Chapter 6
Annika
“Whoa, really?” Daphne asks, shock coloring her tone as I press the phone to my ear.
“Really,” I say, rolling on my back, sprawling out on the bed in the room I’d been given in Cassandra’s mansion.
I’m thankful my phone works here. I was afraid the remoteness of the island would equal zero service and I’d have no connection to my best friend.
Daphne and I had bonded instantly when I arrived at the king’s residence, gushing over our love of books and connecting over the similar sheltered lives we’d grown up in, despite her being a human and me being a vampire.
“Dagon,” she says like she can’t totally believe it. “The ancient hunter kissed you?”
“We kind of kissed each other.”
Daphne laughs. “That’s unexpected,” she says. “How was it?”
I blow out a breath. The memory of the kiss, the way he touched me, sears beneath my skin. “Incredible.”
“What’s the problem then?” she asks.
“He’s technically like…my teacher? And he’s a million years old and seems to be totally annoyed with me most days.” Except, lately, he hasn’t. Something has shifted between us, but I’m not sure what exactly that means.
“Damn,” Daphne says, voices chattering in the backroom. “Hang on.” I hear a door close. “They’re having a party in the hallway outside my dorm room.”
I clench my eyes shut. “I’m so sorry! Here I am venting when you have a party to get to. I’ll let you go, you have fun.”
“No, I’m not going,” she says quickly. “An immortal demon king pays my tuition,” she continues. “The last thing I need is him popping up at a party and embarrassing me in front of everyone.”
A laugh tears out of me. “You think Xavier, the king of the demon realm, is embarrassing?” I’ve only seen him once before and the last thing he seemed was embarrassing. Mysterious, terrifying, sex personified, but not embarrassing.
“Yeah,” she laughs. “He loves to pop in at the absolute worst times. It’s ridiculous.”
I laugh harder. “I think you speaking about the demon king like he’s a worried house mother is more ridiculous than anything. You know most people do their best to not irk him or even talk about him out of fear.”
“I’m not scared of him,” she hurries to say. “Just annoyed.” She sighs. “Annoyed but grateful,” she amends. “He’s been…very generous.”
I sit up on my bed. “How generous?”
“Paying for my tuition is no small thing,” she says. “And I wasn’t about to ask Valor for help. Not when she’s already done enough for me.”
“You know she wouldn’t mind,” I say.
“I know, but this is great. It’s working out great.”
“Okay,” I say. “Just be careful. I don’t know Xavier well, but he’s a demon. That usually means he rarely does anything out of the goodness of his heart. And he’s more ancient than Dagon, if you can believe that.”
“I’m very aware of that,” she says. “I haven’t made any deals with the demon. Now, let’s get back to you and Dagon.”
“There is no me and Dagon,” I say despite my heart fluttering. “It was one kiss. That’s all.”
“And it helped you move the water?”
I sigh. “Yes.”
“Then I say do it again,” Daphne says like it’s the easiest answer in the world.
“I can’t,” I say. “He’s…it was just an experiment. A teaching tactic to get me in the right headspace.”
“I’m sure that’s not all it was.”
I groan, hearing footsteps just outside my hall. “I have to go,” I say. “That’s probably him, ready for another lesson.”
“I bet he’s ready for another lesson,” she teases.
I laugh. “Omigod, stop.”
“What?” she asks. “You’re amazing. And a total badass vampire with powers. Do you know how cool that is? You have power of your own. You don’t have to rely on anyone else. That’s everything.”
I hear the shift in her voice, the longing.
Sometimes it’s easy to forget she’s a human girl in college, experiencing life with supernaturals without actually being one herself. I can’t imagine how hard that must be.
“Thanks, Daphne,” I say. “You’re the best. I love you.”
“Love,” she says. “Now go harness all that power like the badass you are. We’ll catch up on everything and have a movie night when you get back.”
“Okay,” I laugh, and we hang up. I head to my door, swinging it open, expecting to see Dagon there, but find Cassandra instead.
“Apologies,” she says, though she doesn’t totally look sorry. “I couldn’t help but overhear your conversation with the human.”
“Okay?” I wasn’t exactly hiding it.
“Congrats on moving the water,” she says. “I know that must feel like a triumph.”
My shoulders drop. “Not really,” I say. “Not when I couldn’t do it without Dagon’s help.”
Cassandra’s red lips shift to a smirk. “I heard that part too.”
Heat blazes over my cheeks.
“Don’t be ashamed of it,” she says. “It’s natural. Especially with elemental power like yours. It’s vast. Of course, you’ll have to tie into heavy emotion first before you really get the hang of it.”
“Heavy emotion.” I laugh softly.
She smiles. “It could be worse,” she says. “You could need to get all sad and weepy to control it. I’d say getting hot and heavy with a hunter is much more fun.”
I press my lips together, barely holding back my smile. “You would know,” I say, thinking of her and Talon’s mateship.
“That I do,” she says, eyes glittering like she’s remembering exactly how much she knows about hunter skills.
“And since I know,” she continues. “I can encourage you to keep doing whatever it takes to get a grip on the power. If you happen to have fun or a few orgasms along the way? That’s a bonus. ”
I burst out laughing. “Oh,” I say when she only smiles at me. “You’re serious.”
“Why not?” she asks before winking at me and heading off.
I tilt my head. I guess she has a point. Dagon has already been clear about relationships. He doesn’t want one, so there’s no need for us to connect on a deeper level than him helping me get ahold of my power. It can be a purely physical thing.
The ache in my core wants it to be. Needs it to be. I haven’t been able to stop thinking about his kiss or his touch since it happened.
And I do need control over this power. With the war we all know is coming, the king is going to need all the help he can get.
So, in all reality, it’s important that I keep pushing.
Should the way I get there really matter?
Moonlight ripples over the water, a cool silver that moves as I wade through it.
Dagon is practically on the other side of the pond, having kept his distance for the past hour—instructing me from his chosen spot, to no avail.
I did make a few droplets move, but nothing compared to the other night.
I can almost feel the connection to my power, like a wisp of smoke from a blown-out candle.
The last time, after Dagon had kissed me, the connection had felt like grabbing hold of a solid, sturdy chain.
All I had to do was tug it and the water did what I wanted.
The stark difference between then and now is frustrating to the nth degree.
“I want to try again,” I finally say, exhausted with the lack of progress. I move toward him, and he shifts the other way.
“You’ve been trying. Keep doing what you’re doing.” He evades me as I pursue.
“No, I want to try what we did the other night.” God, I can’t believe he’s making me spell it out.
I walk toward him as he moves back. “It was your idea. And it was a good one. It worked. Maybe if I can connect to the power that strongly again, I’ll learn how to do it without needing your help.
If I can just figure out how to grab hold of it, I know I can get better.
It doesn’t have to mean anything, just like last time—”
“We can’t,” he cuts me off.
I stop dead in my tracks.
Rejection rolls through me in a wave, stealing my confidence in an icy blast. Confidence he told me I should have.
He came up with the experiment in the first place. I assumed his distance tonight was out of respect, waiting for me to ask for that kind of help should I need it. But, it wasn’t? Which means…he’s stayed away from me all night because he doesn’t want me in that way. Even if it’s just physical.
This…this stings.
“We can’t,” he says again, as if I needed another round of mortification.
The high I rode after his help last time completely crashes. I can’t be mad. I have no right to be. He has no obligation to keep up with the unorthodox methods in helping me reach my power.
I just thought, from the way he’d kissed me, he might’ve enjoyed it as much as I did. I know he’s not a fan of relationships and I respect that. I never would’ve kissed him if I thought we were going to end up together. He had to know that, and yet, still, he’s acting like I have the plague.
Another wave of embarrassment swirls my stomach.
“It’s fine,” I finally say. It has to be fine. I’m a big girl. I can take a little rejection.
Then why does this hurt so much?
Maybe it’s because kissing him had been the only real success I’d had connecting with my power. That’s all. Definitely not because I’ve never been kissed like that, touched in the way he touched me. Nope. Not. At. All.
I heave a sigh, hating that he’s the only person that’s helped get me close to understanding the depths of my power. His ability to realize that the key was the heavy emotion tied to passion and need and release.
That thought stops the pity-party right in its tracks, an idea taking shape.
Who says I need him to help me conjure those emotions? Especially if he has no interest in me.
“I’m sorry.” He runs is fingers through his damp hair. “Annika—”
“Right,” I say, a challenging sort of courage rising inside me. “It’s not a problem.” I head toward the bank, totally ready to bury my head in the sand that lines the water.
“We don’t need to stop the lesson,” Dagon calls from behind me.
“I’m not,” I say over my shoulder as I climb onto the sandy surface.
“Then where are you going?”
“You don’t want to help me, and I get that. It’s totally fair. But you made me realize a path to tap into my power, and I’m going to do whatever it takes to do that again.”