Blood Eternal (24 page)
He shook his head. “The opposite, in fact. I thought you might feel more at home if you had a space that was entirely yours.”
She smiled, letting her doubts fall away. “In this house, it would never be that. I like to share with you.” Leaning forward she touched her forehead to his hard, cool shoulder and closed her eyes in pure happiness. “Thank you, Saloman.”
He touched her at last, his fingers stroking through her hair. “Then you like this? You have ideas?”
She smiled again and lifted her head. “I have a thousand. Saloman . . . ?”
“Yes?”
“There’s a job,” she blurted at last. “At Budapest University. For a year, with the possibility of extension. Or at least, there was a job. I never sent the acceptance because this stuff with Luk came up before I had a chance to post it.”
The chance or the courage.
The chance or the courage.
His eyes searched hers. “Well, you are in Budapest,” he observed. “It is easy enough to give your acceptance in person.”
She swallowed. “You’d be happy for me to do that? To live here for a year?”
His hand slid down under her chin. He was smiling. “I would like nothing better. Unless it was two.” He bent and kissed her mouth, and she wound her arms around his neck. “You think too much, agonize too much over things that are basically simple. Is this what’s been eating you up?”
“Partly,” she admitted. “And I suppose I worry that there’s nothing in me to keep the attention of a being who’s lived for millennia. I’d rather die than trail around after someone who simply tolerated me, or didn’t notice me.” As his expression changed, she bit down on her lip to shut herself up. “I’m sorry. I—”
“No more self-deprecation,” he interrupted. “You more than anyone should know that we do not choose whom to love; we do not need reasons. Thirty years old or three thousand makes no difference to that. I would always have been drawn simply to who you are, the beauty that is you.”
“Truly?” she whispered.
“Truly.” His gaze shifted to her neck. “But you . . . you grow day by day, and that fascinates me beyond love.” He bent, drawing her up against him so that she could feel his growing hardness in her abdomen, his silken lips on her throat.
Her eyes closed.
“Let me taste you,” he whispered, and she gasped soundlessly as his sharp, wicked teeth grazed the skin over her vein. The familiar rush of helpless desire caused her to fall back against the wall. She twisted her head in blatant invitation. Somehow, there was almost as much sensual pleasure in offering herself to him like this as in the strange, tugging ecstasy she felt when he sucked her blood into his own body.
Moving against her, he pierced the skin of her neck and she moaned aloud. Saloman held her in his arms and began to suck.
It wasn’t a long drink, more of a hello. Withdrawing his fangs, he licked the puncture wounds with tenderness and lifted his head. “Now come to bed,” he whispered. “And be loved.”
Elizabeth, melting at his words, resisted from instinct when he released her. She clung to him with all her strength, grinding her body against him in blatant, demanding lust. “Let’s christen this room instead.”
Flames danced in his black eyes. “You want me to take you on the floor? Hard and rough?”
“Oh, yes.” She pressed her mouth to his, drawing him through the doorway, already burrowing under his shirt to feel the smooth skin and hard muscle beneath. He tugged once at her top, and as the buttons rolled to the floor, his hand found its way to her naked breast. And then he paused. Maddeningly, his eyes lost their exciting focus.
“What?” she whispered against his lips.
He closed his eyes tight with a sound like a groan. And when he opened them, they blazed like burning coals. “Anticipation will have to sustain us for now. I must go.”
“Go? Go where?” Inclined to outrage, she tried to draw back and found herself pulled hard against him once more in a quick, enveloping hug.
“To the Angel.” Releasing her, he stepped away. “Luk and Dante have broken cover at last.”
Dante doubted it would make any important difference to the outcome, but at least Luk chose not to kill the boy. His weak human heart still beat when Luk dropped him, and he slumped dizzily to the floor.
“And now that I’ve got your attention,” Luk said, “let me introduce myself.”
Dante actually felt the mask slipping away as Luk revealed himself, and knew he’d been right: that the Ancient
had
been propping up his own clumsy mask. The vampires in the club all stared. Several stood up and came forward for a better view. Humans glanced in their direction, uneasy, bewildered at what had happened to the singer sitting on the floor absently rubbing his neck, and wary of being involved in any violence.
had
been propping up his own clumsy mask. The vampires in the club all stared. Several stood up and came forward for a better view. Humans glanced in their direction, uneasy, bewildered at what had happened to the singer sitting on the floor absently rubbing his neck, and wary of being involved in any violence.
Angyalka herself lifted one hand to prevent the advance of her vampire muscle, who either didn’t register or didn’t care about Luk’s identity.
“I am Luk,” said the Ancient with a flourishing bow. “Guardian of the Undead Prophecies. And I come to offer you the greatest gift of all: freedom.”
“How kind,” Angyalka said politely. Her eyes were wary but unafraid. If Luk had unmasked, Saloman would know he was here. The only trouble was, they didn’t know where Saloman himself was. He could be in Budapest or still in Turkey. Or anywhere else in the five continents. “Er . . . freedom from what?”
Luk smiled. “Silly rules. Vampires should live as vampires, not as slaves to the oppressive controls of my cousin Saloman. Behold your savior. Follow me and win back your freedom.”
He may have been mad, but he’d just replaced Dante’s cautious plan with a much bolder move of his own, and he was an impressive bastard. In the same sort of way Saloman was impressive. And, of course, he was saying what the rebellious vampires’ spirits wanted to hear. Dante could swear there wasn’t one of them not touched by the prospect of doing what the hell they liked. Like life-sentence prisoners suddenly released en masse into the community. How the hell could he and Luk control that?
Quashing his sudden panic, he realized they didn’t need to. All Luk needed was the overlordship, the acknowledgment, the backup to fight his powerful cousin. Dante saw several pairs of eyes flicker between Luk and Angyalka, known to be Saloman’s friend. At least in this place, they would take their lead from her.
She smiled. “I regard the Angel as a microcosm of the world,” she said conversationally. “And here we enjoy the freedoms we do only because of the rules I insist on. Rules you gentlemen have just broken.”
There was a backward movement as the club vampires aligned themselves physically away from Luk. It didn’t matter. The invitation was made and would spread. Away from the Angel, support would rush in.
“I must, therefore, ask you to leave.” Angyalka was perfectly safe saying that. She knew just as well as Dante did that Saloman could be on his way, and that they were not ready to face him, certainly not with all the vampires of the Angel on Saloman’s side.
“You are too beautiful to disregard,” Luk said gallantly. He wrinkled his nose. “Besides, the place stinks of my cousin. Until we meet again.” He gave another of his flourishing bows and swept from the room with effortless speed. The humans wouldn’t even have seen him go. Dante, emphasizing the pecking order, spared Angyalka a wink before he swept past the Turkish bodyguard and followed Luk downstairs.
The Ancient had masked again, so it took Dante by surprise to see him standing very still in the doorway to the street.
“Dmitriu,” Luk said abruptly.
“What?”
“Dmitriu is coming. Saloman’s younger creation.”
“I’m only too well acquainted with that bastard,” Dante said with feeling. “You can kill him, can’t you? If there’s a way, I’d like to help.”
“But I cannot feel Saloman. Saloman could be with him.”
“Or he could be a thousand miles away.”
“I’m not ready to take the chance,” Luk said grimly. “Not on an empty stomach. Run.”
Without further warning, Luk seized him by the hand and leapt through the air.
Dante had never run like this. It was terrifying being pulled at such speed and at such heights over buildings and roads, trees and cars, wherever Luk could gain the briefest foothold from which to spring next. After the initial paralyzing shock, Dante began to make his own stumbling efforts to cooperate, to move when Luk did, and discovered he learned fast. It would take years, maybe centuries, to find the speed and height of Luk’s leaps, but the new power exhilarated him, and he took as much pride in his ability to learn as in Luk’s obvious return to strength.
You are
so
dead, Saloman.
so
dead, Saloman.
“He went that way,” the vampire Dmitriu said with a negligent nod into the downpour as Saloman settled on the Angel’s roof beside him. Even in the relentless rain, he smelled of the Awakener. “Looked suspiciously like fleeing to me, and he had Dante with him. Can you sense him?”
Saloman shook his head. “Luk’s masking them both.”
“Their bodyguards are still lurking on the stairs inside. They seem a little bewildered as to where their masters have gone.”
“Their masters are a little careless with the lives of their followers,” Saloman observed.
Dmitriu glanced at him. “You want them dead?” They varied in strength; one was strong enough to give a little trouble, but Dmitriu didn’t doubt that between them he and Saloman could easily kill all eight.
“We kill a few; the rest flee,” Saloman said, gazing around the dark streets on either side of the building. His mask was in perfect place, even for Dmitriu—which was unusual enough to alert Dmitriu to the tension thrumming through his powerful friend. A tension that he suspected had little to do with the coming fight and everything, surely, to do with the vampires who had fled. Saloman brought his gaze back to Dmitriu. “Damage limitation. Word gets around that Luk abandoned his followers and therefore is a poor choice of leader. And it’s a visible punishment for breaking Angyalka’s rules. She’ll be so pleased, she’ll give me free wine.”
“She always gives you free wine. They’re coming out.”
They jumped in perfect time, and Saloman unmasked. Dmitriu caught a hint of fury, a trace of sadness, and knew that neither would make any difference to the inevitable outcome.
“Merhaba,”
Saloman said, seizing the stunned lead vampire and biting into his throat. Draining him was the work of an instant, but it was long enough for the remaining vampires to overcome their shock.
Saloman said, seizing the stunned lead vampire and biting into his throat. Draining him was the work of an instant, but it was long enough for the remaining vampires to overcome their shock.
The fight was brief and brutal, and as the third Turkish vampire shattered to dust under Dmitriu’s stake, the door of the Angel opened to reveal several vampire spectators. As one, Luk’s remaining followers fled into the night, their feet casting up puddle splashes that glittered in the streetlight.
Angyalka, hands on hips, observed, “They weren’t the ones who bit my guest.”
“Picky, picky,” said Saloman.
“They’ll spread the word,” Dmitriu assured her. The other vampires, denied the entertainment of a fight, began to drift back inside or off into the night in search of prey.
Angyalka glanced at Saloman. “Was that really Luk?”
The pause was slight. “To all intents and purposes.”
“You have a powerful enemy,” she said with a hint of malice. “I’ll be interested to see how you deal with him.”
“I’ll win him to my side by sheer personal charm and give him your bar as a reward,” Saloman said flippantly.
Dmitriu laughed. Saloman inclined his head to Angyalka in a mocking sort of way, and strolled up the street in the opposite direction from the fleeing vampires. It might have been an illusion caused by the streetlights, but there seemed to be a sort of halo around him where no rain fell.
“I wish I knew when he was joking,” Angyalka said.
“You do better than most.”
Angyalka glanced at him. “He doesn’t like this, does he?”
Dmitriu steered clear of the personal baggage. “He’s already had to kill Luk once. But Luk’s a formidable opponent. Especially in some sort of thrall to Grayson Dante.”
“He’s made Dante too strong for a fledgling.” Angyalka cast an anxious glance over her shoulder at her beloved club. “There’s going to be a huge battle, isn’t there?”
“I hope it isn’t huge, but yes, there will have to be a fight.”
“Saloman
will
win.” It wasn’t quite a question.
will
win.” It wasn’t quite a question.
“Oh, yes,” Dmitriu agreed.
But at what cost?
But at what cost?
Chapter Twelve
R
udy Meyer shut his front door after the last American vampire hunter, with obvious relief, and turned to face Cyn, who leaned against the living room wall.
udy Meyer shut his front door after the last American vampire hunter, with obvious relief, and turned to face Cyn, who leaned against the living room wall.
Cyn scanned his face with some anxiety. The hunters were a revelation: fascinating, organized, knowledgeable, strong, and—
“Assholes,” Rudy commented.
Cyn let out a laugh of relief. “No, they’re not; they’re just stuck in their ways and convinced they’re superior.”
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