As I try to make sense of the designs on the walls, I realize I’m looking at oversize replicas of pencil drawings. Sketches of buildings. And I recognize some of the structures. Did this guy Marius design them?
We turn at the end of the hall and come to a set of large double doors. They’re a deep crimson.
Like the blood Ben took from Faelan.
I glance down at his arm. There’s still dried blood on the tattooed skin, but not a scar in sight. How is this even possible? I can’t wrap my head around it. I’m some sort of goddess’s child? It’s laughably insane. And yet I just watched a vampire I nearly killed with my touch suck the blood from my new tour guide—who is totally fine.
Faelan knocks. “It’s me, sir.”
The door on the right side opens. A tall, pale white-haired man in a white suit is standing there like a sentinel. He bows his head as we pass him, so I’m guessing he’s not Marius.
The room is all white, as sparse as a doctor’s office, except for a single splash of red-orange—a huge painting of a blossoming rose made of fire that takes up the entire wall opposite us. There’s a white wooden desk in the center of the whitewashed cement floor, and sitting behind it is a large black man with silver hair, wearing a fitted charcoal-gray cotton V-neck. His broad shoulder muscles flex as he hunches over his work, moving a pencil across paper. At this angle, he appears perfectly normal, just focused on whatever he’s doodling.
He moves aside a ruler as we step closer, studies his drawing for another two seconds, and looks up.
I swallow a gasp. His eyes, they’re . . . teal. His gaze moves to my face and holds, then skims over my body, up and down, pausing on my hair.
He must have grayed early because his features look young. He can’t be much older than midthirties, lean and muscular, with a small pale scar running along his temple, beside his right eye. His left arm is dotted in a circular pattern with more thick ball-like scars. They look like they were placed there on purpose, to mark him.
“Well, well,” he says, sounding a little British. “Look at this creature.” He stands and sets his pencil down, then walks around to the front of his desk. He leans back on it casually and folds his muscular arms over his chest. “She’s lovely.” A small grin tilts his lips. “Isn’t she lovely, Faelan?”
Does he need glasses? I’m a total mess.
My captor grunts like he doesn’t agree with the assessment of my beauty either.
“Any signs of Kieran following her?” Marius asks.
Faelan shakes his head. “No, sir.”
“Very good.” Then, directing his words at me, he says, “I am Marius. Forgive my informality. I’ve been caught up in the realms of imagination. I’m completely enraptured by this theater I’m working on.” He motions to the large paper lying across his desk. “The acoustics must be just right. We cannot have Mozart’s Requiem sounding any less than perfect when it fills the cracks and crevices of the design.” His smile grows whimsical and I find it’s contagious, like it’s trying to sneak onto my own lips. I have to clench my jaw to keep it back. But before I can stop the full effect, my insides melt a little, like when I had that crush on my art teacher in tenth grade.
“Now that you’re here,” he says, snapping me back to reality, “we must take care of you properly so that you can feel right at home with us. I wouldn’t wish for you to worry or find yourself too overcome by—”
A door clicks open behind him, and he cuts off his words as a thin woman with similar teal eyes, long white hair, and very pale skin emerges from a door hidden in the wall. She’s strikingly odd looking, not to mention half-naked, wearing only underwear and a light gray dress shirt that isn’t buttoned. Something tells me the shirt belongs to Marius, my new Daddy Warbucks.
“We’re bored,” she whines. “Come back to us, macushla. It’s nearly morning, and Korinna is growing famished.”
“Yes, yes.” Marius motions in dismissal. “I’ll be there in a moment.”
She whimpers, obviously impatient, and goes back into the room, shutting the door behind her.
My anxiety cranks back up to a hundred. What sort of guy is this? He hides women in his office to use at his whim? I mean, he’s hot and all, for an older guy, but . . .
I study him more closely, trying to figure out if I can trust him. Then I glance at Faelan to gauge his reaction to what just happened.
The commando’s eyes are locked on the floor as if his life depended on it.
Wow. Obviously not a gawker—not even when the girl’s half-naked. Maybe he’s gay?
“So. Where were we?” Marius asks, like we just got interrupted by his secretary. He looks me over again, and this time I stiffen. His gaze stops at my neck. “We really must get you a new torque; that one is archaic. Truly, Faelan. It’s no longer the Dark Ages, as much as you may miss them.” He laughs softly and goes back around his desk to open a drawer, and then he pulls out a large red velvet box. He opens it and picks up a delicate gold necklace. There’s a charm on the end—a Celtic knot with three loops tucked inside a circle—and in the center of the charm sparkles a yellow-orange stone.
Marius holds it out in offering. “You do the honors, Faelan.”
Faelan runs a nervous hand through his hair before he leaves my side to walk over and take the chain from his boss. He comes back toward me, holding it awkwardly in his left hand. He pauses in front of me, hesitant, like he’s not wanting to get close. But after several awkward seconds, he reaches around my neck to unlock the heavy metal ring resting on my nape.
His chest envelops me, warm against my cheek. I hear a click, and the heavy weight of the shackle falls away as he sets it aside. But he doesn’t move back. He stays. Close. And then he begins to place the delicate necklace.
The smell of fresh-cut grass fills my head, and the taste of peppermint blossoms in my mouth, tingling in my nose. And I know it’s him, his scent surrounding me.
I close my eyes and take a deep breath.
My skin warms as prickles work their way through my insides—
“Stop,” Faelan growls, cutting through the rush. “No feeding.” He steps away a little so we’re not touching.
My eyes fly open as he moves back. But he only allows a few inches between us as he finishes clasping the necklace into place. “I can feel when you begin to take from me,” he says. “Try not to feed without someone’s permission.”
“You taste like peppermint,” I say before my brain can stop my mouth.
Marius chuckles, and a chill runs over me as I realize what I did. I just fed off Faelan? I didn’t even realize that I was doing anything. How could I take something as monumental as life from someone without meaning to—my God, this is insanity.
“I’m sorry,” I say, weakly. Shame fills me, like I got caught doing something perverted. “I didn’t mean to.”