’t he trade in infernal liquor?”
He ran his tongue over his teeth, giving me a considering look. “I can get something better.”
“By Samhain.”
She wasn’t going to make it to semester two. Miss I-Can-Do-Better, probably getting her first fucking demonic tattoo right now, was going to get a taste of some bitter medicine.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
________
CÀEL
“The club is full.”
Several pairs of eyes blinked up at me, like I’d spoken to them in Old Norse and they were trying to decipher it.
“That means you’re not invited in.”
The leader of the gaggle of human women drew herself up, the rich, warm scent of her blood washing over me, mixed with a bit of perfume on the edges.
How interesting, that only two weeks ago I might’ve defied Thraustila’s edict to invite them in and feed like a king for a night. Now they smelled tempting in the way a glass of water might seem tempting to a human: necessary to live, but bland and boring. Not like the glass of wine my shíorghrá had become.
My gaze automatically rose from the humans to the streets, instinctively looking for the black chariot of the slayer academy, but the little blonde in the spangled dress cleared her throat. “Hello? Excuse me? I can literally see in the door right behind you- it’s practically empty.”
Five minutes till Victoria broke the pact between us, and then she’d be subject to my mercy. As much as I ached to see her, a twisted, low part of me hoped she’d break it, just so I could claim the payment for a broken oath: body and blood.
The little gnat in front of me tried to push past, her heels clattering on the brownstone steps, and I flung out an arm. Thraustila had forbidden murdering humans in plain sight. Smart, given how well human technology had progressed with their cameras and videos, but irritating.
She ran face-first into my bicep and stumbled backwards, falling into another woman who caught her awkwardly.
“Do you speak English?” I asked, tamping down my annoyance.
She stumbled upright with a sneer. “Duh! Didn’t you hear me?”
No black chariot. Four minutes. I flashed to the bottom step, leaning down over the stupid human. “Then what part of ‘the club is full’ was difficult for you to decipher?”
My hand twitched to wrap around the stupid blood-bag’s throat, but her eyes had widened in sudden fear, the air perfumed with it like an acrid stench. Even if I brought her in to feed, her blood would be tainted with adrenaline now.
“Get the fuck off my property.”
Her friends helped her up and they tottered away, casting the evil eye over their shoulder at me.
Three minutes. Two.
The beast curled in the depths of my soul purred, stretching as it prepared to take over. She’d slipped, just as I thought. She was mine.
The chariot- a limousine, according to the all-knowing magician, Google- sped up to the curb and the door opened with thirty seconds to spare. Victoria got out, her dark hair tousled, wearing a sheer slip of a tank top under the leather jacket. As soon as she saw me waiting, she scowled, the expression strangely fierce on that beautiful face.
“Here I am, boss,” she called. There was a faint drawl in her voice that made her sound as smooth as syrup. “Hello and goodbye.”
I was at her side before she could climb in and close the door again. “You’re here without your escorts?”
She didn’t entirely stiffen under my touch this time, but stared up at me with a mix of frustration and consternation when I touched her cheek. Although I’d been denied the right to demand reparations for a broken oath, just touching her settled the restless irritation in my veins. “They’re not my keepers.”
Under the heady bloom of her skin, I smelled her anger, hot and burning. Since the last time I’d seen Victoria, looking almost unbearably delicious in Seventh Heaven, something had happened to her. “Why do you smell so angry, mo shíorghrá?”
“Don’t call me that,” she muttered, but her limbs loosened a tiny bit, just enough to let me know my foot was in the door. I just needed to break the rest of it down… with a delicate touch. She was one of those purists, the slayers who turned up their noses at Shadowed Worlders because we’d been created differently.
It would take a careful approach to bring her to me, like a wolf luring in a doe.
“If someone has displeased you, I will disembowel them before I bleed them out,” I said, tracing the soft edge of her lower lip. “You will have the privilege of crushing their heart in your fist when I’ve hacked their ribs open for you.”
She stared up at me, her lips slightly parted. I’d never seen such a beautiful mouth, those eyes like an ancient forest with their long, soot-black lashes. Maybe she’d even deign to kiss me in return when I leaned in...
“What the ever-loving fuck, Càel?”
She didn’t like it? Disemboweling wasn’t as easy as human movies made it look. One wrong slip of the knife and you ended up with shit everywhere. “Would you prefer drawing and quartering? The rack? I believe King Thraustila has imported an iron maiden for entertainment purposes-”
“No!” She drew back, leaning against the limo. “You know what, I’m going home. I’ve fulfilled my end of the pact. See you next week.”
She was flustered beneath the anger. Her heartbeat sped into a horse’s gallop whenever I was near, and that, combined with the way her pupils widened when she looked at me, was all the invitation I needed.
“I think you need a drink first, Victoria.” She resisted for a bare second, but I slammed the limo door shut, blocking her way back in. “And you will tell me who has angered you and why. I will not disembowel them until you approve.”
I’d been gentle with her up until this point, playful, careful to keep most of what I was hidden behind a benign exterior. I hadn’t lived for a thousand years by being kind to women. Thraustila hadn’t Made me to be a lamb in wolf’s clothing.
Now I let a bit of the iron slip into my voice, and I gripped the back of her neck and steered her inside. There was still a little of her resistance in it, but I liked the way she pushed back against me, a refusal to give in to total compliance. It helped that I could be rougher with her; my grip would’ve crushed a human woman’s bones, but Victoria was stronger, faster, tougher than her human counterparts.
Club Bathory was in fact closed to humans tonight, except for those select few who had been chosen to participate in the evening’s entertainment. Gregory took his place at the door when we’d passed, and Victoria ma
de a small noise of surprise when I steered her down the hall instead of up to the clubs.
“What’s your king planning tonight?” she asked, a little breathless. I wondered if it was from my grip or proximity.
Truth be told, it was hard to tell these days what Thraustila had planned. He wasn’t adapting to the modern world as well as the rest of us.
And as much as I wanted Victoria, she wasn’t privy to that level of information. “Blood-sports,” I replied, grinning down at her. Her olive skin paled a little, but I didn’t bring her down to the blooding chamber.
There were enough separate bars in Club Bathory that we employed no less than a hundred bartenders at any given time. Jericho, a vampire who’d been an old man when he was Made, was the only one who manned The Artery.
I steered Victoria right onto a bar stool and sat on the one next to her, resisting the urge to lean forward and take a deep breath. Fuck, but she smelled delicious.
And now that I was looking at her front, the peaks of her hard nipples were easy to see under the thin silk shirt she wore. She tugged her jacket shut, hiding the mouthwatering sight, and I held back a low growl.
Small steps. No disemboweling, no murder, no tearing off her shirt in the bar. According to the great magician Google, women in this modern age had a thing called ‘feminism’ and tearing off their clothes in public was frowned upon. What a disappointing facet of this era.
Victoria gave me a cold look, but that did absolutely nothing to deter me. She was the one who called to me, blood to blood. I had an eternity of patience to give her.
“Have a drink, Victoria. Tell me what bothers you.”
She scoffed, but Jericho was watching her with his eternally cataract-marbled eyes. “A glass of red wine, please. I’ve got a problem with you, Càel.”
“And what is that?” Maybe she did want her clothes torn off, and I was being too gentlemanly about it?
Jericho slid her a glass of red, and the way her soft lips looked when she sipped the wine had my cock stiffening at the thought of her wrapped around me.
“Somewhere between… threatening to murder me-” I held back a wince. I’d been out of my mind with agony on the evening we’d met, every bone in my body shattered and slowly healing. The pain had swamped me so badly I hadn’t recognized her call for what it was. “And actually attempting to murder me, you changed your mind. I want to know why.”
She took another gulp of wine, the alcohol making her eyes glossy. She’d taste like a 19th century Tuscan vineyard if I drank from her now. “I hate owing debts. I hate not knowing where I stand with people. And the fact remains…”
She trailed off, saving me the need to clamp my hand over her mouth. Only two people in this world knew who’d really sloughed Eluned Ravensbane, one of my three blood-sisters, from the mortal coil, and I needed it to remain that way.
She’d saved my blood-sister from agony and a dishonorable death. She’d acted exactly as a Morrìgna would.
But Clouded Court territory was not the place to discuss that, nor the other complication between us. A vampire was always free to ignore a bloodsong, that deep call that resonated between souls.
It was the first time in my long existence I’d felt the bloodsong, and now I understood why it was so dangerous. A vampire would be willing to break any allegiance, turn on his Maker, tear through a thousand bodies to get to his singer.
Victoria’s soul sang to me, a steady, hollow drum like a heartbeat in the back of my mind. The scent of her made all other women smell faint in comparison. As soon as I’d realized what it was, the moment she’d earned her place among the Morrìgna by driving her blade through Eluned’s heart, I’d known I would have a choice to make.
My Maker would use her as bait in his blood-sports if he knew. She was a danger to his authority over me.
“Because you’re very bold for one of your kind.” I said, waving Jericho away. “I admire your bravery and your willingness to face me. And the fact remains…” I leaned in close enough to nibble her earlobe, enjoying the way her skin rose in goosebumps even while she held as still as a statue. “...that I want to fuck you senseless, little slayer. Right after I find whoever pissed you off and… ruin their day.”
She swallowed hard, but the tiniest smile cracked her scowl. “I don’t think they deserve to be disemboweled, Càel.”
“Perhaps, perhaps not.” She hadn’t mentioned-
“And I stand by the old ways. Vampires and slayers just don’t mix like that.”
Fuck. I had it on good authority that my kind and hers did mix like that, very well, in fact, but if she wanted to be stubborn, I was up to the challenge.
“You should broaden your horizons, Victoria.”
She swirled the dregs of the wine in her glass, and I reached over the counter to grab the bottle. Her eyes widened when she saw the price tag scribbled on the bottom of the bottle, but I poured another glassful anyways and let the low growl creep into my voice. “Don’t say a word, slayer. Drink it. We’ve had a thousand years to amass our fortune, one bottle is a drop in the sea.”
Victoria took a sip, her lips already stained deep red, and stared into the wine like it held answers to unasked questions.
“Who upset you? What happened?” I reached out and laid my hand over hers. Her fingers twitched, but she forced herself to hold still. After a fraught moment, she relaxed.
“Fine. If you want to be a therapist for free, that’s your problem, not mine.” I nudged the wine glass her way and she took another swig. Praise Lilith for the tongue-loosening elixir of the grape. “I went on a date with Sura. The big guy, you know?” Oh, I knew. There was something about him that didn’t quite ring true to me. “Anyways, he lied to me about screwing around with demons. I just…”
She shook her head, took another gulp. “A demon murdered my brother. They kill us, and he takes me to a club on a date where he’s fucked them. After I told him about James. I just feel so stupid for thinking anyone here gave a shit about upholding our honor.”
“Tell me about James,” I said, keeping my voice soft. “Your Jim-Jam.”
She blinked and looked down at my hand on hers, her chin set. “A Sathanas demon killed him and my family’s been in shambles since. My mom’s barely functional, my stepdad has insanely high standards that I feel strangely obligated to meet, and I promised James I’d get our name on Libra’s wall of honor.” She took a deep breath. “When I got back to the academy after the shitty date, someone had taken my picture of Jim-Jam and… and destroyed it.”
Her lips drew back over her teeth, and she forced the expression away with an effort. My hand tightened on hers, every fiber of my being thrumming to leave, to find the cunt who’d done this to her and flay their skin from their body, but she let out a low noise. I’d been squeezing too hard.
“And to top it off, some bitch threw me in a snake pit, and now everyone thinks it’s really fucking funny to hiss at me because I passed out over it like a green slayer. It’s stupid, but… God, I wish I’d stayed in Port Leona. If I’d never come here, I wouldn’t have lost that picture. That’s all I had left of him.”
The bloodsong had deepened in the back of my mind, becoming a steady, pulsing beat that urged me to fold her against my chest, but I knew it was too soon.
“I understand what it’s like to lose a sibling you love like your own blood,” I said, running my thumb over her wrist. Her pulse sped beneath my touch. “I have nothing left of Eluned.”
Pain flashed in her eyes. Fuck. She thought I was blaming her.
Quickly, I tapped my head. “But she lives here. Her memory is with me. The picture is just a piece of paper, Victoria. Your Jim-Jam lives in your mind now.” I touched her temple and the silky strands of black hair, my fangs feeling too large for my mouth with how badly I wanted to taste her.
She took a little breath that stuttered in the middle, but her heartbeat settled. “Sometimes it feels like he’s still talking to me,” she whispered. “I just felt les
s alone when I could still see his face.”
At times I still heard Eluned’s voice… telling me to not be such a hot-headed bastard. She’d been the cruelest and hardest of the Morrìgna, but it hadn’t saved her from Thraustila’s greed for the throne.
As she talked, Victoria had turned towards me, her body language more open. Her big eyes ran over my face, taking in every feature, and for the first time in my entire life I felt a twinge of misgiving.
What if my singer didn’t find me pleasing? What if I was too bloody, too vicious, too depraved? Not to her taste? I already knew she was my taste, like Lilith Herself had fashioned the perfect woman for me with Her own hands, but I couldn’t force Victoria to stay with me. Not without losing what little trust I’d gained.
“You’re not alone, Victoria. You hold the memory of his final battle and his voice in your memories.” She leaned her head into my palm, the tiniest change in pressure that spoke volumes. “We are living reliquaries.”
A tiny smile crossed her lips. “He would’ve liked the idea of that. Better than me crying over a picture, anyways.”
“And as for your shitty date, there’s still the iron maiden I’d like to test out.”
Victoria laughed, her fingers entwined with mine. Maybe she didn’t notice. Maybe she even liked it. “Càel. Seriously. No maiming or murder.”
The column of her throat was smooth and beautiful, untouched by blade or fang. It was too easy to picture my own neat punctures on that skin, marking her as mine forever, the only woman I’d ever claim in my second life.
She stopped laughing, as though she sensed my desire to rip her off that chair and into my lap so I could run my tongue along that throat to her wine-stained mouth. Her jacket had fallen open again, revealing the hard nipples I was dying to taste limned against the silk, and the pounding of her heart sped up when she caught me eyeing her.