Chapter 29 #2
He huffed a small, apologetic laugh. “I am sorry to disappoint you. I cannot.” His eyes were mournful when they flashed up to my face.
“Vale has no healer in his coven, so we’ll have to see Arden when we get back to Hillcrest Hollow.
I am sorry.” He said that as if it were a personal failure of his, that he could not take away my pain.
Instead, he offered me a glass of water and a painkiller.
Belfry fluttered from Luther’s shoulder to land on my knee.
Only some vampires can heal others, he said.
Most of them can heal fast, but other than the fangs and blood drinking, they’re really not that special.
He had a tear in his ear I saw now, with a dried crusts of blood, and his vest was torn and stained.
I blinked at him, wanting to reach out, but my hands were back in Luther’s, and he was rechecking the bandages.
“You can go into the light,” I pointed out.
It had felt rather weird to ask about it before, as if I’d be asking something really dumb.
The vampires I was familiar with, the ones from books and movies, they couldn’t, though.
Luther liked thick drapes, but I was certain that was for Belfry’s benefit, not his.
There was an amused snort from Luther, and then he picked up the bat and gently began cleaning his ear.
Belfry was the one who answered. That’s Bram Stoker’s fault.
He deliberately got all his facts wrong.
I laughed, the sound shaky but real. Belfry made it sound like the famous author of Dracula actually knew about vampires.
I was too tired to ask further questions, but it was day, and Luther was eager to return home.
“You can sleep in the car, darling,” he promised me.
Vale saw us off personally inside the garage below the hotel.
Two buff-looking men in sleek suits brought the book from the vault to us.
It was locked in a reinforced safe box and handed over with ritual gravity.
Then he told Luther they must meet again so Luther could explain how he had found his soulmate.
He was unfailingly courteous to me when he bowed over my hand and said goodbye; almost wistful.
I saw it then: envy, sharp and lonely beneath centuries of control.
He held no hope of finding his own soulmate one day, and endless days of immortality stretched out in front of him.
I was still mulling that over when the armored sedan hummed as it pulled onto the highway.
Luther drove, hands tight around the steering wheel and eyes flicking to the mirrors over and over as he checked that we weren’t being followed.
Though I was tired and probably should sleep, my jaw and wrists ached too much for me to find any peace.
So I asked him why it was so rare that he’d found his soulmate, and why it seemed that Vale did not believe he’d find his.
“I don’t know,” Luther answered thoughtfully.
He was still looking over his shoulder but beginning to relax as the highway opened up to us and we began to put the city behind us.
“Just that soulmates have been this myth that’s part of the very fabric of immortal culture.
We all hear of it, of the marks, the completeness of such a bond, and the flash of recognition.
But until Rosy and Chardum last year, I’d never heard of an actual mated pair.
Shifters bond, of course, but it’s a magic ritual of choice, not fate. ”
He swept a hand toward the locked box secured on the seat behind me.
“Perhaps that book has answers. The name Galamut is probably as old a whisper as soulmate bonds are.” I wanted to reach for the book immediately, but Luther told me I needed a few hours of sleep first. Since that wasn’t a no for the rest of the journey, I obliged, cuddling up with Belfry at my throat on the seat and letting my eyes slide closed.
I didn’t think it would work, but it was several hours and hundreds of miles later when I woke up from the pain.
Luther gently reminded me when to take my painkillers, and then he let me distract myself with more questions.
I asked him everything, about his kind, about vampire covens, about bonds, both kind: shifter or soulmate, and about his past. He answered all of it patiently and openly, and I realized how free I felt.
There were no doors left closed and no secrets hanging between us.
Even when Luther opened up about why he’d found it hard to explain what he was to me, I felt only warmth and affection.
Ilse, the woman he explained had sold him out and betrayed him, had lived in Germany with him several centuries ago.
She was no threat to our future, and she was not his soulmate.
I was. Me—the nerdy, book-obsessed librarian who couldn’t decide whether she had a temper or was painfully shy.
Belfry, wedged into the crook of my neck, had been insufferably smug ever since he’d woken from his nap with me.
I breathed fire, he announced for the fifth time.
Told you I could. He cackled with pleasure and buffed his gold chain necklace with a claw.
Luther had helped him smooth out his fur and put on a new red silk vest—pinstriped this time—before we’d left the hotel hours ago.
Except for the bandage on his ear, he looked like his usual self.
I studied the bandage now, certain I’d be subjected to the story of how he’d outflown a huge hawk again if I didn’t change the direction of the conversation.
“The scar’s going to make you look very dashing,” I said, though I knew I wasn’t feeling so pleased about the burns leaving a mark on my wrists.
He preened instantly, proving I’d said the right thing.
I know! Do you think the goats will like it?
Avis is just going to poke fun, but he can go choke on a hairball.
Avis was the cat familiar, I’d learned, of the local mechanic.
Belfry had a rivalry with the creature that I was fairly certain was all in Belfry’s head.
Luther glanced at us, fondness softening his eyes.
“I love you both,” he said quietly. “So much. I could not imagine my life without either of you.” My answering smile was so huge it made my cheeks ache, my chest filling with the same love I felt for the two of them, almost too big to contain it all.
He hesitated, then added, “I am sorry I did not explain the mate bond properly.”
I waved it away with a hand, then hid a wince and quickly returned my arm to my lap. “It all worked out,” I told him firmly. It had been more confusing than anything, and I couldn’t regret it for a single moment now.
Belfry frowned, his furry face wrinkling, his ears going back.
Why was that an issue? It wouldn’t have formed if she hadn’t wanted it.
The car went quiet as we let those words sink in.
I stared out at the forest sliding past, that sentence echoing in my head.
Wouldn’t have formed if she hadn’t wanted it.
Huh, that was interesting… and I was ready to believe it in an instant.
I’d been so hurt and alone when I first came to Hillcrest Hollow, and even when it seemed we were at odds, Luther had made me feel like I was me again from the moment we met.
That night, we slept in a motel alongside the highway, the book tucked beneath the bed, and Belfry haunting the night, chasing bugs.
It was a terrible bed, but it was made better simply because Luther was there to hold me.
In the morning, after my painkillers had started working, he placed the lock box in my lap and told me I could start reading.
That’s how I spent the next leg of the drive, with my protective gloves on so I wouldn’t damage the ancient vellum, and my nose in the manuscript’s pages.
Reading Latin was a bit of a headache, but the text was so interesting I hardly noticed.
We were beginning to approach Hillcrest Hollow late in the day, and I’d made good progress.
Reading the book also kept me distracted from my aching wrists.
The road had narrowed, trees crowding close, and reststops and other signs of civilization had become rarer.
Long haulers passed occasionally, but otherwise, it was empty.
The light was fading, the day slipping toward evening.
Belfry was pointing out all the fireflies we passed from where he perched on the front dash, and Luther kept promising even better treats when we got home.
That was when something slammed into us from the side. I never saw it coming. Luther didn’t have time to react, and Belfry shrieked in terror. Metal screamed as it tore; the world spun, and for a brief moment, gravity vanished. The car left the road and rolled.