Chapter 54 Lia
Lia
“Thank you for bringing me back home,” she told Arctos once they’d left the turmoil of the feast. “It was getting a little…”
“Too much like a battlefield?” he supplied.
She wasn’t immortal yet; even an errant elbow could break her. “I do have a clearer idea what a battlefield might feel like now,” she said wryly. “Loud, crowded, and deeply unconcerned with my personal safety. Good for training.”
“I’ve never seen the clan so rancorous.”
Her humor slipped. “Was it because of me?” Others had been harmed by vampires, some even as deeply as Arctos and Torben.
“No. The clan liked you. Dagny especially.”
“I liked them too.” She hesitated. “But I noticed tension between you and Torben.”
“My cousin is hotheaded to a fault,” Arctos said, then added, “and often right.”
“About Yrsa?”
He shot her a look. “Did Dagny speak to you about her?”
Lia shook her head. “My thoughts usually turn to royals. It’s a bad habit I picked up early and never quite put down. During my days spent in the library, I studied them.” Distrust of crowns lived in her marrow. “It puzzles me that Yrsa wed me to you after what my kind did to your family.”
“Ah. Dagny told you that.” He poured vodka, offering Lia a glass.
“None for me, thank you. I intend to drink only water for the rest of my life.” She paused. “Possibly tea, if pressed.”
“Not a drop of blood?”
“Never.” Her voice didn’t tremble. “Now, your queen?” Some detail still tickled the back of Lia’s brain about Yrsa’s appearance. What was it that her mind struggled to remember?
“Yrsa wonders if she was hasty with the marriage decree.” He drained his glass and poured again. “She offered me an annulment.”
“Oh.” The word was a strangled sound. “How lucky for you.” He’d become her anchor here; the thought of losing him left her adrift. “What becomes of me?”
He hesitated.
She could guess why. “Yrsa’s sending me back.” Lia forced a breath. “I assume this is where I thank you for your hospitality and prepare to run for my life.” Her mind fired with thoughts of escape. Warmer clothes, sturdy boots, her sword. Maybe she could make it past that bear this time.
She would prefer the bear to Co?tin.
“I told her I’d think on it. I gave her no decision.”
A startled laugh broke from her. “You’re very good at suspense, Arctos. But I need to know which way you’re leaning.”
“I don’t want you to return to Bloodreach,” he said with more feeling than his stoicism usually allowed.
“So you’d sacrifice your freedom to spare me a hell?”
He tossed back vodka. “Apparently.”
Lia frowned. “Do you want me…as a wife?”
“Not like that.” Honest as ever. “But I won’t see you harmed.”
“Then what does that make us?” She tilted her head. “Strategic allies with poor timing?”
“I don’t know,” he admitted. “Every day I fight my memories of those vampires. You make it easier because you are different. Will you remain so?”
“Yes,” she whispered. Her throat burned, just a glance of heat. Did her subconscious accept what she’d refused to acknowledge? “This is who I am.”
He seemed to believe her. “Then stay. With me. If you want to.”
“I do.” As long as possible, she silently added. She couldn’t pin down the clan’s regent and sensed danger.
“Good. Good.” He fished a small book from his coat. “Have something for you. I asked Inkletter to source it. It’s a collection of Berserker fables. Tales of your new people.”
She accepted it with a gasp. No gift could be more thoughtful. “Thank you!” She pressed it to her chest, then impulsively reached up to hug him. His neck was right there, the pulse hot beneath salt-scented skin. Delectable. Full of life.
She stepped back, fighting the prickle at her fangs. Nothing with Dagny. Why him?
He flushed along the hard planes of his cheeks, and the little tell only sharpened her thirst. Stop this. You’re not a predator! So she clung to the book like a charm until she got her fangs under control.
“We’ll get more books, and I’ll build you shelves for them.” He seemed pleased with her; she sensed his contentment.
Despite her fears and doubts, his relaxation called to her own. She slid the book into her pocket and kept her palm on the warm leather. “I think you’re happy with me, Arctos.”
“Don’t read too much into it,” he said, then winced at his own pun. Still, his gaze held consideration she hadn’t earned. “I’ll tell Yrsa tomorrow that you’re staying.”
“Can we make this work?” Lia asked, even knowing he didn’t understand all the variables surrounding her.
“I believe we…can move forward.”
“I want your friendship.” But I don’t deserve it!
Maybe all vampires were creepy and wrong because they’d recognized the futility of being anything else.
Yet still, she channeled Dagny’s boldness to say, “Can we have that bond? I respect you—more than anyone I’ve ever met—and I…
I want that bond with you.” A friend would be able to understand her and find compassion for things she couldn’t control.
He stared into the fire for a long beat, wrestling ghosts. She’d asked too much and was sorry for it, aching for him.
At last he stepped closer, curling a finger under her chin. “We will be friends, Emilia. I’ve never given my friendship lightly, and I’m not doing so now.”
“Thank you.” I think I love him—as my friend. Her smile couldn’t be contained. “I won’t let you down.” Liar. Yet her throat didn’t burn on that one.
“Nor I you, little vampire.”
As the winds howled in the background, the moment stretched out between them—calm, improbable, rich with promise.
They were friends. She would eventually confess everything, and he would help her. They would work together as a team, finding other vampires who abstained.
It was in this state, this relaxed and happy state, that the detail from before surfaced, clear as a bell. “Arctos,” she murmured, “has Ravinelun ever traded with the vampires? Bought fabrics, maybe through an intermediary?”
He lowered his hand. “Any material would be burned in disgust. We now know what the dye is made from. Why?”
She could scarcely catch her breath as recognition hammered her. “The queen’s kirtle,” she whispered. “The weave. It only comes from one place.”
He closed his eye. “Bloodreach.”
***
Arctos
Pieces slid into place like a trap snapping shut.
For reasons he couldn’t yet fathom, Yrsa had aligned herself with the vampires.
Betrayal of the clan. Betrayal of him. Torben had been right all along to suspect her.
“Does she have a connection to Bloodreach?” Emilia asked, gaze wide. “Neculain isn’t lucid enough to lure her to his side, and surely gold couldn’t tempt her.”
“I don’t know,” Arctos said, voice low. “But it explains why she forbade us from rescuing our own. Still…why order me to steal you from under their noses?”
“I have no idea,” Emilia said.
“I need to find Torben.” He checked his sword. “He’s seen this more clearly than any of us. But it’s not safe for you here, not yet. I sense you’re part of this. The key somehow.”
Emilia donned her own sword belt, chin high. “I’m going with you.”
Her determination—her steadiness—caught him off guard. For a moment, she looked every inch a Berserker warrioress, the kind he’d once imagined at his side.
“Yes,” he heard himself say. “You’ll remain with me. Let’s find my cousin. We need an honest reckoning.”
But first, an apology. I’ve awakened, my cousin, my brother. I can see—
Agony ripped through him.
He looked down, stunned, as a golden blade burst through his heart.