The Phantom King (The Kings) (13 page)

Now Roman was confused.
He felt his fangs slide back from where they’d extended as h
e came into the room
. He
made hi
s way to her side of the desk and
lean
ed
against it.
“Then who?”

“A friend of mine, a
playwright
. Her opening night was this past Saturday. This is one of her reviews
.” She shook her head,
pushing back in her chair and
crossing her arms over her chest. “
I’ve known her for years, since way before either of us
earned any kind of publicity
.
She’s one of the kindest
people I know, and
h
er
work
is anything but crap
.”

Evie gritted her teeth, and Roman could see that her fangs had come out.
“
What would they know about writing plays?
God, she’s gonna
to be devastated when she reads this.”

Roman considered that in silence for a moment.
He’d lived a lon
g time, and in those eons, one of the many things he’d learned was that i
n the end,
those who often had the least to contribute to an
art form
were very often the ones who had the most to say about it.

“Be kind and considerate with your criticism,” he said softly, “It’s just as hard to write a bad book as it is to write a good book.”

Evie was taken aback enough by the sudden quote that she blinked and looked up at him. “Who said that?”

“Malcolm,” he said.

“Cole?” Evie questioned, clearly surprised.

“No,” he told her, smiling. “Malcolm Cowley.” He reached out with one hand and gently tucked a lock of her hair behind her ear. “American author, journalist, poet, and literary critic who died in ’89. And you’re right,” he said. “They probably don’t know anything at all.
Some people simply get bored if they’ve gone too long without being cruel.
”
He could think of a few off hand.

Evie closed her eyes as Roman’s fingers trailed gently from her ear to her jaw line, and finally brushed softly against her bottom lip. “If you’d like, I can pay her a visit and see that it doesn’t bother her.”

She
didn’t answer; he could see her pulse speed up
in the side of her slender throat, and his fangs were back to their full length in his mouth.

“
Sometimes it’s
good to be married to the Vampire K
ing,” Evie whispered.

Roman smiled, fangs flashing.

“Tell me something,” his wife said, frowning a little, her eyes still closed. “
Do all vampires consider you their sovereign? Even if they’ve never met you?”

“Not all vampires are aware of the way our society is set up, just as not all Akyri
or
warlocks
or werewolves are aware – especially now
. Sometimes we are brought into the fold blindly.”

Evie was silent as she thought about that.
A minute later, without bothering to open her eyes, she said “By the way,
why are you here?”
Her voice was soft, distant. She was referring to his presence in the mansion where she had an office and the vampire council often held meetings.

“The council is meeting in fifteen.”

Her eyes opened. “What for?”

“Some of the council are becoming restless in the face of the Hunter withdrawal. It makes very little sense, and they’re worried that the Hunters are pulling back only to regroup in a more dangerous manner.”

Evie nodded and pushed her chair out to stand. “I was worrying about the same thing, to be honest.”

“We’ll be arranging
a series of
contingency defenses throughout the kingdom,” Roman told her.
He hesitated before adding, “I think it’s also time we discuss Marius and his practices. They’re getting out of hand and Alberich has stated that some of his warlocks were being hounded by Akyri warriors.”

“That’s a bit of a departure from the norm,” Evie stated,
no doubt
referring to the manner in which warlocks had always used Ak
yri as slaves due to the Akyri dependency
on black magic for survival.

“It is,” Roman agreed. “And not necessarily for the better. The Akyri seem to be taking on a bully’s cast, going after warlocks who are not capable of defending themselves.”

Evie frowned. “What warlock isn’t capable of defending himself?”

“A warlock who doesn’t necessarily like
the powers she has and who tries
very hard not to use them for anything but good.”

Evie bit her lip
, squeezing the plump flesh between two white teeth
. Roman’s vision shifted slightly red. “A good warlock,” Evie said softly, talking to herself. “A
walking
oxymoron.”

“Indeed,” Roman agreed.
“
And one that drains the warlock, making them easier prey.”

“Of course it does,” Evie remarked sarcastically. “No good deed goes unpunished.”

Roman could see the
frustrations
written a
cross his bride’s lovely face and he knew that t
hey were placed there, not by the bad news of the day, but by the hardships of humanity
in general
.
She was a sensitive soul.
Today’s events were merely straws weighing heavily on the camel’s back.

“
I was hoping you wo
uld consider attending this one,
”
he said
, referring
again
to the vampire council’s upcoming meeting. His wife was a highly intelligent woman, and she had a vast imagination. Such qualities were helpful when brainstorming
both defensive and offensive
tactics.

Evie inhaled through her nose and blew it out through her mouth. “You know how I hate meetings.”

“I do,” he said. And then he
leaned over her, his body towering as he gently cupped her chin and tilted her head so that she once more looked into his eyes. “
I’ll make it up to you.”

Evie’s pupils dilated, her lips parted, and he could see that her fangs were ag
ain e
xtending behind them. He went in for the kill.

“I’ll
have Jaxon br
ing
fresh, hot
coffee to the meeting
.
”

“Deal.”

Roman smiled, feeling the warmth and vitality of his wife deep in his bones. He leaned in for a kiss, and she closed her eyes.

An unsett
led wave coursed through him, a
frisson
of something starkly negative. He froze, his senses spiking, his fangs at once fully bared, his eyes shifting to red.

So soon you forget about me, my love. What is two hundred years to one such as you? A flash, a dream.
Nothing.
And now you kiss another.

Roman was stunned into immobility. The voi
ce in his head was so familiar,
it was as if h
e’d heard it yesterday. And yet
it was foreign, touched with something unsettling and changed, and the fact that it was in his head in the first place was unthinkable.

Ophelia!

Aw, y
ou remember me after all.

Roman’s body was moving before he fully realized he was directing it. He could feel Evie behind him at the desk and could sense her confusion, but it couldn’t be helped. He tore the curtains from the window and peered into the darkness beyond with the keen eyes of a hunter. The inner garden was empty. Ophelia’s statue stood solemnly, gazing up at the night sky.

“Roman?” Evie’s voice, soft and sweet in its concern.

Oh
, she’s just precious. But you’re t
oo l
ate
my love. You’ve poked the bear.

Roman whirled around as the voice in his head seemed to echo off of the walls of his consciousness, coming from every different direction at once. Confusion rattled his bones,
abrading
his nerves. He could barely believe what he was hearing. Ophelia was alive?

And she was a vampire.

More unbelievably, somehow she had amassed enough power to enter his mind. No ot
her vampire on Earth could do that
.

You’ve
p
oked
the big,
bad master vampire bear
,
Ophelia continued. Then she laughed, the sound
like
audible evil.
Now it’s hungry
, her voice continued, petulant and further away than before. She was receding
. A
nd it has a taste for
what you hold most dear.

Chapter Eight

Siobhan felt something brush her leg and looked down. A large ginger cat cocked its head back and stared up at her through clear yellow eyes. Its tail flicked against her calf, curling around her leg.

Brrreow.

Siobhan smiled, pulling off her gloves to dump them in the soil
in the flower bed against the e
ast wall of her house.
The cat had no collar and no tags.
She knelt
and gave it
a gentle scratch behind the ears.
An odd vibration traveled up her fingertips and into her wrist
. Frowning
, she withdrew her hand. The feeling disappeared.

The cat began to purr loudly, ma
king that half-meow sound again
and butting its big orange head against the side of her knee. It wanted more petting.

Siobhan glanced
up at the sky. The sun was finally lowering in the western sky; it was the hottest time of the day. T
hough she preferred day to night since the urge to use her magic was less then, she’d never been a fan of the heat.
“Tell you what,” she said to the cat, giving it another little scratch and trying to ignore the strange vibration that came with it. “I’ll go get us a couple of drinks. Stay right here.”