13. Chapter 13
Chapter 13
T he enormous Gothic cathedral I’m sitting in is gorgeous, but it’s stuffy as hell. Fighting the urge to fidget in the dress they’ve made me wear, I keep my eyes trained on the young vampire couple getting married.
The ceremony is boring, the people around me are all wearing too much perfume, and every time I so much as move a muscle, I feel the prince’s shrewd eyes dart to me, because I apparently haven’t succeeded in removing all suspicion from myself after all.
Still, the event is giving me an opportunity to think about the task at hand. Now that de Groot has agreed to go into hibernation, it’s only a matter of weeks before I’ll find myself sucked back to my own time.
But I’m not leaving anything to chance. In the meantime, especially now that I can properly use Sight, I’ll be working on unlocking my Runes. I just need to figure out what my powers could be.
It’s the cheering that snaps me out of it. The ceremony has drawn to an end and now everyone is getting up to follow the happy couple to the reception room in the castle across the square.
Without either a word or a glance, Orpheus gets up and holds his hand out for me. I take it, lift my skirt tail off the floor and get up, letting him lead me out of the stuffy cathedral and into the cold but fresh afternoon air.
The crowd blocks the view of the square, but it does nothing to conceal the castle towering over us all. I can’t help but admire the size of it, the intricate stonework and the colorful stained glass, or feel myself drawn to the shadowy silence lurking from behind the open portcullis.
It’s once we’re inside and the crowd starts taking us across the entrance hall that the prince addresses me for the first time since he picked me up. It’s in a low, commanding voice that he leans to say, “I’ll need you to behave tonight.”
My eyebrows shoot up. I crane my neck to glare at him, finding him already having turned his profile to me. I try to fight the urge. I fail. I lean to tell him, “I’m sorry, but I must have heard you wrong. You did not just tell me to behave .”
His nostrils flare, but he doesn’t turn to look at me. “I did,” he replies flatly. “Also, for the next function, tell them not to use perfume. I prefer you without any.”
What is his problem? It’s one thing to keep his eyes on the suspicious wife, it’s a whole other to insult her like this. For a second, I just keep putting one foot in front of the other while staring at his profile in dumbfounded silence.
He doesn’t acknowledge this. He keeps his eyes fixed ahead as he leads me into the reception room. Finally, I tell myself it’s not worth it and I look away, expelling a frustrated breath as I do.
It’s not worth it, I keep chanting, simply because this will all be over soon.
And it sure doesn’t hurt that there’s the wedding reception to distract me from the condescending royal grump next to me.
The reception room is already buzzing, the King seated at its front, the happy couple on his right and the rest of the attendees in a half-circle around the empty space where I presume we’ll be dancing later.
I find myself having to fight not to stare at the attendees. There are members of other bloodlines as well, but I don’t think I’ve ever been in a room with this many vampires. They’re all lavishly dressed, heavily bejeweled, and wearing some of the oddest hairstyles I’ve ever laid eyes on.
It makes me shudder, when we pass one of the men just as he laughs and I see the dark red stains on his canines.
It doesn’t take long for a servant to come to lead us to our seats, but before we manage to take them, another one intercepts to say, “Lord Grimm, the King has requested for you and your wife to join him.”
I shoot a glance at said lord, trying to determine if this is good or bad, but his face remains expressionless.
It’s with countless eyes fixed on us that we let the servant lead us to a pair of seats to the King’s right.
Once we’re in front of him, the prince nudges me to take a bow. “Your Highness,” he says.
King Lothair the Third — a handsome older vampire with an elegant crown on his head — is already sizing us up. His eyes are narrowed, but his lips are curled into a seemingly benevolent smile.
As soon as he gives us a nod, we start getting settled in and he turns his attention to the guests to his right as his Master of Ceremony starts with the speeches.
Alright, this should be of no importance at all then. I shift my attention onto the food they start serving. If nothing else, I’ll at least be able to stuff my face.
It’s with the soup they place in front of me that I start, refusing the servant’s offer of alcohol and with the corner of my eye seeing him pour the prince a glass of scotch.
“I’m told it was beautiful,” I hear the King say to Orpheus just as I bite into a delicious-looking pastry, “that wedding of yours I wasn’t invited to.”
I swallow, my eyes darting to the two of them. Orpheus seems relaxed enough as he takes a sip of his drink and replies, “Apologies, Your Highness, it was family only.”
“Yes, indeed. Quite an impromptu affair at that,” the king pokes.
“What can I say?” Orpheus says. It makes me go stiff, when he takes my hand in his and starts gently stroking the skin with his thumb, all without looking at me. “Sometimes love works swiftly.”
I pull my hand out.
“And your wife,” the king continues as he throws a look at me, feigned innocence in his voice, “she seems to be of the rarest heritage. Not even my best historians can seem to find traces of it anywhere.”
“Surely you haven’t given them enough time,” Orpheus replies calmly. “I hear they can do marvels, including rewriting the courses of entire wars.” He pauses for a moment before he adds, pointedly, “Your Highness.”
The king lets out a delighted laugh. A servant comes to tell him something, but he waves a hand in dismissal. “Yes, yes, give me a moment,” he insists without taking his eyes off Orpheus. “I have something for you, my friend.”
With a single snap of his fingers, he makes a couple of servants bring a gift and present it to us.
“A present for Lord and Lady Grimm,” he announces to the guests, making the chatter die down, “since I was sadly detained from attending their wedding.”
Orpheus gets up and nudges me to follow. “Thank you, Your Highness,” he says with a bow.
Prompted by the king’s gesture, a dozen other guests come to congratulate us, separating us just like they did at our own wedding. Just as another course gets taken off the tables and the music starts playing, inviting the people to dance, the last of the well-wishers approaches me.
“Marquis Heldin, Your Grace,” he introduces himself. “Congratulations, Lady Grimm.”
“Thank you.”
He tilts his head at me. “What an unusual beauty you are.”
I let out a laugh. “I know my strengths, Marquis, and beauty is not one of them.”
“Agree to disagree,” he says sweetly. “Would you care to dance?” he asks as he motions at the floor that’s already getting crowded.
“Why of course.”
It’s at that moment that Orpheus appears next to me. “Ah, Lord Grimm,” the marquis drawls in a noticeably colder voice, “let me extend my congratulations to you as well.”
Orpheus just gives him a disgruntled nod. He takes me by the upper arm, turns me around and starts leading me onto the dance floor. “Unless you want to be disrespectful,” he leans to say in my ear, “your first dance is always reserved for your husband.”
“If you wanted a wife who knew things like that,” I protest in the lowest voice possible, “maybe you shouldn’t have married a commoner.”
“I didn’t marry a commoner,” he snaps, “I married a troublemaker.” He slows us to a stop and turns to face me, but he doesn’t look at me. His eyes only briefly sweep across the dancers around us before he leans to grit out, “You need to stay away from that man.”
When he pulls away, his eyes go straight back to wandering the crowd. Still, I quirk an eyebrow at him. “For the same reasons I should be staying away from you,” I drawl, “or is it a different set entirely?”
It almost makes me flinch, when all of a sudden his eyes collide with mine, their amber intensity pinning me in place. “Was that a question?” he demands in a more brisk, defiant tone. “From you to me ?”
I shoot him a sideways glance, a confused but intrigued smile tugging at the corners of my lips. “It was.”
He scoffs. “Asking a question implies there are things you need to know,” he leans to tell me, “and I’ve been given the impression we already know everything we need to know about each other.”
He pulls away and holds his hand out, going straight back to grumpily observing the crowd while waiting.
The sight has me biting my lips to suppress a chuckle.
As soon as I place my palm in his, he wraps his arm around my waist and pulls me closer, but it’s only after I put my hand on his shoulder that he starts the dance.
When I look up, I see he’s turned his profile to me, his eyes fixed on the crowd with that frown still clouding his face.
I look away, letting him keep slowly spinning me around with my eyes lazily wandering the crowd. And all the while, I keep having to fight back a chuckle, finding myself itching to poke.
I silently debate it for a moment. After all, he’s still the person I feel I have to be most careful around. But then again, this will all be over soon. So what’s the harm in letting myself indulge the curiosity, just this once?
“The food was excellent,” I say, ears pricking up in anticipation.
“Yes, and the weather is fine as well,” I hear him bite out. “Any other brilliant observations you’d care to share?”
I bite my lips to suppress another chuckle. I look around again, my eyes landing on the vampire couple. I wait a moment before I ask, “You know what surprises me most?”
There’s a moment of silence. “What?” comes a reply with a note of begrudging interest.
“That they actually look like they’re in love.”
“Not all married people are complete strangers.”
I shrug. “Still, you don’t expect to find true love among the royals, right?”
“It hardly matters where you look for it,” he protests coldly. “Love is a random phenomenon that only breeds delusion, believing that there’s a single person in the world much more special than anyone else.”
I blow a laugh through my nose. “You’re just delightful, aren’t you? And to think I came here believing I wouldn’t have a good time.”
“I have my views of the world and if I ever change them,” he bites out, “it won’t be to make myself more pleasant at parties.”
“Noted,” I reply with the smile still on my face.
There’s another moment of silence, but this time, it’s him who breaks it, his tone a little more conversational. “Generally, I’m too immersed in my work to find it in myself to care about things like this.”
“Yes, I can imagine,” I muse, my eyebrows pulling down as I keep scanning the crowd. “It’s all very confusing, what you’re researching.”
To this, he slows down a bit and pulls away to squint at me. “And how would you know what it is that I’m researching?”
“I’ve read some of your works. Well, tried to—”
“Why?” he cuts me off with suspicion in his voice.
“ Why? Your works are books, and I am a Librarian.”
He just observes me for a second, then goes back to looking around. “Divine Magic, that’s my main field of study.”
I blow a laugh through my nose. “That much I was able to gather.”
There’s the already familiar condescension in his voice when he asks, “Well, what is it that’s confusing you?”
The question coupled with the tone makes me simultaneously roll my eyes and let out a laugh. “How about… Everything else?”
With a wide smile, I look up to find him frowning at me.
The frown only grows deeper before he tears his eyes away and asks in a softer voice, “Maybe if you tried asking a question…”
I think for a second. “Alright. How do you do research on something as unknowable as Divine Magic?”
“Yes, well, that was the issue,” he starts. It’s only when I feel his shoulder muscles relax that I realize he’s been tense all this time. “But one potential solution is actually very simple. At least that’s how I’m choosing to approach it. I’m testing its limits and seeing if that might tell me anything about its nature.”
Interesting, I think to myself. “I see,” I tell him.
It surprises me, when he just keeps talking. “Almost every fae scientist starts by looking into Divine Magic. Then they realize how tedious the work is and give up.”
“It does sound like you could spend years trying to come to some conclusion.”
“More like a lifetime, and there’s no guarantee I’ll come to a single one, but it doesn’t matter. It’s meaningful work and I’m a patient man.”
I look up at him. “Hardworking as well. Such a shame you’re the exact opposite in your role of prince.”
He scoffs. “Unlike the role of scientist, the role of prince is an utterly useless one.”
It’s with a shrug and without hesitation that I say, “Renounce the title then.”
He looks down, locking eyes with me with his eyebrows raised. It almost startles me, when he laughs.
“Renounce the title, she says,” he echoes with pensive amusement in his voice. “I once spent half a year trying my hand at being an apprentice, only to be treated as the prince throughout the entire pointless ordeal.” He absent-mindedly readjusts his arm, pulling me tighter to his chest. “I can renounce the title, but I’d only end up losing the advantages and keeping the disadvantages.”
“Hm,” I just hum. Now that I’m so close, it’s hard to keep ignoring how good he smells. And it’s not perfume, I think with a touch of bitterness.
“ Hm ?” he echoes with a tinge of suspicion. It snaps me out of it even before he pulls away to squint at me. “That's all you have to say all of a sudden?”
I clear my throat and let out an awkward laugh. “I suppose I see your point,” I say simply.
It’s just at that moment that the music stops and so do we.
Before I can do or think anything, I hear a smoky female voice call out, “Lord Grimm.”
Then this mind-blowingly stunning vampire woman comes to stand in front of us, eyeing Orpheus like a glass of cold water in the middle of the desert.
“Countess Faust,” he says politely, but I can’t help but notice the way the encounter makes him squirm, as if he’s trying to think of a way out of it.
I shoot him a sideways glance.
With the briefest glance in my direction, the woman insists, “Won’t you introduce me?”
He hesitates. “Of course. Countess, meet my wife, Lady Grimm.”
“Charmed, I’m sure,” she says as she bows, taking the opportunity to eye me up and down.
“Likewise,” I say, finding myself relieved at the distraction.
I only notice the performers once the countess turns to look at them. My eyebrows shoot up. Judging by the women’s extremely skimpy outfits, vampire weddings seem to be much looser affairs than the fae ones.
“What incredibly beautiful women, don’t you think?” the countess asks.
When I realize that Orpheus is planning on ignoring the question, I take it upon myself to answer it. “Absolutely stunning,” I turn to tell her with a smile.
She gives me an assessing look and turns back to Orpheus. “Lord Grimm, you men must be so tempted.”
He shoots her a glare. “I’m afraid I can’t speak for men in general,” he tells her with a smile that doesn’t reach his eyes, “but there’s no woman in this entire world more beautiful than my wife.”
“Is that so?” the countess asks with a squint, obviously not pleased.
“It is.”
She leans a little closer, smugness dripping from her voice as she says, “Well, when you grow tired of her, and notice I say when , not if , feel free to come back to my bed.”
“I’m a one-woman kind of man, Countess Faust.”
She gives him a charming smile. “ That is not what you used to say, Orpheus.”
“Only because I hadn’t met the woman yet, Countess, ” he bites out.
I watch him take my hand, interlock his fingers with mine and lift my hand to his lips.
But this time, when he presses a kiss to my knuckles, he locks eyes with me, the touch and the look sending a shiver from my nape down my spine. And it’s not a shiver of terror.
He succeeds in getting rid of the countess, who just narrows her eyes at him, gives me a cold smile and walks away.
But he also makes me a little too speechless, as well as a little too slow to pull my hand out.
To make things worse, as soon as I do, they change the music, the performers leave the dance floor and Orpheus turns to ask, his voice soft and his eyebrows raised, “Care for another one?”
Yeah, that’s not happening. “Do I have to?” I lean to whisper. “It’s only disrespectful not to give you the first dance, did I get that right?”
He doesn’t pull away. There’s a moment of silence before he says, his voice turning cold, “You did.”
I frown. I think my eagerness to avoid dancing with him has just resulted in me being kind of insensitive.
“Lord Grimm,” a male voice interrupts just as I open my mouth to apologize.
I rush to straighten up and take a step to the side. It’s perfect, because I can now fix my eyes on the servant standing in front of us.
While the servant just keeps standing there, waiting, Orpheus once again leans in. It’s in a strictly cordial voice that he asks, “Will you be fine on your own for a few minutes?”
This must be the thing we’ve come for in the first place. Throwing him a fleeting glance, I give a determined nod.
With a bow, he turns on his heel and starts following the servant out of the crowd.
Watching him walk away makes me frown and breathe a sigh of relief all at the same time. I walk over to the refreshments table, my mind buzzing like crazy as I start browsing the food.
I still wouldn’t choose to stop the dreams from happening. There’s not a chance in hell that I would, that’s how much they mean to me.
But in real life, remembering them and getting all flustered every time I see the prince… Now that is becoming annoying, fast.
It’s a gong that snaps me out. Everyone stops chatting.
I look around, spotting servants solemnly going around with silver chalices in their hands. Holy Blood?
One by one, I watch the guests take sips from the chalices, wondering if I should follow suit if I’m offered. It probably really is blood, but it’s a sacred vampiric ritual and it would probably be considered rude to turn it down.
Damn it, of all the moments Orpheus could’ve chosen to leave my side…
Then Countess Faust appears next to me, a charming smile on her face. “It’s alright to refuse, darling,” she tells me sweetly, “if that’s what you’re wondering.”
I return the smile, thinking as I watch her walk away. This is not a woman who wishes me well, so if she says I don’t have to…
When one of the servants approaches me with a chalice, I give him a smile, take it in my hands and bring the rim to my lips.
Inhaling deeply, I prepare myself for the likelihood of the taste of blood repulsing me and choose to simply push through it.
Then, the moment the liquid hits my tongue, the gag reflex kicks in and I involuntarily spit it all out. Just like that.
Because no matter what I did, I don’t think I could’ve prepared for something being as vile as this .
But what’s much, much worse is the fact that everyone has fallen silent around me, countless eyes fixed on my face and the blood on the stone beneath my feet.
Fuck.
I look up, my eyes sweeping over all the faces. There’s the king looking on with amusement on his face, there’s the countess smiling as if I’ve just done her a huge favor...
And then there’s that vampire with blood-stained teeth stalking over to me, a creepy smile curling his lips. The impression I get is of a man who’s just been gifted with an excuse to spill blood.
My heart starting to pound, I stumble back.
I only need to throw a single glance around the crowd to know that no one here will be helping me.
Think, for crying out loud, think.
But just as I turn on my heel to do the stupidest thing possible — run from a vampire, the vampire comes to block my way, sneering and tilting his head as he lifts his hand to use Mind Magic on me.
My heart skips a beat.
I close my eyes to try to resist the influence. The next thing I know, there’s a murmur rising all around me and a shiver rolling over my entire body, a kind of coldness I’ve never experienced before — like the kiss of death itself.
Blood curdling in my veins, I fling my eyes open just as Orpheus comes to a stop between me and the vampire, his back turned to me.
There’s a moment of dead silence, everyone staring at the pair, including the king.
“Lord Grimm,” I hear the man say with an unsettled laugh.
“Yes?” Orpheus drawls flatly.
The vampire shakes his head. “The woman needed to be taught manners.”
“The woman? ” Orpheus echoes. “I don’t think I’m entirely sure who you’re referring to.”
The man lets out a nervous laugh. “Lady Grimm, it’s Lady Grimm I’m referring to.”
“Lady Grimm? I believe there’s more than one Lady Grimm.”
“Your wife, my lord.”
“Exactly.” It startles me, when Orpheus disappears only to appear right in front of the man, looking down on him as that unsettling energy I felt a minute ago rolls over the room again. “It’s my wife you’ve chosen to threaten.”
The countless eyes in the room become even more fixed on Orpheus and the vampire, who seems to shrink and go pale. “Apologies,” he says through gritted teeth. Then he throws a glance at me as well. “Please accept my apologies, Lady Grimm.”
Orpheus cranes his neck to look at me. It takes me a moment to collect myself enough to nod.
Then he comes to stand next to me, holding his hand out. It’s only once I take it that he clears his throat and calmly addresses the king. “Thank you for your hospitality, Your Highness, my wife and I will be taking our leave now.”
With an amused squint on his face, the king nods, and Orpheus turns us around and starts walking out of the reception hall.
It’s in dumbfounded silence that I let him lead me out of the castle and straight to the Pull Chamber on the square.
Just as we come to a stop and I open my mouth to start apologizing and thanking him for getting me out of that mess, he grits out, “I leave you alone for one minute and this is what you choose to do?”
He doesn’t wait for an answer. He’s expressed his displeasure, but he’s also eager to leave. So he shakes his head and motions for me to follow him into the Pull Chamber.
My mind buzzes. I think I know exactly why this happened the way it did. When I chose to drink the blood, I failed to take one very important thing into account — that of all living beings, faes have the most violent reactions to the taste of blood.
But what am I supposed to tell the man throwing daggers at me? That his already suspicious wife forgot she was a fae due to the fact that she’s only been one for the past couple of months?
It’s only once we’re at the foot of Graf Hill that he stops and turns to train his eyes on me, a frown on his face. “Well, what do you have to say for yourself?”
I glare at him. It’s my fault, sure, but if he weren’t such a condescending asshole, he would’ve already heard me apologize and thank him. “ Say for myself ? If you think I’ll be letting you treat me like a child in need of scolding, you’re sorely mistaken.”
I watch a muscle in his jaw jump. “I made it very clear to you that I needed you to behave and you went and did the opposite. So tell me, in what world does this make any sense at all?”
“What?”
“That you are cross with me. ”
“I’m tired,” I say, “I’m going to bed.” And with that, I start for the steps.
He moves as if he’s planning on taking me up, but I just shake my head. “No, thank you.”
It’s with his eyes burning a hole in my back that I keep walking. A long moment goes by. Then I hear him let out a low, frustrated groan, right before he whizzes past me and leaves me to climb my steps in solitude.
It takes me a while to get to my room. And it annoys the hell out of me, that I spend the entire time thinking about Orpheus. Wondering what that unsettling energy was that he used to scare that vampire. Realizing I just assumed that controlling sand was his only power. And worst of all, repeatedly getting air knocked out of my lungs by failing to stop the image of his eyes as he kissed my hand popping into my mind.
As soon as I’m behind closed doors, I let out a groan, throw myself on my bed and fix my eyes on the ceiling.
Soon, sleep starts taking over and I find myself in the moonlit garden again. My heart soaring, I start rushing down the path, stopping only when I see him walking over to me.
The very sight of him makes me lose my breath. He slows to a stop in front of me and we just keep standing there in silence, the world around us falling away. With heavy, palpable longing, my eyes roam his face and his roam mine.
It surprises me, when I register the little frown that makes me feel as if I’ve made him mad somehow. I shake my head, softly but forcefully, and I lift my hand to touch his face, to stroke his hair, to trace my thumb along the curve of his lips, all in the effort to show him how much I love him and can’t bear to see him in any kind of pain.
Warmth spreads through my chest when I see the frown disappear. I expect him to lean into the touch.
He doesn’t. He makes my eyes round when he looks deeper into my eyes, wraps an arm around my waist and tugs me close.
Breathlessly, I watch him dip his head and plant a kiss on my lips.
We both freeze in place. My heart skips a beat, the touch sending shockwaves of pleasure rippling through me. I throw my arms around his shoulders, I part my lips for him and we start kissing, ravenously at first then slowly and deeply.
It makes me almost let out a whimper, when he breaks the kiss and lets go of my waist. I open my eyes to find him staring at me, those striking eyes of his sucking me in and making shivers ripple all over my body.
When he touches me next, we’re both naked, and it’s like his entire body is enveloping my entire body, the intensity of the contact making me lose my breath.
And then we’re falling back onto nothing, I’m wrapping my arms and legs around him and I’m rolling around with him, inhaling his divine scent and feeling him throbbing against my core as he showers kisses all over me.
When the need for him becomes too unbearable, I grip him tighter and slowly start grinding against him. He buries his nose in my hair, grabs my ass with both hands and starts moving with me in a rhythm that makes pleasure swell to such heights that it ultimately jolts me awake.
I find myself in my bed, my breathing shallow, my skin flushed and my core throbbing. I frown, because I’ve never had a wet dream this realistic or intense, but then I just stretch, lazily and contently, and turn to the side mere seconds before I drift into a sound sleep with thoughts of my Jericho on my mind.