Chapter 18 #2
After a moment, Cassius followed, taking a spot across from her on the settee. Silence mounted, the cracking of the logs in the fire the only sound.
“Well?” Thalia asked, finally glancing at him. He seemed tense, and he watched her with so much intensity that she was surprised she didn’t catch flame. “Are you ready?”
“I’m always ready for you, Princess.”
Thalia swallowed the sudden heat in her stomach, taking a pawn and moving it two squares.
They didn’t speak as they played, the marble clinking as they exchanged pieces.
“You’ve gotten better,” Cassius said as Thalia took out his queen with her rook.
Thalia raised a brow. “I’ve always been better than you.”
Cassius smirked, his eyes lighting as he moved his bishop out of her queen’s way. “Maybe, but I’ve learned a few things since our time together.”
Together.
Thalia moved another pawn, trying to block his bishop’s path to the king. “Like what?”
“Distraction, for example.” Cassius’s callused fingers moved a knight, taking out her pawn.
“Distraction?” Thalia glanced up, finding him leaning forward, his arms resting between his knees. The fire cast shadows over his cheekbones, highlighting the sharp facets of his face. The flames turned his hair into burnt amber, glinting in deep shades of red and gold.
Cassius smiled, a hint of fangs showing. “Check.”
Thalia scowled, glancing down at the knight poised to take out her king. She moved the king out of harm’s way. “You aren’t distracting.”
“Oh no?” Cassius leaned even closer. “A true shame. I’ll have to work harder, then. Check.”
Thalia’s scowl deepened at the bishop facing her king. “What was going on in the throne room today?” She moved her rook before the bishop, protecting the king. Cassius took out the rook, and Thalia claimed his bishop. “Did it have something to do with the sickness?”
Cassius paused, his eyes flicking up for a brief moment. “Yes.”
“What was Lord Damien—what was he doing?”
Cassius moved his other knight back to the starting line. “He was using compulsion.”
“Compulsion?”
Cassius nodded. “A full-blooded Vampyr, like Lord Damien, has the ability to sway others to do their bidding.”
“What do you mean, full-blooded?”
“Vampyrs with red eyes are full-blooded—born of pure Vampyric blood.” Like Lord Damien. “Golden eyes belong to Vampyrs born of pure blood and turned; they’re known as half-bloods. But they can also have green eyes as well, not just gold.”
“Why is that?”
Cassius shrugged. “Something to do with the way the Mages created them. When the Vampyrs started turning humans, it changed the way the magic was written in their blood and how it presented itself. Kind of like when a wolf breeds with a house dog, their offspring look different. Vampyrs and humans were never meant to … intermingle.”
“But they did.”
Cassius shifted, his eyes flashing. “That only happened after the human had turned and became a Vampyr themself.”
Thalia didn’t believe that. She would bet all the remaining ore in Agripa that there were more humans who’d been … forced to do other things besides turn. After all, humans were prey to Vampyrs.
Thalia chewed her lip, mulling over the information. Cassius tracked the movement. She stopped. “And what of the others? Your eyes are blue and always have been.” Granted, the blue of Cassius’s eyes had intensified, almost like they’d been sharpened with a whetstone.
“Any humans who were turned by a Vampyr, regardless of their status as pure or half-blood, their eye color remains the same as when they were human. You’ll find there aren’t as many as you’d think.”
“And do you all transform?” She couldn’t keep the image of Lord Damien’s shrunken skull from her mind.
“Yes, when a Vampyr has a strong urge or uses their power, they can transform. Many can control it, but others choose to embrace it.”
Thalia shuddered, then horror twisted her stomach. “Have I been compelled?”
Cassius’s face softened. “No. That ring you wear, it was spelled by a Mage. It stops the effects of compulsion.”
Thalia stared down at the blood-red ruby, noted how it seemed to suck in the light. “Someone tried to compel me in the throne room when I was introduced.”
“What?” Cassius’s words turned lethal.
She shook her head. “I thought Lord Adrian was doing something, but if only full-blooded Vampyrs can …” Cassius’s face darkened, but Thalia asked, “What of you? Have you been compelled?”
The thought had her stomach twisting in knots.
“No. It is harder to compel a turned. The fact we were once human but are now something else makes the Vampyrs’ influence become confused. Even then, we are trained to fight against it. Lord Damien is powerful; the Vampyr that was brought before us was weak.”
“What were you trying to find out? Francesca …” Thalia’s mind flashed to Julian’s lover. “She mentioned trying to find a cure.” She moved another chess piece.
Cassius moved a piece without looking at the board. “Yes, it was about the cure.”
“And there are no leads to it? Surely there must be something to help them get better.”
Cassius moved his bishop, exposing his king, although Thalia didn’t think he realized it. “The prince’s council is seeing to it.”
That wasn’t an answer, but given the guarded expression now crossing Cassius’s features, she didn’t think she’d get any more from him.
Thalia moved her queen. “Checkmate.”
Cassius raised a brow in surprise, then huffed out a laugh. “Seems I was the one distracted.”
Thalia smirked, stretching her neck, then winced at the sharp pain coming from her throat. She touched the bruise that marred her neck from where Cassius had bitten her the night before.
“I am sorry,” Cassius said, his voice quiet but not weak.
Thalia glanced at him. “For what?”
Cassius’s throat bobbed. “For my behavior last night.”
His eyes were on her neck, slightly glowing against the heat of the fire. His gaze wasn’t full of hunger but rather remorse.
“It was a brutish thing to do. Something that I should have had better control of. You have every right to”—he looked at the bruise, and indeed, there was deep regret and shame flashing in his blue eyes—“to not wish me to touch you.”
Thalia wasn’t sure which surprised her more: his apology, or the anguish with which he’d said the last words. “What are you talking about?”
Cassius swallowed, nodding toward the end of the bed. “The day you were introduced to the courts, I held you and you flinched.”
Thalia glanced at the foot of the bed. The memory of when he’d torn her dress so she didn’t pass out surfaced. “I didn’t flinch because you held me.”
Cassius’s face flashed in surprise, the look so human it almost made Thalia laugh—until his eyes seemed to brighten further. “Why did you flinch, then?”
Thalia looked away, her fingers picking at the skin of her thumbs. Cassius didn’t push. Didn’t even tell her to stop before she finally got out, “I had a dream that night. About you.”
At Cassius’s nod to go on, she added, “You ripped out my throat.”
Too many emotions flashed in Cassius’s features for her to decipher before he finally said low, “I see.”
“When you—when you held me that day, you looked at my neck.”
“And that’s why you flinched?”
“Yes. I saw the hunger in your eyes.” Bile rose in her throat at the image flashing in her mind, but she pushed it aside.
Cassius stared at her a moment longer, his gaze dark. “Do you know what that hunger is?”
“No. But I assume it’s your incessant need to be sated by blood?”
Cassius huffed out a laugh, leaning back on the couch. He shook his head, something like amusement dancing across his face. “No.”
Surprise speared itself through her. “No?”
Cassius shifted. “When a Vampyr drinks blood from the source, particularly that of a human or another Vampyr, it’s … pleasurable.”
Thalia suddenly didn’t know what to do or where to look. And she certainly couldn’t explain the odd flush that traveled over her skin. “What do you mean, it’s pleasurable?”
Cassius raised a brow. “I mean that it’s an aphrodisiac.”
“Oh.” She felt the heat of Cassius’s stare sweep over her face. She hoped that sitting so near the fire could be blamed for the redness creeping over her cheeks. “Is that why you refused to share blood at the ceremony?”
“Partially, yes. Although, that pleasure wouldn’t be as strong, because I wouldn’t have actually bitten you, just tasted it as it dripped from the cut.
But I meant it when I said I wouldn’t take what isn’t mine.
” Just like that, the heat inside Thalia died, quickly replaced by anger.
“But if I had bitten you to drink your blood, as a human, it would have caused you excruciating pain. It would have triggered the process of you turning.”
Thalia’s stomach knotted, nausea rolling alongside. “So it’s true your bite causes pain?”
“To a human, yes. It’s why most who are bitten turn in the end. The pain is worse than death.”
Thalia didn’t realize she’d shifted closer until she knocked over a chess piece. “But it doesn’t cause pain to another Vampyr?”
Cassius stared down at her, unblinking. “No. Sharing blood between Vampyr and Vampyr is pleasurable to both parties.”
Something oily filled her stomach, along with a bitterness she couldn’t quite place. “So the reason you’ve been staring at my neck since the moment you laid eyes on me is because you want to get off?”
Cassius smirked, not taking the bait. “Trust me, I have no issue getting off.” Thalia’s heart rate quickened as he leaned closer. “My issue is that I’ve never wanted to do it before.”
“What do you mean? You said it was pleasurable.”
Cassius shrugged, his dark-auburn hair rising with the movement. “So I’ve heard. I’ve never tried it.”
It’d been four years since he’d turned into a Vampyr. Four years—
“Have you fucked anyone?” Thalia blurted out.
Cassius raised a brow. “Have you?”
“You didn’t answer my question.”
“No, I haven’t.”
Thalia scanned his face, but all she saw was the truth laid out. “Why not?”
“Why haven’t you?”
“I guess I’ve been too busy hunting you across Agripa,” she snapped.
Cassius’s smirk grew. “Then I guess I’ve been too busy running from you.”
But Cassius leaving the Scarecrows in Agripa didn’t make sense anymore. Not with the way he held himself now. Not with the duties he carried as hand to the prince. Not with who he was.
The clock above the fireplace chimed, and they both startled, having lost track of the time they’d spent together.
Cassius stood suddenly. “It’s late. I have some things to attend to.” He aimed for the door but stopped with his hand on the doorknob. “I missed this,” he said softly.
“Missed what?” Thalia’s words were too breathless.
There was an invisible string that kept pulling them together. No matter how she fought it, somehow she always found she had no choice but to be tugged along.
A ghost of a smile flickered on Cassius’s lips. “Sparring with you.”
“You think this was sparring? Please, this was barely a warm-up.”
He chuckled, the sounds traveling straight to her toes. “Then I look forward to actually sparring with you soon.” He didn’t glance back as he left.
Thalia felt her warm cheeks with the backs of her hands, swallowing hard. Her eyes were drawn down to the chessboard, her queen taking out his king.
But Thalia didn’t feel like she’d won at all.