“He wanted to make sure that I was paying attention,” he said mildly.
My lips buzzed from the weight of his gaze. My breathing became irregular, the vest feeling tight and uncomfortable when it had fit perfectly fine before I started hyperventilating.
“He threw a knife at me, not you.”
He smiled widely. “Of course. I might not have noticed him throwing a knife at me, but at you…” He shook his head and leaned down, his eyes meeting mine in a clash of desire that I wasn’t ready for. I swayed and felt the wall behind me, cold stone while he closed in, his body barely brushing mine. “He knew that I would protect you from anything.”
I swallowed hard. “And yet, it doesn’t seem quite polite to throw knives at people. Don’t you ever miss?”
He gazed down at my mouth, his own lips softening, parting. “A soft pitch like that from Landry?” he whispered, his breath a caress against my trembling lips. “I can’t remember the last time I wanted to catch something so badly. When can I see you again?”
His nose brushed my cheek sending a frisson of fire over my skin while my breath hitched, my chest rising and falling, brushing against his chest with every inhale. I’d never been so aware of my body before, his strength demanding that I fall into him, that I close the distance between us.
When could I see him again? My heart pounded as I struggled with the momentous question. I shouldn’t see him again, not when I had to pretend that I was my brother. I ignored the question as I slid my hands from his shoulders to his neck. “I’ve never met an adult so eager to throw knives at people.”
“You haven’t met my father.” He smiled slightly, but I caught the pain in the words. There was something between them, something cold and immovable. I smoothed my hands up his neck, over his silky skin, feeling that touch like a throbbing live thing. “He’s like Landry?” I spoke carefully, not wanting to hurt him any more than he already ached.
“No. He’s like me only a bit more ominous and melodramatic.”
I laughed as I gripped the collar of his long coat. “So his coat sweeps the ground?”
He grinned at me, the smile softening his features. “Drags. Instead of knives on his legs, he has fifteenth century muskets.”
I shook my head slightly, brushing his chin with my nose. “Let me guess. He owned a dance club in the 80’s?”
“How did you know?” He bent his head, so close to kissing me, so close as he whispered. “When can I see you again?”
I inhaled and felt dizzy from the scent of him. “I don’t usually date the same guy twice, you know, it’s hard to make out in public with a stranger if you’re with someone who isn’t one.”
He nudged me slightly with his nose. “But I need you to show me Anime. I could disguise myself as a stranger. I could wear a suit, or steal a guard uniform.” He wiggled his eyebrows suggestively.
I laughed breathlessly before I shook my head. “You’re too pretty to forget.”
His hands slid up my arms a touch that shot through me like electricity. “I’ll take that as a compliment instead of an evasion. Violetta, when can I…”
I cut him off. I couldn’t hear him ask me again. I couldn’t say no, not when he looked at me with his soul in his chocolate eyes, not when I wanted more than anything I’d ever wanted before to see him every day, all day, forever.
His lips burned against mine, the taste like peppery truffles, deep, rich and heavenly as his arms came around me.
“Orion, the CM is looking for you.”
The voice was low, reminded me of Orion somehow. Orion stiffened all over as he pulled back, staring at me like he didn’t quite see me as myself but as a situation that he had to fix. Clearly, this wasn’t going to work.
I smiled and ducked under Orion’s arm, headed down the hall in the direction we’d been going. A boy as tall as Orion stood in the doorway of the adjoining hall, his eyes examining me appreciatively.
“Hello,” he said all flirty as I passed him. “I didn’t know that Landry had a daughter.”
I frowned at him then glanced back at Orion whose face gave nothing away. He was not about to open up to this stranger or clarify anything. I paused and met the boy’s gaze evenly before I gave him a thorough once-over that matched him. A curl of anger was unfurling inside of my chest and I wasn’t sure why. I didn’t want to leave Orion, but what did he want with me, anyway except for a good time to help him forget about Olivia?
“There are so many things that pretty little boys like you are utterly oblivious about.” I brushed past him and felt a slight ache at that contact, something metallic and cold in his nature, so different than Orion’s warmth, his calm and generous strength. At the same time, it left me buzzing as I followed the wall to a side door that I hoped was the right one as I left it, leaving without looking back at Orion.
Chapter 23
The Butcher
I stood there for a moment with my eyes closed, trying not to attack Casper like an unhinged Butcher. I turned and took the hall and steps that led to the wide room with the surrounding Butchers seated at tables. They were Butchers like me who maintained established districts as well as itinerant Butchers who travelled, dispensing light and justice wherever they went. I’d nearly missed group discussion. What a pity that I hadn’t missed it entirely.
I slid into the nearest table, empty other than Merlow, a Butcher with a missing ear and more scars across his face than seemed possible for one person to have.
“Merlow,” I muttered.
“Daughtry.”
“Daughtry,” Casper echoed, sliding into the chair beside me. “How is everything going in your district?”
I shrugged and studied the smooth wooden table. I pulled out a knife, a large knife and stabbed it into the wood between Casper’s fingers. He pulled his hands back slowly while I carved deep ridges into the table. A tree of some kind took shape on the table while Merlow and Casper watched me, curiosity in the old Butcher’s eyes, amusement and interest in Casper’s.
He was going to ask me about the Baker I’d been kissing. I should be glad that it was him who had caught me instead of someone who followed rules a little more rigorously, someone like I’d been a few weeks earlier.
I glanced at Casper and grinned at him. He matched my smile and raised his eyebrows suggestively. I nodded slightly and then stood before the C.M. could touch my shoulder seeking connection we’d never had.
“I apologize for my tardiness. I had a mishap with the pond.”
The C.M.’s warm brown eyes went down to my still damp boots and jeans, hesitating on my bandaged hand before he met my eyes. I looked back at him, cold, hard, a Butcher who was too busy doing his duty to care about anything else. Particularly cream puffs.
“I see. And your discussion is going well?” He addressed his question to Merlow.
Merlow grunted and shook his head. “Young Butchers couldn’t explain to me why a whole werewolf village got burned to the ground.”
We all turned to stare at the old Butcher. My attention was fully occupied by him.
“Silence,” the C.M. said in a low voice that wasn’t any louder than usual, but at the same time, cut through all the low talking in the room until every head was turned in our direction.
Merlow rubbed his chin before he stood with a sigh, leaning on the table on his fists. “Two hundred miles south, there’s been some talk of Butchers openly slaughtering law-abiding Weres. Of course it’s nonsense, there haven’t been any Butchers in Rowenburg for a century. Don’t need to be since they’re so isolated, mostly infected Amish who keep to their own even in these days. They’re not a problem, so what Butcher would antagonize the lot of them?” He shook his head. “Butchers should be so busy fighting the darkness that they don’t have time for distractions.” He glanced at me for a moment and my fingers twitched around my knife hilt before he glanced back at the C.M. “I think that someone’s trying to stir up the Weres. If they succeed, it’s going to be a long, dark night this year.”<
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“That’s ridiculous.” “No Butcher could break his vows.” “You’ve been an Iterant Butcher for too long, Merlow.” Low Butcher voices filled the room, words against Merlow who scowled at the room in general before taking his seat and frowning at my rough carving.
The C.M. traced the tree with a long finger, the swirling roots that represented the darkness below the light. “Daughtry, have you heard anything regarding this matter?”
Every eye turned to me. I licked my lips and tasted Violetta. I shoved thoughts of her down while I tried to focus, to analyze every scrap of information I’d sorted through the past few months. “I believe there was something, an accused werewolf for a human death in that vicinity, but there weren’t any charges drawn, and the Butcher’s name who made the accusation wasn’t recorded. I’ll look into it.”
He raised his dark eyebrows at me before a slight smile curved his lips. Approval. I’d never in my life cared for his approval. I didn’t know why he wasted it on me. I was the Butcher because it’s what I was, not because I was his son, what he wanted from me. I dropped my gaze to Merlow, studying him, searching his features, difficult to read beneath the scars, but at the same time, I felt something, fear in spite of his eyes being emotionless chips of blue glass when they met mine. I felt his fear through connection. Merlow was afraid, and that fear was bone deep from one of the most fearless Butchers among our ranks.
I left the meeting trying to avoid the C.M. but he said my name and I stopped two steps away from the door. Casper gave me a sympathetic glance before he ducked out. The second youngest Butcher in our ranks thought it was amusing that I was kissing a Baker, and had called her Landry’s daughter. Was it possible for anyone besides Landry to have a child as talented as Violetta? If she was his daughter, why didn’t she know him? Landry had a sister, and that was it as far as family was concerned. He’d given her a large stack of bills, and hadn’t stopped me from giving her my energy. He hadn’t told the C.M. about her either.
I turned and smiled at the C.M. walked calmly over to him where he still stood talking quietly to Merlow at the table I’d maimed. I waited a respectful distance until Merlow stood and edged around me, away from the Butchers who were lingering, gossiping, eyeing the old man with barely veiled contempt.
“You fell in the pond?” He was staring at the tree instead of looking at me.
I shrugged. “Not exactly. Something else fell in the pond, and I had to fish it out. I’m not sure if the dear even appreciated it.”
He raised his eyes to me and I saw the weight there, a thousand times heavier than the load I carried. “You took the time to rescue a doe?”
I shrugged. “To be honest, I was looking for distractions. Meetings are the worst part of being The Butcher.”
He rested his hand on my shoulder and I stared at him flatly, irritated that he would cover my skin where her hands had been such a short while before. He was not the one I wanted to touch me. “Orion, your position here is based on merit. Try not to act like the spoiled child of the C.M.”
I laughed and brushed his arm off of me. “Spoiled, yes, I’m so spoiled for anything other than slaughtering creatures, spilling blood, feeling the hunger and feeding it with death. Dull meetings with tiresome Butchers when there is darkness to chase feels very much like a waste of my time. Maybe I should join the renegades, except that my informant has told me where they meet, and if their meetings are anything like ours, there wouldn’t be any point, would it?”
He hit me across the face, a sharp blow that cut through my words. His expression was concerned, his eyes gentle and I felt a wave of such deep regret and pain from him that I stumbled away, trying to escape that emotion from him, connection. I didn’t want it, I didn’t need it, not from him, not ever.
“Do not ever speak so lightly. The vows that are burned into your bones…” He shook his head and ran a hand through his short hair, frustrated because I’d wanted him to be frustrated with me. I wanted him to strike out at me, clearly or I wouldn’t have said something so stupid. I’d wanted a reaction out of him because deeply I felt betrayed by him for giving me this burden, a weight that Armand had become a werewolf to escape.
I blinked at him before I spoke, slowly. “I apologize. The truth is, ever since last Twelfth Night, I’ve been uneasy about my position.”
His eyebrows drew together. “Lance is gone. Who else would challenge you?”
I shook my head and frowned down at the tree I’d carved, the light and the dark joined with thick trunk that nothing could sever. “The renegades are challenging me. If word of them hasn’t spread to the other Butchers by now, it’s only a matter of time.”
He shifted as though he wanted to put his hand on my shoulder again, but held back at the last moment. “And you aren’t interested in fighting for your place as The Butcher? You’d rather give it up to renegades who are destroying everything we’ve sacrificed for?”
I raised an eyebrow and smiled slightly. “Are they? They’re Butchers. If I can’t reach them, then I shouldn’t be in this position. It’s not fair for them or for me. I’m the one causing their actions because I’m not giving them what they require. I can’t reach them the way that I can’t reach Olivia.”
His eyes flickered at her name. “Has she joined them?”
“Not yet, but she struggles.”
“We all struggle, Orion. That’s why we are Butchers. Take Casper with you into the North Side until you remember what you are.”
I laughed and shook my head, staring at him, hating that I was looking at myself in twenty years. “I couldn’t possibly forget.”
I left the room, stalking through the doorway, ignoring the other Butchers who were eying me with varying degrees of interest.
“So,” Casper said, falling in beside me as I walked through the great room. “What’s it like?”
“You’re accompanying me to the North Side. Do you have your kit?” I stopped at a small room and grabbed a bag I slung over my shoulder. My usual kit was in the back of my trunk with Violetta’s wet things. Casper was not getting a glimpse of pale green cashmere.
“I’m dressed for business,” he said with another wiggle of his eyebrows. He threw an arm over my shoulder and hissed in my ear, “What’s it like to kiss a Baker?”
“Like having a zombie eat off your face.” I pushed him off of me and continued walking.
He laughed and matched my pace. “Are you feeling up to Butchering? Don’t you need some cream-puffs or something?”
I glanced at him and his eyes were clear as he gazed back at mine, his observational skills bordering on supernatural.
I only shrugged. Casper was an interesting mix between brilliant and completely bone-headed. He didn’t have a city full of Butcher’s Boys’ to look after. Instead, he travelled to the places where the population wasn’t great enough, the darkness consuming enough to require a full-time Butcher.
“We’ll take the jag.”
As we drove towards North City, Casper keeping up a stream of hot girls he dated in his rounds as a Butcher while I thought about Landry, his reaction to Violetta. He’d taken her in immediately, which was what I expected, but he treated her like Armand had treated me, watching out for me, concerned for my welfare. When Landry had taken me into the other room to grill me, his questions surprised me.
“Is she safe?”
The concern, the serious and complete worry in his eyes brought out the Butcher in me, the protector, the role I played. “Yes. She’s found a safe place.”
He frowned and shook his head. “Have you had any leads about their deaths?”
“No. I can’t seem to get a handle on the murders. There are some vigilantes, as I’m sure you know, who may be involved, but I can’t be certain.
“What about the boy? Is he safe?”
“Not unless running around North City unsupervised is what you call safe.”
Mr. Landry scowled. I knew that scowl. I’d seen it a thousand times on Sebastian.
> “Laurel, their mother came to me for help a few weeks before they…” His mouth tightened. “She said that he was wild, out of control, and that she didn’t know what to do with him.” He looked into my eyes and I saw Sebastian looking back at me. It was astonishing that I hadn’t seen the similarities sooner. “I was a Butcher before I was a Baker. Wouldn’t have made either one if not for your father. He kept me in line. Always made certain that the sad little orphan didn’t spend too long feeling sorry for himself. Your father pushes you because he knows that’s what you need. Sebastian needed something else. He needed affection.”
“That’s my failing,” I’d said. “He’s been difficult. I’m afraid I didn’t connect with him. I thought that I tried, but I could have done better.”
Landry almost put his hand on my shoulder before he pulled back, fist tightening. “Nonsense. If Laurel couldn’t handle him, there’s no way that you could. Or his sister.”
“Why would anyone attack the Tancettas?” I said after a silence when I glanced over at Violetta in the other room where I could see the rim of her curly hair beyond the back of the stuffed chair.
“The C.M. went through his files, bank accounts, numbers, and it seems some things were missing, entire years erased from his files.”
“He didn’t tell me.”
Landry shrugged. “Tancetta could have taken them off himself if they were linked to Butcher business. Lots of files disappear.” He shook his head again. “If she would ever like to train with me, I’d happily take her as my apprentice. Tell her that some time when she’s comfortable with what she is, what you are.”
I shifted. “She doesn’t know any of it. She actually thinks that her parents were killed by tigers from the zoo.”
He sighed before he straightened up and smiled at me. “That’s what her mother wanted. Bakers can have a difficult time in a Butcher’s world, particularly young, vulnerable women like her. Be careful with her, Orion.”
Butcher, Baker, Vampire Slayer: A Retelling of Shakespeare's Twelfth Night Page 19