Chapter 32 Gideon #2
“I never should have underestimated you,” I say.
“I think Lucien is the one who burned La Petite Mort. He took me to see it. He gloated when he showed me the fire. He said there were no survivors. I thought you were dead.” I swallow as the lump of grief I’ve carried since that day rises through my esophagus.
“That’s why I husked Lucien and took the necklace from him. ”
She has to react to that. It’s not simply that I drained two vampires. Killing your sire is one of the most abhorrent acts in Upyr culture. Arabella would be within her rights to have me thrown into the cell for Celeste to finish off.
That’s why I’ve never told anyone what I did to Lucien.
Until now.
Her reaction is not what I expect. She rests the eReader on her knee. When she turns to me, there’s a warmth in her eyes I’ve never seen before. Not pity, not revulsion, but understanding.
My heart is a jackhammer against my ribs.
“Say something,” I beg her.
“What do you want me to say? That I appreciate you extracting a bloody revenge on my behalf?” Arabella’s lips curl back into a smirk. “No, thanks. I prefer my vengeance firsthand.”
“I believe it. All I wanted was to see you again, and you were gone. I had no choice but to endure, so I—”
“Do you still have it?”
She leans in close, her eyes ablaze.
“Do you have my collar?” Her words are a choked whisper.
I shake my head. “I’m sorry. After your scar-face boyfriend tried to kill me and I thought I lost you to the flames, I couldn’t bear to keep it. I threw it into the Seine.”
“The ancient wasn’t my boyfriend.”
“He said you were his, that he’d come to take you home.” His laughter reaches through the past to squeeze around my heart.
“I’ve never belonged to anybody.”
“What about your sire?” The relationship between vampires and their sires can often be close.
Arabella’s eyes narrow. “It wasn’t my sire.”
“But maybe—”
“It couldn’t be my sire, because I killed him.”
Her words hang in the air between us, charged with electricity. Arabella holds firm, daring me to comment.
She killed her sire.
I turn over every tiny snippet of personal information she’s let slip past her defences, every little piece of herself she’s gifted me, and I weigh them against her words. I remember her and Eleanor Mock talking in low voices about non-consensual siring. And I think I know why she did it.
She was turned without consent, same as me.
This is why she hates her Bloodeve.
We are both sinners.
We are the same.
I know that the words I say next are the most important I’ll ever say.
“He must have deserved it.”
“He did.”
She doesn’t elaborate. Her silence is curated. I know better than to ask.
Stillness envelops us, broken only by Celeste’s frantic scrabbling.
Arabella sighs, her talons trailing along the edge of her eReader.
“I was born in Egypt, on the banks of the Nile. My mother had fled her own country because she was pregnant out of wedlock. She found a wealthy benefactor in Cairo and set about establishing herself as the city’s most formidable courtesan.
She worked hard to give me an education, dance lessons and art classes, to introduce me to the right people.
She wanted me to marry, to have a family, to have what she didn’t.
But I saw her freedom and I craved it. It’s no surprise that I went into the same line of business, even after I lost her to cholera in my teens.
“I became a favourite in diplomatic circles. I knew enough about history, literature and art that I could provide the kind of scintillating conversation that attracts powerful men. I had many suitors showering me with exquisite gifts. Some of whom begged me to become theirs exclusively.”
“Him?”
My fingers claw the arm of my chair. I can already tell from her detached speech and the way she stares straight ahead at the dungeon door, refusing to meet my eyes, that I will hate this story.
She nods. “He was Lord John Astor, a British diplomat who lived in Cairo. He had a wife and children back in London, but he barely spoke of them. He took me to all the finest parties. He introduced me to the pleasures of opium. And…” She pauses. “He made me his Thrall.”
I push out a breath. That is not what I expected her to say.
She waves a dismissive hand. “You are a white man. You cannot understand. Even the kind of freedom I enjoyed was precarious. I could not own property. I was rich with gifted wealth, but what is given can always be taken away. When Lord Astor showed me the kind of power he wielded over this secret underworld of vampires, I saw a way to ensure my future. I saw a secret that I could use against him when I needed it. I can’t deny that the ecstasy of his bite was immeasurable, but I didn’t choose it because of that.
I chose it because women like me deal in the currency of secrets, and he’d gifted me a winning hand.
“For a time, we were happy, but as his star rose within Cairo society, and mine alongside it, his proclivities grew darker, more sadistic. He became fiercely possessive – he would rage when he saw me so much as speak to another man. He wanted to keep me as his. He offered me the Kiss. I refused. I didn’t want to tie myself to him.
But Lord Astor was not used to being refused… ” She swallows. “He Kissed me anyway.”
No.
My hand flies to her knee. I want to hold her. It was so long ago now, but my raw need to eviscerate this guy is as strong as if he did this to her yesterday.
“When I woke from the stupor, changed forever into a monster, there was Astor, expecting me to thank him for this gift. He was so pleased with himself for creating me. He tied the Antirhodos Collar around my neck and told me that I would be his good luck charm, forever by his side. From that day onward, he never allowed me to take off the necklace, and he never let me out of his sight. It felt like a noose around my neck. All I could think of was the choice he’d taken from me, that all this freedom he promised was an illusion.
I belonged to him. I was his property. My desires mattered not, as long as he got what he wanted.
The jewels around my neck weighed as heavy as lead. ”
I squeeze her knee. Arabella places her hand over mine, as if she’s the one comforting me. “I want to know what you did next. I want to hear how you made him pay for this.”
“I did what women must always do – I pretended to be happy he had changed me. I laughed merrily and kissed ardently and learned everything I could about my new powers. I trained myself a little each day to stay awake as the sun rose. I schemed. And one night, I sensed my chance. We were alone in the house – rare, as he was always entertaining Upyr delegates from other countries. He had even lent out his Thralled maid to another Upyr. I took him to bed one final time, occupying him until the last possible moment. As the sun rose over the ancient city, he had us crawl into his coffin to sleep entwined. He would lock the coffin from the inside, keeping the key around his neck. I remained awake, and when he slipped into the dreamless sleep, I drew my dagger.”
She bends down and withdraws a long, silver-inlaid dagger from her boot. I can’t help staring at it. It is such a small, elegant thing, but deadly to our kin. Not unlike her.
“At first, I went for his heart, but in the gloom of the coffin, I missed, piercing through his ribs into his lungs and waking him. He thrashed, weak but still dangerous. His hands went around my throat, but he couldn’t get a good grip on me because of the collar.
I swiped at his face, again and again, eventually drawing open a wound across his neck.
His blood gushed over me. I drank deeply, knowing I needed the burst of strength to finish him off.
His hands loosened, and I hacked at his neck until his head rolled away.
Then I curled up beside him and fell asleep. ”
The horror of it strikes me like a match, lit and burning bright – trapped in a coffin with the monster you just killed and the dreamless sleep calling you under.
I squeeze her hand. She doesn’t pull away.
“When I woke, he was still and cold. I licked the old blood from the silk lining. I knew I’d need all the strength I could find to flee before my crime was discovered.
I found the key around his neck and climbed out of the coffin, all while the ancient magic of his blood whispered in my veins.
As I cleaned myself and dressed in my finest gown, I noticed the collar of jewels around my neck – not a single delicate setting had been broken during the struggle, nor was there a drop of Astor’s blood to be seen.
“I always intended to leave the collar behind. Who would carry their noose with them? It was too easily identifiable and would be impossible for me to sell once word got around about Lord Astor’s murder.
But as I ran my fingers over those sparkling jewels, for the first time I felt the magic in the stones rising up to meet the magic humming in my veins.
The collar did bring good fortune, but not to Astor.
It had protected me in the coffin. Perhaps it would protect me during whatever came next.