Chapter 30
CHAPTER 30
A terrible dread settled into Takashi’s bones. Being sent away from Seamus wasn’t easing the creeping inside his veins or the urge to look over his shoulder. Zack’s beautifully decorated living room didn’t soothe the inkling of foreboding that was growing in Takashi. The puzzle pieces didn’t make sense, but he had the bigger picture they belonged to. He was missing the fine details and more than a few elements to the puzzle. However, knowing where they were meant to go answered questions and raised others.
“Dragons are the true enemy? He’s got to be making that shit up, right?” Zack asked as he paced.
Takashi leaned his head against the back of the couch and stretched his legs out ahead of him. On one hand, he was glad that Zack was distracted with what Seamus had said. On the other hand, the absolute last scheme he wanted to think about was Seamus going to war with dragons .
And on yet another hand, he was exhausted from turning Katie into a vampire. His own intelligence was cursing him as he’d rather ignore the way the pieces were clicking into place.
Seamus had bookshelves filled with binders of potential soldiers. But to turn more than two in a five-year time span was rare, more than three unheard of. Does he mean to turn them all into vampires? Create some sort of brood? That shouldn’t be possible .
“I mean, if we’re going off what myths everybody talks about, then first of all, dragons are massive creatures. People would notice if Godzillas were running around the planet smashing shit,” Zack continued. “They’d certainly notice fire-breathing giant lizards.”
Watching Zack was draining what little energy Takashi had left. No, what’s draining me is trying to keep from thinking about that long-ago night . The dragon in his memory was a looming shadow, a voice that had cackled, and a snuffing breath that had made Takashi shiver. Not this one . He’d never been so glad to be rejected.
Zack had been lost in his thoughts, even if he had been sharing them aloud, but he paused and frowned at Takashi. “You haven’t said anything.”
“I don’t know what you expect me to say,” Takashi replied carefully.
Zack narrowed his eyes, scrutinizing him. “You’ve got your quiet, reserved face on. That means you’re trying very hard to say the right thing. What aren’t you saying?”
“Quite a bit.” Takashi crossed one ankle over the other and stared at his shoes.
“The evasive act isn’t funny.” Zack knelt in front of him and put his hand on Takashi’s leg.
It wasn’t skin contact, but Takashi didn’t want him anywhere near his mind. Gently, he nudged Zack’s hand off his leg. Zack took that as a sign to hold his hand instead. When Takashi pulled away, Zack opened his mouth to speak, his concern obvious.
“I’ve had a long night,” Takashi said, cutting him off. He sat up. “Unlike you, I haven’t been feeding right.”
“Which considering that you did something incredibly stupid tonight, which I’ll get to, but first, dragons. Seamus is crazy, right? Dragons don’t exist,” Zack said firmly.
The gray of Zack’s eyes had been banished by his transformation, leaving only the deep red. After Seamus’s revelation that the two shared a telepathic bond, Takashi doubted he’d ever see Zack’s beautiful steely gray again. Seamus couldn’t have the power to make another vampire like Zack anytime soon.
Could he?
Something wasn’t adding up, and that bothered Takashi, increasing the dread in his stomach. It became a silver gag against his tongue.
“Takashi,” Zack complained. “Don’t hold out on me.”
“Dragons are real,” Takashi said quietly.
“Bullshit,” Zack said as he sprang to his feet. He had said the same word to Seamus just before they were sent away. Nervous energy poured off him as he renewed his pacing. “I’ve studied more lore than anyone else in my family. If dragons were real, I’d know.”
“They have spent the last seven hundred years hiding themselves,” Takashi replied. “They are real, Zack. A school of them have an island in Lake Michigan.”
“Dragons have schools ?” Zack asked.
“No, that’s the name for a group of them.” Takashi leaned forward, putting his elbows on his knees. “Dragons are one of the purest forms of shapeshifters. They don’t just use magic, they are magic. As humanity grew and other supernatural creatures either found their way to our reality or increased their influence, dragons were hunted close to extinction. They migrated to the fey realms. Over time, they have regained their numbers and began influencing this world again. The fact that less than one percent of the population controls half the wealth of the world is not an accident, nor only mortals’ designs.”
“Dragons are running the world,” Zack said incredulously.
“Have you ever heard that the most fantastical feat the Devil ever accomplished was convincing humanity not to believe in him?”
“Something close to that. But, I mean, the conspiracies it would take to keep them a secret?—”
Takashi wiped a hand down his face and stood. “Says the trained vampire hunter now turned vampire who waltzed with a fey lady at a donor house that routinely engages in murder and yet has never been suspected of a crime.”
“Wait, Candide allows murder at the Chateau?”
Takashi headed for the bedroom, and he wasn’t surprised that Zack came with him. “Accidental deaths, at the very least. Vampires drink and play out their fantasies there. Not everyone walks away from that.”
“Yeah. Duh. I … I haven’t been able to stop myself from killing. Clearly not the only vampire that would ever have that issue, and some vamps don’t care,” Zack muttered. Then he cleared his throat and asked, “Wait, that massive dragon statue in Taliville, is that really a statue?”
“It’s a petrified dragon.” Takashi kicked off his shoes and headed for the bathroom. Some of Katie’s blood had dried to his cheek, and his own wrist was covered in saliva and blood. “That would be Trisoldelf. One of the local witches had stolen her egg. She came to level the town, and the witches petrified her instead.”
“Where was Nell in all this?” Zack asked.
Takashi soaked a washcloth and then began to clean up. “With me in Nashville. She was teaching Eulolia how to be a vampire, and I was teaching Yukio.”
Zack took the washcloth from him, wet it again, put some soap onto it, and then wiped at the mess on Takashi’s face. He pursed his lips for a long moment before releasing a long breath. “Who’s Yukio?”
“My first sireling. I turned her in 1919.”
“Partner?”
“Mortal niece.”
Zack’s eyebrows shot up.
Takashi smirked. “You’ve never thought about whether I might have relatives.”
“I … no.” Zack turned his attention to Takashi’s wrist. “I guess I assumed every vampire lost contact with their mortal family.”
“Far from it.” Takashi took the cloth from him and finished cleaning his wrist. Instead of watching Zack, he kept his gaze on the sink. If Zack wasn’t going to broach the subject, then he should. Waiting for him to do so was murdering his nerves. “Go on. Ask.”
“About the girl tonight?” Zack crossed his arms over his chest and leaned against the counter. “I imagine a mage girl from an academy might have a family. A big, wealthy, probably capable of hurling fireballs at us family. What the fuck were you thinking?”
“Anton lured the girls into a trap by pretending to be me,” Takashi said.
“That’s not an ‘I decided to make a vampire’ explanation,” Zack replied.
Takashi turned around so he could hold on to the edge of the sink. The press of it against his palms grounded him. “Anton was set to kill them. If you hadn’t come home, then the other two would be dead.”
“Again, that’s?—”
“I made a bargain,” Takashi said. He finally met Zack’s gaze. “Anton is lonely. He asked me to make a vampire that he could raise, and I made him promise to give me a new phone.”
“You traded a girl’s life for a phone ?” Zack demanded hotly.
“You may have not noticed, but we are stuck.” Takashi pushed away from the counter and stepped into Zack’s space. “The phone won’t be tapped. We’ll be able to reach out beyond these walls.”
“If the phone is on their plan, they’ll be able to see the numbers,” Zack replied.
“We can work around that,” Takashi said. “Besides, the phone will have another asset. I’ll be able to take pictures of what I’ve been finding in the mansion and analyze them in greater detail.”
“You thought a girl’s life was worth some information and a few unmonitored phone calls?”
“She was dead anyway, and this way, we will be able to seek support. And we’ll have another ally in this household,” Takashi replied shortly.
“Another newbie vampire isn’t much of an ally. What if she hates you?”
“She understood what was happening.”
Zack rolled his eyes. “You had a long conversation of ‘hey, I know you’re a teenager, but here’s your ticket to immortality’?”
“She goes to a magic school, Zack! She likely knows as much about the supernatural as you do!” Takashi took a moment and collected himself. “I read her desires. If her choices were death or vampirism, she wanted to become a vampire.”
Zack narrowed his eyes as he scrutinized Takashi. “What else are you holding back?”
Was Zack being perceptive? Or was he relying on his powers? Takashi traced his defenses and found no intrusion past them, but Zack’s power was brushing up against them. Keeping his guard up constantly was exhausting, yet he didn’t want Zack to read him. He was still so mortal where his morals were concerned.
If Zack lost his faith in him, then Takashi would be stripped of what little aid he had left. Roger would likely follow Zack’s opinion as well. He hadn’t wanted to enter into a relationship with Takashi without Zack’s approval. To lose one would mean to lose both, and they were his anchor to sanity. Without Zack and the hope of reuniting with Roger, he would continue tumbling toward rock bottom. He never wanted to learn how far down that place was. He could never afford to fall again.
“That I am drained, that’s all,” Takashi said softly.
After a long moment, Zack replied firmly, “Bullshit.”
“We are in too precarious of a place for you to question me like this.” Takashi slipped past Zack, navigating around him without touching him.
Zack remained still. In his clear, confident voice that resonated with a novel power, he said, “Our situation is too dangerous for you to hide anything from me. You need to tell me what you’re thinking.”
Takashi stopped in the doorway to the bedroom. Few vampires he had met had the sort of echo in their voice that Zack already had. What was it they called it in Paris? Voix d’au-delà? It had a quality to it that demanded obedience, slipping toward a subconscious pull. If Takashi hadn’t been aware of it, he might have fallen into the trap of meekly obeying Zack.
Did Seamus have that power? He must have some form of it for Zack to have acquired it already. But then, how vampirism manifested was different for everyone. Some older vampires never gained new powers, while some younger ones displayed rare gifts. Takashi longed to speak with a few of his friends overseas. They might know more about what was happening here. Nell would know.
And he could no longer ignore a new danger that had shown itself earlier. Takashi turned toward Zack. “I can’t tell you.”
“Why not?”
“You are telepathically connected to him.”
“Now that I’m aware of that, I can protect myself.”
“Can you?” Takashi asked.
As Zack drifted toward him, Takashi stayed where he was. In the last few nights, Zack’s perfect prison cell had become the closest place they had to a safe haven inside the mansion. Except that was a lie as well. Did Seamus know about Takashi’s scheme to make Zack the coven leader? Was he talking to Zack now? How much influence did Seamus have on Zack?
Every move that Takashi had mapped out had been done with tarnished pieces.
“Look, if he knows about our ambition, he either thinks I’m too weak to kill him, or he’s a million steps ahead of us and still has use for us in his ludicrous plan to go to war against dragons,” Zack said gently.
“Are you suddenly a mind reader?” Takashi asked.
“If I was, I wouldn’t have to ask you the same question fifty times.” Zack frowned. “What could be so awful that you’re working this hard to hide it from me?”
Zack wasn’t going to stop. His dogged stubbornness was a trait that Takashi couldn’t help admiring, even as he was attempting to dodge him.
“You’ll think me a selfish monster,” Takashi murmured as he took a few steps away.
“Yeah, I got that you’re scared I’m going to suddenly turn on you. Unless your goal is to abuse that girl every night for the next eight hundred years—which I sincerely doubt—I’ll get over myself.”
“Promise?” Takashi said.
“Promise,” Zack replied.
Takashi walked the length of the dresser and let his fingers coast along the smooth wood. When he reached the corner, he faced Zack. Allowing his exhaustion to rise to the surface, he said, “I am so tired of being alone.”
“Alone?” Zack’s frown faded into a greater sadness. “I’ve made you feel alone? I thought we’re in this together. You, me, and Roger, when we can get back to him.”
“I don’t even know what Roger’s goals are anymore,” Takashi said. “Bankrupting Seamus and the coven was a stupid idea if he’s planning on taking the reins. All Dmitri has ever wanted was to burn everything Seamus built to the ground, and Roger is working with him. He may not believe in what we want to accomplish.”
“Okay, but that’s because we haven’t had a chance to talk to him,” Zack said. “He probably thinks we’re dead or something. Once he knows we’re alive—well, relatively alive—and a version of all right, he’ll change course again. We can convince him of that. But if I’ve done something to make you feel like you’re alone, then tell me what I can do to fix it.”
Takashi sighed heavily. “Some things are beyond your power, Zack.”
“Takashi—”
“I am, at best, your fourth or fifth priority,” Takashi snapped. He hated that he’d lost his temper for even a fraction of a second, but Zack’s constant pressure had worn down his reserve of patience. His hand was trembling as he brought it up to his face.
“That’s not true,” Zack replied sharply.
“You don’t mean for me to be that low,” Takashi said in a calmer voice. He made his way over to the bed and sat on the edge. “You care for Roger, you’re tied to Seamus in a way that demands your attention, and you have yourself and morals. I know I won’t be a priority for Katie, but we have a connection that I can already feel growing. I’ve had to let go of that bond with my other sirelings almost as soon as they were made for their own benefit. I have never been able to grow roots.” He held on to the edge of the bed. “She is one of my first steps to building some sort of family of my own.”
“What about me?” Zack said.
“I am in awe of you, Zack, and I want you with me, but I’m not fool enough to think that you’d ever sacrifice anything for me,” Takashi replied.
Zack stalked toward him, towering over him with the scantest of height advantage from their positions. “I have been swallowing a bunch of bullshit tonight, but this has got to be the worst of it. My blood family is a bag of dicks, but I do know what family is. They’re the people who will back you up without fucking question, and if you don’t think I’d do that for you?—”
“I know you would. I just also know that if you had to choose, I wouldn’t be first pick,” Takashi murmured.
“Tell me you’re not stupid enough to sit there wondering what I would do if some random force declared that I could only have one boyfriend.”
Takashi hadn’t thought exactly that, but only because he’d known what the answer would be. If forced to answer it, he wasn’t sure what he would say either. He couldn’t choose between Zack or Roger any more than he could decide which fang should be pulled from his head. But that didn’t mean his lovers felt the same. He shrugged.
Zack stilled rather than fidgeted. Despite his quiet, his energy was loud, screaming his discontent. Finally, he bit out, “Maybe the problem of your loneliness isn’t me. Maybe it’s you.”
“What?”
“I felt your need to belong that night I dominated you. But this is the closest you’ve ever gotten to being vulnerable with me.”
“You had me tied up and fucked out of my mind,” Takashi said. “I was incredibly vulnerable.”
“With your body, maybe. But you keep hiding this.” Zack put his hand on Takashi’s chest, right over his heart. “You’re never going to feel less lonely if you keep throwing this beneath a thousand gilded layers.”
Takashi put his hand over Zack’s. Belonging meant allowing others to see his weaknesses. Sergei, that beautiful mortal boy Takashi had loved with all his heart, hadn’t been where he should be. Takashi had reached, literally and metaphorically, and Sergei had withdrawn his hand. His memory tried to play tricks on him, tried to tell him that Sergei had reached for him, but the dreadful truth haunted Takashi’s worst dreams. At the last second, Sergei had closed his hand and let himself drift just out of reach. In the middle of the circus tent, Takashi had fallen.
He would be bones in a grave if not for Nell. All because he had trusted someone unworthy of his faith. She had claimed she had a sanctuary for their kind, but she was willing to sacrifice anything to keep that peaceful place. Sometimes one must pay for the safety of others , she had said. He didn’t matter enough to her to warrant unending protection. He wasn’t even sure that Josefina did.
So he had done everything he could to escape that seemingly idyllic place. He had joined Roger’s desperate cause. He had let himself hope that Roger might be the one he’d been wishing to find since he’d been a boy and dreamed of love.
And as much as Roger tried, he was a man drowning in the seas of his own pain. Roger was charming and caring and gentle in a world that sanded away all kindness until only the emotionless survived. Takashi could continue throwing lifelines to him. He longed to know what Roger was like if he could truly become his own man.
Zack was … undefinable. Zack had taken his hand and pulled him into his relationship with Roger. He had accepted Takashi’s birthday gift with a warm smile and called him boyfriend. Though Seamus had tried to scorch away what made Zack wonderful and forge him into a better weapon, Zack was only becoming stronger. More confident. More handsome and powerful. He was a force of nature.
Takashi had ignored the deeper calls of his heart because he hadn’t wanted to hear its song. He didn’t want to hurt. Even hoping that Zack might be someone who would catch him rather than watch him plummet would bring pain in the end. Because Takashi was bound to be wrong. He was always wrong. His heart was his worst traitor.
But he was also fucking tired.
Carefully and ever so slowly, he leaned against Zack. Zack sat on the bed beside him and wrapped his other arm around him.
Takashi sank into him and murmured, “I am doing everything I can to better our position on the board.”
“I know,” Zack said softly. “But you’re not making these moves alone. We’re together.”
“Mm.” Takashi nuzzled Zack. He was warm for a change, almost reminding Takashi of his mortal heat.
Zack stroked his cheek, then nudged him to sit up straight. His frown returned tenfold. “You’re ice-cold.”
“I’m fine,” Takashi murmured.
“You’re not.” Zack cupped Takashi’s cheeks and made him look him in the eye. “How much did you give the girl?”
“If she’s going to survive, she needs to be strong.” Takashi put his hands on Zack’s elbows. Keeping his eyes open was a struggle.
“Fuck. Takashi, you didn’t have that kind of energy to spare.” Zack started to stand. “I’ll go find one of Seamus’s pets.”
Takashi held on to him. “Don’t.”
“You need blood.”
“I don’t have permission to drink from them,” Takashi said.
“Then I’ll get permission from him.”
“If you start asking for favors, he’ll use that to manipulate you.”
“Shit.” Zack sat down beside Takashi again. “Drink from me.”
That Zack had offered his blood freely, without restraint or second-guessing himself, threatened to kindle the ember of hope in Takashi’s heart more than his blunt observation had. He whispered hoarsely, “You don’t understand what this means.”
“Look, I remember what you said,” Zack said. “This can be dangerous and not very filling. But you’re drained, and that’s a problem. And I can fix this one at least a little. Please, let me help you.”
“It’s not only giving away power that makes this hazardous.” Takashi forced himself to hold Zack’s red-eyed gaze. Looking away would have been easier. Then he might pretend that whatever Zack’s reaction was whatever he wished to believe. But he had to watch him. Had to know if he understood and accepted what he heard. “If you’re too open, I will be able to sense all of you. I’ll know you in ways no one else ever has.”
“You’ve had my blood before,” Zack said.
“Not like this. I’ll know you on an instinctual level if you don’t guard against me, and you don’t have the experience to effectively block your psyche.”
Zack grinned. “Maybe then you’ll finally figure out how much I care about you.”
“Zack—”
“I got it. You’re Mr. Walls Are My Lifestyle, and it would freak you out to do this. But I can’t watch you suffer when I can help.”
Nothing changed in the way Zack met Takashi’s gaze. His concern remained, and his smile was half parts consoling and caring. Zack was a clever boy—man, Takashi corrected for himself. As young as Zack was compared to him, the last week had matured him. Death and rebirth had changed so much and yet hadn’t robbed him of his ability to care for others.
How could anyone resist falling in love with him? How could anyone turn him away?
“Has anyone ever told you that you are incredibly charming when you’re playing the hero?” Takashi murmured.
“Naw. People are usually too annoyed at me for having morals.” Zack brought his wrist up to his mouth and tore into his tender skin with his fangs.
Dark red blood welled in the small cuts Zack had made on his wrist. The smell alone roused Takashi, though the blood was a magnet for his focus. Nothing else mattered. Why had he resisted this? He dipped forward and licked the wound.
Takashi’s mortal mother had made a soul-warming miso soup whenever he’d been sick as a child. Zack’s blood had that strange quality, not only tasting savory but reaching past the physical ails to soothe what Takashi kept behind the mental walls even he’d forgotten existed. His exhaustion melted away, and renewed energy brought more to his sense of taste, hearing—his everything.
When the blood stopped and the next flick of Takashi’s tongue across Zack’s skin revealed freshly healed flesh, Takashi whimpered. He had had a sip and only just begun to feel like himself. Already, the buzz in him was settling into a low, low simmer.
“You can have more,” Zack said gently.
Takashi glanced up, accidentally catching Zack’s gaze. Zack had always been easier to read than most, but there was a subtlety to him that Takashi had missed. The seed of who he would become had taken root. Yet for all the trauma he had been through recently, he still had a genuine heart, one that was reaching out toward Takashi.
Zack leaned his head to the side, inviting Takashi to his neck.
Dignity didn’t matter as much as his delicious blood did. Takashi scrambled onto Zack’s lap, straddling him, and threaded his hand through Zack’s hair. He tilted Zack’s head farther and sank his teeth into his neck. Blood pooled into his mouth, and he slurped it down. Where the first sip had been comfort, this was electric. This was like a perfect kiss, one long and torturously slow, and stroked previously unfathomable places.
Every nerve lit up like a purr just before Zack moaned, his pleasure coming through his blood before his throat had a chance to voice it. And Takashi knew—he knew so many tiny little things now. Zack got a thrill from his superior speed, was terrified he was putting the wrong outfits together, hated some of the GLC’s upper echelons just from the way they scowled.
There were the big things, too. Zack did want him, not in the surface way Takashi had feared but all the way through. He trusted him. Wanted to protect him. To be the king that he and Takashi both needed in their lives. Though he longed to have Roger back, this moment wasn’t about him. It was about them. Takashi was what mattered.
He was growing hard. They both were. Zack had always mingled blood drinking and sex when he was a mortal. The only times Takashi had drunk from him before had been in the middle of the act. No surprise, then, that this would make him horny.
Feeling what he’d felt, walls in Takashi’s heart were crumbling. Hesitation, restraint, all of it was bullshit keeping him from truly enjoying what he and Zack were building despite their terrible situation.
When his bite healed, Takashi groaned with need. But blood wasn’t what he wanted. He pressed a kiss to Zack’s lips, then another and another until they were tangling lips and tongues, and oh, he nicked himself on Zack’s fang, and his blood spilled into Zack’s mouth. Zack’s blood and his mingled into their kiss, and fuck, he was so fucking hard now.
“I need more,” Takashi moaned against Zack.
“I could spare a little more,” Zack whispered.
“Not that.” Takashi rocked his hips down, grinding against Zack’s erection.
“Oh, that. Yeah. Yeah, we can do that.”
Takashi laughed softly into their next kiss. How was it that Zack always brought a smile to him? This had to be love, and he dared to let it fill his heart. Perhaps, for once, it wouldn’t drop him.