Chapter 28
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
BALE
After leaving Idallia enough time to clean up and eat something, I summon her to my chambers at the inn.
We stayed in the southeast, securing rooms for ourselves and the human captives in the town closest to where we intercepted the vampires.
We already flew a whole day and fought a battle, though most of us barely got in a kill.
The humans will be on their way home tomorrow under the protection of dragon shifters from the local garrison.
They’re taken care of. The rest of the Elite Wing can take care of itself.
The warbirds too. But Idallia and I need to have a conversation.
My heart turns over hard.
The knock comes faster than I anticipate, barely giving me time to finish dressing after a bath. I open the door, half expecting to see the blood-covered tornado from earlier.
There’s no gore, but the sight of Idallia still arrests me, a punch in the chest that stops my breath and shocks an explosive heartbeat from me.
Straight black hair frames a face with delicate, pale features that give the impression of a moonlit sprite sliding like mist out of a forest. Then the sheer whiplike strength of her, the power vibrating under her skin, belie that impression entirely.
She’s iron disguised as silk. I never want to be her enemy.
Someone who loves as intensely as Idallia can hate just as powerfully.
We stare at each other, her golden eyes guarded in a way they never used to be. “Bale?” she says sharply when I don’t move from the doorframe.
I unlock my limbs and step back, inviting her in.
After a moment’s hesitation, she sweeps past me, teasing my senses with the subtle scents of sunshine and ice and the softer, flowery perfume of the inn’s soap.
Her hair is still damp, the thick, heavy mass holding the floral fragrance like a bouquet under my nose.
I steady my breathing and shut the door, the snick of the latch far quieter than either of our hammering heartbeats. Turning to her, I ask dryly, “Are you here for my blood too?”
She swings around, scowling. “I might be.”
Despite her obvious hostility, the prospect of a challenge excites me and stirs the shadowy beast lurking under my skin. “I’d like to clear the air between us.”
Her sour huff is astonishment incarnate. I deserve it after lying through my teeth. She crosses her arms, creating a barrier between us—or a shield for herself. “You told me I was worth fifteen vampires in a fight.” Her lips curve in a small, tight smile. “Looks like you were right.”
I can only agree. “What changed?”
She shrugs. “Once I was flying, all I wanted was revenge.”
“I think you got it.”
She nods, a hard glint in her eyes. With her big heart and special connection with her firebirds, she’s kept something innocent about her all these years. It was something to protect and preserve, but I see it fading now. Idallia is on the cusp of change—like everything else, I suppose.
“So I was right to push you?” I ask.
Her expression ices over. “Don’t ever threaten Rim again.”
Shock renders me speechless. I love Rimblaze. I love all the phoenixes. They’re my flesh and blood and made of more magic than even a starborn king should pull from his deepest inner wells and give away. “I didn’t threaten Rimblaze. He’s a warbird. He’s trained for war.”
“And that was all right when rebirth was a guarantee. We both know it isn’t anymore.”
“So what, then?” I scowl at her from under lowered brows. “What are you saying?”
“I’m saying that Rim and Sol are off limits. If you care about me at all, or them, you will never put them near a battlefield again.”
A flush of anger rises in me. “That’s not your choice,” I say stiffly. “It’s theirs.”
“Then you don’t get to make it, either!” she snaps in fury. “Like you tried to today.”
We stare at each other in a standoff. I eventually nod. I can agree to that, especially because I know what the phoenixes will do. They’ll choose Idallia. If she’s fighting, they will too.
She slowly exhales, seeming to evacuate some of her anger along with the air. “What exactly did you want to talk to me about?” Her tone remains accusing, as if I’ve already lost my chance to say anything else that matters to her.
I open my mouth, but no sound comes out.
Finally, like I’m unlocking a vault, the hinges squealing in protest as they creak open on a lifetime of secrets, I say hoarsely, “A sunblood is a vampire who has never drunk blood. They can eat regular food and walk in the sunlight. But the moment they drink blood from a vein—or even a cup, I think—they’re confined to the night and a diet of blood. ”
Her expression doesn’t show a hint of horror or surprise, astounding me. If anything, that hard glint sharpens. “Thanks, Bale, but you know what? I figured that out for myself.”
Her new bitterness feels like a hundred arrows piercing my skin. “Then you know you’re a vampire?”
“I do now. And I thought so.” Her nostrils flaring, she turns and picks up the knife I left on the table. “I would rather have found out from you, but since you chose to lie, I found some pretty convincing information on my own.”
“I didn’t think you’d like hearing you were a vampire.”
She digs a hole in the wooden table with my knife, dulling the tip. “I don’t. I fucking hate it.” She swings furious eyes on me. “But at least I know where I come from now.”
“Do you?” I ask warily.
Her mouth turns down in distaste. “Somewhere with vampires.”
“Torridaig has vampires.”
She drops the knife with a clatter. “Is this why sometimes I can’t speed up? Focus? Because I’m not drinking blood and sustaining myself the way I should?”
“You’re better and faster than almost anyone, even without that. You don’t need to drink blood to be the best.”
Rage visibly builds inside her again, her golden eyes heating. “You talk about choices, but isn’t that my choice? How long have you known? Forever?”
“And what would you choose?” Dread-fueled urgency roughens my voice. I step toward her. “To be a creature of the night? To never fly out or go into battle with us during the day? To never take your birds out under the sun?”
Her flinch hits me like a blow to the chest. “I didn’t say I’d choose to drink.”
I can’t help reaching out and gripping her arms. She stiffens but doesn’t pull away. “You don’t need that. You’re smart, you’re fast, you’re skilled.” Her lips part on a sharp breath. My gaze riveted to her mouth, I murmur, “I wouldn’t change a thing about you.”
“What if I could be better? Do better?” Anger and hard-pumping blood paint her cheeks the color of a winter sunset. “Maybe I should take Rexton Hale up on his offer.”
Cold shock and a hot surge of jealousy collide violently inside me. “What the fuck does Rexton Hale have to do with anything?”
She shrugs out of my grip, half turning from me. “He’s the vampire from the tavern who told me I’m a sunblood. He wanted to drink my blood. Little did I know I could do the same to him and”—her narrow-eyed gaze swings back to me—“unlock my full potential.”
I recognize my own words on her biting tongue. Sometimes unlocking full potential is dangerous. And changes everything.
I turn her back to me. She doesn’t resist, despite the angry hiss of air through her teeth. If anyone is going to finish what we all started more than two hundred years ago, it’s going to be me.
“If you want to drink from someone, you can fucking drink from me,” I thunder like a low storm rolling over the mountains.
I pull her against me, our hips meeting with a thud.
“Is that what you want? Blood and darkness. Only the cold stars and never the hot sun.” I lower my head so her mouth brushes my neck.
Despair twists my stomach. Desire heats it.
“I give you my consent. Do it, if that’s the path you want to take. ”
She shudders under my hands, her breath a ragged caress against my throat.
She leans into me, pressing against my swelling cock.
Liquid fire roars in my veins. I haul her closer, and her lips open against my neck.
I feel a cool scrape of teeth. It turns into the sharper prick of fangs.
Her sudden gasp heats my skin, and my willing blood surges to meet her bite.
I don’t know what she’ll do, but right then, I know I could very well die on the flaming pyre of my ruin that is Idallia.
“Wait.” She abruptly pulls back. “I need to think.” Her hand flies to her mouth. Her face scrunches up, and she shakes her head. She cautiously touches what appears to be a normal tooth again, then swallows hard. “Should it be that easy? Out one second, in the next?”
“I think so.” My heart pounds in relief.
As much as I started to crave her bite, I wanted her to resist more.
The thought of Idallia losing daylight forever makes my throat heat and my eyes burn.
“Letting down or retracting your fangs are physical actions, just like any other. You just never knew to ask your body before, or to even think about it at all.” I gaze down at her, arousal still driving half my words.
Low, almost desperate, I say, “If you don’t want to bite me, then kiss me. Your choice, Sunshine.”
Her pulse accelerates with a fierce leap, and she stares at me, her eyes huge. “I don’t want everything to change.”
“Hasn’t it already?” My blood rushes as violently as hers.
“When did this happen?” She sways toward me.
Lifting her hands to my sides, she anchors herself.
She doesn’t push or pull. She just holds on, locking us face-to-face.
I revel in her deliberate touch. It’s new, and yet somehow, I’ve already been locked here for years, just waiting for her to click into place.
“Does it matter?” I’m not sure I even know. Two hundred years is long, even for me. “You’re vital to me now.”